Is Arsenal’s slippage from last season a disaster, or an inevitable regrouping?

 

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By Tony Attwood

I am hearing a few comments at the moment to the effect that Arsenal are not doing as well as they should, because the club is not maintaining the advances that were made last year.

That there were advances last year cannot be mistaken, as one year ago after 20 games Arsenal had ten more points than the club has today, and a goal difference that was 11 superior to that now.

And because a lot of people are making a lot of fuss in the media about Arsenal losing its goalscoring capacity we might also note that Arsenal one season ago had, after 20 games, scored eight more goals than this season.   That is 0.4 goals a game.

That is a decline, and no declines are welcome, but it is a decline at a time when one of our goalscorers is clearly out of form (I speak of course of Martinelli) and one has been injured (Odegaard) but is now getting going again.

But to get a clearer picture I have built a league table of Arsenal after 20 games across the last six seasons, with an extra column on the far right, showing where Arsenal finished at the end of that season.

Arsenal

 

Pos	Season	P	W	D	L	F	A	GD	Pts	End
4	Arsenal 2023/24	20	12	4	4	37	20	17	40
1	Arsenal 2022/23	20	16	2	2	45	17	28	50	2
4	Arsenal 2021/22	20	11	2	7	33	25	8	35	5
8	Arsenal 2020/21	20	9	3	8	26	20	6	30	8
12	Arsenal 2019/20*	20	5	9	6	26	30	-4	24	8
5	Arsenal 2018/19*	20	11	5	4	42	30	12	38	5

* Emery as manager – Arteta took over on 20 December 2019.

What we can note is the volatility of Arsenal’s point tally after 20 games, ranging from 24 to 50 points.  We might also note that for this stage of the campaign, this is the second best performance across these six years.

Now I want to compare this with Liverpool.  And I am taking Liverpool rather than Manchester City, because Manchester City do not represent a fair comparison with Arsenal, because of the money involved.  I am not suggesting Liverpool is an exact comparison with Arsenal, but it is closer than Manchester City in terms of what it can do.

And the question here is, does a team such as Liverpool, also show the volatility that Arsenal shows?

And the answer when we look at the table is yes.  Liverpool’s best season after 20 games saw them achieve double the number of points as in their worst season across these seasons.

Liverpool

 

Pos	Team	P	W	D	L	F	A	GD	Pts	End
1	Liverpool 2023/24	20	13	6	1	43	18	25	45
10	Liverpool 2022/23	20	8	5	7	34	28	6	29	5
3	Liverpool 2021/22	20	12	6	2	52	18	34	42	2
4	Liverpool 2020/21	20	10	7	3	40	23	17	37	3
1	Liverpool 2019/20	20	19	1	0	49	14	35	58	1
1	Liverpool 2018/19	20	17	3	0	48	8	40	54	2

 

Now it could be argued that Arsenal’s position in the league will be volatile because the club is struggling to establish itself at the top.  But Liverpool had four years in the top three, including one season in which they ended up with 99 points, just one short of the all time record.

So my argument is that for clubs that are not backed by an oil state and which (at least up to now) have had the freedom to spend their money as they wish, there is going to be some coming and going for each club in the league table.  The aim is of course to try and do what Wenger did and stay in the top four for 20 seasons running, without the funding of an oil state.

There is another point in comparing Arsenal with Liverpool and that is the volatility of the goal difference – which both clubs have shown by this point in the season.

So what do these clubs have to do in order to stay competitive with Manchester City and its seemingly limitless amount of money?

The answer, from this simple comparison, seems to be that we have to accept that some seasons will be seasons of rebuilding in which points tallies will slip, but the club will try and maintain the position at or near the top, when the club gets there, for as long as possible.

In short, there will be slips backward, as long as the current situation which allows a club financed as Manchester City to continue to play in the League.   But we should keep the faith and keep on pushing forward in the hope that this anomaly will eventually be removed.

And there is one other point: Arsenal brought in Rice, Havertz, Timber and Raya for this season, which is a fairly major set of adjustments – not just for them but for other players.  Havertz certainly has taken a time to settle – not at all helped by the return of the Anti-Arsenal Arsenal contingent who have crticitised him at every turn.

He was expected to score goals, and this has taken a while, but he is now taking up a place in the group of goalscorers.  Saka has six in the league, Nketiah five, and Havertz and Odegaard four each.  To me, that looks like a new scenario settling down.