The old and very boring ex-Spuds manager Harry Redknapp has given his opinion on whether Arsenal will be challenging for next season’s Premier League or not, but he has made some assumptions which are totally wrong and need to be addressed. He says: “They should be title challengers,”
“Arsenal have got very good players and finished the season very well. The Europa League is obviously a distraction when the league is so wide open. In the last two seasons the title winners haven’t had any European football and that makes a big difference.
“I’m filming A League of Their Own at the moment and Cesc Fabregas was a guest. He said you cannot underestimate how much easier it is when you are not playing European football.
“The Europa League will make it difficult for Arsenal but they will still be strong this season. They’ve added Sead Kolasinac and Alexandre Lacazette, but can they now keep their best players?”
Okay Leicester and Chelsea were not in Europe, but in reality there are very good reasons why Arsenal should be favourites for the title considering that Chelsea, Man City, Man United, Liverpool and Tottenham will ALL have to play Champions League football against the top teams in Europe.
Whereas Arsenal, having to play only second or third tier European clubs, will be quite happy to send over there reserves and youth players for 90% of the Thursday games, perhaps even until we get to the quarter-final stage at least when we may face an occasional quality team. We can rest our first team stars every single week until March probably, and then we will see where our priorities lie shall we?
I think that this is definitely to our advantage, unless Harry thinks that Everton or maybe Leicester (again) will win it simply because they are not playing in Europe?
Give it a break ´’Arry!!!
Sam P