Record Breakers No.5 – Arsenal go the whole season undefeated!
Arsenal’s 2003/04 season will be talked about for years to come. Teams have run close to going the whole season unbeaten but never quite got over the line.
In 1990/91, Arsenal only lost once in a 42 match league season. Their only slip-up came in an away fixture at Chelsea. It was a tough season as club captain Tony Adams spent a few months in prison after a drink-driving charge. The club had also been handed a two-point penalty after a mass brawl with Manchester United earlier that campaign.
Eleven years later, Arsenal had a new manager in charge. George Graham (who had been in charge in 1990/91) had left the club in 1995 and was replaced by Bruce Rioch. The former Bolton manager stayed at the club for only one season before being shown the door. Frenchman Arsene Wenger came to the club and revolutionised the place.
Between 1996 and 2003, Wenger helped Arsenal to win two League and FA Cup Doubles and the FA Cup in 2003. In 2002, Wenger boldly claimed that he believed he could go a whole season unbeaten with his crop of players.
The Frenchman’s claim wasn’t taken seriously. Fans and the media were quick to dismiss it, saying that it would be impossible for any team to go the whole season undefeated. How wrong they would prove to be in the 2003/04 season.
In all, Arsenal won 26 of their 38 league games that season, drawing the other 12. They lost to Manchester United in the FA Cup Semi Final and cruelly lost to Chelsea in the Champions League Quarter Finals. However, those two cup defeats are glossed over as the impressive league record usurps them.
The ‘Invincibles’ as the squad would later be called, had won their final league match the previous season in 2002/03 and so they went into the 2004/05 season 39 games unbeaten. After avoiding defeat in their first ten league matches of the 04/05 campaign, they travelled to Old Trafford to play arch-rivals Manchester United.
United won the match 2-0 but in acrimonious fashion. The referee that afternoon gave some very disputable decisions in Manchester United’s favour and several of the Arsenal players were given a good kicking. It was a horrible way to lose the unbeaten record.
The Premier League commissioned a beautiful gold replica of the championship trophy in 2004 to reward Arsenal for their unbeaten campaign. It was given to Arsene Wenger when he left the club in 2018.
A song soon started to be sung at Highbury by the Arsenal fans after the record was ended. It is still sung at the Emirates Stadium today with pride at what the club achieved seventeen years ago.
“49, 49 undefeated, 49, 49 I say! 49,49 undefeated, playing football The Arsenal way!”
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