Oxo a lone positive in a night that leaves me worrying for the next 5

by & filed under Uncategorized.

Well good morning everyone!

I didn’t attend (I watched online) the game yesterday, so I won’t pretend that I can dish out any sort of world-class match report here, but it was certainly a game of two halves and one where fitness and the quality gulf ultimately saved us from another humiliation.

Shrewsbury took a deserved lead early on after a cross from wide right looked so scary, Johan Djorrou couldn’t find it in himself to jump and defend it, Morgan found himself in acres of space and nodded the header past the rooted Fabianski. Boo’s reverberated around the stadium, the fans were not happy.

The next 15-20 minutes Arsenal continued to invite pressure on their goal. We struggled to get our foot on the game and we offered our keeper very little protection, not the most impressive of first halves. It appeared the confidence problem had leaked into every part of the squad. It’s not often a top 4 team could complain they were being outplayed by a League 2 side.

Jenkinson whipped a low cross into the Shrewsbury box on around the 30 minutes mark, the Englishman did well to fashion a downward header into the bottom corner, the keeper scrambled but not quickly enough to keep it out. A good goal and relief for the 46,000 fans who attended.

The second half was the Oxo show. He started to find his feet in the game and almost immediately made an impact, picking the ball out in the middle of the park, looking up and smashing in a low pile driver from 25 yards out. More than deserved and an exceptional goal for his first full debut regardless of who we were playing.

Yossi Benayoun added a third late on after Oyakzup did well to keep the ball in play, cutting it back to the Israeli who fired his shot past the keeper for his 2nd in his career!

All in all, not a game too many will come away from feeling convinced. We’re still struggling woefully at the back and we’re only a tweaked hamstring or a back spasm away from having to field Johann Djourrou against some pretty nasty teams.

Make no mistake, last night was a bad performance. That lack of urgency and concentration that had hindered us or years still show no sign of relenting even with a squad of unknowns slipping in. Should so-called Premiership defenders be getting run ragged by a player sacked by a Aldershot and a winger on his 5th club? This is a team so depleted, they could only name 6 subs!

Arsene Wenger wouldn’t be drawn on the need for a defensive coach,

“I’ve just completed 32 years of coaching – I don’t want to answer this kind of question.”

You’d think in 32 years of coaching someone would have pointed out to him that this was an important part of the game, especially if the last 5 years have seen your defence become progressively worse. Especially if your team is conceding 2.8 goals a game in the league.

Trouble is, we know that it’s a dictatorship down at the Grove and anyone who comes in would have to have an opinion on how we play and Arsene Wenger is not a fan of being told he might have something wrong. Did anyone hear Pat Rice say he didn’t enjoy the responsibility of managing the side last week? Embarrassing. We begged to keep that attitude on for a year.

I’ll take the win. I’ll take the knowledge that AOC could emerge as a talent that will numb the not too sharp a pain of losing Theo, but I’m still gravely concerned about the direction of this club over the next few months. Our manager shouldn’t be in a position where he is told he is un-sackable. It’s a nonsense. Where is the accountability? Where is the motivation for him to change what he’s doing? It’s madness.

I kind of feel for Gazidis though. What can he say 2 months into the season? The cost of removing Wenger now would be £20million+, you’d have no time to bed a new manager in and it could all end in a disaster that would fully be on the head of CEO for years to come.

We’ll have to ride out this season and pray to god a miracle happens and we finish 4th. At the moment, that looks like a pipe dream, we simply don’t have the quality, we don’t have the preparation and the players don’t look like they have the guidance.

The next 5 games could get very messy…

Radio

I made a brief appearance on Radio 5 live last night, which had one caller praising the site and reeling off stats he’d picked up from Sunday’s post, followed by a rampant AKB more interested in debating Le Grove than the facts of Wenger’s demise as a manager. Very embarrassing. He even thought it relevant verbally spell out a very naughty word on a family radio station. The embodiment of class and intelligence.

Fancy that, a debate about Le Grove on the biggest news station in the world. Who’d have thunk it? I’ll post a link when I get one!

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500 Responses to “Oxo a lone positive in a night that leaves me worrying for the next 5”

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  2. IvoryGoonz

    It’s like Petain declaring DeGaulle outlaw before his call from London.
    At the end of the day, we’ll still be there after the war.

  4. BOOZY

    Goonerholic

    sorry excuse of a blog – i got banned for simply saying i wanted pat rice sacked – can you imagine that – never bothered posting anything there anymore.

    i used to like it cuz of its boozing perspective – but any blog that only allows for only a particular opinion should not be blogging at all.

    plus i hear the guy is like 85 yrs old.

  9. IvoryGoonz

    Arsenal: again, sorry, had to say that, on Arseblog, today;
    “Ideas are being tossed amongst supporters like confetti. Defensive coaches, new captains, new owners, new assistant managers. We’ve all hit the shuffle on the why-pod searching for answers. But ultimately, the finger increasingly points towards the manager. It strikes me more and more that the team’s fragility hasn’t been a question of personnel but rather a failure of coaching.”
    hmmm. oho.
    how about you start looking at the tree in your eye, rather than the matches in ours?

  26. goonerboy

    Only the most deluded can really still believe that Arsene knows. when Arsenal sit 17th in the league. AKB sites rattle on about ref conspiracies, oligarchs, injuries, extolling the great virtues of replacing your best, most experienced players with untried kids or panic buys at the end of the window, simply because they are cheaper, and blaming everyone and everything except the people and policies responsible for the teams decline. The thing which the AKB share it seems is an aversion to any change in the running of the club.
    The comments of the AKB towards other Arsenal fans who do not share their views are often offensive and misguided-but they are also completely irrelevant. Who gives a shit what such idiots think. They are clearly part of the problem- as much as Gazidis and Kroenke are.

  27. yangkamp10

    we had one of the world’s best players.

    Couldn’t be arsed to build a winning team around him.

    We deserve to be shit for showing absolutely no ambition.

    Spurs have shown multiple times more ambition than us over the past 6 years.

  28. IvoryGoonz

    I think he’s on trial for now, wish him good.
    and on this good note, going to bed . Was a long day, and another big one tomorrow with my boss and my other colleague leaving’s do at mid-day which means I’ll have to focus on my keyboard for the rest of the afternoon… really this recession is killing me.

  37. Ricky

    Long live William patey!

    We need more fans Like him putting pressure on the board.

    Is mr patey a member if le grove by any chance?

  38. skandibird

    what is it with this ‘love fest’ with Cesc by everyone on Twitter, and on here? He aint a gooner no more, why bloody bother mentioning him? He couldn’t give a shit about Arsenal, if he did, he would have stayed! Can we please move on, and forget him, he looks like a some dirty Flamenco dancer with his greasy hair and stupid grin shouting ‘vamos’ – hope he fucking breaks his bloody leg.
    Oh Dear, I’m off my soap box now.

  42. Leedsgunner

    Notice to AKBs – if you want all your so called Arsenal haters to shut up then show me the trophies namely but not limited to : the PL title, the FA Cup or the Champion’s League trophy or if you must the Carling Cup. Last time I checked Arsenal was a football club and not a funfair ride for accountants. When I call my son champion I say so meaning he’s tops and not merely fourth place. If balancing the books and turning a profit means so much — I understand the UK treasury needs some inspiration. It’s not like AW needed to spend £60m for the past six years every year all the club needed to do was the get one or two players to address weaknesses which were so evident to all of us… Including the players. Imagine if we had bought Suarez or Alonso or David Luiz or Mascherano or Sanchez 2008 to 2010? Do you think Nasregas would have left? Do you think we would be 17th? What? You don’t think the club would have known about them? I thought we had the finest scouting system in the world?! Don’t make laugh… AW doesn’t lack money — he lacks balls. That’s why he is no longer fit this club.

  43. KC

    One reply on here summed it all up why things won’t change and why Wenger backed by our board will take us down the tubes. GunnerPete who quoted the “blitz” would you believe said that once the new players have had time to bed in we would have one hell of a team??? Are you kidding?? we have replaced top class players like Fabregas & Nasri with what …Arteta & Benyoun…give me a break these players personify the whole problem with the Wenger policy of doing it on the cheap!! All that is happening is that our side is growing weaker year after year because we have a squad of average EPL players rather than a side with World class players who have the class, experience & the confidence in knowing that they are good!! Along with this we now have 2 players Park & Miyachi) who quite obviously have been acquired with marketing the Asia market finished off by a defence that has little or no cordination, are weak in virtually every defensive aspect of the game…. and the only goalkeeper we have of any note is Szeczsney with no quality as backup…when he should be the one who is backup and learning…from maybe Given (who we could have bought for 3m or Friedel on a free…either of whom would have jumped at the chance of joining us) ….

    So for GunnerPete and any other blitz kids or indeed any of the AKB’s or whatever ………. to summerise in clear terms, all is not rosy and wonderful and things are not all sweetness and light, they are pretty damn depressing and all this with a Manager who has an overated opinion of himself and who looks as if he is about to implode together with a board who will back him to the hilt because as Gazidis virtually shouted on his interview, to change Wenger would be too costly (so they must have talked about it over their wine glasses) and that is a problem of their making because they gave him the contract …. a very expensive mistake to make….in fact I seem to remember that this is one thing you are taught very early on never do in business is sign off on something that if things go wrong it will cost you a bundle!!! But then again we are talking about Arsenal here, with a history of a board spending more money on themselves and on frivalous things rather than spending money where it could be most effective i.e. on buying or keeping World class players! And that IS and has been a fact since the 1950′s.

  44. KC

    “I am not bothered at all by this speculation. I have had 14 years at this club and kept them 14 years in the Champions League. I hope it lasts another 14,” said Wenger

    What arrogance!!

    Says it all really doesn’t it? the man doesn’t even consider winning anything – just getting into the CL, well that run could well be coming to an end, so what will he quote then “I am not bothered I kept them in the EPL”!!

  46. gnarleygeorge9

    “……a rampant AKB more interested in debating Le Grove than the facts of Wenger’s demise as a manager.”
    Pedro

    If anything, this blog got it right ages ago. In all my time poking about le Grove I have never once seen any of the writers or bloggers condemn The Arsenal Football Club. In fact I would say they are as loyal as anyone to the 125 year old club.

    Sometimes I’ve copped a bit of flack for shooting my mouth off about Poms v Aussies, & India v OZ , etc & I probably deserved it, but my treatment is fair, which is the case for Arsene Wenger on here, well apart from him being insulted but thats probably piss talk.

    6 years of nothing; a youth policy that was in truth a method of raising kids to sell on for profit. & this in an environment where lack of success can get you sacked after 5 matches (i.e Inter).

    If AKB’s are satisfied to accept average then thats their choice, but who do they think they are when giving Le Grove a mouthfull just coz the majority of posters crave for success.

  48. Dave

    Put it this way. Arsene would have performed fine if Mourinho and Roman did not enter the EPL. Mourinho was the perfect Anti Arsenal and it worked superbly well against us. Roman gave him the funds to weaponize it. It was there we declined. If you remember Man Utd’s first game against a Mourinho led Chelsea, they played so defensively unlike their usual ways. AW continued to keep running into the blue wall and Drogba had his day running against a defense pushed so high up searching for a goal.

    From there our model collapsed. Financial frugality and building a new stadium did NOTHING because our rivals got their sugar daddies. Our need to cut costs for a brighter financial future further hindered us causing the financial gap to be even bigger.

    I will put it on Arsene that he could not react to market changes in terms of tactics. The board for the change in financial strategies.

  50. Jim Clarke

    I find the negativity of this post surprising. Oxo the “lone positive”? Coqelin had a great game. Park and Benayoon looked lively. The team included Jenkinson, Miquel, Coqelin, Benayoon, Park, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Frimpong, Ryo, Ozyakup and Aneke, none of whom have played more than a handful of games for the club and several were making debuts

    I was going to write exactly these words above as read in Mark H’s comment. All the players he mentions showed great promise and Coquelin was Man of the Match for me.
    It was a replica performance of the 1st team ie plenty of exciting attacking football but not a clue in defence. If only Wenger had signed a couple of reliable centre halves with PL experience then we would not be in the terrible situation we are now.
    He seems to have a thing about defending as if it is unnecessary. 15 goals against in 5 games should be a wake-up call even for him.
    And please do not play Djourou or Sqillacci in any more games this season.

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