Coppell: lesser lights can’t challenge elite

Arsenal 2 Reading 1

Reading’s dry-witted manager might be in the process of masterminding his club’s most successful ever season, but that has not diluted his distaste for England’s elite division.

Coppell is dismayed at what he perceives as a lack of competitiveness in the higher echelons of the Premiership, exemplified by games such as this, when a half-strength Arsenal cruised to a victory which was far more emphatic than the scoreline suggests.

Not even Manchester United’s unexpected renaissance has revitalised Coppell’s interest in a league he views as wearyingly predictable, where the fat get fatter and the rest are left to fight for scraps thrown down from the top table.

“I’m not sure United winning the league means a lot — the champions always come from a select group,” he said. “Who’s going to win the cup and the league every year? One of the four big teams. It’s not a competition any more.”

Coppell is well positioned to judge the merits of the Premiership. He has been a manager for over 20 years and is one of only three current top flight bosses — along with Alex Ferguson and Neil Warnock — to have worked in the old First Division.

“If you go back to the old Football League, there were always a variety of winners,” he said. “Can you imagine a Nottingham Forest or a Derby County winning the league title now?

“There’s no chance of a club like Reading ever challenging the top four — that’s not negative, it’s just realistic. It’s a closed shop and anyone who thinks otherwise is a fool. We’ve created monsters.”

The Premier League would do well to heed Coppell’s gloomy prophecy. The Royals manager is not the sort who trades in snazzy sound-bites: his quietly efficient work at the Madejski stadium, and previously at Palace, has never been trumpeted, precisely because he refuses to draw attention to himself in the media.

Neither can this be dismissed as the bitter tirade of a beaten man. Reading may be experiencing their worst run since November — three successive defeats — but they have already secured their safety and are just a point shy of the top six. European football is no longer an impossible dream.

Yet Coppell’s major gripe — that a provincial club, fuelled only by hard graft and raw talent, can no longer entertain hope of upsetting the established aristocracy — still stands. The Premiership, blinded by pound signs, has become the antithesis of genuine sporting competition.

Arsenal proved it on Saturday.

Arsene Wenger’s side might have been expected to labour without the crackling contributions of Thierry Henry and Emmanuel Adebayor, and the solidity of Kolo Toure and Emmanuel Eboue, but despite a late flurry from the visitors they were never seriously vexed.

Having missed a glut of chances in the first half — with Francesc Fabregas, scuffing wide of an open goal — Arsenal turned the screw in the second. Gilberto easily converted a penalty after Gael Clichy had been fouled by Andre Bikey, and Julio Baptista added a second after barging past Graeme Murty.

Reading might have snatched the most unlikely of points after Fabregas diverted a corner into his own net, with Jens Lehmann saving well in injury time from Steve Sidwell, but a draw would have been a travesty and Dave Kitson, the Reading forward, summed up the league’s problem when he noted that a narrow defeat “does us quite a lot of credit”.

Victory was the ideal balm for a troubled week at Arsenal. Three defeats and an ugly spat with the Football Association over the club’s treatment by match officials had upset the mood but spirits are perky again ahead of Wednesday’s crucial Champions League meeting with PSV Eindhoven.

Wenger, acutely aware that his team must score at least twice to progress after their 1-0 defeat in Holland last week, will recall Henry to the squad although his participation rests on a fitness test scheduled for Tuesday.

“We were a bit down and frustrated because of the results,” Gilberto admitted. “PSV is the biggest game of our year because if we lose the season will be over in terms of trophies. We are going to have to be patient and remain calm.”

Opta Fact: Arsenal won their ninth penalty of the season in the Premiership — the most in the division.

Opta Fact: Reading have scored at least once in their last six Premiership away games but have not scored more than twice in a road trip all season.