Arsene Wenger says Manchester City are even stronger than Arsenal's Invincibles as they have 'petrol and ideas'

Sign up to Miguel Delaney’s Reading the Game newsletter sent straight to your inbox for free

Sign up to Miguel’s Delaney’s free weekly newsletter

Please enter a valid email address

Please enter a valid email address

SIGN UP

I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy policy

Arsene Wenger believes that Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City could be even stronger than his own famous Invincibles side, because while both teams had “ideas”, City have “petrol” on their side too.

Wenger’s Invincibles won the 2003-04 Premier League title without losing one league game all season, a record City are currently heading for. They have won 16 and drawn one of their 17 league games this season, including a record-breaking 15 straight wins. They are on track for 109 points, which would be 14 more than the current record, set by Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea in 2004-05.

Wenger is now asked almost every week if Guardiola’s City are as good as his best Arsenal sides and at his Friday morning press conference, he said that they did look as good.

Although he pointedly added that while City are “more efficient”, that is because they have the resources that come with being owned by Abu Dhabi, and having spent hundreds of millions of pounds over the years, on players, facilities and of course on Guardiola himself.

“Look, we had no petrol but ideas, they have petrol and ideas,” Wenger explained when asked to compare this City team to the Invincibles. “So that makes it more efficient. Overall, yes, they are like that, so everybody expects and projects that they will last. Why not? It can happen, but there is still a long way to go. At the moment, I think everything goes for them inside the games. But maybe as well they have the quality to turn it in their favour.”

Asked what exactly he meant by ‘petrol’, Wenger confirmed that he meant the money City have enjoyed since their Abu Dhabi takeover almost 10 years ago. Although he added that he still respected their football achievement, given how good they now are. “They have resources,” he said. “Money and quality is what I wanted to say. In their managements and players they have everything that is needed to be successful. It is still not easy, they still to respect that achievement.”