Oh, my stars and garters! Bring me some smelling salts! I do declare, I have the vapors!
Apparently, Arsene Wenger completely erupted at Monday’s press conference before Tuesday’s UCL match against Bayern Munich, venting unmercilessly on poor, hapless reporters whose only fault was their unflinching commitment to the truth. It’s enough to make me want to reconsider my advice to Arsene. Good God, if he’s going to treat credentialed reporters in this uncouth manner, what unholy pain would he inflict on me, a petty part-time blogger? Maybe I should delete this whole blog and go crawl back under the rock from whence I emerged.
Oh wait. I just watched the video. It’s three minutes long. For two and a half minutes, it’s just Arsene answering questions. Then, he gets a little terse. After that, he really dials it up and gets brusque. Then, as if 20 centuries of manners and politeness never existed, he interrupts someone. You know what I blame this on the breakdown of? Civilization itself. I mean, if a man can’t remain perfectly calm and unflappable, no matter how persistent others are in prying, what are we left with? We might as well go back to clubbing mastodons.
Look, I get it. Managers are not supposed to let reporters’ questions get to them. Wenger’s reaction has been described in terms like so: he “erupts“, “vents fury“, and “Wenger meltdown“.
Do you want to see testy? Do you want to see an eruption? Here’s a meltdown, while we’re at it. Heck, here’s a top ten. Look, I’m not a professional reporter. I’m not even pretending to be one. All I’m saying is that, before you say that a coach “erupted”, maybe you should scan your own memory, or, I don’t know, do some research, to establish a bit of perspective.
At worst, Wenger displays a thin skin. Perhaps he should be a little less self-deprecating in the future so that any subsequent “outbursts” seem tamer? I’ve seen bigger blow-ups in the check-out line of a supermarket. A coach getting impatient with a reporter’s off-topic questions (yes, I know that the loss to Blackburn is significant, but this was a UCL press-conference) hardly lives up to its billing.
At the end of the day, a tempest in a teapot. Thoughts?
