Nasibnya Wenger dan Arsenal di bulan ini bener-bener berubah sejak Januari pas
dua kali mempencundangi Liverpool di Anfield dan mengalahkan MU di Emirates.
Arsenal dan Wenger pun masih tetep dipuji sampai dengan Carling Cup final dan
keributan antar pemain di final tersebut. Setelah itu ada aja musibah, Van
Persie cedera, Henry ga baek-baek (denger-denger cedera lagi?) belon masalah
disipliner. Sampai akhirnya tersingkir di FA Cup dan UCL.
Ada artikel dari BBC tentang Benitez dan Wenger. FYI.
Realist Benitez outshines Wenger by Phil McNulty - BBC Sport 07 March 2007
Take your mind back to the first week of January - the week when Arsene
Wenger was hailed as the great visionary and Rafael Benitez as a bungler who
did not know his best team.
Arsenal dumped Liverpool out of the FA Cup on the Saturday then became the
first visiting side to score six at Anfield for 77 years in a Carling Cup tie
on the Tuesday.
Wenger's brilliant band of youngsters ran Liverpool ragged, with Benitez
accused of betraying Anfield's great traditions by fielding weakened sides.
Liverpool supporters voiced disapproval, but Benitez was unrepentant,
effectively saying he had not come to Anfield to win the Carling Cup.
He wanted the Premiership or the Champions League.
Arsenal and Wenger, in contrast, were almost obliterated by the bouquets hurled
in their direction. The world was at their feet.
How we laughed. At Benitez.
Turn the clock forward to where we stand after a dramatic two nights of
Champions League football and who is laughing now?
Wenger's season has collapsed in the space of 10 days that have damaged
Arsenal's image and left them empty-handed in their glittering new Emirates
Stadium.
Arsenal were outstanding in defeat against Chelsea in a Carling Cup final that
ended in acrimony, but were then promptly dumped out of the FA Cup by Blackburn.
And the Champions League exit at the hands of PSV Eindhoven capped a miserable
10 days.
Benitez, on the other hand, has been hailed as one of the finest tactical
brains in football after meticulously plotting Barcelona's downfall to reach
the last eight.
Arsenal went the way we always knew they would. Passing the opposition into
submission, then missing the chances that should have sent them through.
The glitter has been taken off Wenger's golden generation - for now at least.
Benitez is an altogether more pragmatic figure. If you want romance, send
flowers but don't look for it in his football teams.
He deals in the small details, whereas Wenger is an admirable man of
footballing principle who embraces the beautiful game.
But after two seasons without a trophy, it may be time for Wenger to adopt a
little of Benitez's hard-nosed realism.
No-one would suggest for one second Wenger is under pressure, but two seasons
without a trophy is not good news for Arsenal as they settle into a new home.
Benitez's insistence that he was seeing the bigger picture has arguably made
Liverpool the best-equipped of the Premiership trio still in the Champions
League to go on and win the trophy.
And that statement is made with the knowledge that Manchester United and Sir
Alex Ferguson have set their heart on reclaiming the trophy.
The Spaniard still fails to nail down the Premiership, but he has no peers when
it comes to plotting a route around Europe.
And Liverpool's fans will start to see uncanny echoes of 2005, when they
emerged from the shadows to win the trophy in Istanbul.
Examine the evidence.
Benitez was criticised for fielding a below-strength team in an FA Cup defeat
at Burnley, but then a succession of high-quality opponents fell by the wayside
in Europe.
Make no mistake, no team in the draw will want to be paired with Liverpool in
the quarter-final.
And this is not just because of the prospect of facing Steven Gerrard or
confronting The Kop. It is also the fact that they will have to out-smart
Benitez.
Wenger will be a miserable man after their loss.
He is a bad loser at the best of times, and three hammer blows in less than a
fortnight will not be well-received.
Unthinkable as it may seem, maybe it is time he put his principles - laudable
though they are - to one side and put a little bit of the Benitez philosophy
into his talented but flawed Arsenal side.
He must dwell on that while Benitez eyes up another Champions League crown -
but wasn't that what he said he was doing after losing 6-3 to Arsenal in the
Carling Cup?
Andri Leo <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
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