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Just published on the Arsenal History site:  100 Years since Chapman joined Arsenal part 17: very dubious dealings

By Tony Attwood

So now we know: Arsenal sailed through last night as the third-best team in Europe.  Not bad considering the “fact” that in the run-up to the game we were told “Mikel Arteta battles injury crisis amid Arsenal’s crammed January schedule”, while Arsenal were  ‘One game away from a crisis’ (Jamie Carragher).  And of course going back to last year we had prolonged tales of Arsenal face defensive crisis )

And I am not noting just the remorseless doom gloom doom gloom petty tales from the media at the moment – this has been going on forever.  But it has just been hyped up of late, for who can forget “Arsenal ‘deserved’ nothing from humiliating cup defeats – now Tottenham have the chance to end the Gunners’ season and send them into complete crisis.”  That was Goal.com who not so much lost the plot, never fully understood that they were inventing a plot in the first place.

As ever, an apology for such atrocious journalism would be welcome, but we won’t get one.  And of course, these were not the only outbreaks of nonsense in recent weeks.  For way back in November, we had Arsenal hold crisis meeting.   What crisis?

I doubt that any club ever has been pilloried in this way, while actually having a certain level of success.  Here for example is the Champions League table for British clubs…

 

	Team	P	W	D	L	F	A	GD	Pts
1	Liverpool	8	7	0	1	17	5	+12	21
3	Arsenal	8	6	1	1	16	3	+13	19
8	Aston Villa	8	5	1	2	13	6	+7	16
21	Celtic	8	3	3	2	13	14	-1	12
22	Manchester City	8	3	2	3	18	14	+4	11

 

And here’s something else you probably won’t read in the media at the moment: Arsenal came out of the Champions League mash-up with the second-best defensive record of any of the clubs – just three goals conceded.  And the third-best goal difference with +13.  And all that through apparently the worst injury crisis that the club has seen in years with only Ben White reckoned to be back by the middle of next month.

Yet Arsenal have now gone 17 Premier League and Champions League matches without defeat – another fact you won’t find readily admitted by the media.  That is 12 wins and five draws in the two top competitions in which Arsenal participate, with 40 goals scored   And yet all those headlines above came in recent days.

And let us also not forget that things are going quite well in the Premier League too… True, as with the Champions League, Arsenal are not top, but those contributions from the journalists are still thoroughly naff and biased.    For example, we’ve just seen the headline  “Postecoglou says Tottenham can still have ‘special’ season.”  And really I am not faking this – that was indeed published yesterday.

 

Pos	Team	P	W	D	L	F	A	GD	Pts
1	Liverpool	22	16	5	1	54	21	33	53
2	Arsenal	23	13	8	2	44	21	23	47
3	Nottingham Forest	23	13	5	5	33	27	6	44
4	Manchester City	23	12	5	6	47	30	17	41
15	Tottenham Hotspur	23	7	3	13	46	37	9	24

 

I am not sure how long the media will keep up the tale of Arsenal failing and Tottenham about to burst forth, but past experience suggests it will go on and on irrespective of results.

Meanwhile, there is another clever trick being used: Aston Villa angered by Arsenal’s Ollie Watkins bid   That is from the Telegraph, and just consider this.  If Arsenal DON’T make an attempt to get any players in, then the club is blamed for being weak, unimaginative, slow, sloppy, sleepy sluggish and probably some other words beginning with “sl”..   But when the media do report Arsenal making a bid (and of course, none of us knows if the bid really has happened or not) they are not praised, but instead, we are told that the club currently having the player on their books are “angered”.

And one may ask, “How come Arsenal are never angered?”    The answer presumably from the media is because none of Arsenal’s players are any good, and Arsenal would be pleased to get rid of all of them.

Besides, why were Aston Villa not angered by Al-Nassr of Saudi Arabia bidding £65 million or more for Jhon Duran?   Could it be they don’t think he’s any good? We are not told.

But let’s be fair.  I mean I know the media are not fair, but Untold should not be dragged into the gutter along with them.   The Telegraph does have another headline that says, Ethan Nwaneri’s stunner reveals a killer instinct that has sadly deserted Raheem Sterling.   But even then, why “sadly”?  After all the media doesn’t seem sad about any Arsenal player who loses form.

Still, we battle on, and here’s one more to finish with from today’s media – or to be more specific, the appalling Telegraph. 

“Five players who must move this transfer window – and the clubs in dire need of reinforcements.”

The clubs in “dire need” of course include Arsenal – it would not be a newspaper story otherwise.  And we are told “Arsenal cannot take a player on loan from another Premier League club” as they already have two such players.  

In fact Arsenal’s position and their strategies, are now so bad I don’t know how we can carry on publishing this blog.  I mean the next thing we know an Arsenal player will be sent off for a minor tackling offence which no one except the referee and his two VAR Assistants thing was a sending-off.  Oh, sorry, that’s already happened.