Money vs Know-how at Eastlands

Manchester City have spent more in the last year than Arsene Wenger has spent in 14 years in charge of Arsenal. If Roberto Mancini and Arsene Wenger were drinking in a bar then Mancini would be sipping a $10,000 champagne while Wenger sipped a modestly priced house wine that tasted better. In life you have to either have money or know-how, but it is best to have both. Mancini has yet to get the know-how of Wenger but Wenger chooses to save the club money. Wenger’s lack of overt spending makes him untouchable to the board. Man City are like your fantasy football team, they play with monopoly money that is almost worthless to them; just numbers on paper. Nonetheless Mancini is a good coach, he has minimal interference with the team on the pitch, he lets the team play and balances egos well, something Wenger cannot do. Mancini is a good coach, his 3 titles in Italy with Inter were at a time when Italian football was recovering from corruption and adjusting to the Euro debt crisis but he built the team that Mourinho took to victory in champion’s league. Arsenal fans cannot wait another year without a trophy, they have kept faith in Wenger but the squad seems to fade away towards the end of the season. Fans wish he had a deeper squad but Arsene relies on smaller tightly-knit squads. This year’s squad is better than recent years, Chamakh is classy, Wilshere is amazing, Nasri is blossoming and the best thing is they have Walcott, Fabregas, Van Persie, Bendtner, and a host of youngsters to come. This year is a test for both teams and the different paths they have taken. Carlos Tevez is still really underrated, even now we are waiting for him to lose his form. they say form is temporary and class is permanent and maybe he is pure class. The same cannot be said for Adebayor, Arsenal must be glad they sold a dud for $50m and I bet Karekezi is better than him at the moment because Adebayor has no vision of where he is going as a player. That is the problem with Man City, the vision is not there but they have ambition in spades. The midfield is tight with two or three holding players, two creators and one central striker. Arsenal needs to win this to break the hopes of City otherwise City might pip them for 2nd or 3rd place. We need to see Fabregas have his classic passes in a pocket held by Song and Diaby otherwise De Jong and Yaya will murder him. Nasri also needs a good game, he has become their creative fulcrum when Fabbie is out. Chamakh will never match Kolo Toure and Kompany physically so he will have to be very clever. Vaemalen is going to be out for a while and Djourou is not the same class and Kocielny is still learning. So City have a good chance of scoring but they will be under pressure as well. ramaisibo@hotmail.com