Arsenal and Unai Emery: ‘League position’ not the problem

According to Guillem Balague, Arsenal are backing Unai Emery because they are looking beyond the ‘league position’. But the league position is not the issue. It is everything else.

The decision of Arsenal and the future of the team has gone beyond their head coach. While Unai Emery is the man making the decisions, he is not in charge of who makes the decisions, and this is a debate that is of increasing pertinence with every passing week.

Find the latest episode of the Pain in the Arsenal Podcast here — Unai Emery out, again

And as the displays of the team have continued to decline and the results have fallen off the cliff too, waiting for Emery to turn things around is an increasingly futile process. With every week, he is proving his coaching ineptness, so much so that if the coach cannot change things, the coach must be changed.

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That is the general viewpoint of the fanbase. A quick look at the replies and comments to Arsenal’s official posts on social media will quickly reveal just where the general feeling of the supporters is in relation to Emery and his future.

But the club are not quite taking the same stand. In fact, in the aftermath to the 2-0 defeat to Leicester City at the weekend, they came out in full support of Emery. In a statement through the media, the club stated that they are 100% behind their manager and believe that he and his coaching staff can turn the recent struggles around.

Given the performances of the team and the downward trajectory of the season, it is difficult to understand the reasoning for this stance.  But football journalist Guillem Balague provided some insight into the decision-making process in a video this week. Here is an excerpt:

"“The [league] position is not the only thing that the board feel is backing what Emery is doing. It’s just the fact that at this point, you’ve got two choices – you get rid of everything & start over, but it’s the middle of the season or you back and give confidence to the leadership. Right now Emery is the leader and he was chosen because of his ability to make the team flexible, competitive, and to change the culture of the club. That you definitely don’t see but that’s happening.”"

Now, I am not quite sure what the board are thinking here, if this is indeed their logic for backing Emery, but the results of recent matches and the position in the league are only one aspect of the Emery problem. The criticism surrounding his management delves far deeper than just the scorelines of the matches.

The lack of identity, the confused tactics, the relentless tinkering, the overly conservative nature. These are far more concerning aspects of Emery’s management that will have longer-lasting ramifications than where the team is in the table at any given moment in the season. And yet, the Arsenal board do not seem to recognise that fact.

Emery’s management is under threat not just because of the results, but due to the many underlying troubles that reflect poorly on future prospects. And if the Arsenal board cannot see that, the club has deeper problems than just who the head coach is.