Arsenal are steadily going backwards under Unai Emery as the players have lost confidence in their manager.
This is according to ex-Gunner Perry Groves, who is shocked to his former side’s rapid slump to mediocrity.
The Gunners have struggled this season and despite sitting sixth in the table have looked well off the pace.
Manager Emery is coming under close scrutiny for their poor form and one of the club’s ex-stars claims he’s watching them go downhill in front of his eyes.
Groves, who won the league twice with Arsenal in 1989 and 1991, feels the Spanish boss initially had a good impact at the Emirates when he replaced Arsene Wenger.
Now, though, he believes the players signed by Emery and the club’s transfer department have been poor acquisitions who don’t have the required attributes to arrest the current decline.
Speaking on the Weekend Sports Breakfast, he also claimed their current manager has no actual strategy as they risk failing to make the Champions League for a fourth season in a row.
Groves said: “I think, when he first went in there, there was an intensity because it was too comfortable under Arsene Wenger and he made his stance [clear].
“The closing down was a lot more intense – covering more ground.
“He went 22 games unbeaten over a little period and in the game against Spurs they went 2-1 down and came back. There was a real buzz about the Emirates.
“And what has happened is he’s got rid of the players he didn’t want, like the Monreals, the Petr Cechs, and Aaron Ramseys but then the players that have been brought in, whether it’s by him or the sporting director, they have actually got steadily worse.
“That intensity has got less and less and less with a team that he is supposed to be constructing.
“The thing from watching from the outside is there doesn’t seem to be a desire to do the horrible stuff.”
Groves continued: “The thing with the Arsenal situation with Unai Emery is, if you watch them against Leicester, and I’ve been watching Arsenal a lot this year, there is no structure. There doesn’t seem to be any philosophy.
Ray Parlour says Unai Emery still doesn’t know his best team at Arsenal
“Unai Emery doesn’t seem to know his best formation, he doesn’t seem to know what players to play in that formation and I think the players have lost confidence in him. I don’t think the players are getting him at the minute.”
