So, by that measure a mid-table finish for a bottom dweller is a poor season because they didn't win a trophy?
Who had the better season? Arsenal or Man utd?
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So, by that measure a mid-table finish for a bottom dweller is a poor season because they didn't win a trophy?
To me it's embarrassing from Man Utd fans. This is something we laughed at from Bluemoon and RAWK. No one set a season target to win the FA Cup but failed Top 4 and qualification for CL. And we failed terribly at that last season.
FA Cup was nothing more than a bonus. Getting top 4 have been far more important for the Big 4 for so long.
Suddenly, Man Utd won the FA Cup and it's more important. Football is all about winning trophy.
If you asked a RM fan, whether they want a Spanish Cup or qualification of CL, the answer will be obvious and they would think you're crazy even asking that question.
It's all relative, innit? During Klopp's time at Liverpool, Chelsea won about as much as them (Pool won two League Cups, but Chelsea won the EL). I'd wager most would agree that Liverpool had a much better 9 season run than Chelsea, despite the similar trophy hauls.
Looking at a season in isolation, though, winning a trophy is obviously better than not winning one. So it boils down to how much importance you put on the wider context, I guess.
Looking at a season in isolation, though, winning a trophy is obviously better than not winning one. So it boils down to how much importance you put on the wider context, I guess.
That's not remotely what he said.
Viewing CL qualification as some kind of trophy is something we used to laugh at Arsenal fans for doing. Now we have United-supporters claiming qualifying CL is not only as good as winning a trophy, it's actually better. And thinking otherwise is now embarassing. Well well well, how the turn tables.
It's not just CL qualification though, is it? Being in an actual title race until the final day, even if they ultimately fell short, has to count for something when you're discussing how good a season was.
I will give you if we won FA Cup and finish 4th and qualify for CL. Not finished 8th and broken all embarrassing records and qualify for EL. In addition, we were able to laugh at Arsenal because we were winning much bigger things then. Nowadays, qualification for CL means more money to help your team progress.
This is the only forum for big clubs that can claim a complete disaster of a season finishing 8th to be better than a team that just went toe to toe with the "best team in the world".
You know that Arsene Wenger won the FA Cup 3 out of 4 years in the ‘10s? I don’t remember that doing much for Arsenal’s reputation and his own legacy at the end of his career there. I also think most people remember Liverpool’s second place finishes to City in their title races when they reached 90+ points more than the cup winners those years.
Well played sir. Any obvious flip floppers I wonder?
Arsenal, no question. they came close, pushed city till the final day. their team is progressing very fast unlike us.
I just had a look at that thread, and you're correct. However, four years later, it is Arsenal, not Chelsea that are challenging for the PL (tbf, Chelsea won CL the next year).
Interesting...
good spot.Isn't it? The whole thread implies that. Which makes me me consider that in effect every team that did not win a trophy has a worse season than the ones that did. I think the team that had the best season in the top 10 has to be Villa. That was the biggest bump for them and CL place to boot. All the clubs in the top 4 had a decent season, in that they all move up their point total. Spurs and Chelsea did okish, but of all the teams Newcastle and Man Utd had the worst of it, mind you they also had injury issues to get through. Both had a step or two backwards there, regardless what they did in their Cup runs.
It’s cute that points totals are now seen as important because no one can beat City to the title over the course of a season.
Arsenal no doubt. If we continue playing like we played this season, we'll end up in the bottom half of the table next season while Arsenal may end up champions.
Arsenal and it’s not even a doubt
Yep, that novel idea of considering the amount of points accumulated as important when assessing a season.
New-fangled, hipster nonsense.
Before you know it, we’ll be discussing irrelevancies like league position, which (if any) European competition teams qualified for and generally how well they played during the games we paid to watch.
Clearly Arsenal. Building momentum, growing an actual side and club. Versus a team with no style of play, club in disaray with a cup win.
I'd much rather be in Arsenal's spot than in ours.
I'd much rather be in Arsenal's spot than in ours.
Arsenal have had the better season but we have been had more success in terms of silverware (again).
Yes they have champs league qualification but have f*ck all chance of winning it.
They'll be a new beast if they sign someone like Osimhen.
Yes they have champs league qualification but have f*ck all chance of winning it.
They'll be a new beast if they sign someone like Osimhen.
Yup, their respective trajectories have been very interesting and surprising, although in Chelsea's case they had the change of ownership which played a huge part
More gaslighting I see.
You either win the league or you don’t. You either qualify for Europe or you don’t. You either win silverware or you don’t.
I don’t really care if you do it with 60 points or 96 and neither did anyone else until a few seasons ago.
Now you have teams complaining that if they’d have got X amount of points a few years ago they’d have won the league. Or that it was much easier to win the league a decade ago and using points totals to try and explain it away. Ultimately it’s not all that complicated and you’re either successful or you’re not.
From the thread when Chelsea finished 4th, barely but we won the FA cup and finished 8th.
I didn't even go through the whole thread, just the first half of the first page.....wonder what's changed? In my personal opinion if a season is a blip like Klopp when he'd finished 6th an FA feels nice, as a consolation. But when your team is breaking records being poor, its not worth anything. I felt the same when we won those meaningless FA cups last 10 years and the club was a train wreck season after season.
That's not how it's done.
If the same posters changes their opinion on who had better season then quote that. Not bunch of posters who all said chelsea.
I am generally commenting on what the general 'mood' then was to what it is now. I suspect its because its Arsenal. Had this been any other team (and Liverpool) this thread would have had a very different tone. Probably can say the same thing the other way around too I suspect.
We won an FA cup against our bitter rivals and against all odds. It also stopped them doing a double record.
Context is key.
I wouldn’t swap it with your season.
To be fair I read a lot about how City's records don't matter, more than the City fanbase its United supporters constantly telling everyone why they 'support' City over any other team who tries to get close to a title, so why would this double record matter? It'd be just as meaningless?
On a serious note, for me, I have already seen us win 3 out or 4, beating City and Chelsea in one of them but being miserable the other 10 months so I feel different. Personally its a subjective decision and I suspect another season like the one you've had, an FA cup would not be (and shouldn't be) enough for a club the size of United.
Gaslighting? What are you on about?
When INEOS carries out their end of season review, do you think discussion of the league campaign consists of a single yes/no question? Or might analysis of the 38-games season be far more in-depth than that?
Do you think Aston Villa are going to sack Unai Emery because he failed to win the league? Or will they be thrilled with how the team has progressed and their qualification for the highest level of European competition?
Are the Kroenke’s offering Arteta a new contract because he won silverware in the form of the Charity Shield? Or are they more interested in the fact that we challenged for the most important competitions?
If you prefer United’s season, that’s fine. It’s completely valid. If you offered Spurs, Newcastle or Brighton a domestic cup with an 8th place finish, they’d bite your hands off because they’re mired in long trophy droughts.
But if you offered that to City, Liverpool, Madrid, Barca, Atletico, Juventus, PSG, Bayern, Dortmund… basically any team that expects to be in with a shout for major honours - they’d laugh in your face.
After successive title challenges, Arsenal (both the fans and club itself) feel they are in the second group. Hell, even West Ham think they’re in that group, too - hence firing Moyes less than a season after he brought them their first silverware in decades.
I personally put United in the second group as well. That ain’t gaslighting, that’s just me thinking that United fans would be less happy with their season than Arsenal fans are with theirs.
Seeing as Gooners are generally disappointed yet proud of their team, that would mean United fans would have to be fairly chuffed with how things went down across the season. I find that hard to believe, but I suppose it’s possible.
Either way, such a binary view of success is constantly presented as how you “uphold standards” in this thread. But as an outsider, it just looks like glaring proof that expectations have been successfully lowered.
Arsenal easily had a better season overall. They tallied 89 points, which is 8 more than Mourinho's respectable second place in 2017/2018. If you think Leicester won the league with 81, it puts Arsenal's effort into context.
United won a trophy and showed they're a good domestic cup team. Generally speaking, United played pretty well in big games this season. There's no way that Arsenal should have taken 6 points from the two fixtures they had against United, which was more down to some outrageous home-refereeing decisions at the Emirates, like the Gabriel, 'he's been strong there!' foul on Hojlund, the clear foul in the run up to Rice's goal, and the gnat's whisker offside call. The other game was a strange one, neither side really deserved to win.
But over the course of the 38 games, Arsenal did well and pushed City very hard, and they do deserve credit for that. But just going back to that last game of the season, how on earth Gabriel Jesus does not get punished for handball is beyond me. Those kind of decisions went against United all season.
United won a trophy and showed they're a good domestic cup team. Generally speaking, United played pretty well in big games this season. There's no way that Arsenal should have taken 6 points from the two fixtures they had against United, which was more down to some outrageous home-refereeing decisions at the Emirates, like the Gabriel, 'he's been strong there!' foul on Hojlund, the clear foul in the run up to Rice's goal, and the gnat's whisker offside call. The other game was a strange one, neither side really deserved to win.
But over the course of the 38 games, Arsenal did well and pushed City very hard, and they do deserve credit for that. But just going back to that last game of the season, how on earth Gabriel Jesus does not get punished for handball is beyond me. Those kind of decisions went against United all season.
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You’re confusing some posts you read here with our match going and local fanbase. Unsure why you’re asking me about records. I’ve already said my thoughts.
Again context matters. Another FA cup v Palace and I may feel differently. This wasn’t though.
Yes look up gaslighting. Perhaps you don’t realise you’re doing it.
Again I’ve said my thoughts. I wouldn’t swap seasons with you due to the context of the FA cup and what it meant to the fans.
Fair enough.
The problem here is you’re taking this thread seriously and not appreciating it for what it is, trolling Arsenal fans.
I know the definition of gaslighting. It’s not disagreeing with somebody about the relative success of respective teams in season of football.
(Funnily enough, “Perhaps you don’t realise you’re doing it”, is perhaps the most gaslighty sentence in this entire thread.)
And I completely understand not wanting to swap seasons due to context of the FA Cup win. As I’ve just said, it’s totally valid and understandable.
I just think it’s intriguing that positive context is considered for United’s season (beat Liverpool and City to win a trophy and prevented a City double) but negative context is ignored (it was literally United’s worst league campaign since the PL began).
Whereas for Arsenal’s season, there isn’t even the pretence of considering the context. Funny that.
I think expectations have fallen so low that quite a few ain’t trolling. That may be ETH’s greatest achievement.
From what perspective do you want to look at it from? If you're Arteta and his coaches, you can take heart that you pushed City all the way and are in good shape for next season, but you ultimately won feck all and did nothing in the cups.
If you're Ten Hag and his coaches, what do they take from the season other than they may have saved their jobs with the final roll of the dice, and it's a big may still.
If you're Arsenal fan, do you take satisfaction from good football, gradual progression but ultimately nothing to show for it?
If you're a United fan, do you take a putrid season like that if it gets capped off with a wonderful moment like last week?
I think I'd take United's season. There's nothing like winning a trophy as a fan. I don't really remember 05/06 United inching towards Chelsea, I remember 06/07 and finally overtaking them.
If you're Ten Hag and his coaches, what do they take from the season other than they may have saved their jobs with the final roll of the dice, and it's a big may still.
If you're Arsenal fan, do you take satisfaction from good football, gradual progression but ultimately nothing to show for it?
If you're a United fan, do you take a putrid season like that if it gets capped off with a wonderful moment like last week?
I think I'd take United's season. There's nothing like winning a trophy as a fan. I don't really remember 05/06 United inching towards Chelsea, I remember 06/07 and finally overtaking them.
I disagree. Even if you think winning a trophy automatically means you've had a better season than everyone who didn't, you can still evaluate the performance of other teams relative to size and expectations. You'd have to ask him, but I doubt @TheReligion thinks Villa had a poor season.
As I said initially, I think it's relative. @Yakuza_devils was specifically making the point the CL qualification weighed heavier than a trophy, and I pointed out that not that long ago we used to make fun of Arsenal fans for doing just that.
I'm not going to lie and say I wouldn't rather us be in Arsenal's position than our current one. In a wider context, they're clearly having a better time of it, and have more reason than us to be excited about next season. In that sense, they've had a better season than us. Still, I wouldn't trade our season for Arsenal's, if that makes sense.
I'm going to have to disagree. A trophy is better than CL qualification every time. Qualifying for the CL means next to nothing if you're not in a position to make something of it, so I'd rather have my team finish 8th and win an FA Cup than finish 4th and win nothing, and have no real hope of doing anything of note in the following CL campaign.
Very weird that Redcafe seems biased in favor of United. Elon Musk should look into this with his space laser network.
In Spain the Copa del Rey its like a consolation prize, it's nice to win it but nothing to write home about it. The only time I really enjoyed winning a Copa del Rey as if it was something huge was when we won against Barcelona back on Mourinho's first season. It was more about being able to win a title against that Barcelona side but we also came in 2nd in La Liga and made it semifinals in the UCL after several season of not going through last 16 teams. So we didn't win anything major that season but the improvement was tangible so it was nice beating them on a final. The following season we were able to win the League and made it also into the semfinals in the UCL.
I can understand Manchester United fans being proud of winning this cup after eliminating their rivals on the process and in a final, it's a nice feeling but everything else has been dreadful. The negative goal difference, the points tally, not getting through a piss easy group, etc.
True, but the top 4 trophy thing for Arsenal came about after Wenger initially making the claim during the 2011/12 season. A lot of the laughter was from the perspective of us still winning things regularly at the time, including the league. It was easy to laugh from where were, and both teams were qualifying for the CL year after year.
They'd won nothing for almost 7 seasons at the time he said it, but had always qualified for the CL without fail. They weren't challenging for the title strongly with their string of 3rd and 4th place finishes and were looking stale with nothing to show for it.
It was seen as a lack of ambition to take that next step and win something, or excuses for failing to do so. CL qualification seemed almost inevitable for them already as they'd finished top 4 for 15 years in a row by then.
Very different circumstances now with both clubs failing to qualify quite a lot recently, and Arsenal doing better than the distant 3rd or 4th they were often getting back then for the past 2 seasons. They've been genuine title challengers.
I'd disagree with those saying preferring the FA Cup is embarrassing.
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Context and timing is everything.
My best friend is a die hard Arsenal supporter. T-shirts, socks, shoes, jacket, tea cups and one of the ugliest bedrooms you will ever see with the Gunners colors all over it. Even his daughter is dressed like a clown but he’s 63 years old and has a cancer diagnosis in his liver so I forgive him even if I want to throw up watching these ugly colors every time I visit him.
Almost the whole season he has dancing around his office on my expense.
Every Monday I had to hide behind my Espresso and pretend I don’t care after another disappointing weekend. The icing of the cake was when he and his oldest son went to Old Trafford a weekend and saw that ugly team win against us ….again. Two straight losses against such a woke team with zero charm. You can imagine what I had to look forward to the next couple of months….
With mixed emotions I saw City win the league but I prefer a party at the wrong side of Manchester than seeing Lego Pep strutting around with his ugly smile. Not to mention my friend.
I fully expected us to lose at Wembley. I wasn’t even nervous so even if they crushed us it was ok for me.
It’s hard to describe but on those 90+ minutes our season changed from a disaster to something memorable. When I after the game saw my friend again our mental state of mind was totally reversed.
He ended the season disappointed and I can take on the summer with a smile all over my face. We deserved to win against Pep. I saw glimpses of the future and with the right signings I look forward to next season. Garnacho. Mainoo. Amad. Hojlund. Maybe even Ten Hag. That’s what this win did to me.
So to finalize my thoughts.
Arsenal was the better team and their season was much better until the last day but in the end I was the one who had the last laugh. A FA cup win is much more joyful then a disappointing second place after so much hopes.
No one is ignoring the negative context for United. It’s been a tough season for a number of different reasons.
For Arsenal? Well they come up short again. I imagine it’s been quite a frustrating season especially when you look back at some of the awful dropped points at home to the likes of West Ham. Unless we are still pretending Arsenal have no right being in a title race and are punching above their weight?