In The League you have 20 teams who play each other home and away, are awarded points for wins and draws, and the club with the most points at the end of the season wins a trophy. That League trophy is one of the most difficult things to get your hands on. In the 20 years that the League has existed just 5 teams have won: Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea, Blackburn Rovers, and Manchester City.

In addition to winners, there are losers: and while the winners get a trophy, the losers get kicked out of the League.

There’s also prize money awarded to each team in this League. Each place that a team finishes up the table in the League earns £755,062 cumulative. The winners receive £15m and the losers just £755,000. Already the seeds of inequality are planted. Not only do the losers get kicked out of the League but they receive a pittance in prize money.

This League has, however, a soft spot. There are lucrative domestic and foreign television contracts which are divided equally among all 20 teams to the tune of £32.5m.² In addition, all 20 teams are guaranteed that 10 of their games will be played live on television and thus earn them an additional £5.8m.

Among all of their various prize monies, television contracts, and other awards, the bare minimum that a League team will earn is £39m and the maximum which a team could earn is around £61m.

And if a team is booted out of that League, there’s a “parachute payment” of £15m which is given to teams to help them fight their way back into the League. That parachute payment is reduced the year after their first year of relegation and reduced further the year after that but is still a massive payment considering the fact that the league below The League only pays out an average of £1m in prize monies.

For many teams just being in this League is considered a huge achievement. There are two other competitions, cup competitions, that teams play in at the same time as they participate in the League: the Football Association Cup and the League Cup but more important than winning either of those two competitions is staying in the League. It’s even referred to as “survival” when a team avoids relegation because it’s the difference between life and death for some clubs.

This doesn’t mean that winning the FA Cup or the League Cup is completely without merit. Rather that those trophies are considered “stepping stones” to larger, more important trophies such as winning the League. Winning the FA Cup is a stepping stone, staying in the League is survival.

It’s simple math. The difference between surviving relegation from the League and winning the FA Cup is £25m. That’s £25m the club can spend on upgrading their stadium, on buying players, on training grounds, and on making their club better.

But there’s a second league above this League. A super league if you will. And unlike the League, it’s not friendly, things aren’t shared equally, and there are no parachute payments for relegated teams. It is pure capitalism: the rich get richer, the poor get poorer, and the have-nots are left to rot in the gutter.

Unlike the League, there are 32 teams from the leagues all over Europe and there is no egalitarian home and away play round robin to decide the winners and losers. Teams are only guaranteed 6 games and £6m. In those six guaranteed games there are bonuses that go to teams who win (£700,000 per) or even draw (£350,000 per). Those six games are used to determine who will go into the next round with the top two teams from each group selected to the round of 16. After that, it’s a knockout competition.

Making it to that round of 16 guarantees an additional £2.64m. That round’s prize money alone is more valuable than winning the FA Cup.

The next round is worth £3.3m.

The next round is worth £3.7m.

And if you win, the prize is £7.9m.

The total prize money up for grabs is £363,440,000. But there’s a hidden prize. One more valuable than the prize money. And completely determined by how powerful your league is. This is what this “Champions League” refers to as the “Market Pool”.

That Market Pool prize money is worth £300m and nearly 25% of that money goes to the four teams from The League. And the League winner, the best team in the best league in all the world? The Champions League pays them 8% of the Market Pool money, or nearly £24m. Just for showing up.

All totaled, if a team were to win all 13 of their games in the Champions League and if they were the champions from The League the payout would be £51,477,360.¹ Give or take a few pennies here and there.

Only the top three teams from The League are guaranteed admission to the Champions League. The fourth placed team has to survive a promotion battle between another similarly placed team from a different league in Europe. This is almost exactly the same system that teams from the league below the League use to get into The League.

For a club like Arsenal, who don’t have the backing of a man who is willing to spend £1bn to win the League, achieving third place and thus securing Champions League football is crucial, financially, to ensuring that Arsenal are even remotely competitive in the League. People wonder why Arsene Wenger prioritizes the Champions League over the FA Cup and even more so over the League Cup but it’s really quite simple.

As I illustrated above, almost no team in England would take an FA Cup trophy if it mean that they were relegated from the League because it’s financial suicide. The same applies to the Champions League, except in an even more direct, more cut-throat, more capitalist way: there are no parachute payments to help a team get back into the Champions League.

That’s why Liverpool have struggled for three years to get back in to the Champions League. That’s why Kenny Dalglish was fired. Winning the League Cup is meaningless if you finish 8th to a team like Liverpool who have aspirations of winning the League and getting back into the Champions League. That’s why Arsenal’s 15 consecutive years of Champions League football is a massive achievement. And that is why Arsene Wenger sat on the bench last Saturday, clutching Pat Rice, and looking like a manager whose team was on the verge of relegation.

Because they were.

Times have changed in The League. The old days when winning the FA Cup meant something have all but disappeared. At most it’s seen as a stepping stone to bigger and better things as Manchester City used it last year. But a manager would certainly never risk relegation from the Champions League places to win it.

Remember that next time someone tells you they would rather finish 8th and win the FA Cup: 8th place is relegation.

1. UEFA Champions League Distribution
2. Premier League Prize Money

For those who don’t know, “Hawk-Eye” is a system that will predict the trajectory of a ball and relay goal/no goal information to the referee in less than half a second. There are similar systems widely used in Tennis and Cricket and they are not without controversy, which I am convinced is exactly what FIFA and dinosaurs like Richard Scudamore want.

The problem with goal-line technology isn’t that it won’t work — it will be statistically more accurate than the human eye — but that goal-line technology doesn’t address any of the major issues with refereeing and when it does fail will be a scapegoat for any future calls for technology in football.

Think back over the entire Premier League season: 20 teams played 38 games each. How many times was the ball wrongly ruled to have either gone over the line or to have not gone over the line? Twice? With the Chelsea v. Tottenham ruling being the most “controversial”? Let’s go ahead and multiply that number by 10 and say, like Richard Scudamore has argued, that instead of a 1 in 190 games rate this is something that happens once every 20 games.

It would still pale in comparison to the number of good goals disallowed for offside, the number of bad goals allowed for offside, and the number of penalties wrongly called or not called in the Premier League. For example, Arsenal had zero instances in all 38 games this season where Hawk-Eye technology would have been used to decide whether there was a good goal or not. And yet, in their first two games of this season Liverpool scored an offside goal, Joey Barton should have been given a red card for assaulting Gervinho, and Arsenal should have been given a penalty against Newcastle.

Then there was the Blackburn match which the official gave a good goal when Yakubu was clearly offside. How this wasn’t called is only something that the officials will know.

That’s just the first four Arsenal games. All totaled, the objective analysis of DebatableDecisions.com found that Arsenal matches had 24 major decisions called incorrectly (out of 37 matches, they haven’t finished analyzing the season!).

That’s 24 major calls gotten wrong out of 37 matches. 64% of Arsenal matches had a major call blown by Premier League officials. 0% of Arsenal matches had a call go wrong because the ball didn’t cross the line.

Debatable Decisions, it should be noted, relies solely on the very biased and extremely edited footage from the BBC Match of the Day program to pick which calls should and should not be “debated”. Thus, the number 24 is lower than the actual number of blown calls.

It should also be noted that Stoke City have received the vast majority of both blown calls and calls go their way. A whopping 35 calls have been miss-called by officials in Stoke’s first 37 matches, 29 of which have been called wrongly in Stoke’s favor. Which explains why their supporters are so adamantly in favor of the current officiating regime and why they sing that they “play how they like” and revel in “one-nil to the rugby team” whenever their rugby tactics earn them a goal.

All totaled, Debatable Decisions noted 230 instances of poor officiating in the first 370 League matches. And the Premier League knows that they have a PR nightmare on their hands here with officiating. As the League has gone global so has the technology and the commentary. People from all over the world are now watching the game and all of the clubs in England depend on people from all over the globe watching their games in order to make ends meet.* Right or wrong, that global audience couldn’t give two fucks that Stoke is one of the oldest teams in Football. Instead, they carry with them certain expectations such as, fairness, getting the calls mostly right, and the officials being allowed to use the same technology that millions of viewers use every game to see when Yakubu is offside.

And so, to correct this problem, the Premier League has gone to great expense and has labored for years to introduce technology that will be used twice in a season: Hawk-Eye. Maybe. If FIFA will approve of its use.

The Premier League will tell you that instant replay can’t be used because it undermines the authority of the officials and because it stops play. Nothing undermines the authority of the officials worse than getting 230 calls wrong in 370 matches. If instant replay even helped that number by 1/4 it wouldn’t undermine the officials, it would make them look stronger. Because as it stands the fans see officials get calls wrong so often that we are unclear on whether officials even know how to officiate games. If they stopped, looked at video replay for a few seconds, and then got the call right, our confidence in official’s competence would be increased.

As it stands, there are whole web sites devoted to cataloging the mistakes of the officials, how could they possibly get any less respected?

The second argument they will make is that football is a game of constant action and that they don’t want to stop play. Football is not a game of constant action: it’s a game of punctuated equilibrium. There are long periods of play in which little of substance happens, followed by a major event, usually then a break in play, and that is followed by a change in the entire nature of the match. The idea that we will all get bored or that the fundamental nature of the game will be changed when the officials stop play twice in 90 minutes for a one-minute review of a major call is absurd. If stoppage in play was as hated as some people make out then no one would ever want to watch a Liverpool match because Luis Suarez spent more time rolling on the ground feigning injury than he ever spent playing football. And any game that features Joey Barton is almost certain to be marred with fights and other disruptions. Those are just two players and two teams. All teams stop play. All teams have players feign injury. All of them.

The only reason I can see for the Premier League and FIFA to introduce Hawk-Eye technology is that it will become a convenient scapegoat for all technology in football. “See,” they will say “Hawk-Eye technology is almost never used. This is because our officials are the best officials in the world and don’t need technology to assist them. Also, Hawk-Eye got [X] number of calls wrong which means that the technology is just as fallible as the human. The debate over technology is dead. Long live the reign of the officials.”

And we can all go back to blind allegiance to football’s authorities.

Qq

*Without Premier League television revenue next season I expect Bolton to go into administration.

- Mikel Arteta led the league in passes per game with 76.9 but did you know that the lowest average passes per game for a midfielder — most people who complete few passes are FW who come on as subs — was Jamie Mackie who in 24 starts (31 games) only managed 13.9 passes per game. Rory Delap averaged 15.8, passes.

- It’s normal to see GK and defenders not getting any key passes but when you see a forward who has 7 starts and 16 subs manage just 5 key passes all season you have to wonder who that FW is and who he plays for. Step up Cameron Jerome, Stoke City! You have fewer key passes this season than Ryan Shawcross.

- Speaking of useless forwards… Robin van Persie and Wayne Rooney have very close numbers in many categories but especially in things like goals scored/shot where both players averaged 5.8 shots per goal. Here. I made a chartoon that tells the WHOLE story of their two seasons:

Anyway, 5.8 shots per goal may seem like a high number but in terms of efficiency 6 shots per goal is not that bad. What’s bad? How about Luis Suarez being a racist? Oh and averaging 11.6 shots per goal? Or Gareth Bale being a space chimp? Oh and averaging 15 shots per goal? Or how about Adel Tarrabt getting just two goals on 88 shots? And one of those goals came against Arsenal! After which hookah was smoked by all. Make mine a double hookah!

- The League’s worst passer was Paul Robinson with just 25%, edging out the second worst passer Simon Mignolet by just 13%.

- It’s normal to see GK like Hennessey and Begovic topping the Long Ball table year in and year out but in among the trees is a little smurf — Luka Smurf — who averaged 7.6 long balls per game playing for Harry Redknapp’s Long Ball dream team. That’s good enough for 4th place in the League. Redknapp loves long balls…

- It’s well known by now that Alex Song led the League in successful through balls per game with 0.7 (24/90). What might not be known is that haul is a little less than half of Messi’s number of 1.5 per game (56/153) and slightly better than Barcelona’s new #4, Cesc Fabregas. Want a chartoon that tells the WHOLE story of these two players’ seasons? SURE!

- For the second year running Chiek Tiote leads the League in yellow cards, while simultaneously being second in both fouls per game and terrible haircuts! Also Grant Holt is a thug who is looking to steal Kevin Cyrill Davies’ crown as biggest thug in the League who miraculously manages to get away with being the biggest thug in the League. Holt was called for 89 fouls and got just 6 yellow cards. That’s fewer yellow cards than each of Song (10), van Persie (8), Koscielny (9), and Vermaelen (7). In fact, if you add up all the fouls committed by RvP (30), Koz (33), and Vermaelen (33), (96) and all the cards they got for those fouls (24) and then look at Grant Holt’s numbers (89 and 6) you see that it’s clearly better to be a center forward, who is English, and whose name doesn’t rhyme with “under the sea”.

- Peter Crouch and Andy Carroll won the most aerial duels in the League. They are tall.

- Emmanuel Adebayor lead the League in total number of offsides (52) and in being dispossessed (105). His 1.6 offsides per game comprised 67% of Tottenham’s total of 2.4 offsides per game. He was also the best player in the world for turning the ball over for no reason with 115! For those numbers and being the world’s most mercenary player Adebayor wins 2011-2012’s Golden Cunt! Congrats, it was close between you and Nasri but you edged Nasri on the terrible stats.

- Who had the most clearances per game? Ryan Shawcross! You know who the top ten are in that category? Shawcross, A. Ferdinand, Collins, Dunne, Huth, Martin (Norwich), Kaboul, Knight, Turner(Sund.), and Johnson (Wolves.). That’s some illustrious company there.

- Speaking of illustrious company, remember Scott Dann? Remember last summer when all the papers were reporting that Scott Dann was coming to Arsenal? Well, this season he lead the League in Own Goals with three!

Of course, Koscielny had 2, Ramsey had 1, Song had 1, and Vermaelen had 1. I’m pretty sure Arsenal lead the world in comical own goaling, maybe we should have doubled down and gotten Scott Dann? Think of how much funnier this season would have been with his three own goals thrown in. I can hear the Yakety Sax now — because I just turned it on.

- Man U and Man City jointly scored 16 penalties this season: Man U alone had 9, while Man City had 7. Man U scored more penalties than Arsenal (2), Tottenham (4), and Newcastle (2), combined. To give this some more perspective, there are 5 teams in London (Arsenal, Chelsea, Fulham, QPR, and Tottenham) and just the two teams in Manchester. The five London teams scored just 15 penalties while the two Manchester teams scored 16.

More insanity tomorrow.

Qq

2011-2012 P5 W1 D1 L3 F6  A14 GD -8 Pts 4
1982-1983 P5 W1 D1 L3 F4  A6  GD -2 Pts 4

It was close and would be the only time in the last 29 years that Arsenal took less than 5 points from the first five games. Still, the goal difference stood out and I wondered if there was a time when Arsenal took less than 5 points and had allowed 14 goals or more. So I kept digging.

The next stop was 38 years ago:

1973-1974 P5 W1 D1 L3 F5  A10 GD -5 Pts 3

By all accounts that was a rebuilding year. Arsenal finished 10th but the double-winning side 0f 1971 had been nearly dismantled and that year kicked off several years of decline for the club.

One could keep going, further down the rabbit hole and pull out 1953-54 as a worse start than the one Arsenal found themselves in this year and they would be right. That was the only time in the last 58 years that Arsenal had a worse start.

But the rebuilding year of 1973-1974 is more remarkable to me than 58 years ago because 2011-2012 was a rebuilding season for this Arsenal team as well. And so, while the goal difference isn’t the same, the points would be (that was in the era of 2 points for a win) and that’s good enough for me. So, in the first five games of the 2011-2012 season Arsenal had gotten off to their worst start in 29 years.

The mischief making of Samir Nasri and Cesc Fabregas* cannot be excused in the final calculus of what caused the start of the season troubles. Yes, we all know that Cesc “was is always will have been” standing in the team with one foot out the door. But so too did Nasri after about January of last year when Rio Ferdinand started making goo-goo eyes after him and saying he should be player of the season.

Thus shorn of the captain and one of the best midfielders of his generation and Nasri, Arsene turned to the market to try and solve the obvious problem that Arsenal had faced in the first three games of the season — lack of a solid central midfielder — and Arsene Wenger bought Mikel Arteta on deadline day, without a physical.

On that day, Arsenal were in 17th place.

On this day, Arsenal are in 3rd place.

In between was one of the weirdest roller coaster rides of a season I can remember. A season which culminated in a final game that Arsenal probably wouldn’t have won but for three goalkeeping mistakes but a game that Arsenal did win and in which the class of Arsenal shone through.

Before Arsenal even scored the first goal, reports came from White Hart Lane that Spurs had scored. Just mere moments later, Marton Fulop came out of goal and failed to claim the ball. Yossi Benayoun ,whose tireless workrate and professionalism has endeared him to Arsenal supporters, pounced on the ball and skipping past the keeper, simply passed the ball into the back of the net. He’s not a flashy footballer, but he is a solid squad player and I know more than one person who would gladly have Benayoun in the team next year.

And then came the inevitable collapse/response/debatable refereeing decision which allowed the opposition to not only get back into the game but to take control. Think back to the first game of the season, where Liverpool beat Arsenal 2-0 at the Grove. It’s a tense game and closely contested from the start. After Frimpong, Frimponged himself and got a second yellow card, there was an error by Miquel in the clearance and a comedy own goal. Yes, Frimpong was dumb to get his second yellow, yes Arsene was dumb to rely on Nasri, Frimpong, and Miquel, but still… both Liverpool goals were offside.

This fact was mirrored in yesterday’s game when Shane Long was a good 2 yards offside but the officials didn’t blow and, of course, Long scored with West Brom’s very first shot in the game. Then came West Brom’s second goal and here again was Arsenal at their comically worst in terms of defending as Thomas Vermaelen was caught up field while no one was covering which gave Dorrans another gilt-edged chance.

Down 2-1, away from home, and knowing the import of the game, Arsenal’s Coqs began to shrink. It looked to me like the season was over. I could already imagine the Tottenham supporters lining up their “Mind the Gap” jokes, creasing the lines on their favorite kit to wear to work today, and preparing their talking points on how “the balance of power has shifted in North London”. I could even here the distant moaning of the Tottenham DVD press being lubed and oiled for a long day’s pressing of the commemorative “St. Harry’s Day” DVDs.

But then luck struck again.

Luck always plays a part in football and I suppose it’s fair to say that Arsenal have had their share of luck this season as well. Again yesterday was a classic example of that as Fulop again gifted Arsenal a goal, and then again gifted Arsenal a goal. I said it twice, not because I felt is was mildly important but rather because Fulop gave Arsenal two goals.

The first was off a Santos shot. To be fair, the Brazilian did well to create the shot and it was a powerful blast but the keeper did get a hand on the ball and probably could have done better.

The second goal was… here’s the thing, I feel like Arsenal have been the victims of some pretty outrageously stupid goalkeeping over the last 5 years so I’m having a really hard time either reveling in or moaning about that third goal. It was what it was, a goalkeeping error. Koz took advantage of the error and while it’s tempting to give all the credit to Fulop, some has to go to Arsenal, who were clinical in finishing the chances for once.

A one-goal lead with this Arsenal team is never safe and it’s even less safe when the team start thinking that they have the game in hand. Why Theo Walcott was brought on at half-time to replace Rosicky is still a mystery. I think it might have been tactical, to try and pin West Brom back with Theo’s pace but the problem is that while Theo brings pace, he doesn’t do very well partnered with Jenkinson on the right. Too many times when those two play together the handbrake comes out. I’ve seen that happen so many times this season I nearly shit a Leprechaun when just two minutes after the Koz goal put Arsenal in the lead I saw Theo Walcott’s lackadaisical pass pounced on by Fortune. This set off a chain of events where West Brom won a free kick, then started a succession of four corners off which I thought they would surely score. Finally ending when Koscielny won a free kick with some strong play on the right side of defense.

Arsene made a change and brought on Gibbs for Gervinho, in effect putting five defenders on the pitch (Jenkinson, Koz, Vermaelen, Gibbs, and Santos) plus two alleged defensive midfielders (Song and Coquelin). Despite having 8 of the 11 players supposedly in defense, Arsenal still looked shaky at back.

And there, on the 91st minute, with the referee giving West Brom 5 minutes of Redknapp time, and everyone in the stadium (even Wenger) believing that Arsenal needed a 4th goal to win this game, Song plays a ball to Robin, who is streaking down the left side. In that one breathless moment we all wanted that shot to go in. But Robin’s shot was well over the bar and in a moment which betrayed just how much Arsene cares about this team and just how much he leaned on Pat Rice for support over all these years, Arsene Wenger buried his head in Pat Rice who looked on stunned.

There was no time to reflect on the shot, no time to think through what had just happened because almost before the cameras could catch up to the action, half of West Brom was slowly jogging through the Arsenal midfield as Ramsey and others took a quick nap. Only Gibbs saw the danger. Only Gibbs seemed to know that Arsenal’s season was on the line. Only Gibbs knew that all the work they had done to climb out of 17th place and into third would be undone in that moment. And only Gibbs jumped into the line of fire, ready to take whatever consequences came his way, but putting his body and probably his career on the line to make the tackle that saved Arsenal’s season. Half a second later and it’s a goal, where everyone blames him for not seeing the threat. Half a second earlier and it’s a penalty, where everyone calls him “the new Clichy” and moans about every pass, turnover, tackle, and reads hidden meanings into everything he ever says from here to eternity. That’s the life of a defender, one mistake and you’re utter shit. But thanks to the Gods, he wasn’t half a second late and we can be spared an entire summer of “who should replace Kieran Gibbs” articles.

Arsenal have not been below Tottenham in the entire time that I have been following them. Both times that Spurs have been close, the final day was the decider. One time it was dodgy lasagna and this year it was dodgy goalkeeping  but it seems to always be something.  Most years it is simply class.

The narrative this summer will be that luck won Arsenal third place on the final day but that’s not true. A great deal of the reason why Arsenal finished above Tottenham on the final day of the season was because of the class that the team showed for the other 37 games. Koscielny consistent performances have him being tipped as one of the defenders of the season. His partner on the right, Sagna, showed just how important he was to this team when he went down injured and Arsenal’s midfield passing and defense went to pot. Santos is another who doesn’t always get the credit he deserves but his defending is much better than people think and he is a great option going forward and even better when paired with Gibbs on the left (ahem, told you). If Benayoun leaves this summer, and I think he will, let’s hope that he passed on his work ethic. Robin van Persie won the golden boot and of course he’s also proven himself to be a great captain.

And then there’s Arteta, a player many wondered “what does he do?” for much of the season. In his absence we all found out exactly what he does; keeps possession, tirelessly moves to provide an outlet, shuttles the ball forward, drops back to shield when Vermaelen, Santos, and Song all go forward, scores goals of the utmost quality, tackles when needed but not in an ugly way, and provides a massive index of Premier League experience upon which the whole team relies to help dominate the midfield.

It hasn’t been an easy season and yesterday wasn’t an easy game. But to go from 17th place after a shambolic summer transfer window and finish the season in 3rd place took a tremendous amount of hard work and a high level of class. As the season wound down, you could tell the toll of that work in the results where Arsenal just couldn’t get over the line, physically. But when that happened, they relied on their class and their talent and though it was very close, much closer than I would have ever wanted…

Arsenal finished third.

Qq

*Some will say that Cesc gave his all and that he’s a legend. I disagree. Cesc signed a lucrative contract, took a massive contract bonus and then left Arsenal for his true love at a fraction of the price he should have been sold for. Perhaps he felt vindicated in doing this because “Wenger failed to properly build around him” but all this seems like excuse making. Cesc was a highly paid athlete, under contract, who did his best to get out of that contract via his agent (Darren Dein), via Barcelona’s management and hierarchy, and via all of his friends on the Barcelona team. The mayor of his hometown was even pressed into service.

I see very little difference between Cesc and Nasri. In fact, if anything Nasri did Arsenal a favor: by opening his legs to every possible suitor he ensured that Arsenal got absolute top dollar when the club finally sold him. Cesc’s insistence that not only he be sold but that he only go to one club ensured that Arsenal wouldn’t be paid what they deserved for a player of his quality.

Sometimes a single photo can tell an entire story. This is one of those times.

Happy St. Totteringham’s Day everyone!

The records don’t matter because they only reflect an arbitrary mark on a piece of paper. What good will it be for Robin van Persie to score five goals tomorrow if the defense allows six and the club falls to 5th place on the table? If anything, the records might hurt Arsenal. Players could come out trying to get some kind of personal accolade for Robin at the expense of the team and possibly the three points. That’s just one permutation of problems with all this talk about records. Throw the records out.

Stats don’t matter either tomorrow. Is it important how many shots on goal Arsenal have averaged over the season if Arsenal can’t score tomorrow? The stats show how the teams have played up until this point and they indicate how the teams might play tomorrow but they cannot predict how they will play. For example, West Brom has been very poor at home this season. Winning just 6 home games and losing 9 puts them in the bottom of the table in both categories. But they are at home, Hodgson is now the England manager, and well, since it’s a cup game for Arsenal anything can happen.

It also doesn’t matter how much Arsene Wenger says that his team won’t take West Brom lightly or that he was angry that the team played such poor defense to allow Norwich to score 3 goals on 4 shots last weekend. It doesn’t matter because he’s said it before,

We made really basic errors defensively if you analyse any of the goals. I just feel that from back to forward we were flat and poor.

That was when Arsenal lost 3-2 to Roberto di Matteo’s West Bromwich Albion last season. Here’s what he said about Norwich:

We came back into the game, we had a great second half, but again we made the mistakes at the back which were absolutely unbelievable. At the back everybody was absolutely horrendous for the third goal. It is just not acceptable.

I will grant that I’ve never hear him say that his defense was horrendous before but I can also show you literally dozens of times where Wenger’s said that he’s disappointed in the defense.

The same for the team. It’s almost comical how a player will give an interview before a game lauding the team’s ability in a category only for the team to concede a goal because of that same weakness. Fabianski did an interview right after the Carling Cup win over Tottenham and just days before the West Brom game last year in which he said that the team “doesn’t switch off” anymore. Three days later, the team didn’t so much switch off as dick-whip the off switch into a coma.

And now Arsene is “certain” that his team will perform.

Let’s make sure we finish third and win our game – that is the only answer we can give. To do that of course you need a full, committed performance from everybody. On that front I am quite sure we will get that from our players and then we will have a very good chance to do it.

I agree with Arsene on all fronts. Only a fully committed performance from all XI players will beat West Brom on Sunday. The problem is in predicting when we will see that type of performance from this team. Against Udinese we saw an Arsenal team that put in a hell of a performance in what was a similar cup game. That’s the team we need on Sunday.

The opposite arguments are all true as well. Robin could break all the records and do it in style with a hat trick. Arsenal could play a statistically perfect game and West Brom could live up to their home form and the game could be a walk in the park. And the team could listen to the old man for a change and come out pressing, playing slick passes, and scoring on every shot.

That’s the game I really hope we get to watch and putting on my positivity hat I will boldly predict that is the game we will see. Dominant Arsenal, fulfilling all of our hopes, celebrating St. Totteringham’s Day, a clean sheet, Robin getting the golden boot and the Premier League record for goals in the season. It will be the perfect kick off to this summer where Arsenal will sign all of their targets, Robin will sign a contract that allows him to retire as an Arsenal player, and Arsenal will challenge for the Champions League.

It all starts tomorrow.

Qq

P.S. For those who live in the States, the match is live on FSN (check your local affiliate). If you have a paid subscription to Fox Soccer 2 Go (foxsoccer.tv) the match will also air live there. If you don’t have either of those and you live here in Seattle/Tacoma there are two pubs that I know will be showing the game: Fado in Seattle and Doyle’s in Tacoma. I will be watching the game on foxsoccer.tv here in my home with my daughter. Enjoy the game wherever you get to watch.

Here’s your list of Golden Boot winners since the inception of the Premier League. And here’s a list of facts:

• There have only been 7 players who have scored 30+ goals in a single season since the start of the Premier League.
• There have only been three players who increased their output the year after they won the Golden Boot.
• There have only been five players in 20 years who have not seen a drop in their output the year after they won the Golden Boot.
• The average drop in output is -9 goals.
• Before 2001-2002 the Golden Boot winner’s team finished in the top four just 6 times.
• Since 2001-2001 every Golden Boot winner’s team has finished in the top four, both in the season they win the award and the season after.
• Only one Golden Boot winner’s team has been relegated the year after they had a player win Golden Boot
• Only two players have won Golden Boot in three consecutive seasons: Shearer and Henry.
• Only one player has won Golden Boot four out of five seasons: Thierry Henry.
• Theirry Henry would have won five consecutive Golden Boot awards had he scored just one more goal in 2002/2003 instead of getting 23 assists.
• Yes, you read that right. 24 goals, 23 assists in 2002/2003. I’m counting that as a fucking Golden Boot.
• Thierry Henry is the only player to win Tim’s Golden Boot award for 5 consecutive years.
• There was only one Golden Boot winner who left England the year after he won the Golden Boot (Jimmy Floyd Hassleebaienekes)
• There have only been 7 seasons in which the team with the Golden Boot winner did better the year after their player won the Golden Boot
• Only two of those teams’ seasons coincide with the player doing as well or better than the season before, but JFH doesn’t count because he went to Athletico Madrid.

What did I miss?

Qq

If you remember the game, Arsenal went up 3-0 in the first half and defensively there wasn’t much for the Gunners to do as Milan were more than happy to soak up Arsenal’s pressure. Confident in their experienced defenders and with van Bommel in front breaking play up.

Still, there were two nervy moments in that first half: Robinho nearly made the tie moot with a wide open shot that he blazed well wide in the minute after Koscielny scored the opener; and El Shaarawy almost scored in the final minute of the half. Both shots came off defensive errors which were so glaring that every fan in the stadium’s butthole clenched simultaneously.

But not Pat Rice. Instead of clenching, he jumped up and started barking instructions at the defense. In fact, throughout the game he was up and talking to his defensive captain (Thomas Vermaelen pictured below) telling him how to keep the shape defensively, actively telling the team to compress the field, and various other tactical instructions.

I say all this to hopefully put to bed this pernicious lie that Pat Rice was just the guy who puts the cones out or a “yes man” as some like to paint him. Pat Rice was an active part of crafting Arsenal’s defense, through both the good times and the bad, both on the pitch and off. And I think he would be the first to admit that the last five years have been quite frustrating.

What happened behind the scenes between Arsene and Rice was something shrouded in great mystery. This led to the speculation that Wenger was some great dictator and that Rice was just a yes man. So great was this mythology that respected people, people connected to the club, pronounced loudly that Steve Bould wouldn’t sign on to be Arsene’s number two because

One, he wants to be allowed to coach, as opposed to put out cones. Two, he wants to retain employment once Wenger does finally go. And on £20,000 a week who can blame him. If Bould were allowed to actually get his hands on the defensive side of the team’s game, there would be some merit in giving him a shot. But the man obviously knows the situation he would be getting himself into and doesn’t want to work under those conditions.

The mythology in that one paragraph is so dense that it’s nearly impossible to unpack it all. Just think about how he slips so easily from “the guy who puts out cones” to “defensive demi-god” in just a few words. Somewhere between “cone placer” and “religious revolutionary” lies the truth.

Of course Arsene Wenger has a way that he wants to play football. All managers do. And it’s probably true that Pat Rice taught the team to play defense the Arsene Wenger way, but I’m certain that Pat injected his own philosophy into the mix. You don’t play football and coach for 44 years by being a husk of a human being.

It’s also probably true that Steve Bould will bring in some new ideas and from what I’ve read is a bit more of a commanding figure among the players. In that AC Milan game I actually got frustrated with the players because Pat was telling them what to do (and he was right) and they clearly weren’t listening. I asked the guy next to me and he said that it’s always like that “they never listen to Pat”. If Steve Bould can just do that, keep the players like Alex Song and Thomas Vermaelen from thinking that they are Eden Hazard and Samuel Eto’o, that would be a huge improvement.

But is Steve Bould the “defensive messiah” that Arsenal need? Not so much, according to Jaime Sanderson of YoungGunsBlog — another well respected journalist with many connections to the club and who followed the Arsenal youth set up for many years. He tweeted this morning:

Final point on Bould: don’t think he’s answer to ‘defensive coach’. U18′s ship silly goals and lack organisation on set pieces. Familiar?

Damn, looks like we are getting another “yes man” who will “put out cones” and not do anything to “shore up the defense”.

I think the only answer is to get Martin Keown in. No wait, Tony Adams.

Yeah, Tony. He’s the defensive messiah that Arsenal need.

I don’t need a messiah. I don’t need myths. I welcome Steve Bould to the first team management set up and can’t wait to see what he brings to the table. And as for Pat Rice, I’ll just stick to the facts and like Tim Stillman, simply thank Pat Rice for his years of tireless service to Arsenal.

Qq

Wait, except the lack of transfer news. Catch 22.

HA HA!

LOL!

Meh.

Really, I have to figure out what I’m going to do this summer with all the players that Arsenal are going to be linked to.

I could do a statistical analysis of each player and show what they could bring to the squad but that could get overwhelming, pretty quickly. After all, the Sun linked Arsenal with Dempsey and Hoilett yesterday and I mean, really, do you want to see Junior Hoilett’s numbers?

Ugh. You do.

Well, he’s a good dribbler. In fact, he averages more dribbles per game than any other player in the League at 2.6. That’s 0.1 more dribbles per game than Victor Moses and Luis Suarez. The problem with Hoilett is that dribbling is all he’s good at. His crosses aren’t particularly good, his passes aren’t particularly good, and he’s Canadian. And we all know what that means!

There’s a weird thing about some people and how they value attacking players. It seems to be based mostly on how well they dribble. Think about all the accolades that Moses and Suarez have received this season. I happen to think Suarez is not a very good player, sure, he can and does dribble, but he’s a terrible person, a massive liability in terms of diving, and also a cunt of a teammate. He’s always throwing his hands in the air whenever he doesn’t get everything his way and I hate playing with those guys.

I should create a metric called “guys Tim would play with”. Wait. No. No I shouldn’t.

Victor Moses? Well, his stats are similar to Suarez but he’s never struck me as an utter, utter cocksandwich. And then there’s Junior Hoilett. Good dribbler, but goes missing in games and has a very Canadian demeanor. You guys know what I mean!

If there was a guy I want to play with it would be Moses. He’ll lead you to the promised land… and then be banished from entering it himself because he questioned God.

Hrm… I’d also play with Dempsey.

There are other dribblers out there. Former Chelsea player Gökhan Töre plays in the Bundesliga and leads the whole world in dribbling with something like a dribble a minute. I don’t know about him because he plays in Germany but I do think that Arsenal could probably buy him for a few dollars less than any of the above mentioned players. I bet he would even be cheaper than Hoilett.

Meanwhile, people are busy making “Welcome to Arsenal” skill compilation videos to post on YouTube for both Vanilla Manilla and Klaus Jan Vertonghenen both of which are hilarious. The M’Vila video is 11 minutes of him passing sideways and backwards, for France. Well, I assume it’s 11 minutes of that because I turned it off after 30 seconds of him passing sideways and backwards, for France.

And I like France!

The Vertonghen video must be like some kind of reverse psychology, right? Like, it’s a plant by a Spurs fan who really wants him to go to Arsenal instead of Spurs? Because if scoring goals off flat-footed headers and free kicks that dribble over the line after being deflected are considered “highlights” I’d hate to spend even a single night watching the Eredivisie. The only conclusions I came away with watching that video of his top 10 goals is 1) that the Dutch division is so poor that this lumbering center half is free to roam up front like a sort of Alex Song/Chamakh defensive-center forward type and 2) that we should pray that Arsenal never buy any Dutch goal keepers.

Just kidding, I’m sure that Jan Vertonghen is exactly the guy we need to be the 6th and decisive center half at Arsenal. Also, apparently, he’s going to be backup to Song in midfield and, conveniently, Marouane Chamakh at center forward. I wonder what his dribbling numbers are? Maybe he could fill in for Hoilett on Arsenal’s left wing?

I think the Canadian air has done something to me.

Qq

On Wenger’s transfer policy over the last few years, the reality is probably far more complicated than we’d all like to think. We see other teams snapping up players like Juan Mata and Gary Cahill and it looks easy when it’s really not. We only ever see the end product, what goes on before Mata signs for Chelsea is more complicated than I care to write about this morning. We also fantasize about a past and particularly a past chairman who “just got things done”. Again, this is easy to do when all you see is a rumor on the back page of a broadsheet and then a week later a photo of Bergkamp holding an Arsenal shirt.

I suspect that when the story of Arsenal over the last 7 years is finally told we will read a tale of great hubris, failures, successes, miscalculations, back stabbing, players refusing to do what they are told and almost none of it will be the names you think will be tied to each of those adjectives. We simply do not know what’s been going on.

But we do know that Arsenal have broken the mould a bit this summer and have signed Lukas Podolski before before the season has even ended. This is a season where the club could end up anywhere from 3rd place to 6th place on the final dy and yet the Podolski signing is a clear a signal of the club’s intentions: no matter where we finish this year, the aim is to be better in the next.

Indeed the boss has also been startlingly vocal about his squad and frankly I think he’s sick and tired of yelling at the fourth official and throwing water bottles all over the place because he, of all people, knows that it’s not the fourth official or the Emirates branded Nike Obsidian water that’s been the real problem, it’s the team. And the team have plenty of players that they need to get off the books, I don’t even need to list them here because you all know the names better than I do. I think Wenger knows their names as well and is ready to move them on and bring in fresh blood.

To that end, we are hearing strong rumors (some even saying that it’s a done deal) that Yann M’Vila is on the verge of signing with Arsenal for a record transfer fee of nearly £18m. If true, that’s incredible for several reasons. The first is that it’s an admission that the Arsenal midfield needs some steel. I know that people like to disagree over what every player brings to the table but M’Vila is legitimate holding midfielder. Of course he can play box to box, of course he’s creative, of course he can pass the ball with great range, and of course his touch is great and he holds the ball well. I would expect nothing less from an Arsene Wenger signing, he’s hardly going to go out and get a one-dimensional player like Scott Parker. But M’Vila is a defensive midfielder and you will be surprised (pleasantly I think) at how few times you see the opposition simply waltz past him.

But the most remarkable thing is that if the rumors are true it means that Arsenal will be paying a record fee for a defensive midfielder. I’ve long thought that Wenger doesn’t so much disregard the value that this position brings but rather undervalued it, in the sense that he thought it crazy to spend more than a certain amount in acquiring a DM. So, £18m is a tactic admission that he was wrong, that this is a specialists position, and that should you find one who can tackle like Scott Parker and pass like Alex Song, well maybe that guy is worth a good bit of money.

And then there’s the Steve Bould story. Arseblog wrote this morning that “Steve Bould will this week be confirmed as Arsenal’s new assistant manager.” That bold of a statement from the well-respected Arseblog himself is as close to fact as we get, until it’s published on the dot com. And yet it was just yesterday that various other sources were reporting that Bould would never take the job because Wenger won’t listen to anyone else. Apparently, some folks believe that Wenger locks himself in his fortress of solitude and plays subutteo all afternoon while the assistant manager just arranges the cones on the deck of the Titanic.

There’s no doubt that Wenger is a stubborn man, that he’s a man with a vision, and that he likes things his own way. There’s also no doubt that Wenger is insanely detail oriented, wanting to be involved in every aspect of the club and probably having an opinion on anything that anyone ever does. That’s what all great men are like. He’s a figure like Frank Lloyd Wright; obsessed with details, sometimes to the detriment of the big picture, builds flawed houses, but everyone wants a Wright house, and he changed architecture forever.

That’s why I laugh when people use Wenger’s stubborn streak as a club to beat him. Saying that he “needs someone to challenge” his ideas. Do you really think Mourinho’s second is challenging him? And what does that look like to you? A scene from Uncle Pulis’ Naked Shower Hour?

Yes, Wenger is stubborn. He can be since he’s done nothing less than change football in England while being the greatest manager Arsenal have ever seen and building a 60,000 seat arena. But, if it comes to pass that Bould becomes that Arsenal number two and that Milla Vanilla* signs for £18m, I think it signals a change in Arsene Wenger. Perhaps a slowing down of his activities at the club and of moving to the next phase of his career.

Which would be a bold move, entirely on Arsene Wenger’s terms.

Qq

*Blame it on the rain