Barclay's Premier League discussion '13-'14 V8

They have had teams good enough, which says more about the genius of the man than anything else really.

Wenger and Fergie aren't 'tacticians', no chance.

They have/(had) one style of play and played it consistently. They drilled into their players and pretty much played the same way for 10+ years.

It works in England, but it doesn't translate into Europe. Why Wenger/Fergie both "flopped" (although Fergie did quite well towards the end of his tenure) in the CL.

Blue Barrett wrote:

RealGunner wrote:

Blue Barrett wrote:Stop it mate

The money Chelsea/City/United spent did not make you lose a cup final to Birmingham. Liverpool also came 2nd in that span too. They certainly weren't big spenders.

I hate when Arsenal fans use that excuse. You have had teams good enough to win the title(or a trophy at least) over the past 8 years(maybe not every year of the , true or false?

Liverpool are 5th most money spenders in the PL. Arsenal are 18th...

In any case

How was Szczesny-koscielny mess up in the end Arsene's fault?
How was Martin taylor ripping Eduardo's leg apart Arsene's fault?
How was RVP betraying the club Arsene's fault?
How was Nasri, Cesc leaving Arsene's fault?

Liverpool were 5th most money spenders as of 2009 when they came 2nd? I highly doubt that.

And these are all valid reasons which you could have mentioned rather than try to dump whatever failures Arsenal have had in the past 8 years on Chelsea/City/United money in one fell swoop. Its a weak argument tbh.

Liverpool spent 50m in 06/07 season, 22m in 07/08, 40m in 08/09, 36m in 05/06. All without selling anyone. Add it all up and compare it to us, we made profit in every single season on transfers because we HAD to.

Those ARE valid reasons. Those ARE the reasons why we couldn't win anything. Stop trying to compare Chelsea/city to us. We are nothing alike. Both the clubs run on completely different philosophies. You can spend 50m on crap and show no regret. You can waste however you want and don't think about it twice.

We had to compete with clubs who were making 150m loss while we had to make 30m profit every year. It's not easy to understand for you because you were spoon fed ever since Roman bought Chelsea and you probably don't remember Chelsea before they became relevant but not everyone has owners with money to burn

ExtremistEnigma wrote:Nowhere have I mentioned/implied that Wenger is a failed tactician.

Just saying that SAF may have worse win-loss stats in 1000 games than Wenger, but double the number of trophies is what makes a huge difference than apparent.

SAF's first 1000 games all came under the time where United ran the PL. United won 4 PL titles in a row before Arsene came to England. United would have won 10 PL's in a row if Arsene didn't exist and Roman was the one who came in 2004 instead of Arsene in 97.

Uhh, we sold a number of players in those windows. We had to sell before we could afford Torres and others.

RealGunner wrote:

Blue Barrett wrote:

RealGunner wrote:

Liverpool are 5th most money spenders in the PL. Arsenal are 18th...

In any case

How was Szczesny-koscielny mess up in the end Arsene's fault?
How was Martin taylor ripping Eduardo's leg apart Arsene's fault?
How was RVP betraying the club Arsene's fault?
How was Nasri, Cesc leaving Arsene's fault?

Liverpool were 5th most money spenders as of 2009 when they came 2nd? I highly doubt that.

And these are all valid reasons which you could have mentioned rather than try to dump whatever failures Arsenal have had in the past 8 years on Chelsea/City/United money in one fell swoop. Its a weak argument tbh.

Liverpool spent 50m in 06/07 season, 22m in 07/08, 40m in 08/09, 36m in 05/06. All without selling anyone. Add it all up and compare it to us, we made profit in every single season on transfers because we HAD to.  

Stopped reading after this.

Surprise Lex didn't write this.

Stop re-writing history. We didn't sell anyone? We had to SELL TO BUY under Rafa.

Red Alert wrote:Wenger and Fergie aren't 'tacticians', no chance.

They have/(had) one style of play and played it consistently. They drilled into their players and pretty much played the same way for 10+ years.

It works in England, but it doesn't translate into Europe. Why Wenger/Fergie both "flopped" (although Fergie did quite well towards the end of his tenure) in the CL.

Nah, I disagree. pretty much every important game Fergie would change stuff. Usually in Europe he went 4-5-1, then there's sticking Park wherever on the pitch he was neccessary. I'm sure there were games he wanted to get a draw, games he wanted to get a win. Point being, he modified his approach in certain games, with tangible intentions, and he always had a backup, multiple ways to win.

Wenger is maybe closer to what you say, but he's done things differently over time. It's probably just a result of the players he's got, but this Arsenal isn't the same as Arsenal 3 years ago, and that one isn't the same as Arsenal three years before that.

Le Samourai wrote:

Red Alert wrote:Wenger and Fergie aren't 'tacticians', no chance.

They have/(had) one style of play and played it consistently. They drilled into their players and pretty much played the same way for 10+ years.

It works in England, but it doesn't translate into Europe. Why Wenger/Fergie both "flopped" (although Fergie did quite well towards the end of his tenure) in the CL.

Nah, I disagree. pretty much every important game Fergie would change stuff. Usually in Europe he went 4-5-1, then there's sticking Park wherever on the pitch he was neccessary. I'm sure there were games he wanted to get a draw, games he wanted to get a win. Point being, he modified his approach in certain games, with tangible intentions, and he always had a backup, multiple ways to win.

Wenger is maybe closer to what you say, but he's done things differently over time. It's probably just a result of the players he's got, but this Arsenal isn't the same as Arsenal 3 years ago, and that one isn't the same as Arsenal three years before that.

 
Like I said, Fergie did well towards the end of his tenure as he adapted to Europe more. But that was after he had 10-15 years of CL experience behind him.
 
He wasn't great in Europe OVERALL. He won 2 CLs in what, 20 years?

Red Alert wrote:

RealGunner wrote:

Blue Barrett wrote:

RealGunner wrote:

Liverpool are 5th most money spenders in the PL. Arsenal are 18th...

In any case

How was Szczesny-koscielny mess up in the end Arsene's fault?
How was Martin taylor ripping Eduardo's leg apart Arsene's fault?
How was RVP betraying the club Arsene's fault?
How was Nasri, Cesc leaving Arsene's fault?

Liverpool were 5th most money spenders as of 2009 when they came 2nd? I highly doubt that.

And these are all valid reasons which you could have mentioned rather than try to dump whatever failures Arsenal have had in the past 8 years on Chelsea/City/United money in one fell swoop. Its a weak argument tbh.

Liverpool spent 50m in 06/07 season, 22m in 07/08, 40m in 08/09, 36m in 05/06. All without selling anyone. Add it all up and compare it to us, we made profit in every single season on transfers because we HAD to.  

Stopped reading after this.

Surprise Lex didn't write this.

Stop re-writing history. We didn't sell anyone? We had to SELL TO BUY under Rafa.

You guys didn't sell your best players every year though. Reina never left, Gerrard, Kuyt, Agger, Skrtel, even Torres was only sold because of his clause.

Sold Luis Garcia, Robbie Keane, Djibril Cisse, Fernando Morientes, Craig Bellamy, Peter Crouch, Jon Arne Riise, Steve Finnan, Scott Carson, Danny Guthrie, Mark Gonzalez, Gabrielle Paletta, Sinama-Pongolle, Momo Sissoko, Djimi Traore, Chris Kirkland, Kromkamp, Stephen Warnock, Milan Baros,

And he says, all without selling anyone.

And that's only from  2005-06 till 2008-09 that you mentioned

I haven't included Benitez's 2009-10 where he lost Alonso, Arbeloa, Dossena, Voronin, and Sebastian Leto

McAgger wrote:Sold Luis Garcia, Robbie Keane, Djibril Cisse, Fernando Morientes, Craig Bellamy, Peter Crouch, Jon Arne Riise, Steve Finnan, Scott Carson, Danny Guthrie, Mark Gonzalez, Gabrielle Paletta, Sinama-Pongolle, Momo Sissoko, Djimi Traore, Chris Kirkland, Kromkamp, Stephen Warnock, Milan Baros,

And he says, all without selling anyone.

Are any of those players in the list better than or imoprtant than Vieira lol? or Fabregas? or RVP? or Adebayor? or Nasri?

You had to sell Kromkamp because of financial reasons lol?

Sadly yes. We needed money to buy so we had to accumulated from wherever possible. But he was shit also so getting rid of him was an added bonus to the funds we'd get.

And Alonso and Luis Garcia were just as important to us as Vieira or Cesc was for you.

Agreed about Alonso.

Garcia was gone for 3m and in a deal that meant Torres coming the other way. Not related but that halped. It was a better deal for you than it was for us when we sold Kolo and got Squillaci.

Voronin loool

Yeah, I'm sure his departure and the absence of his scoring ratio of two goals a year severely affected Liverpool's chances of future success

In any case I don't even know why Barrett brought Liverpool into this. They are nothing like City/Chelsea either. His point was that they finished 2nd in the league without being big spenders. We competed for the league 3 times as well in the last 5 years without being one. But being runners up or competing means f all if you don't win it.

I didn't mean to cause any offence.

McAgger wrote:And that's only from  2005-06 till 2008-09 that you mentioned

I haven't included Benitez's 2009-10 where he lost Alonso, Arbeloa, Dossena, Voronin, and Sebastian Leto

That counts as a massive gain, mate.

Andrea was like the cherry on top Liverpool's finest monets though.

I'll always remember that goal he scored against us. It wasn't the fact that he made it four nil, so much as the fact that Andrea freaking Dossena scored on us that really put the sting in. Same weekend I think he scored against Unted

Forza Dossena

I remember that, his peak lasted two games. How glorious they were though It was embarrassing watching him in the Confederations Cup that summer.

McAgger wrote:And that's only from  2005-06 till 2008-09 that you mentioned

I haven't included Benitez's 2009-10 where he lost Alonso, Arbeloa, Dossena, Voronin, and Sebastian Leto

Thats is exactly fair comparison to wenger.

We sold Arbeloa for 4 mil and replaced him with a 16 mil RB in Glen Johnson

Losing Alonso was a big set back but we did sign a replacement in Aquilani for around 20mil.

Voronin is just Voronin.Probably compete with Degan for our most useless signing.

As for Sebabstian Leto seriously? He never even played for us in the League and was on loan to Olympiacos when sold.

And Dosenna   

I can't remember how much we sold him for, I think it was 3-4m but I'm sure the money was used to fund someone else's transfer. Just goes on to show how much on scraps Rafa was living on at the end of his tenure under those two 'Murican c*nts.

Counting on my main man Dejagah to get something from etihad

McAgger wrote:I can't remember how much we sold him for, I think it was 3-4m but I'm sure the money was used to fund someone else's transfer. Just goes on to show how much on scraps Rafa was living on at the end of his tenure under those two 'Murican c*nts.

We spent roughly 20 mil on Keane 20 on Aquilani and 16 mil on Glen Johnson in the last 2 seasons under Rafa.All higher than Arsenal's record transfer fee if i am not mistaken.

What Wenger achieved with Arsenal in the league with the constrains he had was astounding . That too with the football they played  can only be admired (as well as his loyalty).Just compare that with Maureen who spends 100s of million and still plays the most turgid 19th century football.

RealGunner wrote:

Blue Barrett wrote:

RealGunner wrote:

Liverpool are 5th most money spenders in the PL. Arsenal are 18th...

In any case

How was Szczesny-koscielny mess up in the end Arsene's fault?
How was Martin taylor ripping Eduardo's leg apart Arsene's fault?
How was RVP betraying the club Arsene's fault?
How was Nasri, Cesc leaving Arsene's fault?

Liverpool were 5th most money spenders as of 2009 when they came 2nd? I highly doubt that.

And these are all valid reasons which you could have mentioned rather than try to dump whatever failures Arsenal have had in the past 8 years on Chelsea/City/United money in one fell swoop. Its a weak argument tbh.

Liverpool spent 50m in 06/07 season, 22m in 07/08, 40m in 08/09, 36m in 05/06. All without selling anyone. Add it all up and compare it to us, we made profit in every single season on transfers because we HAD to.  

Those ARE valid reasons. Those ARE the reasons why we couldn't win anything. Stop trying to compare Chelsea/city to us. We are nothing alike. Both the clubs run on completely different philosophies. You can spend 50m on crap and show no regret. You can waste however you want and don't think about it twice.

We had to compete with clubs who were making 150m loss while we had to make 30m profit every year. It's not easy to understand for you because you were spoon fed ever since Roman bought Chelsea and you probably don't remember Chelsea before they became relevant but not everyone has owners with money to burn

That is all nice and all, but I'm sure the pressure on Arsenal to win SOMETHING wouldn't be as much if you had won any other trophy.

You were knocked out of the FA Cup in 06 by Bolton and out of the Carling Cup in 06 by Wigan.

Out of FAC in 07 by Blackburn and out of CC in 07(final) by Chelsea - One of the few justifiable KOs.

Out of FAC in 08 by United(lost 4-0, embarrassing but still its United so its a bit justifiable) and out of CC in 08 by Spurs....lost 5-1 to the apparently big spending Spurs at WHL.

Out of FAC in 09 by Chelsea(justifiable) and out of CC in 09 by Burnley.....ummmm.....

Out of FAC in 10 by Stoke....lost 3-1.....and out of CC in 10 by City(justifiable)

Out of FAC in 11 by United(justifiable) and out of CC in 11....well lost in the final to the mighty Birmingham City.

Out of FAC in 12 by Sunderland and out of CC to City(justifiable).

Out of FAC in 13 to Blackburn....and out of COC to Bradford.


Obviously, I had to check wiki for those but only to back up my claim, because I was VERY sure you haven't always been stopped by Chelsea or City. Of the 16 chances you've had to win either the FA Cup or the League Cup, you've only met Chelsea/City or United 6 times. Which means 10 times in 8 years, you've lost to teams you SHOULD beat and were favourites against. Only one cup final in that span and you still cocked it up against the mighty, big spending Birmingham. Its not always Chelsea or City standing in your way, mate. Stop playing the victim.

I won't even go into how you've lost unnecessarily at times in crucial parts of the league season over those 8 years that would have seen you probably in the title hunt at least until the end of the season.

Point is, no one would be calling Arsenal trophyless if they'd won at least a cup. And more often than not, you've lost in the cups to MUCH WEAKER opponents. I don't remember Chelsea or City money playing a role there.

And while I may not remember early/mid 90's, but we did spend quite some money to make our squad better in recent times before Roman. We spent 40m in one window(Lampard, Petit & co). We made the CL twice in the 4 seasons before Roman, for a club with a low/moderate budget. We were spending money we didn't have, at times(and it was coming to bite us in the arse right before Roman took over and cleared it), but we wanted to win and get to the next level.


Anyway, back to Arsenal, what I've been saying is that you need to stop trying to dump all your woes on Chelsea/City money. Like I said, its a very weak argument.

In Rafa's final 2 or 3 seasons Liverpool operated at basically break-even. Prior to that the club had an average of around £20 net spend a season.

RealGunner wrote:

Red Alert wrote:

RealGunner wrote:

Liverpool spent 50m in 06/07 season, 22m in 07/08, 40m in 08/09, 36m in 05/06. All without selling anyone. Add it all up and compare it to us, we made profit in every single season on transfers because we HAD to.  

Stopped reading after this.

Surprise Lex didn't write this.

Stop re-writing history. We didn't sell anyone? We had to SELL TO BUY under Rafa.

You guys didn't sell your best players every year though. Reina never left, Gerrard, Kuyt, Agger, Skrtel, even Torres was only sold because of his clause.

 
That's not what you said though, was it?
 
You said we didn't sell anyone and still had the finances to bring players in; that's not true.
 
We literally had sell 2-3 players at a time to get half the players you mentioned in when G+H was in charge.
 
You could argue quality > quantity (and normally I'd agree with you) but that left our depth of the squad very very thin. We had a very strong starting XI but probably the weakest bench that's ever title challenged in the PL era. An 18 year old N'gog was our back for Fernando Torres. Lucas Leiva was 21 back then, and found it difficult to settle in England early in his career. He was the main back-up for all of Gerrard/Mascherano/Alonso because we had nobody else. That was a kid, being back-up to 3 WORLD CLASS players in a new country/in new position(s).    
 
It wasn't AS BAD as Arsenal had it (to pay off the Emirates by snatching the hands of anyone bidding for their players), but we eventually got rid of Mascherano and Alonso due to G+H. That pretty much ruined our CL chances as we couldn't control games anymore. Torres was pretty much sold because of a clause inserted by G+H aswell. Keep in mind we lost a lot of youth, and more players just to pay off debts from G+H towards the end of it.  
 
Even now, we're letting Reina go for financial reasons. Skrtel and/or Agger will leave in the summer because they're both been given 80k+ a week and they're not guaranteed first team anymore. (Well, Agger isn't atleast.)
 
We're financially stable, but we have absolutely nothing on City/Chelsea. So not too sure why Barrett brought us in, tbh.

EDIT: Read this; just the OP.

http://www.redandwhitekop.com/forum/index.php?topic=249365.0

One of the better posts of RAWK. Highlights pretty much Rafa's signings.