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The year was 1996. London giants Arsenal was looking to create a dynasty in English football by straightening their side and was on the lookout for a coach to lead the club to success. The tenure of George Graham was relatively successful in the past and the two short spells for Stewart Houston and George Graham were nothing extraordinary, except the signing of Dutch starlet Dennis Bergkamp. But the most talked about decision of the club came in October 1996 when a completely unknown French coach Arsene Wenger was picked for the role of manager and the club’s history found a new hero.
Arsene Wenger was not well known for his playing days and his only well known achievement came when he was part of the Strasbourg squad which won the club’s only LIgue 1 title in 1979. Wenger found his true calling in management which saw him make his name in the French football scene. Wenger started his career by taking charge of the Strasbourg youth teams and then moved on to his first major job at Nancy. The Frenchman led Monaco to the French title in 1988 and coincidentally it was the year when he decided to visit England as a way to study English football and was invited for dinner by Arsenal vice chairman David Dein which resulted in a good friendship.
A surprise spell in Japan with Nagoya Grampus followed, but Wenger was always on the radar of the Arsenal board. He was the top name on the board’s list when Bruce Rioch was sacked and the British media was abuzz with the rumours of a possible appointment of the Frenchman. It was a pretty bold move for the board as Arsene became the first non-British manager of the club and they believed in him to be the person who will inspire the team to play attacking football. But, the reaction of the fans and players were not quite positive, as they were quite taken aback by the appointment of an foreigner who was rarely known in the media.
“At first, I thought: What does this Frenchman know about football? He wears glasses and looks more like a schoolteacher. He’s not going to be as good as George [Graham]. Does he even speak English properly?” was the reaction of then-skipper and ‘Mr. Arsenal’ Tony Adams.
The Evening Standard agreed with the general consensus; as they had no idea whatsoever about who he was and they published the now immortal headline of: ‘Arsene Who?’ and a few weeks later, they interviewed him as a part of their initiative to answer their own questions and to understand the new Arsenal coach.
Arsene Wenger
“I think in England you eat too much sugar and meat and not enough vegetables,” Wenger told them while talking his philosophy for the future. “I lived for two years in Japan and it was the best diet I ever had. The whole way of life there is linked to health. The people there are known to work harder than anywhere else and they have the highest life expectancy. Their diet is basically boiled vegetables, fish and rice. No fat, no sugar. You notice when you live there that there are no fat people. Well, no fat people among the middle-aged and elderly.”
It was an important step taken by Wenger in his initial days of his Arsenal days when he decided to change the traditional player diets which consisted of the pre match steak and chips, and also the post match Mars bars.
“It’s silly to work hard the whole week and then spoil it by not preparing properly before the game,” Wenger added. “As a coach you can influence the diet of your players. You can point out what is wrong. Some are wrong because they are not strong enough to fight temptation and some are wrong because they do not know. As a coach I can teach the players what they do wrong without knowing it is wrong.”
Arsene Wenger was also responsible for some major changes in the squad, including the transfers of Remi Garde, Patrick Vieira and Nicolas Anelka. The new acquisitions were instrumental in the team which boasted of British stalwarts like Tony Adams, David Seamen and Lee Dixon. The transfer moves were a stroke of genius and it eventually lead the side to adopt a much aggressive model of football which will end the usual ‘Boring, Boring, Arsenal’ and ’1-0 to the Arsenal’ chants.
“I could understand the public not knowing who I was but I was surprised the specialists didn’t,” Wenger told journalist Matt Weiner years later. “I’d taken Monaco to the Cup Winners’ Cup final [in 1992], helped them to win the league [1988] and won the cup three times [1989, 1990, 1991]. But it didn’t bother me much because at the end of the day that meant they had low expectations of me.”
The move to choose Arsene Wenger was a master stroke for the London club and he has proven himself as the best Arsenal manager during his still running tenure at the club for 18 years. Arsene Wenger is undoubtedly one of the greatest managers in the world and as we wait for him to coach Arsenal for the 1000th time on Saturday against Chelsea, it is safe to say that the whole world knows the answer to the question ‘Arsene Who’.
