When Wenger came, Arsenal was named "Boring Arsenal" and they played among the least attractive football in European top football. Without Wenger, Arsenal would most likely have stayed in the vacuum and never become the club that it is today. Saying anything else is preposterous, really.
ECI = European Club Index
That's a very strange post. "Arsenal played the least attractive football in
European top football" A few days ago you said pre-Wenger Arsenal were "anonymous" in terms of European football, yet now you judging them in the context of "top European football".
You say they played the least attractive football in Europe, I think you are judging European football from the 1990s against the standards of today. The game has changed a lot since then in many ways, for instance the back-pass rule was introduced in 1992/3 prior to this teams could aimlessly pass the ball between defenders and goalkeeper and the keeper could then pick it up as and when he pleased, killing any opposition attack. You also saw man marking decline as a concept in the mid/early 1990s, prior to this teams would be set up with as many as 5-6 of the players merely there to negate the oppositions attackers, it meant games were a lot more defensive.
Also English club sides were tactically behind European clubs in the early 1990s as they hadnt played competitive continential football for 5 years. In this environment very few of the English club sides were entertaining to watch. In 1990-1 the only teams English clubs beat by more than 2 goals were Ostrava (Villa beat), Pécs, Wrexham, Legia Warsaw and Montpellier (Man Utd). In 1991-2 again you didnt have that many big English wins against quality sides, Liverpool beat a Finnish team (Lathti?) and Tirol by more than 6 goals but went out to Genoa, Spurs beat Porto 3-1 and an Austrial team 2-0 but went out to Feyenoord, Man Utd beat a greek team 2-0 after extra time and then went out to Atletico Madrid. Arsenal beat Austria Vienna 6-2, but then went out to Benfica in extra time. In 1992-3 Man Utd went out in the first round on penalties to Torpedo Moscow after 0-0 in both legs, Sheff Wed beat a Luxembourg team 10-2 but then lost 5-3 to Kaiserslauten, Liverpool beat Limassol of Cyprus 6-2 but lost by that score to Spartak Moscow, in the European Cup that year Leeds lost on away goals to Stuttgart but were given a replay after Stuttgart made an illegal substitution, Leeds won but then lost in round 2 to Rangers.
Finally in 1993-4 you begin to see English teams doing a bit better, Norwich beat Vitesse and then edged out Bayern Munich 3-2 before losing to eventual UEFA Cup winners Inter, Villa beat Bratislava and then lost to Depor, in the CL Man Utd beat Honved 5-3 but then lost to Galatasaray. Arsenal actually won the 1993-4 Cup Winners Cup, becoming the second English club to win a European trophy since the 5 year ban (Man Utd also won this in 1990-1) on the way they beat Liege, Odense, PSG, Torino and Parma. In 1994-5 Man Utd played 6, won 2 (Gothenburger, Galatasary) drew 2 and lost 2 so didnt make it out of the CL group, in the UEFA Blackburn went out in the first round (to Trelleborg and Inter), Newcastle beat Antwerp but then went out to Bilbao in round 2 as did Villa (Round 1 beat Inter on pens, R2 lost to Trabzonspor). The only English teams to make it far in Europe that season were Chelsea and Arsenal both in the Cup Winners Cup, Chelsea got to the Semis, and Arsenal lost in the final.
So you can see in the first 4-5 years since the European ban English teams generally struggled. They were all playing somewhat archaic football and generally did pretty average. In fact in some ways Arsenal were the best English performers since they made two finals and won one of them. It's very disingenuous to imply they were the worst footballing team in Europe, since their football was no different to most of the other English teams and you dont take into account the disadvantages English teams faced in the early 1990s. They certainly were not in a vacuum they were sucessful both domestically and in Europe, indeed Wenger's 8 years without a trophy is a longer gap then to the last trophy before he was in charge (you have to go back to the 80s/70s for a similar barren run). And it's pure wild speculation to say how good the club would have been without him.