the way you got to look at it is pick your strongest arsenal 11 availible to you and a chelsea/man utd starting 11. how many arsenal players would get into the chelsea and man utd teams??? possibly just fabregas and maybe van persie is some cases but thats it. you have class players but chelsea and man utd have world class players. also i think the club and fans are obsesed with playing a so called right way to play football what has that done for you recently, you need to learn how to adapt a more physcal way to play the game.
Erm Sagna? Arshavin? Fabregas? Van Persie? But its hard to compare because your players
have peaked or are past it and our players are peaking or are about to.
And for your second point, look at Barcelona.