With Manchester City in the Premier League, being almost perfect isn’t good enough
Over the last few seasons, the standards required to win the league have become near unattainable without a flawless campaign, and even then, perfection often isn’t sufficient.
And that is before you even factor in the element of fortune.
To win a title, a club needs a bit of luck – the bounce of a ball, a refereeing decision in your favour, or, critically, an injury record that doesn’t derail momentum. These factors make all the difference when the margins are as fine as they are in this league.
For Arsenal fans, this season has been a harsh reminder of just how fickle luck can be.
Despite a solid start, Arsenal have struggled to maintain the kind of good fortune often required to stay ahead in such a competitive race. Dropped points have rarely been a result of tactical inferiority or being outplayed, but rather a string of events that have compounded their challenge for the title.
Take the rash of red cards Arsenal have suffered this season. Each dismissal has come at a crucial time, costing points, and the decisions have often seemed harsh, to say the least, in retrospect.
Against Bournemouth, it was Jarred Gillett, a referee with known affiliations to Liverpool, who issued a controversial red card via a VAR intervention most agree was unwarranted.
This not only reduced Arsenal to 10 men, but it also ensured that their best defender missed the next critical encounter – against Liverpool, no less.
To say Liverpool benefited from this sequence of decisions would be putting it mildly.
In the game against Liverpool, there was Anthony Taylor’s decision to blow his whistle for a foul that no one else on the pitch saw, cancelling out what would have been a late Arsenal winner.
It was another instance where the rub of the green seemed to favour their opponents, and Arsenal were left ruing what could have been.
These moments accumulate, each one a body blow to Arsenal’s title ambitions.
Against Liverpool, there were further setbacks. Gabriel’s injury early in the second half robbed Arsenal of stability in defence and an uncertainty swept through the team, an issue Mikel Arteta will need to address.
With Gabriel sidelined, Liverpool found space, gained momentum, and grabbed a draw from a match that Arsenal seemed poised to win.
On the day, all the defining moments tipped in Liverpool’s favour, leaving Arsenal clutching a single point and wondering how things might have been different if not for the hand they were dealt.
Even before this game, injuries have been another blight on Arsenal’s season.
A consistent title challenge requires a stable squad, and that simply hasn’t been the case for the Gunners. Key players have found themselves on the treatment table rather than the pitch, and as a result, Mikel Arteta has had to shuffle his lineup more than he would like.
Mikel Merino fracturing his shoulder in his first training session, Martin Odegaard getting crocked on international duty, Takehiro Tomiyasu picking up injury after injury, ditto Kieran Tierney, Oleksandr Zinchenko and Gabriel Jesus. Riccardo Calafiori tweaking his knee. It’s a long list.
It’s hard enough to keep up with Manchester City at the best of times, but when you’re robbed of your star players, and don’t have deep pockets, that challenge becomes even steeper.
It is easy to chalk up these events as mere excuses, but when margins are so thin, the role of luck cannot be discounted.
Arsenal have the quality, the tactics, and the hunger, but so far, the breaks have gone against them.
They’re playing in an era where ‘almost perfect’ isn’t enough, especially not when Manchester City set 115 standards that are bordering on inhuman.
For Arsenal, finding a way to keep fighting until their luck turns will be the true test.
They have to hope, at some point, that the pendulum swings back their way, and they start getting some of the decisions, some of the breaks, that can make the difference between finishing first or second.
Until then, Arsenal can only do what they’ve always done: push on and fight, hoping that one day the luck will line up with their undoubted talent.
