I realise that re-arranged fixtures are very much a ‘me’ problem, as well as circa 40,000 other season ticket holders, but it ain’t half annoying when they re-arrange the fixtures to rubbish times, so I was a little cheesed off yesterday to see a bunch of them moved in December. We all now that the TV companies are going to get their grubby mits on the fixtures and let’s be honest, given we’re up there at the moment and anticipated to be a team fighting for a title, we’re always going to be favoured for TV coverage. But it still makes it annoying when you find out that your Saturday evening is being disrupted by a home game against Wolves on 13th December. Villa away and Everton away I can live with, although the 5.30pm kick off for Villa does mean that even if you’re at home the ability to do something else is limited, but again this is very much a ‘me’ problem I realise.

Everybody wants their pound of flesh from The Arsenal, it seems.

In a way I guess it is a good thing; more TV games means more money, which means more investment, which is evidenced by the squad build this summer just gone, which was the first time in possibly decades that I’ve thought to myself “I think we’re alright this season” in terms of depth and quality of players. That’s become one of the Arsenal fan vernaculars most common phraseology for quite some time, the ol’ “we’re just one short”, dating back to the mid 2000s I think. It was a striker for a long time around the David Villa to Arsenal era. We also had the post Vieira Get a DM era. We’ve had the All the left backs are injured season back when Pascal Cygan deputised, plus the tiny technical masters period of time when Wenger stockpiled your Denilson’s at a time in which big physical players were winning that reprehensible club Chelsea the title. So to have us in a situation in which I’m looking at the current squad and going “yep, it’s all here” is a very welcome feeling and situation to be in, I must say.

It’s a different feeling, but so is the feelings towards KSE these days too, I must confess. I have been a staunch opponent of the KSE regime ever since Stan got involved. I felt he treated us as a club, as a fanbase, as a mild irritant. We were just numbers on a spreadsheet and his appearances in the annual meetings felt to me like it undermined his commitment to Arsenal apathy. “I don’t want somebody like that running my club” was always my feeling and whilst that hasn’t completely gone away (comments likes – and I’m paraphrasing here – “you don’t get into sports ownership to win things” don’t help), I think for all that Stan got wrong in terms of how I feel he handled The Arsenal, Josh has been a very different character. I still harbour questions as to why a rich American family with no ties to Arsenal got involved and continue to be involved (I thought they’d buy us, potentially cash in as the money rapidly increased in the league, or worse, do a United/Glazer thing), but I think at least Josh has realised that there are ways in which you can engage a fanbase to get them more on side than we were perhaps six or seven years ago. I’m bringing all of this up because I’ve just read a piece on Josh in The Telegraph and it got me to thinking about how he’s engaged with the fans and how KSE have, through Josh, shown they are willing to listen. To me the KSE stuff was never about ‘spend some faaaakin’ money’ but more comfort and safety in the knowledge that they knew how to run a football club and take them in the right direction.

That involves making the right appointments that work for the culture of your club and you only have to look at United and Sir Jim to see why one guy (family in our case) could ruin everything if he (they) don’t have their heads screwed on and make the right appointments. But in the last five years, pretty much since they appointed Arteta, I feel like broadly speaking the appointments have been successful. There are people who don’t like Arteta, which is fine, but when you think about what the football and competitiveness was like at the end of the Wenger reign and during the one year+ of Emery, you can’t argue that the direction of travel hasn’t been positive.

The Telegraph article talks about how Tim Lewis’ exit now puts a new slant on the backroom ‘Project’ and you have to say that it feels like that with all of the recent appointments, so perhaps we are now entering a new phase of KSE ownership? That brings with it uncertainty and naturally I have a little bit of caution about whether or not this will be a success, but in Josh I have a little more faith than I do in Stan, so that is one positive I will take. He still needs to steer this ship in the right direction, he will still rely on other actual ‘football people’ to guide him, but the harmony on the pitch has recently felt like it is mirrored off it and my hope is that this equilibrium remains in place for a long time to come.

That’s a solid 600+ words talking about off the field stuff, which isn’t really my comfort zone but in the absence of any real football just yet, I figured I might as well have a little delve on a Thursday morning. Thankfully tomorrow I’ll get back to the real stuff as I do my new thing for this season and have a little look at Fulham and how their fans are feeling ahead of the trip to The Cottage. So until then, have a good one and I’ll catch thee all in the morrow.