By CHARLIE WYETT
ARSENE WENGER will appear in front of shareholders at Arsenal’s annual general meeting this morning — and it could not have come at a worse time.
A 1-0 league defeat at Norwich on Saturday was bad enough.
But a first home Champions League group stage defeat since moving to the Emirates in 2006 will ensure some tough questions today.
And it is fair to say boss Wenger will not be sitting comfortably.
The Frenchman was able to avoid questions from the Press last night as he was serving the third and final game of a touchline ban, so No 2 Steve Bould faced the music.
Yet Wenger will be on stage, in the firing line, at the club’s north London home today.
Talking to the people who — you could argue — really matter. The fans.
People who have invested varying degrees of money in the team they love, supporters who have waited over seven years for a trophy.
Well on the evidence of the last two games, Arsenal could complete an eighth year without a pot.
An impressive Schalke side condemned the Gunners to only their second loss in 45 home Champions League games, with that other defeat coming against Manchester United in the 2009 semi-finals.
And this result completed a disastrous five days for Wenger who, until then, had enjoyed a far smoother ride compared to the start of last season when, for the first time, his future at the club was being called into question.
Arsenal were awful at Carrow Road at the weekend and on Matchday Three of the Champions League, they were not much better, particularly going forward.
One feature of today’s AGM will be the amount of money Arsenal have made over this last year, helped by the sale of land but, most painfully of all, Robin van Persie.
And how they needed the flying Dutchman last night.
Instead, two of Van Persie’s Holland team-mates — Klass-Jan Huntelaar and the impressive Ibrahim Afellay — twisted the knife with goals in the 76th and 86th minutes.
In Wenger’s defence, Lukas Podolski and Santi Cazorla have been outstanding additions to his squad.
Yet the Gunners are still missing a central striker capable of magic.
Last night, Wenger played Gervinho instead of £13million summer signing Olivier Giroud. Apart from one outrageous dive, Gervinho did nothing.
Wenger has not been helped with injuries. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Theo Walcott, Abou Diaby, Kieran Gibbs, Bacary Sagna and Wojciech Szczesny were again absent.
Fit-again Jack Wilshere was left out of the squad but will return against QPR on Saturday, a clash that is now as important for the home side as Mark Hughes’ basement boys.
Arsenal’s lack of intensity going forward here, though, was a major worry. Aaron Ramsey played wide on the right but the move did not work.
Equally, Wenger’s side looked incredibly weak on the left-hand side of defence, with Andre Santos absolutely hopeless. The return of Gibbs cannot come quickly enough.
If Wenger has any sense, he will switch Thomas Vermaelen to left-back for this weekend and partner Per Mertesacker with Laurent Koscielny.
Santos has qualities going forward but he cannot defend and, on numerous occasions, this inability caused Arsenal major problems.
Equally, keeper Vito Mannone is a major worry and he, too, is not good enough for the Gunners.
He made another error at Norwich and was lucky not to concede a penalty after 11 minutes last night.
The Italian rushed off his line to block Afellay and even though there was contact, the Schalke star was penalised for a dive. Mannone got lucky.
Schalke are a quality side and included Lewis Holtby — a tidy, Everton-supporting midfielder whose dad was a British soldier but he plays for Germany.
Yet Holtby and his team were denied by some excellent first-half defending by Mertesacker, who continually covered for his team-mates’ errors.
Mertesacker was beaten just once by Huntelaar before the break, yet a decent chance was wasted.
After the break, Jefferson Farfan then breezed past Santos with alarming ease. He teed up the ball perfectly for Benedikt Howedes but the centre-half delivered a shot you would expect from a centre-half.
So the game was meandering towards a goalless draw. Wenger made his first change in the hope of a goal being scored and it happened. At the other end.
Defender Atsuto Uchida was again a danger down the right and while his cross was blocked by Santos, the ball ended up bouncing in the centre of the pitch.
Afellay headed it between Vermaelen and Mertesacker and Huntelaar buried his effort past Mannone.
The bricks were coming down on Arsenal’s European fortress and it got even worse.
Arsenal lost possession in the middle of the pitch, Farfan crossed and Afellay — unbelievably — found himself unmarked at the far post before firing home.
One good piece of news for Arsenal was that Olympiakos, the worst team in the group, scored a late goal to win 2-1 in Montpellier.
But that will not help Wenger at the Emirates today, where the club’s largest shareholder Stan Kroenke will also be in attendance.
You can bet, though, that Silent Stan will not say a lot.
