At the turn of the century, Arsenal were
undoubtedly
Manchester United's number one
challengers for the Premier League
trophy. Between the 1997-98 season and 2004-05 campaign the
Gunners did not finish outside the top two positions in the
domestic league.
However, since the 2005-06 season, Arsenal have been fourth twice,
third once and this year might not even make it to a Champions
League qualifying position.
While many Gunners fans hail manager
Arsene Wenger as the best nurturer of youth in the
world, others are beginning to question his transfer policy,
including Man United manager
Sir Alex Ferguson.
In recent years, the north London club's success has been built on
fantastic attacking football, with a lynch-pin such as Patrick
Vieira in midfield to break up play.
Arsenal seem to be without that type of player following the
departures of Gilberto Silva, Lassana Diarra and Mathieu Flamini,
and the Red Devils boss can't understand why his old foe did not
look for somebody in that mould in the January transfer
window.
"He believes profoundly in his youngsters, he doesn’t like to blend
them too much with older players," Fergsuson is quoted as saying in
The Independent.
"What astonishes me is that he always buys attacking
players, like [Andrei] Arshavin. "He is a good player but [Wenger]
already has [Samir] Nasri, [Emmanuel] Adebayor, [Robin] van Persie,
[Nicklas] Bendtner, Eduardo [da Silva], [Theo] Walcott.
"I don’t think he likes buying defenders. That lacks balance."
<!--h3>Ricky Brooks</h3-->