The Malaysian Insider :: Opinion
The Malaysian Insider :: Opinion |
| Posted: 05 Nov 2012 03:29 PM PST NOV 6 — This could be a make or break few days for Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger. Tonight the Gunners are in Germany for a tough Champions' League fixture against Schalke, and on Saturday they host Fulham in the Premier League. If they fail to win either, Wenger could well find his job security come under serious pressure for the first time in his long and formerly glorious reign. Trouble has been brewing for a long time. Going more than seven years without a trophy is bad enough, but the biggest problem for Wenger is that many Arsenal fans are now starting to doubt for the first time whether the future looks any brighter. Their encouraging start to the current season — unbeaten with four wins and three draws in the opening month of the campaign — has been long forgotten and replaced by rumblings of discontent following a worrying run of form. Saturday's limp defeat at Manchester United, where the Gunners were flattered to lose by just one goal, came on the back of equally poor reverses against Norwich and Schalke and unconvincing victories over strugglers QPR and Reading. Confidence, it's fair to say, is at a low ebb as Arsenal travel to Germany for tonight's pivotal Champions' League meeting with Schalke, who have made a good start to the Bundesliga season and were unbeaten in nine games before Saturday's 3-2 loss at Hoffenheim. Arsenal know that their task won't be easy because Schalke have already given them a first-hand glimpse of their quality with an assured 2-0 win at the Emirates a fortnight ago. Klaas-Jan Huntelaar is one of Europe's most prolific strikers and he's receiving plenty of supply this season from another Dutch international, on-loan Barcelona winger Ibrahim Afellay. It's an important game because Arsenal's qualification for the knockout stage is by no means assured. Greek champions and league leaders Olympiakos are three points behind the Gunners as they prepare to host Montpellier, who are looking very much like one-season wonders. An Arsenal defeat coupled with a big Olympiakos victory would leave Wenger's side in third place — and they have to travel to Greece in the final round of fixtures. If Arsenal come away with a draw from tonight's game, they can consider it a very good result. If they don't, they will probably face the troubling prospect of having to get a result from their trip to Olympiakos early next month, or face a humiliating early exit. Saturday's visit to the Emirates Stadium of Fulham, who are currently level on points with Arsenal in the Premier League standings, is also unlikely to be a straightforward affair. Martin Jol's side are unbeaten in their last four games and, with the unpredictable but undeniable talents of Dimitar Berbatov, Hugo Rodallega, Damien Duff and Bryan Ruiz within their attacking ranks, they will be more than capable of giving Arsenal's shaky back line a difficult afternoon. Things weren't always like this — there was a time when meetings with middleweights like Schalke and Fulham would have caused no anxieties for Wenger's Arsenal. The Frenchman's first ten years in charge at the North London club were magnificent, featuring three Premier League titles, four domestic cups and an appearance in the 2006 Champions' League Final. Those successes rightly earned him an enormous amount of respect and affection from fans, but the glory years are a long time ago now — the majority of the squad that won their last trophy, the FA Cup in 2005, have now retired — and sooner or later Wenger's credit in the trust bank will run out. In the last seven years Arsenal have slowly been transformed from a leading power in the game to little more than a strong second tier side. A generation of new fans and new players will only know them that way, with Wenger's past achievements becoming more and more irrelevant to his present position. Of course, the failures of the last seven years have not all been Wenger's fault because he has been severely limited in the transfer market by the club's strict budget, which has also contributed to the departure of key players such as Robin van Persie, Cesc Fabregas and Samir Nasri. But Wenger does have to take a large share of the responsibility for his stubborn insistence on doing things one way and one way only. His footballing principles are admirable but he has shown little room for tactical compromise or flexibility and as a result his team are regarded as an inconsistent soft touch — capable of beating anyone on their good days, but capable of losing against anyone on their bad days. If the Gunners continue to head in that direction, eventually we will reach a point where the long-suffering fans come to the collective understanding that enough is enough and change is required. When that happens, it will probably happen quickly. It may well take no more than a couple of bad performances and bad results to turn simmering discontent into outright mutiny. Schalke and Fulham will not be easy and could easily pour more water on the already-sown seeds of discontent. And then, guess who's up next? You guessed it: Tottenham. For Wenger, these are dangerous days. * The views expressed here are the personal opinion of the columnist. |
| The need for better news reporting Posted: 05 Nov 2012 03:26 PM PST NOV 6 — The media in Malaysia seems to be as polarised as the voters in the country because there are two clear camps, thus influencing the nature of reporting. Many headlines often have underlying insinuating messages. They are loaded with value judgments indicating the partiality of news sources. It is difficult to obtain news that is free from very blatant biases. This is not to say that there exists a world where premeditated misconceptions do not influence a reporter's writing — this does not exist. But even within the realm of bias, there are ways to play down the slants and write news from a nonpartisan angle. In Malaysia, more often than not we see no attempt at this. Why is this worrying? Well, if these are your only sources of news, to what extent are you able to trust whatever is being published? If the biases are so blatant, how sure are we that important facts are not being distorted? There is no point in believing in the authority of these sources if all they resort to is mudslinging simply because the news we receive is pushed so far from the truth that it becomes pointless to read it anyway. The traditional role of a newspaper has been to record. In Malaysia, it is no secret that mainstream newspapers are owned by the governing parties. The rise of alternative media as a prominent source of news in recent years initially sought to provide a counter to the slanted mainstream news sources. But now, we are back at square one because we have two camps of kids calling each other out on who started the fight first. In a 2009 Wall Street Journal article written by Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, Peter R. Kann, there was mention of how Internet sources are unable to take over the pertinent role of traditional newspapers — a point worth noting since our primary alternative news sources come primarily from the Internet. This is mostly due to the fact that there is a lack of funding, and unfortunately this drop in quality will result in the public losing out. Things need to be reported from a more neutral perspective instead of lambasting the government (if you are coming from a pro-opposition point of view) or vice versa, if you are coming from a pro-government point of view. I must add that I realise that for the most part, these issues are not the fault of journalists themselves. Reporters are not the people who make the final call on what gets published or how it gets published. Many a time self-censorship plays a big role in what gets published or does not. The pressure to self-censor can stem from political powers or market forces. It is understandable to a certain extent how these factors may influence decisions. Perhaps it was never the intention of the alternative media to take over the role of the traditional newspaper. And perhaps it may be so that the reason for succumbing to market forces is that we are a money-minded society anyway. But the reasons for them to remain in this position seem awfully selfish. We are all brutally aware of the misgivings of the politics in this country. And the way for us to truly have a shot at democracy is if we have a reliable media. Unlike traditional newspapers where controls are held tightly, it seems almost sinful that alternative media, that is tied down primarily only by market forces, should succumb to publishing only what the market wants to hear. They are in an enviable position where they have a true shot at changing our country but they have degenerated to something no different from traditional newspapers. * The views expressed here are the personal opinion of the columnist. |
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