It’s official: Cesc Fabregas’s return home has been postponed and he will play for Arsenal in the 2010-11 season.
Arsenal fans, excited with the news, seem to expect Cesc to lead their team to the Premier League title. Arsène Wenger himself has kind of issued the title challenge to Fabregas.
But can Cesc actually lead Arsenal to glory? Is it realistic to expect that from the 23-year-old midfielder?
Absolutely not. Leading Arsenal to the Premier League title is a near-impossible mission. Not even Lionel Messi, the undisputed best player in the world, could achieve such task.
A realistic analysis shows us that there’s no way Arsenal can compete with Chelsea and Manchester United (not to mention Manchester City).
At the goalkeeping position, Almunia is no match for Edwin Van der Sar and Petr Cech (and also Pepe Reina).
As far as defense is concerned, United and Chelsea have two of the best centre-back duos in the world (Rio Ferdinand/Nemanja Vidic and John Terry/Ricardo Carvalho respectively) and two of the best left-backs in the world (Patrice Evra and Ashley Cole). Again, Arsenal comes up short.
The midfield is Arsenal’s strongest sector. With Andrei Arshavin, Fabregas, and Samir Nasri, among others, one can say that Arsenal has a world-class midfield. However, Chelsea’s and United’s midfields are at least as strong as Arsenal’s. It can even be argued that Chelsea’s and United’s are better.
Arsenal fans seem to think Fabregas is somehow the best player in England (since they expect him to lead the club to the Premier League title on his own). But the truth is he’s not even the best midfielder: Chelsea’s Frank Lampard scores and assists much more often than Fabregas.
The striker position is where Arsenal struggles the most. Marouane Chamakh, Nicklas Bendtner, and Robin Van Persie are all decent strikers but are simply no match to the likes of Wayne Rooney, Didier Drogba, Fernando Torres, Carlos Tevez, and Nicolas Anelka.
On paper, there’s simply no way Arsenal can win the Premier League. A Top 4 spot seems to be a much more realistic objective.
Last season, Arsenal lost (pretty badly) everytime it faced a top team; four losses against Manchester United and Chelsea in the Premier League and an embarrassing defeat at the hands of Barcelona in the Champions League. Suddenly Chamakh comes and Arsenal becomes a contender?
No, it would take much more than that. Wenger keeps insisting on his disastrous and fruitless youth policy. One would think that five trophy-less seasons in a row would be enough for Wenger to understand the failure of his policy and start investing in order to strengthen the squad. But no. Quite surprisingly, Wenger keeps faithful to a policy that has brought Arsenal nothing other than utter failure.
But that’s not all.
Things at the Emirates hit a new low as Arsenal’s captain is a 23-year-old player who professed his love for another club (curiously a club which many Arsenal fans hate). The most baffling part is that the player in question is the fans’ hero and is expected to lead the club to glory.
Am I the only one who thinks that this situation is just plain ludicrous?
Arsenal are facing a deep crisis and changes have to be made before they can even dream of winning a major trophy.
Arsenal fans will just have to accept the evidence: Arsenal will not win the 2010-11 Premier League.
