Perhaps this is just typical Arsène Wenger rhetoric: saying this year's squad is better than last's. After all, what's the Arsenal manager supposed to say, ahead of his squad's UEFA Champions League match with visiting Barcelona? For a club that has so many financial, physical and emotional resources invested in the idea that they are continuously moving forward - trying to approach what the team was at the beginning of the last decade - the mere admission that this year's team is not better than last could derail the entire operation. After all, if Wenger doesn't believe Arsenal have made progress over the last 12 months, what does that say for his plan? For the path of the team? And is there a Plan B?
Arsenal vs. Barcelona: Arsene Wenger Says Gunners Better In 2011, But Is He Right?
Unfortunately for Arsenal, nobody knows, all the more reason why the Gunners’ boss must always stay optimistic. Be it one a small scale (the constant claims his teams actually had the better of matches where they post disappointing results) or large (the insistence the squad is better), Wenger has to stay looking forward, even if it requires blinders.
Which is not to say Arsenal is not better this year than last, though when you look at the Gunners' defense (something we discussed in more detail in our match preview), it's easy to make the opposite argument: Arsenal is actually more vulnerable this year than last. Thomas Vermaelen, Bacary Sagna and Lukasz Fabianski are all out, leaving a back line of Emmanuel Eboué, Johan Djourou, Laurent Koscielny and Gael Clichy in front of Wojciech Szczesny. Last year, the Gunners started Bacary Sagna, William Gallas, Thomas Vermaelen and Clichy in front of Manuel Almunia.
For Wenger, comparing this year’s team with last may represent a false dichotomy. In the Arsenal boss’s mind, last year’s team was not real Arsenal, as he explained to Jamie Jackson in today’s Guardian:
“Last year was not the real Arsenal,” Wenger said. “In the first game we lost [Andrey] Arshavin after 30 minutes and [William] Gallas at half-time, so we had already made two changes. We also lost [Cesc] Fábregas in the last minute so [we] went into the second game with three key players not fit.”
True, but that’s an old story, as it concerns Arsenal. They never have a full team. They always carrying a slew of injuries. While part of that is bad luck, at some point people should ask what is it about Arsenal that keeps their injury list large? Regardless of what you come up with for an explanation, it’s hard to listen to Wenger bemoan injuries when Arsenal seems at a competitive disadvantage when dealing with them.
As it concerns the comparison between 2010 and 2011, Wenger seems to give this year’s team credit for last year’s injuries. We had three people hurt last year, goes the thinking. This year, we may not. We should be better.
And things may very well play-out that way, but the remarks may be more reflection of Arsenal’s forward-looking, stay positive approach than sincere reflection of the team’s chances. It’s an approach that’s reflected in Wenger’s overall evaluation of his team, a view he shared with Jackson.
“Since I am a manager for a long time I have not seen many teams with such consistent focus every day to improve. The main reason we have improved is because of the attitude of the players. We want to win this competition and we know we face the super-favourite. But the only way to do it is to knock them out.”
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