Arsenal wasted Unai Emery, and they may waste Mikel Arteta too

Arsenal’s success moving forward is not going to be predicated on a manager. They’ve already wasted Unai Emery, I’d hate to see them waste Mikel Arteta too.

I stand up for the Arsenal board more than most think I should. But that’s okay. For all their failings, at least they took the time to truly evaluate all their managerial options before making any decisions. Like it or not, that’s a good thing. If only it could have happened a bit quicker.

In handing the reigns over to Unai Emery, they gave him a mess that not even Arsene Wenger could sort out. They gave him a bunch of overpaid duds with more of a reputation than a presence on the pitch.

They asked Emery to sort this out and gave him just over a year to do so. In that year, he was unable to pawn Mesut Ozil off on anyone; Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, despite his goal-scoring prowess, continued to prove himself as a liability of sorts when the going got tough. The only check mark in Emery’s favor was getting rid of Henrikh Mkhitaryan. At least partially.

Emery was destined for failure. How was he supposed to sort what not even Wenger could? There was no hope. He did his best, and I still admire him for standing up to Ozil, even though the fanboys were pestered by it.

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Now, the club is likely turning to Mikel Arteta to sort out the same mess that no one has been able to sort. As I detailed in a precious article, Arteta won’t solve this bunch. Because no one really can. At least no one that the Gunners are considering.

Unless we are prepared to take a hard stance on Ozil, sell Aubameyang and clear out the bloated veterans that are contributing next to nothing at this club, the mess will remain. And we will keep wasting good managers while the players suck the soul out of the club.

Unai Emery would have done brilliantly at this club if the mess hadn’t set the house on fire. His willingness to start youth over veterans was magnificent and I can’t say enough about how well he handled Ozil.

Arteta will run into the same problems Ljungberg has. What do you do with so much bloated stock at the club? Emery was the right man to handle that, but we wasted him. Are we ready to waste Arteta too?