BIoodBrother
Well-Known Member
I was wondering what I and you really enjoy and need/want most from being a(n Arsenal) fan.
Apart from wanting to see beautiful football, there is a wish to reach the top undoubtedly.
I dare say winning is a big part of the joy of being a fan and losing can be a reason not only to have meltdowns in anger but eventually to watch less games and involve oneself less in the news around the club (remains questionable though as we had more people commenting on Matchday threads when Arsenal lost than on they's Arsenal won on AM I believe) but for me competing is where it's really at.
To compete for domination, the biggest titles, you obviously have to win a lot so they go hand in hand to a certain degree, but while some goals die and become unobtainable at some points within a season or decade, competing never stops completely. We compete for a win in every game we play, and that probably keeps me ticking over and kept me firmly interested in times when we had a dire team on a downwards trejectory. We didn't have a chance at titles, not even at a Champions League place at times but we always stood a chance to win the next game.
As a boy I probably saw every game as a final, every game a chance to win or lose it all, not only 3 points available towards a bigger goal, namely the best available league position, be it 1st or 4th.
Now, after having been an Arsenal fan for most of my life of 33 years, that's changed quite a lot.. too much maybe.. but the dream is still there somewhat. After all, I kept watching, always believing in hope for the next season, wanting to witness the little changes.
I would say, I even started caring more about competing towards a larger goal than the best available league position in a respective year. I care more about the future than the now because the feeling, I had as a boy, seems fleeting and worthless compared to a continuous drive, so I push a wagon full of hope in front of me and say "maybe next year", maybe next year, all will be better and one day it might be perfect.
But this perfection obviously will never come. Even if we win the quadruple, there will be a next day that remains competive, that wants my attention, wants my desire, wants my hope.
To give an example:
More important to me than to win the league this year, would be to prolong Salibas and Sakas contracts.
Give me second place and 3years security of Champions League football + semi final runs, over one league title with 10 points in front of second placed City and 2 years of Europa League or even out of Europe (even less games to compete in) after that.
It would mean more excitement, more days of anguish, more pain and more moments of joy, but no title.
I wonder if therein lies a fear, a clinging to always just sticking around, like the incapability of breaking up in an expired relationship?
Why not win it all and then go down in flames?
I've never seen us win the Champions League after all? What are we doing it for if not to reach the goal? The German World Cup Winners (Özil and Mertesacker) had a difficult time coming back from their success to the club, as there was little reason to aim at climbing a mountain, that they had already reached. Is the climbing the essential then, is arriving even possible? But can climbing be fun when you know that there's no cherry on top of the mountain after all and just another mountain appears?
And am I scared of the day when Saka hangs up his boots at 36 and players that aren't born yet will wear the jersey instead?
I've seen generations of players come and leave and yet it never felt like a complete loss because obviously there is a constant flux, the identity never really changed from one day to the other apart when Wenger left and a big part of my Arsenal idea/connection with him, but even then, we still had most of his players in the following season.
So we continue to compete, we change slowly but never too much, so that we allign with our illusive goals in a fictional future, and define ourselves more through the same hope that we had yesterday than through what we achieve today.
Just imagine someone gives us 3 league titles because of breaches, betting scandals etc in the past... You don't care about them.
Have Jesus back now via a miracle or 3 titles in the 2010s added in official documentation? Give me the former surely.
So all that matters is the journey but without the belief in the goal you wouldn't travel even one step.
I think I speak for many when I conclude:
We want to deserve it.
We want to earn it. Yet we want not it.
We want to earn.
We want to deserve.
(So no, Laca, it's not the goal but it helps that you believe so...)
Apart from wanting to see beautiful football, there is a wish to reach the top undoubtedly.
I dare say winning is a big part of the joy of being a fan and losing can be a reason not only to have meltdowns in anger but eventually to watch less games and involve oneself less in the news around the club (remains questionable though as we had more people commenting on Matchday threads when Arsenal lost than on they's Arsenal won on AM I believe) but for me competing is where it's really at.
To compete for domination, the biggest titles, you obviously have to win a lot so they go hand in hand to a certain degree, but while some goals die and become unobtainable at some points within a season or decade, competing never stops completely. We compete for a win in every game we play, and that probably keeps me ticking over and kept me firmly interested in times when we had a dire team on a downwards trejectory. We didn't have a chance at titles, not even at a Champions League place at times but we always stood a chance to win the next game.
As a boy I probably saw every game as a final, every game a chance to win or lose it all, not only 3 points available towards a bigger goal, namely the best available league position, be it 1st or 4th.
Now, after having been an Arsenal fan for most of my life of 33 years, that's changed quite a lot.. too much maybe.. but the dream is still there somewhat. After all, I kept watching, always believing in hope for the next season, wanting to witness the little changes.
I would say, I even started caring more about competing towards a larger goal than the best available league position in a respective year. I care more about the future than the now because the feeling, I had as a boy, seems fleeting and worthless compared to a continuous drive, so I push a wagon full of hope in front of me and say "maybe next year", maybe next year, all will be better and one day it might be perfect.
But this perfection obviously will never come. Even if we win the quadruple, there will be a next day that remains competive, that wants my attention, wants my desire, wants my hope.
To give an example:
More important to me than to win the league this year, would be to prolong Salibas and Sakas contracts.
Give me second place and 3years security of Champions League football + semi final runs, over one league title with 10 points in front of second placed City and 2 years of Europa League or even out of Europe (even less games to compete in) after that.
It would mean more excitement, more days of anguish, more pain and more moments of joy, but no title.
I wonder if therein lies a fear, a clinging to always just sticking around, like the incapability of breaking up in an expired relationship?
Why not win it all and then go down in flames?
I've never seen us win the Champions League after all? What are we doing it for if not to reach the goal? The German World Cup Winners (Özil and Mertesacker) had a difficult time coming back from their success to the club, as there was little reason to aim at climbing a mountain, that they had already reached. Is the climbing the essential then, is arriving even possible? But can climbing be fun when you know that there's no cherry on top of the mountain after all and just another mountain appears?
And am I scared of the day when Saka hangs up his boots at 36 and players that aren't born yet will wear the jersey instead?
I've seen generations of players come and leave and yet it never felt like a complete loss because obviously there is a constant flux, the identity never really changed from one day to the other apart when Wenger left and a big part of my Arsenal idea/connection with him, but even then, we still had most of his players in the following season.
So we continue to compete, we change slowly but never too much, so that we allign with our illusive goals in a fictional future, and define ourselves more through the same hope that we had yesterday than through what we achieve today.
Just imagine someone gives us 3 league titles because of breaches, betting scandals etc in the past... You don't care about them.
Have Jesus back now via a miracle or 3 titles in the 2010s added in official documentation? Give me the former surely.
So all that matters is the journey but without the belief in the goal you wouldn't travel even one step.
I think I speak for many when I conclude:
We want to deserve it.
We want to earn it. Yet we want not it.
We want to earn.
We want to deserve.
(So no, Laca, it's not the goal but it helps that you believe so...)
