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Former players are always good for a controversial opinion or two and Jermaine Jenas has now suggested Arsenal are not at the level some think.
Despite being top of the Premier League, in the EFL Cup final and with a clean sweep in Europe so far, Arsenal still have some doubters out there.
Indeed, it seems former Newcastle and England man Jenas is among those doubters.
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Speaking on the Wildcards podcast, Jenas explained why he doesn’t feel the current Arsenal team is at the level of those he faced.
“I rate Declan Rice. I rate Zubimendi, you know, good players, good players, but my word, I wish I’d have had the opportunity to play against that midfield because I was having to deal with like Gilberto and Fabregas and like Vieira like proper players, you know what I mean?,” Jenas commented.
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“So I’m just looking at it and I’m going what has happened to football? Because this this Arsenal team, it’s a good team.
“It’s a very very good team. Like granted, it’s a top team, but my word, they’re not like it’s not world class.”
Comparisons to days gone by are always subjective
We hear so many former players on the airwaves nowadays that it’s easy to forget that like most fans, they are simply forming an opinion on what they see.
Sure, their opinion can hold a bit more credibility given the standing in the game they held or the level they played at.
However, what Jenas is saying here is almost impossible to quantify and compare. We all know that the likes of Fabregas, Gilberto and Vieira were world-class players of their era.
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But by the same token, the likes of Rice, Odegaard and now Zubimendi are top performers in their own right and era and can lay big claims to being mentioned amongst those former stars.
The problem here is that the game has changed so much. For example, would Vieira be able to cover the ground Rice does each game? Maybe. Would Gilberto keep the game ticking over like Zubimendi does and can Zubimendi bring that aggression to his game that Gilberto did?
These are all factors we can probably measure with enhance stats but ultimately, it’s impossible to say who is and isn’t better than a former player.
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