Arsenal: Unai Emery needs to get the hamburger out of his caesar salad

If you’re still reeling over the loss to Leicester City, you’re not alone, but as the official Arsenal optimist, let me help you out a bit.

I don’t think I’ve ever gone on a such a vitriolic spewfest like I did after Leicester City. I usually make it a point to pick out the bright side for Arsenal, but it felt like an impossible task after this one. But with some distance between me and the match, let me actually go ahead and try to say something positive.

I imagine that some people are thinking that Unai Emery hasn’t changed anything, or that he’s made it worse. Would Arsene Wenger have been any different? Would we have lost 9-3 on aggregate to Palace, Wolves and Leicester? Impossible to say. It’s a complete collapse.

That said, one thing I think we always have to remember is that this is still hugely Wenger’s club. These players – Mkhitaryan, Ozil, Aubayang, Lacazette, Koscielny, Xhaka, Iwobi – these are all Wenger’s guys. And Emery is the new man in town, trying to finagle the team as best as he can to fit the way he wants to play the game.

Sure, he’s brought in Lucas Torreira, Sokratis, Matteo Guendouzi and they’ve had their problems as well, but they are the new guys as well.

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And in case you’ve forgotten, transitioning in the Premier League takes time, and that holds true whether you’re a player or a manager or something else entirely. It’s a new beast, playing in England.

I don’t want to make excuses for what happened against Leicester City, because it was pathetic. But I will say that big picture, it confirms what we’ve known all season – that Unai Emery needs time to build the squad out to his liking. It’s like taking a hamburger and a caesar salad and saying “combine these into one one thing.”

Maybe it ends up alright at times, but more likely, the ketchup won’t mix with the caesar dressing and you end up wishing you had one or the other, not both.

Emery needs time to get the hamburger out of his caesar salad if we want it to taste good again. And that’s not easy, especially when the ketchup starts getting on everything.

But in time, he will. That’s what he’s here to do and he needs more transfer windows to get more of his guys into this clean-up zone before we start judging him too harshly.