Three Key Champions League Takeaways after Arsenal made it eight wins from eight 

Here's Charlie Ashmore with his must-read take after Arsenal strolled to a perfect Champions League record 

1 - Heavy rotation just the ticket

Ahead of the game the big question was just how weak Mikel Arteta would go with selection for a game that had nothing of substance on it, save the pride that would come with being the first team to go 100% in the group stage of the new format Champions League. 

For me there were two surprises in the selection – Ben White and Viktor Gyokeres.

Both of whom I personally would have rested on the basis that White has had a lot of injuries to contend with and rest would not have been a bad thing for him, whille Gyokeres has played far more football over the season than he would have been expecting/expected to. 

However, overall, no complaints from me as key players were rested and players who needed minutes in their legs were give them. And it was interesting to watch this group of players coming together in a way that was very different to what has become the normal restrained, if not positively passive, Arsenal way. The players we had brought a little bit of the chaos we have been missing. 

I love watching Noni Madueke play, but his inability to make something of the positions he dribbles his way into is increasingly frustrating.  Eberechie Eze’s moments are wonderful and unpredictable but at the moment they remain moments – he does not look capable of controlling a game and taking it by the scruff of the neck. Though of course he has done once this season to glorious effect. 

Both bring an element of unpredictability to our play which I suspect will be important in the latter stages of the season.

2 - 100% - you cannot do better

It’s always been a bit of a joke in our household. 

Whenever anyone says they gave 110% , all eyes turn to me as my eyebrows raise and I say “you can’t give more than 100%”. 

Well, you can’t score more than 100% and that’s what we have done – the first team to do it (albeit that the new format is just two years old).

Seriously, just think about that. 

In what is reputed to be the elite club competition (I can’t stand it, let alone its self-importance but that’s just me) we have just won eight out of eight.

Following on from last year’s third place with six wins and just one defeat, that means that over the least two years aggregated we would be top by four points. 

Which means we are now consistently one of the best teams in Europe. Our semi-final last year was not a fluke. 

We should be aiming for at least the same this year (though I worry that the prevalence of English teams might be a problem for us) and there is no reason why we cannot hope to win the damned thing and get that monkey off our back. 

But here’s the thing – as we sit here legitimately rubbing shoulders with Europe’s elite, let’s all have the humility to recognise that it wasn’t long ago we aren’t even eating the scraps at the top table and we were fighting (unsuccessfully, to the relief of many) for a place in the UEFA Conference League. 

We have come a long way and the (mainly online) Arteta-bashers need to remember that.

3 - but….English dominance is a worrying trend

The Pope is Catholic. Bears do their business in the woods.  Football is becoming increasingly uncompetitive. 

Statements of the bleeding obvious but the latter worries me to an ever greater degree.  Once competition, genuine competition ceases to exist, so does the spectacle. 

Across Europe, too many Leagues are dominated by too few clubs. PSG and Bayern are the most glaring examples.  But the trend exists everywhere. 

Essentially it boils down to one thing – money talks and it’s talking louder than ever. 

Over the recent past there has been one consistent factor which is the best predictor of success and that is a club’s wage bill. 

As it happens we are punching well above our weight in that regard but as a general rule the clubs with the biggest wage bills are the clubs that win the trophies. 

A brief history lesson – the moment things started to change in England was when the clubs many years ago stopped sharing gate receipts equally.  Thus the clubs with the biggest home support started pulling away financially. Because they kept their gate receipts in full.  That enabled them to buy better players and pay them more. 

When TV money started getting to serious levels, guess which clubs made the most money out of it – yes, the ones who had the most money already.  And that accelerated still further when European money got serious because, guess what, it was the wealthier clubs who were typically qualifying. 

Now, because all Premier League clubs are now ridiculously wealthy compared to clubs across Europe – I think most if not all the Premier League clubs are in the top 30 across Europe leaving proper European names like Ajax floundering in their wake, the Premier League maintains a veneer of competitiveness – it is certainly a League in which the tops teams can be beaten by the bottom teams but at the top, it is inevitably the same group circling. 

However where it is having a real impact is in Europe. 

The English clubs in the Conference League and the Europa League are pretty much favourites from day one. And the Champions League is looking increasingly likely to be dominated by English clubs, a trend it is hard to see reversing. 

It’s for another day, but if UEFA want to change that then I think the only way they do it is by doing the one thing they can’t do an reintroduce unseeded knockout football from round one.  But the very reason they need to do that is also the very reason they can’t – the rich clubs won’t let them. 

And here’s the rub for us…….a Champions League with English clubs between us and the trophy is harder for us to win than one with European opponents. 

The latter generally try and play against us and that suits us and gives us spaces to work with.

The English clubs don’t – when even Manchester City are coming to us and playing the lowest of low blocks that is telling.