Arsenal’s record 49-game unbeaten League run may have ended in a typically controversial defeat by Manchester United, but history will record their achievement as one of the finest ever in top-class football.

The sequence stretched from 7 May 2003 until 16 October 2004 and was unprecedented: no other English club (not even MU!!) had gone undefeated for so many league games since the Football League began in 1888.

Among the major European leagues, only AC Milan Sachhi's 'Invinsble' side have done better than Arsenal. They put together a 58-match unbeaten run from 1991-93.

The Gunners embarked on their undefeated odyssey with a 6-1 thrashing of Southampton in the penultimate Premiership fixture of 2002-03, and finished that season with a 4-0 win at Sunderland. Then last season they won the title with a record of 26 wins, 12 draws and no defeats, scoring 73 goals and conceding 26, to finish with 90 points - 11 more than runners-up Chelsea.

Their feat emulated that of Preston North-End in the inaugural season of League football, 1888-89. Preston’s ’Invincibles’ went through a 22-game campaign season without defeat. By the end of last season, Arsenal’s run stood at 40 matches.

And on 22nd August this year they equalled Nottingham Forest’s record 42-match run, beating Middlesbrough 5-3 despite having trailed 3-1 in the second-half. A 3-0 victory over Blackburn broke Forest’s 1977-78 record, and the run was extended to 49 with victories over Norwich and Fulham, a draw against Bolton, and wins against Manchester City, Charlton and Aston Villa.

Robert Pires scored the third goal in the 3-1 win against Villa, which proved to be the last in the sequence. Pires had also scored the first goal in the run. (how co-incidental that?)

In total, Arsenal won 36 and drew 13 of their 49 games, amassing 121 points out of a possible 147. They scored 112 goals (39 coming from Thierry Henry), an average of 2.9 per game, and conceded just 34 - an average of 0.7.

In only four of those games did they fail to score (0-0 draws against Manchester United, Fulham, Newcastle and Birmingham).

 For the record, longest unbeaten runs in the major leagues are as follows:

• Italy - 58 - AC Milan (1991-93)
• England - 49 - Arsenal (2003-04)
• Spain - 38 - Real Sociedad (1978-80)
• Germany - 36 - Hamburg (1982-83)
• France - 32 - Nantes (1994-95)
  

 By coincidence, Arsenal's next Premiership fixture - on Saturday - is a home game against Southampton, which is how the 49-match unbeaten sequence began.

- Hail the Gunners -

The truth is rarely pure and never simple

Oscar Wilde,
The Importance of Being Earnest, 1895, Act I

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