Arsenal: Someone give Paul Merson a Snickers, he seems irritable

Paul Merson has gone off the deep end again, saying that Arsenal don’t even want to win the league. Someone sort this guy out, he’s embarrassing himself.

If Arsenal were to win the league next season, you’d still have talking heads spraying venom about how they weren’t conclusive about it, or got lucky, or didn’t win it with the same tenacity as Manchester City, or some stupid garbage like that. It’s just part of the trade. The talking heads have to attack the Gunners, it gets them the attention they crave since leaving playing behind.

Paul Merson, a former Gunner himself, has been one of those talking heads, constantly berating his former club and making outlandish claims, his latest of which being his crowning achievement – that Arsenal don’t even want to win the title.

This unfortunate logic came up in a debate on Sky Sports with Dion Dublin. Merson criticized the Gunners for something that they haven’t even done yet. He said that while Manchester United will go into the summer and buy players, which is apparently the only sign of wanting to win the Premier League, Arsenal won’t, because they don’t want to win the Premier League.

Yes, it is as dumb as it sounds. I paraphrased, but you can see the full debate and let the idiocy of the belief settle in your head. He actually thinks, or wants everyone to think he thinks (again, attention is currency), that the Gunners don’t want to win a title.

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Apparently, the club landing Unai Emery and completely changing the regime doesn’t mean anything. Apparently they have no aspirations at all.

I don’t think I should even have to refute these ridiculous statements, but since I’m here, let’s go ahead and talk about why Merson is, yet again, wrong, and seems wildly unhinged for no apparent reason other than, again, attention.

For starters, we have no idea what the club might do this summer. Not just because it hasn’t happened yet, but because Emery is in charge now, not Arsene Wenger. Wenger had his own hesitancies with spending money. Emery has shown no such tendencies, other than the club not having funds.

But if we do qualify for the Champions League, there will be quite the influx of funds that, according to Paul Merson, will go towards a new beer vendor at the Emirates, a couple of 16-year-old French players and a new jacuzzi at Stan Kroenke’s third vacation home.

When Arsenal qualify for the Champions League and make some big purchases in the summer, as they have done before, will Paul Merson be there to say that he was wrong? No. He’ll be silent. Because he already achieved his goal when he spouted this nonsense. He got the attention he was seeking. Whatever does or doesn’t happen is of no concern to him.