End of the world?

According to the Mayan calendar, the world may well end on 21/12/12, in just over a week's time. However, judging by some of the reactions on Arsenal blogs and forums across the interweb after last night's loss to Bradford, it already has.

It was a painful way to go out of what, realistically, was our best chance of ending the Gunners' so-called 'trophy drought'. In the past, Arsene Wenger used the League Cup as a chance to blood young players. Yesterday, he played almost a full-strength first team. He'd intimated that this would be the case, given that we don't play again until Monday night, but nevertheless it was perhaps a gesture from the manager that there was a genuine desire to win this competition. A cup would also go some way to appease some of the more antagonistic fans, who shout ever more noisily about Wenger's deficiencies.

Indeed, the anti-Wenger brigade had made themselves heard in recent weeks, most notably at the home game against Swansea the weekend before last, when the atmosphere as the final whistle blew was perhaps the most hostile that I have heard at the Emirates. There is certainly discontent with the manager, but it is far from universal among fans. Others direct their anger elsewhere, such as the Black Scarf Movement, who are angry at the board. Some fans continue to support Arsene to the hilt, while others are ambivalent, recognising that a fallow patch is not unusual in the historical context of football clubs in general or Arsenal in particular.

Last night however, the vitriol was directed at a further source – the players. Gervinho in particular came in for strong criticism, as did Chamakh and Ramsey. Like many, I too have doubts whether these players should be in the team given the standard of their recent showings. But if there are concerns about their abilities, there surely cannot be any about Santi Cazorla, Jack Wilshere, Bacary Sagna, Thomas Vermaelen. They are quality players, and a confident, functioning Arsenal team containing those players should be able to win a game like the Bradford tie.

Unfortunately, at the moment Arsenal are not convincing. They lack confidence, incision, inspiration and often (inexplicably) this season they have also looked, to use an annoying Wengerism – 'jaded'. This is evident in our recent record. We were poor against Swansea, poor in Greece against Olympiakos, better – but lucky – against West Brom, and in all honesty pretty poor against Bradford.

At the moment Arsene is not getting the best out of the players, and it is neither unsurprising nor unreasonable for fans to question why not. Similarly, if the quality of the squad is deficient, then there are further questions to be asked of the manager – ultimately, he bought them. But while Wenger will be criticised when the team falls short, the real concern is that unless he acknowledges that there is a problem and does something to address it, Arsenal will continue to lose ground all the time.

Even the most vocal, proactive supporters do not really have the power to force change. Most supporters' noise can easily be filtered out. Ultimately, the power lies with an owner and Chief Executive who both seem largely passive and in accord with Arsene's policies and 'vision' for the club. That perhaps, is because neither Stan Kroenke nor Ivan Gazidis predates Wenger – they have never seen an Arsenal without Arsene, and cannot envisage a future without him.

So are Arsenal – the manager, the board and the players – just too comfortable? Paradoxically, this is a situation that has been created and exacerbated by the commendable achievements of the Wenger era; never out of the top four, consecutive seasons in the Champions League. Such success should not to be discounted or belittled. But fans still find it frustrating. The root, I think, is that there is a sense that we haven't done as well as we might have. We've been close, only to have the rug pulled from under our feet, which can be attributed to more than bad luck. Big losses and smaller ones – from Champions League final defeat against Barca to League Cup final defeat against Birmingham – have combined with an increasingly regular cycle of building and stripping away squads that seem to be perpetually on the cusp of achieving something great.

Here, the obvious cases in point are of players leaving – Nasri, Cesc, Song, van Persie. Their replacements are generally not of the same calibre. They're still good, but the tragedy is that they have to plug the new gaps in the squad instead of adding an extra dimension. Then again, the great unanswered question is, what are the financial restrictions at Arsenal? If Wenger has been tasked by the board to balance the books at the expense of the team, then he is working with his hands tied and deserves far more credit than he has been given. If it is a self-imposed restriction, then the perception changes again. This uncertainty is compounded by the shadowy half-information that emanates from lots of different sources at the heart of the club and means that in the end, I do not feel Arsenal fans have the facts they need to truly be able to judge Wenger's abilities in 2012/13.

We have to make do with what we can see, and that is what happens on the pitch. Last night, even in the League Cup, that performance was not good enough. Improvement is needed fast if we are not to fall behind in the competitions that really matter. And at the moment, the only quick fix on the horizon looks to be the January transfer window. If he has the money that is reputed to be available, then Wenger must buy players to improve and enhance the squad, without losing existing assets like Theo Walcott.

Two very different draws

Away trips to Villa and Goodison Parks, respectively, have left the Gunners with two points from the last two games – not a great return. They were very different performances, but in truth Arsenal didn't play particularly well in either match.

The Villa game was a drab affair. Given the Villains' recent performances, and our own fairly decent recent form, I said in my last post that there were no excuses. Wenger didn't agree, however, and promptly made some in his post-match interview, blaming the poor performance on the classic go-to explain-away: 'We had a Champions League game on Wednesday night and we knew [that] when you play away from home after the Champions League, it’s a difficult game … after the Champions League game, when you play away from home, you can make a draw, it can happen. We could have won the game, we could have lost the game.'  He put our lack of cut and thrust down to the fact that 'we lacked sharpness … in the final third. You could see that physically we were a bit jaded.'

Even conceding that he had a point here, we were all hoping for a better performance on Wednesday night against Everton. The starting line-up was unchanged save for the surprise omission of Lukas Podolski – struck down by illness, apparently. This meant that Aaron Ramsey started out wide – a prospect that didn't fill me with confidence. However, I was almost immediately forced to eat those words when Ramsey's neat one-two with Theo Walcott led to a goal just 52 seconds in.

Walcott has now scored 9 goals in his last 11 games in all competitions – and we are still wrangling over his contract. It’s no surprise that the fans were chanting for Gazidis to ‘sign him up’ after he netted the opener. Let's hope the Chief Exec listens; Theo has now started to deliver on all that early promise and arguably carries more attacking threat than any other Arsenal player.

We held on to the lead for 27 minutes but the returning Marouane Fellaini proved to be our undoing, as Bacary Sagna was robbed in our own half and Fellaini picked up the ball before sending a low drive past Szczesny. Fellaini has been Everton's best player this season and he caused Arsenal big problems throughout the game. At his best the Belgian's play is as unruly and untameable as his hair, and Arsenal struggled to contain him.

We created few chances of our own. Santi Cazorla was subdued as Everton intentionally stifled him in midfield. He was well marshalled by Leon Osman and Darron Gibson despite the best efforts of Jack Wilshere and Mikel Arteta to compete in the middle of the pitch. Without Santi there was little in the way of service to to Olivier Giroud, who nevertheless struggled manfully, but after looking as though he was about to make a real breakthrough in his fledgling Premier League career, now seems to have stalled a bit. In itself that raises many questions about the predictability of our play and the lack of creative outlets when the central midfield players aren't ticking.

Only a solid defensive performance – and an excellent showing from Szczesny – saved us from conceding again. This was all the more commendable given the injury to Laurent Koscielny just four minutes into the game, which led to the introduction of Kieran Gibbs. It did mean, however, that Vermaelen was shunted from left back to centre half. Thomas went on to give probably his best performance of the season so far, emphasising the fact that he is wasted as a full back. The captain is far happier and much more effective in his natural position.

He had to be at his best, as Arsenal had their backs to the wall for much of the second half. The Toffees have played some scintillating football this season, and they had numerous opportunities to win the game. Given their uncharacteristically fine start to the season, they look to be in the mix and should be considered a real threat to our hopes of finishing in the top four. Depressingly, that made this match effectively a six-pointer – from which we could not capitalise.

I cannot be alone among Gooners in shooting envious glances at certain members of the Everton squad – they looked very good indeed. David Moyes has been quietly building a very effective unit on a well-publicised shoestring budget. Arsene Wenger seems to have built a decidedly average squad working within the same means – but his financial limitations seem largely self-imposed, rather than dictated by a parsimonious chairman like Bill Kenwright.

One Everton player in particular who has impressed is Kevin Mirallas. Although he didn't play last night (he's out for three weeks with a hamstring injury), he has looked a lively and skilful player. He was also one of the many supposed targets with whom Arsenal were repeatedly linked over the summer – who knows why we didn't end up signing him, but he definitely looks to be one who got away. Similarly, Nikica Jelavic, Marouane Fellaini and Leighton Baines would all be welcome additions to the Arsenal squad – and even young players like Seamus Coleman, Apostolos Vellios and new £5m signing Bryan Oviedo look like the sort of raw talents that Arsenal were once famed for finding.

Fortunately for us, on Wednesday night none of the Everton attack save for Fellaini found their range, and we managed to hold out for a point. We will need to improve on Saturday when we return to the Emirates for a tough home tie against Michael Laudrup's Swansea – another team with some fine players, including the two flamboyant Spaniards Michu and Pablo Hernandez. Spearheaded by those two, the Swan ripped a hitherto impressive West Brom apart at the Liberty last night, as the Gunners laboured to their tepid 1-1 draw.