Arsenal: Frank Lampard inadvertently exposes key weakness

Frank Lampard, while answering the question of who his toughest opponent was, inadvertently exposed Arsenal’s key weakness: their inability to bully.

Arsenal have not won a Premier League title since 2004. It has been a painfully extended period. And while there are many reasons for their lack of success, the inability to build a well-rounded squad and team, ultimately, falls on Arsene Wenger.

Arsenal have always boasted a searing, potent attack. They have always played attractive, free-flowing, attacking football. Wenger has hoarded technically-sound, slight but agile midfielders. The full-backs have never shied away from bombing forwards. These are the characteristics of the Arsenal team. But they have not been complemented by defensive discipline, by industry and effort and grit and fight and character. They have been a one-dimensional team.

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Inadvertently, Frank Lampard actually proved this much. Lampard was not even fielding questions about Arsenal. In fact, what he said, during an extended interview with Copa 90, had very little to pertain to the Gunners. There was just one moment that pricked my ears, worryingly. Lampard was asked about the best players that he had faced during his extended Premier League career. Here is what he said:

"“Steven Gerrard… it’s a tough one, I played against so many great players. I remember Roy Keane and Patrick Viera, they were untouchable and they would sort of bully me on the pitch, in a good way. I felt in awe of them on the pitch. Roy Keane would just say “get off” and keep you over there while he played his own game. When that era finished, Gerrard, Scholesy, Yaya Toure came through… But I’ll say Gerrard [as his toughest opponent] for the consistency over the years, when he was on it he had everything.”"

Lampard talks of Patrick Vieira, one of the Premier League’s greatest ever players and one of the foundation pieces of the early ’00s Wenger teams that enjoyed such relentless success, as a bully, someone who would overpower him through force of character and force of physicality.

That is exactly what Vieira was. He was a bully. He was also a brilliant footballer, striding forwards with exuded calmness, opposition players draggling off his long, wiry, but muscular legs. But not only did he handle the physical challenge of the English game, he revelled in it. How different times.

This current Arsenal team are famed for lacking the backbone that is needed to challenge in the Premier League. They are soft, they buckle under pressure. They can be ruffled up, upset, aggravated, overawed. They are easy to play against. Physicality is all that is required.

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The early Wenger teams dished out the punishment; the late Wenger teams are on the other end of it. And Lampard’s talking of Vieira, a player who embodied those great teams, exposes that key weakness. Until it is addressed, a title will not find its way to the Emirates.

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