by Unknown
Ah, the Invincibles. We’ll never forget them, will we? And yet they might have been scrabbling around for another label had a depleted Arsenal side nicked another goal at Chelsea in February 1991 and avoided the solitary league defeat they suffered that year. Yes, Graham was that close to beating Arsene Wenger to the punch by 13 years. Either way, his team did suffer fewer defeats than any other top-flight side in the 20th century – a magnificent achievement.
Assuming some readers weren’t old enough – or even alive enough – to enjoy the 1990/91 campaign in all its majesty, it’s worth recapping how Arsenal won the league. They had, frankly, flopped the previous season following that incredible high at Anfield in ’89, but were re-energised by a clutch of new signings – David Seaman, Anders Limpar and Andy Linighan – not to mention the hunger of those who had missed out on the World Cup finals in Italy. Tony Adams, Alan Smith and David Rocastle all failed to make the cut when Bobby Robson named his England squad and the Arsenal captain felt he had a point to prove. “Being omitted from the squad that summer probably did me, and perhaps even Alan and David, a power of good in Arsenal terms. I was fresh and full of determination to prove people wrong,” Adams wrote in his autobiography, Addicted.
Having formed a strong pre-season bond in Scandinavia, Arsenal hit the ground running in August. Wimbledon were beaten 3-0 at Plough Lane on the opening day (a good omen: Graham’s side kicked off their 1988/89 campaign in the same manner at the same ground) and the Gunners eventually hauled in early pacesetters, Liverpool, inflicting the champions’ first league defeat of the season in December. They did so in style as Paul Merson’s cute back-heel set up Smith for a show-stealing strike to clinch a 3-0 win at Highbury.
Arsenal led the First Division by New Year’s Day and eventually stretched their club record unbeaten run from the start of the campaign to 23 games, before going down at Chelsea in February. But they atoned for that aberration at Anfield a few weeks later as Seaman kept John Barnes and company at bay before Merson’s cool finish earned a decisive 1-0 win. It represented a changing of the guard as Liverpool, for so long the dominant force in English football but unsettled by the resignation of manager Kenny Dalglish, ceded power to Graham’s men. That was no mean feat: for anyone growing up in the Eighties, Liverpool had been pretty much untouchable at home and in Europe.
Arsenal looked set for a Double and, although those dreams were extinguished by Tottenham in a horrible FA Cup semi-final at Wembley, the title duly arrived on May 6 in rather more humdrum circumstances than one might have expected. Liverpool’s defeat at Nottingham Forest meant that Graham’s team were champions when they took to the pitch to face Manchester United an hour later at Highbury. Smith scored a hat trick in a 3-1 win to edge himself closer to the Golden Boot, but, next to the drama of Anfield ’89, this had the air of an exhibition match. By the time the champagne corks had popped and the parade around Islington was in full flow, the bare facts were these: Played 38 Won 24 Drew 13 Lost 1 For 74 Against 18 Goal Difference +56 Points 83.
The stingiest defence in Arsenal history got the plaudits and rightly so – no other top-flight side has kept as many as 24 clean sheets nor conceded as few as 18 goals. The quartet of Lee Dixon, Tony Adams, Steve Bould and Nigel Winterburn had lined up together for the first time in 1988 and, after two years of Graham-flavoured intensity and repetition on the training pitch they were a fearsome unit, with a strong supporting cast in David O’Leary and Linighan.
Then there was Seaman. Arsenal fans had been up in arms about the proposed move for the Queen’s Park Rangers goalkeeper in 1990 – “We all agree, Lukic is better than Seaman” was a regular refrain on the Highbury terraces – but Graham knew what he was doing. “I still think John Lukic is one of the top five keepers in the country. I just think David Seaman’s the best,” he insisted. And he was right, of course, proving his players wrong as well as some supporters. “I had not realised David was as good as he was when he was at QPR,” wrote Adams in Addicted. “And the defence was so familiar, it was practically unbreachable at times. Steve Bould was simply outstanding. In footballing terms he was next to impassable.” Winterburn agrees: “Nothing will have the drama of the 1989 title but 1991 was special because in particular the back four was built-in,” he recalled. “At that time I felt it was impossible to go unbeaten but we gave it a good shot. Under George we were just a clinical team that had the right formation to win; we were almost a machine.”
Arsenal’s defensive meanness was legendary. But perhaps more surprisingly, the ’91 vintage scored more times than the revered, free-flowing Invincibles and boasts the best goal difference of any post-war Arsenal side. Another of Graham’s defensive kingpins, Bould, thinks that side’s attacking verve is too often overlooked. “Rocky [Rocastle] was still at the club, Mickey Thomas was there, Paul Davis too, we had some talented footballers, it wasn’t just about the defence and keeping clean sheets,” he says. “The style was rather rigid because that’s the way George wanted us to play – he wanted it tight, he wanted to win 1-0 and not 4-3. But as it happened we had good players and we scored a hell of a lot of goals that season – I think we scored a lot of fours and fives as well as a six against Coventry on the final day. It was a good side, we were tight at the back and we had some flair up front.”
As it happens, Rocastle, so influential two years earlier, spent much of the 1990/91 campaign nursing injuries, but Thomas and Davis offered energy and vision from the centre, while Merson’s pace and flair complemented the prolific Smith’s more prosaic qualities up front. As is often the case, one or two players emerged during the season to play a notable role: for Nicolas Anelka, Chris Wreh and Alex Manninger in 1998, read David Hillier and Kevin Campbell in 1991. The former added ballast to the midfield while the latter’s raw power and pace was a sight to behold when he broke into the Arsenal side during the run-in. It certainly might surprise those who saw Campbell labouring towards the end of his career.
And of course there was Limpar. Signed from Italian side Cremonese for £1million, the original ‘Super Swede’ was Graham’s trump card and, in the words of commentator Martin Tyler, “the man they are calling their new match winner”. Limpar sprinkled magic dust on Arsenal’s title charge, scoring and making goals, while bewildering defences up and down the country. In a time when overseas signings still had a novelty value, before the trickle of imports became a flood, Limpar’s flair and freshness turned heads. “We had Anders to give us that little bit of magic,” recalls Bould. “The first time we actually saw him in a game was in the pre-season Makita Tournament at Wembley in 1990. He scored against Aston Villa, he smashed this one into the top corner having beaten about 18 players and we thought, ‘Jesus Christ! Who’s this kid?’ Anders wouldn’t have really been George’s kind of player, or so we imagined, but he had that magic about him and it’s quite sad that he didn’t go on and have a seven or eight-year career at Arsenal. He looked like he was going to be a real top player year-in year-out for the club, he was like a little George Best when he first arrived and he was brilliant for 18 months to two years but then never really pushed on.” Winterburn was a big fan too. “We met up with Anders in Sweden and he had great ability, really quick feet. He was absolutely sensational at the start of his Arsenal career; defenders could not get near him for long periods of games with his movement. He had pace as well and was a terrific player to play alongside. We were very organised, we pressed, we were hard to beat, and we were introducing a little bit of flair with Anders.”
There’s a tendency to lump the class of ’91 in with Graham’s cup kings of 1993 or even the side that conquered Europe a year later. But while those later sides leant heavily on defensive resilience and relied on Ian Wright to nick a goal, the ’91 team had verve in abundance. This was a time when Graham still trusted the likes of Limpar and Rocastle and picked passers as well as destroyers in midfield. That tally of 74 goals in 38 league games speaks for itself.
So if the ’91 side was dazzling as we
ll as doughty, why else does it get overlooked? Bould thinks the timing of Arsenal’s triumph and the perception of the club back then are partly responsible. “We were very good that year,” he says. “We played every week thinking we couldn’t lose, there was a confidence about everybody. But people didn’t love football so much back then, the Premier League hadn’t formed and the game had yet to explode. All the exposure now is above and beyond what it used to be and I’m sure that’s one of the reasons why that ’91 team didn’t get that much notice. Football had been in troubled times, it was just coming out of the doldrums and all the attendances were nowhere near what they are now. On top of that we were everybody’s hated team at that time. I think Liverpool were perceived as the club that could play football while we were perceived to be journeymen and cloggers and not too pretty.”
Arsenal were certainly not as lovable then as they would be under Wenger and, although new football supporters had been wooed by Paul Gascoigne’s tears and England’s exhilarating run to the 1990 World Cup semi-finals, the toxic reputation the sport had built up during the Eighties would need slightly longer to shift. The razzmatazz of the Premier League – launched a year after Arsenal’s title success – brought families as well as casual fans on board. But at the turn of the decade it was less acceptable to like the team they called ‘Boring, boring Arsenal’ – a mocking chant that was ironically adopted by Gooners once Wenger, Dennis Bergkamp and the rest, had deliciously made their mark.
After the excitement of Italia ’90 – at least from an England perspective – perhaps the new wave of football fans weren’t ready for a team as supposedly rugged and methodical as Graham’s, or at least a team so dominant that drama was in far shorter supply than it had been in Turin when Bobby Robson’s side took on West Germany. A penalty shoot-out, larger-than-life personalities, a famous old rivalry and a dash of jingoism can capture the imagination where a 38-match machine-like march to the title cannot. Let’s be honest: for better or worse, Graham’s Arsenal did not boast a personality or superstar like Gascoigne. The ’91 title side was put together on a relative shoestring, with only the fees for new signings Limpar, Seaman and Linighan creeping into seven figures. And although Arsenal had the flair of Limpar, Merson and Rocastle, the foundations of their success – organisation, efficiency and collective strength – were reflected in the end-of-season awards. Gordon Strachan of Leeds and Manchester United duo Mark Hughes and Lee Sharpe walked off with the individual gongs while Arsenal’s own success remained very much a team effort. If you want more evidence, pop in your ‘Champions’ video from the 1990/91 campaign (kids, ask your parents about this) and fast forward (ditto) to the 5-0 win over Aston Villa late in the season. After surging into a four-goal lead you might expect Arsenal to ease off slightly but their harrying and tackling is as committed as ever, even when the game is won. Teamwork, flair, a miserly defence and a potent strike-force – is that enough for the ’91 team to be mentioned in the same breath as the finest Arsenal sides? If you’re still not convinced then consider this: it’s likely that no other title team has overcome such adversity in their quest for the championship.
Graham’s squad endured two savage blows in 1990/91 that could easily have derailed their ambitions and may well have proved terminal for lesser sides. First of all, their inspirational captain spent eight weeks of the season in prison after being found guilty of drink-driving. Jailed on December 19, Adams missed eight games – that’s more than 20 per cent of the league programme – before making his top-flight return at Anfield of all places. Would the ‘Invincibles’ have been invincible had Patrick Vieira spent 58 days in Chelmsford nick? Would history have been made in 1971 if Frank McLintock had been locked up for that long? Given that football is a game of fine margins, given that both were totemic figures, there would be plenty in the ‘no’ camp for that debate.
The 1991 side just got on with it. Linighan is best known for his 1993 FA Cup final heroics but he came in from the cold to partner Bould and help keep Arsenal’s title challenge on track. “I have to say that the biggest praise you can ever give is to Andy Linighan,” says Bould. “He had just been bought from Norwich for what was then considered a fair bit of money and he didn’t get straight into the team and he found it tough. Then Tony went to jail and in came Andy and it looked like he’d been involved in the system we were so used to since he was a kid. In many ways Tony wasn’t missed and that’s high praise for Andy. As for myself, well, I have to say I enjoyed the extra responsibility. No team is ever a one-man team, I don’t care who it is. Barcelona are not just Lionel Messi. Everybody has a job and sometimes you have to pitch in and if our captain was missing then you have to have a go.” It’s worth pointing out that Adams’ incarceration coincided with Arsenal’s sole defeat of the league season – that 2-1 reverse at Chelsea. Would that have been avoided, and history made, if the captain had been around? Quite possibly.
Adams wasn’t the only one in trouble that season: the entire club found itself in the dock in the wake of the infamous Old Trafford brawl. It all kicked off during the first half of Arsenal’s 1-0 win in October – secured by an audacious strike from that man Limpar – with only Seaman keeping his distance while protagonists and peacemakers pushed and protested. The Football Association came down hard on both clubs but especially Arsenal, docking them two points. It was an unprecedented punishment and one at which Bould still bridles. “It was ridiculous,” he says. “It certainly wasn’t worth two points for misconduct, it was an absolute joke, it was a few handbags at dawn. It was ridiculous but again we weren’t a very well-liked club at the time, I think people thought Arsenal were a bit stuffy but I don’t know why. Two points off was scandalous.” Winterburn admits that the residual bad feeling between the sides probably stemmed from his run-in with Brian McClair during an FA Cup tie at Highbury in 1988. “I was involved in the tackle with Denis Irwin that started it all off but what went on after that wasn’t my fault,” he says. “I was lying on the ground and I got a couple of kicks in the back and fair play because it was competitive. It did seem harsh to have points taken away but maybe the FA wanted to set a precedent. We just felt ‘it’s happened, let’s get on with it’.”
And get on with it they did. Arsenal’s domination rendered the points deduction obsolete – they could have had another seven removed and still been crowned champions. Once again, one has to ask if other sides might have responded differently to such a sense of injustice. The Invincibles, for example, saw their title defence crumble after a handful of bad refereeing calls brought their record 49-game unbeaten run to an end at Old Trafford in October 2004. Would they have been shaken or stirred by a points deduction? We’ll never know, of course, but this is certain: the ’91 side had the character to turn a negative into a positive by using their punishment to foster a siege mentality within the squad. “George loved it to be fair,” recalls Bould. “Every day when we came in he’d remind us that people didn’t like us. ‘It’s us against the world,’ he used to say. We had that kind of siege mentality as a group.” Adams agrees. “What happened at Old Trafford spoke volumes about our character,” he wrote in Addicted. The captain demonstrated Arsenal’s ‘us versus them’ mentality in a less-than-subtle manner when he flicked V-signs at QPR’s fans after a late comeback at Loftus Road a matter of days after the points deduction had been handed down. And the fans soon joined in. One of the most boisterous chants at Highbury on the day Arsenal won the title? “Stick your two points up your arse!” Fittingly, Manchester United were the visitors.
Those incidents did nothing for Arsenal’s reputation of course and that’s one reason why the Invincibles will always win a popularity contest with the ’91 vintage. But they have more in common than you might think. For starters neither side fulfilled its potential. Thirteen years before Wenger’s team squandered a golden chance of Champions League glory by running out of steam against Chelsea, Graham’s men fluffed their lines in that FA Cup semi-final against a Gascoigne-powered Spu
rs. Having won their respective titles so convincingly, neither side could live up to their own high standards in the years that followed. “That was a big disappointment,” admits Bould. “The following year was a really poor year. We never got going in the league until it was too late and, although we had the cup successes in 1993 and 1994, the group should have done better than it did.”
All the same, the ‘91 team deserves to be held in the same high regard as that most revered of Arsenal sides. It was more secure in defence; more productive up front and so nearly cornered the market in invincibility long before Thierry Henry was cutting a swathe through defences. If Ruud van Nistelrooy had smashed his penalty six inches lower in September 2003, if Adams had been a free man in February 1991 … on such fine margins are legends built. Not that Bould is overly concerned. “It could have been us but I’m not sure I like the tag anyway!” he says. “Everybody gets carried away giving people and teams and clubs tags. We didn’t have the style of the Invincibles team – they raised the bar I think – but although we weren’t as exciting to watch as some of Arsene Wenger’s teams, we had good players, we were a really good unit and perhaps we never got the praise we should have done.”
So it’s time to put the record straight and finally give the ’91 side the credit it deserves. They weren’t just another title side; they were special. The stats and conditions of their triumph bear that out. If you don’t think great achievements are ever forgotten, remember this: when Arsenal fans were asked to pick their favourite centre backs of all time in an online poll in 2011, Frank McLintock – the inspirational Double-winning skipper of ’71 no less – could not even force his way into the top five. Old-school legends get edged out by modern-day heroes, and if the high-water mark of Graham’s reign is already hazy, those recollections will fade even further as the years roll on.