Pool/Arse: Who had the better season?

Pepe LeFrits

I noticed there that the folks on RAWK seem to agree that Liverpool had a better season than Arsenal. I was a little surprised by this; the Arsenal fans I know (myself included) think the reverse. So which is it, and why?

mike65

Score draw.

Liverpool better in CL Arsenal better in League.

Mike.

herbieflowers

Everyone wrote off Arsenal befoe the start of the season, especially after their lack of transfer activity and selling their best player. No-one could've predicted that they'd mount any sort of a title challenge.

As for Liverpool - signing of Torres has improved them immensely, but for me it was same old story: good CL run and decent in the league but still lacking somewhat. But they're getting there.

Creamy Goodness

i think liverpool as well considering the form for the last few years, they make a huge leap in form this year. they were actually able to win against some teams in the league

arsenal did very well this season considering the squad, i knew they would do well and it was only a crushing defeat to man utd that knocked the wind out of their sails. i expect them to better themselves next season.

Pepe LeFrits

aah, headrush.

I neglected to add that 'equal' option, as did I neglect to make the poll answers public. Perhaps a mod can oblige?

Shaque attack

I would have thought there was very little between the two tbh.
I mean we both won nothing, we'll both have to go through the qualifiers, liverpool got further in the cl and arsenal finished one place higher in the pl.

hard to say yet with all the transfers to come but i would say that liverpool look to be building a slightly better team than arsenal to challenge for the title. But alot of that depends on what happens over the rest of the summer really.

Chardee MacDennis

Shaque attack wrote: »

I would have thought there was very little between the two tbh.
I mean we both won nothing, we'll both have to go through the qualifiers, liverpool got further in the cl and arsenal finished one place higher in the pl.

hard to say yet with all the transfers to come but i would say that liverpool look to be building a slightly better team than arsenal to challenge for the title. But alot of that depends on what happens over the rest of the summer really.

+1

jesus_thats_gre

Shaque attack wrote: »

I would have thought there was very little between the two tbh.
I mean we both won nothing, we'll both have to go through the qualifiers, liverpool got further in the cl and arsenal finished one place higher in the pl.

hard to say yet with all the transfers to come but i would say that liverpool look to be building a slightly better team than arsenal to challenge for the title. But alot of that depends on what happens over the rest of the summer really.

+2

voted arsenal

DSB

Arsenal by far. Better league finish, only one round behind Liverpool in the Champions League. Knocked out of the FA Cup by a good side. Haven't spent half the money Liverpool have (probably an exageration).

herbieflowers

I think in terms of expectations prior to the start of the season, Arsenal come out on top.

Loomis

Arsenal tbh imho

_blank_

herbieflowers wrote: »

I think in terms of expectations prior to the start of the season, Arsenal come out on top.

True, Liverpool fans were expecting a realistic title challenge.

Vokes

Arsenal have had the much better season by far. A number of people in the media and on boards (see Predictions thread) thought there was a good chance Arsenal would drop out of the CL spots into 5th, considering Henry's exit, etc..

Liverpool have underperformed. Really thought the team could make a go of nailing 2nd spot. The League is everything.

herbieflowers

I don't think they've underperformed, I just think there squad isn't up to a title / CL challenge yet. They've improved in terms of beating those rubbishy little clubs with their second string though, they're on the right road as long as Rafa stays at the helm.

Radharc na Sleibhte

Arsenal, no doubt.
They progressed, Liverpool arguably haven't. They've finished one place lower in the league than last season, and one stage sooner in the CL. They weren't even close to the title run in.

Arsenal had a better season.

tomred1

Personnely Liverpool have gone backwards considering that Torres scored the goals but it didnt improve there league postion.
Arsenal had a better season as they did improve on last season and were great up until Feb.

delija_sever029

well by succes draw,Liverpool better in CL,Arsenal in league but Arsenal made more progress as a team in this season

Mr.Nice Guy

Arsenal by far. They were only beaten by Liverpool in the CL due to some shocking refereeing decisions. They also spent less than Liverpool last summer.

Galvasean

Arsenal for me considering they did better than they did last season and Liverpool did slightly worse overall (than they did last season).

Keano

Arsenal as they have a team capable of winning the league. Liverpool need to make their presence felt in England for a change!

Unearthly

Arsenal considering that a few people were predicting doom for them and Liverpool to win the league. I think it's more impressive to finish higher in the league than CL to

jesus_thats_gre

Arsenal defo had a better season than Liverpool but not overly so to be honest. They pip it for me simply because they managed to stay in contention until the last quarter of the season until they literally capitulated and play better football than Liverpool.

Saying that, and think this makes for an interesting point considering there is an argument that little seperates the two other than Arsenal ****ing up at the end of the season apparently meaning more while Liverpool ****ed up in the 2nd quarter, both Liverpool and Arsenal drew against:

1. Blackburn away from home
2. Portsmouth away from home
3. Birmingham at home
4. Birmingham away from home
5. Aston Villa at home
6. Wigan - Liverpool at home and Arsenal away
7. Against each other home and away

The list of team that both clubs drew against is quite surprising. 8 out of the 11 teams that Arsenal drew against were draws for Liverpool as well. 7 of them were the exact same fixture except for Wigan.

If anything, the fact that there is such an overlap in both clubs drawing the exact same fixtures and really did **** up against the exact same opposition in the exact same fixtures does somewhat prove that there wasn't that much to seperate them this season. Liverpool just ****ed up 3 extra times (lost 1 more and drew 2 more).

jesus_thats_gre

tomred1 wrote: »

Personnely Liverpool have gone backwards considering that Torres scored the goals but it didnt improve there league postion.
Arsenal had a better season as they did improve on last season and were great up until Feb.

Liverpool didn't actually got backwards. Arsenal just took a large leap forwards.

Liverpool 2006/2007 season:

W: 20
8
L: 10

F: 57
A: 27
GD: +30

PTS: 68

Liverpool 2007/2008 season with 1 game to go:

W: 20
13
L: 4

F: 65
A: 26
GD: +39

PTS: 73

As you can clearly see, we didn't take a step backwards. This season, while still a disappointment, was a small step forward with some major quality additions to the squad.

For the summer, the addition of 3 or 4 more quality players should bring us up to close to 80 points or so - I would hope anyway. Gladly, we don't seem to have the threat of any first team players leaving or being rumoured to leave so we can just concentrate on improving.

It is going to be interesting with Arsenal. The team they have extremely stong but instead of being able to concentrate on adding to the squad, they have the additional headache of replacing first team players that were instrumental for them throughout the whole season. Rumours also doing the rounds that they aren't gonna have much money to spend (25 million apparently).

jesus_thats_gre

jesus_thats_gre wrote: »

Liverpool 2007/2008 season with 1 game to go:

W: 20
13
L: 4

F: 65
A: 26
GD: +39

PTS: 73

Just thinking about this. Reducing 1 or 2 of those draws into wins and convert 5 or 6 of those draws into wins would defo be the goal for this coming year.

romperstomper

whats the difference? both nowhere in the end. the fact that arsenal were contenders for a while shades it for me, but honesly if you are a manu fan you must look at this thread and think 'losers'. who cares? 3rd & 4th both have to start early next season for qualifying for the CL. Liverpool increased the quality of their squad but still need to get better quality players (the THOUGHTS of dirk kuyt starting a second CL final in a row sends shivers down my spine. is rafa on drugs?). while arsenal's first 11 is strong, the squad is pure crap (sendeross wouldn't make the wigan 22). whereas united & chelsea can replace strong players with strong players.

LuckyLloyd

lol. There isn't too much between the two. And who really cares anyway? No trophies / looking like a trophy was a distinct possibility at one stage of the season / champions league qualification for both. Ho hum.

ROCKMAN

Quiet frankly Liverpool

LIVERPOOL had the better season,

4th spot in the league , where a lot of people expected them, so no great failure.(only liverpool fans expected anything else)
CL semi 's no great surprised there really.

ARSENAL on the other hand 3rd in the league would be seen as a massive failure . Arsenal management, players and fans along with other club's fans expect them to be title contenders every year , and rightly so , just look at their record. Over the last 15-20 years.
CL Q's final Another let down and a step backwards (previous year ) so again would be seen as a failure .

vorbis

eh what!!

NOONE expected Arsenal to be title challengers this season. That they were even in the title race was a big improvement over last season! The fact is that Chelsea and Utd and in a league of their own when it comes to money for transfers. I'm hopeful that that additional money from the new stadium will start to come through soon. Still it was undoubtedly a better year for Arsenal.

Liverpool were very lucky to beat us in the CL and went out in the following round. The fact that we challenged for the title is decisive imo.

yahoo_moe

I'd say Arsenal quite comfortably as well.

I'm an Arsenal fan but Liverpool's title challenge didn't sustain itself long enough to be realistic from August till March the way Arsenal's did and I think there was so little between them in the CL that the extra round counts for very little.

As an Arsenal fan, I'm almost happy to be disappointed with a season that's exceeded my expectations

ROCKMAN

vorbis wrote: »

eh what!!

NOONE expected Arsenal to be title challengers this season. That they were even in the title race was a big improvement over last season! The fact is that Chelsea and Utd and in a league of their own when it comes to money for transfers. I'm hopeful that that additional money from the new stadium will start to come through soon. Still it was undoubtedly a better year for Arsenal.
Liverpool were very lucky to beat us in the CL and went out in the following round. The fact that we challenged for the title is decisive imo.

Read my post again , Im agreeing with you in a weird way ,I am saying that your club has set such high standards for yourselves over the years that a so-so season for Arsenal compared to a so-so season for Liverpool has to be seen as a BIGGER FAILURE, .


Ps I always include Arsenal in the title picture(pre-season )

Lex Luthor

jesus_thats_gre wrote: »

Just thinking about this. Reducing 1 or 2 of those draws into wins and convert 5 or 6 of those draws into wins would defo be the goal for this coming year.

I would prefer to see Liverpool convert a few of their losses against the top 3 into wins at home and a few draws away

At least getting maybe 10-12pts from the 18 available against them.

Fuzzy_Dunlop

I'd say Arsenal did based solely on the fact that they managed to sustain a title challenge for much of the season and far exceeded all the doom and gloom predictions everyone made at the start of the season. Much of a muchness though since neither won anything.

romperstomper wrote: »

(sendeross wouldn't make the wigan 22).

Sorry but this is just starting to annoy me a bit,
While i agree that he isn't cut out to be playing for the Arsenal first team, especially against the big teams and players. People really have been far too insulting of Senderos just because of the liverpool CL game, which was a disaster granted but doesn't reflect on the solid performances he put in while Kolo was away at the ANC. Not to mention being part of the defence which holds the record in the CL for the longest time not conceding a goal and the Swiss defence that conceded the least amount of goals at the last world cup(in fact the only goals conceded were from a penalty shoot out).

IMO he is a very good defender who's let down by his liability to sometimes make stupid mistakes and more importantly his very brittle mentality which doesnt allow him to recover quickly from these errors.

CivilServant

herbieflowers wrote: »

Everyone wrote off Arsenal befoe the start of the season, especially after their lack of transfer activity and selling their best player. No-one could've predicted that they'd mount any sort of a title challenge.

As for Liverpool - signing of Torres has improved them immensely, but for me it was same old story: good CL run and decent in the league but still lacking somewhat. But they're getting there.

Liverpool have gone backward. In previous seasons we managed 4th and latter stages of the CL, this year we managed the same but with a world class striker. Take that world class striker away and what are you left with, a bunch of talentless no hopers and Gerrard.

Arsenal had the better season and could easily have won the premiership.

We are not getting there, not by a long shot. We've been trying to get there for the past 15 or so years since the inception of the Premiership, never once really challenging for the title. We need a massive shakeup and hopefully this season will get it, by sacking Rafa and bringing in someone like Mourinho who knows how to get results.

redzerdrog

not much in it but i voted for arsenal

liverpool fan btw

LuckyCharms

Arsenal defo had the better season, they just sold Henry, people had no expectations while pool spent heavily and had acquired torres and they were expected to be contenders.

Arsenal contended for the title but fell away due to squad depth and the cl games between them coulda gone either way.Even tho pool got further in cl , they didnt go far enough to suggest they had a better season then Arsenal

mike65

CivilServant wrote: »

Take that world class striker away and what are you left with, a bunch of talentless no hopers and Gerrard.

Yeah right. :rolleyes: (<- WFT is that?)

Mike.

Dont be at yourself

Second place is first loser. I don't think either sets of fans would be happy with their seasons.

As a Liverpool fan, I was happy with the impact of Torres, our CL run and the effectiveness of our 4-2-3-1. I was disappointed with our league results against Man Yoo/Chelsea/Arsenal, the off the pitch nonsense and our failure to sustain early momentum.

Xavi6

In simple terms for me, Arsenal lost a superstar (Henry) and Liverpool gained one (Torres) so the expectation for Arsenal to perform wasn't there considering they lost their talisman. Based on what they did without him, Arsenal had a better year.

Mr Alan

CivilServant wrote: »

Liverpool have gone backward.

Are you just making stuff up to annoy me this early in the morning?

jesus_thats_gre wrote: »

Liverpool 2006/2007 season:

W: 20
8
L: 10

F: 57
A: 27
GD: +30

PTS: 68

Liverpool 2007/2008 season with 1 game to go:

W: 20
13
L: 4

F: 65
A: 26
GD: +39

PTS: 73

kida

Progress is measured relative to the teams around you, given that Liverpool have digressed since last season regardless of how their own points has gone up/down.
Guaranteed that if Pool had finished second on less points than last season they would be claiming progress.

Key Points
4th vs 3rd
Cl Semi vs Final
Missing Link from last season signed and worked out -> implies rest of team underperformed

Mr Alan

thanks for clearing up what entails making progress.

i guess your right we are a worse team than this time last year.

apologies.

jesus_thats_gre

kida wrote: »

Progress is measured relative to the teams around you, given that Liverpool have digressed since last season regardless of how their own points has gone up/down.
Guaranteed that if Pool had finished second on less points than last season they would be claiming progress.

Key Points
4th vs 3rd
Cl Semi vs Final
Missing Link from last season signed and worked out -> implies rest of team underperformed

Perception is an amazing thing


End of season 2006/2007:

	Team:		Points:
1st	Man United	89
2nd	Chelsea		83
3rd	Liverpool	68
4th	Arsenal		68

End of season 2007/2008:

	Team:		Points:
1st	Man United	84
2nd	Chelsea		84
3rd	Arsenal		80
4th	Liverpool	73

There have been multiple statements that Liverpool have taken a step backward this season but every single one of them can be dismissed by the use of the simplest of facts - the league table.

jesus_thats_gre

CivilServant wrote: »

Liverpool have gone backward. In previous seasons we managed 4th and latter stages of the CL, this year we managed the same but with a world class striker. Take that world class striker away and what are you left with, a bunch of talentless no hopers and Gerrard.

Torres and Gerard scored the same percentage of Liverpool's goals as Fabregas and Adebayor did for Arsenal and less than Tevez and Ronaldo did for United.

Chelsea are the only team of the top 4 that are not over dependent on 2 or 3 players for an extremely large percentage of their goals.

CivilServant wrote: »

Arsenal had the better season and could easily have won the premiership.

They looked like they could have won the PL but in reality, 80% of the fixtures that they drew, Liverpool drew the exact same ones. The only difference being that Liverpool played those fixtures early on the season whereas Arsenal played those fixtures in the final 1/4 of the season.

I know it is an inconvenient fact and it is easier to ignore..

CivilServant wrote: »

We are not getting there, not by a long shot. We've been trying to get there for the past 15 or so years since the inception of the Premiership, never once really challenging for the title. We need a massive shakeup and hopefully this season will get it, by sacking Rafa and bringing in someone like Mourinho who knows how to get results.

Complete and utter nonsense.

Mr.Nice Guy

jesus_thats_gre wrote: »

Perception is an amazing thing


End of season 2006/2007:

	Team:		Points:
1st	Man United	89
2nd	Chelsea		83
3rd	Liverpool	68
4th	Arsenal		68

End of season 2007/2008:

	Team:		Points:
1st	Man United	84
2nd	Chelsea		84
3rd	Arsenal		80
4th	Liverpool	73

There have been multiple statements that Liverpool have taken a step backward this season but every single one of them can be dismissed by the use of the simplest of facts - the league table.

The league tables you highlight show Liverpool finishing third last season and about to finish fourth this season.

Surely that suggests they have taken a step backwards?

The fact they have more points is irrelevant since the league has been more competitive this season.

kida wrote:

Progress is measured relative to the teams around you

Bingo.

event

jesus_thats_gre wrote: »

Perception is an amazing thing


End of season 2006/2007:

	Team:		Points:
1st	Man United	89
2nd	Chelsea		83
3rd	Liverpool	68
4th	Arsenal		68

End of season 2007/2008:

	Team:		Points:
1st	Man United	84
2nd	Chelsea		84
3rd	Arsenal		80
4th	Liverpool	73

There have been multiple statements that Liverpool have taken a step backward this season but every single one of them can be dismissed by the use of the simplest of facts - the league table.

i dont get what you're trying to say there

i know you will point to points totals, but i would be more inclined to look at league position.

last year ye finished 3rd and got to the final of the champions league.

this year ye will finish 4th and got to the semi finals of the champions league

i can see what pool fans mean, in that i think they play better football now, but at the end of the day you can mention points tallys and how many more losses ye had last year, but you finished in a higher position last year.

CivilServant

jesus_thats_gre wrote: »

Complete and utter nonsense.

This is completely what I expected to hear from pool fans. To put the argument down to waffle and to blindside me with facts and figures.

Who of the top so called 4 teams have not won the premiership... ever? Is that progress to you? Squabbling about third or fourth and making it sound like a worthwhile endeavour is quite sad overall, yet this is the reality the fans have had to put up with year after year. Pretty soon fans won't be able to sleep at night with the thought of Man Utd closing in on their 17th title and 18th title judging by many comments on another thread.

Fact is the club needs a major change to get from 3rd/4th to 1st and that's a change in mentality from the fans, the manager, all the staff at Liverpool. It seems like we may get something this year if Parry leaves, a new manager is brought in and a lot of new players.

Mr.Nice Guy

I'm not so sure that Liverpool have necessarily 'gone backwards' but they certainly haven't made any progress from what I can see. I think that's their main problem. Last season there was little between them and Arsenal yet Arsenal have made big strides this season and at one stage looked to be in with a serious chance of winning the league.

United, Chelsea and Arsenal improved while Liverpool had to battle with Everton for fourth spot. I'm surprised Liverpool fans are willing to settle for that to be honest and I think Benitez will continue to prioritise the CL over the Premiership.

_blank_

Clearly, if Liverpool had a good season finishing a place lower than they did last season, then Arsenal's improvement of one place in the league is an absolute disaster for them.

Wenger OUT!

Prufrock

Arsenal had a better season. No question.

dceire

Arsenal because they've progressed more than Liverpool have from last season & actually looked like they would put up a good title challenge this season but just ran out of steam at the end and were unlucky as well.

If you look at the manner in which they lost against Chelsea, Man Utd and in particular Liverpool in the champions league, they can feel a little unlucky!

jesus_thats_gre

Mr.Nice Guy wrote: »

The league tables you highlight show Liverpool finishing third last season and about to finish fourth this season.

Surely that suggests they have taken a step backwards?

The fact they have more points is irrelevant since the league has been more competitive this season.



Bingo.

event wrote: »

i dont get what you're trying to say there

i know you will point to points totals, but i would be more inclined to look at league position.

last year ye finished 3rd and got to the final of the champions league.

this year ye will finish 4th and got to the semi finals of the champions league

i can see what pool fans mean, in that i think they play better football now, but at the end of the day you can mention points tallys and how many more losses ye had last year, but you finished in a higher position last year.

My point is that Liverpool did not take a step back. Arsenal just took a massive step forward.