"You Arsnal guys have been talking of winning trophies for decades now", some people will remind the Gunners faithfuls today. They scoff at the Arsenal clan that the trophy expectation this season is same old same old, it will all come crumbling down eventually.
Well a few things are clear to me:
1] There existed a time that, we can just wake up in a summer morning and hear that Saka has been sold. I tell you, it became a normal occurrence then, ebenthough heartbreaking. Just like that, Saka gone. Forever!
Those years, Arsenal were doing business quite similar to how Brentford or Bournemouth are doing theirs now. As I write now Bournemouth is set to sell their best player, Semenyo, at the next available opportunity. Maybe these two clubs are doing it better than Arsenal was then because, they are still very competitive at their level.
In those years, honestly, a player like Saliba would have been long gone. A club will offer him a much better pay than he earns at Arsenal. Those years, during summer, it's like a part of one's heart will seem like it is ailing with cold because of the kind of news of player exits in Arsenal.
2] Now, today Arsenal is not that kind of selling club. Player salaries are amongst the best globally. If players like, Cole, Hleb, Nasri,Song, even Van Persie, etc were in this time, they won't even imagine to shift to another club. No way! NOW THE FAN BASE ARE
SO RELAXED IN THIS REGARD. It's a huge burden lifted. Plus players are so willing to renew their contracts.
3] Back to the point 1 above. An extra thing is that even when for example, a Flamini is sold, you expect a solid replacement to be bought. But no it wasn't the case, where is the money to spend? So what we saw is that they started grooming Alex Song for Flamini's position. Alas as soon as Song gained international recognition, he too found his way to more cash in Barcelona.
As I Conclude
Well, those who don't see these things above as significant, that's their own cup of tea really.
Once again I think it– you wake up in the morning only to hear Nasri is gone, Flamini gone, the magical Hleb gone! That's a team that has been rebuilt, after the invincibles left, to be solid.
Or in those days, you will just wake up and hear that the best left-back in the EPL, Ashley Cole, has suddenly left. What was chasing them away? Money! Arsenal couldn't increase their wages. And they often leave to rival clubs.
There was a mercurial striker back then in Robin Van Persie. He was mostly out injured, but like one who had been monitoring the pattern of player exits, as soon as he became fit and had his first full season largely without any injury, he too registered his exit notice and painfully(for Arsenal fans) left for Manchester United the following season. He was wary of the amount of players sold, which frankly didn't make Arsenal a team that could win a trophy.
Conclusion
So it's not really true that Arsenal has geniunely been talking about winning trophies for decades. If we access the team properly many years back, a trophy winning kind of situation didn't really exist, once the Emirates stadium project started.
I mean, even small clubs today are trying their best to do what Arsenal weren't doing in those days– eg Crystal Palace lost star man, Eberechi Eze, to Arsenal, but endeavoured to bring in the Nigerian, Chrisantus Uche who is solid midfielder too. You know, they are trying to maintain things and look at how they have been outstanding so far this season.
A bigger one like Newcastle lost their best in, Alexander Isak and bought two goods strikes in Nick Wotermade and Yoane Wissa. That's not bad business at all.
Arsenal those years were not like these at all, so the sincere quest for trophies only resumed about two or three years ago and it shows. Now,with the kind of stability mentioned in point 2 above and the coaching, we can expect trophies to roll in. That's just the way it is.
Thanks for reading.