If he goes, he leaves his successor with a great new stadium, a great squad, a great scouting system, and a great youth academy. His successor will have money to spend (if you believe the Arsenal board, lots of it), and have plenty of talented youngsters trying to break-through. I think you can’t leave a club better off than what Arsene has already achieved for us.

But hopefully, him leaving is not a thing that will come to pass anytime soon. Probably has another 10 good years or more of management left in him.

Makes me almost reluctant to turn off Sky Sports and watch “Have I got news for you.”

Liverpuddle are indeed between a rock and a hard place. Imagine having a manager that you want anymore but can’t get rid of? That surely takes the biscuit, doesn’t it? My fiend, almost like my twin brother, but a Liverpool fan, came to visit today. He couldn’t stop bemoaning the fate of his club. I had no choice but to feel for him. Very sad, the state of affairs there. How can Benetez expect anyone to believe that he is a good manager?

OK, he’s playing against Sheffield Thursday, but even so, bloody brilliant.

Talk about being stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea. Liverpool literally can’t afford to sack him and they certainly can’t afford keep him. At least the scouser’s can rejoice in the fact that Arsenal are broke, it must be true their supporters have told me often enough.

In a country that usually (with the occasional exception) manages to produce managers that are either A) useless b) complete scumbags and I’m being extremely polite or C) all of the above, Steve Bruce actually looks like a good manager who doesn’t take pride in his team doing permanent injury to opposition players, especially if they are “foreign”.

As for Benetez, I don’t really have anything to add to all that’s been said. I do hope that Liverpool can find some miracle.

Just speaking of Steve Bruce, I fondly remember his press conference after the Arsenal v Wigan Carling cup match last season. Carlos Vela single handedly orchestrated a 3-0 humiliation of a fully loaded Wigan team with the likes of Polassios and Valencia.

When asked to comment on Wigan’s performance against the Arsenal Carling cup kids, Steve Bruce smiled coyly and said “What do you want me to say? we were given a good hiding. In that form, those kids can beat any team in the premiership”.

I nailed my colours to the mast at the beginning of the season when I bet my Liverpool supporting friends that they would be the most likely team to finish outside of the top 4.

Liverpool could have won last season but many of the regulars here also knew that Arsenal were desperately unlucky with injuries and felt that with more young players were starting to look the business we would be back with force this year.

It is clear to me that any of the top clubs would have struggled to win the title with the injury situation Arsenal have suffered over the last two years but somewhow it always feels as though it is whining to say such!

I also put my money where my mouth goes by putting £50 on Arsenal to win the title before the season started (at odds of 11-1).

I think any victorious title campaign takes luck but we are better equipped than we were last season and, if we can just avoid injuries to the wrong players, The Arsenal are clearly in with a VERY real shout.

Even the doom mongers at The Grove have started to make noises about ‘believing’, in spite of claiming Wenger was ruining their club as little as a month ago!

You have to remember this is a totally pro-Wenger site which was set up as a counter measure to the endless doom-mongers that have gathered around our club, and who think that if we don’t win something every year the manager should go.

So we are always positive, but I think it is fair to say at the moment we are positive +++. To watch the goals go in, and not just any old goals, but beautiful goals scored from about 2 miles out by a centre half that no one had previously heard of (unless you are Dutch or Belgian) is something to behold.

Arshavin is indeed a master, scoring from places that look impossible, and transforming games.

Then when our great Lord Wenger stands up and says “with this team, this year” – and promises us a title or at least a cup, you know we are back on the road.

But I would add that I was having a discussion about Steve Bruce the other day, and what a brilliant manager he is. Not only does he perform magic, he comes over to me (one of your paying customers) as a nice guy. His interviews are reasoned and reasonable, you see him smiling and laughing with players – and not just with his own players. Everything about him says, yes here is a manager who is good at his job and has style.

In terms of the rest of the big clubs, we have been saying for 2 years on this site that Liverpool is on the edge because of its debts, lack of income, and lack of a viable model for getting out of the mess. This year’s move by the banks more or less proves the point. I personally think that Liverpool will drop out of the top four, and then not long after will do a Leeds.

But then I also expect the manager of Tottenham to announce that he has taken the job of managing the team in a residential institution, so what do I know?

Last, if you have an interest in history, you might enjoy http://blog.woolwicharsenal.co.uk/2009/10/15/sunderland-6-arsenal-2-16th-october-1909 – the story of a match 100 years ago in which you thumped us. Maybe you can add some further details for our history site.

As it is, however, Arsenal have kept with the pace early on and none of the other 3 look anything like going on the kind of run that can pull them clear at the top. Liverpool were dreadful. They are obviously missing Alonso and, as soon as Gerrard and Torres were ruled out, I had the feeling we had a chance. Without those two they struggled to create anything of note and we had more and better chances. I cant see them getting anywhere near the title, especially since their defence is looking dodgy as well. Carragher, as well as being a complete c**t (standing over jones telling him to get off the pitch when he was seriously injured and ended up having to be stretchered off and substituted), is also looking more and more error prone and struggled very badly with our attack. Obviously we got the win partly thanks to Mr B. Ball but still, it was a well deserved 3 points

Man Utd were also fairly poor. They were better than Liverpool but they dont have that many goals in them. Rooney oten bangs in a load and then goes on a barren spell and, with Ronaldo gone, Berbatov not being prolific and the likes of Wellbeck being very inexperienced, they are likely to slip up a few times this season

Chelsea were class against us, which had me convinced they would win the league. I still think they probably will but 2 defeats in 2 away games for them puts question marks over their chances, especially since i believe they will lose drogba and essien for a month during the african cup of nations

All of this should mean the Arsenal are right in the hunt. Results have been steady, performances seem, on the whole, to have been good and, in Arshavin, you possibly have the one player most likely to turn a game on its head. There seems to be a good balance to the side and I think the relative lack of media coverage might be a help. What do people on here think, is this the best chance in a while to win the Premier League again?

**

This is of course a matter of opinion, but on current form Mascherano the 2nd best in DMF, no way. Just to mention some names as food for thought: Song, Felipe Melo, Lorik Cana, Lassana Diarra, Yaya Toure, Wilson Palacios, Seydou Keita, Marcos Senna, Anatoliy Tymoshchuk (Bayern) etc etc. Not similar players all of them obviously but in my books Senna is up there with Essien. Besides, Liverpool plays with two very defensive midfielders, whereas many of those I mentioned have a lot more responsibilities.

Liverpool do have some good players, give them some credit. Kuyt, Benayoun & Carragher are all good players (although Carragher has lost it this season so far). But they rely to heavily on Gerrard & Torres. They should have never got rid of Crouch, Keane or Alonso. Imagine their strike force now if they had stayed. Torres, Keane, Crouch & Kuyt. Thats pretty good. Kuyt as their 4th striker! Ultimately Benetiz has finally been exposed…

Ah well, it means more happy days for us, atleast 3-4 world class players (Cesc, RVP, Arshavin & Rosicky) and with others potentially world class in the future (Vermaelen, Walcott, Wilshere, Nasri, Vela, Gibbs), mix that with some very good players like Clichy, Sagna, Eduardo, Song, Ramsey and dare I say it Eboue, even bendtner is getting better, then you have a promising future.

Wenger has proven we cannot only live without Adebayor & Toure but actually improve. The guy is a genius. I don’t doubt him, yet still think we need cover for Song or for Song to be cover for a world class defensive midfielder. And also another central defender. I leave you with this thought….I know this wont happen as its too attacking but I would love to see Wenger play the following team even if it was only for one game against a weaker team like Portsmouth or something. The midfield is devastating!

Alumunia
Sagna Gallas Verm Clichy
Arshavin Nasri Cesc Rosicky
Eduardo RVP

Bench: Fabianski, Gibbs, Song, Wilshere, Ramsey, Walcott, Vela, Bendtner.

You also have to notice that Lyon had to take of Cris in the first half, which left them with no first choice centre backs. In fact they had Toulalan, their best defending midfielder and a 20-year old midfielder in there. For Liverpool similar situation would have meant something like having Mascherano and Spearing as their centre half pairing.

Everton’s situation yesterday was much worse than said here. They were missing something like eleven first team players for their game at Benfica. Although I think two of their players were ineligible not injured. Jagielka, Yobo, Heitinga, Neill, Neville, Arteta, Pienaar, Osman, Baines, Anichebe & Vaughan were the players that were out I think. Put Jagielka in goal and you can make a decent starting eleven out of that list…