Tony Pulis would, I am sure, have been delighted to add to the growing pressure on Arsene Wenger by beating Arsenal on Thursday night, but his West Brom side were well beaten on the night and the combative boss was clearly not happy.
He has no reason to want to offer the Frenchman any help and in fact the pair have clashed plenty of times in the past, most notably when Pulis was in charge of our Premier League rivals Stoke City. The two certainly have very different management styles and the football produced by their respective teams is poles apart.
That is why I think it is worth listening to anything positive the West Brom boss has to say about Wenger and it was interesting to read on Sky Sports ahead of Thursday’s game what Pulis thought of the failure of Arsenal’s challenge for the Premier League title this season.
Just as I have written in the past, he reckons that the Gunners and Wenger have had terrible luck on the injury front and he clearly thinks that any club would struggle in the absence of big players like Santi Cazorla, Alexis Sanchez, Jack Wilshere and Danny Welbeck.
He said, “Arsenal can beat any team in Europe on their day. And I think Arsene has been incredibly unlucky with injuries this season. He has missed big players at important times.
“Once all those players are fit, he has got a strong enough squad to win this league. He will be disappointed with the inconsistency but all the other clubs will be saying the same thing, apart from Leicester and Tottenham.”
Is it really a coincidence that the two clubs above us have been blessed with hardly any injury problems? Or that last season’s winners Chelsea were able to name the same starting XI almost every week? Yes there are genuine concerns about Wenger and Arsenal but can we not accept that bad luck has also played a big part in our problems?