There are many myths in football. For example Newcastle have the most loyal passionate fanbase, despite booing their players off the pitch on a regular basis. Spurs are a big club despite not winning any major trophies for many years (League Cups excluded). Even Arsenal have their own, and apparently played boring unattractive football under George Graham, which may have well been true in his latter years, but it certainly wasn't in the early 1990's. Listen to the media, and they would have you believe we were still dangerous from set pieces many years after Adams and Bould had hung up their boots.

Why I feel we are becoming the new West Ham is not because we look like them in our new away kit, but more to do with the myth surrounding them for as long as I can remember. The myth is that despite often being on the wrong end of a good hammering, or in a relegation dogfight for many seasons, and never winning any silverware for over 25 years, it's a well known ‘fact’ in the football fraternity that West Ham have always played good football. A bit like Spurs playing football in the "Spurs tradition", whatever that might be (often losing and not winning major silverware as already mentioned presumably).

The parallel I draw with the above is that it seems to me that the common consensus among the media in general, and among the football pundits, is that Arsenal still play the most attractive/entertaining/best football in the Premiership, but as we have not won anything for three seasons is this really the case? Even as an Arsenal fan I'm getting pretty fed up hearing this. I guess it comes down to how you define what good football is, which can be pretty subjective, but off the top off my head I would list good quick penetrative passing and movement, flair, creativity, and ultimately winning matches as a result. Obviously there is a lot more to it than that, but I feel that we have been spoilt a bit in the past and are still living off our reputation from three years ago to a certain degree. Apart from an early season flourish, I haven't seen too much of the above.

Obviously on our day we can turn it on, but since a good first half at Villa in December, and a couple of easy wins against Newcastle (and the win in Milan of course), I'm struggling to think of many games when we haven't struggled or have won playing well. It's easy to feel like this after losing to Chelsea and on our worst run in years, but I felt the same when we were five points clear before the so-called blip. This all might sound a bit critical, bearing in mind the season we have had, and we have over-achieved taking account of injuries and the lack of spending, but my point is that we need to avoid becoming a club that lives on its perceived reputation, and starts delivering what our football is supposedly meriting.

At the end of the day football is a results driven business and for a club of Arsenal's stature winning trophies, (and certainly not sacrificing domestic cups, but that's another story). Playing the best football must mean you are winning trophies on a fairly regularly basis, or you can’t be playing the best football. I understand entertaining and attractive football does not always equate to being the best, but I would argue that we haven't been particularly entertaining or attractive on a regular basis either.

Going back to the 1990's again, I don't think Chelsea are that dissimilar to the way we were then, in that they mix it up, have a similar leader in Terry when we had Adams, have had skilful goal scoring wingers, (we had Limpar) and they can pass as well as go long. I'm not suggesting that we develop a win at all costs mentality (Terry not giving the ball back on Sunday springs to mind, as well as their goalkeeping coach doing the same), but we have become too predictable and teams know how to play against us.

On a slightly different subject, the lack of atmosphere at home matches is often highlighted as a hindrance but it can’t always be up to the fans to lift the players and has to work both ways. I think that there has often been very little to lift the fans recently, especially in the first half of matches at Ashburton since we moved, and the atmosphere has suffered as a result, and thus the performances. As a result, I find it hard to believe that for the past two years especially, particularly bearing in mind the majority of first half performances at home, that we are consistently the best footballing side in the Premiership. To me the evidence says otherwise.

Let’s hope we can win the Champions League. As Liverpool have proved, you don't have to be anywhere near the best to do that!