- Beware the quotes of what players said, they may well never have said them
- Fleetwood v Arsenal: the line up and a choice of goalkeepers
By Tony Attwood
Now here is a headline which up to a year or so ago I never thought I would read: “Manchester United can end doom spiral – if they copy this Arsenal template.” I mean holding up Arsenal as an image of how to succeed is just not done! Even when we had the unbeaten season we were told that it was a noose around our necks because the first defeat – when it did come – would topple the club and we’d decline for game after game because we wouldn’t be able to stop losing.
But in fact it is the long run without defeats that now attracts these journos who openly say, “Mikel Arteta’s north London repair job is cause for encouragement…”
But then that is really not that much of an explanation since all managers are encouraged to impose themselves by getting rid of the players who have allegedly “let the club down…” (or for the more sophisticated, “not understood the club’s values” – whatever they are.) Yes it is the players’ fault, and the fault of the management team who bought the dud players, although rarely the fault of the directors who appointed the manager.
As so often in these cases, I am reminded of Arteta’s progress in which Arsenal came 8th, 8th, 5th, 2nd, 2nd, 2nd. And all the way through that progress which as we know led to Arsenal winning the league last season while beating a team now in court for well over 100 misdemeanors, we were still told we had the wrong manager!!
This is not to say that ManU have the right person as manager, but rather that it is the directors who choose the manager at ManU as indeed it is the directors who appoint the manager at Tottenham. Maybe someone should try sacking all the directors. Here’s the table…
| Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Manchester City | 8 | 7 | 0 | 1 | 20 | 9 | 11 | 21 |
| 2 | Arsenal | 8 | 7 | 0 | 1 | 13 | 5 | 8 | 21 |
| 14 | Tottenham Hotspur | 8 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 8 | 10 | -2 | 9 |
| 15 | Fulham | 8 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 8 | 10 | -2 | 8 |
| 16 | Manchester United | 8 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 10 | 13 | -3 | 7 |
Now of course a major part of the angst being spread by the media concerning ManU is the fact that they have won the Premier League 13 times and as result lots of their readers support ManU. Knocking Manu loses a publication readers (while knocking Arsenal gains readers. Knocking Tottenham has no noticeable effect). .
Yet clubs do in fact rise and fall, and the key thing to do if wanting to make predictions is to take the rise and fall of a range of clubs into account. The trouble is that requires a lot of open thinking about the management and recruitment at a lot of clubs. But if Man U start slipping the media become panic stricken.
The reality is that the journalists have created a “Man U Must Win” model of football journalism, because they know more of their readers support Man U than any other club. So they still have to write about Man U, but the only model for writing about a club that is failing that the journalists have is one that says, “change the manager.” And that rarely works immediately as we saw at Arsenal.
Mind you it was interesting to hear the journalists on the media last night talking about the Mancunian failings and suggesting that Manu might employ the Aston Villa manager instead… that being the Aston Villa manager who totally cocked up at Arsenal through blowing most of the transfer budget on a player so bad that eventually we had to give him away as no other club would pay a penny for him.
The fact that ManU have won the Premier league more times than ManC and Arsenal put together does not give them any right to win the league again, just as having a big ground with grandiose plans to make it even bigger does not mean they are immune to relegation. New grounds rarely win games.
But we have all become a bit better at spotting the tricks that wealthy clubs pull through studying the antics of ManC. What it needs is the money to buy multiple players season after season after ….
And this brings us back to a thought that I have raised before – is it really helpful for any league to have one club winning the league over and over again? Are we actually saying that having Bayern Munich and PSG actually make for better entertainment, more enjoyment, better football or anything else by winning the league each year?
Chelsea won the Premier League three times between 2005 and 2010 – not quite up to the PSG level, but we know how they did it, and there are still daggers drawn between the Premier League and the club’s previous owners.
Which should have warned everyone about what the owners of Manchester City might be up to, but seemingly didn’t, until not until some years later.
So the new model has to be be, use other people’s money, win the league a few times and get out of the country as fast as possible. Maybe the league could change the rules to stop that happening quite so blatantly.
And of course I want Arsenal to win the league again, but I want it done, as it is happening, by the slow, careful development and evolution of the team, with a club that actually is not dependent on endless input from rich owners. Chapman, Allison and Whitaker did it. Arteta is moving in that direction creating a self-sustaining club which wins things and doesn’t lose money every season. Just like 90 years ago.
