Gunners head towards sporting immortality

Fulham 0 Arsenal 1

The champions extended their undefeated league campaign to 37 games with a scrappy win at Fulham after Jose Reyes took advantage of an early blunder by Edwin van der Sar.

Now only Leicester bar their path to the record books. Preston North End are the only other top-flight English side to have gone unbeaten, albeit in a 22-game season in 1888-89.

Dutch side Ajax and Italian giants AC Milan have also achieved the feat in the modern era, but Wenger underlined the scale of what title-winning side could achieve.

“I don’t think the players fully realise what is at stake as there is no history of it happening before. For me it would be something massive. There is real history to be made and certainly, football-wise, immortality as I don’t think it will be done again. Everybody who has played against English teams realises how difficult the Premiership is. You would get a lot of respect to do that in any big championship.

“Next Saturday’s game is like a final for us. You can always lose a game, even against a team who are already relegated. But we must be focused. There are no regrets when you give everything so we must be fully prepared to achieve that record,” he said.

Against Fulham, Arsenal never extended themselves and were handed the lead after eight minutes when van der Sar was caught in possession by Reyes, who finished from close range.

While Wenger observed that his team “refused to lose“, Chris Coleman was frustrated at Fulham’s inability to convert a host of chances into an equaliser.

“I’m pig-sick. I thought we did enough to deserve at least a draw. It’s ironic as Edwin is normally as sound as a pound but he’s had a bit of a brain-storm there and it’s lost us the game,” he said.

“He’s so confident that he tried it again in the second-half and it came off. If you try to knock that arrogance out of him, he wouldn’t be the same keeper. But it didn’t come off the first time and the ball was in the back of the net. He’s gutted, devastated.

“At half-time, he came in and held his hand up. But what’s the point of me getting on his back? He knows he’s done wrong. He’s had a magnificent season and could well be our player of the year.”

Coleman tipped Arsenal to complete an unbeaten season, but warned they would have to win either the title or the Champions League next season to be considered a truly great side.

“Some people say they have under-achieved but they’ve won the title and they’re a terrific team,” he added.

“But I do think that if they’re going to call themselves immortal, great teams have to start winning back-to-back championships and the Champions League, like Manchester United and Liverpool have done in the past.”

FULHAM: Van der Sar, Volz, Goma, Pearce, Bocanegra, Djetou (John 58), Malbranque, Inamoto (McBride 58), Sean Davis, Legwinski, Boa Morte.

ARSENAL: Lehmann, Lauren, Toure, Campbell, Cole, Pires (Clichy 78), Vieira, Parlour, Ljungberg (Keown 87), Reyes (Aliadiere 71), Henry.

Referee: M Dean (Wirral).