But in today’s post, Blackburn George asks – exactly who are the real losers here?

I can’t think how yesterday’s result could have been worse.

We lost a game we dominated from start to finish.  Blackburn’s solitary effort on goal was struck so badly that it looped into the net via the post.  It was a nightmare.  But Arsenal undeniably performed below par.  Some players were understandably off the pace following extended layoffs and/or lack of playing opportunities.  Others just did not seem to have the urgency required to put a poor Blackburn team to the sword.

On the other hand, no player in particular had a stinker.

We were not crap, or even very bad.

Arsene picked a team that should have been more than good enough to win.  He later strengthened it further with the introduction of Santi, Jack and Theo.  Thomas Rosicky – who was head and shoulders the best player on the pitch – was withdrawn, together with The Ox and Gervinho.  I think most would have made the same changes given that Thomas was unlikely to last ninety minutes.

It took a huge slice of good fortune on their part to score and more luck – this time of the bad variety – combined with some poor finishing, for us not to score.  Arsene must be livid and desperately disappointed in a team that should have gotten the business done.  On any other day it would have.  In the words of Lucas Podolski:

 “Shit happens”

Onwards and upwards is now our only option.

Twitter, following the game was absolute carnage.  A performance of over-reaction and judgmental cowardice that frankly beggared belief.

Forgotten was the West Ham display.

Forgotten was the comeback against Liverpool.

Forgotten was the brilliance – and courage – shown against Sunderland.

The team and manager were disparaged and rubbished in the rudest of terms.  It was, by any standards, disgraceful.  In response to some of it I tweeted the following:

“If you can’t get behind the team in the worst of circumstances, you are nothing but a fair-weather glory-hunting twat.”

I thought it then and I still do.  I am not suggesting we could – or should –  not have done better as a unit.  But were we bad enough to justify what followed as supposedly ‘loyal’ supporters turned on their team like a pack of deranged halfwits?  No, we were not.  Not by a long way.  True, it is the second time in the season that lightning has struck in the cup, and that undeniably makes it harder to swallow.

But swallow it we must.

Nothing I saw yesterday has changed my opinion that given a settled Summer and the addition of one or two players, this squad will be good enough to compete both domestically and in Europe.  The future is bright, despite what the ill-informed may say.  For me, Tuesday simply can not come quickly enough.

I am confident we will see the real Arsenal very soon.

Hopefully we’ll see the real fans, too.

“It was utterly moronic and shows that, for some people their time in the spotlight has become more important than the good of the Club…We fans have a huge role to play in getting behind the manager and the team for the rest of this season and beyond.”

Following on from Matt’s excellent post yesterday and in preparation for this afternoon’s fifth round FA Cup clash I thought I’d offer us all a bit of comfort. The above quote is the kind of comment we might expect from one of the PA crew, beset as we are by organisations who purport to represent us, vehemently anti Arsenal blogs who claim to be like us and bannerwankers who apparently just need a hug and understanding. But it may surprise you (it may not after all I have no special insight beyond my glass balls, you can find this stuff on the net just as easily as I can) to hear that this is taken not from an Arsenal fan but from the first response of a Blackburn Rovers supporter to news that his club’s resident ‘action group’ are miffed at the appointment of their new manager.

The dickheads we all have to put up with on the internet and for some of you sadly in the stadia where our boys go into battle might genuinely have some cause for alarm if our club had endured the recent history of today’s opponents. I’m not talking about the managerial merry go round, the owners and meddling back-room boys, nor the fact that the club is being sued by a former manager or that horse meat is being served in Lancashire schools. Oh wait, sorry over enthusiastic scanning of the headlines in the Lancashire Telegraph there, disregard the last bit. No the utterly horrifying news greeting Blackburn’s fans this morning is that the club have failed to keep David Bentley from returning to their playing staff. The midfielder who once compared himself to Dennis Bergkamp… Oh Jesus. Give me a moment. Just typing that makes my spleen start to hurt. Ahem. Right here we go. The midfielder who once thought he’d be as good as Dennis Bergkamp…

Aaaaaaaaaaaargh.

The young footballer who once set his sights on emulating the inestimably brilliant Dennis Bergkamp, but who ended up not good enough even for Spurs, is returning to Ewood Park on loan for the rest of the season. You see, some people think we have it tough but the guys who George shares a bus with have to digest not only the fact that their kids are eating Shergar but that their home town club has to have that rodent faced little underachiever in their side not just once but for a second go around.

Don’t you feel just ever so slightly better about your life now?

If not, just the simple fact that it’s FA Cup fifth round day should give you a scintilla of pleasure, a slight shiver of spinal sensation at the prospect of a home tie in the country’s premier knock out competition. There’s a whole lot of guff spouted about the devaluing of cups and Arsene not caring enough about this particular tournament but our record in it is second to none. Apart from a team I refuse to acknowledge that is, so second to none as far as I’m concerned. Arsene always looked pretty chuffed at winning the thing and while the Champion’s League and the way qualification for it is organised has altered the balance of power so that in our minds we have to shoe horn in a top four finish to the old hierarchy of European Cup, League Title and FA Cup, there is enough history to keep the pursuit of the old trophy an exciting prospect.

I’m trying desperately not to slip down memory lane into one of my nostalgic diversions. I haven’t mentioned Ronnie Radford, Wrexham, Jim Montgomery, Bobby Stokes, Dave Beasant or Bournemouth in ’84. I’ve been good haven’t I? We have of course been on the receiving end of our fair share of cup upsets and we have to take them on the chin, they are for many old romantics (whatever happened to the new romantics? I suppose they became old in their time) what makes the competition special. I’m not mentioning any of the above mentioned because I’m sure you all have your own FA cup memories both happy and sad and don’t need to read of mine. We can share in the comment section. This flim flam is really only the lure to draw you all here, the light around which us Positive Arsenal moths can gather, the real meat is in the comments as far as I’m concerned.

 There are of course FA Cup memories which will bind us all together depending only upon our age. Charlie George lying flat on his back and gazing down at his erection after one of the best ever FA cup final goals and poor Geoff Barnett unfairly carrying the can for letting the loathed Leeds beat us the following year. The sense of utter disbelief when we lost to Ipswich being wiped out by the crazy ending to the 1979 final against United. And the bitter return to Wembley where we somehow contrived to let West Ham score their ping pong goal and beat us the following season. There have been finals which didn’t concern us but nonetheless stick in the mind. I’m certain I only need say Keith Houchen and Gary Mabbutt and many of us will remember diving header and own goal with a warm sense of satisfaction.

 As I say I shan’t meander down the roads of my memory for that is a sad habit into which us old men must take care not to fall. I merely wish to set the scene so that you all can relive and share past glories and failures in this venerable competition.

 Of course the cup isn’t all about traditions and the past. These days it has a different but no less important attraction. It is a chance to slip out of the suffocating “3 Points A Must” straight jacket of the Premiership and experience life in a different arena. Points are not at stake and a defeat elsewhere for a hated or feared rival means they can be scratched, torn from the wall chart and need not pose us any future threat. Today we are likely to see a different side take the field. There may be old faces returning to the line up from the treatment table as they rehabilitate or youngsters staking a claim in order to alleviate an injury crisis. Fringe or bench players have a chance to shine as their first choice colleagues are rested ahead of supposedly sterner tests. This all gives the FA Cup a feeling of being in a different place, of stepping outside of ourselves for a day and seeing the world through an altered perspective. Of course we want to win, I’m not for a moment suggesting otherwise. I don’t care too much about the league cup but I sure as hell want to win it every year. But there is a tangible relaxation of the weekly grind, of the usual pressures and it is replaced with the allure of cup glory, the promise of a May moment in the Wembley sun. There is the chance of something special at the end of the season, a way of forging a link between these players today and Charlie George’s hard-on and for that reason alone today is a special day.

Matt Windmill seeks to separate the men from the boys in today’s guest post.

After hard fought back-to-back 1-0 victories, is it just possible the Banner and Black Bin Bag faction now have their Arsenal back?

Perhaps we can look forward to another stellar season like the one that the 1994-95 vintage squad delivered us? Isn’t this what the BW Brigade want? (Banner W**kers for those wondering).

A 12^th placed finish in the league, which at one point actually looked like it could turn into a relegation scrap, were it not for a late run.  George Graham sacked after a bungs scandal and Paul Merson missing for three months while he underwent treatment to combat drug and gambling addictions.

Sounds great doesn’t it?

It got me thinking though, where were the banners and protests then? 

Where were the supporters’ groups telling us what to think, telling us what we want, and then representing ‘our’ views to the club?  Where was the booing in the stadium of such performers as Ian Selley, David Hillier and the howls of frustration at wing wizard Glenn Helder?  If the vocal minority are moaning and whinging today, back then they must have been apoplectic with rage!

Or maybe there is another possibility.

Perhaps they only started supporting Arsenal once the good times had actually returned?

Perhaps it was only after Arsene Wenger arrived and revolutionised English football – and more importantly – our great club.

Transforming The Arsenal into one of the top 10 clubs in Europe, doing away with the “Boring, boring” Arsenal tag and producing the most exciting brand of football the English game has ever seen.

Overseeing the construction of arguably the best football stadium in European football.

Whilst consistently challenging for honours at the top of the English game.

How happy the BWs must have been in 2004, with the delivery of an historic unbeaten season, by a team capable of beating any opposition, right across the globe.

You see – as any glory hunting supporter will tell you – it is easy to follow a team when they are winning. Just ask the majority of Manchester United supporters.

But the arrival of Russian and Arab billions has changed the landscape forever, and made it extremely difficult to stay at the top.  Surely anyone with a smidgeon of intelligence can work that out.

Can’t they?

No, not the BW brigade!

Of course, they well know only ridicule would come their way if they were to actually  change their choice of team to support. But the anger that seeps from their pores, manifests as screamed abuse of frustration.  The logic of this ruinous mentality culminates in the ridiculous notion of them putting themselves up as those who somehow know better than one of the greatest managers in our club’s proud history.

Where am I going with this, you ask?

Well at the start of this piece I suggested, with tongue firmly in cheek, that the BW’s now have their Arsenal back, but do you know what Arsenal I want back?

I want the Arsenal back without them.

Perhaps our lean spell, trophy wise, has a silver lining?

Perhaps it separates the men from the boys.  Perhaps we will see a return to having only those fans who are there just to support? Those who smile just at the thought of walking up to The Emirates with its ever improving, ever impressive décor and its carpet-like pitch. 

And one of the best teams in Europe gracing it.

That’s what I want – comebacks from 4-0 down, 7-3 victories, attacking football that, back in that 94-95 season, I dared to not even dream about.

I don’t want my Arsenal back, because it has, and never will, leave me.  I fully intend to make the most of every single game I go to.

And hey, if I am lucky, the BW brigade will be nowhere to be seen.

Yesterday morning we learned of an honour. An honour bestowed on one Mr Pat Rice. Or as we must henceforth know him: Patrick James Rice Member Of The British Empire. I’m not much of a one for Empires. From Moguls to the Byzantine, Incas to Romans not much seems to come of them bar defeat and occupation of peoples who were otherwise minding their own business and generally just trying to get through this life without being subjugated, forcibly converted, garotted or generally pissed off. However I am delighted that such an incredible servant to our club with a record which must be the envy of most if not all involved in the game should receive any recognition from any quarter. I’d be over the moon if he stuck two fingers up to the whole overpriced and embarrassing royal shambles and told them to shove their award where Sri Lankan prisoners keep their phones, but if he and his family are happy with the gong then that is all that matters.

Pat was there at the start for me. I didn’t know back when I started following the club in 1970 that he’d only played a bit part in our Fairs Cup winning season nor that like Li’l Jack he came up through the youth set up to captain the team to glory. Woops, sorry I’ll cover the crystal ball over don’t want to spoil the surprise for the rest of you when certain events come to pass. Anyway as I say when I started supporting the coolest team in the land Pat Rice was the right back, I’d known no other and neither would I for the rest of my childhood. To give you some context as to how ever present Mr Rice MBE has been in my life I was at St John’s Infants when I first cut out his picture for my scrapbook and working for the Ministry Of Defence, married and living in my first flat when he left us to pursue a twilight career with Watford. This has been a strangely Riceless season for me.

As it’s Bacary’s birthday today and I seem to be strolling down memory lane once more I thought we might take a few moments out of our hectic lives to consider the right back. The Arsenal right back of course. And naturally we will start with Mr Rice. My first.

I don’t intend to give you any great tactical insights as to how vital the full back position has become to our style of play. I’m a little under qualified. However I did used to play right back for Reg’s Bar first 11 in the lower reaches of the Frome and District Sunday league so I do have some little sensibility of the role. The one thing my research has shown is that Pat in his heyday was a little more mobile than I used to be. It’s easy to assume that defenders back in the late sixties and early seventies were just lumpen cloggers hoofing the ball clear and the opposition winger with it. Think Stoke City or Sunderland circa 2013. Easy but wrong. Pat used to bomb forward with every bit as much aplomb as the modern full back, dark locks streaming out behind him and in many matches you’d see him crop up in unusual areas of the pitch, meandering across to the left, or making runs inside his winger a la Andre Santos in fact. I’m watching the 1971 final against Liverpool as I write this and he’s just skinned Steve Heighway on the half way line and charged forward in the inside right position to unleash a shot which, well, ok so let’s draw a veil over the somewhat tame pass to Clemence which may have a been a through ball so subtle that only a time travelling Thierry Henry could have got on the end of it or may just have been a lame shot, the point is I was weaned on attacking minded right backs with dubious finishing skills.

Pat was there as I’ve said for a long time. A very long time. He was our RB for ten years and when he left a pattern began to emerge. We seem to replace long serving right full backs with a series of bit part players. Some win things with us, some don’t. Some amuse others infuriate but they don’t last. And then the next long term incumbent dons the number 2. Or whatever bloody number they wear these days. After Pat we saw John Devine. Apparently. I seem to remember John Hollins playing in defence as well but my recall is hazy at best so forgive me. I do clearly remember Viv Anderson coming to us from Brian Clough’s Forest.

Double European Cup winner, tall and somewhat elegant for a full back Viv was another attack minded defender scoring fifteen times for us and looking for all the world like an inside forward rather than a full back. However Anderson was approaching his thirties and only lasted three seasons. George Graham provoked the eighties equivalent of a black bag protest by selling him to Man United without any obvious world class talent to replace him. Of course fools who react to managers’ far sighted decisions in the transfer market with knee jerk protests and spasmodic convulsive complaints are almost always proved wrong. Graham had bought a young, fancied but untested Lee Dixon from Stoke City and the rest is history. Pat’s true successor had arrived, and the next full time right back assumed the position. OK if you must have the facts, after a failed experiment with Nigel Winterburn on the right he assumed it. Dixon’s playing career was nothing short of phenomenal. He was with us from ’87 to 2002 won titles and cups galore and managed to make the switch from Graham’s rigidity to Arsene’s fluidity without drawing breath.

The pattern of long term incumbent followed by bit parters continued after Lee retired with Oleh Romanovych Luzhny AKA The Horse (ask your parents why), Lauren (The Invincible) and His Royal Eminence Lord Emmanuel Eboué Dada all pretenders to Pat’s throne, but none quite making the grade. And then our birthday boy arrived. If Bac is to maintain the pattern he must sign an extended contract and play on well into his thirties and of course I fully expect him so to do. I was derided from all sides for saying I fully expected Theo to sign on for another stint and look how that turned out. I therefore have complete confidence in my powers of prediction. The crystal ball of course comes in handy here too.

Bacary is very much in the Pat Rice MBE tradition. Piling forward at every opportunity, extravagant hair-do flowing in his slipstream and yet brutally unforgiving in his defensive duties he is as Arsene is alleged to have said the ‘best right back of all time in the Premier League’ . If anyone questions his commitment just look at how he has tackled since coming back from two broken legs. No. Strike that – if anyone questions his commitment just piss off and follow a different sport. He’s the kind of man that has the character to play through a run of poor form needing no protection from the manager and as his out of position heroics against Sunderland (who were remember playing with a ref and an extra player for much of the match) proved he has versatility and footballing intelligence in his locker to boot.

Those predicting Corporal Carl to take Bac’s shirt any time soon need to beware the pattern. After the long standing player steps aside a period of uncertainty must follow and only then will the next true heir to Mr Rice MBE become known to us mortals. Unless of course , like me, your balls are crystal.

Hello and welcome to this week’s news round up.

First up is transfer activity. Andre Santos has moved back into his parents’ basement after his travels across Europe ended in tears. Having found himself in trouble with the police in London, he is believed to be “grounded for a year”. Santos will only be allowed out for football practice with local side Gremio.

Arsenal player of the month award was given out this month to Le Flop himself, Olivier Giroud. This was a typically kind gesture from the Arsenal faithful to rally around a player who is failing so miserably. We can only hope that the manager will listen to the experts when buying players in future.

The goal of the month award for January went to Lukas Podolski. There were several strong contenders such as the Gibbs volley against Swansea or the fantastic team goal against West Ham which was finished off by Cazorla. The fans have opted for Podolski’s, frankly dangerous, hammer-blow from distance.

Sunderland away was the game on Saturday and Arsenal had several thousand chances to let us have that extra year on our lives back. Santi Cazorla got the only goal in a game where we could have romped home. Chances were spurned and tension built but Arsenal hung on to claim the three points. One has to feel for the Sunderland players as they faced the Wenger’s hatchet men in a game that saw the Gunners throw themselves to the ground and cheat their way to three points. One of the Arsenal assassins actually had himself sent off on two counts of assault. The FA must surely clamp down.

Arsene Wenger has called for blood testing to be introduced to the English game. This comes in the wake of allegations made about Spanish Doctor Fuentes who has been juicing Spanish athletes since Pep was a lad. Some resistance is expected as certain Stoke players are said to be reluctant to reveal their DNA code.

Bacary Sagna spoke to Arsenal player about returning the balance to our defence this week. Perhaps not the wisest choice of words, considering how Liverpool’s first goal came about last week. It has been decided that Sagna is past his best and it’s hard to see how he can come back from an error like that. Fortunately, the vastly superior Jenkinson was on hand to take over the right-back spot for the Sunderland game. There is no doubt that Sagna would have blown it for us.

So next we have what might become known as the meerkat’s derby as Blackburn Rovers visit for the FA Cup tie next weekend. There will be stowaways on the bus and they will be furry. Watch out Gooners, they bite!

That is all from me for another week, thank you for reading.
Up the Arsenal.

I don’t know about you, but when Arsenal are suffering, I am miserable.

My long-suffering wife leaves the room at kick-off and checks the score before she comes back.

If we lose, she keeps a healthy distance and it can be some time before I can raise a smile.  I can’t sleep for a couple of days and eating is a chore.  Now I know it’s ‘just a game’ and I should not make other people miserable because of it.

I just can’t help it.

I love Arsenal with an unhealthy passion.

I know I am not alone.  I know it’s also not something that’s exclusive to people who adore the manager and players.  I understand that miserable gits, malcontents and know-it-alls also feel like this.

But me being a selfish old curmudgeon, I don’t care about them.

When my head goes down I want a place to visit that makes me feel better.  Not a place that wallows in the misery and offers endless opinions on easy fixes proffered by idiots with little or no understanding of the small picture, let alone the big one.

I don’t want to be told that player X, Y or Z is not fit to wear the shirt.

Or that the manager is a senile old fool who has lost the plot.

I don’t want to be reminded of every bad loss or the perceived ideas of why players left.  Apart from the fact I have heard them a million times before, and argued against them a million and one times, it just depresses me further.  The attitude of those I am arguing with makes me more than a little irate.

Discussions degenerate into arguments, arguments into rows and rows into slanging matches.  This suits the malcontents fine.

Now everyone is miserable and irate like them.

So it came to me some months ago that what is needed is a blog where like-minded people could gather and make each other feel better rather than worse.

And here we are, “Positively Arsenal”.

An oasis of joy in a desert of misery.  A place where people can rejoice in all that is good about the club.  Somewhere for us to look forward with enthusiasm and expectation.

If people want to discuss tactics, formations and personnel, fine.  That’s what makes a blog go round.  But if they want to play Football Manager and imply that they could run or manage the club better than the top professionals that actually do the job, here is not the place for them.

The idea was easy, implementing it the hard part.

So I did what I do best, and got someone else to do it for me.  That someone was, as you now know, Adi.  He did all the spade work and a damn good job he has done – I am sure you will agree!

We now have regular contributions from Andrew, Stew, Adi, Frank and Bradyesque.  And I have to say the standard of writing has exceeded my wildest dreams.  The quality of comments is something I hankered after, yet never expected.  The first two weeks has been quite a success.  I hope it goes from strength to strength because it can only bring us all joy.

I see this as a family, a positive community.  One where each poster feels at home and part of the experience.  And I hope you all feel the same and continue to bond and flourish.  Everyone who writes and posts is as important to the future of the site as myself or Adi.

Thank you all for making me a very happy little Meerkat.

By our very own @BlackburnGeorge aka Pedantic George

Over the years of supporting Arsenal, I’ve seen many high and mighty claims made on a variety of topics and these are bandied about as a stick to beat either the club or the manager or players with. I’ve had many a discussion and debate trying to clear the fog of misinformation but the same claims continue to be made. Here at Positively Arsenal, we will look to debunk some of these claims and explain the reality in the hope that people can find it informative and at the same time learn to better see through these myths that get propagated.

I figured I’d start with the most common one, the supposed 7 year decline from challengers to fighting for the top 4. I think it’s a rarity now to see an article in the media or watch a football match on TV without seeing or hearing the mention of 7 years and the words “trophy drought”. To an extent, this media brainwashing has worked on far more people than you’d expect but then again, the human race has always been one that is easily swayed by whatever is seemingly the popular opinion.  Most people seem to talk about this decline like it has been a disastrous downward spiral since 2004 when it has been anything but.

The claim of a decline is only even remotely true if you look at a starting point of the Invincibles (the highest peak any team could ever hope to reach) and the players in that and an ending point of today, a point when the season isn’t over. But to look at it in such black and white fashion is such a simplistic and simple-minded dismissal of a very complicated time in Arsenal’s history. A time that I will seek to explain in this post to show what really happened.

We turn the clock back to 2005, to our last glorious cup win, a penalty shoot-out win that we were rather fortunate to get considering we were outplayed for most of that game. More significantly though, we finished 2nd in the league that year, a good 12 points behind then winners, Chelsea. The first signs of the odds we would be up against was there to be seen, that the year after a season unbeaten and finishing 11 points above them, Chelsea had managed to literally buy themselves a 23 point swing by adding Robben, Drogba, Carvalho, Cech, Ferreira and more in just one summer.

While Chelsea were busy buying the league in 2004/05 and 2005/06, our last seasons at Highbury, these were the years of the aging Invincibles team and the years when the first phase of rebuilding began. While this time marked an FA Cup and a dominating run until the Champions’ League final, our performance in the league dropped in comparison, especially in our last Highbury season. It took us some good fortune and dodgy lasagna to finish 4^th that year, despite having most of the Invincibles still around. What’s more surprising is the fact that this squad finished 24 points behind league winners Chelsea (who continued their reckless spending)

Our rebuilding during this time was quick, drastic and enforced by a combination of age and the need to offload big earners without resale value (a bit like Chelsea are doing now with Drogba last season and Lampard now). To plan and compensate for these departures, pieces were gradually added with the likes of Hleb, Rosicky, Adebayor, Gallas, Sagna, Walcott and more. While the first season together was shaky in 2006/07 with the expected disjointed nature of new teammates in a rebuilding team, there were still signs of a promising team coming together especially indicated by a run between early December and mid-March that saw us just suffer one defeat in 14 games in the league. However this was another season finishing 4^th and this time 21 points behind the winners.

The full potential of this squad was reached in the 2007/08 season where we played the finest Wengerball in years.  This team racked up a great set of results and sat on top of the table as true title contenders all the way until late Feb when our season began to shatter just like Eduardo’s ankle did in that infamous game. A string of poor results (and poor refereeing in the case of the Champions League) followed with just one win between then and the middle of April and this decided our fate in the league. Despite a strong finish with a few wins on the trot, we just fell short, 4 points off the title in 3^rd.

This team had the makings of a great one that was capable of reaching great heights had they stuck together. However, greed struck with the loss of Flamini and Hleb to teams that could offer a better financial package than we could at a time when the financial restrictions of moving to a new stadium was starting to visibly affect us. At the same time, after an excellent season, the caricature that is Adebayor began to show his temperamental nature while agitating for a move and departed the very next summer to Manchester City. A falling out with then captain, Gallas, meant that Kolo Toure was also let go off to the newly rich team from Manchester.

This forced the second rebuild since the Invincibles, one that built around a youthful core that was showing signs of blossoming. The likes of Alex Song, Nasri, Theo, Fabregas and even Denilson, Diaby and Bendtner contributed greatly towards keeping us in the top 4 and inching closer to another title challenge that was around the corner. We finished 4^th in 08/09 and 09/10 thanks to these youngsters and some spectacular play from Arshavin as well and the gap to the top was slowly decreasing, with an 18 point deficit in 2009 narrowing down to 11 in 2010 (a season when we challenged well into March when we were just 2 points off the top before falling short).

Then came the next big push for a title from an Arsenal team since the Invincibles in the 2010/11 season. Nasri, Fabregas, Arshavin and Chamakh were in sparkling form at the start of the season and kept us in the title hunt well into March at the end of which we were 5 points off 1^st place United, with a game in hand and a game to face them. This despite a season long injury to our best center back in Vermaelen and a goalkeeping injury crisis that meant we had to call Jens Lehmann back on emergency loan for a game. However once again, bad luck struck and after a devastating defeat in the Carling Cup final and dodgy refereeing knocking us out of Europe again, a limp end to the season saw the title challenge fade and the club finished 4^th again, 12 points off the top.

Since then we’ve again been forced to rebuild, losing players to impatience or greed (or both) over the span of two summers just as the financial restrictions were beginning to lift and genuine strengthening would’ve been possible. The following table shows you the changes in the team, in the year of every genuine title challenge. It is so startlingly clear how much we’ve been affected by this rebuilding cycle of players leaving and almost an entire squad getting overhauled due to factors ranging from age to greed to impatience.

It is full credit to the man in charge that despite being forced into doing such a drastic overhaul so frequently in the last few years, he’s kept us within reach and at worst, a year away from the next title challenge. For all his accusation about being too tactically rigid, the evolution of tactics and the adaptation to key players departing is nothing short of remarkable and yet somewhat unappreciated too.

The last section of that table shows you what we have now and what we will continue to build on come this summer. You can see how hard the team has had it when having to cope with such a drastic change after losing two players whom the team was built around (Cesc and RVP). You can also see that there is a fantastic foundation present, one we can be proud of and one which will serve as a platform to future success. And lastly, for the past month or so, you’ve seen evidence of what this team is capable of when it truly comes together. Just like 08/09 or 06/07 before that, the time right now is the teething period before we attempt to take our bite of success.

As for the point about the myth of the decline, by now I think this analogy will make sense. Calling what we have gone through a decline is like being in the Himalayas, and claiming that everything other than Mount Everest, the Invincibles, isn’t high enough and that every valley between peaks we encounter is a disaster. A little more perspective, a little more patience and a little more understanding is all it takes to realize why our last few years have been a rollercoaster and further realize that there is only one way from here, and that is up.

I was going to do one of those clever invite the opposition blogs. You know, chat to my Sunderland supporting mate about how he sees Arsenal, what his own side’s strengths and weaknesses are and generally give the P.A. readership, erudite and urbane as you all are, the chance to see the world through their eyes.

Problem is he’s a bit blinkered with hatred for us (doubtlessly born out of jealousy) and tends to answer even the most ambiguous questions with a long drawn out “Aye”. Only the subtlest alteration in stress or inflection gives you a clue to his thinking. Wouldn’t have read well so I scrapped that idea.

Unperturbed and determined to pursue some semblance of the plan I searched for a few Sunderland blogs online so I could quote extensively from the comments they attracted. Unfortunately the first one I came to had me screaming at the monitor after they talked about Per’s injury which lead to their goal the last time we played up there. They seemed to suggest he was somehow inept or bumbling not to have stopped whichever clodhopping Sunderland player it was that lurched passed him as he lay injured on the floor. I fought down the bile and ploughed on. The next site I came to had robbed my idea. Well, ok it’s a pretty well worn and old idea but I had thought of using it so that much was down to me. This Black Cats blog had interviewed a man who shall remain nameless but writes for a leading allegedly Arsenal supporting blog. He used the platform of today’s opponents supporters blog to display disloyalty, dishonesty, dishonour and generally bleat in the most abject way about how miserable he was that we lost to Birmingham in the widdley diddley cup final and how it wasn’t fair that nasty old Arsene wouldn’t change his ways having singularly failed to replace any of the hundred stars he’s sold in the last two weeks. You catch my drift. I was angrier than ever by now so shut down my search and just started to think about Arsenal versus Sunderland without any outside help thank you very much.

Sunderland to me is two memories. The first shared by many of my generation features a trilby hatted man with a flapping mac and red tights who looked like a nineteen fifties car mechanic and part time Butlins Redcoat in his best clothes on a day out, doing a funny hop skip and bouncy jump across the hallowed turf of Wembley. Bob Stokoe had just witnessed his fabulously coiffured and bewhiskered Sunderland team hand out an unlikely FA cup final defeat to an infamous Leeds United team who were in their pomp back in 1973. The nation cheered as the red and white striped journeymen who had come down to London as little more than sacrificial lambs bullied Leeds (not many did that) and kept them at bay, thanks in no small part to some truly incredible goal keeping from Jim Montgomery. The double save from Trevor Cherry’s header and Lorimer’s follow up shot was so ridiculously good that even as I watch the youtube video now, knowing what will happen, I’m still convinced it goes in. Brian Moore commentating for ITV at the time was equally bewildered, shouting “And a goal … NO.. my goodness I thought Lorimer had got that one”. I’ll draw a veil over the fact that Sunderland knocked us out of the FA Cup in the semis to deny us our rightful chance of revenge against a hated Leeds side who had somehow beaten us in the previous year’s final. It’s a measure of how much Leeds were despised in the early seventies that despite the indignity of being dumped out of the cup by second division opposition I still wanted them to go on and win the cup.

 My other memory when I think of Sunderland, shared only by me and my immediate family, is being driven around Roker Park about a dozen times on our way to a bizarre holiday destination somewhere on the North East coast. Mum was wrestling with a Bartholomew’s road atlas and Dad was becoming increasingly exasperated as no matter how many different escape routes she plotted for us the magnetic force of Roker Park pulled us back into it’s orbit.

Of course Sunderland left their historic home back in 1997 exactly a hundred years after building it on what was originally farm land. Like Arsenal they built and moved into a new shiny stadium and despite the financial implications and inevitable stresses of a stadium move they stuck with the same manager and continued to play in an attractive, exciting style and remained firmly among the elite of European football, their beautiful pitch with it’s flawless playing surface being the envy of other less fortunate clubs.

Oh wait.

Sunderland like many others who’ve built new stadia have struggled to find consistent success. Or even consistent top flight status. In fact the last time they achieved consistent success was between 1891 and 1895 when they won the league three times in four seasons. That 1973 triumph against Leeds was their last ever trophy.

Strangely though, as I was trawling the blogosphere to find Sunderland quotes for my abortive article and whenever I speak to my Sunderland supporting friend the mood was and is always positive. The passion and support and self belief are everywhere self evident. One blog had at least five of the current Sunderland first team better than their opposite numbers in our team. And it’s been forty years without a trophy. Seventy seven years since they won the league. Something to ponder the next time you have to read or listen to some whining anti Arsenal ‘fan’ bitching because Sky told him to about seven years, and trophy droughts.

Modern day Sunderland as far as we’re concerned means packed defences and a lack of ambition at our place and a deliberately ploughed pitch with knee high grass at their place. I feel embarrassed for those passionate loyal supporters having to stand up and shout for a side that showed such a craven lack of self belief and desire at the Emirates or for a club that along with Milan should hang their heads for deliberately creating an unplayable surface just to stop their visitors producing decent football. Having said that their fans have been known to stand and applaud some of our players on occasions so hats off to them for that. O’Neill as a manager has always been an annoying waspish presence on the touchline but he knows how to organise his teams and does have some good players. It’ll be vital Theo has a good game to keep their speedy left back penned in his own half, but if we show the same patience we employed against the Orcs and the bravura with which West Ham and Liverpool were put to the sword we have enough to beat them.

Of course as Per can testify, sometimes a deep hoof print in the wrong place at the wrong time can make a mockery of even the best laid plans.

These are two of the most damaging allegations against Arsenal in a decade, including those of the anti-support, the combined efforts of the village idiot trust, precisely because they sound a bit well-dressed, respectable and tidy, backed by ‘data’ in one case. They allow those embracing such ideas to speak the telltale words “I have always supported Wenger but …. I was as shocked as you when I found out, you know, the damning evidence of mismanagement”. The intelligence and corporate worlds refer to this as “plausible deniability”.

On the other hand, being an Arsenal-positive kind of bloke, I saw opportunity, not threat, to debunk such fiction. I am not going to talk about the financial limitations 2006-2011 and the restrictions these placed on the types and calibre of Arsenal players. I am not even going to talk about how many players ended up in just one other club, Manchester City, spirited away by big money, the major destabilising factor at Arsenal by a distance (an outcome ironically of Wenger’s incredible record in identifying technical players).

I am trying to imagine the soap-opera script telling the story of an economist who orchestrated the strategy of moving stadium, unparalleled in modern football management, a plan that by definition must envisage 10-25 year financial projections interwoven with narrative arguments exhaustively justifying the strategy, becoming the same chap who, it seems incredible, abandoned planning, alongside intensive research and stats, as a prime instrument of football management and now “flies by the seat of his pants”. Such genius strikes me as too far-fetched for Mr. Wenger.  How on earth did he manage this feat of duplicity? How did he fool us?

The second argument concludes that, by the evidence, Wenger never had a fully conceived football plan in the first place, post-Invincibles, that his tinkering and change of course and composition exposed the paucity and critical weaknesses of any plan he might have had scribbled down. The evidence is presented primarily in the outcome, that as we know is no trophies for 7 seasons.

The evidence is further based on a hotch-potch of alleged figures and flimsy anecdotal references alluding to and describing a pattern of ‘incomprehensible’ transfer decisions, and mistakes: you know the drill I’m sure, Cole, Pires, Gilberto, Flamini, Hleb, Diarra, Reyes, Adebayor, and a phalanx of hopelessly fat, lazy and geriatric defenders, Gallas,Eboue and so on (sorry, I’m bored already) through to the “inevitable” fall-out culminating in the summer of 2011.

I have an alternative theory. Wenger is fallible, in a strictly football sense, in that his football philosophy places tremendous trust and responsibility in his players. His post-2006 formations came close, damn close, twice if we examine the truth of it, but (injuries aside) had a human flaw despite meticulous planning and fine-tuning. The central premise rested on his ability, as coach, motivator and tactician, to coax, from four or five key players and a supporting cast, a degree of self-belief that they did not, and possibly could not, possess.

He had the best (young) central midfielder in the world, not fully matured, but acknowledged; what he thought was one of the best strikers in Europe (post-injury, proved correct); one of the best left-backs in England (a key position in modern football); and, in time, he had a twin compliment to these in two French internationals: Nasri, seemingly destined for greatness with his deftness of touch, and Diaby, despite injury, showing ability to dominate with an awkward gait, stance and movement on the ball. His teams were decidedly continental, technical and rested (they still do) on dominating the opposition. It has been said that training rarely includes tactical counter-moves to negate opposition strengths or advantages to be obtained from their weaknesses. Yes, I can believe that. Wenger only knows one strategy, to overwhelm, from passing, possession and technical mastery; to emphasize your own team’s creative ability.

He believed in his players, the core had joined young and were nurtured by him from early twenties or younger, and believing in them, he must have believed in his ability to impart self-belief to this core, more than anything that with hard work and freedom to express themselves they would reach their highest creative potential. Yes, I would think Wenger tried every conceivable combination to unlocking these players’ potential, as a team. He spoke passionately about these players, and they about him.

Wenger’s second Arsenal vintage was all but disbanded with the departure of Fabregas, and a summer later, van Persie, combining to make these the most poignant moments in the history of Arsenal in 17 years, and probably much longer. Nine other players left or were required to leave over two summers. Change was resolutely underway. Fans were shocked. Wenger acted decisively, even ruthlessly.

What belies the idea that Wenger did not have a plan underlying a plan was the speed in the re-building, and the actions we now know that could not possibly be ‘purely’ reactive: the clear-out itself, building a young British core, identifying Giroud and Podolski in advance of van Persie’s departure (and what players they turn out to be) andcontinuously strengthening defence with Per, Jenks, Santos, Miguel’s promotion, young Bellerin, now Nacho. The midfield having lost its (then) pivotal players, barely broke its stride, and that’s worth dwelling on as a feat of football engineering. There are a couple that do strike me as speculative, Park and Benayoun on loan, maybe Santos, but overwhelmingly not, nor was there any sense of panic or over-reaction (what the media drooled for) in recent transfer windows. It has been composed. The steady incorporation also of younger players has continued without so much as blinking.

I cannot think of a comparison in recent football history in the scope and speed of successfully transitioning one team into another. Manchester City bought their way with mind-numbing expenses through a transition, and it took longer. Can it be accidental that in the first season of a new-look, transitional side (last season), having lost someimmense talents, an unsettled team attained a higher placing. Was it luck? Many ascribe this to van Persie’s skills, to Benayoun’s or Rosicky’s late-season surge, or Chelsea’s ‘collapse’, but this season the team is out-scoring last season, over-reliance on one striker is thrillingly overcome, we have a lethal trident-attack, centred on a gem named Giroud, the midfield is purring with options and I think we will overhaul Chelsea, again. Somebody is doing something right.

“Planning” (in the sense I mean) is under-pinned by a philosophy, a coherent set of ideas, an identity. Wenger’s overwhelming contribution to Arsenal, his principle legacy will not only be bricks and mortar, but a vision of why football should be played and watched, and how to get it there. I doubt this has changed much, if at all over the years. The least ambitious ideas need the least gestation (for example, Manchester City’s contribution to the game); in Wenger’s case the converse is true. I look forward to the definitive book. When coherence of ideas is principled and tested, planning becomes embedded, continuous and elastic and allows for rapid action when required, because circumstances can and do change; this alone can explain how Wenger has achieved this transition.

Those howling in the wind for “change” are already over one year late, almost two as we speak. By this time last year, a full-blown transition was underway, and it shows every sign of being thought out, articulate and part of something bigger. That Fabregas and van Persie were plausible components of ‘a plan’ (elastic enough to include some probability of their departures) does not change direction and strategy. I was intrigued reading this Wengerism “don’t rule out the possibility that Fabregas will one day return to Arsenal”.

I am confident and delighted that Wenger seems not to have altered his intuitive trust in players, as people, and as a team. What proved fallible or premature with one core of players can and will excel with another; that is a question of character, work ethic and stressing such values as loyalty, teamwork and vision, as much as skill and technical ability. I cannot speak for players who departed. It hurt. Yes, they were young and so much was expected of them at the time. We suffered horrendously from injury “plague” season after season (lest we forget, van Persie, Diaby, Ramsey, Eduardo, Wilshere, Denilson, Walcott, Gibbs, Fabregas, Rosicky and Gallas all suffered extensive lay-offs through injury at critical periods). But Father time, as always, will tell us the big truth much more simply.

In the meantime, Wenger’s method has given everything I wanted from football, the opportunity for players as a team to express themselves creatively, and so, memories of the best football I have seen, certainly in England, and this has never changed in Wenger’s period. The consistency of this standard of football should tell us something about the philosophy behind. I have noted key tactical changes in the latest Wenger team, nuances, but I suspect these are built around the player’s attributes as much as tactical innovation, a combination. Is it my imagination, or has Theo Walcott just grown up, boy-to-man, at Arsenal? I could mention others, Jack and Chewie’s maturity, the story of Diaby, of Aaron, or my favourite, Rosicky. Wenger is a people-trusting person. That’s my kind of football manager.