With Arsène Wenger approaching his 1,000th match in charge of Arsenal this Saturday, the Islington Now sports department has been having heated arguments all week over the best players of his 18 years in charge.
Such processes have a disappointing tendency to end in dissatisfying compromises, but we’re confident that few will have reason to argue with our final selection, which is dominated by players from the first half of Wenger’s tenure.
Consideration was given not just to pure ability, but also to the mythical concept of team chemistry (the main example of this being the selection of Lauren, a member of the Invincibles, over Bacary Sagna) and games played (which ruled out Carl Jenkinson).
Other big calls included leaving out Marc Overmars, the flying Dutchman, and Emmanuel Petit, a World Cup winner with France in 1998 (after all, one ponytail is enough for any team).
Let us know your own selection by tweeting us directly or by commenting below.
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