“People are too quick to accept conventional wisdom, because it sounds basically true and it tends to be reinforced by both their peers and opinion leaders, many of whom have never looked at whether the facts support the received wisdom. It’s a basic fact of life that many things “everybody knows” turn out to be wrong.” ― Jim Rogers
The above named Mr. Rogers is a renowned investor who made his fortune several times over by investing where others fear to tread. It may be ancient history but in 1973 Rogers and George Soros founded the Quantum Fund whose portfolio in the following 10 years gained 4200% while the S&P advanced about 47%. He is somewhat relevant to an Arsenal football blog because he is famous in 1992 for bucking the wisdom of the great and good in the English financial media by making a cool £1 billion betting against the British pound when it crashed out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM).
While I am not able to bet the farm as Rogers did in 1992, it is my contention that any objective review of the facts will refute the now conventional wisdom that Arsenal cannot win the 2016 title with Giroud as the main striker. The most notorious proponent of that viewpoint is a certain legendary striker, turned pundit who was very explicit:
“I think Giroud is doing extremely well. But can you win the league with him? I wouldn’t think so.
“He does a job, and he does it ever so well, but you can’t win the league.”
The backlash from making this very direct criticism of Giroud, particularly from Wenger and his teammates, have forced the legend and his fellow pundits to be a little more circumspect.
This may explain explain why another former Arsenal great, Martin Keown, on August 1st on TalkSport, took a more roundabout way of “dissing” the Frenchman by using his non-selection in one game to conclude that:
“ If you’re not the champions and your striker, Olivier Giroud, didn’t start the FA Cup final last season, there are question marks over that position and maybe they need to be addressed…. “Why not go for Karim Benzema to play down the middle.”
Nick Miller, an ESPN hack, resorted to innuendo, by suggesting that Lord Harris, “the £200 million-man”, was speaking for the manager when he said “We get a list of the players that Wenger wants. On the list is a centre-forward, but I’m not going to tell you who he is.” Miller was thus able to leap to the stunning conclusion that:
“It isn’t much of a stretch to say this is a tacit admission that Wenger also believes he can do better, that Giroud is a fine striker but not quite good enough to help Arsenal win the league.”
Apart from outright belittling the man who is currently Arsenal’s main striker, throughout the off-season there was/has been a growing clamor for the signing of Karim Benzema, who, whether one admits it or not, is a like-for-like replacement.This led to the spectacle in late July of near hysteria on Twitter with almost all the pro-Arsenal accounts convinced of the imminent signing of the Madridista. This was based solely on an Instagram posting by the player of pictures of himself on a private jet with the message “Leave the past to the past. #directionfuture.”
Doesn’t it say something about the dangers of conventional wisdom when the fanbase so easily falls for a blatant rumor even though there were ample reasons to be skeptical, e.g. at the time Benzema was still with Real Madrid on their pre-season tour in Shanghai…not on his way to London? Doesn’t it say a lot about their belief or lack of in Giroud as the main striker?
But is the wisdom of our media appointed “opinion-leaders” and the herd who hang unto their every utterance supported by the facts? To answer the question I thought it would be useful to research the past 11 years since Arsenal last won the Premier League to see if there is any evidence to support the thesis that for a club to win the title it needs a dominant striker.
| SEASON | CHAMPION | TOP GS | GOALS | RANKING |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 04-05 | Chelsea | Lampard | 13 | 4 |
| 05-06 | Chelsea | Lampard | 16 | 4 |
| 06-07 | Man Utd | Ronaldo | 17 | 3 |
| 07-08 | Man Utd | Ronaldo | 31 | 1 |
| 08-09 | Man Utd | Ronaldo | 18 | 3 |
| 09-10 | Chelsea | Drogba | 29 | 1 |
| 10-11 | Man Utd | Berbatov | 20 | 1 |
| 11-12 | Man City | Aguero | 23 | 3 |
| 12-13 | Man Utd | Van Persie | 26 | 1 |
| 13-14 | Man City | Aguero | 17 | 4 |
| 14-15 | Chelsea | Costa | 20 | 3 |
The data above speaks for itself. There were only four occasions, i.e. 36% of the time, when the league’s top goal-scorer was from the winning team. In contrast, 64% of the time the winning team in the league did not have the the top-striker. What struck me, in particular, was that in at least three out of the 11 seasons, the top striker from the winning team was ranked as low as 4th in the league’s Top Goal Scorers. The amazing thing is Chelsea secured back-to-back titles between 2004/5 and 06 with their top goal-scorer being Frank Lampard, registering only 13 and 16 goals in successive years. Their most productive strikers in those years, Gudjohnson and Drogba respectively, finished with 12 goals each. They both make Giroud’s 14 goals in 21 games last year look Messi-esque.
Despite such a miserly contribution from its strikers, Chelsea was able to rack up the 1st and 3rd highest number of points in Premier League history, 95 and 91 respectively. They won the league, not by goal scoring, but by having the meanest possible defense, conceding only 15 goals in 2004-05, an amazing 0.39 goal per game.
Similarly, while Manchester United may have a reputation for being swashbuckling goal-scorers, in two out of their five title-winning campaigns over the 11-year period, their top goal scorer was ranked as low as 3rd in the league. In 06-07 Ronaldo only scored 17 goals. For the next two titles they won 07-08 and 08-09, United simply did a Chelsea, locking down on defense, conceding a miserly 22 and 24 goals respectively, ranking them 2nd and 3rd in the Goals Against department in the entire history of the Premier League.
In summary, since Arsenal last won the title, the top goal-scorer from champion team was ranked an average of 3rd in the league with a median average of 20 goals per season. The range was a low of 13 and a high of 31.
Based on this routine analysis it is self-evident that the constant demeaning at Giroud and the belief that if only Arsenal had a “world-class” striker they would surely win the league is not supported by the facts. To the contrary, the data is shouting at us that restricting the scoring of goals by the opposition is the key to success. Hopefully this is evident from the following table:
| 11YR MEAN | AFC-2015 | AFC-2016 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| W | 27 | 22 | ? |
| D | 6 | 9 | ? |
| L | 4 | 7 | ? |
| GF | 83 | 71 | 83 |
| GA | 29 | 36 | 26 |
| GD | 54 | 35 | 57 |
| PTS | 88 | 71 | ? |
In contrast to the 11 year average of 83 Goals For and 29 Against to win the title, in the 2014-15 Arsenal finished with 71 and 36 respectively, a difference of 12 and 8. By doing this analysis I stumbled on how the Wenger came to the conclusion that the team need for 10-12 more goals to win the title as stated at his press conference before the Emirates Cup:
“What we want is some more goals from some players who are not really strikers and that was our strength traditionally. Our offensive and creative players scored 10 to 12 goals, that’s what you need.”
He has made it clear that he is not dependent on Giroud for more goals; he and Alexis did their part last season with 14 and 16 goals respectively, the only ones to make double figures in the league. Obviously they can and need to improve their goal-scoring but going forward, it will be up to the British Core (Theo, whose contract is now secured, Ramsey and Oxlade-Chamberlain) as well as Santi, and Ozil to do the business.What is lost in the noise of the transfer market (as the media fan the flames of clubs competing for big-money signings) is the importance of reducing the Goals Against column.
Unlike my earlier sentimentality towards Ospina and Szczesny, the manager has harbored no such idealism. Apparently in 2014 he made an inquiry for Cech and again this year. If Arsenal is to become even meaner in defensively, who is better than the man who was between the sticks for Chelsea in their most miserly years? Who’s better than the goal-tender who is described as obsessed with clean sheets?In stressing the importance of defending, at the same press conference, the manager was clear about not doing a Liverpool or City:
“Our target is to improve our number of goals but you as well have examples of teams who have scored 90 or 100 goals and have not won the championship. We want to combine good defensive efficiency with 10 more goals.
“In the second part of last season we only conceded 13 goals in 19 games. So we want to keep that and add a few more goals.”
Instead of depending on goalscoring the manager was moved to stress the importance of defending and not conceding unnecessary goals. We hardly see or hear this discussed by the pundits who keep nattering on and on daily about signing another striker.
I was therefore very encouraged by what I saw vs Chelsea in the Community Shield. While it was good that Wenger broke the Mourinho streak, what was even better was the team’s commitment to defending our one goal lead.
I shall conclude by noting that over the past three years Wenger has been able to build a squad of top quality players especially after he could spend some money, developed a consistent way of playing, and finally forged consistency and cohesion especially in the spine. Similar to Ferguson and even that classless hypocrite Mourinho, that is ultimately the predictor of Arsenal again winning titles.
Positively Arsenal 
Great analysis, very interesting. Cech and Gabriel will be a big help, plus Coquelin.
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Great stuff!
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Excellent thought provoking stuff Shotts
My preference is for a gang of strikers, four individuals who are probably different in size and expertise to put the goals away. It does not matter how world class your main striker is, he will have his ‘off’ day, be carrying a knock or just tired. You need strength on the bench to vary the line of attack or to pep up the threat if the effort is flagging. Citeh had it as did Manyoo with the option of bringing on Hernandez or Balotelli with half an hour to go.
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A nicely produced argument… I think Wenger wants a team of goalscorers and not just the reliance on one. Ramsey, Walcott, Santi, Ox, Alexis, Ozil, Wilshere, Wlbeck and plus Giroud. And the occasional goal from Kos, Mert, Bellerin etc. Should do us nicely. Yummy
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Can’t wait to se Coq au Vin when he score his first goal…. he’ll go fecking crazy
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I have seen Arsenal fans say that with all the chances we create that our main striker SHOULD be scoring 30 – 35 league goals a season, and that Giroud not doing so proves he is not good enough, conventional wisdom at its best.
TH14 managed 30 league goals once in this time at Arsenal, 27 league goals once, and 25 league goals once. Van Persie managed 30 league goals once for Arsenal, his next best season was 18 league goals. Adebayor’s best league season for us was 24, which in fact beats Ian Wrights best ever league season for Arsenal, 23 goals twice. and 23 league goals is also the best Alan Smith ever managed for Arsenal. But hey who am I to suggest we don’t need a 30 league goal a season striker.
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Good stuff.
I’ve wondered a few times how Giroud compares to someone like Alan Smith.
I remember alarmingly little about Smith’s play, even though I’d started supporting the club back then.
The main point is,though, that Smith is surely held in high esteem, by older supporters who were fans at the time, and by newer ones who weren’t but have blanket fondness for players of that era.
So that’s everyone respecting Smith (first three years : 137/52), who won titles with the club, and many disrespecting Giroud (134/58), and saying we can’t win titles with him, even though they are probably quite similar in ability.
Giroud’s a good player. Like all good players now, and unlike in the past, he plays his football to a much wider audience who, crucially, are likely to also watch the exploits of the very best players in the world- Messi-Ronaldo- every weekend.
An audience who watch much more football than before, and talk about football much more than before and who, in many cases, and despite all the watching and talking, seem less able than ever to keep in mind simple truths about good, great and the very best players, or understand other elementary realities of football, such as the scarcity of players who are better than a player like Giroud, and how amazingly difficult it is to bring one of those players to your club.
Your stats are excellent and dovetail nicely with the best example in modern football of what can be achieved with a good if not equal to the world’s best striker : Mandzukic at Bayern. They were a fantastic team the year they won the CL, and demolished the best team of the era, including perhaps the greatest player ever, Barca.
Their striker was Mandzukic (40;22). Giroudian (and Smithian) goal-scoring stats and, I reckon, similar overall ability.
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its telling Dennis Bergkamp that internet access and twitter etc was not as prevalent when he was at Arsenal, cos he only managed 36 goals in his last 196 league games for us. I would also say that Freddie Ljunberg would have been a major target for the boo boys if current internet was about back then.
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Very nice work and research!
Not very reassuring that simple repetition of a non-fact is enough for people to start believing anything.
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when Wenger talked about Arsenal needing more goals in the team, he mentioned that he had expected more goals from several players last season, especially Ramsey, but due to injury his goal scoring was hindered. There is no doubt Wenger wants Ramsey, Ox, Wilshere and Ozil all banging in more goals this season.
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eduardo > Bergkamp was 36 when he started the FA Cup final of 2005, imagine that today.
– fucking shameful we can’t replace an old man, we’re AFC FFS!
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Excellent Shotta, very interesting analysis.
A few years back Wenger was not shy of proclaiming the entire team as being worthy of being team captain; he had/has an unshakeable belief in collective responsibility and, additionally, the old idea of defence being a team-wide role is not a cliche without reason. Looking at the nature of our contemporary midfield, which is of course predominantly offensive, it seems to my eye that Arsene views goal-scoring as a job that is categorically not the sole responsibility of the centre forward.
When you look at it as a shared responsibility then the idea of having at least three genuinely offensive midfielders in addition to the forward of course multiplies your goal-scoring options, mitigates against loss of form, effect of injury to key player, reduces predictability and so on.
If being captain, defending and goal-scoring is spread across eleven then as Shotta points out, anyone getting too hung up on any one position is likely to be somewhat wide of the mark. Of course, we are always looking to improve the squad and the fear-factor alone of signing big names does us no harm. But the chances of any one individual being ‘the answer’ to our future ambitions are remote.
The last thing, I’d humbly suggest, Arsene wants is to be in a position to be overly reliant on another Henry, Fabregas or van Persie.
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I see Usmanov is flip flopping again, now Wenger is doing great again, it seems we are ambitious again, to think so many people wanted this cunt to own Arsenal.
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Excellent piece shotta, at ARSENAL we have always had teams rather than one player who was carrying the team. Alan Smith was respected because of his link play not because of his goal scoring, he actually had a remarkable knack of being able to hit the post from anywhere. The most successful teams have always had a strong defence as shown in your stats. What alot of people are missing is the injury to Giroud, had he played more then he would have broke the 20 goal total and would probably have been pushing towards 30 .If we Improve our injury record we will improve in all areas of our game.
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aorb – agree, it’ll be injuries rather than who else we sign that’s likely to have a greater bearing on the outcome of the season. The ultimate irony being that Giroud, based on recent scoring rate, is on target for 25, even 30 goals a season.
And still some will moan.
Interesting parallel with Smudge by the way.
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Excellent research as usual, Shotta. Evidence based analysis eh? Who would have thought….
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Top work Shotta. Too astute for most pundits I suspect.
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What a great blog, shotta – and some really good follow-up comments.
It seems to me the combination of Coquelin at DM for a full season, plus full seasons for Olivier, Theo and Ox will make much more difference than a new striker (hooked though I am on the rumour mill).
NB1969 You forgot to include Petr Cech in your occasional goalscorers list.
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Arsenal Youth Squad
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Look like someone reads this blog:
http://www.standard.co.uk/sport/football/think-arsenal-need-karim-benzema-why-gunners-dont-need-a-world-class-striker-to-win-the-premier-league-10440566.html
Blatant plagiarism – sue George, sue!
Or is shotta James Benge in disguise?
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Thanks for the feedback guys. It has been a challenge trying to make such stubborn and, some will say, boring facts interesting to read. No wonder pundits and bloggers pander to emotionalism and conventional wisdom. We all know how good this has been for the commercial media and in recent times this is a road easily travelled by bloggers and tweeters needing eyeballs. No need to rehash the blog.
You guys have dissappointed me to a small degree. I deliberately left my last table with questions about about our projected Wins, Drsws, Losses and Points yet nobody has taken up the challenge. Don’t tell me you are cowards at PA?
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Don’t think we are unbeatable yet. That’s for the next season.
AFC-2016
W 27
D 8
L 3
PTS 89
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dkg@3:38pm – Blatant plagiarism and I suspect he is being paid for piggy-backing on someone else’s hard labor. Too lazy to even modify some of the actual but conveniently fails to expose his fellow hacks and pundits for peddling b.s.
I will leave George to do the litigating. Banned smiley.
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Fingers crossed old Smudger picks up on Shotta’s work.
Or the funny paper’s ripped version.
Who am I kidding? Smudger has earnt a good penison off Newscorp and there’ll be no changing tune at this juncture. There’ll be more Gr*t & gibberish for the grinder as far as the petty arsed plundits are concerned. Or as Andy townsend would say:
“Get In!”
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Given his record against the ‘ammers & Walcott’s starts in the last two important games (Cup Final and the FA’s not very charitable shield) I’d be offering generous odds on Giroud getting the start for the next game. Plenty of games to go round for the forwards. At least till Welbeck is (match) fit and then the headaches begin.
Fun times for AW.
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0-0 at half time
Arsenal Under-19s v VfB: Huddart, O’Connor, Chatzitheodoridis, Dasilva, Osei-Tutu, Mourgos, Pileas, Donovan, Sheaf, Hinds, Fortune
subs: Keto, Eyoma, M. Bola, T. Bola, Pleguezuelo, Zelalem, Willock.
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Great stuff Shotts, these carefully analysed well thought through pieces are the perfect antidote to the more emotionally or agenda driven bloggers out there.
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Yassine Fortune has scored his first Arsenal goal to make it 1-0
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about 15 minutes to go, its 1-1, Arsenal wasted several good chances to make it 2-0, then what looked like a foul went unpunished and stuttgart got in to make it 1-1 with an outstanding strike
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u19 semi gone to penalties
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Shotta, atta-boy!
I would suggest that Didier Drogba, is the clinching debating pointer?
8 seasons in the EPL, 100 goals in the league games! 2004/2012 in his prime years.
Last season, Drogba scored 4 league goals.
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sheaf scores the first penalty
stuttgart level
Willock scores
Huddart got a touch but its level again
Da Silva scores
Huddart saves
O’Connor fires over the bar
Huddart saves again
Zelalem scores to send Arsenal into the final to face PSV on sunday
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Good call NOTH. Imagine Drogs ending his career at the Chavs as a legend with an average of 12.5 goals per season. And Lampard as their all time leading scorer. Taking recent history into account it makes you wonder if the pundits denigrating Giroud really know what it takes to win the league. Henry and Keown were champions making them even more guilty of misleading those fans relying on them for their expert opinion.
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Seen an Arsenal fan today say that we still need a right back, left back, defensive midfielder, right winger and a striker, but that we should still win the league. Really, you could not make it up.
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Eddy, Eddy
ONLY 664 answered that survey. The AST no longer post their AGM on the internet. So, perhaps just over half the membership bothered to reply?
Tim (Chump) Payton, according to the savant, 664 represent the Arsenal Supporters!
Come, come, the AST are not fit for purpose.,
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well notoverthehill the pic I posted shows, that no matter how few or how many took part in their survey, that of those that did, 12% of them are not optimistic for Arsenal’s prospects over the next 5 years, also remember that 24% of them not satisfied with Wenger.
AST and Payton in particular are a joke.
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Fortune’s goal
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Talking about jokes, remember all those Wenger Out folks who were saying we should have bought Chris Samba?
Chris Samba hahaha
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Thx for the clip of Fortune’s goal edu. Have to say though that the Stuttgart defender has been watching too many Joachim Boateng videos.
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Excellent work Shotta and you don’t get paid for it. Those lazy hacks and plundits are just stealing a living!
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Delicious analysis.
I’m very happy with Giroud. I’m happy with Welbeck, blah blah, inc. hopes for Sanogo, Akpom, etc, etc.
Does anyone have the number of players who’ve scored over the last two seasons? There’s a lot. Loads and loads esp. since rvp left.
Nice one Shotta.
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no CL football for RVP this season
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Another joke: Chelsea 0 Fiorentina 1
Zouma booked for a tackle like Cantona’s on that Palace fan, just on the pitch and without the same justification. Only saw the last 10 minutes but they looked right niggled.
Came on the Swans.
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Correction: Come on the Swans
Otherwise it sounds a bit iffy.
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Rafael Hernández @RafaelH117 23m23 minutes ago
Szczesny having a spectacular match.
Sergi Domínguez @FutbolSergi 21m21 minutes ago
Barça playing beautiful football whilst creating plenty of chances. Szczesny pulling off some really good saves too.
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Every Chelsea loss is a thing of beauty.
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szczesny having an outstanding game for Roma v Barcelona tonight but it has not stopped the most idiotic of gooners having a go at him, he is even being blamed by them for this goal
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the mirror reporting that Jack Wilshere is out for a couple of months with a fractured left fibula, which contradicts the initial reports that he had a minor injury to his right ankle.
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Excellent work Shotta.
Nice to see NB69 popping in to the blog too.
Loving every moment of Chelsea’s mini downward spiral at the moment.
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