Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger says he will take a 'gut' decision whether he stays or goes this summer

Wenger has not decided on his future yet but he will need the support of the fans if he is to sign the two-year extension he has been offered

Wenger is in the midst of a four-game touchline ban (Getty)

Are we turning into the final corner of the Arsene Wenger era? That is how it feels, with just 15 Premier League games left this season, the last of Wenger’s current contract. There is a new deal on the table but Wenger will not be rushed into making his “gut decision” whether he signs it or not.

Whether Wenger continues as Arsenal manager is only up to him, a weight that he wants to bear all by himself. Of course his players want to know who their manager will be next season, and Mesut Ozil has even said that his decision on his own future will be informed by what Wenger does. But Wenger, speaking at his press conference yesterday morning, told his waiting squad that they should worry about Chelsea before they worry about him.

“My future has always been certain, I focus 100 per cent until the last day of my contract,” Wenger said, not for the first time. “That is the only way you can guarantee the future. We worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow is not in the summer. It is tomorrow.”

It was not a rallying cry, more of a reminder that if the players focus too much on the bigger picture then they will lose the ability to focus on the details. That is what happened on Tuesday night, when Arsenal simply did not show up, a mental failing Wenger has spent all week trying to explain. If they do that again at Stamford Bridge the scoreline will be far uglier than 2-1. Wenger told his players that they must think about Chelsea, not about him. “They have to not think beyond the game,” he said. “They have to think on tomorrow’s game.”

It is good advice but nothing that happens at Stamford Bridge can be as important as the decision Wenger will make about his future. Wenger gave the clearest indication yet of how he will decide if this is the end or not. He needs to know that he is still taking Arsenal in the right direction, but he will not make himself hostage to any target or metric. “It is not all quantifiable,” Wenger said. “It is linked with your gut feeling as well.”

That gives Wenger flexibility to make his own mind up. He will not be compelled to stay by a strong league finish, or an FA Cup win, just as he would not have to stand aside if the team achieves neither. Last season, for example, Arsenal ended up second, their highest finish since 2005, but it did not look like a sign of obvious progress.

Even gut decisions are not made in a vacuum, and the atmosphere around the club will define which way Wenger jumps in four months’ time. That means that the attitude of the fans matters now more than ever. Wenger will not want to stay if it means open revolt against him.

The problem is that fans are more fickle and reactive now than they have ever been before. It is easy to see an uprising in post-match boos and online noise. Wenger is a keen observer of social change and thinks that fans appear more emotional than they used to be, because of the means of communication open to them.

“Of course,” Wenger said, when asked if fans appear more to be fickle than they used to be. “Because everybody can express his frustration straightaway, in a fraction of a second. There is no time to take a distance from what happened.”

Ozil has hinted his Arsenal future will hinge on what Wenger does (Getty)

There is no better example of this than Arsenal Fan TV, the YouTube channel that as of Friday afternoon had 323,868 subscribers. It is never more popular than in the immediate aftermath of a bad defeat. After the Watford game 12 videos were quickly uploaded. One featuring regular contributor known as Troopz, who argued that it was time for Wenger to leave, has been viewed 314,946 times already. Another with ‘DT’, along similar lines, 385,347 times.

Wenger did not want to say whether Arsenal fans were more prone to this sort of thing than fans of other clubs. For him this is a social issue, with the same causes as the election of Donald Trump, which so upset him early in November.

“We live in a society that is like that and I cannot change society,” Wenger admitted. “I focus on what I can influence. I live with the response of society. You [the press] are more the captors of what is going on, of the waves in society. Do we go the right way? Maybe. But if you look at society all over the world, we are not really sure.”

Wenger is urging his players to refocus after slipping up against Watford (Getty)

Arsenal Fan TV may not be wholly representative of Arsenal supporters, and certainly not of all those who attend games. But there is a lot to be said in 2017 for simply making the most noise. As Wenger knows only too well, Trump won the presidency with just 46 per cent of the vote.

Wenger’s challenge over the last 15 league games of this season is to make sure that they turn away from what happened against Watford. If Arsenal recover their stability and finish strongly, they can avoid the spasms of rage that sometimes take over the Emirates Stadium and the online community of Arsenal fans.

But if they do not then Arsenal’s season could spiral towards the Europa League. The calls, from the stands and from online, for Wenger to go would be deafening. And at that point it would become politically difficult for Wenger to sign his new contract for another two years. Whatever his gut tells him.