Grinning Wenger and touchscreen toys

When referee Lee Probert blew his whistle for the last time on Saturday at Wembley, he effectively ended the 2013/14 season in terms of competitive football for England’s top clubs.

The all-Premier League FA Cup final had come to an end and we were left to contemplate a match that had accurately reflected the league season that ended six days earlier: surprising, wide-open, occasionally controversial and ultimately decided by some stunning individual skill which helped a fading giant of a club rediscover its mojo.

Drenched in champagne, grinning uncontrollably, Arsene Wenger celebrated in a way we hadn’t seen for… well, for nine years. Silverware was finally heading for their Emirates Stadium and for once we weren’t left debating whether a top four finish really should represent a successful season for the Gunners.

It’s important to remember, however, that Arsenal actually spent more time (128 days) at the top of the Barclays Premier League table this season than any other club – without ever really looking like winning it once February rolled around. That tells us something about Arsenal, but more about the brilliance of the title race: the lead changed hands 25 times and we went into the last week of the season with three teams capable of winning, into the last round with two in the hunt.

Okay, so it was a brilliant season. That much you have heard over and over. So here are a few final thoughts on 2013/2014, based on comments and opinions I heard uttered in our studio during the season both on- and off-air.

No-one begrudged Manchester City the title. Forget all the hypocritical talk elsewhere of the club “winning the lottery” and its breaches of spurious Financial Fair Play rules, pundits take City for what they are: a wealthy club but one which nonetheless can be difficult to manage due to raised expectations. Manuel Pellegrini is universally admired but very few, if any, of the pundits would have chosen him as their manager of the season because they felt he had superb options at his disposal in terms of strikers and the remarkable Yaya Toure.

In truth, most of the people who sat opposite or alongside me wanted Liverpool to win. Some had played with or against Steven Gerrard and wanted to see him lift the trophy. Others were old enough to remember the glory days at Anfield and nostalgically yearned for a return to them. The majority simply thought Liverpool had played the best football.

Just one note of caution: while Liverpool’s return to the Champions League stage has to be a good thing, our pundits, to a man, expressed reservations about their ability to defend properly in that competition. They must buy well defensively this summer.

In my opinion, the best thing about the season just gone was that I got to sit and watch the experts use our touchscreen analytical “toys” to examine the ways in which the managers of teams like Liverpool, Everton and Southampton were producing exciting, flexible attacking football. I’ll be honest and admit I get a bit fed up seeing goals being deconstructed simply from the perspective of defensive failings.

This refreshing emphasis on attacking flair took Liverpool’s football to a level not seen since Fernando Torres was at his best. Liverpool’s return to eminence also added greater edge to the traditional rivalries with Manchester United and Everton as well as their more recent one with Chelsea. Thus, the league as a whole benefited.

But for his tactical masterclass at the Etihad in orchestrating Chelsea’s win over Manchester City, Jose Mourinho didn’t get a lot of love from the experts on his return to the Premier League. They expected more from him.

It was also another season that saw club owners continue to push the panic button and sack managers at an alarming rate. A positive by-product of this phenomenon was our ability to get the likes of Tony Pulis and Malky Mackay into the studio for guest punditry stints.

Viewers clamored for Sir Alex Ferguson to make an appearance (and even David Moyes in the immediate aftermath of his sacking) but these things really aren’t as simple to arrange as that. Without a doubt, the most impressive addition to our punditry roster was Roberto Martinez, whose tactical insight and ability to “telestrate” or “touchscreen” his thoughts made him a brilliant guest.

The most frustrating period of the season came when our very own Alan Curbishley went to Fulham to advise them but was powerless to prevent a series of disastrous decisions by the club and two of its three (three!) managers this season. Having worked with Alan for many years now, I knew that he knew exactly what was needed (and which players had to be bought) to save Fulham from the drop but instead they threw £11 million away on Olympiakos striker Kostas Mitroglou when Shane Long was available and willing to join them.

This past weekend, for the first time in what seemed like ages, I was at home watching football rather than talking about it. A few fans got in touch saying how they missed us and wondered how they were going to get though the summer.

Thank you, that’s very flattering. Well, the good news for me is that I will be back in a TV studio, discussing line-ups and tactics very soon. I will be anchoring SupertSport’s Fifa World Cup coverage from their studios in Johannesburg this summer and African viewers can also expect to see one or two familiar faces from our Premier League broadcasts popping up on screen.

With as many as 130 players from Premier League clubs likely to be involved in Brazil, I will feel very much at home. But the beauty of a World Cup is the way in which it takes us on a football journey into the unknown and I can’t wait to embark on that journey with you guys in a couple of weeks. See you there!