On May 15, 2004 Arsene Wenger became the first manger in 115 years to lead his team through an entire season undefeated in England’s top division.
A golden Premier League trophy was commissioned to commemorate the achievement. 26 wins. 12 draws. 0 defeats. The Invincibles.
In the 12 years since, Arsenal have failed to recapture the league. In truth, they have never mounted a serious title challenge beyond early spring since 2005. Few would have thought their opponents on May 15, 2004 would claim the Premier League title before Arsene Wenger’s men.
On the same day the Gunners achieved an unbeaten season, their opponents Leiecester City were relegated to the Championship. Four years later, the Foxes were relegated again, this time to League One. Now they find themselves 13 points clear of Arsenal at the top of the Premier League.
In 2004/05, Arsenal finished second in the table. Since then, they have finished either third or fourth in every single Premier League season, and look destined to do so again this year.
While most fans would kill for such consistency, there is something deeply unsatisfying about the team’s failure to find that little bit extra to take them to the next level.
Wenger has blamed many things over the last decade, from untimely injuries to the “financial doping” of their rivals. But this season has made the real reason clear – Arsene Wenger sold his soul in exchange for the eternal glory of the ‘Invincibles’ season.
It’s often been said that the move from Highbury sucked the soul out of the club, but maybe it’s the manager’s soul that fans should be worried about.
Arsene Wenger first mooted the possibility of going through a full Premier League season unbeaten, in September 2002, after a 4-1 win over Leeds saw Arsenal set a record of 22 away games undefeated in the English top flight.
The next season, his prediction had come true.
Perhaps it was that day in which he made the deal. The man known for his refusal to spend, paid the ultimate price to achieve greatness. It’s the only explanation for the barren years that followed.
You may think a deal with the Devil would see Arsenal plummet to the second or third tier, with fans being forced to face the ignominy of relegation for just the second time in the club’s history.
But the Devil is much too clever for that. Dropping the Gunners straight down to League One would be too easy. Too obvious. And not nearly cruel enough.
You see, it’s the hope that kills you. The never-ending promise that this year might finally be their year, only to take it all away come Spring.
Like Sisyphus, Wenger rolls the Arsenal rock up the Premier League table only to see it slip back down again to their “natural” home of third or fourth.
#WENGEROUT
Hello 4th place our old friend
Weve come to fight for you again
And at the Emirates
The Sound of Silence— Boris Mellor (@BorisMellor) April 18, 2016
In hindsight, there were warning signs in the immediate aftermath of the Invincibles.
The 2004/05 season saw the Gunners finish second in the league and beat rivals Manchester United in the final of the FA Cup.
But the 2005 FA Cup final will likely go down as the worst in the modern era. Arsenal fans punished for daring to watch their team win another trophy. And it would be the last time they saw it happen for almost a decade.
Even within the league season, United ended Arsenal’s unbeaten run on 49 games in controversial fashion. The half century mark was just out of reach, and how different things could have been.
The next season saw Arsene Wenger’s men make a miraculous run to the Champions League final, only to see Jens Lehmann – who had not conceded in the competition that season – sent off in the opening stages of the game.
Sol Campbell’s 37th-minute header gave Arsenal fans the hope that would later be crushed by Henrik Larsson’s late heroics. Despite consistently navigating their way through the group stages every year since, the North London club have not found much joy in Europe’s top competition.
A semi-final berth in 2009 saw them dismantled at home by Manchester United. In 2011 it looked like Arsene Wenger might actually find a way past Barcelona, before Robin van Persie was shown a second yellow card for kicking the ball immediately after being called offside.
The League Cup offered no respite for Wenger and co. Despite making 10 quarter-finals in a row, they had just two runners-up medals to show for their efforts.
Most famously, Laurent Koscielny and Wojciech Szczensy found a way to somehow lose the 2011 final to a soon-to-be relegated Birmingham side.
Since 2004, Arsene Wenger has either pushed captains out (Patrick Vieira), seen them collapse spectacularly (William Gallas), force a move away to a “bigger” club (Thierry Henry, Cesc Fabregas, Robin van Persie) or done a combination of all three (Thomas Vermaelen).
He has seen title challenges derailed by freak injuries like Eduardo da Silva’s horrific leg fracture in 2008. The Champions League has offered only a series of moral victories, after away goals defeats to AC Milan and Monaco.
A League Cup humiliation at the hands of Sheffield Wednesday in October summed it up perfectly, as Theo Walcott – who had finally begun to show promise as a striker – was injured less than fifteen minutes after replacing the injured Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain.
Some blamed Arsenal’s “cursed” third kit.
This kit is cursed, whilst wearing this kit we lost Walcott, Alexis, koscielny, chamberlain to injury. Lost to Sheffield Wed, now drawing…
— OBJ (@OwenJ_25) November 29, 2015
Two FA Cup wins in a row meant Arsenal fans could believe again, but this season looks to be the biggest disaster to date as Wenger looks set to finish below Tottenham for the first time in his Arsenal tenure, while Leicester City of all teams claim the title, 12 years after Arsenal’s most famous win over them.
Once again, the Devil built Gooners back up just to break them down once more.
It’s either that or football is just a complicated game that left one of its great innovators struggling to keep pace in an increasingly competitive market place.
But that would be too easy.
