Arsenal’s Premier League record after 26 games
As we can see, the stat that sticks out is that our goals against is the worst in our PL history (tied with 2011/12) and significantly higher than our average. But nothing else appears to be a big issue in comparison to previous seasons.
So we have to look elsewhere to find what it is that gives some of us concerns ……
The PL is a six horse race and we have been also-rans in the last 14 seasons, in that time Man U have won 5 titles, Chelsea 5, Man C 3 and Leicester 1. This season it will be either Man C, Liverpool, or even Spurs.
The Leicester win was a one off occurrence by an inspired team and manager – self belief was a big factor.
Man U won 5 titles in 7 seasons with Alex Ferguson as manager but has not won in the last 5.
Man C are the rich kids on the block and won their first title in 2011/12 and have since won 2 more.
Chelsea’s riches gave them their first title in 2004/05 they repeated in 2005/06 and have won 3 times since.
Liverpool and Spurs are still PL virgins and long may it last.
So all that said, what about Arsenal – if it’s not stats then what is it?
Arsene Wenger treated us to many wonderful memories, far too many to list, in his final 14 seasons he did not win the PL but did win 4 FA Cups and 4 Charity Shields.
Unai Emery took over the reins on May 23, 2018 and he has an array of achievements.
Getty Images
Sevilla
UEFA Europa League: 2013–14, 2014–15, 2015–16
Paris Saint-Germain
Ligue 1: 2017–18
Coupe de France: 2016–17, 2017–18
Coupe de la Ligue: 2016–17, 2017–18
Trophée des Champions: 2016, 2017
Individual
Miguel Muñoz Trophy (Segunda División): 2005–06, 2006–07
La Liga Manager of the Month: March 2014, January 2015
European Coach of the Season: 2013–14
UNFP Manager of the Year: 2017–18
Unai’s record as a manager
I would offer that Unai has inherited the same set of problems and issues that dogged Arsene in his final seasons.
Specifically,
- Injuries to key players – in key positions
- Lack of funding forcing creative purchases
- Overpaid players
- The Bosman Ruling
- Inadequate positional balance
- Over reactive supporters
Personally I’m not equipped with the knowledge to give definitive answers to these issues but one thing I do know and advocate is that Unai Emery has the future of our illustrious club in his capable hands.
He needs the support of both the management and supporters in order to achieve his goals and our dreams.
I wish him a successful and fulfilling career at Arsenal.
Give the man a chance.
GunnerN5
Arsenal News 24/7
arsenalarsenal.net 
Thanks, GN5.
I really like the 26 games played comparison.
Goal difference seems a good indicator of how to rank a season. The Invincibles season only beaten into second place by 2007/8. It really was a missed opportunity with Flamini, Fabregas and Hleb cruising in midfield. That Eduardo injury at Birmingham seemed to have such far reaching effects.
Predictably the seasons with the lowest goal difference are the later George Graham seasons. Just imagine if the internet had been a thing in those days!
Good luck to Unai. I hoping he can steady the ship sooner rather than later.
(Once he’s finished building it, of course 🙂 )
Great work GN5, there is nothing anyone can argue with about all that. I’m pleased to see everyone picking themselves up after recent set backs … Unai has to keep positive and believe in himself and that will transmit to the team.
We all know how a few bad results can bring despair and a couple of good results can make everything look rosy again. I expect us to progress to the next round of the EL and at some point achieve (but not necessarily hold on to) 4th spot before the end of the season.
Good luck to Unai, I’m not sure he realised what he was letting himself in for … but he sure knows now!
GN5,
You are the Rolls Royce of Stats Reports!!
Excellent stuff. 😀 ✌️
GN5
Thanks very much. It’s interesting what figures stand out for different readers. For you, and I do understand this, it is the Goals Against column for this season, whereas my eyes took me straight to the Goals For column of the 1992/3 season and I was struck by the paltry figure of 25 and what a terrible time to be a Gunner that was! 🙂
I made a comment t’other day that I was losing my enthusiasm for blogging, (not on AA, I must say) and because I was not feeling too well early this morning, I tried to distract myself by reading the Arsenal twitterati comments.
I rarely do that, but I certainly was horrified by the sheer hatred, etc, that was shown there. Much worse than the blogs. It was so horrific that at least it made me forget the pain in my head for a time.
A quick look at non-football tweets to have a comparator made me realise there was very little difference in the boilerplates that was spewed, written by disturbed people I suppose. There’s an awful lot of them — maybe I was looking at the wrong parts?
Sheesh.
Thanks for the comments guy’s.
Rasp, I am not picking myself up, I’m pissed off with the recent way we have been playing and if that doesn’t change my current attitude will get worse.
I can however clear my head of where we are today and put my trust in Emery to get us back to where we need to be.
Two very different things.
RA,
I rarely wander off to other sites – I find most of them far too volatile.
I just noticed that I did not change the formula for the 2003/4 Invincible season.
It should be –
P26, W19, D7, L0, Pts 64, GF51, GA17, GD34.
Done
Thank you Mr. Blog Master
The more I think about it the more I believe that Unai will create an Arsenal team that can compete at the top level – the big “if” is if the club release the funds he needs to buy the players of his choice.
Micky, how very dare you!!
Season 1992-3 – FA Cup and League Cup Winners. One of the best home shirt from Adidas of all time, and a fashion zenith with the away shirt! Andy Linegan, Ian Wright, Wright, Wright. We of the average home attendance of 30,611 loved singing “1-0 to the Arsenal”, (NOT!),and knowing, unlike today, that we could expect 3pts. Good times…..
Great post and read. Just to put the PSG record in perspective qs Emery is the coach with whome we lost our Ligue 1 title in his first season. Also he is the coach that was in charge during the debacle against Barcelona…and the French league is very much a formality for PSG because of the budget gap…The only teams that could bother us are Lyon and Monaco and then every year, there is a surprise team. This year it is Lille but it could have been Marseille or Saint-Etienne. Marseille, St-Etienne and Nice are all getting cash injections so eventually we will have a Top 4 with:
PSG, Monaco, Lyon, Marseille
And then 4 teams to compete for Top 6 spot:
St-Etienne, Nice, Bordeaux and Lille
I think in 5 years time, the French league will be much more attractive to both players and broadcasters.
Another league that is picking up again is the Italian league. Both Milan teams are putting together nice teams…Inter is close to securing Rakitic after having secured Godin and Milan is going to pounce again this summer while Napoli is no l onger a selling club and Roma want to build a strong squad again…So Juve, Napoli, Inter, Milan, Roma will be forces to reckon with while Lazio will continue to be solid as well so again another strong top 6 that could excite players and broadcasters.
Ultimately, the Italian and Frnech league will try to emulate the EPL in terms of TV Rights because that is a massive revenue source but to do that, you need quality players and football. Italy has become a goal-scoring league and France is also trying to be more attacking.
EPL: City, Utd, Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal, Tottenham
SL: Barcelona, Real, Atletico, Sevilla
FL: PSG, Lyon, Monaco, Marseille
IL: Juve, Napoli, AC Milan, Inter
GL: Bayern, Dortmund
These teams could become the future European League.
Bottom 6 go to national league…Imagine…only fun games but also a loss in terms of national rivalries…
Hazard demands Zidane as Head Coach if Sarri is sacked…Chelsea board considering Zidane option. Zidane considering Chelsea job if given guarantees of keeping Hazard and transfer kitty of 200 Mln pounds…
Chelsea under Zidane:
Kepa – Azpiculueta, Rudiger, RECRUIT, Alonso – Jorginho, Kante – RECRUIT – Willian, RECRUIT, Hazard
Recruits:
– Starters: Varane or Aldewereid, Kroos, Mbappe or Rashford
– Squad players: Sidibe, Asensio, Mertens
Kepa – Azpi, Rudiger, VARANE, Alonso – Jorginho, Kante – KROOS – Willan, MBAPPE, Hazard
I wrote a comment elsewhere this morning, trying to get my head around the vitrifying of fairly innocuous comments which smashed them into sharp fragments which could seriously cut a blogger’s self esteem– unsurprisingly it went down like a lead balloon.
So, I thought I would copy paste it here, after all, why should you lot escape it. Remember, it was simply an exercise in writing a comment summing up a viewpoint without pointing fingers, or being judgemental generally. 😜
Debating football in general, and Arsenal in particular can lead to serious misunderstandings when words or phrases are used in an argument with an implied understanding by one party that the definitions of these words or phrases are universally accepted by the other party/(ties).
The use of the expression “organic change’ has crept into the lexicon, and is defined as an ‘evolutionary process’, and has been applied to the era post-AW.
Spoken English can be a tricky communication tool at the best of times, as it has so many nuances. In its written form it can be the cause of major rows because meanings are not always understood by all parties, and there is often little opportunity to stop and explain what was actually meant.
Applying the phrase ‘organic evolution’ to the throwing away of playing assets (Sanchez/Rambo and maybe Özil) or their monetary value by allowing contracts to run down, can make sense in that it is a change from the past, but as that phrase is widely understood to mean that it refers to a gradual change, it can also be used as an indication of the time expected to accomplish a sweeping task, such as changing the style of play, the way players are recruited, their age range, or the more complete introduction of suitable youth players.
Emery, for example, has effectively only been in charge of the team for about 6/7 months and it is difficult to judge him on such a short ‘evolutionary timescale’, I would suggest.
In addition, he was a given the role of coach at a time when there has been a groundswell of change at Arsenal following the deposing of AW, a brilliant manager of 22 years, and the Chief Exec, Gazidis choosing to leave Arsenal for pastures new at about the same time, as well as the changes in the corporate structure of the football management, and then the unexpectedly rapid departure of one of those key appointees, (Sven) and that would tax even the best of managers.
Use of the word ‘values’, as in Arsenal’s values, is another expression that is potentially difficult to use in a discussion without carefully explaining what is meant. ‘Values’ is usually defined as ‘the principles or standards of behaviour’ but that, applied to Arsenal’s values, is a somewhat esoteric, personalised and therefore subjective expression, and each fan may have their own view on what these principals and behaviours are.
I was just trying to rationalise the moot differences, and the major ones too, that I have read over the past few days in blogs and Twitter, following the Bate bashing.
For what it is worth, and leaving aside any judgemental matters concerning the club;
1. I think any manager appointed at this time, needs to be a very strong character/personality to be able to bear the weight of outrageous fortune that inevitably strikes in such turbulent times, such as injuries to key personnel, as well as needing to be
a technically excellent coach. [Not sure that Emery has both of those attributes, or either — but too soon to judge?]
2. I have loved Mesut Özil ever since I saw him play for Real Madrid. That has not changed — I want to keep him, so stop being silly please (Arsenal) and use his talents, rather than flatten his ass on the bench. In your case, Mesut, put in a shift in every game, and show the doubters, and there are many, that you are still top drawer.
3. I also love, Rambo, and his amazing comeback from his career threatening leg injury all those years ago has been amazing. He is superb action man, even in a floundering team. Sadly, he has effectively gone from Arsenal already – how the hell did that happen? We should have kept him in the peak of his powers.
4. The obvious boost, it seems to me, which would help overcome our current team struggles, would be to bring in some more of the cream of the youth crop. That could make all the difference for the later part of the season, and that would lift both the team and the fans.
Fred,
Sorry – the above is a bit long for everyone not just you — don’t bother reading it is the solution. 🤪
Incidentally, your comment at 2 p.m. — the top, right hand picture of Hector is a bit rude — was he just pleased to see his girlfriend?
RA,
You are a wordsmith of the highest order.
Your comment describes exactly what happens on blogs, including AA, and if it is/was met with derision then it’s the reader that needs to look in the mirror and not the writer.
Lol @ RA
RA
I always go for “organic” if I can as it seems like
good ” value” in terms of taste.
I don’t know about pleased to see his girlfriend, Hector’s lady on that basis should be pleased to see him!!
I wonder if Emery has just decided that naming 4 vice captains at the beginning of the season was a ridiculous idea so now he’s slowly moving them on to cover up his stupidity.
Cech, Ramsey and Özil were 3 of them. If I was Xhaka I would be very worried.
Nice one GN5. 🙂
Can anyone explain to me what Jorginho does for Chelsea that Fabregas couldn’t have done? He barely moves and is there solely to distribute the ball. None better than Fabregas at that.
Lineker, Shearer, Hasselbaink, P.Neville, Fletcher, Bridge, Keown plus Chappers and a commentator.
Apparently that’s how many people are needed to present and analyse a 90 minute game of football on the BBC.
Ridiculous
Motning,
My day always begins with a one minute scan of a few news sites. Unusually for me, this motning I looked at a UK one, Skynews.
Only interesting bit was case of that South African bloke woman athlete. Because people can self determine their sex, I guess footballers who don’t make it at the highest level in the men’s game could switch to girls football
Mustafi, for example, could just change his name to Shirley, and bingo
Haha, Shkirley Mustafi. Nice.
I saw an online form the other day and under the question ‘Gender’ there were three options …
Male
Female and
I’d rather not say.
p.s. I wonder if the beard would have to go?
Micky
Here’s a location question for you. The photo is from 1968.
Piccadilly
Chas
Re the beard: get with the times, man. In 21st century Britain you cannot run around the streets telling women to shave their beards off 🙄
I had a ghastly feeling something like that would appear 🙂
Piccadilly now – same view
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.5083087,-0.1393789,3a,75y,84.17h,102.01t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sGTnARzxneY-XVdSHNj2cCA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656
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