What is the endgame for Arsene Wenger at Arsenal?

In the swirling maelstrom of vitriol and rage which accompanies any debate over Arsene Wenger these days, it’s rare that someone stops to wonder: why does he want to be Arsenal manager at this point? Regardless of the obvious financial advantages of remaining at the club – spitefully overstated as a motivation by his most hardened detractors – Wenger now faces a weekly ritual of excoriation in the media, anger from the stands, vicious ad hominem attacks on social media and lacklustre showings from his players.

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At 68 years of age, it’s worth asking why he wants the stress and unpleasantness of managing Arsenal in his life. His approach, whichever way one looks at it, is a pale imitation of what it once was, while we have arguably gone beyond the point of ‘tarnishing his legacy’ given that he is now almost certain to be remembered as a man who retired several seasons too late. Arsenal’s loss to Bournemouth on Sunday leaves them 6th in the table, eight points off top four and looking highly unlikely to qualify for the Champions League. Things are not getting any better for the club, with the short-to-mid-term outlook currently somewhere between difficult and absolutely disastrous.

Dreadful legacy planning

Though it cannot be laid entirely at the door of the manager, even if Arsene Wenger is unusually influential in formulating club strategy, the legacy planning ahead of the final year of his contract has been absolutely abysmal. While Mesut Ozil and Alexis Sanchez have grabbed the headlines after entering the last six months of their deals – Sanchez looks set to depart to one of Manchester City or Manchester United imminently – the list of players whose deals expire between now and 2019 includes: Jack Wilshere, Santi Cazorla, Nacho Monreal, Theo Walcott, Aaron Ramsey, Danny Welbeck and Mathieu Debuchy.

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While Arsenal will be better off without several of those players, replacing those who depart will require an enormous recruitment drive. On top of all that, Per Mertesacker is retiring at the end of this season, Laurent Koscielny has chronic injury problems, Petr Cech isn’t getting any younger and Olivier Giroud is likely to ask for a move. Arsenal could require upwards of four or five major signings this summer simply to replace outgoing players, let alone improve the squad or make themselves more competitive. The problem is, with Wenger once more approaching the final year of his current contract, who will want to join Arsenal with so much looming uncertainty along with their growing aversion to winning?

Recruitment dilemma

Wenger is hence stuck in the unenviable position of needing to bring in new players this summer, but most likely finding that his contract situation will be a deterrent to many transfer targets. That leaves him with two options: either see out his final year with the players he already has at his disposal, many of whom have been found badly wanting, or gamble on low-key recruits who feel that joining Arsenal at a tumultuous time might be their only opportunity of playing for a club with comparable profile and prestige.

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Quite possibly, the result of either approach would be an ignominious final year as a manager, with Arsenal bound to decline even further in terms of their league position, style and performances. Were Wenger to get it wrong and sign a batch of uninspiring players as a desperate last gamble and stopgap, they could well become a millstone around the neck of whoever comes after him. No matter who succeeds Wenger, there will be a huge rebuilding job to undertake in his wake. The Frenchman is in danger of making that job even more difficult and further damaging the club to which he has dedicated 22 years of his life and career.

Addicted to football

When it comes to Wenger’s motivation to clinging so tightly to the Arsenal job, many have speculated that he is essentially addicted to football. He has invested too much time and emotional energy to give up on Arsenal now, even as evidence of his inability to turn the team around stacks up against him. Nonetheless, he cannot bury his head in the sand forever, especially when the team is collapsing around him. The reality is that, barring a minor miracle, he is now a quarter of the way through his final contract with Arsenal and needs to think of a future at the Emirates without him.

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Wenger may well have a winners’ mentality, a single-minded belief in himself which allows him to plough on through even the most bitter criticism, but even he must realise that age, time and waning effectiveness have caught up with him. Finding a replacement is no longer just a case of ‘someone else can do better’ – although that is almost certainly true – so much as it is an inescapable necessity. That begs the ultimate question: what is Wenger’s endgame at Arsenal?

Ultimately, he can cling on for grim death until the end of the 2018/19 season, sticking to the habit of a lifetime and seeing out his contractual obligations. It’s increasingly clear, however, that Wenger staying on would not be in the best interests of the club, this long after it ceased to be the preference of the majority of fans. If he wants the best for Arsenal first and foremost and loves the club more than he does his own self-perception, he could consider stepping down at the end of this season and giving a new manager a foundation for rebuilding. That would resolve the club’s recruitment dilemma and allow for a much-needed injection of new coaching techniques and fresh ideas.

Whether or not Wenger is interested in some other role at the club – rumours of him being ‘moved upstairs’ continue to persist despite little concrete suggestion of what that might entail – his standing in the world of football will recover much faster if he cuts short his tenure. Wenger’s reign deserves to be viewed with perspective and history will judge him far more kindly than the present, even if Arsenal continue to flounder over the next few months. If he cares about his legacy, then, Wenger could consider going out on his own terms as opposed to burdening the club with another season overshadowed by his impending departure, as much as the hopeless romantics among us are willing him to have one last exceptional year.

That would confirm him as a man of rare principal, instead of someone who would rather muddle on with his face turned stubbornly away from the inevitable. Excluding some sort of radical turnaround for Arsenal and a sudden revival of late-nineties Wenger, the truth is that the end is coming and it’s up to him to decide whether it’s in a few months or in 2019.