Those of you new to the Arsenal fold often give me blank stares when I reference things that happened prior to ten or sometimes even five years ago. It's often a funny scene when I'm talking to my Yank Gooner friends and I'll say "he reminds me of Ade Akinbiyi" or compare Giroud to Emile Heskey at Leicester City. It's fair to say that in the USA I may be a bit of an outlier.
There's nothing wrong with being a new convert. "All are welcome." No, I'm not going to cook you on a grill. I'm not going to complain about enthusiastic people who support Arsenal--we need all we can get. It's just that my point of reference for the club includes Ian Wright and Davor Suker, and also my point of reference for other clubs includes seeing MUFC win the treble and give the middle finger to the FA Cup. Time has actually made fond memories of John Gregory's Aston Villa sides.
What prompted this was today's excellent post from Yogi's Warrior at A Cultured Left Foot. He quantified something that caused me to rethink what I remembered--or didn't accurately remember--about most of Wenger's teams, especially from the early portion of his tenure as manager.
There is something of a myth about Arsenal though. As much as Arsène has produced consistently sparkling football, only in the period 2003- 2005 have they finished top scorers in the Premier League. The rest of the time sitting somewhere at an average of 1.75 goals per game.Even the double winners of 2002 weren't top scorers?
He goes on to note that under Wenger, once you get past the first few scoring threats, there wasn't much help getting the ball past the opposing keeper. I suppose what made the 2003-2005 period unique was that there was a strong supporting cast for Henry and Bergkamp, including the incomparable Bob Pires, Freddie Ljungberg, and a rotating pool of forwards.
What I recall about the 2000-2005 period (and I hope this isn't my mind playing tricks on me) is that Arsenal were much more direct than they are now. Was there less passing? Was there more counterattacking? Were players more likely to have a go at the goal? I'll leave the statistical analysis to that other Yank blogger who seems to have an infinite amount of patience and willingness, but my perception leads me to answer "yes" to those questions.
I think at that point Arsenal needed to be more direct because, frankly, Manchester United were the best attacking team in England and one of the best in the world. My hatred for them at that time was based on the fact that they could set out a side that featured Dwight Yorke, Andy Cole, and Teddy Sheringham up top, supported by the likes of Scholes, Beckham, and Giggs, each of whom managed to find the goal with seeming ease. Throw on a late sub like Solskjaer and you have an attack that was built to fill the net.
(Cole, it should be remembered, was an Arsenal player, shipped off to Bristol City by George Graham for the princely sum of half a million quid. Dear god.)
Bloody hell. No wonder Wenger had to find an attack that could match Ferguson's--United won three straight titles before the double winners took it from them at their place in 2002, and Ferg supplemented and freshened that squad with Van NistelHorse (who Wenger famously tried to sign; how many times have I heard that?). Goals, goals, goals. And what was the goal?
Scoring. What happened?
Blame it on the Barcelona, the team of dull.
I won't go into the langers who populated the Arsenal team in the post-2005 era (I've done that already) but in addition to their general shite-ness, they were playing for a manager who was transitioning from a style journos called "swashbuckling" to one of incessant sideways passing (Denilson, cough cough). It's charming that Wenger looked at his charges in the late 2000s and thought they were as good as Xavi and Iniesta and Messi. Really, it could even be labeled "precious" of him. This was during the time when the Chavs of West London were playing ugly, negative football and City began stockpiling strikers "just because."
Wenger's response was to try to emulate the dull metronomic style of Barca, who unseated Real Madrid by putting out a team of clever midgets who could pass the ball, press the opposition, and find Messi. That's really all it was. Unfortunately, Arsenal didn't have those players.
This was the era when I began screaming at the telly "Would you just fucking shoot already!!!!!!" and I realised that Bob and Freddie and Thierry and Dennis were not walking through that door. The ball went everywhere but in the net. Literally. With Denilson and Diaby you could count on more sideways action than a drunken university party.
Pundits began to remark that Arsenal were trying to walk the ball into the net--this was not a compliment. At the same time, Drogba was doing his impression of a battering ram. Keep the ball, your opponent doesn't score. This is opposed to the idea of scoring and forcing your opponent to take chances.
Arsenal today are still guilty of the term that I think sums up most of the past 10 years: over-elaboration. I think it's changing, slightly and slowly, to a bit more direct style, but it's still predominantly all about passing. I can't understand what Wenger's up to when he has so many players who would destroy the league if he set them out to sit deep and punish on the counter.
What's the point of all that sideways and backwards passing when your opponent has 7 players lined up across the edge of the 18 yard box? You have the Ox, Ozil, Wilshere, Ramsey, Walcott (when healthy), and now Sanchez. Invite the opponent on you and then slaughter them like you did back in old days. I feel like Mickey talking to Rocky--"Why don't you stand up and fight this guy, hard, like you done before?"
Four years ago some manager said after watching the World Cup Finals that the future of the game was the ability of sides to rapidly transition from defence to attack, moving the ball from deep to the opponent's half faster meant victory. Four years ago! Whoever this genius was (no, it wasn't LVG), he predicted the demise of Bore-celona football long before last season's destruction of Bayern Munich or Spain's humiliation during the summer.
People didn't think that Barca under Joey G. were boring because they had Messi. Arsenal have never had Messi. If you don't have Messi, all that passing tends to simply burn out and leave you with a great deal of possession and very few goals.
Direct and deliberate attacking play will win the league this year--if Arsenal play that way. I don't assume Moaninho will do anything but set out his lab animals to spoil the game. Arsenal can't continue to pass the ball in too many directions and think that 1.75 goals/game will accomplish much. Sanchez is a Lambo. I hope AW drives it like a madman.
