After 14 games this season the table says: 1. Chelsea 33 points 2. Arsenal 31 points and further down the table... Man Utd 24 points Last year after 14 games the league table looked like this: 1. Chelsea 35 points 2. Arsenal 34 points 3. Manure 31 points We were also on our way out of the Champions league at this stage last year...so let's put everything into perspective. Chelsea is only 1 point better off under Mourinho compared to us last year, but are 2 points worse off (35 p. last year, 33 p. this yr.) It's a long season.
Incidently, you may remember our 14th game last season, the frustrating 0-0 against Fulham, another game we should have won easily.
More statistics for you (you can tell I have nothing better to do). The eventual champion's amount of points after 14 games in every season since 1997-1998: 1997-1998 Arsenal 27 points 1998-1999 Man U 28 points 1999-2000 Man U 30 points 2000-2001 Man U 33 points 2001-2002 Arsenal 26 points 2002-2003 Man U 23 points and we have 31 now in 2004-2005, it's still championship form folks. Yes, there are problems in the defence at the mo, but be patient. It will be alright. The question is not whether Arsenal can keep it up, we know they can. The question is, can Chelsea keep it up ? Well, they started even better last year and failed. Sorry guys but the pressure is on Chelsea to perform.
Unfortunatly by the same logic of history repeating itself we are doomed anywho. Arsenal havent won it twice in a row in the modern (post WW2) game.
Thanks for the perspective. I've felt that all along, but it really shows how great our start was at the beginning of the season, given that we are still on awesome pace, but our current form really is pretty perplexing.
Spot on. The fact that our points are similar to last year at this time for some reason is not assuaging my current fears. The club just looks listless right now.
You must allow for a drop in form sooner or later, and being 2 points behind the leaders after a few weeks of what we would concider bad form aint that bad. You see, this wont last for too long. I know, because we are not playing badly, we are playing pretty good football but we are not taking our chances and our defence lacks in confidence. Its a question of time. We picked the 1 st place in January last year and we seem to get our game plan together in the second half of the season every year. Chelsea will hit the same dire spell soon, all it takes is a niggling little injury to Robben or Lampard and suddenly confidence may erode away. Manure has had 10 months of it and have only just won 2 matches back to back for the first time this season. Everton are 2 points behind us now, but will fade gradually after x-mas because injuries will set in and they will run out of fit squadplayers and luck. Liverpool and Newcastle are inconsistent also and struggling. Things will pick up for us soon. 24 more games to play. Chin up all you Gooners!
If you look at the seasons 1999 and 2001 we had only 24 points and 28 point respectively after 14 games, not enough to win the league. OK, I admit that in 2002-03 season we had 32 points at this point and threw it away, but we have moved on since then and learnt to give everything, something I felt we didnt do all time during that season. We have are a great team with loads of talent and determination.
I remember that game - my one and only trip to Highbury in the Invicible season (it's a long way from Australia), and it was to see what was one of the very few (if not the only) occasions that Arsenal failed to score. So many chants that I did not get to sing that day (ie "One-Nil to the Arsenal" and "One team in London, there's only one team in London"). That was the same day the Chelski beat Manure too, and we lost even more ground. That Fulham result though was the last poor result of that season. I reckon though it was the game just prior (the 5-blot spanking of Inter midweek before th Fulhan game) that really started some really sparkling football. The boys are struggling to hold onto leads, but if we spank PSV midweek, and Sol comes back on deck in the next weekend or two then things will start to really fire up.
If we havent won it back to back besides Chelsea...whats stopping us from doing it? im sure we can win it if we not winning it i really really really want Everton to win it I'd like Cahill to get a medal and i want Rooney to cry
i said i want it to be Everton if it isnt Arsenal but hey i also said i want an RX-7 but it aint happening
I like the stats but you are overlooking something. Here are the results from both years: WWWWWDWWWLDDWD now WWWWDDWWWDWWWD then See the difference? We were on an even better pace through the first 9 games this year (before the OT robbery) and our form has really fallen since then. The longest we went without a win (before we wrapped up the title) was 2 games last year. We've already had a 3 game winless streak. It is also the teams that matter. By this point we had drawn ManU at OT, beat Chelsea, and beat Liverpool away. We had only given up more than 2 goals once (in the CL) and only Newcastle had scored more than a goal against us in the EPL. This season we have lost to ManU and drawn with 3 teams that are just hoping to avoid relegation (twice at home). Only the home draws to Portsmouth and Fulham were real disappointments in the league last season by this point and we had wiped away that big loss to Inter by crushing them away. I hope we'll be able to show that type of willpower this week and crush PSV to get this thing going the right way again.
The biggest difference is we lost away to Man Utd, a game thrown to them by the ref, quite honestly. The 3 games without a win wouldn't have happened if Sol had been in the middle of defence. He's back tomorrow according to reliable sources. We also know that Henry and Pires are far from 100% at the mo, and that Fabregas is playing far too many matches due to injuries to Edu and Gilberto, so from that perspective it is not such a big surprise that we are facing a dip in form. I just wish we had wrapped up the European games already. What would have happened last year if Pires had not been given that penalty vs Pompey? Surely we would have lost. Or Cole's late goal vs Kiev? We could have been out and that would certainly have affected the confidence. Apart from that I agree with most of your points, our defence is in need of a new campbelt and the midfield new engine oil. And it will come.
Turbo / intercooler certainly needed now. There's only one way back and that's hard, hard, hard work. We have Birmingham next, then Chelsea, both home games that we must win. We've got a bit spoilt in recent years and perhaps beginning to take things for granted, well that has certainly stopped now with Chelsea 5 points clear. I still believe there are far to many points to win and lose from now till May, but I'm sure the press have decided that Chelsea are the new champions. Suits me fine. And the other good news is we are at the end of our traditionally horrible November.
Yes, its a long season but as pointed out before our form after the loss is crap - we gained most the points early on. I don't see Chelski losing many games because they have 2 quality players for each position so injuries don't effect them like other teams. They have already started to rest players. The only way we will win the prem this season is if we beat them on Dec. 12th and get at least a point in the reverse fixture. The loss of Gilberto and Edu is really hurting us - Cesc has played well but looks very tired and is easily pushed off the ball. He also need a real striker - our only natural striker is lupoli i think! Henry is a converted striker and has a 'free role' and drifts about (which is great) Bergy is a second/support striker and plays deep Reyes plays on the left and also as a converted striker Van Persie is also a left sided player - being converted into a striker Am I the only one that sees a problem with this? We have playrs that will drift to the left and no-one will be in the box (apart from freddie that is!) .....I guess i'm still pissed about the Liverpool game
I dont blame you. If we can only start beating someone convincingly starting agaist B'ham on Saturday, things could change. I know Chelsea looks strong, but they have traditionally found it difficult to get results on wet and freezing mid week games away against teams such as Bolton, so we'll find out whether that has changed. I also remember this time last year, I couldn't see Man Utd losing and then they lost to Wolves in January. My main concern is the number of injuries we have to deal with.