Happy New Year!

It shows how high Mikel Arteta has pushed the bar of expectation that we are looking at the 2023 calendar year as a poor 12 months for The Arsenal.

We finished the year with a whimper. A defeat to Fulham which denied us being top of the table on New Year’s Day. That followed a defeat at home to West Ham United.

Back to back defeats lead to the usual over the top reaction. Fans saying that they “will not be spending more on this rubbish in 2024” and booing the team at the final whistle. And this is my issue with many of our moaning fans.

When we are playing brilliant, top of the league, they take to social media and complain that they can not get tickets. We then have a slight downturn, more tickets become available, and they stand their saying things such as they will not be going anymore.

I have long maintained that the biggest ticket problem at The Arsenal was that we were playing good. And those fans that abandoned us in our truly tough years wanted to start going again. The recent defeats have proved me right, and hopefully when those demanding Arteta Out do not come back. Leave the tickets to the fans that will go through thick and thin. That love Arsenal whether we are top of the table or 13th. Only want to go when we are top? Do not bother turning up at all.

The reality is, we are a 72-75 point team right now. That is a solid top 4 team (average across Premier League seasons is 71.5), and is that not what we all demanded 18 months ago? A return to us being regulars in the top 4 again and then mounting a title challenge?

The first half of last season we were unbelievable good. This lead to some fans expectation level going through the roof. Many football fans are naturally bi-polar – everything is either absolutely fantastic or it is the worst they have ever seen. That first 19 games saw some of our fans hit the highs.

We then dropped off in the 2nd half of the season, and have rebuilt in the first 19 games of this season:

First 19 games of 2022/23: 50 points
Last 19 games of 2022/23: 34 points
First 19 games of 2023/24: 40 points

For me, what this breakdown does is highlight that the team was playing ahead of where it should have been in the first half of the season. We then dropped off a bit and finished 2nd. You take the last 19 of last season and the first 19 of thise (takes you up to the Fulham game), we gained 74 points.

I am not going to throw my toys out of the pram because we are only a 72-75 points team right now. And that form can not be when we begin considering sacking a manager – do we really want to turn into Manchester United? Going through managers every 18 months and each new one coming in taking us backwards.

Some will say “but we spenmt so much in the summer. We should have moved forward”. And we have moved forward from the last 19 games of last season.

The commenting about how much we spent also does not take into account how much others have spent – mainly Liverpool and Manchester City. And not just how much they have spent in the summer of 2023, but over the last 5 or 6 years when they have had Champions League football, and we have been in the Europa League.

That drop is worth around £70-80m in revenue a season. That is £70-80m more they have been able to spend on wages and transfer fees over the last half a decade. It should not be surprise that we are still behind on the pitch considering that investment.

We are catching up, and last summer we spent big. But so did Liverpool.

All the noise is “Arsenal spent £105m on a midfielder”, but Liverpool spent £145.4m on 4 midfielders! And you only have to look at their attack options against Newcastle to see the gulf in investment in the clubs.

Gabriel Jesus, Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Martinelli, Leandro Trossard and Reiss Nelson cost us a combined £72million.

Mohamed Salah, Darwin Nunez, Luis Diaz, Cody Gakpo and Diego Jota cost over £225m. Should it be any surprise that Liverpool have more attacking options when they have spent over 3 times as much on forwards as us?

This highlights just how much we are still in the building stage. Our next step is to get players at the level of Gakpo and Jota to back up Jesus, Saka and Martinelli.

Last summer was not a summer where we spent big to take us champions. It was a summer where we spent to solidify our position in the top 4. And that is something we are looking like doing.

What we now need is another 2 or 3 summers like last summer. Multiple years in a row of Champions League football, and investing the additional revenue into the club – buying better players than what we have now, continually improving the squad.

And we will have ups and downs, some transfers we will get rightm others we will get wrong. But proper fans stick by the team. They do not bail at the first sign of trouble.

If you spent New Year’s Eve demanding Arteta out, throwing your toys out the pram and saying you no longer have an interest in going to a game again, then please never comment about ticketting issues again.

The majority reading this are like me. You stick with the club through thick and thin. It is the minoirty making a lot of (loud) negative noises. They will say they are just holding the club to a high standard, that they will not accept things not being good enough. In their minds, it is champions or failure. There is no middle ground.

And they do not seem to understand that football is not just about your team being champions – the league would not maintain 92 teams if that was the case.

Love The Arsenal for The Arsenal, not because of the trophies. Go when times are good, go when times are bad. 

I bet in this second half of the season, we see succesful ballot applicants increase. Hopefully that means more fans that will go rain or shine getting tickets, and we lose those that only want to turn up on a sunny day.

My final thought is if back to Liverpool. They have only gained more than 75 points on 5 occassions in the last 14 years. If we finish on 75 this season, it will really not be a bad total. Just not good enough to win the league.

Enjoy your first day back at work!

Keenos

Our fantastic range of Arsenal fleece blankets!https://t.co/SFrGVBAZww pic.twitter.com/hvcgolB022

— Kick Off Merchants (@KOMerchants) November 30, 2023