The bookies thought Johan Cruyff would replace Bruce Rioch, but the Arsenal board appointed an unknown Frenchman who had been coaching in Japan. Not everyone was impressed. This was the atmosphere in London on the 30th of September 1996. Nicky Hornby summed it up perfectly in his words “I remember when Bruce Rioch was sacked, one of the papers had three or four names. It was Terry Venables, Johan Cruyff and then, at the end, Arsène Wenger. I remember thinking as a fan, I bet it’s fucking Arsène Wenger, because I haven’t heard of him and I’ve heard of the other two. Trust Arsenal to appoint the boring one that you haven’t heard of.” 19 years since, that man has become one of the greatest managers to ever grace the beautiful sport.

“Wenger who?” All the papers read this headline, everyone wanted Johan Cruyff the Dutch maestro and exponent of total Football to be the gaffer of Arsenal football club, yet the board decided to for a relatively unknown Frenchman who previously worked in Nantes and Monaco and was currently in Japan. Such a man who did not have enough credentials to land an assistant managers job in Tottenham should be appointed as the leading man of Arsenal FC. People wondered what would Mr. Wenger bring to the table, will he be able to get Arsenal to fire again on all cylinders was he just another christian name which resembled the club hiring him more than any other in the world. “Arsene and Arsenal”. Such a coincidence.

Yet, Arsene found the job and he was there in the training room on the month of October. He met his team for the first time. He had to get the team to perform, to get results, to win. However most importantly, he had to earn their respect. the locker room was full of big big names, David Seaman, Tony Adams, Ian Wright, Nigel Winterburn, Steve Bould and Martin Keown. Wenger’s appearance didn’t convince the senior members of the team. They were not much impressed. ‘He wore glasses, looked like a schoolteacher. What does this Frenchman know about Football?’ thought a skeptical Tony Adams. This skepticism was also shared by other members of the team including Winterburn and Steve Bould, who thought, ‘This man cannot be better than George Graham.’ ‘Does he even speak proper English?’. In the set up, there was a young french boy who had signed from Milan. He too didn’t know much English, or used to the life in England. He was Patrick Viera. Naturally, the gaffer and the young boy had a bond between them because they both were immensely talented and somehow felt out of place in this club.

Sometimes Wenger sat and wondered, whether coming to Arsenal was a right decision. Not that he doubted his ability, or his teams ability. He thought is Arsenal “CRAZY.” Why would such a top club in the biggest league of the world hire a manager who did not have any experience. He thought about it. He was foreign, he had no history. There were articles in the paper about how a foreign manager had never won the title before. Arsenal were crazy, but brave.

Wenger was an intelligent man, a man who had won titles in France and Japan so language wouldn’t be problem for him. However, Sir Alex Ferguson said that he had heard Wenger spoke five languages and ridiculed his knowledge of the languages and  football by saying that he had a 15 year old boy from Ivory Coast who could do the same. Sir Alex was wrong, Wenger did know a lot about football and he knew not five but six languages – English, French, German, Spanish, Italian – and Japanese. Speaking English wouldn’t be aproblem for him but he struggled initially with the media reporters trying to expose this weakness of Mr. Wenger.

Wenger revolutionized the diet of English Football. It is a cliched as to say that Milk turns faster than Per Mertesacker. Wenger grew up in a restaurant so he knew the value of nutrition and the way the English footballers ate was staggering. He banned chocolate before his first match against Blackburn Rovers. This caused an outrage amongst the players who roared “We want our Mars Bars!” as they were travelling in the bus to the stadium. But, Arsene wasn’t going to back down. Nutrition in sports is a vital factor and something which every sports team should have incorporated in their player’s lives. The idea that foreign coaches were not up to the challenge of winning the championship sounds absurd now – no English manger has won the Premier League since its inception in 1992 – but Arsène’s eyes were not deceiving him. English media believed that Foreign coaches were the problem in English football and Arsene was just another part of the problem. These foreign coaches did not understand the culture of the country or the football played there. There were some ‘experimental failures’, Aston Villa’s experiment in the early 1990s with the Czechoslovak intellectual Dr Jo Venglos proved an unqualified failure. Venglos spoke a different language, literally and metaphorically, from his players and so the club replaced him with Ron Atkinson who was perfectly understood when he exhorted a defender to “give it some wellie”. Then there was Ossie Ardiles at Tottenham. The Argentine taught his team to play a beautiful game, but forgot about the stamina that would be required in even greater quantity if his players were barred from delivering even a few “route one” passes on a treacly January pitch. Ardiles left and that pragmatic Londoner Gerry Francis arrived to put strength in the players’ legs and remove fancy ideas from their heads. Now only Dutch, Ruud Gullit and Arsene remained.

Arsene Wenger faced a lot of stick when he joined Arsenal. He had a few supporters as well, notably then England National Team manager Glenn Hoddle. Glenn previously worked with Wenger in Monaco and admired him for his work and professional attitude. Glenn credited Wenger for his own desire to become a manager. Hoddle backed him from the start, since he was unveiled in Highbury. “He has an English mind, but also a German mind, which is very disciplined. He prepares a guideline on how the club should function on the playing side and how individuals should work, and, if anyone steps out of line, he has a ruthless side to him. That’s when the German side comes out.” Said Glenn Hoddle.

Wenger’s arrival in London sparked a revolution in English football, he opened the gateway for future foreign managers to come to England and win trophies with English clubs like Jose Mourinho, Rafael Benitez, etc. He will be the person who brought a new age of reason to English Football.