Arsenal thread | 2025/26

Danny Tiatto said:
You’re kidding right? He gets nothing but plaudits and headlines and thats the point I’m trying to make.

How long did it take Rodri (a far superior player) to get the attention and recognition that Rice is getting now? Like I said if the guy wasn’t English he wouldn’t even be spoke about.
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From an Arsenal perspective at least we always knew Rodri was an exceptional player. The best player in the world in fact. Maybe the Dippers cast aspersions on him but we always knew he is a phenomenal player, and for sure better than Rice.

It was also fucking hilarious seeing Vinicius throw his toys out of the pram!
 
ChicagoBlue said:
He’s a better Nico Gonzales, who also takes corners and free kicks. He walks into the England team and the Arsenal team, and would have been the obvious and natural replacement for Gundo/Kovacic, even with Rodri fit and healthy…but he could have filled in for him, too, last year.

I give up. He’s shit and would be on the bench at City…got it!

(Delusional and I’m done.)
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He's a completely different player to Nico Gonzalez. He's more like Reijnders. Hes a front facing player. Good when the pitch is in front of him. He's not a 6. never will be. ridiculous comparison with Gundogan. Chalk and Cheese.
PS nowhere did i say he was shit. He's clearly a very good player at what he does.
 
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bridgeno1 said:
Rice is a bit like David Silva or Santi Cazorla. Basically a player that other teams' fans don't appreciate so much because they don't see them week in/week out but when you do see them every game you realise they are a minimum 8/10 every match and are key to the team even though they don't get the headlines of other players.
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Rice and Cazorla in the same sentence as David Silva? You're just taking the piss now.
 
Alan Harper's Tash said:
He’s not as complete as either of those. He’s more akin to Gerrard. Very good at most things, but the downside of chasing the ball all over the pitch means he’s out of position too much.
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Both his club and international team are playing him with someone that holds a bit more.
Now that might be because of what you say above, or it might be because much like with Kante, their managers think that having him as a traditional 6 doesn't get the best out of him. Or maybe a bit of both.
 
GunnerGer said:
Both his club and international team are playing him with someone that holds a bit more.
Now that might be because of what you say above, or it might be because much like with Kante, their managers think that having him as a traditional 6 doesn't get the best out of him. Or maybe a bit of both.
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Comparing him to Gerrard isn’t an insult. He’s pretty complete, it’s just that his positioning is suspect at times. You need your 6 to be positionally aware at the top level, hence he’s now a box to box 8. City struggled last season as we had Kovacic in the 6 and he’s of a similar ilk.

All players have flaws. It’s how you mask them that matters.

His improvement in set piece delivery is a huge extra string to his bow.
 
Alan Harper's Tash said:
Comparing him to Gerrard isn’t an insult. He’s pretty complete, it’s just that his positioning is suspect at times. You need your 6 to be positionally aware at the top level, hence he’s now a box to box 8. City struggled last season as we had Kovacic in the 6 and he’s of a similar ilk.

All players have flaws. It’s how you mask them that matters.

His improvement in set piece delivery is a huge extra string to his bow.
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Fair points mate. I think this season him and Zubimendi have been playing much more like a traditional midfield pairing, with taking turns in holding and in build up, bombing on, with Eze playing more like a traditional number 10. It will be interesting to see if that continues with Odegaard back.
 
GunnerGer said:
Fair points mate. I think this season him and Zubimendi have been playing much more like a traditional midfield pairing, with taking turns in holding and in build up, bombing on, with Eze playing more like a traditional number 10. It will be interesting to see if that continues with Odegaard back.
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Having a top 6 means your 8s can do more. Zubimendi is better than Partey.
 
GunnerGer said:
I mean, i made an error in my thinking that i owned up to that I'm not even sure anyone would have pointed out with the way i worded it, so if that makes me a 'know nothing fukwit' then ill take that.

I've not got giddy after the start of the season, i assume nothing when it comes to what will be won this season, believe me, i never make bold predications and I've been on here for over a decade. The overall point was that a few years ago, there was a big gap in quality between the teams and the squad, i think that gap has closed up as evidenced by the performance's over the last couple of seasons and this season. That means that picking combined XI's become a lot more subjective and supporters bias (on both sides) will kick in. That's all i was saying.

Oh, and this know nothing fukwit does remember that 2 seasons ago our form didn't deteriorate after Xmas, in fact we won 16 out of the last 18 games (& still won nothing). And if we are discussing injuries, would only be fair to point out that we lost a lot of our forwards the last few months of last season and had to play a centre midfielder up front February onwards.
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You are sounding giddy as fuck.
 
Alan Harper's Tash said:
Having a top 6 means your 8s can do more. Zubimendi is better than Partey.
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Disagree massively with this. Partey (off field controversies aside) was what made Arsenal tick. Very good midfielder. Zubumendi still has it all to prove and I’m not convinced he will handle the physicality of the Premier league.
 
bridgeno1 said:
Rice is a bit like David Silva or Santi Cazorla. Basically a player that other teams' fans don't appreciate so much because they don't see them week in/week out but when you do see them every game you realise they are a minimum 8/10 every match and are key to the team even though they don't get the headlines of other players.
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I get your point but would have use Garth Barry as an example not Merlin
 
Danny Tiatto said:
Disagree massively with this. Partey (off field controversies aside) was what made Arsenal tick. Very good midfielder. Zubumendi still has it all to prove and I’m not convinced he will handle the physicality of the Premier league.
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A lot of Arsenal fans thought the same re Partey and Zubimendi in the summer, with the same worry. I think most of them will admit they think they have got that wrong.
 
cheekybids said:
You are sounding giddy as fuck.
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Not giddy at all mate. Happy where we are, think we are better equipped squad wise than previous seasons to try and last the distance, but fully appreciate it's early and many things can happen, and that even if you think you have a good squad, injuries to your key players can make a big difference.

Also fully aware that even though City were in a bit of a transition, you look like getting into a rhythm now and showing consistency and especially with Pep as manager and Haaland putting up freak numbers you'll be right up there again.
 
GunnerGer said:
A lot of Arsenal fans thought the same re Partey and Zubimendi in the summer, with the same worry. I think most of them will admit they think they have got that wrong.
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Very very early days. I don’t think Zubumendi was overly impressive against either us or Liverpool.

As of now I would still have Partey as comfortably the better footballer
 
Danny Tiatto said:
Very very early days. I don’t think Zubumendi was overly impressive against either us or Liverpool.

As of now I would still have Partey as comfortably the better footballer
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Yeah, it is early, and I agree, I don't think Zubimendi had his best game in either of the games you mention, so yeah in that sense he does need to prove he can perform in the big games in this league.

The part I think that's surprised Arsenal fans about him is that for some reason he looks smaller than he actually is, especially for this league, but I was trying to tell them many back in the summer he's actually a tenacious fecker at times and for that reason I don't think he'll be bullied.

Partey the player was a really good player, but by each passing season his legs were going and if he got caught wrong side of a player he struggled to get back, and he had lost a fair bit of that athleticism that made him so effective in the first place.
 
Gingers Dad said:
Rice and Cazorla in the same sentence as David Silva? You're just taking the piss now.
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Steady on. Cazorla is to Gunners what Silva is to City - a club legend that other fans don't appreciate. Sadly Cazorla was struck down by injuries all too often but was a fab player when the lad was fit.
 
Danny Tiatto said:
Disagree massively with this. Partey (off field controversies aside) was what made Arsenal tick. Very good midfielder. Zubumendi still has it all to prove and I’m not convinced he will handle the physicality of the Premier league.
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Well it's been 11 league games so not really long enough to make a sound judgement but re the new signings I think both Zubimendi and Gyokeres are sorely missed when they are missing from the team and only then do our fans realise what we have.

Eze has been a bit 'meh', Madueke looks decent but end product is noticeably worse than Saka. Mosquera has looked good when he comes in but in every match has made one big error (and for the rest of it played well). Hincapie looks like an absolute hardcase lunatic - hasn't had many minutes but when he has played has done ok, albeit he has played against weaker teams.
 
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