The issue with the growth of club groups that owners dare not mention
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By Tony Attwood
It is difficult to get much Arsenal news today aside from tales of Max Dowman (any minute now we expect a detailed interview with a publican who reports that underage Max tried to buy a drink in a pub – it’s the usual sort of thing that crops up. And then one from someone who taught him in primary school, who claims that he/she “always knew” something or other…).
And we already know that Mikel Arteta feels that Max’s arrival inspires everyone who plays with him. All we are waiting for now is Liam Brady to pop up doing interviews comparing his rise to fame with that of Max Dowman’s, and of course, some more repeats of the fact that Max is the youngest ever scorer in the Premier League, which I think we already know, but these journalists need to fill the space…
So the Guardian tells us today that “The 16-year-old, who became the youngest player to appear in the Champions League when facing Slavia Prague during the league stage in November, is likely to be on the bench again for the second leg of their last-16 tie against Bayer Leverkusen,” which I guess we knew anyway.
Martin Ødegaard is still out although Arsenal are hoping for his return for a certain game on Sunday. Still meanwhile the media can fill their space with tales of “the youngest Champions League player and…”. well, you know, because that is what is in all the newspapers and chat sites. Arteta said, “It’s very inspiring when you see someone almost naive making decisions…” He also spoke of the young man’s “flowing and careless playing in that manner”. And I think of course that’s fine – there really isn’t too much more to say. Well, not much until we get the interviews with family members, someone who sat next to him in class and… unproven rumours about this and that, and well, you know. Watch out Max, those reporters saying great things about you today can turn on you like a thing that turns very quickly. One ex-girlfriend telling a tale and your image is shattered.
Indeed we are getting some negative bits already, as fromWayne Rooney, who has just lost the record of the youngest goalscorer, worrying about Max’s ability to do his GCSE coursework and train with the first team at the same time. (Although actually, I remember reading that Wayne Rooney did particularly well at school, so maybe that’s fair advice.)
So we now move onto phase two, where all sorts of people try to get a bit of self-promotion on the back of Max’s success – claims that they personally helped Max find his right position, develop his speed, learn how to swerve – you can make it up as you go, because undoubtedly lots of others will. At leastTemisan Williams was probably right in his claims, and when Max’s father complained immediately agreed not to say another word.
But now we try and set all that aside for tonight’s game against Leverkusen, who had a 1-1 draw with Bayern Munich at the weekend, which was impressive. And next weekend they have an easier task with a match against the bottom club 1. FC Heidenheim, who after 26 league games are already ten points from safety at the foot of the table.
So yes, they need to hold nothing back tonight. Forwith a victory pretty much assured in next weekend’s gam,e Leverkusen can be expected to throw absolutely everything at Arsenal tonight. And then some.
And lest we should still feel tempted to think this is going to be another simple 2-0 victory against a team that hasn’t won anything, we should look back for a moment to 2023/24 when Bayer 04 Leverkusen won the German league. And not just because they won the league but also because of how they won the league. That was their unbeaten season (28 wins and six draws) in which they scored 89 and conceded 24. This makes 2.64 goals a game scored by them and 0.7 goals a game conceded. They were 17 points above VfB Stuttgart who came in second.
So what we have in this game are two teams, each of which has won its league with an unbeaten season. That doesn’t happen often.
Likewise, it doesn’t often happen that we have a player in our squad who spent ten years playing for the opposition, but such is the fate of Kai Havertz. He moved from Leverkusen on to Chelsea for £71m in 2020.
So that leaves just a final look at the possible lineup before we move on to the game tonight…
We had more about Leverkusen in our appropriately titled earlier article: Arsenal v Leverkusen, tuesday at 8pm. How the opposition are doing
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The issue with the growth of club groups that owners dare not mention
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