KROENKE OUT / The Board / Staff etc (merged thread)

As we're unlikely to see terraces again at football, this is the virtual equivalent where you can chat to your hearts content about all football matters and, obviously, Arsenal in particular. This forum encourages all Gooners to visit and contribute so please keep it respectful, clean and topical.
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Sam.Harrison
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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by Sam.Harrison »

augie wrote:
Tue Jan 22, 2019 2:56 pm
In an ideal world it would be better doing the protest on the day of the superbowl when our game is live on sky sports, but the problem is that game is away at citeeh and I doubt if there would be enough appetite amongst the away fans to do it
Just put all the flags on citeh's empty seats.

mcdowell42
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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by mcdowell42 »

Independent: #AFC confident of signing Monchi (handpicked by Emery) as their Technical Director.
https://t.co/v6UXmIoRzK

Jock Gooner
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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by Jock Gooner »

The best we can hope for to help kickstart any form of protest is a coldsnap just like last year and trust me I can live with the prospect of a boycott at the bowl. Isn't it great that we have to depend on the elements as a barometer of the fan's opinion of where we're at :shock:

I've just looked out the window and it's sleet / snowing - it's a sign :barscarf:

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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by Jock Gooner »

Snow stopped......we're fucked :roll:

arrgee
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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by arrgee »

xisstential wrote:
Tue Jan 22, 2019 1:58 pm

In 5 years time EVERY game will be a big game.

Seriously if we are treading water for the next few years and hovering around 8th place what will constitute a big game? If everybody has lost interest and we have nothing ever to really play for, who will care if we beat Chelsea or Man. U.....how many people in 5 years time are going to pay the thick end of £1500 knowing they don't really care and are only going to watch 2 or 3 games a year. The club is FUCKED.
Always guaranteed 5 category A sell outs even if people just want to see the opposition. And maybe a few Category Bs like West Ham. Pretty much every Premier League club runs at 90% plus capacity, except Spurs...

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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by DB10GOONER »

Sam.Harrison wrote:
Tue Jan 22, 2019 4:30 pm
augie wrote:
Tue Jan 22, 2019 2:56 pm
In an ideal world it would be better doing the protest on the day of the superbowl when our game is live on sky sports, but the problem is that game is away at citeeh and I doubt if there would be enough appetite amongst the away fans to do it
Just put all the flags on citeh's empty seats.
:lol:

That's a hell of a lot of flags. Not sure we could get enough made by then. :lol:

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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by SydneyGooner »

This is a great comment on Arsenal Truth (probably the best Arsenal blog out there IMO) from an old school long time gooner going by the name of Johnno. He does a great job of detailing how historically at board level there's always been a lack of ambition at Arsenal.
Much has been written on how badly the club has been run – Ivan, Wenger et al and how we should spend more money, or alternatively how we have spent plenty of money – just badly. Take your pick. I will not add to that. As an aging fan, I will try to provide some context to all this. Hopefully by citing history and facts.

The frustration at how far we have fallen out of being competitive in the league is everywhere to see and hear. But it speaks to fans with either no memories or sense of history. Any older fan (or anyone with a curious mind and Wikipedia) could tell you that Arsenal are right where they have always been. Sixth (well after this weekend anyway).

Since the war, our average league finishing position is 5.92. Arsenal’s average league position before Wenger was 7.22. Wenger’s was 2.95 (So he dragged the average up a whole place).

Take a look again at that average finish over 72 years. Sixth.

Wenger’s first ten years were especially extraordinary (average 2.00). They looked to represent a new dawn. But the second ten have a somewhat familiar look. The position we were in was frittered away as the club made bad decision after bad decision, removing Dein and then taking Kroenke anyway, tightening the belt in response to Chelsea and Citeh, keeping Wenger too long and giving him too much power and then settling for 4th as a trophy - as winning was never really the agenda. We should have seen it coming. It’s not like it hadn’t happened before;

1969-1973 – Fairs Cup, the Double. Then broke the team up instead of investing to kick on. Kennedy, George – both sold.

1978 -1981 - 3 FA cup finals, CWC Final – Then broke the team up instead of investing to kick on. Brady, Stapleton – both sold.

1988-1993 – 2 League titles, 2 league cups and an FA cup – then broke the team up instead of investing and kicking on. Rocastle, Thomas, Marwood, Limpar –all sold.

We’ve not spent much time at the very top table. We’ve challenged Leeds, then Liverpool, then Liverpool again and finally Man Utd as the top dog – but always crumbled partly through a lack of execution – but also ambition. In fact, who has been the best club of the era has varied over the last 50 years – but the one constant has actually been that every ten years or so Arsenal pop their head around the door of the office of the Champions, have a look inside and then decide the temperature is too hot in there. The culture of the club is not grand when it comes to the on-field matters. A SMALL CLUB IN BIG CLUBS CLOTHING.

Those fans that still adore Wenger do so for many reasons. The only one that I truly appreciate him for was the fact that he kept it going for a decade. Mee and Graham could only elevate the club above its altitude for half that time. And Wenger won 3 titles, Graham only 2, and Mee a single one.

The only time in post war history that Arsenal have shown real ambition as a club was under Dein and the first half of Arsene. The move to The Emirates. They spoke of being elite in Europe. But they couldn’t follow through. In hindsight we can see why. When the board agreed to move from Highbury and spend hard cash on a new shiny ground, we assumed there were football ambitions behind it. Sure, it helped the cash flow, but only so we could stay on top. But then Roman and the Oligarchs showed up and changed the picture. Being as big as Arsenal were at that point only got you top 4 – not top 2 any more. To stay top 2 - we would have to go further. Never gonna happen. And so we camped out in 4th. And now of course, it only gets you top 6. And so we will be sixth ad infinitum. The usual Bare Ass Minimum as they say over here in North America.

It is hard to do such analysis on other clubs. We have never been relegated nor been in a lower division since the war, so the y-o-y comparisons are constant and relevant. But that is kind of the point of Arsenal. Constantly above average with occasional brilliance that the Keystone Cops that run the club will ensure is short lived, all the while also ensuring there is never a total disaster.

Fans bemoan Kroenke as the root of the issue. But they miss 2 important points. Firstly, how is he that different from the Glazers and J Henry? He stays out of the way, pays people good money to run the club and reinvests revenues. He isn’t really about winning – but he has an asset that he wants to appreciate. Winning usually achieves that. So everybody gets what they want if it is done well and it works (we just don’t and it doesn’t.)

Secondly – Kroenke is an overseas owner in the Arsenal tradition. He appears disinterested in what the fans think. He tolerates the bare minimum. He knows nothing about football and has nothing in common with the average fan. In fact he clearly has utter disdain for the common fan. So tell me – how is he any different from the Old Etonian Hill-Wood and Bracewell-Smith families that effectively controlled the club from WWII until 2007? I still recall Hill Wood the youngest (recently departed) sarcastically thanking the shareholder fans for “your interest in our affairs.” At least Stan had the sense to buy all the shares and do away with the AGM as presumably he knows what an odious and condescending knob he is and assumes we would rather not see it. Clearly Hill Wood didn’t possess such introspection.

No - the owner is not the issue. The Board is the issue. Always has been. Never had a clue. Never been ambitious. Year after year of awful decisions while lying or staying silent with the fans. Those that bemoan that Emery is not good enough and was an uninspiring choice as manager might reflect on the fact that since the mid 60s we have hired Mee (a physio), Terry Neill (managed Spurs badly), Don Howe (managed WBA badly), George Graham (managed Millwall), Bruce Rioch (managed Bolton) and Arsene Wenger (managed Monaco and Nagoya Grampus 8.) Some of those clearly worked out, but Hell, I'd say Emery is the most qualified and ambitious hire the board has made in 50 years. That’s how low the bar is.

And then the board let Gazidis appoint his successors before he left. Like he could care less at that point. And we should be surprised when one of them eats the other and seizes control? What an absolute shambles and a bad joke. Our defending has only ever been the second funniest clown car at Arsenal.

So. Which type of Arsenal fan are you?

If you became a fan around 2000ish because we played good football and entertained, bless you. But you have to know that it has rarely been that way and with our budget and Emery’s style it may be a while before we get there again. But hang in there. There will be sunny spells amongst the grey skies.

If, like me, you are from Islington and/or grew up in an Arsenal family, then you know the score. It is what it is. We are back where we belong. We can’t break away and we just have to enjoy the good years when they come along – in the knowledge that we will find some way to balls it all up.

But if you are a fan that came to us on the back of the later part of Wenger’s success period, then my old mucker you have unrealistic expectations and false perspective. You need to recognize this for all our sakes. And you need to stay the f..k off social media and YoutTube TV stations. You give us all a bad name and annoy the hell out of us while you do it. If you think supporting Arsenal means that you should be camped at the top of the table with a ruthlessly ambitious attitude, signing big names in bunches, creating great teams, having top level managers and playing in the Champions League every year – then history would suggest you’ve signed up for the wrong team. So either gain some perspective or please go support Citeh. Until they collapse.

We are the sixth best team in England. We have a slightly better than average manager. He may even be decent. We have a couple of great players. We play in Europe’s second tier competition. We are terribly run. We have a pathetic board and an absent owner.

We are right where we have always been.

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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by Jock Gooner »

An interesting perspective on the club and there is a fair amount of truth contained within. I have always been gutted that we didn't have the balls to step into the 90s and take control, it was our right to do so as no other fucker was stepping upto the plate against the victims, it was us - we served notice in 89 they came back at us in 90 and we knocked the fuckers over in 91....end of. And then........manure! WTF. Those 'in charge' didn't seem aware of the possibilities open to us and by the time they woke up manure had taken over....they just stepped in and we let them.

Small club punching above it's weight......we're more than that. We are based in one of the main cities in the world and not only have a history but have a history of success too. That said I can see where he is coming from and there is a delicious irony in laughing at the entitled JCL twats who joined TOF band wagon thinking that his first ten years were all things Arsenal. Those of us who have few years behind us (or is that just a few years in front of us :shock: ) have stood in 20,000 crowds (and less) at Highbury and watched average football and know we haven't a hope at the title........but then again those 20,000 were largely like minded people and you had 3pm Saturday kick offs, terraces, cheap admission, singing, surges after a goal....we had a laugh. Going to the football was fun and you turned up early for it. I digress slightly but the problem with success as Roy Keane put it is the prawn sandwich brigade starts to turn up and then before you know it the fuckers have stolen your fun. Safe stadia and seating have helped to ruin the experience and while not advocating a return of the hooli firms they at least served a purpose of helping to keep grounds clear of bearded hipster twats who didn't fancy even the thought of getting a smack in the mouth at upton park on a cold wednesday night. Interesting times ahead.

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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by herbert »

A good read and I agree with a lot of what he said and have personnally never felt that our board have been overly ambitious it has always taken an ambitous manager with some clever signings and a willing set of players but the bit about showing no ambition after the 71 double the board can argue that they spent a club record fee on Alan Ball the following mid season to keep the momentum going and followed that up with Supermac and the famous £333,333,33 bid and the 78-82 team we lost Brady and Stapleton and they tried to replace them with Petrovic,Chapman :banghead: and Woodcock

So they did try throwing a bit of money at the team now and again but were shit at it so the best hope is to just get behind an ambitious manager(Emery)and his attempt at creating a squad of willing players and see where we are this time next year

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SteveO 35
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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by SteveO 35 »

My old man first took me to Arsenal in 77/78, and in the years that followed we finished 5th, 7th, 4th, 3rd, 4th, 10th, 6th, 7th, 7th, 4th and 6th before GG eventually turned us into champions. 11 years average = 5.72......so I'm not a stranger at all to where we are right now. I can remember the excitement of the odd FA Cup win, League Cup 87 and a few little forays in the UEFA Cup....so again no stranger to where we are

Liverpool were the dominant force of the 70s and 80s, and we knew our place at the table. Odd cup, runs in the UEFA/ECWC Cups. I never remember growing up as a young Gooner expecting anything more. It cost 5 quid to get in and you turned up on the day. The football was mostly boring. The commercial side was amateur and the club shop run by people with Arsenal in their blood and ex-players and was almost a hole in the wall !

However, roll forward to 2004 with the bold promise of "moving to compete with Europe's elite" on the back of an Invincible season and you can see why fans feel as if they have been oversold a dream. Include in that Ivan's "Catalyst for change" and the supposed untold wealth of commercial deals which could see us sign (just about) "any player in the world". We're now scrapping around trying to borrow cast offs like Denis Suarez. Back in the day we never paid the big fees - we never had owners who pretended differently though.

The club have only themselves to blame for the bullshit messages they have sent to fans over the past 15 years

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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by DB10GOONER »

SydneyGooner wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 2:31 pm
This is a great comment on Arsenal Truth (probably the best Arsenal blog out there IMO) from an old school long time gooner going by the name of Johnno. He does a great job of detailing how historically at board level there's always been a lack of ambition at Arsenal.
Much has been written on how badly the club has been run – Ivan, Wenger et al and how we should spend more money, or alternatively how we have spent plenty of money – just badly. Take your pick. I will not add to that. As an aging fan, I will try to provide some context to all this. Hopefully by citing history and facts.

The frustration at how far we have fallen out of being competitive in the league is everywhere to see and hear. But it speaks to fans with either no memories or sense of history. Any older fan (or anyone with a curious mind and Wikipedia) could tell you that Arsenal are right where they have always been. Sixth (well after this weekend anyway).

Since the war, our average league finishing position is 5.92. Arsenal’s average league position before Wenger was 7.22. Wenger’s was 2.95 (So he dragged the average up a whole place).

Take a look again at that average finish over 72 years. Sixth.

Wenger’s first ten years were especially extraordinary (average 2.00). They looked to represent a new dawn. But the second ten have a somewhat familiar look. The position we were in was frittered away as the club made bad decision after bad decision, removing Dein and then taking Kroenke anyway, tightening the belt in response to Chelsea and Citeh, keeping Wenger too long and giving him too much power and then settling for 4th as a trophy - as winning was never really the agenda. We should have seen it coming. It’s not like it hadn’t happened before;

1969-1973 – Fairs Cup, the Double. Then broke the team up instead of investing to kick on. Kennedy, George – both sold.

1978 -1981 - 3 FA cup finals, CWC Final – Then broke the team up instead of investing to kick on. Brady, Stapleton – both sold.

1988-1993 – 2 League titles, 2 league cups and an FA cup – then broke the team up instead of investing and kicking on. Rocastle, Thomas, Marwood, Limpar –all sold.

We’ve not spent much time at the very top table. We’ve challenged Leeds, then Liverpool, then Liverpool again and finally Man Utd as the top dog – but always crumbled partly through a lack of execution – but also ambition. In fact, who has been the best club of the era has varied over the last 50 years – but the one constant has actually been that every ten years or so Arsenal pop their head around the door of the office of the Champions, have a look inside and then decide the temperature is too hot in there. The culture of the club is not grand when it comes to the on-field matters. A SMALL CLUB IN BIG CLUBS CLOTHING.

Those fans that still adore Wenger do so for many reasons. The only one that I truly appreciate him for was the fact that he kept it going for a decade. Mee and Graham could only elevate the club above its altitude for half that time. And Wenger won 3 titles, Graham only 2, and Mee a single one.

The only time in post war history that Arsenal have shown real ambition as a club was under Dein and the first half of Arsene. The move to The Emirates. They spoke of being elite in Europe. But they couldn’t follow through. In hindsight we can see why. When the board agreed to move from Highbury and spend hard cash on a new shiny ground, we assumed there were football ambitions behind it. Sure, it helped the cash flow, but only so we could stay on top. But then Roman and the Oligarchs showed up and changed the picture. Being as big as Arsenal were at that point only got you top 4 – not top 2 any more. To stay top 2 - we would have to go further. Never gonna happen. And so we camped out in 4th. And now of course, it only gets you top 6. And so we will be sixth ad infinitum. The usual Bare Ass Minimum as they say over here in North America.

It is hard to do such analysis on other clubs. We have never been relegated nor been in a lower division since the war, so the y-o-y comparisons are constant and relevant. But that is kind of the point of Arsenal. Constantly above average with occasional brilliance that the Keystone Cops that run the club will ensure is short lived, all the while also ensuring there is never a total disaster.

Fans bemoan Kroenke as the root of the issue. But they miss 2 important points. Firstly, how is he that different from the Glazers and J Henry? He stays out of the way, pays people good money to run the club and reinvests revenues. He isn’t really about winning – but he has an asset that he wants to appreciate. Winning usually achieves that. So everybody gets what they want if it is done well and it works (we just don’t and it doesn’t.)

Secondly – Kroenke is an overseas owner in the Arsenal tradition. He appears disinterested in what the fans think. He tolerates the bare minimum. He knows nothing about football and has nothing in common with the average fan. In fact he clearly has utter disdain for the common fan. So tell me – how is he any different from the Old Etonian Hill-Wood and Bracewell-Smith families that effectively controlled the club from WWII until 2007? I still recall Hill Wood the youngest (recently departed) sarcastically thanking the shareholder fans for “your interest in our affairs.” At least Stan had the sense to buy all the shares and do away with the AGM as presumably he knows what an odious and condescending knob he is and assumes we would rather not see it. Clearly Hill Wood didn’t possess such introspection.

No - the owner is not the issue. The Board is the issue. Always has been. Never had a clue. Never been ambitious. Year after year of awful decisions while lying or staying silent with the fans. Those that bemoan that Emery is not good enough and was an uninspiring choice as manager might reflect on the fact that since the mid 60s we have hired Mee (a physio), Terry Neill (managed Spurs badly), Don Howe (managed WBA badly), George Graham (managed Millwall), Bruce Rioch (managed Bolton) and Arsene Wenger (managed Monaco and Nagoya Grampus 8.) Some of those clearly worked out, but Hell, I'd say Emery is the most qualified and ambitious hire the board has made in 50 years. That’s how low the bar is.

And then the board let Gazidis appoint his successors before he left. Like he could care less at that point. And we should be surprised when one of them eats the other and seizes control? What an absolute shambles and a bad joke. Our defending has only ever been the second funniest clown car at Arsenal.

So. Which type of Arsenal fan are you?

If you became a fan around 2000ish because we played good football and entertained, bless you. But you have to know that it has rarely been that way and with our budget and Emery’s style it may be a while before we get there again. But hang in there. There will be sunny spells amongst the grey skies.

If, like me, you are from Islington and/or grew up in an Arsenal family, then you know the score. It is what it is. We are back where we belong. We can’t break away and we just have to enjoy the good years when they come along – in the knowledge that we will find some way to balls it all up.

But if you are a fan that came to us on the back of the later part of Wenger’s success period, then my old mucker you have unrealistic expectations and false perspective. You need to recognize this for all our sakes. And you need to stay the f..k off social media and YoutTube TV stations. You give us all a bad name and annoy the hell out of us while you do it. If you think supporting Arsenal means that you should be camped at the top of the table with a ruthlessly ambitious attitude, signing big names in bunches, creating great teams, having top level managers and playing in the Champions League every year – then history would suggest you’ve signed up for the wrong team. So either gain some perspective or please go support Citeh. Until they collapse.

We are the sixth best team in England. We have a slightly better than average manager. He may even be decent. We have a couple of great players. We play in Europe’s second tier competition. We are terribly run. We have a pathetic board and an absent owner.

We are right where we have always been.
Jesus fucking Christ. What type of complete modern fan mong uses stat figures like "we finished 5.92 for x number of years" and "2.98 for blah blah fucking blah"?

Our average finishing position stat means nothing. He quotes no comparative qualifiers like how many years we were in the top flight against other teams' time in the top flight. Fucking stats. You say to a real football fan "you are gonna finish in position 4.54 for the next 3 years but you will win the Double in year 4" and they would bite your hand off. Fuck this Americanised obsession with stats as markers of success. Go add up the scum average finishing stat and Leicester's and I bet the scum come out way ahead but then tell me which set of fans went tonto celebrating winning the league a couple years back ffs.

For every half decent (but long known) point he makes he cuts his own arsehole with shit like stats and comments like "A SMALL CLUB IN BIG CLUBS CLOTHING". Fucking idiot. Arsenal are a huge world famous club with real history - and the biggest club in London. Like most bloggers he's taken a mish mash of stuff from other websites and blogs and tried to package it up as some new insightful commentary when all it is really is regurgitated opinion.

For all his disparaging comments on JCLs he comes across as having a JCL mentality if he is implying that a club is only "big" in their current position without considering their overall history and success. Absolute bollocks. :roll:

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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by StuartL »

DB10GOONER wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 5:29 pm
SydneyGooner wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 2:31 pm
This is a great comment on Arsenal Truth (probably the best Arsenal blog out there IMO) from an old school long time gooner going by the name of Johnno. He does a great job of detailing how historically at board level there's always been a lack of ambition at Arsenal.
Much has been written on how badly the club has been run – Ivan, Wenger et al and how we should spend more money, or alternatively how we have spent plenty of money – just badly. Take your pick. I will not add to that. As an aging fan, I will try to provide some context to all this. Hopefully by citing history and facts.

The frustration at how far we have fallen out of being competitive in the league is everywhere to see and hear. But it speaks to fans with either no memories or sense of history. Any older fan (or anyone with a curious mind and Wikipedia) could tell you that Arsenal are right where they have always been. Sixth (well after this weekend anyway).

Since the war, our average league finishing position is 5.92. Arsenal’s average league position before Wenger was 7.22. Wenger’s was 2.95 (So he dragged the average up a whole place).

Take a look again at that average finish over 72 years. Sixth.

Wenger’s first ten years were especially extraordinary (average 2.00). They looked to represent a new dawn. But the second ten have a somewhat familiar look. The position we were in was frittered away as the club made bad decision after bad decision, removing Dein and then taking Kroenke anyway, tightening the belt in response to Chelsea and Citeh, keeping Wenger too long and giving him too much power and then settling for 4th as a trophy - as winning was never really the agenda. We should have seen it coming. It’s not like it hadn’t happened before;

1969-1973 – Fairs Cup, the Double. Then broke the team up instead of investing to kick on. Kennedy, George – both sold.

1978 -1981 - 3 FA cup finals, CWC Final – Then broke the team up instead of investing to kick on. Brady, Stapleton – both sold.

1988-1993 – 2 League titles, 2 league cups and an FA cup – then broke the team up instead of investing and kicking on. Rocastle, Thomas, Marwood, Limpar –all sold.

We’ve not spent much time at the very top table. We’ve challenged Leeds, then Liverpool, then Liverpool again and finally Man Utd as the top dog – but always crumbled partly through a lack of execution – but also ambition. In fact, who has been the best club of the era has varied over the last 50 years – but the one constant has actually been that every ten years or so Arsenal pop their head around the door of the office of the Champions, have a look inside and then decide the temperature is too hot in there. The culture of the club is not grand when it comes to the on-field matters. A SMALL CLUB IN BIG CLUBS CLOTHING.

Those fans that still adore Wenger do so for many reasons. The only one that I truly appreciate him for was the fact that he kept it going for a decade. Mee and Graham could only elevate the club above its altitude for half that time. And Wenger won 3 titles, Graham only 2, and Mee a single one.

The only time in post war history that Arsenal have shown real ambition as a club was under Dein and the first half of Arsene. The move to The Emirates. They spoke of being elite in Europe. But they couldn’t follow through. In hindsight we can see why. When the board agreed to move from Highbury and spend hard cash on a new shiny ground, we assumed there were football ambitions behind it. Sure, it helped the cash flow, but only so we could stay on top. But then Roman and the Oligarchs showed up and changed the picture. Being as big as Arsenal were at that point only got you top 4 – not top 2 any more. To stay top 2 - we would have to go further. Never gonna happen. And so we camped out in 4th. And now of course, it only gets you top 6. And so we will be sixth ad infinitum. The usual Bare Ass Minimum as they say over here in North America.

It is hard to do such analysis on other clubs. We have never been relegated nor been in a lower division since the war, so the y-o-y comparisons are constant and relevant. But that is kind of the point of Arsenal. Constantly above average with occasional brilliance that the Keystone Cops that run the club will ensure is short lived, all the while also ensuring there is never a total disaster.

Fans bemoan Kroenke as the root of the issue. But they miss 2 important points. Firstly, how is he that different from the Glazers and J Henry? He stays out of the way, pays people good money to run the club and reinvests revenues. He isn’t really about winning – but he has an asset that he wants to appreciate. Winning usually achieves that. So everybody gets what they want if it is done well and it works (we just don’t and it doesn’t.)

Secondly – Kroenke is an overseas owner in the Arsenal tradition. He appears disinterested in what the fans think. He tolerates the bare minimum. He knows nothing about football and has nothing in common with the average fan. In fact he clearly has utter disdain for the common fan. So tell me – how is he any different from the Old Etonian Hill-Wood and Bracewell-Smith families that effectively controlled the club from WWII until 2007? I still recall Hill Wood the youngest (recently departed) sarcastically thanking the shareholder fans for “your interest in our affairs.” At least Stan had the sense to buy all the shares and do away with the AGM as presumably he knows what an odious and condescending knob he is and assumes we would rather not see it. Clearly Hill Wood didn’t possess such introspection.

No - the owner is not the issue. The Board is the issue. Always has been. Never had a clue. Never been ambitious. Year after year of awful decisions while lying or staying silent with the fans. Those that bemoan that Emery is not good enough and was an uninspiring choice as manager might reflect on the fact that since the mid 60s we have hired Mee (a physio), Terry Neill (managed Spurs badly), Don Howe (managed WBA badly), George Graham (managed Millwall), Bruce Rioch (managed Bolton) and Arsene Wenger (managed Monaco and Nagoya Grampus 8.) Some of those clearly worked out, but Hell, I'd say Emery is the most qualified and ambitious hire the board has made in 50 years. That’s how low the bar is.

And then the board let Gazidis appoint his successors before he left. Like he could care less at that point. And we should be surprised when one of them eats the other and seizes control? What an absolute shambles and a bad joke. Our defending has only ever been the second funniest clown car at Arsenal.

So. Which type of Arsenal fan are you?

If you became a fan around 2000ish because we played good football and entertained, bless you. But you have to know that it has rarely been that way and with our budget and Emery’s style it may be a while before we get there again. But hang in there. There will be sunny spells amongst the grey skies.

If, like me, you are from Islington and/or grew up in an Arsenal family, then you know the score. It is what it is. We are back where we belong. We can’t break away and we just have to enjoy the good years when they come along – in the knowledge that we will find some way to balls it all up.

But if you are a fan that came to us on the back of the later part of Wenger’s success period, then my old mucker you have unrealistic expectations and false perspective. You need to recognize this for all our sakes. And you need to stay the f..k off social media and YoutTube TV stations. You give us all a bad name and annoy the hell out of us while you do it. If you think supporting Arsenal means that you should be camped at the top of the table with a ruthlessly ambitious attitude, signing big names in bunches, creating great teams, having top level managers and playing in the Champions League every year – then history would suggest you’ve signed up for the wrong team. So either gain some perspective or please go support Citeh. Until they collapse.

We are the sixth best team in England. We have a slightly better than average manager. He may even be decent. We have a couple of great players. We play in Europe’s second tier competition. We are terribly run. We have a pathetic board and an absent owner.

We are right where we have always been.
Jesus fucking Christ. What type of complete modern fan mong uses stat figures like "we finished 5.92 for x number of years" and "2.98 for blah blah fucking blah"?

Our average finishing position stat means nothing. He quotes no comparative qualifiers like how many years we were in the top flight against other teams' time in the top flight. Fucking stats. You say to a real football fan "you are gonna finish in position 4.54 for the next 3 years but you will win the Double in year 4" and they would bite your hand off. Fuck this Americanised obsession with stats as markers of success. Go add up the scum average finishing stat and Leicester's and I bet the scum come out way ahead but then tell me which set of fans went tonto celebrating winning the league a couple years back ffs.

For every half decent (but long known) point he makes he cuts his own arsehole with shit like stats and comments like "A SMALL CLUB IN BIG CLUBS CLOTHING". Fucking idiot. Arsenal are a huge world famous club with real history - and the biggest club in London. Like most bloggers he's taken a mish mash of stuff from other websites and blogs and tried to package it up as some new insightful commentary when all it is really is regurgitated opinion.

For all his disparaging comments on JCLs he comes across as having a JCL mentality if he is implying that a club is only "big" in their current position without considering their overall history and success. Absolute bollocks. :roll:
Not only is it absolute bollocks DB10, it’s quite clearly wrong too.

We are not the sixth best team in England - using their calculations we have an average finish place of 5.92 :roll: but the only other teams would be Man Utd / Liverpool to have a higher average than us and even then they had spells in lower leagues, so god or Buddha or allah only knows what that would do to the calculations.

Chelsea’s average must be in the low / mid teens given their historical crap ness.

We are Historically the 3rd best / biggest team based on league titles......and I have no problem accepting that FACT.

Oh and it starts the calculations after the war.....conveniently missing out our period of dominance, winning 5 league titles between 1930 - 1938, which would reduce the average significantly no doubt (but that wouldn’t fit the agenda would it ?)

Topside Northbank
Posts: 608
Joined: Thu Sep 13, 2012 10:06 am

Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by Topside Northbank »

DB10GOONER wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 5:29 pm
SydneyGooner wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 2:31 pm
This is a great comment on Arsenal Truth (probably the best Arsenal blog out there IMO) from an old school long time gooner going by the name of Johnno. He does a great job of detailing how historically at board level there's always been a lack of ambition at Arsenal.
Much has been written on how badly the club has been run – Ivan, Wenger et al and how we should spend more money, or alternatively how we have spent plenty of money – just badly. Take your pick. I will not add to that. As an aging fan, I will try to provide some context to all this. Hopefully by citing history and facts.

The frustration at how far we have fallen out of being competitive in the league is everywhere to see and hear. But it speaks to fans with either no memories or sense of history. Any older fan (or anyone with a curious mind and Wikipedia) could tell you that Arsenal are right where they have always been. Sixth (well after this weekend anyway).

Since the war, our average league finishing position is 5.92. Arsenal’s average league position before Wenger was 7.22. Wenger’s was 2.95 (So he dragged the average up a whole place).

Take a look again at that average finish over 72 years. Sixth.

Wenger’s first ten years were especially extraordinary (average 2.00). They looked to represent a new dawn. But the second ten have a somewhat familiar look. The position we were in was frittered away as the club made bad decision after bad decision, removing Dein and then taking Kroenke anyway, tightening the belt in response to Chelsea and Citeh, keeping Wenger too long and giving him too much power and then settling for 4th as a trophy - as winning was never really the agenda. We should have seen it coming. It’s not like it hadn’t happened before;

1969-1973 – Fairs Cup, the Double. Then broke the team up instead of investing to kick on. Kennedy, George – both sold.

1978 -1981 - 3 FA cup finals, CWC Final – Then broke the team up instead of investing to kick on. Brady, Stapleton – both sold.

1988-1993 – 2 League titles, 2 league cups and an FA cup – then broke the team up instead of investing and kicking on. Rocastle, Thomas, Marwood, Limpar –all sold.

We’ve not spent much time at the very top table. We’ve challenged Leeds, then Liverpool, then Liverpool again and finally Man Utd as the top dog – but always crumbled partly through a lack of execution – but also ambition. In fact, who has been the best club of the era has varied over the last 50 years – but the one constant has actually been that every ten years or so Arsenal pop their head around the door of the office of the Champions, have a look inside and then decide the temperature is too hot in there. The culture of the club is not grand when it comes to the on-field matters. A SMALL CLUB IN BIG CLUBS CLOTHING.

Those fans that still adore Wenger do so for many reasons. The only one that I truly appreciate him for was the fact that he kept it going for a decade. Mee and Graham could only elevate the club above its altitude for half that time. And Wenger won 3 titles, Graham only 2, and Mee a single one.

The only time in post war history that Arsenal have shown real ambition as a club was under Dein and the first half of Arsene. The move to The Emirates. They spoke of being elite in Europe. But they couldn’t follow through. In hindsight we can see why. When the board agreed to move from Highbury and spend hard cash on a new shiny ground, we assumed there were football ambitions behind it. Sure, it helped the cash flow, but only so we could stay on top. But then Roman and the Oligarchs showed up and changed the picture. Being as big as Arsenal were at that point only got you top 4 – not top 2 any more. To stay top 2 - we would have to go further. Never gonna happen. And so we camped out in 4th. And now of course, it only gets you top 6. And so we will be sixth ad infinitum. The usual Bare Ass Minimum as they say over here in North America.

It is hard to do such analysis on other clubs. We have never been relegated nor been in a lower division since the war, so the y-o-y comparisons are constant and relevant. But that is kind of the point of Arsenal. Constantly above average with occasional brilliance that the Keystone Cops that run the club will ensure is short lived, all the while also ensuring there is never a total disaster.

Fans bemoan Kroenke as the root of the issue. But they miss 2 important points. Firstly, how is he that different from the Glazers and J Henry? He stays out of the way, pays people good money to run the club and reinvests revenues. He isn’t really about winning – but he has an asset that he wants to appreciate. Winning usually achieves that. So everybody gets what they want if it is done well and it works (we just don’t and it doesn’t.)

Secondly – Kroenke is an overseas owner in the Arsenal tradition. He appears disinterested in what the fans think. He tolerates the bare minimum. He knows nothing about football and has nothing in common with the average fan. In fact he clearly has utter disdain for the common fan. So tell me – how is he any different from the Old Etonian Hill-Wood and Bracewell-Smith families that effectively controlled the club from WWII until 2007? I still recall Hill Wood the youngest (recently departed) sarcastically thanking the shareholder fans for “your interest in our affairs.” At least Stan had the sense to buy all the shares and do away with the AGM as presumably he knows what an odious and condescending knob he is and assumes we would rather not see it. Clearly Hill Wood didn’t possess such introspection.

No - the owner is not the issue. The Board is the issue. Always has been. Never had a clue. Never been ambitious. Year after year of awful decisions while lying or staying silent with the fans. Those that bemoan that Emery is not good enough and was an uninspiring choice as manager might reflect on the fact that since the mid 60s we have hired Mee (a physio), Terry Neill (managed Spurs badly), Don Howe (managed WBA badly), George Graham (managed Millwall), Bruce Rioch (managed Bolton) and Arsene Wenger (managed Monaco and Nagoya Grampus 8.) Some of those clearly worked out, but Hell, I'd say Emery is the most qualified and ambitious hire the board has made in 50 years. That’s how low the bar is.

And then the board let Gazidis appoint his successors before he left. Like he could care less at that point. And we should be surprised when one of them eats the other and seizes control? What an absolute shambles and a bad joke. Our defending has only ever been the second funniest clown car at Arsenal.

So. Which type of Arsenal fan are you?

If you became a fan around 2000ish because we played good football and entertained, bless you. But you have to know that it has rarely been that way and with our budget and Emery’s style it may be a while before we get there again. But hang in there. There will be sunny spells amongst the grey skies.

If, like me, you are from Islington and/or grew up in an Arsenal family, then you know the score. It is what it is. We are back where we belong. We can’t break away and we just have to enjoy the good years when they come along – in the knowledge that we will find some way to balls it all up.

But if you are a fan that came to us on the back of the later part of Wenger’s success period, then my old mucker you have unrealistic expectations and false perspective. You need to recognize this for all our sakes. And you need to stay the f..k off social media and YoutTube TV stations. You give us all a bad name and annoy the hell out of us while you do it. If you think supporting Arsenal means that you should be camped at the top of the table with a ruthlessly ambitious attitude, signing big names in bunches, creating great teams, having top level managers and playing in the Champions League every year – then history would suggest you’ve signed up for the wrong team. So either gain some perspective or please go support Citeh. Until they collapse.

We are the sixth best team in England. We have a slightly better than average manager. He may even be decent. We have a couple of great players. We play in Europe’s second tier competition. We are terribly run. We have a pathetic board and an absent owner.

We are right where we have always been.
Jesus fucking Christ. What type of complete modern fan mong uses stat figures like "we finished 5.92 for x number of years" and "2.98 for blah blah fucking blah"?

Our average finishing position stat means nothing. He quotes no comparative qualifiers like how many years we were in the top flight against other teams' time in the top flight. Fucking stats. You say to a real football fan "you are gonna finish in position 4.54 for the next 3 years but you will win the Double in year 4" and they would bite your hand off. Fuck this Americanised obsession with stats as markers of success. Go add up the scum average finishing stat and Leicester's and I bet the scum come out way ahead but then tell me which set of fans went tonto celebrating winning the league a couple years back ffs.

For every half decent (but long known) point he makes he cuts his own arsehole with shit like stats and comments like "A SMALL CLUB IN BIG CLUBS CLOTHING". Fucking idiot. Arsenal are a huge world famous club with real history - and the biggest club in London. Like most bloggers he's taken a mish mash of stuff from other websites and blogs and tried to package it up as some new insightful commentary when all it is really is regurgitated opinion.

For all his disparaging comments on JCLs he comes across as having a JCL mentality if he is implying that a club is only "big" in their current position without considering their overall history and success. Absolute bollocks. :roll:
Yes a load of points missed will add two this blogger conveniently may of overlooked :roll: not including Charity shields which some clubs would list on their honours lists.

Domestic English clubs,Manchester United 42 trophies followed by Liverpool 41,Arsenal 30 then Chelsea a distant 4th with 22.

Arsenal 6th highest turnover in WORLD football figures 2018 and readily available to all,

Those stats tell me we are a club that is currently underachieving and not open to interpretation but historical and currently factual.

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StuartL
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Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by StuartL »

Topside Northbank wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 8:11 pm
DB10GOONER wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 5:29 pm
SydneyGooner wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 2:31 pm
This is a great comment on Arsenal Truth (probably the best Arsenal blog out there IMO) from an old school long time gooner going by the name of Johnno. He does a great job of detailing how historically at board level there's always been a lack of ambition at Arsenal.
Much has been written on how badly the club has been run – Ivan, Wenger et al and how we should spend more money, or alternatively how we have spent plenty of money – just badly. Take your pick. I will not add to that. As an aging fan, I will try to provide some context to all this. Hopefully by citing history and facts.

The frustration at how far we have fallen out of being competitive in the league is everywhere to see and hear. But it speaks to fans with either no memories or sense of history. Any older fan (or anyone with a curious mind and Wikipedia) could tell you that Arsenal are right where they have always been. Sixth (well after this weekend anyway).

Since the war, our average league finishing position is 5.92. Arsenal’s average league position before Wenger was 7.22. Wenger’s was 2.95 (So he dragged the average up a whole place).

Take a look again at that average finish over 72 years. Sixth.

Wenger’s first ten years were especially extraordinary (average 2.00). They looked to represent a new dawn. But the second ten have a somewhat familiar look. The position we were in was frittered away as the club made bad decision after bad decision, removing Dein and then taking Kroenke anyway, tightening the belt in response to Chelsea and Citeh, keeping Wenger too long and giving him too much power and then settling for 4th as a trophy - as winning was never really the agenda. We should have seen it coming. It’s not like it hadn’t happened before;

1969-1973 – Fairs Cup, the Double. Then broke the team up instead of investing to kick on. Kennedy, George – both sold.

1978 -1981 - 3 FA cup finals, CWC Final – Then broke the team up instead of investing to kick on. Brady, Stapleton – both sold.

1988-1993 – 2 League titles, 2 league cups and an FA cup – then broke the team up instead of investing and kicking on. Rocastle, Thomas, Marwood, Limpar –all sold.

We’ve not spent much time at the very top table. We’ve challenged Leeds, then Liverpool, then Liverpool again and finally Man Utd as the top dog – but always crumbled partly through a lack of execution – but also ambition. In fact, who has been the best club of the era has varied over the last 50 years – but the one constant has actually been that every ten years or so Arsenal pop their head around the door of the office of the Champions, have a look inside and then decide the temperature is too hot in there. The culture of the club is not grand when it comes to the on-field matters. A SMALL CLUB IN BIG CLUBS CLOTHING.

Those fans that still adore Wenger do so for many reasons. The only one that I truly appreciate him for was the fact that he kept it going for a decade. Mee and Graham could only elevate the club above its altitude for half that time. And Wenger won 3 titles, Graham only 2, and Mee a single one.

The only time in post war history that Arsenal have shown real ambition as a club was under Dein and the first half of Arsene. The move to The Emirates. They spoke of being elite in Europe. But they couldn’t follow through. In hindsight we can see why. When the board agreed to move from Highbury and spend hard cash on a new shiny ground, we assumed there were football ambitions behind it. Sure, it helped the cash flow, but only so we could stay on top. But then Roman and the Oligarchs showed up and changed the picture. Being as big as Arsenal were at that point only got you top 4 – not top 2 any more. To stay top 2 - we would have to go further. Never gonna happen. And so we camped out in 4th. And now of course, it only gets you top 6. And so we will be sixth ad infinitum. The usual Bare Ass Minimum as they say over here in North America.

It is hard to do such analysis on other clubs. We have never been relegated nor been in a lower division since the war, so the y-o-y comparisons are constant and relevant. But that is kind of the point of Arsenal. Constantly above average with occasional brilliance that the Keystone Cops that run the club will ensure is short lived, all the while also ensuring there is never a total disaster.

Fans bemoan Kroenke as the root of the issue. But they miss 2 important points. Firstly, how is he that different from the Glazers and J Henry? He stays out of the way, pays people good money to run the club and reinvests revenues. He isn’t really about winning – but he has an asset that he wants to appreciate. Winning usually achieves that. So everybody gets what they want if it is done well and it works (we just don’t and it doesn’t.)

Secondly – Kroenke is an overseas owner in the Arsenal tradition. He appears disinterested in what the fans think. He tolerates the bare minimum. He knows nothing about football and has nothing in common with the average fan. In fact he clearly has utter disdain for the common fan. So tell me – how is he any different from the Old Etonian Hill-Wood and Bracewell-Smith families that effectively controlled the club from WWII until 2007? I still recall Hill Wood the youngest (recently departed) sarcastically thanking the shareholder fans for “your interest in our affairs.” At least Stan had the sense to buy all the shares and do away with the AGM as presumably he knows what an odious and condescending knob he is and assumes we would rather not see it. Clearly Hill Wood didn’t possess such introspection.

No - the owner is not the issue. The Board is the issue. Always has been. Never had a clue. Never been ambitious. Year after year of awful decisions while lying or staying silent with the fans. Those that bemoan that Emery is not good enough and was an uninspiring choice as manager might reflect on the fact that since the mid 60s we have hired Mee (a physio), Terry Neill (managed Spurs badly), Don Howe (managed WBA badly), George Graham (managed Millwall), Bruce Rioch (managed Bolton) and Arsene Wenger (managed Monaco and Nagoya Grampus 8.) Some of those clearly worked out, but Hell, I'd say Emery is the most qualified and ambitious hire the board has made in 50 years. That’s how low the bar is.

And then the board let Gazidis appoint his successors before he left. Like he could care less at that point. And we should be surprised when one of them eats the other and seizes control? What an absolute shambles and a bad joke. Our defending has only ever been the second funniest clown car at Arsenal.

So. Which type of Arsenal fan are you?

If you became a fan around 2000ish because we played good football and entertained, bless you. But you have to know that it has rarely been that way and with our budget and Emery’s style it may be a while before we get there again. But hang in there. There will be sunny spells amongst the grey skies.

If, like me, you are from Islington and/or grew up in an Arsenal family, then you know the score. It is what it is. We are back where we belong. We can’t break away and we just have to enjoy the good years when they come along – in the knowledge that we will find some way to balls it all up.

But if you are a fan that came to us on the back of the later part of Wenger’s success period, then my old mucker you have unrealistic expectations and false perspective. You need to recognize this for all our sakes. And you need to stay the f..k off social media and YoutTube TV stations. You give us all a bad name and annoy the hell out of us while you do it. If you think supporting Arsenal means that you should be camped at the top of the table with a ruthlessly ambitious attitude, signing big names in bunches, creating great teams, having top level managers and playing in the Champions League every year – then history would suggest you’ve signed up for the wrong team. So either gain some perspective or please go support Citeh. Until they collapse.

We are the sixth best team in England. We have a slightly better than average manager. He may even be decent. We have a couple of great players. We play in Europe’s second tier competition. We are terribly run. We have a pathetic board and an absent owner.

We are right where we have always been.
Jesus fucking Christ. What type of complete modern fan mong uses stat figures like "we finished 5.92 for x number of years" and "2.98 for blah blah fucking blah"?

Our average finishing position stat means nothing. He quotes no comparative qualifiers like how many years we were in the top flight against other teams' time in the top flight. Fucking stats. You say to a real football fan "you are gonna finish in position 4.54 for the next 3 years but you will win the Double in year 4" and they would bite your hand off. Fuck this Americanised obsession with stats as markers of success. Go add up the scum average finishing stat and Leicester's and I bet the scum come out way ahead but then tell me which set of fans went tonto celebrating winning the league a couple years back ffs.

For every half decent (but long known) point he makes he cuts his own arsehole with shit like stats and comments like "A SMALL CLUB IN BIG CLUBS CLOTHING". Fucking idiot. Arsenal are a huge world famous club with real history - and the biggest club in London. Like most bloggers he's taken a mish mash of stuff from other websites and blogs and tried to package it up as some new insightful commentary when all it is really is regurgitated opinion.

For all his disparaging comments on JCLs he comes across as having a JCL mentality if he is implying that a club is only "big" in their current position without considering their overall history and success. Absolute bollocks. :roll:
Yes a load of points missed will add two this blogger conveniently may of overlooked :roll: not including Charity shields which some clubs would list on their honours lists.

Domestic English clubs,Manchester United 42 trophies followed by Liverpool 41,Arsenal 30 then Chelsea a distant 4th with 22.

Arsenal 6th highest turnover in WORLD football figures 2018 and readily available to all,

Those stats tell me we are a club that is currently underachieving and not open to interpretation but historical and currently factual.
Does the Norwich hospital cup trophy 🏆 (shared) not mean as much as it used to ? :rubchin:

arrgee
Posts: 717
Joined: Mon Jun 08, 2009 12:16 pm

Re: The Board / Wiggy Out / Staff etc (merged thread)

Post by arrgee »

Topside Northbank wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 8:11 pm


Yes a load of points missed will add two this blogger conveniently may of overlooked :roll: not including Charity shields which some clubs would list on their honours lists.

Domestic English clubs,Manchester United 42 trophies followed by Liverpool 41,Arsenal 30 then Chelsea a distant 4th with 22.

Arsenal 6th highest turnover in WORLD football figures 2018 and readily available to all,

Those stats tell me we are a club that is currently underachieving and not open to interpretation but historical and currently factual.
Just looking at the 13 league title and 13 FA cups, which are the only trophies all the clubs have competed for over 100 years, only Liverpool and Man United have a better record. And Arsenal were late starters not winning anything until 1930. There have been clubs like Leeds, Everton, Chelsea and Man City who had a few years at the top, but none are that close the the top three clubs.

Historically, Arsenal are one of the top 3 clubs in England and currently in the top 10 in terms of UEFA coefficient and money.

Agree, massive underachievement at present, no matter how it is cut.

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