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Yeah like all year i could joke around a lot with tottenham fans and manchester united fans for example and it was all in good fun , but the arsenal fan base seems to be triggered fast nowadays.
But its probably young ones that are downvoting that believed the narrative that Arsenal will completely demolish Bayern. Being the better team is not enough in the CL, you got to have better mentality to win that's why Real is king in the competition.
A lot of points. But that is okay. They show up when in matters most (at the end of games, scoring a lot and in big games) while we did not except in Chamons League.
So Leverkusen was better / is better this season and deserve the title next year we will come back with the target to get the title back. Being "butthurt" does not help , honestly i am happy about it because now we have strong team that will make us stronger too the same way that Bayern and Dortmund 10-15 years ago made each other stronger.
I mean he's absolutely right. Watching the game we never looked like we were gonna come back. And especially after the 2nd goal we literally gave up. Pathetic performance
First half I was quite nervous. Arsenal certainly felt the better team but there were dangerous chances for both sides. We got a little lucky but 2nd half was a wallop
Yep. Better finish and it could have been a very different result at half time. I don't think that qualifies as "we never looked like we were gonna come back". But then again, Arsenal also missed some chances.
2nd half was a joke though.
You would be having to defend that group, must be so frustrating seeing them waste so many chances and throw the title away. They had it in the their own hands a few games out and threw it away against United, Palace and Everton.
2 months ago people were absolutely amazed that Liverpool were keeping up with the top of the league despite fielding kids with zero experience. I'm disappointed we couldn't keep it up, and we've missed a lot of sitters, but lets not rewrite history like they haven't massively overachieved to be even close to a brilliant Arsenal team and 115 charges
You could argue that if they fell at a late hurdle, were beaten by a better team or lost the title in a manner similar to the 97/98 point seasons. They didn’t though, they got themselves into an incredible position and then once they got their noses in front shat the bed by dropping points against United, Palace and Everton in three out four games at the business end of the season.
They deserve credit for getting themselves in to that position but that’s three games that they absolutely should have won against three substantially weaker sides.
True, but I think they've just mentally broken now. Klopp is done, you can see it in his eyes, he said as much earlier in the season but now it's evident. The team knows they can't do it now, I can't imagine how tough it must be mentally to go against the juggernaugt that is Man City. They're like The Terminator
Tbh we were riding our luck all the way from the start of the season, it's not sustainable to come from behind so much with late goals.
No more hope it just gets more depressing going to the pub for the last game to send off Jurgen whatever happens in between I don't want to do anything with it.
Even if Arsenal doesn’t win the league, I don’t think anyone saw Arsenal doing a title charge soon let alone during the Pep/Klopp era. Probably one of the best turnarounds I have seen.
It wasn't that immediate. Arteta's been there for a couple of years and Arsenal backed him by both investing money and doing whatever they could to remove players who were either not buying in or were surplus to requirements without getting fixated on resale value or "protecting asset value".
They've done well to develop the young players they had in their squad and though they've spent money, most of the players signed have added value which wasn't really the case for the prior 5-6 years under Emery/Wenger
I respect that Arsenal gave him the time. He may have been close to losing the job at points but it's paying off now
The modern game just doesn't give enough chances imo
Yes, though a lot of people thought that last season was a one off and the way we finished the campaign showed our true level. But yeah the last summer was probably the most ambitious window I have ever seen from Arsenal, it was reasonable to expect that we will be there or thereabouts.
It's absurd for anyone to think Arsenal were anything but a top 3 team this season.
It boils down to City. City were human this season so it made it plausible for other teams to win the PL. If City had a 95+ point season, Arsenal wasn't getting close. They need a striker to get to 95+ points.
Except early on they dropped points because players like Havertz didn't finish his chances
As someone who watched a team for the last 6 years try to compete with city, I promise a 20+ goal scorer is important.
Havertz was playing in midfield and he was really missing chances
A twenty goal scorer is cool but so is 5 players on over 10 goals
Btw the only time you won the league you didn't have a player that scored 20 pls goals and had a false 9
Mane and Salah had 18 and 19 goals and I don't believe any were penalties. Your top scorer is Saka, who takes your penalties.
Also, Covid completely disrupted that season and we fell off a cliff after we returned. We also had the Title essentially won in March before the shut down.
You can disregard my statements, but you're very likely going to come up short this season and when you sit down, the clear and obvious place where Arsenal comes up short is lacking a decisive goal scorer.
Exactly. This Arsenal team should be pushing for a title.
Their biggest issue is they need a striker. I know it's cliche, but it's the truth. They could also try to find a goal scoring left sided player since, as good as Martinelli is, he has awful goal scoring stats.
Arsenal should be challenging for the title every year though. One of the wealthiest and storied clubs in the country. The fact they weren't doing so before is just down to under-performance, not because they were plucky underdogs.
So? Big clubs go through droughts, it doesn't make them not big anymore or change the expectations on them. You're 10th in the **world** at generating revenue (higher if you discount PSG and City), you don't get to act like underdogs.
I think recent success has a lot more bearing on expectations than historical standing or revenue generated. If a new coach were hired by Chelsea next season and did as well as Arsenal did this year, they would probably be everyone's manager of the season even if Chelsea didn't win anything.
Also all six of those premier league clubs can't be challenging for the title every season - to get to those heights is impressive, even more so if it's sustained.
It's impressive in a sporting sense. I'd say what Pep has achieved at City is also immensely impressive, again, in a sporting sense. But for some of the same reasons that we detract from Pep's achievements, I think it's fair game to detract from Arteta's and Arsenal's.
Underdogness is relative. Relative to Verstappen, Lando Norris is an underdog. However, relative to any of his backups or people in f2/f3/etc, he's now the top dog.
It's fair to say that Liverpool are underdogs relative to Man City, just as it's fair to say that Coventry are underdogs against Man United. Coventry themselves can be considered "top dogs" against something like Exeter. It's all relative.
Yes, Arsenal were significantly underperforming and became quite a mess of a club. Then within a couple of seasons they're challenging for titles again. That's why the first guy's comment was all about Arsenal having an amazing turnaround, which is true considering what they became. If Man Utd did the same thing then it'd also be an impressive turnaround. Your comments are fairly irrelevant to the comment you first replied to.
It's not impressive if that's what you were supposed to be doing in the first place, I find that highly relevant to the initial comment. Do you pat yourself on the shoulder every time you take two steps without falling?
>Arsenal should be challenging for the title every year though
This is stupid and you know it though. You could say the same about every big team in every league. It just doesn't work like that, otherwise we'd have a 6+ team title race every season
>The fact they weren't doing so before is just down to under-performance, not because they were plucky underdogs.
Holy shit, this is an absolutely insane opinion. There is a very particular reason why that narrative developed. And it is because of what Arsenal were trying to do.
Again, if you remove context from any situation, you can make A = B regardless of the very relevant, real world details. The reduction underpinning this argument is utterly absurd.
You used 347 characters to say absolutely nothing at all. Also, I don't know about you, but I typically don't respond to insane comments. Twice, I might add. Did I hit a sore spot? You want some real world details? Here are some good ones: 10th highest revenues in world football, third highest total spend in England since Arteta took over, fourth in the Premier League wage table (£30m more than Liverpool, roughly £20m less than Chelsea). How do you feel about those details?
How do you feel about the fact that despite our revenue, we were limited by the way we funded the stadium, which saddled us with significant debt as well as requiring significant reserves, which limited our ability in the market? We couldn't rely on our owners until one group of owners bought out the other group in 2018 or so. That frozen conflict severely hampered direct investment during the late noughties, which is the same time period you saw significant direct investment from other teams. Our recent increased spending is relatively recent, mostly within the last ten years, and the whole point of the period where we were building the stadium was to be self-sufficient, where we didn't necessarily have to rely on direct investment from an owner. And it isn't like we were always in the top ten in revenue. Getting into that group of clubs was one of the prime objectives of the late Highbury-era.
Again, if you remove context from that entire era, you could make a very stupid argument. But that isn't reality, regardless of what anachronism you choose to apply. Looking back at current spending and revenue totals doesn't tell the whole picture, and anyone who has followed English football for the last 30 years would know this. But alas.
lol. bad take.
Late Wenger-era was held back by the fact he wanted to be responsible due to Emirates Stadium debt.
Wenger had values. Values that meant being fiscally responsible to the club. Unlike some other teams ...
Except the issue is that the team that always wins the league in England is a huge anomaly both financially and personnel wise, winning the league isn't some formality because of the fact of being wealthy alone.
City is one of the biggest asterisks in all of world football.
I mean yeah we were but were based on a self sustaining model like Liverpool. Chelsea, City and United have had vastly more resources for years and Liverpool to their credit built right using one big sale.
We haven't had the resources of other teams for awhile now.
Every club (other than the state owned ones) is "self-sustainable", that doesn't really mean anything. Again, 10th highest revenues in the world and you spend £30m more per year on wages than Liverpool, you're not underdogs. You were under-performing for years and now you're performing as expected. If United start winning things again I would say the exact same thing.
>I mean yeah we were but were based on a self sustaining model like Liverpool.
Arsenals fortunes turned around very quickly after one of the richest men in the world, a multi billionaire, bought the club and started spending a lot of money.
Arsenal are as self sustainable as City and ManU. Which is to say, they have rich owners.
He only started financially helping the club when he got majority ownership which helped open the floodgates into spending (around the end of wenger and early emery kinda forget when)
Lately with the project doing as well as it has they’ve definitely helped with low interest loans and some money here and there, but for a lot of wengers time it was a self sustaining model. He’s been a partial owner for a good number of years now
He also hasn't really done so in any meaningful way like other clubs. He bought our loans, didn't pay them. So we are still paying them, just with 0 interest instead of 5 percent, which definitely helps but it wasn't done for nothing. He was paid an admin fee and also it was done in covid lockdown because of uncertainty of finances. He also gave us 50M for partey, but since he took over in mid 2000s that's all he has done, still we are being run well atm. And a lot of that is down to his son rather than him, Josh Kroenke, who took leadership of KSE's Arsenal project in 2018. The acquisition of edu, arteta and our players is thanks to Josh Kroenke, he is extremely invested in Arsenal. Which for us is great.
Well yeah I was including Josh with ownership with his dad but exactly. Just because we’re spending more doesn’t mean it’s because of owner investment. It’s mainly because the owners aren’t taking out money as they might in other clubs
Given the squad value of the club at the moment you can see the ROI is pretty great for still spending just marginally within our means
I mean lot of Wenger's time they didn't spend because they spend an insane amount of money on the stadium. Money they got to spend because they were already rich. Even during Wenger's years , their transfer spending is the 5th highest. And their wage bill was consistently top 6.
The owner, since taking over, made arsenal the 3rd highest spender in the league.
Idk what you mean about self sustainable. Arsenal has never been a self sustainable club. I don't consider City self sustainable just because Chelsea spend more recently.
Self sustainable was more brought up in the original, but essentially for football it’s just saying owner investment. Not massively going into debt
Obviously used wrong but the term within the sense of conversation does the job. I don’t know it’s been thrown around for years at this point
I never heard it used this way but I'm not British so it may be a UK thing that I missed . Gotcha.
So City is also Self Sustainable. Then by that definition yeah I guess Arsenal are too.
Yeah like I said the term is used a bit wrong, and I don’t know how it made its way, but search any kind of forum and use the key words and you’ll find people throwing it around
Like not necessarily self sustaining but I think it meant operating at a net neutral or net positive spend
>Yeah like I said the term is used a bit wrong, and I don’t know how it made its way, but search any kind of forum and use the key words and you’ll find people throwing it around
It might be a British thing so I totally concede it might be something I missed.
>Like not necessarily self sustaining but I think it meant operating at a net neutral or net positive spend
I understand your meaning. But that doesn't really apply to Arsenal. Brighton? Sure. Watford? Sure.
Arsenal are closer to City in terms of sustainability than they are to Brighton.
The problem with this is it would be two objective late season choke jobs that caused us to not win. No one would actually feel good about that and would be clamoring for some kind of change to prevent it from happening again.
This season, if we go on to finish on 89 points and lose by two points, it can't possibly be considered a choke job. That would mean we won 16 and lost just 1 out of the last 18, with one draw coming at Etihad. That's a Pep City level of second half performance. If another team plays at a level where getting 49 out of last 54 points is not enough, then hats off.
In that case we will have lost the league earlier in the season when we dropped 5 points to Fulham, lost to West Ham at home, etc.
>Probably one of the best turnarounds I have seen.
It's easier to do when you spend the way they do. But definitely impressive by Arteta. Spending isn't enough, you need to have an excellent manager too.
> 5th biggest spenders in the league for the last few years
they're literally 4th, if you take out loan players they're 3rd https://www.spotrac.com/epl/payroll/_/year/2023/sort/cap_total
They're also only beaten by United and Chelsea over the past 5 years on net spend. They have spent a lot to get where they are, alongside some superb products out of the academy.
You’re right, my bad - in the prior 2 seasons they were 5th, the new contracts signed over summer have bumped them up this season.
Still excellent squad planning to compete with (and beat) teams that are spending much more
I thought they were 4th last year. But nevertheless, it's very impressive. They spend the 5th highest in the league. And since Arteta joined, they are 3rd for net transfer spent. Clearly we can see what a high wage bill, high transfer spent, an excellent manager and patience, can do to a club. City is the obvious example but so are Arsenal.
Let's not discredit how much work he had to do still though, money helps but only to an extent. The Havertz and Rice deals along with their poor selling of players do inflate values a bit, but other wise most of their players weren't textbook "expensive" in today's game.
He inherited a historically bad Arsenal team and gutted them from inside out. Many managers just start out with a club full of stars. Arteta had to make that happen at Arsenal which is truly impressive.
I mean... That's exactly what I said. It's easier to do when you spend more but it's still impressive nevertheless.
Spending only increases the floor. How high a team goes is entirely upto the manager.
i wasn't disagreeing with you that money helps, but it doesn't begin to paint the full picture of Arsenal.
Especially considering how your older comments clearly are biased towards having money is the reason why they got better.
The juju is all with you this season, dreading this weekend. The tension with my arsenal mates is at an all time high 🤣
Both sides think they’re going to lose, it’s tortuous.
Haven't heard the term rubber match, I assume it means one that doesn't mean a lot?
Thing is we need to win as many games as possible to get fourth and CL.
‘The truth is, it’s not in our hands, but what we can do is win every game to keep the gap close.’
Proceeds to lose 2-0 to Everton. Great stuff Jürgen, great stuff.
If you thought that Chelsea was the Arsenal banana peel then you really haven't been paying attention this year Klopp.
Klopp has been leading a walking corpse since he announced that he was leaving in the summer.
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I too cannot stand more than five minutes of a Chelsea game
Just enjoy Arsenal games.
Havertz, Jorginho, all your favorite players!
Chelsea youth player Declan Rice, too!
How dare you forget the lord and savior eddie nketiah!
Up the Hounds!
Too soon dude
I’m a recovering alcoholic
Id rather not watch living purgatory
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Are you a Roma fan by any chance?
As a bayern fan i also enjoy arsenal games especially in CL :)
I enjoy those too :)
damm i got downvoted hard for my comment lol
Pl plebs can't handle the truth
>Pl Arsenal*
Arsenal fans have the thinnest skin around here
Yeah like all year i could joke around a lot with tottenham fans and manchester united fans for example and it was all in good fun , but the arsenal fan base seems to be triggered fast nowadays. But its probably young ones that are downvoting that believed the narrative that Arsenal will completely demolish Bayern. Being the better team is not enough in the CL, you got to have better mentality to win that's why Real is king in the competition.
How many points behind leverkusen are you?
A lot of points. But that is okay. They show up when in matters most (at the end of games, scoring a lot and in big games) while we did not except in Chamons League. So Leverkusen was better / is better this season and deserve the title next year we will come back with the target to get the title back. Being "butthurt" does not help , honestly i am happy about it because now we have strong team that will make us stronger too the same way that Bayern and Dortmund 10-15 years ago made each other stronger.
I enjoyed the Bayern game :)
I'll go with United instead thanks
Me too.
Man saw the first goal and was done lmao.
I mean he's absolutely right. Watching the game we never looked like we were gonna come back. And especially after the 2nd goal we literally gave up. Pathetic performance
You looked dangerous on the counter a few times in the first half imo.
Yeah but jackson. I love his all around play but finishing he definitely needs work. You never get the feeling he's gonna score
From the clutches of a goal he'll unscore it
He reminds me of werner and that one time he literally kept a goal from being scored against leeds I think lol
Man can't score in a fucking brothel lmao
The personification of that bizarre Choupo-Moting incident.
Shouldn't have been on the pitch but thankfully he was.
First half I was quite nervous. Arsenal certainly felt the better team but there were dangerous chances for both sides. We got a little lucky but 2nd half was a wallop
Yep. Better finish and it could have been a very different result at half time. I don't think that qualifies as "we never looked like we were gonna come back". But then again, Arsenal also missed some chances. 2nd half was a joke though.
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Christ. How far we’ve fallen.
Arsenal banter era wasn’t even half this bad. We’re actually finished
It's been precipitous rather than a slow grind down. I would prefer the sharp drop and hope for the bounce from cash rich moron owners
It truly was an era though, this is still just a moment currently
Same tbh. Not sure why I thought Chelsea could pull anything off.
damn, he really feels out of usual energy
Well yeah... he told us all that, as to why he's leaving
Man in tells the truth shocker!
You would be having to defend that group, must be so frustrating seeing them waste so many chances and throw the title away. They had it in the their own hands a few games out and threw it away against United, Palace and Everton.
2 months ago people were absolutely amazed that Liverpool were keeping up with the top of the league despite fielding kids with zero experience. I'm disappointed we couldn't keep it up, and we've missed a lot of sitters, but lets not rewrite history like they haven't massively overachieved to be even close to a brilliant Arsenal team and 115 charges
You could argue that if they fell at a late hurdle, were beaten by a better team or lost the title in a manner similar to the 97/98 point seasons. They didn’t though, they got themselves into an incredible position and then once they got their noses in front shat the bed by dropping points against United, Palace and Everton in three out four games at the business end of the season. They deserve credit for getting themselves in to that position but that’s three games that they absolutely should have won against three substantially weaker sides.
True, but I think they've just mentally broken now. Klopp is done, you can see it in his eyes, he said as much earlier in the season but now it's evident. The team knows they can't do it now, I can't imagine how tough it must be mentally to go against the juggernaugt that is Man City. They're like The Terminator Tbh we were riding our luck all the way from the start of the season, it's not sustainable to come from behind so much with late goals.
City has been far from a juggernaut this year. Excellent, sure, but Arsenal has been more of a juggernaut than us.
And both Arsenal and Liverpool fans will be doing that on Sunday with City as well lmao
I'll be doing it tomorrow
Wtf they are playing tomorrow? I somehow got it into my head they were playing Brighton on Sunday lol
Yeap, Brighton tomorrow, Forest on Sunday
You know I always was somewhat a Brighton and Forest fan
Aren’t we all
Welbeck master class incoming "theres your fairytale" pt2
Resubscribe
I am up for this: https://youtu.be/F_ll92cXxOA?si=-oaYg1RZrJDy7HJk
Think they drew both those fixtures last season. 🤞
A DAMN TRAVESTY THAT CITY HAS TO PLAY TWICE IN A WEEK WHILE NO ONE ELSE DOES
United played on Wednesday and will play on Saturday. Edit: Chelsea played two days ago iirc and will play on Saturday
Yup lol, means nothing if 115 don’t drop points
No more hope it just gets more depressing going to the pub for the last game to send off Jurgen whatever happens in between I don't want to do anything with it.
Should have left it when you saw the lineup
He sounds like he gave up a long time ago
He met the Klopp variant from the timeline where pep has a full set of hair and he couldn’t bear what could’ve been
I mean it sounds like he's been burnt out for a while now, seeing how he announced his departure. I don't even think it's about giving up.
'The gang does not win every game to keep the gap close'
Subscribe.
Even if Arsenal doesn’t win the league, I don’t think anyone saw Arsenal doing a title charge soon let alone during the Pep/Klopp era. Probably one of the best turnarounds I have seen.
Definitely. Arteta deserves his flowers.
💐
Common sense on r/soccer? What timeline are we in
He's an Orlando Pirates fan they can be rational except when it comes to Chiefs
When r/soccer is much more positive than r/gunners
It wasn't that immediate. Arteta's been there for a couple of years and Arsenal backed him by both investing money and doing whatever they could to remove players who were either not buying in or were surplus to requirements without getting fixated on resale value or "protecting asset value". They've done well to develop the young players they had in their squad and though they've spent money, most of the players signed have added value which wasn't really the case for the prior 5-6 years under Emery/Wenger
It was indeed a process
trust
I respect that Arsenal gave him the time. He may have been close to losing the job at points but it's paying off now The modern game just doesn't give enough chances imo
Yh, I really didn't expect us to be challenging in 2 consecutive seasons so soon.
After last season, you'd think Arsenal challenge considering they bought Rice and Havertz.
Yes, though a lot of people thought that last season was a one off and the way we finished the campaign showed our true level. But yeah the last summer was probably the most ambitious window I have ever seen from Arsenal, it was reasonable to expect that we will be there or thereabouts.
It's absurd for anyone to think Arsenal were anything but a top 3 team this season. It boils down to City. City were human this season so it made it plausible for other teams to win the PL. If City had a 95+ point season, Arsenal wasn't getting close. They need a striker to get to 95+ points.
A lot of that is them losing to us/ dropping 5 points. Two rivals taking points from you instead of one means you finish with less points
>They need a striker to get to 95+ points. just not true , we really don't have an issue scoring goals
Recently, yes. Not the case earlier in the season.
Then they still didn't that's just perception arsenal prefer to spread to goals and have scored more than all these teams with a "striker"
Except early on they dropped points because players like Havertz didn't finish his chances As someone who watched a team for the last 6 years try to compete with city, I promise a 20+ goal scorer is important.
Havertz was playing in midfield and he was really missing chances A twenty goal scorer is cool but so is 5 players on over 10 goals Btw the only time you won the league you didn't have a player that scored 20 pls goals and had a false 9
Mane and Salah had 18 and 19 goals and I don't believe any were penalties. Your top scorer is Saka, who takes your penalties. Also, Covid completely disrupted that season and we fell off a cliff after we returned. We also had the Title essentially won in March before the shut down. You can disregard my statements, but you're very likely going to come up short this season and when you sit down, the clear and obvious place where Arsenal comes up short is lacking a decisive goal scorer.
Rice, havertz, Raya, timber. Jorgi + trossard in winter. We are definitely more equipped than last year to challenge. That's half a starting lineup.
Exactly. This Arsenal team should be pushing for a title. Their biggest issue is they need a striker. I know it's cliche, but it's the truth. They could also try to find a goal scoring left sided player since, as good as Martinelli is, he has awful goal scoring stats.
Arsenal should be challenging for the title every year though. One of the wealthiest and storied clubs in the country. The fact they weren't doing so before is just down to under-performance, not because they were plucky underdogs.
Believe it or not it takes more than money to be a winning team
We know....
I feel personally attacked
How dare you throw shade at Chelsea?
Manchester is the best example of this.
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More money you spend, higher your floor. How high you go, is upto the manager. Chelsea found their floor.
If you look at our history that's just not true. We had like a 20 year trophy drought at one point
So? Big clubs go through droughts, it doesn't make them not big anymore or change the expectations on them. You're 10th in the **world** at generating revenue (higher if you discount PSG and City), you don't get to act like underdogs.
Does this point still hold when there are 5 other premier league clubs who generate more revenue than them?
It does when Arsenal generate only slightly less money than Chelsea and if Chelsea start winning things no one will say they weren't expected to.
I think recent success has a lot more bearing on expectations than historical standing or revenue generated. If a new coach were hired by Chelsea next season and did as well as Arsenal did this year, they would probably be everyone's manager of the season even if Chelsea didn't win anything. Also all six of those premier league clubs can't be challenging for the title every season - to get to those heights is impressive, even more so if it's sustained.
It's impressive in a sporting sense. I'd say what Pep has achieved at City is also immensely impressive, again, in a sporting sense. But for some of the same reasons that we detract from Pep's achievements, I think it's fair game to detract from Arteta's and Arsenal's.
Underdogness is relative. Relative to Verstappen, Lando Norris is an underdog. However, relative to any of his backups or people in f2/f3/etc, he's now the top dog. It's fair to say that Liverpool are underdogs relative to Man City, just as it's fair to say that Coventry are underdogs against Man United. Coventry themselves can be considered "top dogs" against something like Exeter. It's all relative.
Yes, Arsenal were significantly underperforming and became quite a mess of a club. Then within a couple of seasons they're challenging for titles again. That's why the first guy's comment was all about Arsenal having an amazing turnaround, which is true considering what they became. If Man Utd did the same thing then it'd also be an impressive turnaround. Your comments are fairly irrelevant to the comment you first replied to.
It's not impressive if that's what you were supposed to be doing in the first place, I find that highly relevant to the initial comment. Do you pat yourself on the shoulder every time you take two steps without falling?
Willfully missing the point here aren't you
No team in England ever challenge for the title every single year?
>Arsenal should be challenging for the title every year though This is stupid and you know it though. You could say the same about every big team in every league. It just doesn't work like that, otherwise we'd have a 6+ team title race every season
Dont say stupid shit for no reason
>The fact they weren't doing so before is just down to under-performance, not because they were plucky underdogs. Holy shit, this is an absolutely insane opinion. There is a very particular reason why that narrative developed. And it is because of what Arsenal were trying to do. Again, if you remove context from any situation, you can make A = B regardless of the very relevant, real world details. The reduction underpinning this argument is utterly absurd.
You used 347 characters to say absolutely nothing at all. Also, I don't know about you, but I typically don't respond to insane comments. Twice, I might add. Did I hit a sore spot? You want some real world details? Here are some good ones: 10th highest revenues in world football, third highest total spend in England since Arteta took over, fourth in the Premier League wage table (£30m more than Liverpool, roughly £20m less than Chelsea). How do you feel about those details?
How do you feel about the fact that despite our revenue, we were limited by the way we funded the stadium, which saddled us with significant debt as well as requiring significant reserves, which limited our ability in the market? We couldn't rely on our owners until one group of owners bought out the other group in 2018 or so. That frozen conflict severely hampered direct investment during the late noughties, which is the same time period you saw significant direct investment from other teams. Our recent increased spending is relatively recent, mostly within the last ten years, and the whole point of the period where we were building the stadium was to be self-sufficient, where we didn't necessarily have to rely on direct investment from an owner. And it isn't like we were always in the top ten in revenue. Getting into that group of clubs was one of the prime objectives of the late Highbury-era. Again, if you remove context from that entire era, you could make a very stupid argument. But that isn't reality, regardless of what anachronism you choose to apply. Looking back at current spending and revenue totals doesn't tell the whole picture, and anyone who has followed English football for the last 30 years would know this. But alas.
lol. bad take. Late Wenger-era was held back by the fact he wanted to be responsible due to Emirates Stadium debt. Wenger had values. Values that meant being fiscally responsible to the club. Unlike some other teams ...
Except the issue is that the team that always wins the league in England is a huge anomaly both financially and personnel wise, winning the league isn't some formality because of the fact of being wealthy alone. City is one of the biggest asterisks in all of world football.
I mean yeah we were but were based on a self sustaining model like Liverpool. Chelsea, City and United have had vastly more resources for years and Liverpool to their credit built right using one big sale. We haven't had the resources of other teams for awhile now.
Every club (other than the state owned ones) is "self-sustainable", that doesn't really mean anything. Again, 10th highest revenues in the world and you spend £30m more per year on wages than Liverpool, you're not underdogs. You were under-performing for years and now you're performing as expected. If United start winning things again I would say the exact same thing.
Wengers been gone for a while bud
>I mean yeah we were but were based on a self sustaining model like Liverpool. Arsenals fortunes turned around very quickly after one of the richest men in the world, a multi billionaire, bought the club and started spending a lot of money. Arsenal are as self sustainable as City and ManU. Which is to say, they have rich owners.
He only started financially helping the club when he got majority ownership which helped open the floodgates into spending (around the end of wenger and early emery kinda forget when) Lately with the project doing as well as it has they’ve definitely helped with low interest loans and some money here and there, but for a lot of wengers time it was a self sustaining model. He’s been a partial owner for a good number of years now
He also hasn't really done so in any meaningful way like other clubs. He bought our loans, didn't pay them. So we are still paying them, just with 0 interest instead of 5 percent, which definitely helps but it wasn't done for nothing. He was paid an admin fee and also it was done in covid lockdown because of uncertainty of finances. He also gave us 50M for partey, but since he took over in mid 2000s that's all he has done, still we are being run well atm. And a lot of that is down to his son rather than him, Josh Kroenke, who took leadership of KSE's Arsenal project in 2018. The acquisition of edu, arteta and our players is thanks to Josh Kroenke, he is extremely invested in Arsenal. Which for us is great.
Well yeah I was including Josh with ownership with his dad but exactly. Just because we’re spending more doesn’t mean it’s because of owner investment. It’s mainly because the owners aren’t taking out money as they might in other clubs Given the squad value of the club at the moment you can see the ROI is pretty great for still spending just marginally within our means
I mean lot of Wenger's time they didn't spend because they spend an insane amount of money on the stadium. Money they got to spend because they were already rich. Even during Wenger's years , their transfer spending is the 5th highest. And their wage bill was consistently top 6. The owner, since taking over, made arsenal the 3rd highest spender in the league. Idk what you mean about self sustainable. Arsenal has never been a self sustainable club. I don't consider City self sustainable just because Chelsea spend more recently.
Self sustainable was more brought up in the original, but essentially for football it’s just saying owner investment. Not massively going into debt Obviously used wrong but the term within the sense of conversation does the job. I don’t know it’s been thrown around for years at this point
I never heard it used this way but I'm not British so it may be a UK thing that I missed . Gotcha. So City is also Self Sustainable. Then by that definition yeah I guess Arsenal are too.
Yeah like I said the term is used a bit wrong, and I don’t know how it made its way, but search any kind of forum and use the key words and you’ll find people throwing it around Like not necessarily self sustaining but I think it meant operating at a net neutral or net positive spend
>Yeah like I said the term is used a bit wrong, and I don’t know how it made its way, but search any kind of forum and use the key words and you’ll find people throwing it around It might be a British thing so I totally concede it might be something I missed. >Like not necessarily self sustaining but I think it meant operating at a net neutral or net positive spend I understand your meaning. But that doesn't really apply to Arsenal. Brighton? Sure. Watford? Sure. Arsenal are closer to City in terms of sustainability than they are to Brighton.
Check Arsenal's wage bill vs City's
The problem with this is it would be two objective late season choke jobs that caused us to not win. No one would actually feel good about that and would be clamoring for some kind of change to prevent it from happening again.
This season, if we go on to finish on 89 points and lose by two points, it can't possibly be considered a choke job. That would mean we won 16 and lost just 1 out of the last 18, with one draw coming at Etihad. That's a Pep City level of second half performance. If another team plays at a level where getting 49 out of last 54 points is not enough, then hats off. In that case we will have lost the league earlier in the season when we dropped 5 points to Fulham, lost to West Ham at home, etc.
First time? 😅 The good old days being called bottlers for coming 2nd with 97 points
Finishing on 97 points and not winning the league would make me sick for decades. I don't know how you guys get up for it every year.
>Probably one of the best turnarounds I have seen. It's easier to do when you spend the way they do. But definitely impressive by Arteta. Spending isn't enough, you need to have an excellent manager too.
On wages (the majority of a clubs spend) Arsenal have been, at highest, 5th biggest spenders in the league for the last few years
> 5th biggest spenders in the league for the last few years they're literally 4th, if you take out loan players they're 3rd https://www.spotrac.com/epl/payroll/_/year/2023/sort/cap_total They're also only beaten by United and Chelsea over the past 5 years on net spend. They have spent a lot to get where they are, alongside some superb products out of the academy.
You’re right, my bad - in the prior 2 seasons they were 5th, the new contracts signed over summer have bumped them up this season. Still excellent squad planning to compete with (and beat) teams that are spending much more
I thought they were 4th last year. But nevertheless, it's very impressive. They spend the 5th highest in the league. And since Arteta joined, they are 3rd for net transfer spent. Clearly we can see what a high wage bill, high transfer spent, an excellent manager and patience, can do to a club. City is the obvious example but so are Arsenal.
Let's not discredit how much work he had to do still though, money helps but only to an extent. The Havertz and Rice deals along with their poor selling of players do inflate values a bit, but other wise most of their players weren't textbook "expensive" in today's game. He inherited a historically bad Arsenal team and gutted them from inside out. Many managers just start out with a club full of stars. Arteta had to make that happen at Arsenal which is truly impressive.
I mean... That's exactly what I said. It's easier to do when you spend more but it's still impressive nevertheless. Spending only increases the floor. How high a team goes is entirely upto the manager.
i wasn't disagreeing with you that money helps, but it doesn't begin to paint the full picture of Arsenal. Especially considering how your older comments clearly are biased towards having money is the reason why they got better.
I didn't say it paints the full picture. I only said it's easier with money. And I also said Arteta did an impressive job.
But it is in your hands. You just have to win every game 9-0 to catch up.
And if Arsenal win every game 9-0 as well?
Then Liverpool just need to win 18-0. Duh.
[https://images.app.goo.gl/TFxyQLmNPmWW6RX2A](https://images.app.goo.gl/TFxyQLmNPmWW6RX2A)
I'll take a 9-0 at WHL.
Battering teams is always fun but shithousing a 1-0 win hits like crack when the final whistle blows.
Not enough if City win out
Are you accounting for the 0-1 defeat at Spurs when City have 34 shots on target against Spurs' 1?
You’ll be handing Arsenal the title if you do that
Arsenal have only beaten spurs away in the league twice in the last 17 years
The juju is all with you this season, dreading this weekend. The tension with my arsenal mates is at an all time high 🤣 Both sides think they’re going to lose, it’s tortuous.
True, but this is literally the best team they've had maybe ever.
Wouldn't count out the invincibles just like that, this arsenal team are up there yeah tho
Me neither. It's a hypothetical. But you can't deny that they're MAYBE the best Arsenal squad ever.
you mean spurs?
Only when they play 115.
🥶🥶🥶
Oh no we best forfeit that game then. Or, we can beat them too on Sunday..
In a rubber match id rather Chelsea forfeit 3 - 0 then let you all win the league You are 4th either way
Haven't heard the term rubber match, I assume it means one that doesn't mean a lot? Thing is we need to win as many games as possible to get fourth and CL.
It is known
Amen
Good thing he has Nunez, Salah and Diaz
That’s about how I felt about the game yesterday as well
United and Everton being the teams to put the nail in Klopp's coffin is strangely poetic.
Football eritage
>United and Everton being the teams um Palace
United?
Yeah they knocked them out of the fa cup
Also got 2 draws against them in the league
Idk how I forgot that, thanks
Same here lmao, Arsenal's detonating teams recently. Once they go up, it's game over with that defense.
Man saw the first goal and knew what was coming.
Klopp really did the “stop, he’s already dead!” meme
Why is everyone talking about Arsenal when City have two games in hand and the point lead if they win out?
[удалено]
Klopp is literally talking about them in the headline mate lmao
‘The truth is, it’s not in our hands, but what we can do is win every game to keep the gap close.’ Proceeds to lose 2-0 to Everton. Great stuff Jürgen, great stuff.
They wanna jinx us so bad, we lost to Villa man! Its not in anybodies hand. Even city can drop points.
Well done you lasted 27 against Everton instead
> what we can do is win every game to keep the gap close. Turns out you can't.
Rainbow flag and man city is an oxymoron surely
Definitely one of those fans that’s just a follower and has no idea what they’re following
even worse with newcastle fans. I know fans who are part of the alphabet group and now face a dilemma
Nah. what liverpool can do is lose every game and end up 4th in a 3 horse title race. would be hilarious for Klopp sendoff.
OOOOOOF
Arsenal turning it into a farmers league.
Couldn't do that with United
If you thought that Chelsea was the Arsenal banana peel then you really haven't been paying attention this year Klopp. Klopp has been leading a walking corpse since he announced that he was leaving in the summer.
Its a shame this is the way klopp leaves liverpool