A Beautiful Thread for the Beautiful Game

A couple of changes that went a bit under the radar in international football:

FIFA will seed all the pots for the World Cup draw:

So, no more geographical pots. The principle of drawing teams from different confederations (with the exception of UEFA, that can have two teams in a same group) remains, though.

And a stupid change by the Saudi FA. Van Marwijk, the guy who led them to be qualified in a nice fashion after slightly more than a decade, was... replaced. Edgardo Bauza (who was not good with Argentina) is in. Needless to say, most Saudi fans are pissed off at this change by their FA. Nah, not pissed off, let me correct myself.

They are furious.

Here's Van Marwijk's perspective.

edited 16th Sep '17 7:38:39 AM by Quag15

Eeeh, this new seeding rule will make the draw quite the clusterfuck, the kind where you need a Masters Degree in statistics to follow what can happen. Because like the "Tuesday/Wednesday" rules in the UCL, it will require to draw a team first, and to remove all "impossible options" second, before allocating it, which might become quite complicated fast.

But hey, their choice. The FIFA rankings are stupid anyway, it's not going to make pools more balanced.

Edit : to explain why those are stupid:

• Poland 6, Switzerland 7, so pool 1
• Spain 12, so pool 2. Like Peru. And Wales.
• Italy 17, so pool 3
• The five current leaders of the African pools are respectively ranked at 31 (Tunisia), 44 (Nigeria), 49 (Burkina Faso), 30 (Egypt) and 54 (Ivory Coast). Which means that African teams are going to get shafted super hard, as they won't have any chance to face the lowest-ranked opponents.

edited 16th Sep '17 7:46:47 AM by Julep

That's not fair to those people at all.

As much as it gets repeated that "football is more important than life and death," for people in and around the London area who have to work for a living, for families with kids who have to go to school, there are still far greater things that need prioritizing on a Thursday evening.

More than anything, this should be further grounds for criticism of Köln's traveling support for delaying the match. It's no fault of the Arsenal supporters (who had surely paid for their own tickets) who had to miss out on half the match because of the late start. If the match started when it was originally intended to, this wouldn't even have become an issue.

edited 16th Sep '17 3:40:58 PM by SeanMurrayI

I agree. When I said the criticism was to be expected, I didn't mean that it's justified. It's just not surprising.

@Julep: And the Asian teams are not in a good position either in said rankings, with the exception of Iran (Iran: 25th, Japan, 40th, South Korea, 51st, Saudi Arabia, 53rd ^note in the play-off, Australia are 50th and Syria are... 75th).

So, let's take a look at what some Tottenham fans did, instead.

(It's a parody that was made for a young boy's bar mitzvah, though, so it's not quite as cringe-y as it may sound).

edited 19th Sep '17 10:26:13 AM by Quag15

No video to be found at that Vimeo link, but going by the sound of other "Tottenham fan video" buzz, I'm going to take a guess that this is what you're talking about?

For a Bar Mitzvah video, I'd have to say that the sheer production quality is nothing short of amazing. If only the same could be said about the video's focal subject and theme.

Yes, it's that one. I guess they deleted the Vimeo link.

And yeah, the quality of production was certainly better than what I initially expected.

Some news today:

Mark Sampson set to leave as England women's manager due to allegations of misconduct.

Benzema renewed with Real (up to 2021).

Barcelona delivered a club statement regarding the recent political events involving Catalonia. If anyone here is out of the loop, the European Politics thread has some recent posts on what happened. Or you can read the more recent news here.

edited 20th Sep '17 9:40:36 AM by Quag15

I didn't see Arsenal's draw against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge Sunday, but I've seen the highlights and read some of the analysis of the game. Apparently both sides came close to scoring a couple of times, but the only goal of the game, by Mustafi, was well offside, so 0-0. That's an incredible result for Arsenal, definitely better than anyone could have expected. Arsenal have now got three of the toughest away games of the season (Liverpool, Stoke, and Chelsea) done, and they've got one point more from those games than I would've predicted.

Tonight, Arsenal host Doncaster Rovers in the League Cup. Doncaster are a couple of tiers below Arsenal, and this is "only" the League Cup, so I expect Arsenal's squad will be quite heavily rotated, with youngsters getting minutes from the start. The lineup will be something like:

Macey
Chambers Holding Bielik
Reine-Adelaide Wilshere Elneny Maitland-Niles
Nketiah Nelson
Akpom

I'm not too sure about the wing backs and the attacking midfielders, as all of the players I've named in those positions would be more natural in attacking midfield than they would be as defenders, but I'm guessing this is how they might be picked for this game.

Even with this squad, Arsenal should win, maybe 2-1.

EDIT: Alright, so it seems the actual squad is quite a bit stronger than I had predicted. I suppose that makes sense; the League Cup is by far the most likely route for Arsenal to get Europa League football next season, even though they've never won it under Wenger.

Ospina
Holding Mertesacker Chambers
Nelson Wilshere Elneny Maitland-Niles
Walcott Sanchez
Giroud

The bench is Macey; Monreal; Willock, Dasilva, Iwobi; Nketiah, Akpom.

I should also mention that Arsenal are dealing with a number of injuries at the moment. Sanchez is still recovering, but apparently fit for this game and in need of first-team minutes. Özil is still injured. Welbeck got an injury against Chelsea that will keep him out for at least a month. Coquelin and Cazorla are still out.

I'm not too happy that Nelson, an attacking midfield/forward, is playing at wing-back. He did that in preseason, and was decent enough for those games, but he should be playing in his proper position, rather than rotating wherever he can fit. I hope he doesn't perform poorly and lose confidence.

HALF TIME: Arsenal 1 - 0 Doncaster. The goal was scored by Walcott. Alexis assisted with a fantastic cross. Arsenal got plenty of goalscoring opportunities, while Doncaster had none. Arsenal will need to score one or two more to make sure they go through, but as Doncaster's players become tired, it shouldn't be too hard to get a goal against them. We'll see.

FULL TIME: Arsenal 1 - 0 Doncaster.

Arsenal just didn't try hard enough. The makeshift wing-backs made a number of mistakes that resulted in opportunities for Doncaster, but fortunately, Maitland-Niles was usually able to use his pace to put a stop to any sudden counter-attacks. Alexis and Giroud were pretty disappointing. I was quite pleased with Wilshere's game. All of that said, the best player on the pitch was Rodney Kongolo, on loan from Manchester City. He was able to bring the ball into Arsenal's defending third of the pitch, keep it there until his teammates had arrived, and put in good passes and crosses to keep the attack moving. He looks like he has potential.

edited 20th Sep '17 1:46:37 PM by BestOf

Discovering the Oxlade-Chamberlain highlights from Liverpool's League Cup loss against Leicester yesterday. Holy crap!

Your 2017 FIFA Puskas Award Nominees...

• Kevin-Prince Boateng, Las Palmas (Backheel volley assist, scissor kick finish)
• Alejandro Camargo, Universidad de Concepción (Mammoth volley from inside his own half)
• Deyna Castellanos, Venezuela U-17 Women's Team (Scoring from kickoff, immediately following a stoppage time equalizer)
• Moussa Dembele, Celtic (This one's especially for anybody who still appreciates THAT Esteban Cambiasso World Cup goal)
• Olivier Giroud, Arsenal (The one with the scorpion finish that Henrikh Mkhitaryan would probably be getting a nod for, if only he hadn't been in an offside position)
• Alviles Hurtado, Tijuana Xolos (Bicycle kick straight from a corner kick finds the top left corner of the goal)
• Mario Mandzukic, Juventus (The Champions League Final goal that made you wish Juve could've gone on to win the damn thing)
• Oscarine Masuluke, Baroka (South African goalkeeper salvages a draw with a bicycle kick in stoppage time)
• Nemanja Matic, Chelsea (The whizzing rocket straight to the top-right corner and in off the crossbar)
• Jordi Mboula, Barcelona Reserves (Some fancy dribbling, a roulette turn, a slalom run between two defenders, and a finish)

edited 22nd Sep '17 11:45:14 AM by SeanMurrayI

Those goals are absolutely fantastic. I'm a bit surprised that Giroud's made the shortlist, though - Jack Wilshere had a much better one against Norwich a couple of years back (with Giroud assisting), but that one didn't make the shortlist so I assumed the people who put the shortlist together don't accept Premier League goals or something. Either that, or the quality of goals has dropped considerably in the last 4 seasons, which is unlikely.

edited 22nd Sep '17 11:52:38 AM by BestOf

Rangers midfielder Josh Windass slide tackled his own manager less than three minutes into today's Old Firm Derby.

In a similar vein, tomorrow will mark the first meeting between Sheffield United and Sheffield Wednesday in five years, following Wednesday's promotion to the English Championship in 2012. Easily one of the more "overlooked" and "underrated" rivalries in England, it's also the most closely contested (In over 127 league games, United has 48 wins, Wednesday has 48 wins, and there have been 40 draws; in FA Cup play, each team has three wins apiece to go along with three draws), and both clubs have their sights set on similar goals for this season, as well (Principally, a high finish and a playoff spot for Premier League promotion). United are currently in 6th place, and Wednesday sit in 9th.

Here in the States, ESPN are giving the match exclusive coverage through their online streaming service, I definitely got my sights set on getting up early tomorrow morning to catch it.

My local team played today for promotion to Finland's 3rd tier of football. (Yeah, our team fucking sucks, yet it's the main team in our city. We have a decent basketball team, though.)

Our team needed at least a draw to secure promotion, and the result was a comfortable 4-1 win, with the last goal coming at the last seconds of added time. The audience was exceptionally large for this team - something like maybe 60-80 home fans and maybe about 6 or 7 for the away team. That's a pretty good indicator of the popularity of football in Finland. Granted, this was a game in the 4th tier of Finnish football, but still: in a city of about 75 000 people (for Finland, that qualifies as a city), you'll struggle to get 100 people to watch football, even if it's the local team fighting for promotion.

Percentage-wise, 100 people out of a population of ~75,000 would still be a larger representation, in comparison to the ~5,000-seat attendances at New York Cosmos games in a surrounding area of 8-10 million people. New York's MLS clubs, however, do fare a lot better.

I suppose that's one way of looking at it. The fans that were there were very loud, at least. They've been following the club through two consecutive relegations, so it must be pretty good to celebrate for once. (I go to their games every now and then, but on average it's probably less than twice a year. Most of my memories of the club are from the time when it was in Finland's 2nd tier, when it was one of the least good clubs there and played very negative football most games. I prefer this, to be honest.)

Since I'm already here: Arsenal's next game is on Monday, Against West Brom. It's at the Emirates, which makes me pretty optimistic about the game. I'll predict 1-1. Arsenal should go with a very strong lineup for this game, but injuries have ravaged the squad. The latest is Calum Chambers.

It'll be very weird to see Kieran Gibbs play for another team, against Arsenal. I hope he does well (but not too well).

Cech
Mustafi Koscielny Monreal
Bellerin Ramsey Xhaka Kolasinac
Özil Alexis
Lacazette

Sheffield United up 2-1 at halftime over Wednesday. Have to admit this derby feels a lot different and much more passionate than rivalry matches in the Premier League (Or, at the very least, aren't often presented as well on television).

The biggest highlight so far is the opening goal for United inside the first 3 minutes of the match that came from a neat little free kick routine they've surely been honing all week on the training ground.

In other derby news, Istanbul clubs Fenerbache and Besiktas accumulated 3 goals and 5 red cards between themselves◊ (and Pepe didn't even get a yellow card, INSANITY). Fenerbache emerged 2-1 winners with 9 players on the pitch.

Video highlights of goals and cards.

edited 24th Sep '17 6:24:09 AM by SeanMurrayI

The good thing about Pepe is that he matured a lot in recent years and has more or less controlled his temper. Maybe it's because of his young daughter, or because he's aware he only has 2 or 3 more years at the top level, but the man changed significantly. And he continues to be a great defender.

It's indeed ironic, in any case, that Quaresma and Neto, on the other hand, got sent off.

We play tonight against Marítimo (who are currently in 3rd place (!), and, on Thursday, we'll be playing the Europa League game against Konyaspor in Turkey.

I don't feel really confident about these games. At home we're usually favourites, but Marítimo are in peak form, while we're still trying to regain the morale after the 2-1 defeat in Braga's stadium the previous week. As for Konyaspor, they didn't have a good start in the Turkish League, but they're usually a hard to beat team at their home.

Today's demolishing result: PSV destroyed Utrecht at the latter's stadium by 7-1 (goals here).

edited 24th Sep '17 6:55:34 AM by Quag15

Yeah, a lot of players change up their game after they reach their peak. After all, in his last few years at Man U, Rooney made a transition from a decent striker to a completely useless attacking midfielder.

Sheffield United emerged 4-2 winners over Wednesday in their first meeting in over 5 years. The real difference maker being Leon Clarke, who scored two of United's goals and, as a former Wednesday player, has become the latest addition to a list of players to have played for both Sheffield clubs.

The match commentators were also saying that this was the first time ever that United has scored 4 goals against Wednesday away at Hillsborough.

Vitória SC 2-1 Marítimo

Well, that was a difficult match. But things ended well. Raphinha scored in the first 5 minutes (assisted by Héldon), but Marítimo equalized some 10 minutes later. For most of the first half, we attacked, but Marítimo's GK was in top form and their defensive line held well.

The second half was mostly the same, but with a few more Marítimo counter-attacks. Jubal (our player) and Zainadine (their player) had a very heated argument that nearly led to a scuffle, but the ref was very no-nonsense and sent both of them off. We managed to break the deadlock in the 75' with a header by Héldon, after a corner.

In the dying moments of the match, Marítimo tried to equalize again, and was very close to doing so, with their free-kick near the end being saved by Douglas and the post (Douglas punched the ball away half a minute later).

It's nice to get these 3 points, so that we can begin chasing the European spot(s), while, at the same time, the morale will be back up again, which will be necessary for the matches away at Konyaspor in Europe and Belenenses in Lisbon.

Highlights here.

Juventus President Andrea Agnelli has been handed a 1-year ban by the Italian Football Federation for selling match tickets to scalpers/ultras/the mafia (depending on what headline you might read).

Arsenal's line-up for night's game:

Cech
Mustafi Koscielny Monreal
Bellerin Elneny Xhaka Kolasinac
Ramsey Alexis
Lacazette

The bench is Ospina; Mertesacker, Maitland-Niles; Wilshere, Özil; Walcott, Giroud.

It's almost the same as I had predicted. I thought Özil would be fit to start, but apparently not. (He's on the bench.) Ramsey starts in one of the attacking midfield/inside forward positions, which is a more natural role for him than his usual, deeper central midfield position. He should do well here; we'll see.

Elneny starts in the position vacated by Ramsey, combining with Xhaka for a more defensive midfield duo than usual. That should translate to more ball possession for Arsenal, and a more active pressing game. The downside is that there will be fewer advanced players in the build-up - but the wingers should compensate for that by making more forward runs - and there will probably be more long shots from fairly optimistic positions, coming from both Xhaka and Elneny. I think Giroud will come in from the bench and do well against tired opposition, as usual. I predicted a 1-1 before, and I'll stick to that.

HALF TIME: 1 - 0 for Arsenal. Lacazette scored after Alexis' free kick ricocheted inside the box.

Rodriguez came close to scoring for West Brom a bunch of times, and Gibbs' attacking contribution for them was better than anything Arsenal's full-backs (including Chamberlain, who's supposed to be more of an attacker) have done in years. His positioning, dribbling, and crosses were excellent, and if he was that good in Arsenal's training ground, it's hard to see why Wenger would have sold him. Former players often do play exceptionally well against their old team, though, so it might just be that.

Both sides had absolutely obvious penalty calls that the referee missed - one for West Brom, three for Arsenal. Monreal also had a very impressive clearance off the line. West Brom have been slightly better than Arsenal so far in this game, but Arsenal have the lead. I think the 1-1 I predicted is looking very likely.

FULL TIME: Arsenal 2 - 0 West Brom. The second goal was also by Lacazette: a penalty after a foul on Ramsey.

West Brom played really well, and didn't deserve to lose. That said, Arsenal were pretty good, too.

It's annoying that the penalty that the referee did eventually give - after a number of clear ones that he missed - was pretty soft. It was shoulder to shoulder, Ramsey running with the ball and one of their defenders leaning on him to drag both players out of the pitch before Ramsey could reach the ball and stop it going over, as well. You see that about once per game at least, and it's almost never given as a penalty.

Alexis should have had two yellow cards: he got one for complaining about a decision, but proceeded to keep talking to the referee and gesturing at him even after the card, until Koscielny went over to talk to the ref, as well. Dawson should have had 3 yellow cards, and Jones 2 (or a straight red, for the foul that actually did get him a yellow). All things considered, a very poor performance by the referee tonight, and I do feel sorry for West Brom and their fans, even though Pulis wins out on shit refereeing 9 times out of 10.

Man of the match, for me, was Gibbs. He was absolutely fantastic. He even took all of their free kicks and corners, on top of everything else. Krychowiak and Rodriguez complete the top-3 players of this game, IMO, and Monreal was Arsenal's best player. He was everywhere, even in attack. Lacazette, despite scoring both of the goals in the game, comes 5th for me; but he was very good, so it was a very good game in that sense.

Barry is now the player with the most appearances in Premier League history. I think he'll go for about 2 or 3 seasons after this, as well, so he'll add to it. If I'm not mistaken, after this game, Pulis has still never taken a point against Arsenal away.

edited 25th Sep '17 2:02:44 PM by BestOf

Best Of, you seem to be making pretty conservative, if not outright pessimistic, match predictions for Arsenal. I wonder if you are trying not to jinx them?

I admit that I've stopped following them in the late noughties (I lost interest in football by that time in general), but they've seemed to stay a top tier team. Or is it a start-of-the-season thing?

edited 26th Sep '17 2:33:19 AM by Millership

I moan about all of this frequently on this thread, so I'll be brief this time. (So, after writing this post but before I send it, I remember that I meant to be brief. As you can see, I failed to keep it terse. Feel free to jump to the bullet points at the end if you don't feel like reading the same complaints from me yet again.)

Basically, Arsenal are in a continuous crisis. 10 years ago, you could say that Arsenal were a top team - at least top-4, and sometimes looking like a title contender - that was maybe underperforming. This lack of success, between roughly 2007 or so and 2013, was almost exclusively because other clubs, especially those that would compete for titles, had several times the funds that Arsenal had for transfer fees and wages, with clubs like Chelsea and Manchester City receiving around £1 billion each in that time from their owners/"sponsors", while Arsenal had to make a profit every season because the stadium was being paid for and all of the long-term sponsorship deals that had looked very good at the time were dwarfed by the inflation of the sponsorship and "loans" that other clubs could get.

If you look at a list of the top-10 highest transfer fees every season during that time, or a list of all transfers over a pretty high value (£30 million, say), you'll see that Arsenal make an appearance every now and then but out of every 10 such massive transfers, about 6-8 every season are either the Manchester clubs, Liverpool, or Chelsea.

Then FFP came in, after certain clubs had already gained from massive revenues that came from their owners and the owners' businesses, and instead of punishing such unsustainable inflation, ended up punishing clubs that were now unable to rise to the same tier due to the new restrictions. When Manchester City were supposed to be banned from the Champions League due to their failure to comply with FFP, the punishment was changed to a restriction on their squad size instead. This is a pretty clear sign of pressure from the competition's sponsors and TV companies: don't take out stars away, even if they break the rules.

After 2013 and the arrival of Mesut Özil, though, Arsenal were in a new situation. The stadium was paid for, the club had some prestige again (in terms of the superstar signing and, perhaps more importantly, a high transfer fee finally being paid by the club - something like £45 million for Özil, after Arsenal's previous record had been £16 million for Arshavin in 2008.) At that point, Arsenal should have shown ambition and grown. I was optimistic then, and Arsenal did have a very good season in 2013-14, culminating in an FA Cup win that ended the trophy drought. The next season, Alexis arrived and Arsenal seemed on course to continue their growth, starting with another FA Cup win.

The summer of 2015 was when Arsenal went out of their way to prove to the world that the club was not going to aim for trophies, or even the top-4, in the foreseeable future. They were the only club in Europe's big leagues not to buy even one outfield player, even though there were pretty obvious problems with squad depth and quality. If Arsenal had wanted to compete then, first in the transfer market and then in the league, the situation would be very different. Alas, the decisions made at the club reflected the attitude that making a profit through steady stagnation was more important that taking a risk with investments and trying to rise to the next tier.

So after the FA Cup win in 2015, or maybe even the one in 2014, it would've been more accurate to say that Arsenal were an overperforming mid-table club, unlikely to make top-6 but somehow doing it, than it would be to say they were an underperforming or declining top team. Arsenal had already declined by then, and seemed intent to stay that course. Even this past transfer window, while Arsenal did bring in a couple of players who look like they'll fill some gaps in the squad, Arsenal made a profit in the transfer market.

That's basically why I don't expect much from the club these days. Last season, and the season before, there were some games where none, or only one or two, of the players looked like they wanted to play at all. I'm sure they would've preferred to be on the bench or, even better, negotiating for a transfer away from the graveyard of Arsenal. It's absolutely plain for anyone to see that the club is being restructured to sustain itself financially as a mid-table club, equally likely to fight against relegation as they are to challenge for Europa League qualification. The period when top-4 was the minimum is over, and probably has been for longer than we fans thought.

On top of poor form and lack of motivation, Arsenal are also struggling with tactical errors from the manager, especially in team selection - fortunately, in the past few games at least, most players finally seem to get to play in their own position again, so that's some comfort. Then there's the injury crisis. When you compare Arsenal's stats with Cazorla and without him, the difference is almost one full point per game, on average. He's one of Arsenal's 3 most important players, and he's been injured now for almost an entire season - again. It's like Barcelona having to play 30 games without Iniesta or Suarez, for comparison.

Coquelin is injured now, Wilshere is just returning from injury, Koscielny has to have a scan of his foot every week to check if he can play, Mertesacker is in and out of the squad with injuries (and he's retiring after this season), Welbeck is out, Özil is just coming back, and so on.

So:

• The club is declining, and the people who control the club are completely fine with it.
• The manager is only now adjusting for some very glaring tactical errors from the start of the season.
• There are loads and loads of injuries, often overlapping.
• Most of the players have shown, on several occasions, than when things are not going their way, they might just stop playing, and that threat is always in the air, every single game.
• Oh, and Alexis and Özil are almost certainly leaving after this season, or in January.

With all of that baggage, I'm unlikely to feel optimistic about an Arsenal game except if they're playing against lower-league opposition. That just reflects the state of the club at this time, and for the foreseeable future.

edited 26th Sep '17 5:28:37 AM by BestOf

So, to sum up, "the club's owners are interested in the finances more than in the sports achievements". It's like the end of the first Galacticos era, but in inverse, when there were billions of euros running around the pitch like headless chickens, with no visible thought, meaning or hope for improvement. Everyone's happy, except the fans. But as a marketing strategy it was kinda successful.

I was always wondering, back in 2007 or 08, why Arsenal doesn't sign accomplished players and relies on the youngsters (the average player age was, like, 23-24 years?). It's not like they haven't been receiving money from transfers, they've sold Henry to Barcelona for some 25M euros, a pretty large sum by those times. So it was a symptom of a financial crisis.

That sucks. Arsenal is my favourite English club.

edited 26th Sep '17 9:39:04 AM by Millership

The Emirates stadium construction finished in 2006. It's different from the way many other clubs have moved in that Arsenal weren't given an alternative stadium (contract with Tottenham at Wembley and West Ham at the Olympic stadium) and had to pay for the entire project themselves - about £400 million at the time, which would translate to a much larger sum now if you take inflation and other such factors into account.

For the time Arsenal were paying back for the stadium, the budget for transfers and player wages - and sponsorship, as well - was set for a long term based on the rates at the time and the perception that Arsenal's squad then was good enough to challenge for trophies. They didn't predict that transfer fees and player wages would undergo massive inflation. They also didn't predict that the sponsorship deals (for the main kit sponsor, kit manufacturer, and stadium naming rights), which all seemed very good at the time, would become quite small in comparison to big clubs in just a few years.

I return to Arshavin as an example. He came to Arsenal after the Euros in 2008, for £16 million. That was Arsenal's record transfer at the time - and would remain so for another 5 years. Even now, when Arsenal have started spending, there aren't very many transfers higher than that. (It's telling of the inflation, though, that £16 million was the rate Arsenal paid for Calum Chambers, a promising young defender, in the summer of 2014.)

Since 2008, it became normal for big clubs in the Premier League to spend £30 or even £40 million on players that weren't even necessarily going to be key players for them. Meanwhile, for Arsenal, the transfers of 2012 - Podolski, Giroud, and Cazorla all for less than £40 million - would seem an absolutely massive period of investment. So on that front, from about 2006 to 2013, Arsenal's transfer budget was much close to that of Southampton and Everton than it was to the Manchester clubs, Liverpool, and Chelsea. Arsenal didn't even have superstars going for massive fees, unlike Spurs with Bale and Chelsea with a whole bunch of players.

The profits that Arsenal consistently made in the transfer market in that time would go towards the cost of the stadium, rather than purchasing new players. Instead, Arsenal were always looking for bargains and youngsters: Chamakh, Gervinho, Cazorla, Jenkinson, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Flamini, Ramsey, etc. You could compare that to how Newcastle and Aston Villa were building their squads. Arsenal were definitely not a club that could buy established star players, except in very rare occasions when one happened to be available without much competition to sign him. (Podolski was a bit over £10 million, despite his reputation. Arteta was also surprisingly cheap at the time.)

I've mentioned this before, but Eden Hazard is a good illustration of this. Of course, he was already very famous when he came to Chelsea after they won the Champions League: he was already considered one of the most promising youngsters in the world, and winning awards for it. He had starred in the Lille side that won the league. Arsenal tried to sign him for about £20 million, but when Lille asked for 25 million, Arsenal gave up because they couldn't afford him. That tells you where Arsenal were in terms of finances at that time. He went to Chelsea instead, for roughly the same fee that Arsenal were asked to pay.

Arsenal were a big club in the first decade of this century. After Manchester United, Arsenal were the second most likely side to win the league, until about 2007 or 2008. Now, it would be silly to suggest that Arsenal are definitely a top-6 club. There's some inertia still holding Arsenal in that range, but several clubs are on the ascent, and Arsenal are settling for less. Arsenal were in the top-4 for 20 consecutive seasons, so what seems obvious to me might take a while to be commonly accepted, but in a few years, the conversation about Arsenal will be about whether they can make a plan to rise back to compete for a Europa League spot, rather than whether they'll be in the Champions League next season. That is, unless Arsenal make a drastic change of direction.