Arsenal: Jose Mourinho reveals accepting irrelevance

The news of Jose Mourinho’s appointment at Tottenham is a shock, but it does serve as a reminder of Arsenal’s dwindling relevance and their acceptance of it.

Daniel Levy decided to burn everything to the ground on Wednesday night when he appointed Jose Mourinho as Spurs manager almost immediately after disposing of Mauricio Pochettino.

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While it seems weird that he would decide to replace one of the best managers in the world with someone that guarantees to have your club in ruins within three years, I am not going to argue too much with someone that seems intent on destroying Spurs from within.

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However, what this move does signal is that Spurs are no longer satisfied with mediocrity. As soon as they fell down the table, regardless of whether it was with one of the best managers they have ever had or a mere Joe Bloggs, they took action and decided to make a change.

Now, the execution and timing was poor, and the man they have turned to is not the correct appointment either, but it highlights a cautionary air at Arsenal that is seeing them slip into mediocrity without any action to make a change. Sadly, under Unai Emery, they are losing relevance by the week. But what is even more concerning is that they are doing nothing about it.

With every season spent playing poor, indistinguishable and identity-less football, the less anyone around the world will care what they are doing. And that is even more troubling than losing matches. Apathy is more dangerous than criticism.

In the past, people mocked the Gunners for always finishing in the top four but no better, but that still saw the club in the Champions League each season up against the biggest names in world football. Many fans would dream for such consistent relevance at present.

Arsenal may have been regularly embarrassed by the best in the world, but now they are being outplayed by Leicester City and Watford instead. It is not much better, and all without the realistic prospect of winning a trophy bar a run in the largely overlooked and unvalued Europa League.

With Emery, nothing is interesting or exciting or enthralling. At this point, it is boring to watch and boring to talk about. There is no sign of improvement around the corner, or the club plucking up the courage to make a change.

Until the club decides it truly wants to relevant again, all there is for Arsenal fans to enjoy is watching Spurs slowly implode. Levy may have made the wrong decision, but the motivation behind it is admirable, something that the Gunners might do well to replicate.