Our resident Chelsea fans are pointing and laughing in the direction of our Arsenal fans in the Football Transfer Tavern who despite their deadline day woes are trying to build up the belief that they can do something in the Champions League this season.
Bitterly disappointed due to the fact that Arsene Wenger ensured Arsenal were the only side in Europe’s top five divisions not to sign an outfield player this summer, it looks for all that the Gunners will live to regret this decision but what can Gooners do?
They’ve been left no option but to get behind the crop they have at their current disposal and lets not forget, it wasn’t so long ago that seemingly every man and his dog was backing Arsenal as the biggest title challengers to Chelsea this season.
Having not come out of the blocks as quickly as they would’ve liked this term, Arsenal have at least managed to grind out two valuable away wins at Crystal Palace and Newcastle United so far this season ensuring that they’re in touch with Liverpool and Manchester United, if not Manchester City right now while Chelsea languish in the bottom half.
Football can change around so quickly nowadays and with a couple more morale boosting wins after the international break, Arsenal fans will forget all about their summer of inactivity, bar Petr Cech of course.
So with Gunners fans carefully mustering the spirit to be positive about their beloved club, we’ve devised five reasons why Arsenal fans might believe they can win the Champions League this season.
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Click on the image below to reveal the 5 reasons why Arsenal can win the Champions League.
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Because squad upheaval has been at a minimum
It’s very easy for Arsenal fans to slip into that mentality of everything being wrong at their club and while there is of course a strong argument that Arsene Wenger definitely missed a trick in not really reinforcing his squad in terms of further signings beyond Petr Cech this summer, has anybody looked at their predicament in an alternative light?
Wenger has spoken time and again about only adding players of true quality who can add something extra to the squad and while the likes of Manchester United were forced to splash £36 million on Anthony Martial, the Gunners didn’t take such a gamble.
While the sign anybody and it’ll be alright argument is often used by many, if Martial turns out to be a complete and utter flop, United fans’ early smarmy attitude about at least doing some deadline day business will quickly be traded for embarrassment and anger at the club’s transfer policy.
Let’s not forget, Arsenal still boast something of a talented squad despite only signing Petr Cech this summer and in that transfer alone, the Gunners have undoubtedly improved their back line from lasts season.
Given the togetherness and cohesion this current Arsenal group has, despite not showing it so readily in the opening weeks of the season, this also can’t be underestimated with the double FA Cup triumphs giving the Gunners a tangible representation of their new found team spirit that was lacking prior to their glory against Hull City in 2014.
Because in Alexis Sanchez, Petr Cech & Mesut Ozil, they have world class players
Of course Arsenal would’ve started to turn heads if they managed to land the likes of Morgan Schneiderlin and Karim Benzema this summer but lets not forget, the Gunners still boast four world class stars in Petr Cech, Santi Cazorla, Mesut Ozil and Alexis Sanchez.
Undoubtedly the Gunners’ four best players, with players of this calibre and experience, they won’t be daunted by going up against the big guns in the Champions League.
While Arsenal’s record in the knockout round has been anything but pretty over the course of the last five years, having these players in your team is likely to put you in much better stead of succeeding than failing and as we’ve already seen in regards to Cech’s recent performance against Liverpool, he can prove a game changer.
With mistakes from the likes of Wojciech Szczesny costing Arsenal in the past against Bayern Munich, Cech’s maturity and experience will prove vital on those crunch head-to-head knockout meetings in the springtime.
Because the Monaco defeat was a huge wake up call
Yes, Arsenal have exited the Champions League at the last sixteen phase for each of the last five seasons but compared to their most recent exit at the hands of Monaco, they have played some pretty handy teams in the shape of Bayern Munich, Barcelona and AC Milan.
Last season’s two-legged defeat to the Ligue 1 club was probably the most depressing of the lot given the fact that when the draw was made for the knockout round, there wasn’t a single punter or pundit believing that the Gunners wouldn’t progress to the last eight.
This complacency in the media seemed to trickle down to the players who were stunned by goals from Geoffrey Kondogbia, Dimitar Berbatov and Yannick Ferreira-Carrasco in a mad 3-1 defeat for the Gunners at Emirates Stadium before a failed salvage job with the Gunners going out on away goals in the second leg.
You’d imagine that this complacent attitude won’t be tolerated for a second season running against any side in the knockout rounds if Arsenal progress there, let alone a team they are fancied to beat again.
Because they can still beat anybody on their day
Is there any elite top four team that are so consistently capable of achieving a truly standout result against the likes of Barcelona or Manchester United only to weeks later forget all the good they did while throwing three points away against the likes of Swansea City?
This describes Arsenal in a nutshell but it mustn’t be ignored that on their day, Arsene Wenger’s men can indeed inflict defeat on almost any side in Europe.
Often a cliché uttered by many a pundit, Arsenal do boast the quality and playing style to cause trouble to a plethora of top level opponents and we saw in Jack Wilshere’s breakthrough game against Barcelona a few years back that Wenger can indeed fire his men up to do what many others deem to be the impossible on certain occasions.
Of course, we’ve not nearly seen enough performances of that calibre since that great night against Barcelona at home in the Champions League but the fact remains, Arsenal boast quality game changing players and as we’ve seen in football before, it isn’t always Barcelona or Bayern Munich who win the Champions League – although they’re quite good at it!
Because Chelsea did when all the odds were against them
When John Terry was sent off against Barcelona in the intimidating surrounds of the Camp Nou in the Gary Neville scoregasm game, who ever thought Chelsea would manage to get out of their alive?
When Thomas Muller put Bayern Munich into a 1-0 lead in the Champions League Final in the 83rd minute in the Bavarian giants’ own backyard in 2012, who would’ve thought the Blues would’ve mustered the mental strength to level up just before 90 minutes?
And to think, these great feats were completed under the guidance of former Milton Keynes Dons and failed Schalke manager Roberto Di Matteo who has completed something Jose Mourinho is yet to do with Chelsea.
The fact of the matter is that football is a funny old game and with many pundits annually claiming that you need a bit of luck to win the Champions League, it is hard to disagree with this sentiment.
With Arsene Wenger having been in charge of Arsenal for as a long as he has, he boasts all the experience in the world regarding certain scenarios in the competition and with those aforementioned Chelsea odds looking like everything was against them, who’s to say Arsenal can’t emulate something of similar ilk this time around despite nobody backing them to win Europe’s elite competition with the likes of Barcelona around.
You never know.
