Having passed the midpoint of the season, it’s remarkable to think that this current squad have claimed more points than the Invincibles had done, even if they’d lost at Old Trafford (a loss that may have been averted had Tierney or VAR done their jobs on Martinelli’s wrongly disallowed goal). Even after the shock-loss to Everton, we’re currently on a pace to take 95 points, five points ahead of the pace set by that legendary 2003-04 side—a side that featured bona fide, well-established superstars such as Thierry Henry, Dennis Bergkamp, Robert Pires, and Patrick Vieira, all of them voted among the club’s greatest players of all time. After that scintillating run, of course, we were forced to endure a law of diminishing returns, some of it by necessity and some of it on principle.
Arsène was infamously averse to overspending on transfers. Some of that was philosophical; one of his more-famous aphorisms was “we don’t buy superstars. We make them”. The idea of a self-sustaining club was still realistic at that point. Regrettably, a larger part of that was practical; once we embarked on the Emirates Stadium project, we committed ourselves to that self-sustaining model. It was only after we made that commitment that Abramovich and then Mansour came along to throw the transfer-market and wage-packets completely out of line. Recent developments make that situation seem almost quaint by comparison, but I digress.
Arsène’s vision was, well, visionary. Take away the post hoc accusation that he should have seen how Abramovich and Mansour would pull the rug out, and you’d have to admit that Arsène had put this club on a path towards almost-permanent competitiveness if not dominance for years to come. We saw hints of what was possible in his latter years as the club splashed cash on the likes of Alexis, Özil, Xhaka, Mustafi, Lacazette, and Aubemayang. Each of them inspired or frustrated by varying degrees but represented a departure from Arsène’s previous parsimony. Each of them was, more or less, a known quantity. Arsène was finally reaping the rewards of his purist vision but, at the same time, was seeing the squad falter.
Enter Arteta. Although there have been a few blips, his transfer-business has been the embodiment of Arsène’s vision. Aside from Partey, each of our key players has either come through the Academy or been plucked up out of relative obscurity. Only Ødegaard and Jesus might stand apart and away from Saliba, Ramsdale, Magalhães, White, Tomiyasu, Zinchenko, or Vieira as a highly-touted prospect. To that group you can add Saka, Smith-Rowe, and Nketiah as Academy products. There is also of course the genius-signing of Martinelli. That…that’s pretty much our XI plus a few extras. We regularly field one of the youngest if not the youngest squads in the Prem.
This has been made possible by significantly larger investment in the transfer-market, the kind of investment that Arsène either refused to indulge or couldn’t access. Arteta and Edu have picked up the best pieces of Arsène’s philosophy and have built a squad chock-a-block with young, budding superstars while avoiding (we hope) the kind of chicanry that Man City have been accused of and that Chelsea have to be wary of. These are superstars in the making. For as good as Ødegaard and Jesus and Saka and Saliba and White and others have been to this point, they’re only going to get better.
That’s right. Although we’re five points clear of Man City with a game in hand, we’re still only just now plumbing the depths of what we’re capable of. The same can be said of Arteta as a manager. For as much as the players can improve, so too can—and indeed should—Arteta. Our recent setback against Everton proved as much on both fronts.
None of this is to say that we’ll win the Prem or Europa League. If anything, what I’m suggesting is that we’re only scratching the surface of what this process is pointing toward. What will happen between now and the end of May? Who knows? We’re starting to see the fruits of Arsène’s prescient vision, and it’s already starting to feel, well, fruitful.
If you’re still here, I hope you’re intrigued to learn of the launch of March Merch. Duringt the month of March, I’ll be tallying up who comments most often and entering those accounts into a raffle for some Arsenal merch. You can set up a Disqus account with any email or with a Google, Twitter, or Facebook account. In any case, I hope to hear from more of you in the comments below.
