Arsenal Thread 2013/14

[Ronuja]

It would be a one game ban, but Chamberlain can now argue that he did not stop a goalscoring opportunity, because the ball was going wide. Depends on what the rules are.

I am still shocked that Wenger sets out his teams so open in the big games. They don';t have the quality like they used to, which meant they could blow teams away. The likes of Carzola are a liability defensively. For the big games he really needs to play Flamini and Arteta, with wide men that will track back. It's embarrassing how they have conceded 6 and 5 to the other top four teams.

For me Arteta is gone and has been for a couple of seasons. They have nothing in midfield when games arent going their way, they dont really have it in them to grind results out against a decent side. They are suffering with injuries i know, but not sure why Flamini was on the bench.

no argument about how poor we were, but to say we have nothing in midfield is a bit over the top.

today we were missing ozil wilshere walcott and ramsey, the latter who was the best player in the league till he got injured. they are 4 first team players, and make a huge difference to the team. 2 of those players are the best players in our team, and walcott gives us something that can trouble any team.

our problem is always injuries, they seem to rob us of our best players more constantly then any other team, thats our fault obviously and something needs to be looked at.

its not a coincidence that the quality of our football and form has gone out the windows since the injuries started kicking in, first ramsey then walcott then wilshere then ozil.

i know we lost 6-3 against city with ramsey and ozil, but come on that can happen to any team at the etihad and we still scored 3 goals ourselves.

Sure we were missing key players, but the ones who were out there, Mertesacker, Cazorla, Oxlade Chamberlain- you expect them to be able to play, while instead they were utter shit dipped in vomit baked in an oven topped by a layer of toxic sludge. Injuries are always our problem and maybe to some extent we deal with them worse than other teams, but everyone has to handle injuries. It's no excuse for three utter humiliations. The game at the Etihad I don't midn so much because we showed some fight, it was proper competitive for some of the match. But Anfield and Stamford Bridge, fuck. So much pain. It's only slowly receding even a day afterwards.

 

[terraloon]

if the Ox gets a suspension, would it be for 1 game or 2? They play Swansea at home on Tuesday

Is it considered the same as what Vinnie did? Professional foul, if so i guess just the one game.

It would be a one game ban, but Chamberlain can now argue that he did not stop a goalscoring opportunity, because the ball was going wide. Depends on what the rules are.

I am still shocked that Wenger sets out his teams so open in the big games. They don';t have the quality like they used to, which meant they could blow teams away. The likes of Carzola are a liability defensively. For the big games he really needs to play Flamini and Arteta, with wide men that will track back. It's embarrassing how they have conceded 6 and 5 to the other top four teams.

I would suspect that the FA will transfer the red card to OX, no need for Gibbs to appeal.
Irrespective of the obvious cock up why would a player punch the ball if he didn't think it was going in? Which for me suggests that Ox did what he did with the intention of denying a clear goal scoring opportunity.

 

[Marvin]

Ox will get a one-match suspension because the ref did not make an obvious error in his decision that it was a red card offence.

With regards to Arsenal, despite some top defensive players in Gibbs, Koscielny and Vermaelen, as a team they can't defend. It's not players, it's Wenger's footballing approach. He needs to change, or go if Arsenal are to win the League. Using the financial power, of City, Chelsea and Man Utd is dodging the real issue.

Arsenal are capable of beating anyone, but they are vulnerable against top teams. I listened to Frank Mclintock on Sportsweek this morning and he claimed that Wenger's lack of defensive discipline costs his team. In the first 30 mins he said the full backs should be close to the centre-backs but Arsenal's full-backs push up and and their central defenders are left exposed to counter-attacks. He went on to say that Barcelona play a similar attacking style, but that when they lose the ball, all their players sprint to close the ball down, and Arsenal don't do that

City are mid-way between Arsenal and Barcelona in that City press to an extent and also we have the best defensive midfielder in the Premiership in Fernandinho. Arsenal are left even more exposed when Flamini is not available

 

[GunnerGer]

I was one of the Arsenal fans today in the Shed Upper Row 3 just to the left of he goal as you look at it.

So I had an excellent view of the game and goals.

Before the start when I saw the team selection, I winced. No Flamini? What was Wenger thinking? And Podolski on the left? He's been hopeless there. As for the Ox in midfield. He's indisciplined and gives the ball away too much.

I feared the worst and having been in the away end at Anfield, events turned sour very quickly and in a déjà vu way.

Tactics were insane. Team selection was crap. I know we had key players missing and don't have the squad strength of Chelsea but we should never lose any game by that margin. I have been to City away, Liverpool away and now Chelsea away.

We are back to where we probably belong battling for 4th spot.

I feel pissed off and will finish the rest of this bottle of wine and seek solace in English cricket (oh fuck!)

I hope City or Liverpool win the title. I can't bear the idea of Chelsea winning it who by the way seem to attract a particularly obnoxious type of fan.

Good post mate. It's awful for something like that to happen once a season but 3 times now is a feckin disgrace.

Its hard to explain how we are so awful in these games. I mean, I can see why we are awful, but why is it being allowed to happen?!
Before yesterday we had 13 clean sheets, joint best in the league. We can go to Spurs, to Munich, to Dortmund and put on good defensive performances. We can play Liverpool and Chelsea and Utd at home and not concede a goal. So why oh why when we go to these places and play like a feckin pub team? We've conceded 34 goals this season, and 17 of these, yep 50%, have been in these three games!

None of that front 6 should be a starter in our strongest team next year. We need an upgrade at defensive midfield, left wing and up front! Arteta's legs are gone, yet he flanks him with Ox who doesn't have the awareness yet to play these big games away from home, and leaves Flamini on the bench?! Podolski just doesn't suit the system at all, and the less I say about Giroud the better. That's not knee jerk, I've been saying the same about Giroud forever.

It really was just a rerun of the Liverpool game. You would think after that spanking, the tactics would be to stay behind the ball, keep it tight, stay nice and compact at least for the first 20mins. Watch those first 3 goals again, literally no midfield, and Sagna and Gibbs aren't even in shot in any of them.

A total joke like. And Szcezney can shove his selfie up his arse!!


Ah.......that's better.......:-)

 

[Bilboblue]

Not even close.

basic stupid reply.

just to elaborate, basic and stupid because even if you don't agree he was the best, to say he was not even close is just silly. i think he was the best but most people would agree he was at least 1 of the best 2-3 players at that point, which is why he was being talked about as being player of the year if he carries on that form.

Sturridge, Suarez, Negredo, Aguero, Hazard, Yaya, there are 6 players that were better than Ramsey until the point he got injured.

Still a very good (and massively improved) player though, wonder where he will go to win trophies after the FA Cup you will get this season?

By the way gooners, feel the pain, not so funny seeing your side ship goals galore, is it? Now you know how we felt every time we played you a few years back! (that's said a bit tongue-in-cheek)

 

[Marvin]

I was one of the Arsenal fans today in the Shed Upper Row 3 just to the left of he goal as you look at it.

So I had an excellent view of the game and goals.

Before the start when I saw the team selection, I winced. No Flamini? What was Wenger thinking? And Podolski on the left? He's been hopeless there. As for the Ox in midfield. He's indisciplined and gives the ball away too much.

I feared the worst and having been in the away end at Anfield, events turned sour very quickly and in a déjà vu way.

Tactics were insane. Team selection was crap. I know we had key players missing and don't have the squad strength of Chelsea but we should never lose any game by that margin. I have been to City away, Liverpool away and now Chelsea away.

We are back to where we probably belong battling for 4th spot.

I feel pissed off and will finish the rest of this bottle of wine and seek solace in English cricket (oh fuck!)

I hope City or Liverpool win the title. I can't bear the idea of Chelsea winning it who by the way seem to attract a particularly obnoxious type of fan.

Good post mate. It's awful for something like that to happen once a season but 3 times now is a feckin disgrace.

Its hard to explain how we are so awful in these games. I mean, I can see why we are awful, but why is it being allowed to happen?!
Before yesterday we had 13 clean sheets, joint best in the league. We can go to Spurs, to Munich, to Dortmund and put on good defensive performances. We can play Liverpool and Chelsea and Utd at home and not concede a goal. So why oh why when we go to these places and play like a feckin pub team? We've conceded 34 goals this season, and 17 of these, yep 50%, have been in these three games!

None of that front 6 should be a starter in our strongest team next year. We need an upgrade at defensive midfield, left wing and up front! Arteta's legs are gone, yet he flanks him with Ox who doesn't have the awareness yet to play these big games away from home, and leaves Flamini on the bench?! Podolski just doesn't suit the system at all, and the less I say about Giroud the better. That's not knee jerk, I've been saying the same about Giroud forever.

It really was just a rerun of the Liverpool game. You would think after that spanking, the tactics would be to stay behind the ball, keep it tight, stay nice and compact at least for the first 20mins. Watch those first 3 goals again, literally no midfield, and Sagna and Gibbs aren't even in shot in any of them.

A total joke like. And Szcezney can shove his selfie up his arse!!


Ah.......that's better.......:-)

Vermaelen and Koscielny are for me the best 2 central defenders in the Premiership apart from Kompany, yet weak defending has been an ongoing theme for Arsenal teams over the last few seasons. The manager sets the balance between attack and defence. It's not a playing issue, it's tactical, and you don't have to play the all out defensive Chelsea game as Utd have shown in recent years.

 

[afc16]

basic stupid reply.

just to elaborate, basic and stupid because even if you don't agree he was the best, to say he was not even close is just silly. i think he was the best but most people would agree he was at least 1 of the best 2-3 players at that point, which is why he was being talked about as being player of the year if he carries on that form.

Sturridge, Suarez, Negredo, Aguero, Hazard, Yaya, there are 6 players that were better than Ramsey until the point he got injured.

Still a very good (and massively improved) player though, wonder where he will go to win trophies after the FA Cup you will get this season?

By the way gooners, feel the pain, not so funny seeing your side ship goals galore, is it? Now you know how we felt every time we played you a few years back! (that's said a bit tongue-in-cheek)

well a lot of this sort of stuff is also based on opinions so on that basis in hindsight i can't questions yours, i can only argue mine.

in almost every media circle/pundits/newspapers, the player they were mentioning was ramsey as likely to be winning player of the year.

none of the players you mentioned (that i remember anyway) were single handedly winning games, taking games by the scruff of the neck, scoring spectacular goals on as regular basis as ramsey was. also a lot of it was the scale of the improvement as well from previous seasons.

remember that liverpool before december were not playing as spectacularly as they are now even though suarez was still scoring goals.

neither were yourselves or chelsea.

as for where will ramsey go, hes just signed a new contract and i dont think city fans (yet) are in any position to goad us about losing our best players.

we could finish this season with the fa cup, and you could easily end up with just the capital one cup. who would have had the better season?

i think this season has showed that we have the *majority* of the ingredients needed to challenge for the title and other trophies. even after our rubbish 2nd half of the season, we are only a handful of points behind the leaders. remember the other 3 teams have at least 1 if not 2/3 top top strikers, world class ones. we don't have any.

we also have a very good defence overall.

all in all we are not far away at all, and i wouldn't question our ability to compete for trophies beyond this season if i was a fan of any other club.

 

[afc16]

I was one of the Arsenal fans today in the Shed Upper Row 3 just to the left of he goal as you look at it.

So I had an excellent view of the game and goals.

Before the start when I saw the team selection, I winced. No Flamini? What was Wenger thinking? And Podolski on the left? He's been hopeless there. As for the Ox in midfield. He's indisciplined and gives the ball away too much.

I feared the worst and having been in the away end at Anfield, events turned sour very quickly and in a déjà vu way.

Tactics were insane. Team selection was crap. I know we had key players missing and don't have the squad strength of Chelsea but we should never lose any game by that margin. I have been to City away, Liverpool away and now Chelsea away.

We are back to where we probably belong battling for 4th spot.

I feel pissed off and will finish the rest of this bottle of wine and seek solace in English cricket (oh fuck!)

I hope City or Liverpool win the title. I can't bear the idea of Chelsea winning it who by the way seem to attract a particularly obnoxious type of fan.

Good post mate. It's awful for something like that to happen once a season but 3 times now is a feckin disgrace.

Its hard to explain how we are so awful in these games. I mean, I can see why we are awful, but why is it being allowed to happen?!
Before yesterday we had 13 clean sheets, joint best in the league. We can go to Spurs, to Munich, to Dortmund and put on good defensive performances. We can play Liverpool and Chelsea and Utd at home and not concede a goal. So why oh why when we go to these places and play like a feckin pub team? We've conceded 34 goals this season, and 17 of these, yep 50%, have been in these three games!

None of that front 6 should be a starter in our strongest team next year. We need an upgrade at defensive midfield, left wing and up front! Arteta's legs are gone, yet he flanks him with Ox who doesn't have the awareness yet to play these big games away from home, and leaves Flamini on the bench?! Podolski just doesn't suit the system at all, and the less I say about Giroud the better. That's not knee jerk, I've been saying the same about Giroud forever.

It really was just a rerun of the Liverpool game. You would think after that spanking, the tactics would be to stay behind the ball, keep it tight, stay nice and compact at least for the first 20mins. Watch those first 3 goals again, literally no midfield, and Sagna and Gibbs aren't even in shot in any of them.

A total joke like. And Szcezney can shove his selfie up his arse!!


Ah.......that's better.......:-)

Vermaelen and Koscielny are for me the best 2 central defenders in the Premiership apart from Kompany, yet weak defending has been an ongoing theme for Arsenal teams over the last few seasons. The manager sets the balance between attack and defence. It's not a playing issue, it's tactical, and you don't have to play the all out defensive Chelsea game as Utd have shown in recent years.

i think you meant kos and mertesacker, vermalin has hardly played.

its all down to tactics as you say, i could not believe how high gibbs was getting, and not even bothering to track back. once and its criminal, but then for the 2nd goal it happened again and its just so basic its unreal.

wengers biggest flaw is his stubbornness to change things when they clearly aren't working.

theres an instance i remember when we played man u about 3 years ago at emirates. in the 1st 10 mins we were absolutely ripping them to shreds, and fergie made a tiny tactical change, he moved scholes' position a bit, and from there onwards dominated the rest of the game and won. i still remember that small thing because at the time and even to this day i think to myself that wenger, to our teams detriment, would never do anything like that.

no matter how much something isn't working, he will wait till 60/70 mins before changing it.

 

[Gillespie]

I was one of the Arsenal fans today in the Shed Upper Row 3 just to the left of he goal as you look at it.

So I had an excellent view of the game and goals.

Before the start when I saw the team selection, I winced. No Flamini? What was Wenger thinking? And Podolski on the left? He's been hopeless there. As for the Ox in midfield. He's indisciplined and gives the ball away too much.

I feared the worst and having been in the away end at Anfield, events turned sour very quickly and in a déjà vu way.

Tactics were insane. Team selection was crap. I know we had key players missing and don't have the squad strength of Chelsea but we should never lose any game by that margin. I have been to City away, Liverpool away and now Chelsea away.

We are back to where we probably belong battling for 4th spot.

I feel pissed off and will finish the rest of this bottle of wine and seek solace in English cricket (oh fuck!)

I hope City or Liverpool win the title. I can't bear the idea of Chelsea winning it who by the way seem to attract a particularly obnoxious type of fan.

Good post mate. It's awful for something like that to happen once a season but 3 times now is a feckin disgrace.

Its hard to explain how we are so awful in these games. I mean, I can see why we are awful, but why is it being allowed to happen?!
Before yesterday we had 13 clean sheets, joint best in the league. We can go to Spurs, to Munich, to Dortmund and put on good defensive performances. We can play Liverpool and Chelsea and Utd at home and not concede a goal. So why oh why when we go to these places and play like a feckin pub team? We've conceded 34 goals this season, and 17 of these, yep 50%, have been in these three games!

None of that front 6 should be a starter in our strongest team next year. We need an upgrade at defensive midfield, left wing and up front! Arteta's legs are gone, yet he flanks him with Ox who doesn't have the awareness yet to play these big games away from home, and leaves Flamini on the bench?! Podolski just doesn't suit the system at all, and the less I say about Giroud the better. That's not knee jerk, I've been saying the same about Giroud forever.

It really was just a rerun of the Liverpool game. You would think after that spanking, the tactics would be to stay behind the ball, keep it tight, stay nice and compact at least for the first 20mins. Watch those first 3 goals again, literally no midfield, and Sagna and Gibbs aren't even in shot in any of them.

A total joke like. And Szcezney can shove his selfie up his arse!!


Ah.......that's better.......:-)

In the cold light of day and after some enforced sober reflection ( now that the neurofen has kicked in after overdoing the laughing juice last night) I have come to one firm conclusion.

I have always been firmly behind Wenger. Always recognising that no team has a divine right to year on year success and there are cycles in football etc. etc.

I recognised that after the move from Highbury to the Emirates ( vital if we were to be able to generate income to compete at the top level) there would be a long period of relative lack of success because of financial restraints.

To give Wenger his due, before he arrived, we finished in the top 4 only 23 times in 92 years. After he arrived we have never been out of the top 4 which is a huge achievement when you consider the lack of money these past 8 years.

However, those financial constraints have disappeared now. This should be the promised land we were told to expect. As a club we are currently sitting on cash in excess of £150m. We should be able to compete now in signing marquee players.

It is just not acceptable to be beaten 6-3, 5-1 and 6-0 in the same season. It smacks of gutlessness and mediocrity. He knew Theo was injured for the season, he knew we needed a striker and what did we get in January? A makeweight midfielder with an injured back, for Chrissakes!

We get beaten at Anfield and does he learn the lesson that you can not have both full backs sprinting upfield and leaving our 2 central defenders to cope with Chelsea and Liverpools attackers running at them in full pelt on the counter.

Tactics were abysmal. Team selection was plain daft. No Flamini and a slow Podolski out wide who often fails to track back.

Criminal. No excuse for not learning from previous results.

As far as I am concerned, failure to win the FA Cup or a failure to secure a top 4 finish is unacceptable. In either of those instances Wenger has to go.

Maybe like Moses, Wenger is not fated to see the Promised Land.

 

[malg]

^^not to see the promised land? Christ, he managed a team that went a full season unbeaten in the league.