Arsenal And The Strange World Of Football
Simple in theory. Ridiculously complicated in practice.
We live in a strange world. We are animals living on an organic planet. We are subject to physical forces but we’re also subject to psychological forces where our emotional and mental state drives our perceptions and behaviour.
We invent stories that describe our lives, then we imagine our lives are inseparable from the stories we’ve invented. We are messy, irrational and impulse driven creatures with cognitive biases who continually seek simplicity in a world of complexity. Strange indeed.
But even stranger, we’ve invented an economy and a social system that require us to be rational, predictable creatures who continually act to maximise our advantages and outcomes. And on top of that we’ve digitalised our daily lives to such an extent that we expect specific input to unquestionable lead to a specific output. We expect machine like responses from organic creatures. Basically, we’ve invented a system diametrically opposed to ourselves and the material world.
The problem is that we’ve forgotten this truth.
Football is also a strange world. Football (and sport in general) is essentially a highly managed set of behaviours (kicking, passing, dribbling, positioning, tackling etc. etc.) that are performed within the constraints of highly specific rules (interpreted by non-participating judges - referees) all of which are designed to measure the players/teams ability to perform these specific behaviours to best achieve a predetermined outcome within a set of constraints (score more goals than the opponent). The “winners” are those who outperform the opponents according to the rules.
Simple in theory. Ridiculously complicated in practice. Especially considering, as mentioned, our emotional and mental states are driven by the animal perceptions living within narratives on an organic planet. And, because we’ve invented this digitalised machine-like society where we’re trained to expect machine like outputs to from organic creatures our expectations as fans about football can become severely twisted.
The Arsenal that nervously edged past Chelsea is the same Arsenal that romped 4 goals past Athletico Madrid but it sure didn’t feel like it.
The Arsenal that blew a two goal lead against Wolves is the same Arsenal that dominated West Ham, Brighton, Burnley and all the rest, but it sure didn’t feel like it.
The reason Arsenal are called set piece champions is because other teams employ low block tactics to avoid being taken apart like we did to Spurs, to Leeds, to Sparta Prague but it sure doesn’t feel like it.
There’s a lot of feeling as a fan. Feeling, that’s as much about perception as it is about material reality. And I’m pretty sure (100% sure) it’s exactly the same as a player. In fact, although it’s true to say that physical fatigue is behind a lot of Arsenal’s difficulties recently (Rice and Zubimendi look exhausted and although Trossard always looks exhausted he definitely needs a good sleep) there is also the question of mental fatigue and stress.
Football punditry and commentary and writing these days are all subject to the social environment in which we live. I honestly think the world has gone mad. We’ve forgotten that we’re organic creatures. We’ve forgotten that we’re subject to emotional forces that affect our behaviours, our perceptions, our capacities. If the world were a digital machine filled with people maximising their advantages Arsenal would still be rolling over everyone else on a straight course to victory. But the world isn’t a machine and fans and players are not robots.
I forget it too. I could barely stand watching the Chelsea game. It was painful. My expectations were formed by crushing Real Madrid and Bayern Munich and three seasons of almost, almost, arrgghh, not quite. We are the best team in the world on our day but that’s the point. This fabled “day” isn’t a material reality but a consequence of untold factors and contexts and butterflies flapping their wings in the Amazon jungle. It is true that seemingly insignificant changes in the starting conditions of a system can result in vastly different, unpredictable long-term outcomes.
But I can’t get that into my head. Even though I know that Chaos Theory has absolute merit, even through I know the world is an unpredictable place where the only certainty is uncertainty, I still can’t really embrace that. I want predictability and outcomes I understand. I want the highly managed set of behaviours (kicking, passing, dribbling, positioning, tackling etc. etc.) to be, well manageable. My anxiety levels are telling me so.
Or are they? Maybe I’m just feeling entitled and bratty and needy. Maybe I’ve outsourced my feelings to forces outside my power. Maybe I’ve internalised Arsenal’s successes (or failures) into my sense of identity and I’m feeling threatened by the possibility of not realising what I assume to be my destiny!
Maybe all these things are true and maybe that’s what’s so wonderful about football. Maybe it’s precisely that my psychological state is dependent on forces I have no control over because that’s a mini-mimicry of real life.
Maybe the real problem is I’ve forgotten it’s ok to not achieve some arbitrary set of hopes and dreams that exist only within the constraints of football’s rules. Maybe I’ve forgotten that Losing and Winning are twins, born out of the same illusion, neither making any difference to anything but the perceptions and emotions inside the mind of some animal living on an organic planet who’s obsessed with a formulaic and symbolic representation of life.
I told you we live in a strange world. Because having said all that all I want now is to beat Brighton on Wednesday and keep on track to our first title in 22 years. It’s just that I don’t want the tsunami of anxiety that comes with games these days. Strange world :)
Beautifull article! I always tell my friends that all that's happening it's normal and i really try to transmit confidence and security. Or, may be, i am trying to convince myself. I need to simulate the whole season to calm my anxiety
Well written, I feel the same and nerves are killing me, i just want to build some confidence and momentum until we start playing good again (I know we will). I don't care how we play against Brighton but win please!