Wednesday 16 March 2016 06:41, UK
Sky Sports News HQ's Rob Dorsett is in Barcelona ahead of Arsenal's Champions League clash and has been speaking with Gunners fans about the future of manager Arsene Wenger.
Ask any Arsenal fan here for the game at the Nou Camp, and the same pained expression comes across their face. It hurts them to even think about it.
But, with Arsenal facing another last-16 exit from the Champions League, just three days after being knocked out of the FA Cup at home to Watford, they'll tell you the situation is becoming critical.
It's the main topic among the travelling groups, in every tapas restaurant and bar along Los Ramblas - and they are divided almost 50-50.
"The man is an Arsenal man," says one fan. "A legend. It should be his choice when he goes. I can see him walking, I honestly can. I can't say a word against him, but there has to be change. We are just going nowhere. We just aren't good enough to compete with the likes of Barcelona - one Champions League semi-final in 10 years tells its own story.
"It's all we've heard among Arsenal fans over here. It's been the only topic of conversation. I will never go on telly and call for him to go. I'm 28, and Wenger is all I've ever known. He is Mr Arsenal. But we are now at a stage where enough is enough. Sometimes change isn't a bad thing.
"It's horrible seeing the in-fighting among Arsenal fans right now. He should go. But I hate seeing that banner, the one that says "Thanks for the memories, Arsene" as the fans row between themselves, and some fight to take it down. We have to get behind the team, and save the arguments until the end of the season."
Every Arsenal fan seems to share the sentiment about what Wenger has done for their club, and for English football, over the past two decades. But at least half of the fans I've spoken to - and maybe more than half - think that it's time for a change.
"It's time for him to step down," says another fan I spoke to. "He should've done it at end of last season, because now he's starting to become something of a villain for the fans and that's very hard to take, seeing a man who's done so much for the club becoming hated by so many.
"He's our greatest ever manager, we can never repay him for what he's done. But there has to come a time when he has to move on, and that time is now. It's overdue.
"He's always going to be a legend at our club for what he's done, but I just think it's time for a fresh face, fresh ideas. Wenger has had the same ideas for years. That was fair enough when we were paying off the stadium debt. He managed the club very well in that time. But I find it hard to believe there aren't better players out there we could've bought since then."
Not one Arsenal fan I've spoken to believes they can overturn a 2-0 deficit in the Nou Camp. Though a few believe they can get a result that can rejuvenate the squad (and re-engage the fans) for the games that remain this season.
"We need a bit of passion. It's too late this time. But I'm a football fan and an Arsenal fan. They're the best team in the world. Their front three is unbelievable in Messi, Neymar and Suarez. It's done now, as a contest. I just hope we give a good account of ourselves.
"I've been to Munich and Monaco when we've been two goals behind, and we've gone close. If we get an early goal, you never know."
Leicester's victory over Newcastle opened up a five-point gap to second-placed Tottenham in the Premier League title race, and an 11-point gap to Arsenal. No-one I've met here in Barcelona thinks Arsenal can catch Leicester - but all of them are united in their support of the Foxes - just so long as it prevents their north London rivals claiming the title.
"It's too big a gap for us now, and we just aren't in any sort of form to put a run together," says one. "It would be great to see Leicester win it - a great story. Just so long as it's not our noisy neighbours down the road! We will all be backing Leicester now.
"But I think Spurs will win it. And that kills me to say, but I think they've got the easier run in. Of course I'd rather see Leicester win it rather than Spurs, every day of the week. It'd be the first time in my lifetime that they've finished above us, and it would be unbearable.
"I'm quite enjoying seeing Chelsea and Man City below us, after all the millions they've spent, but it hurts to see Spurs above us. Obviously I'd rather see Leicester win the League rather than them. We'd never hear the end of it otherwise."
