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LONDON. — ESPN pundit Craig Burley has unleashed a stinging attack on Arsenal fans’ willingness to settle for “mediocrity” every soccer season, after the Gunners fell 12 points behind English Premier League leaders Chelsea with defeat at Stamford Bridge on Saturday. Burley, who represented Chelsea, Celtic and Derby County in his career, has advocated greater fan agitation to remove Arsene Wenger as manager and to end an era of “stale” football at Arsenal, who haven’t won a league title in 13 years.

He also launched a blistering attack on “spineless” and “mentally weak” Arsenal fans. Burley, speaking on an ESPN broadcast, laid into supporters of the north London club for what he perceived as an acceptance of mediocrity under Arsene Wenger.

The Gunners currently sit fourth in the Premier League, 12 points behind leaders Chelsea after a 3-1 defeat to their capital rivals on Saturday. Wenger has only returned two FA Cups since 2005 and, though some regulars at the Emirates Stadium have voiced their dissent, Burley believes more fans should be complaining about the relative lack of success.

Speaking on an ESPN broadcast in the United States, Burley said: “I’m telling you, Arsenal fans: you are spineless. You are the mirror image of your team: weak, mentally weak.

“They follow their club across Europe and up and down the country in England, and they accept the mediocrity – and it is mediocrity, by a club of that standard, getting in the top four.

“They keep using the Champions League as some barometer for their success but every year up until now – apart from the time they got to the final in Paris (in 2006) – they’ve been knocked out in the round of 16. Every time. What’s the point?

“Wenger at the moment – one: he’s getting paid well, and two: he’s either too ignorant or arrogant, to think he should not be moving on.”

Far from being entirely negative, Burley insisted Arsenal fans had every right to think big and to take the club in a new direction themselves.

“It should be better than that. It should be about better than just making money and being a business. It should be about having success domestically and on the European front and that’s not what Arsenal are about anymore. And it seems that’s what the supporters are happy to endure as well.

“Arsene Wenger between 1996 and 2004 was amazing, absolutely amazing. But between 2004 and 2017, it is stale. Yet the spineless Arsenal fans will not get up at the Emirates and voice their opinion, and really stamp their feet: ‘We want change, we want change. It might hurt for a couple of years, but we want to go in a different direction.’

“Now if the Arsenal fans don’t believe they’ve got a voice that can change that thinking, that mindset, within the Arsenal hierarchy, then they’re wrong. Because as fans, you can make that change, you can pressurise the board to think again; pressurise the manager to think: ‘Well, I need to maybe take a backseat, and let somebody else get in.’”

Burley’s opinion contrasts sharply with that expressed by Sky Sports pundit and former Manchester United defender Gary Neville, who regarded some Arsenal fans’ complaints as “embarrassing” and controversially called a fan who had displayed an anti-Wenger banner mid-match “an idiot”.

“Arsene Wenger doesn’t deserve that,” Neville said in the post-match analysis of Arsenal’s defeat at Chelsea. “Obviously the Arsenal fans are disappointed, but to preempt by bring a banner into the ground — it’s a joke.

“Think about changing your manager; it might be that you don’t finish in the top four for a few seasons, and actually what Arsene Wenger has achieved is fantastic. So be careful.”

Arsenal currently lie 4th in the Premier League table, 12 points adrift of Chelsea in top spot after two consecutive defeats.

Three FA Cup triumphs, in 2005, 2014 and 2015, are the only trophies the Gunners have to show for the 13 seasons since their last victorious title campaign — the “Invincibles” season, in 2003-04. — The Telegraph.