Jens Lehmann blasts moaning Arsenal fans and says players should’ve kicked balls at ‘Wenger out’ banner
Lehmann — a key member of the Arsenal Invincibles team — says Gunners fans have gone too far in voicing grievances
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IT is the closest Jens Lehmann comes to losing his cool.
The former Arsenal No 1 is as forthright as ever in his opinions, but he delivers them without raising his voice and often with a smile.
Until you ask about the plane, sponsored by disaffected Arsenal fans, which flew over The Hawthorns on Saturday trailing the message: “No contract Wenger out.”
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With a flicker of anger in his blue eyes, Lehmann — a key member of the Arsenal Invincibles team — said: “That is so disrespectful.
“The players should have tried to hit that plane with the ball, to defend their manager.
“A single guy comes and holds a banner up, that’s his opinion, fine.
“But hiring a plane? Come on, it’s too much.
“Even now the guys who are against Arsene they should recognise it has gone too far.
“The people that hold up their banners saying ‘Wenger Out’ don’t hold up banners saying they want x, y, z to come in because this guy will guarantee success.
“Bring Allegri in and we will win everything? Who is Allegri, with all due respect? He is in Italy. Will somebody like him bring success?
“When you look at the type of football he is playing, it doesn’t really fit Arsenal.
“None of them has a solution, someone who would guarantee them Champions League football and maybe win something.”
In fairness to the Arsenal fans, it is not their job to have a solution. That responsibility belongs to the board, whose members want their manager’s two-decade reign to continue.
Lehmann, 47, also remains a firm supporter of Wenger, but he is not blindly loyal.
The Frenchman arrived at Arsenal in 1996 as an innovator from abroad, a modern coach who would revolutionise English football.
But now, in the way he appears to control or oversee every aspect of Arsenal, Wenger is the most old-school British manager in the Premier League.
Lehmann nods and smiles when SunSport raises the issue.
After all, even Wenger’s long-time nemesis Sir Alex Ferguson, in many ways the archetypal one-man club, recognised he had to adapt and delegate some responsibility in his latter years at Manchester United.
Lehmann said: “That goes in line with the change that has to be made at Arsenal.
“Due to all the new demands of modern football, the structure of the club probably needs someone to run the sporting department so that Arsene can focus just on coaching and setting up teams.
“Sometimes with a guy like him who really runs the club he needs a bit of support.”
Even if Wenger accepted the appointment of a director of football, it would not cure all Arsenal’s ills.
Wenger’s critics also feel he has been left behind tactically, with a new wave of foreign coaches like Pep Guardiola, Jurgen Klopp and Antonio Conte leading the way.
Lehmann points to Conte’s success at Chelsea as evidence of how quickly things can change. But Arsenal fans are tired of failing to challenge for the title, which the Blues have won four times since the Invincibles’ season of 2003-04 — and as recently as two years ago.
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Lehmann conceded: “Arsene needs to change a little bit. He needs to slightly change his approach.
“The question is whether he is willing to change.”
Another aspect of his management Wenger might have to revise is his loyalty to players who keep failing to deliver when it matters.
Lehmann said: “The way it goes now most of the players know they are on the table for being replaced.
“If I was a player at Arsenal now, I would be scared. Unless I was happy to go to play somewhere else.”
Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil may well do just that, of course, but Arsenal fans do not have the luxury of changing allegiance.
Lehmann believes Wenger can still win some of them over and turn Arsenal’s fortunes around.
He said: “We’re not talking here about a club that is in big crisis.
“It’s a fantastic club. It’s very rich now, due to him and his fantastic work.
“Never underestimate how intelligent Arsene is. Sometimes everyone lacks a bit of confidence.
“We will be sitting here in four weeks, suddenly they will be winning games again, it will be a different situation and you won’t see anyone holding up a sign saying ‘Wenger Out’.”
That sounds a bit optimistic.
But Lehmann is adamant that giving Arsene Wenger another chance to change, rather than changing manager, is still the best way forward for Arsenal.