League games under him for me, the Blackburn game away that season was the best an Arsenal team ever played.
3 Likes
Lauren - 6/7m?
Toure - couple of hundred k?
Campbell - free
Cole - youth player
Even more incredible when you consider Toure and Lauren originally thought of as midfielders
3 Likes
Yeah exactly, in the video he says something like Lehman was free as well. Quite unbelievable really considering how good they were. He says it was like under £4/5m for all of them
Pretty amazing all that genius in making Arsenal competitive with United, but even then there are stories of moments of cash crises for the club. It is a reminder of just how much is required to get this club to the top, and definitely not something to feel entitled to.
3 Likes
This sort of puts to bed the whole George Graham’s defence is what carried him.
1 Like
Thing is though this defence started to take shape around 03 times, the first double was from 98 was the defence GG formed. And that could be said to some degree for the second title as well.
1 Like
Yeah while it’s indisputable Wenger inherited GG’s magnificent defence for the first title win, what is understated is how he got into their heads (in a good way). Wenger galvanised them.
6 Likes
Yeah there’s no doubt about that. He enriched them football and monetary wise.
They’d learnt their defending under GG and were fine tuned by Wenger and re educated with the ball.
6 Likes
Arsenal - One Tony Adams, there’s only one Tony Adams… - YouTube
Love GG, but this goal NEVER happens under him!
3 Likes
Did it? I thought Lauren, Campbell and Cole were pretty much already established in the lineup by the 01/02 season? With either Keown or Adams slotting in as the other CB
RB in the 01/02 season was Dixon.
Lauren did score a noteworthy pressure penalty v spurs at home, though.
1 Like
Dixon played the majority of 01/02 if I remember, Keown played majority of 2002/3, Lehman didn’t come until 03 I think and Toure came the season before. 2003/4 is when we seen the invincibles back line of Lehman, Lauren, Toure, Sol and Cashley for the majority of the season. If my memory serves me
2 Likes
I thought this but the statistics for that season have him down as making 3 league starts. We also had the horse that year but he was down as making a dozen starts. Lauren on 27. He definitely started the cup final at RB. Lauren had been with us since 2000 and I think it was 01 when the conversion to RB started to take place.
My memory from 01/02 was we used to always score when Dixon was warming up on the touchline, not sure he actually started many games. Mostly Lauren I thought and maybe some of the galloping horse Oleg Luzhny
1 Like
That’s right, you see him wheeling away before the balls even hit the back of the net as he’s warming up behind the goal when ljungberg scores in the FA cup final 
Seems a bit odd but hilarious he was allowed to warm up behind the Chelsea goal that day. Not something you see nowadays.
4 Likes
1 Like
Arteta is painting pictures of Wenger on the fucking walls lol, @BigWeng_4LYFE why ain’t you a full artetasexual again bro, this shit is your jam?
1 Like
Don’t forget Stepanovs, who played alongside Luzhny, which meant we had a donkey and a horse in the Arsenal defence, no wonder Man U scored six against us. 
That was season before 
1 Like
1 Like