When Arsene Wenger bumped into Sir Alex Ferguson last season there was one truth he was keen to unlock. ‘I said, “Come on, don’t you miss it?”’ grinned Wenger. ‘He came to meet me after the game when we played at Manchester United.
‘He says no, he’d had enough. He still goes to every game. He has horses. I have no horses.’
Wenger is 65, eight years Ferguson’s junior, but still at an age when many people might consider winding down.
‘It crosses my mind sometimes,’ said the Arsenal boss, ‘but for no longer than five seconds, because I panic a little bit.’
Wenger is preparing for his 20th campaign in the Barclays Premier League — some of his youngest players were not even born when he arrived — and it is only ‘with difficulty’ that he can imagine working at another club.
His enthusiasm, however, is undimmed. ‘I am more committed than ever,’ said Wenger.
‘The number of times you have done it doesn’t count. It is how much you love what you do that counts. And the love is not necessarily diminished by the number of times you’ve done it.
‘Football is new every day. That’s a big quality. It makes you question. With every defeat people say, “What’s this guy doing?”
‘You have an exam every three days. You have no way to look back. You have to prepare for the next exam and come out with success.
‘I am like everybody: you lose three games and… but when you analyse my time here, you will see I did not lose three games on the trot many times. The job of a manager, as well, is to reduce the time of crisis.
‘I want to do well for the club, and when I leave one day, I want to leave it in a position where it can go on and on.’
Competing against rivals for whom money is no object, Wenger has been criticised for resisting spending trends, and some Arsenal fans remain convinced it is time for change. He avoids social media but this does not protect him from personal abuse in a public job, as he found when he was jeered at Stoke-on-Trent railway station after a defeat last year.
‘Big experience helps you anticipate what you will face,’ said Wenger. ‘Even here, there are unpredictable responses. You would not necessarily expect people to insult you on the way to the train.
‘It’s the way society has gone. I can take a distance from that. I know the same people can be excessive.
‘That’s where experience helps. You have a good assessment of who you are and you’re not influenced by what people say, whether it’s too positive or too negative.’
Nine trophy-free years have been ended by back-to-back FA Cup wins, and there is quiet confidence inside Arsenal that they can compete more strongly for the title.
‘What is true is we have stability we didn’t have before,’ said Wenger. ‘I was more exposed to, “who will go” and now the question I get more is, “who will come?”
‘Our potential on the market has changed a bit and if you ask me will we win the Premier League, I just say we want to. We will try and give everything but it will be a very open competition.
‘We have a chance. All is going well. Our heaviest defeat last season was 2-0 and it was against Chelsea. We have reduced the gap and I believe we are ready to go further.
‘To guarantee, I cannot do that. You cannot guarantee in the Premier League. Again there are five to six competitors. It’s very difficult to guess how strong the other teams will be. I promise we will fight to win, but it is difficult.’ There have been times when Wenger knew, even as the season began, that Arsenal would not compete.
‘When you lose your best players it is impossible,’ he said, with the likes of Samir Nasri, Robin van Persie and Cesc Fabregas in mind. Before that, Patrick Vieira, Ashley Cole and Thierry Henry.
‘You see opponents strengthen when they are already stronger than you,’ he added. ‘You just get into the top four and see others still strengthening. On top of that you’re losing your best players, so it is difficult to be convinced you can still win the league.’
‘I know if I could have won the league or not. The year we lost it at Birmingham (2007-08), we could have won the league.
‘Last year, no, because after six games we were 11 points behind Chelsea and to catch 11 points back was nearly impossible.’
Hearing Wenger talk openly about the exodus of top players and the problem it caused only reinforces the idea that this phase is over.
Arsenal are into the delivery stage of a project which started with the move from Highbury. While questions remain in some positions, a strong squad has been enhanced.
The elite quality of Mesut Ozil, Alexis Sanchez and Petr Cech has been added without destroying the framework.
‘Stability is undervalued and that is what we want to show,’ said Wenger. ‘We have stability and that gives us strength.
‘Chelsea has good stability, especially defensively. They took advantage of it from the start of the season.
‘Last year, we missed our start for different reasons. One was that after the World Cup some players were not mentally ready. We also had the Champions League qualifier that cost us a lot of energy against Besiktas.
‘But again we have a tricky start — West Ham look to have bought well and Crystal Palace are a strong team. We have to be ready.’
Arsenal’s last title was won after a summer when the big summer signing was a goalkeeper, Jens Lehmann.
Twelve years on and the only major recruit is Cech, another goalkeeper, who was able to cross London with the blessing of Roman Abramovich thanks to the player’s special relationship with Chelsea’s owner.
‘He caused us enough problems,’ chuckled Wenger, when it came to the irony of a favour from Abramovich.
Cech’s move promises to be one of the narratives of the season. Is he a missing piece in a jigsaw? Can he help Arsenal shake free of Jose Mourinho’s mental hold?
Wenger insists there is no such hold. ‘We don’t have that,’ he said. ‘I don’t believe in that at all. Chelsea have lost against weaker opponents than us.’
As for Cech, he added: ‘There was a deal that he could go, no matter where, for a certain price, and that’s why it happened. It wasn’t too big a surprise to me because they couldn’t keep him for ever at 33 years of age as No 2.
‘Goalkeeper is a special problem in the game. If you don’t have two top ones you’re in trouble. And if you have two top ones, the No 2 says, “I want to play as well”.’
Wenger will not rule out making more signings before the end of August but it will be no surprise if Cech ends up as his sole recruit.
‘We can still buy but I don’t think we’ll sell,’ said Wenger, who aims to develop Arsenal’s own talent.
‘We want to combine stronger financial resources with faith in our philosophy. We want to give chances to young players, build them inside the club with our culture. Most clubs who have been successful have done that well.
‘You can take Barcelona or Manchester United, who had a generation and built their success on players who came from within. These are our values and it is our DNA. It’s important we keep that.
‘After, if we can buy the exceptional players, we can compete today but that will not be the basis of our policy.’
United have veered from this philosophy, spending heavily on established international stars. It may be one reason why Ferguson does not miss it.
‘With success they have created huge financial resources and today there is no patience for them to continue what they did,’ said Wenger.
‘They have the financial resources to go with a different policy. And they do not have available players like Paul Scholes, Ryan Giggs and David Beckham inside the club.
‘Youth talent is spread more through 20 clubs than it was. You cannot group the best English talents at 16 as easily as used to be possible. It would be interesting to study the reason. And it would be interesting to analyse the basic wages of the England Under 18 team 20 years ago, 10 years ago and today. Then do it in five years with the Under 16 team.’
Wenger looked set to launch into the task. His enthusiasm is undimmed, even if times have changed. Then it seemed as if he had already started.
‘You would have a shock if you knew what the average 18-year-old footballer earned,’ he said. – Daily Mail