Is this the Best Arsenal Side since the Invincibles?

32 thoughts on “Is this the Best Arsenal Side since the Invincibles?”

• We are comparing apples and oranges. In 2001-2 the only real opposition to the Arsenal was Manchester United. Liverpool and City were lesser lights. As well, big money wasn’t in the game as compared to today. As well, the lower half teams couldn’t beat the top 4 teams very often.

  Today, there are 3 other teams who are very competitive: Liverpool, City, and Spurs with at least 2 more knocking at the door. The style of play has changed as well with Arteta-ball replacing Wengerball. Their approach to the game is different but they are after the same final result, a hard hitting, very fast game which delivers results. We have a broader depth of skills and strengths than Wenger had and our bench is much more endowed as well.

• I think size matters a lot to MA indeed, mate, so much so that imo, provided everyone’s fit (hence the brackets), we might be treated to …

  Raya

  White-Saliba-Gabriel (Kiwior)-Timber (Tomiyasu-Kiwior)

  Partey-Rice

  Saka-Odeggard-Martinelli (Trossard)

  Havertz

  … when “real” football resumes.

  I don’t know the average size of that bunch, but I bet it’d be one of our most formidable ever.

  Otherwise, I’d have Jens ahead of Raya any time; as for Ashley, call me unforgiving, but I’d really want to see more of Timber before passing judgment on the L(W)B spot, the (too??) little I’ve seen of him so far has taken my breath away …

• Indeed, Don. Our bench has become stronger, as LG points out above, especially in defence. If Wenger started with Lauren, Sol, Toure and Cole at the back, he could only call upon Keown, Cygan, Clichy and Hoyte.

  However Wenger had excellent midfielders and forwards in reserve: if he started with Ljungberg, Pires, Gilberto, Viera, Henry and Bergkamp, he could call upon Kanu, Wiltord, Aliadiere, Reyes, Edu, Parlour and Bentley.

  I won’t call you unforgiving, LG. I’m a pastor and I still want to scragg the scrote for his desertion. In fairness I have arrived at the opinion that the club could have kept him with a better contract offer. If Timber overtakes Ashley performance wise, we are in for a magnificent few years ahead.

• A fine post, Stu. There’s plenty of steel and silk in the current team, and I like your comparison.

  Combined 11 is so hard. I think mine would be:

  Mad Jens

  Campbell Saliba Big Gab Saka

  Freddie Paddy Rice Ode

  Thierry DB10

  Unbeatable. 🙂

• Interesting subject to bite into, Stuart, as we twiddle our thumbs, waiting for Citeh. The watch word for me there is “since”, so not quite a straight comparison with the Invincibles, as a nod to how good the current team makes us feel.

  It hhas been a while since any Arsenal side filled fans with optimism as Arteta’s 2022/23 and 2023/24 sides have (the latter, more so). The allusion to the relevance of size also appeals to me. For long, we have been roughed up by less talented teams and succumbed to unexpected defeats; but no longer so, with the current team who give as good as they get while still maintaining their focus on the goal(s).

  For a combined 11, I would have gone with TA’s team but stick in Gilberto and Timber for Freddie and Saka and have a 4-3-3 (instead of a 3-5-2, as TA appeared to have chosen) and have…

    Mad Jens

  White – Saliba – Campbell – Timber

    Gilberto – Paddy – Rice

    Saka – Henry – Pires

  midfield would be about power, while creativity will not be lacking with Saka, Pires and Henry, anyway.

  Tough jjob, coaching and selecting an 11.

• Wow! No DB10, Eris. And Saka at left back, Total.

  Looks like I am outvoted on the keeper. Kev will come to my rescue.

  Good news about Tomi.

• I loved Jens, I thought the decision to replace him with Almunia for a spell under Wenger showed that Arsene was losing his touch, but if you want to play out from the back then you have to pick Raya.

• That’s why I would pick Gabriel over Campbell, but Cole could tuck into midfield.

• I loved Bobby Pires but he couldn’t do the press, the only exception I’d make would be Bergkamp who would be a false 9

• My team would be:

  Raya

  White
  Saliba
  Gabriel
  Cole

  Rice
  Vieira

  Odegaard

  Saka
  Bergkamp
  Henry (on the left flank as in his Barcelona days)

• Jens was tall with a good reach, made good saves and I love his bursts of mad-ness/unpredictability. Playing out the back wasn’t a thing until a few years back, but I get it; Raya would do a better job at that.

  I ccouldn’t leave out any one of those three midfielders and had no idea how to shoe-horn DB10 in there. He will certainly be my first sub, after the starters have worn down the opposition. 😅

• Yeah! Great news about Tomiyasu.

  I llike your selection, Kev.

• Cheers Eris, I see that Manu Petit admitted recently that he deeply regretted leaving Arsenal for Barcelona back in the day, apparently he did it for a woman…

  Let that be a lesson to you all. 😄

• A honeytrap. I liked Manu, he was a brilliant foil for PV4, but Gilberto and Edu more than made up for his departure.

  Yeh, nice balance to your team, Kev. The Pires in my team is the pre injury version. He, Cole and Thierry had something very special down our left side. I can see MO8 behind Thierry and the younger Bergkamp. As he matured DB let the fast boys (Overmars, Wright, Anelka, Henry) loose with his sublime passing. I feel he and MO8 may take up the same positions if playing together.

• One for you, LG…

• I see a symphony.

  Goes to show too, that the Late Great Jonah L. was a much more subtle player than what he was given credit for, then. What a player he was – what a man!

• Hehehehe! I saw that interview with Petit and was not sure whether to laugh or feel sorry for him. Arsenal is a great club to call home and that’s why most players who leave have a tinge of regret. RvP is living in denial because fans won’t give him an easy way back.

• Whilst the subject of rugby Union is on the agenda I was, as an Englishman, very impressed with the England U20 team, who won their 6 Nations tournament topping it off with an impressive 31-45 win in France against a very talented French team. It looks as if their is a rich vein of English talent coming through and the next few years should be encouraging for the red rose.

• I watched the U20 game on “L’Equipe” site, Kev. It was as thrilling as the big boys’ showdown the day after. England’s second half was jaw-dropping, all the more so that this was a very strong French side; Perpignan’s starboy Posolo Tuliagi had even been brought back from the first team’s squad, into the young “Bleus”‘s – to no avail, obviously.

  We’re in for years of a fierce rivalry, or so it seems … I just hope Borthwick will keep leaving Marcus Smith out, btw – the lad’s pure dynamite.

• LeG what impressed me was the number of tries, by both sides but particularly England. Now that the best Irish team in living memory is gradually breaking up it’s going to be down to the Anglo-French again to carry the Northern Hemisphere flag.

  Really interesting interview with Jack Wilshere, I’ll leave a link, but reading between the lines for me seems a worrying lack of grit and a bloody-mindedness that you need to make it in pro-football from the present youth generation.

• Ok, I can’t seem to cut n paste it but if you go to Google and type in :

  Up Front with Simon Jordan.

  Then click on the Wilshere interview.

• Food for thought(s) indeed Kev, thanks for the tip.

  There’s almost too much of it, actually, to write any meaningful comment straight away. I’ll try and give it a shot asap, though.

  Hats off to the interviewer, who really did his homework … and I like the man Jack has become an awful lot, too.

• Jacky Wilshere, a name for a Spitfire pilot. Most excellent interview, thanks Kev. Always loved him. Our newest signing reminds me of him…

  Ethan (Hebrew: strong, firm, enduring) Nwaneri (Igbo: Child that eats.)

  COYG.

• Nice one Stu. That young man’s surname is an anagram of…. A Winner. Says it all. 🙂

• Uplifting news re GN5

  Hi 🙂 Sorry have been busy…
  Dad is continuing to improve but we don’t yet have a firm date as to when he can resume normal activities. He is expected to make a full recovery though so it is just a matter of time 🙂

• Gee, thanks Total. That’s truly uplifting and good enough for me, re GN5. He must be buzzing for the game on Sunday, as we all are.

• Good job, there Stuart. You must have a Nigerian og Igbo origin around you, or you keep a dictionary for other languages. 😄

  I ddo hope young Ethan Nwaneri gets to be all that he can be, with us.

• Watchin’ Bayern-Borussia. It’s HT in Munich, 1-0 to Dortmund, and I can barely believe what I just saw. To say that Bayern look like the ghost of a professional team would be much too nice an assessment for their shameful performance.
  Where to start? The goal, maybe … worthy of the kind of goal 3rd-tier – and beyond – teams concede on a regular basis. 10 yards into Dortmund’s half, Müller miscues a simple pass – his old legs being what they are, he’s now out for the rest of the move. Seeing this, Laimer, the DM who deputizes for Kimmich (who plays RB), does the one thing he shouldn’t do – attempt a hopeless tackle 60 yards from his box – he’s out too, and now the Bayern half opens up in front of the yellow shirts like the Red Sea in front of … well, you know who. Goretzka, who seems to not give a farting f.. k about what’s going on around him, has a nice stroll down the pitch back to his box, so much so that Brandt and Adeyemi just have to run along a straight line – with De Ligt burdened with the impossible task of controlling ’em both. Brandt’s through ball’s weight and timing are perfect, Adeyemi is just outside the 6-yard-box, De Ligt’s so dejected he doesn’t even attempt the tackle he could have. Adeyemi’s shot is weak at best, but Ulreich’s (Neuer’s deputee) left hand is as strong as brown leaves at the end of autumn, so that the ball finally bounces into the back of the net.
  Well … that sums up about everything. On his bench, Tuchel looks like he’s mainly concerned with what Mrs. T. will have cooked for him when he gets home. I don’t think Kane had 10 touches in 45 minutes, but one of them – a header in the 6-yard-box – was such a sitter that you have to consider the possibility he messed it up on purpose. The number of times Tuchel’s boys gave the ball away under no pressure at all is staggering – the stat will be worth checkin’ out. Even Tuchel’s choices are bizarre, to say the least. Kimmich’s absence leaves a huge gap in midfield, I can almost hear Müller’s leg creak from where I sit, and because of his presence, Musiala is relegated on the left, while Gnabry sits on the bench. As for Dier, it makes you dizzy to think that: a) Deschamps will always pick Upamecano instead of our Big Bill b) Tuchel has picked Dier instead of Upamecano; that kind of “mise en abyme” could make you feel sick, really, wonderin’ if, after 60+ years of passion for the game, you’ve ever understood anything about football …
  Anyway, this is the only time I’ve seen Bayern play this season, so I don’t know if we should make too much of this, but Arsenal-Real in the semis doesn’t look like an impossible dream to me, right now.
  As for tomorrow … I don’t know if I should write this, but – I hope the superstitious among you won’t blame me too much for it – but … I feel strangely confident.
  COYG

• Nice comment, LEGALL. 🙂

  I am glad we play them at THOF first. Let’s get a result first and then we can finish it off in Bayern.

• You paint a beautiful picture, LG.

  I see trees of leaves                                     Brown as poo                                        I see them fall                                      For me and you                                      And I think to myself
  What a wonderful world

  I see Black Forest Gateau                                  Sliced all through                                      I see it served up                                     For For me and you                                       And I think to myself
  What a wonderful world

  I hear Bavarians cry
  I watch them groan
  They’ll learn a lesson
  From our very own
  And I think to myself
  What a wonderful world
  Yes, I think to myself
  What a wonderful world
  Ooh, yes

  I share your confidence, ami. On both fronts.

  See you in the early hours.

• Stu, you are a poet and you don’t know it.

  LeG, yes I watched the Bayern vs Dortmund game yesterday and the Bavarians were truly awful, surely they can’t be as bad as they seemed on TV, surely… 🤞🤞🤞

• New Post 🙂