Manager Arsene Wenger apologised to Arsenal's supporters on Friday for the abject 4-0 midweek defeat at AC Milan in their Champions League first knockout round first leg.
"The fans were absolutely fantastic in Milan and we can only say sorry," the Frenchman told reporters on the eve of the FA Cup fifth-round visit to Sunderland (1715 GMT).
"Tomorrow there will be another fight and we want them to be on our side. I am sure they will be," added Wenger.
"Defeat never gets out of your system because you take it with you until the last day of your life. But when you love competition you always strive for the next one and prove that you are ready for a new fight."
Arsenal may be reeling after suffering their worst defeat in European competition on Wednesday but Wenger said he now wanted to see a reaction from everyone in the camp.
"You can find 100 explanations for the fact we had a poor performance and an off day," he said.
"I believe for us, for the rest of the season, it is important not to dwell on that too much, focus on the next performance, respond in a positive way and ensure we have the mental qualities to be at this club.
"We have to ensure straight away we are capable of responding, that is the real test."
Wenger's Arsenal have gone seven years without winning a trophy and the FA Cup takes on even more significance with the north London club fourth in the Premier League, 17 points behind leaders Manchester City.
"It was always important," said Wenger, referring to the world's oldest cup competition. "But because we had a big disappointment in the last game it becomes more important.
"We have an opportunity to qualify for the quarter-finals. It is important we are up for that and do not feel sorry for ourselves because of that performance in Milan."
Arsenal will be without injured defenders Per Mertesacker and Laurent Koscielny for their second visit to Sunderland in eight days, having won 2-1 there in the Premier League last weekend.
Forward Gervinho is ready to return after his Ivory Coast team were beaten on penalties by Zambia in Sunday's African Nations Cup final.
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100 explanations? theres only 1' you
Unless the fire at the Emirates is not put out quickly the fire is going to spread to force top players to leave in search of clubs who are in the business of winning trophies and paying their players the " going rate " commensurable with their abilities. The summer transfer window will tell us if the management team at Arsenal have been successful.
The real issue is not in signing players, but in investing in a culture that is fast eroding at the emirates. i can tell you point blank. i have been an arsenal fan and i still am but i dont feel the pleasure i normally have watching my team play. back in d day, it used to be a big occassion knowing that we are going to play by mid week or weekend, the joy used to be enormous; win or loose, we were satisfied with the performance and passion in the players.today,it is far from all but a few of them. We need a total overhaul as there is no competition for positions in the arsenal team and this accounts hugely for why they have grown complacent. how i miss the hard nut of the likes of viera. we miss our heroes. please instill discpline by having options as this brings competitiveness amongs the players. invest today to save the team, else i forsee a time when 2/3 of the pitch will be empty and all hope will be lost. the salvage is now or we will need to wait for a decade to get it back.
just patient and can see the plan in progress, and wont walk out on my team unless i see the plan fail us, which aint for a couple of years yet. I dont need quick easy fixes when a long term misson will see us better setup. You might think im wishful thinking, i actually read about whats going on and make judgements from information not knee jerking.
Arsene Wenger doesn't need to prove himself to anyone. Under his guidance, Players like Henry, Viera, Adams, Overmars, Bergkamp, Van Persie, Ashley Cole, Sagna and Ljungberg were able to flourish under his guidance.
To call his management skills into question is absolutely ridiculous. He's spent hardly anything on these players and turned them into world class players. If you do it once, then yeah, it's a fluke. if you do it consistantly. You're a genius.
I'd understand some of the feelings of frustation if we weren't surrounded by cash rich clubs buying themselves into the top four. Even though they've spent alot more, we're still in the top four.
Arsene Wenger can only do his job. He brings in reasonably talented players and finds a way to raise their game to a much higher level. If Wenger has made one mistake in his time. It was underestimating Henry and overrating Walcott. We weren't ready for life without Henry. And he should have done more to keep him.
But as Wenger always does. He brings in a young replacement and lets the old guard go.
That had quite an effect on the team. playing without Viera was hard enough, Without Henry.
We lost more key players and we're still in transition.
What doesn't help is the more replacements we bring in. the more experienced players choose to move on.
Before we had time to groom them to fit in. Now we're getting the chance.
The real problem is the players refusing to show loyalty to the man that created them. And the board for not having a tougher stance. We should look at what that mob Tottenham did with Modric. He wanted to leave, the board said no chance. Done. He's still there.
We need the board to support Wenger and stop trying to take as much money from the club as they can. And they hide behind Wenger. Because they know he likes to think of himself as the figurehead of the club and takes all the blame.
This is all the boards fault. And if Wenger
2 clowns
If Wenger leaves come the summer then fine, Maybe a new manager would be able to use the money available better. But the club has had a business plan in place since 2006. With the board and Wenger all in agreement, i think we could end up being worse off, as a new manager may not understand or be able to deal with the constraints. We will loose players because of this plan, but I would trust Wenger to always keep us within the top 7 at least. Its not great, nothing to brag about, but its still a good platform to build from. The plan in place means we aim to be self sufficient from about 2014/15. THen we can start coming back in a much more healthy and consistent way. Someone mentioned Pool losing the addidas sponsor and that it hurt them. Well actually no it didnt because currently Pool and Man U have the best shirt deals in the Prem league. Just because you are not in the top 4 doesnt mean you cannot negotiate a healthy deal, as when selling, you always sell as a future prospect, and with a successful working plan, a future prospect is an easy sell. We will suffer for the next two years. But we are not finished. we will be back as a prime example as a great club model for others to follow.
Clown.
Please member who will inform wenger to visit this site and read our comment, If your the one please tell Grand to read this notification.
Wenger I don't understand your sorry, B'se your there at the ground and watch how your player play, wenger find more defender,there is so many whisper about buyying we didn't see any new player but your prefering to buy the player who can't play by the moment so what do u wish with the arsenal club,Check out Robin he going to leave the gunner, even vermalain ,Walcot ,Sagna they are in the way to move but we don't know what are you going to do.
Fans, this is where you have to come out and make things happen in your beloved club. The club is fast erroding in a time when Man city and spurs are resurging. Every team that has never beaten arsenal before can confidently beat them now. Dont stay at home or boo the team. come out with placards on a weekly bases to enforce the team to buy players. Recall that both Barca board and players were involved in buying Henry, Fabregas and even Hleb. It is when the fans make soo much noise and do everything to show their love for a player the club is about to buy that the club knows that the player will be welcomed and then intensify negotiations. when we allow Wenger to continue like this, we loose the best players that were supposed to come to arsenal. we lost the opportunity to sign Cristiano Ronaldo, Juan Mata, Eden Hazard, Mario Gotze, chris smalling etc while we are forced to sell quality players and keep mediocres and perpectual injury prune players like Diaby, Gibbs, etc and sign players like carl, Arteta, Benayoun, etc.
Do you remember when Arsene Wenger first came to Arsenal? Everybody in football said Arsene WHO? Why? because he'd achieved nothing in football apart from managing Monaco and Grampus 8 in Japan. Arsene WHO? And he was exceedingly lucky to inherit a good goalkeeper and defense. True, he made some excellent signings, we have to give him credit for that, or was he just lucky? Certainly, his more recent signings have been far from inspiring. So to sum up! He was nothing before he came, he was very fortunate for a few years, and now we've had the opportunity to examine him in more detail over the past 7 years, sad to say we have found him lacking in tactical ability (same old same old no matter who we are playing), spending money as if it was coming out of his own pocket, still trying to prove he knows something nobody else knows, and probably his worst trait, "Promising what he is unable to deliver.". We Arsenal fans wouldn't expect to win so much if Arsene didn't promise so much, Last year we were in contention for four trophies! In that case, at the beginning of the season Blackburn were in contention for three trophies and a Champions league place!
Wenger's the best Manager in the world
Look Mr Wenger, saying sorry is simply not good enough. it's clearly our team hasn't improved since 2004. Our players haven't been replaced properly especially in defense. You always said we can't afford 30, 40 million pounds or more for each player which I can totally understand and justify your claim since we moved to Emirates stadium, and you and the Board always want to make the club self-sustainable - by declaring even missing out of the Champions League, the club is still be able to be financially well off. Can't you guys look at even bigger picture? Assuming we don't make up the top 4 place this season and no Champions League football next season. Do you think players such as RVP, Oxlade-Chamberlain and even Vermaelen want to stay around longer? The players certainly will lost confidence if our best players left us - see the difference when we still had both Nasri and Fabregas? If we are not winning anything, then the worst still has to come. We will also lo lose some major sponsorship, just like Liverpool lost Adidas as an example. These sponsors are not stupid. Each marketing dollars mean big business to them especially during this financially hardship period. We probably can meet the Board's target by maintaining a 15 million pounds profit this year or maybe next year. But it is very hard to say after that. As there will be many fans start not to show up matches and more empty seats in the stadium during match day. Many of us have lost the confidence in the team and you still charge us those high ticket prices - even I am not living in England. So what will you expect then? Don't say sorry to us, say sorry to yourself and to the Board. With current Board setup and mentality, I don't see how the club is really moving forward. If I have a choice, I still prefer the good old Arsenal at our Highbury ground. Mr David Dein where are you? I want you back......
Arsenal will unfortunately lose to Sunderland, If you don't buy defense when you need it, you will pay for your mistake.
wenger = IDIOT, CRETIN, IMBECILE !
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