This is bigger than Poch and the present team. I've said it before, but Poch has performed minor miracles in getting us to this point.
But even he can't change what we are, fundamentally, as a club.
Always the bridesmaids, never the bride. Good fortune and success is always something that happens to other teams, and never us. Other teams get ambitious owners...we get, well, somewhat adequate, penny-pinching spendthrifts looking to flip us on for a profit. Other teams cross the final hurdle and win titles and trophies - we always fall short. Other teams sign players out of their league and have a never-say-die attitude - we seem to be defeated by obstacles that other teams surpass, both in the transfer market and more generally.
We will be nearly men, because the sort of monumental change required to undo that strange sense of fate is once-in-a-century. And we haven't yet experienced that. Nor do we seem to want to - we're happy being bridesmaids, more or less, because, while Poch struggles against massive odds to get us to where we are now, no one really sees that taking us beyond what we are will require the sort of investment that Daniel Levy and ENIC will never provide. Indeed, we have people proud of the fact that we're going to be stuck that way, historically. Even if we do win something here and there - because at least we're also-rans in a sustainable fashion.
I've always been of the opinion that no one cares how history is made or trophies are won, in the long run. No one cares, just as no one now cares that we spent British record transfer fees to bring in the likes of Jimmy Greaves back when we were on top, half a century ago.
Ultimately, as long as we believe that being run like a pound-shop Arsenal will bring us the sort of generational success required to rid us of that curse of spurs.i.ness, I don't think we'll stop being bridesmaids. But hey, c'est la vie - and all you can do is enjoy the small moments.
