The problem isn’t Mikel Arteta and Jurgen Klopp – The problem is the media

Mikel Arteta has been making headlines this season.

No wonder.

Arsenal riding high in the Premier League, so high in fact that they are currently at the very pinnacle, eight points ahead of Man City and nine ahead of Newcastle United.

As always, you have to laugh when it comes to the Arsenal fans though.

Even though the Gunners top the table after playing 17 Premier League games this season, you only have to go back less than 20 PL matches for when many Arsenal fans were demanding Mikel Arteta should be sacked.

Losing at home to Tottenham and away at Newcastle, Arsenal fans declaring Arteta had blown a Champions League spot last season in the third last and second last league matches of the season, as they ended up in fifth, despite beating Everton on the final day of the season.

Now of course the boot is on the other foot, as Mikel Arteta holds all the aces, for now. Arsenal fans loving their former player / manager, well, at least whilst they remain top of the table…

What about the rest of us though, do we love, well…respect, Mikel Arteta?

I think he has definitely done a good job at Arsenal but…he is now showing clear signs of Jurgen Klopp style behaviour.

I thought he had peaked too early and could never dream of bettering the embarrassing comments he made in October 2021.

After Newcastle United very belatedly sacked their Head Coach, Mikel Arteta was outraged and declared that  ‘Steve Bruce is one of the most important managers that England has had in the last 100 years.’

Dear me, where do you go after that?

However, we have seen Mikel Arteta have a really good go, his behaviour on the touchline last night and comments in his media interviews after the Newcastle United match, were spectacularly embarrassing.

His sense of entitlement, the histrionics, the clear plan to try and unfairly influence match officials by bullying them, it was effectively cheating. The post-match comments on a similar level, making out that he and his side had suffered the worst miscarriage of justice in the entire history of football, in particular, claiming it was ‘scandalous’ that Arsenal hadn’t been awarded two penalties, as though they were the most astonishing clear non-decisions ever.

This is exactly the path Jurgen Klopp went down, Mikel Arteta just doing it so much quicker, in terms of how quickly his behaviour has gone downhill.

However…The problem isn’t Mikel Arteta and Jurgen Klopp – The problem is the media.

When Mikel Arteta was coming out with his nonsense last night, he wasn’t challenged by those interviewing him.

That has followed on into today, with pretty much all the media simply repeating his quotes on how terribly Arsenal were supposedly treated, the two ‘scandalous’ penalties not given and the rest. No challenge to the comments / claims, simply repeated as though they are fact and not opinion. Whilst as for Arteta’s behaviour on the touchline, the best you tend to get is those in the media laughing about it and not calling it out for what it is, totally unacceptable and trying to put undue influence on match officials.

Jurgen Klopp has been doing this for years and when do you ever see him challenged?

There is definitely a two tier approach by the media, maybe even three tier or more.

The likes of Klopp, Arteta and other bosses of the usual suspects, able to say and do what they want with very little, usually no, challenge, Whilst Newcastle United along with most of the others get very different treatment.

It is ironic that Newcastle’s last visit to The Emirates saw NUFC (in Eddie Howe’s first away game) saw the visitors with three penalty shouts when the game was goalless. One of them was unbelievable, Fabian Schar clearly wrestled to the ground at a corner and such an obvious penalty, far beyond anything that happened last night. Yet the referee gave nothing and somehow VAR didn’t intervene whatsoever, same with the other two penalty shouts. Eddie Howe didn’t shout and scream or go on like Arteta and Klopp, but did raise these penalty claims, only for the media have no interest in pushing them.

It has been ludicrous just how many of them and how extreme they have been, when it comes to NUFC on the end of bad decisions / non-decisions under Eddie Howe, yet no media interest. Wilson not getting the penalty at Old Trafford when Varane cleared him out, Fraser last season at home to Man City when Ederson wiped him out and the ball nowhere near, Stones on Schar this season at SJP, the goal at home to Palace this season that was disallowed when Willock was pushed…so many others that I’m sure you can all add.

Yet the same thing happens time after time, the media let the usual suspects get away with saying and doing anything, and rarely, if ever, challenge anything. Just repeat what they say word for word.

The thing is, if a lie is told often enough, it becomes the accepted truth, unless challenged.

There also appears to be a fear of the media to challenge certain clubs / managers. We saw this so often with Alex Ferguson, he could get away with saying anything, due to the media afraid of what then would be the repercussions. Referees even affected as well, so many times when Man Utd needed a goal and the time ticked over longer than it should have done, with Ferguson’s team often benefiting.

You look at Eddie Howe and Newcastle’s quite restrained comments on Leeds time wasting and gamesmanship when hanging on for their goalless draw, the referee having a poor game, the media basically laughing in Newcastle’s faces.

Yet once again, when it is Arsenal and Arteta moaning about Newcastle United doing something similar, in reality less extreme than what Leeds did, the media happily play along and let Mikel Arteta get away with claiming anything.

The way the media treat certain clubs differently, does then undoubtedly, in my opinion, then end up in also helping these clubs get advantages also in many matches, whether it is subconsciously or not, when it comes to referees and VAR officials.

So often you watch on TV as the ‘Big’ clubs get far more marginal decisions in their favour than the rest.