Amorim gone!

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Originally Posted by Ganpati's Goonerz--AFC's Aboriginal Fertility Cult

PS - "Can you imagine Alexis being asked by Arteta to focus on his defensive responsibilities for the good of the team?"

Different team, different era.

You might as well ask whether Big Paddy Jennings would be good at passing the ball around in his own box.

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I take your point, but I do think the eras are not quite as separate as you think. Wenger hadn't moved on much but a lot of football had and was already moving to the point where luxury players were a luxury that few teams could afford. These days it is just Mo Salah.....

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Originally Posted by redgunamo

Jennings was actually quite good with the ball at his feet; notably, unfashionably so, ahead of his time.

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As long as you wanted him to wallop it the length of the pitch. He was certainly good at that :-)

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Originally Posted by redgunamo

The trouble wasn't so much the money we had but the money our rivals had. That side was certainly worth a title, in different times.

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I agree with the point about our rivals having more money than us. If we bought a Mustaphi, we'd be stuck with him. But our opponents could just not play him and write the loss off, a bit like we later did with P?p?.

But that side had too many holes to be a title-winning team. We needed a DM and a pwoppa CH pairing. All the titles in my lifetime have had a world class CH pairing, and normally 3 CHs. {O'Leary, Bould, TA, MK, Sol, Kolo.} I don't think it a coincidence that we've challenged for the title for 3, now hopefully 4 season since we've had Big Willy and Gabby at the back. And now we have Triphop, Hinchappy, and also Timber and Ricky C as options.

We could have our 4 first choice CHs out and still have a backline of BW, JT, Ricky C, MLS which isn't that shabby, given JT and Ricky C play CH for their national sides. BW's looked as good as ever when he's played this season - still think he's a better crosser than JT. And MLS dealt with Rodrygo and Mbapp? home and away.

MA's basing the challenge on defensive solidity like GG did. And for the Invincibles, we'd won two titles with Paddy V as DM, but then got Gilby to play there with PV4 moving further forward like Dec has.

The team with all the creative genius didn't have the defensive foundations.