It was a beautiful sunny day in North London and the mood between fans as we traveled to the Emirates was quite positive despite the frustrating transfer window and the news of Kallstrom suffering an injury in training. As we entered the stadium there were people singing and shouting, we even joined in with singing Bergkamp Wonderland with some fans.
So imagine my surprise when the moment the game kicked off until the moment it ended the only noise that filled the ground was the Palace supporters with their huge drum and continuous singing. I was actually a little envious of them yesterday, it reminded me of all the times I went to Highbury as a kid and how that place rocked with noise, it was so loud and you couldn’t even hear yourself think. Palace’s support was small but filled the stadium and we couldn’t be heard.
Nowadays we are a shadow of our former selves, yesterday was the quietest game I have ever been to at the Emirates and it shocked me, we’ve been 2-0 down and I’ve heard more noise than that. I am still very much one of those fans that will sing and shout throughout the whole game until someone tells me to shut up and I can’t see why everyone else isn’t doing the same thing?
I sat in the North Bank which holds the reputation for being the nosiest stand and there wasn’t much singing at all. I’d say about 100 people were making the effort whilst people sat in silence or exchanged awkward glances and it shouldn’t be this way. You can blame it on lulls in play or the fact that it was a boring first half but that didn’t stop the Palace fans did it? Maybe if we had sung our hearts out and cheered our lads together then they would play better. Just a thought there.
This weekend I was watching an interview with an ex footballer who said that when he signed for a club before he even put ink to paper he would sit with the fans for a couple of games to see how they felt about the club, get their perspective and see things from their point of view. He would base his decision to sign for a club on this. Imagine if Julian Draxler, Jackson Martinez or Diego Costa or one of the many names we talk about had been sitting at that game, with that poor atmosphere. It’s not a great advert for any potential player to come and sign for us.
I know there are various fan groups trying to sort out the atmosphere issue but it lies with people attending the games. It’s about time everyone started to realise we have a lot to sing about. We are top of the league for the first time in 8 seasons and we have been consistently top. We didn’t expect to get there this season after that first game loss to Villa and no matter what happens in the next 4 months we improved this season no end.
Look how many players we have that could walk into some of the best teams in the world: Ozil, Cazorla, Wilshere, Ramsey, Podolski to name a few. They all chose Arsenal for a reason. They make the effort to interact with fans, and play to their best most of the time and we should show them how much we want them there.
We have this amazingly beautiful stadium that has the nickname the ‘Souless Bowl’, do we really want to keep this reputation? Let’s fill the place with noise and then maybe, just maybe we might have something to really cheer about. I will join the other sites in emailing Arsenal and see what kind of motivation we can come up with to get a better atmosphere but on every match day from now on we will post the chants and Arsenal songs on Twitter, print them off and share them with your friends, learn the words and sing your hearts out for our boys, they deserve it.
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