via @arsenal
Unai Emery takes charge of Arsenal vs Newcastle this evening in a tense as you like battle that could see Arsenal LEAPFROG United AND Spurs. Imagine the banter lads and laddetes… Arsenal, going above Spurs. A team they said could no longer be deemed Spursy. Title challengers a mere two months ago. The GREATEST crop of players to ever have graced Shit Hart Lane… and we could go above them in a transition season.
A thought so appetizing, even Harry Kane couldn’t resist licking it. Watching Poch and his boys botch a point yesterday gave me so much joy. Imagine moving into your new toilet bowl under the ad headline of ‘THE NEWEST STADIUM IN THE EUROPA LEAGUE’… I am physically aroused at the thought.
There are some watch-outs this evening. Rafa B is a wily old fox. He’s always been a smart tactician and he’s literally rotting away at a Newcastle. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t have some secret weapons up his sleeve. Miguel Almirón might not have scored any goals, but be honest, when has a goal drought ever been a problem for a player coming to us? We are a gift for bad records. The guy was MAJOR LEAGUE SOCCERBALL hype over in the states where the speedy wide man would electrify 70,000 fans in Atlanta. He could be a nightmare for a defence that is extremely susceptible to the long ball over the top on the fast counter-attack.
The only other worry we have is that Arsenal have had a whole bunch of players out on international duty, whilst Newcastle will have had 2 weeks to plan and practice a strategem to stifle us.
The game being at home helps, but I truly hope we don’t come back lethargic. We need to fly out the traps like we have done in the last few games. As Mike Tyson once said, ‘everyone has a strategy until they get a smack in the mouth’… the football equivalent of that is an early goal.
Emery, who came to his senses this year when he decided to bring Ramsey and Ozil in from the cold has doubled down on what good players can do for your systems.
“I think we are taking a good performance using a different system and different players,”
“For example, we started the last two matches playing 3-4-1-2.
“But we finished it playing 3-4-3, with players helping us in the 90th minute with a different system and different positions.”
“At first I used information from last year or the last two years. Mesut can play like a No 10 player, or starting on the right or left, in a different system, and he has a good mentality.
“And also Aaron Ramsey can play in a system with two or three midfielders, getting more in the opposition box.
“I used this information with this player and I think this player’s mind is very open to help us, to play in different positions and give us a big performance. He has a very good attitude to do that.”
Amen Unai… the big worry for the summer is how we replace Aaron. It’s not just a talented player we’re losing, it’s someone who understands a North London Derby, a player who knows what the shirt is all about. But fuck it, that’s a worry for another day.
We need a big performance this evening. Newcastle are an easy switch off side, they’re not sexy, they have a poor reputation and complacency could be a problem.
… but the players MUST be tasting Champions League bonus money by now. So let’s hope Emery and his coaches have them firing on greed cylinders.
BIG MATCH, see you in the comments. x
Yo
2
Us tonight (hopefully!)
Tr4phy
Nice one groovey. I wouldn’t usually take the 3rd place but it had significance
Damn!
Cheers DM
I know you strayed from your usual M.O. , but I’ll take it. Tr4phies are hard to come by when you’re lurking about…. 🙂
Really need the win tonight – it would be good to build some momentum before two tough away matches against Everton and Watford
Hopefully DM getting third place today is a good omen
Let me use a very basic probability calculation to prove how wrong and foolhardy it is to say wrong refereeing decisions even themselves out. Assume there are 8 wrong referring decisions in all the games involving a football team. If I use symbol ‘A’ to represent referring decisions going against the team and ‘F’ to represent decisions going in favor of the team. Now let us see samples of all the possible 9 events : (8F, 0A), (7F, 1A), (6F, 2A), (5F, 3A), (4F, 4A), (3F, 5A), (2F, 6A), (1F, 7A) (0F, 8A) Probability of things evening themselves out :… Read more »
Pedro
Thanks for taking out time from your demanding schedule to serv this one up.
“The only other worry we have is that Arsenal have had a whole bunch of players out on international duty, whilst Newcastle will have had 2 weeks to plan and practice a strategem to stifle us.”
I don’t think this holds true given that we kept most of our squad together and even chilled out in Dubai
We used the international break well.
I expect a bruising battle because Newcastle have genuine pace and a bruiser leading the line.
I’m a bit worried about injuries today. Salomon Randon is a great guy who just has a knack for causing defenders to get serious injuries.
They have in Longstaff, a young midfielder in the form of his life.
Shelver can move the ball around
Kennedy can draw fouls in dangerous places to give them a chance to cross the ball into dangerous places.
Every game is like a final these days.
I just hope the referee won’t ruin it.
“everyone has a strategy until they get a smack in the mouth”
Arsène agree!!
“I just hope the referee won’t ruin it.”
Stop being so pananoid. lol
Very sound analysis TR7 :).
Same thing with coins. Toss one 99 times and will you get 49.5 heads? Will you ‘eckers like.
Lets be careful with what we wish for..
@TR7, Your math are incorrect. You are mixing probability of a set of events and probability of an individual event. In order to make it easier, just assume that an incorrect decision is like tossing a coin. Head: decision for. Tail: decision against. The probability of head or tail is 50%. If you toss a coin once, you have a possibility of 50-50. If you throw the coin twice, you have a 25% chance to have two heads, 50% to have 1 head and 1 tail and a 25 % of two tails. Extend that to 9 draws and you… Read more »
Been an ETERNITY and finally we have our football back.
Marc put the thought out there about a month ago, the map to overtake Spurs. Seemed like great banter at the time, yet here we are.
Get it done boys, its your birthright.
Dissenter
I think Longstaff is injures and on the shelf for the rest of the season. I also don’t think kenedy has been getting many minutes for them.
I’m still nervy for the match. Our home record suggests we’ll be fine and bag the 3 points but this is a pesky Newcastle side
I know Ramsey seems like a very important player we’re losing, but honestly Pedro, do you think he can’t be replaced? I mean Emile Smith-Rowe is there. We still have Joe W.llock and Mailand-Niles isn’t short of confidence, we’re not losing Messi or C. Ronaldo are we? We will be fine without Ramsey. As much as he has done, he has equally frustrated. Losing Cesc Fabregas was probably more difficult.
Please enough of the referees stuff
There is NO conspiracy against Arsenal
Bad refereeing decisions DO NOT even themselves out over the course of the season
The premiership just has terrible officials and if consequences for having a bad day at the office isn’t introduced they will only get worse
Besides the same old men keep turning out as referees season after season, don’t they recruit??
@RH : without talking of “conspiracy”, you must admit that Arsenal was not very much “helped” during the last decade… but it seems to have changed a little since wenger is gone, go figure!! lol
I’m a bit hesitant about the whole VAR thing, but Chelsea got away yesterday, VAR couldn’t come faster after that farce refereeing
@Highbury
I guarantee you supporters of other clubs, even manchester united, will tell you they were not helped by referees in this or that match. it’s not a thing peculiar to Arsenal, even with Wenger.
Unfortunately Wenger used wrong refereeing decisions as an albi for poor performances and most fans bought that.
Yes we have had some poor decisions go against us and change the course of games but so has everyone else.
Bringing up Calciopoli is unnecessary
The only other worry we have is that Arsenal have had a whole bunch of players out on international duty
Not that many these days
@RH : I guess I’ve been wengerized.
Pffffft Don’t know what all the fuss is about.. Clearly if every referee decision would have been correct and everyone given correctly 100% over the last 20 years Arsene W. would have won 5 more championships and been the greatest manager the world has ever known. Obviously. I mean it all ties in to the Ancient Alien theory as put forth by Erich Von Daniken in his book .. Chariots of the Gods.. Cleary AW was an Ancient Alien.. as everyone knows martians don’t know how to use a zipper. And duh… he was ancient. So it is pretty clear… Read more »
@Receding, I would say bringing Calciopoli is very necessary. For years team in Italy have complained about the pattern of dodgy decisions. Everybody turned a blind eye and said that there was nothing to see there. All attempts to bring the truth were shot down as the work of paranoid conspiracy theorists. Newspapers colluded with Juventus to bury any news of anomalies. When suddenly the justice intervened, a certain number of recommendations were put in place. A proper independent and random system of naming referees. A transparent system of assessors. A greater number of referees to limit the possibility of… Read more »
It’s been a long three weeks without my fix of watching Emery prowling the touchline analysing the events unfolding in front of him. As far as ref decisions go, teams that are playing well, and appear in control, always get the benefit of the doubt. If you are hanging on for dear life and a defender sticks a leg out, the ref will give a pen, if you are in command and do the same thing the ref will assume the player is looking for it too much. In that 4-4 draw against Newcastle we were clearly not in control… Read more »
We hammer them today
Ok?
Lol it’s starting to look like Untold on here with all the referee conspiracy theories.
Pathetic.
So the league is rigged in whose favor exactly Valentin??
Who and who should we be looking at?? You seem to have it in for Mike Riley.
There is no calciopoli going on here, trying to link bad decisions with the corruption that was calciopoli is wrong.
Like someone once mentioned here, you try too hard to appear clever and well informed and that act is wearing thin
City have quietly set themselves up to do the impossible; win all four competitions they are participating in.
Last season it looked like a fool’s dream, but they do have a very good chance of getting that quadruple this season.
-They have the league cup won already.
-They are favorites to win the FA cup- Watford, Brighton or Wolves aren’t going to stop City.
-They are favorites to win the league and are +7 on GD already.
-They are the best team left in the CL, bar Messi’s Barcelona.
Paulinho
“As far as ref decisions go, teams that are playing well, and appear in control, always get the benefit of the doubt. If you are hanging on for dear life and a defender sticks a leg out, the ref will give a pen, if you are in command and do the same thing the ref will assume the player is looking for it too much.”
Or the team that plays with fast dribblers will get penalties while the Wenger team of the past decade would play tippy tappy just outside of the 18 yard box and not get penalties.
Dissenter – That as well. Lacazette earned that pen a few weeks back for his decision to run with the ball and engage United’s defenders in the box. Ozil and Aubameyand spent that whole match playing far too conservatively so they would’ve never gotten in pen in that fashion.
It would be understandable for fans of small teams like Burnley and Cardiff to get preoccupied with refereeing conspiracies. they tend to get the brunt of shoddy officiating.
It’s just inexcusable for Arsenal fans to do the same.
Pierre’s brigade of whingers are out in force today with their calculators.
Again it’s a AKB thing that provides an excuse for Wenger not being more successful over the years
Neil Wrnock used to be an object of derision
This referring cock-up has helped to humanize him. They only thing left is for the FA to charge him
…and then the next question is to ask what is the penalty for officials that miss glaring offsides and determine who stays up or goes down in relegation.
@Receding, Mike Riley had been outed as ManUtd fan with a particular dislike of Arsène Wenger and the foreign managers (Pochettino, …) who dared challenging him during an annual pre season meeting. During the Leicester winning season, Pochettino was the only one making references that Leicester Robert Huth and Wes Morgan seemed to get away with an extraordinary number of fouls. He got censured. However the following year, as part of the new referees recommendation a lot of those fouls were now deemed mandatory yellow card. As I have said before, I don’t think that Mike Riley is issuing orders… Read more »
“Mike Riley had been outed as ManUtd fan with a particular dislike of Arsène Wenger and the foreign managers (Pochettino, …) who dared challenging him during an annual pre season meeting. ” Guess you were present at said meeting. And not many men from Leeds are Man United supporters. So you are basically building your whole case of gross corruption on alleged xenophobia. Wow “However I do believe that referees know what Mike Riley would like to happen. They then adjust their decision to make sure to generate his preferred outcome.” Christ on a bike!! “Why have the Italian best… Read more »
Besides the Referee at the weekend would know that the evil Man United loving Mike Riley would love for Chelsea to drop points in the top four hunt and sent off Rudiger
So you see where your “they know what Mikey would like” theory looks a bit weak right??
It is vital that Arsenal grasp the opportunity tonight to win against Newcastle. That will put us in third place in EPL, which is much healthier than being in fourth position. Finishing third would also ensure that we avoid qualification games in pre season. The reality is that under Wenger in recent years Arsenal seldom took advantage of such situations often losing or drawing games, which we were expected to win. My real concern is not so much the three remaining home games, but how we have performed away from home in last two seasons. Emery needs to reverse that… Read more »
At the beginning of every season, club managers and referees meet to discuss the new recommendations. Usually it is a very mundane affair.
However one year, the meeting turn fractious. Some of the foreign managers did not appreciated being lectured by Mike Riley about their attitude toward referees.
Tempers flared and words were said.
That was reported in numerous newspapers.
I am not sure whether that was at the beginning of 2012 or 2013.
Arsène Wenger gave an interview on French TV where he called Mike Riley ‘Mike le rouge’ a well known ManUtd supporter.
@Receding,
To say that Neil Warnock is not well like inside PGMOL is an understatement. He kept accusing them of incompetence and called them a disgrace.
If a referee has to make a decision whether to give a penalty to a Neil Warnock team or do nothing, the choice is easy. Unless the foul is so blatant to be uncontroversial, his team will not get the benefit of the doubt.
Valentin you are not in the know you are a bullshitter and liar you do realize that. So when you say something like “To say that Neil Warnock is not well like inside PGMOL is an understatement” it’s actually funny to read. You’re what about 20 and so well informed and connected that you should be taken seriously? Nah not for me
@Marko,
You are really obsessed with me. Your stalking of every one of my comment is becoming pathological.
Valentin you have to understand your passing off every thing you post here as inside knowledge can get a little annoying right??
It becomes more annoying when all you have to back them up are newspaper clippings and links yet you post these things like you were there when it happened, even journalists who wrote those articles don’t go that far
Neil Warnock has history with PGMOL.
https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/controversial-story-links-cardiff-city-12614361
https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/neil-warnock-just-identified-real-16057184
Lol @ people who engage in debate on the internet, offer a controversial opinion and point of view, then accuse people of stalking when someone argues against them.
Maybe he just disagrees with all your points dude.
3 points today, easy or not. Absolute must win. Winning with some style and comfort would be a nice marker for the rest of the season. Lineup expectations?
Big game, tonight sets us up so well and a win will mean we then have no excuses for not finishing 3rd.
Big night for mesut tonight I feel, come on you gunners!!!
It’s my first comment on here, as I could not resist the probability comment.
@TR7, using your simplistic 9 event scenario, the probability of decisions favoring one team is 5/9 and favoring the other is 5/9 as well. Hence, they even out.
There are a lot of other factors that would make it uneven like bias towards stronger teams, timing of bad decisions during a game and so on.
Hoping for a big win tonight!
@Receding,
When I post link, you said that does not means anything.
When I said that I have been told by somebody involved in football, you deride me as a liar.
Tell me what would you accept as proof.
When I said that Emery had overworked his players in November/December, despite physical evidence that that was the case you rejected that. When I linked to an interview that Emery recognised in January that he was adapting his workload because it had been too heavy, you dismissed it as proving nothing.
@Luteo,
I have nothing a good debate with somebody on internet. Quite the contrary I enjoy that.
What Marko is doing is not that. When I post a comment, all Marko posts is “You are a liar. Nobody believe you. I know better than you.” Read his comment no argument just petty insults and innuendos.
Valentin, you don’t have to prove yourself, you write great stuff that is consistently on-point.
Ignore the nit-pickers who live for the strawman.
“When I post link, you said that does not means anything.”
Nothing wrong with posting links Valentin, everyone posts one from time to time.
There is something wrong with drawing assumptions from said links and posting them as absolute certainties or fact .
Anyway do your thing, i am not policing you or your contact, just don’t call someone a stalker when you get called out.
Finally Arsenal play tonight!!! Phew. What a wait.
We must win tonight! I am particylarly happy that my prediction (😉) of Spuds bottling it came to fruition last night. Massive lols from me on that one.
On a more serious note, we really need to make sure not to slip up tonight and that we take this chance to grab 3rd spot with both hands. I really think we can do it!
Valentin I wouldn’t have to reference the things that you say if they were in fact true instead of you trying to pass them off as true which is false. Let’s run it down. You have not proven double training sessions in November/December. You have not proven that Steve Rowley is back at Arsenal. And you have not proven that Eboue has AIDS. And yet you said all these things. But don’t worry Pedro has your back because one of those things that you haven’t proved coincides with the agenda that he perpetuates. Again none of it’s a big deal… Read more »
Top 5 paid managers in football in 2018/19:
1 | Diego Simeone (Atletico Madrid) – €41m
2 | José Mourinho (Man Utd) – €31m
3 | Thierry Henry (Monaco) – €25.5m (3 months wage + severance)
4 | Pep Guardiola (Man City) – €24m
5 | Ernesto Valverde (FC Barcelona) – €23.5m
(FF)
AIDS is so 90s.
Pierre and Dissenter Having played competitive sport to a high level, I learnt, from a very early age, that if you were going to blame anyone, blame yourself. However, in the case of Cardiff yesterday, this though was not the case. Let me explain. The conspiracy theorists amongst us are only embarrassing themselves and the good name of the club, with the constant drivel about Arsenal being hard done by. Why not blame the weather? How about a dodgy pitch or the technological changes in the footballs? What if you blamed the colour of your football kit (MU did)? I… Read more »
Marko, you are shitting me on Simeone?
All a bit serious on here.
What about tonight’s match? Am always slightly concerned after an international break how cohesively we will play. Hope we set up the same as before and hit them hard in the first half. In the next few weeks we’ll ideally able to coast in a few matches after taking a 2 goal lead in the first half, assuming Mustafi is not on the pitch.
Anything but a win will be mightily disappointing.
Would explain why he’s still at Atletico. But Henry though what a disaster from Monaco on that one
Pressing the patronising a little heavily there Graham…’let me explain’ , ‘remember ‘.
Anytime a team gets back from a 4 goal lead has done amazingly, but it was the perfect storm that day with a red card and the referee allowing all sorts of aggressive fouling without the ref stepping in. Arsenal screwed up but sometimes when things go badly, the ref can be accused of being a homer for example.
We all hate Graham Dean but are there referees who we feel are prone to helping us out? Refs are generally pantomime villains after all!
Valentin
I know this is not the place to discuss mathematics but Binomial distribution is used when events are dependent on each other, right ? In case of referring decisions, I assumed all.the decisions are independent and hence the simple mathematical calculation.
@TR7- On the contrary, it is the probability distribution over independent events.
Mustafi playing…oh no!
Arsenal: Leno, Maitland-Niles, Mustafi, Sokratis, Monreal, Kolasinac, Guendouzi, Ramsey, Iwobi, Ozil, Lacazette
Subs: Cech, Elneny, Suarez, Jenkinson, Mkhitaryan, Nketiah, Aubemyang
It’s completely acceptable to talk shit today.
It’s April fools day!
5/0 to the Arse!
Did I just hear that we had our best home record this season?
It seems that Xhaka is more injured than reported. I don’t trust Guen playing as a DM. He’ll let opponents running pass him easily. We are counting on NewCastle packing the bus.
If we win tonight it’s the first time we won ten league games in a row since 97-98.
Evening all!
we will miss Xhaka today
Time for Matteo to show us what he can do after his little rest
No granite concrete boots tonight! Shame mustafi is playing.
Feels like months since we played.
Issac Hayden back for revenge!
Looks like we’ll be bombing heavily from the left channel with Iwobi and Kola. Emery probably thinks that there is not enough room for both Auba and Laca playing in the middle.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang has been ill this weekend with a temperature and isn’t being risked tonight ahead of a busy period. According to sky.
Auba will be sitting on the bench.
Don’t like that Ramsey had a thigh injury, causing him to miss Wales games.
He’s usually sloppy when he’s unsure of pushing himself physically.
The formation will probably be 3 4 2 1 with Iwobi and Ozil playing behind Laca.
Interesting to see whether a Guen, Rambo and Ozil MF will be effective tonight vs Newcastle. With Laca up top, this could be interesting… if we don’t get ourselves bogged down in their parked bus in the process.
I rather have Mkhitaryan than Iwobi. Even Suarez would be better than Iwobi. I think Emery wants the Iwobi/Kola combination.
And it’s Arsenal,
Arsenal FC,
We’re by far the greatest team,
The world has ever seen….
Oh to! Oh to be!
Oh to be a …. Gooner!!!
Come on The Arsenal!!!!!
We will miss Xhala today
Guendpuzi has no control about him and Suarez is untested.
It’s going to be a long night
“I rather have Mkhitaryan than Iwobi. Even Suarez would be better than Iwobi. I think Emery wants the Iwobi/Kola combination.”
Sigh………hmmmmm
Even Suarez????
Why aren’t we playing Auba and Laca together?
What a fucking joke.
That was SO soft
The referees are bloody awful in this country.
The standard of reffing is a joke. No consistency.
And Guen had to get caught out. He better watch out as this is happening to frequently.
Haven’t been playing to badly so far but you can tell that Newcastle are geared to latch on to/ create a mistake and then go on the counter.
And goal ruled out….. for a foul. … Just gotta keep pushing as we have so far.
test
Arsenal are making the spate of london stabbings look interesting.
171,000% possession and 0% penetration.
Guedenzi has regressed badly. Poor player at the moment.
AMN is the new Eboue.
Guns is back with his BS
Getting bad vibes about tonight…
Correct amn all over the shop
Rambo, he’ll be missed greatly.
Come on Rambo!!!! 1-0. Good on the lad!!
What a shame really when he’s only blossoming now under Emery.