via @Arsenal Instagram LOVE THESE TWO
Another Europa night, another devastating pummelling of a prestige team.
The big man in charge, Sir Unai Emery, inflicted defeat over Valencia in a pretty poor match at The Emirates.
Unai opted for what some thought was an attacking formation, with some thinking it was defensive. I thought it looked like a 3-5-2 at home, with 7 defensive players on the pitch, with a view to keeping a clean sheet for the second leg. Others thought it looked like a wrecking machine with two strikers and Ozil free to create havoc.
Havoc we created. The opening 20 minutes were straight out of the dustbin. Matteo and Xhaka were all over the place, the defence was getting pulled every which way and there was no intensity to our play. We even managed to concede from a setpiece (which is pretty rare), a long ball to the back post was nodded back into the mixer, Xhaka was nowhere and he was beaten to ball by Diakhaby who headed home.
The Swiss really isn’t fit for purpose… it makes me so sad that when he has a few ok games and all the usual suspects revert back to him being peak-Gilberto when it comes to football enigmas. He’s not. He’s bang average. There is nothing smart in the long-form editorial suck up pieces that lambast social media obsessed millennials who just don’t understand the beautiful game because they can’t see the beauty in Xhaka. Football fans are OBSESSED with other fans who celebrate shit players in militant fashion because it’s so bizarre, you worry you truly are missing something. You’re not. You weren’t with Senderos. You weren’t with Denilson. You’re not with Xhaka. Move on.
Up the other end, 7 minutes later, Lacazette played a perfectly weighted ball to Auba, he cut back and gave his buddy the gift of an open goal from ten yards. What a gentleman. I love those two. If they had a child, it’d be one helluva striker… would probs dress nice too.
7 minutes later, Xhaka showed why the usual suspects menace themselves to bedroom posters of his radar maps. He whipped a beautiful first-time diagonal ball into the box, Lacazette made a yard on his centre back and headed into the ground, the keeper claimed the ball didn’t cross the line but the refs watch buzzed… techhhhhhnology wins again. Xhaka… what a cross, I really think if you ignore the OTT critique of Xhaka, there’s a great player in there, I guess some people just don’t get it.
The second half just didn’t feel particularly smart. We were chasing the third goal and leaving Laurent Kos and Sokratis completely exposed on the counter. It was really tough to watch, Cech kept us in the tie when he denied Kevin Gameiro with a great block. Kos nursed an injury for as long as he could before limping off, we really have to pray he’s going to be ok. That block where he threw his head at a foot late on was something else.
Late on, Kola found Auba at the back post on a tight angle, the ball was struck awkwardly but crept in at the near post. A real shame most fans had gone home by that point. A sad indictment of the fans? The drab football? The Europa League? Who knows.
3-1. That’ll do nicely. £100m worth of strikers to the rescue. Another example of how dependent we are on superhuman finishing.
There’s no point in analysing the game too much. The football was awful, we looked a mess, but we did the job. We’ll shithouse ourselves to the final and then it’s a coin toss… and there’s no manager that knows this trophy as well as Unai.
Whatever my thoughts on his long-term future, watching him twitching out on the sidelines shows how much passion he has for the project. When that third goal landed at the end, he lost his damn mind. It’s great to see. He’s a hard worker, a trophy in his first season would be epic, it’d be even better if we didn’t have to play Chelsea.
Also… does a cup final count as an away game? Answers in the comments.
I’m getting ahead of myself, let’s see if we can go away from home and not concede 3 goals… not as easy as one would think.
Right, see you in the comments you total meltbags xx
On what basis do you rate Jardim higher?
He’s clearly done a good job his last few clubs. It’s not his fault that his title winning team was gutted to the point where they’re struggling.
gambon
Anyone wish we’d taken a risk and brought Vieira in?
lol, like arsenal are hot property. We have a shit youth set up and are broke in terms of how much we can spend in the window.
You see veira improving this bunch ??
Anyone wish we’d taken a risk and brought Vieira in?
Ahhhh I’m not sure he was ready last summer in all honesty. But he’s showing enough progress that in a year or two I’d absolutely consider him. He’s showing something by actually taken a job unlike Mikel
Jardim is much better manager than Poch
Until Poch leaves his comfort zone he won’t get the respect of many
It was better to keep Vierra away from this hot mess
Lets clear house then bring in the club legend
We have a bull crap squad, don’t smear Vierra with it.
Dissenter
Point I was making is they will spend big this summer adding numbers and quality.
Wolves have the resource and contact.
That’s actually a good point. I think Vieira off the back of New York FC taking on the Arsenal job given everything if he failed it might have set his career back quite a bit. At least this way he’s showing progress and taking the necessary steps to get a top job in the future. I’m absolutely all for him coming back home to Arsenal in the future he’s a born leader and winner
Victorious is all over the place. Apparently he doesn’t rate Emery at all but he still has him way ahead of Jardim and Poch”
Not mutually exclusive mate, don’t seriously rate any of them to the calibre of a proper Arsenal manager taking us back to the top
Guess who else I rate above the lot?
Allegri
Enrique
Conte
Nuno
Get any of those in and watch us get back to business before you say JS
That’s what the people asking that we take a “risk” don’t get.
We had a nasent backroom last summer that was on shifting sand because Gazidis had one leg out.
That was not the time to be bringing in unproven managers.
Just “hot sauce” or “pizzaz” they clamored for without understanding that such a manger will require the support that we didn’t have at the time.
In no way or form is Potlesstino a better manager than Emery.
This will become very clear next season.
Heck he may even somehow finish below Emery this season. Lets see.
Are people screaming Viera because he’s having a good game against a PSG team who’s already on Holidays ?
How did he fare in the first leg? When there was truly something at stake?
Don’t get me wrong, I love him as a legend of the club but he’s no way ready yet
It would be so sad to see the fans baying at him after tanking so badly
I’d take Vieira in a flash, if he’s willing. Sure, our squad needs massively overhauling but we’ve made a modest start already and 6 upgrades with a coach that sprinkles a little stardust on the club then our progress might be pronounced.
The additional benefit of a new coach might be that Kroenke might release more funds for a project that he has confidence in, with Emery I don’t see that happening.
Putting special sauce on rotten meat might hide the taste for a while but you’ll still end up throwing your guts up in the end.
The special sauce is the finishing touch but the rest of the dish needs good ingredients to make it a winner.
Vierra will bring all the best contacts from French footie
We have a bull crap squad, don’t smear Vieira with it.
______
Pretty much how I feel about it. Maybe if our Executive suite or Owner were better at communicating what exactly we are doing other then trying to make them money then maybe but chances are he would have struggled. Then like I said I would feel awful about it. Hope he continues to progress .. And we get the ship stabilized and then he is ready after next season.. Best case scenario… win/win.
Neil Warnock. Im gonna miss him. Best interview provider since Gordon Strachan and cannae hear a word that man ever said.
“It would be so sad to see the fans baying at him after tanking so badly”
It’d be worse than sad.
Bacary “If we’re all being honest, at least 95% of us would take Guardiola, Klopp and Poch over Emery if offered the choice tomorrow.” Right, but this isn’t where the divide lies. The divide is over the question of who or what is responsible for our recent run of poor results (prior to Valencia, that is). One camp says it’s down to an inadequate manager (whatever the squad’s weaknesses may be); the other says it’s down to an inadequate squad (whatever the manager’s weaknesses may be). I’m in the latter camp. I too would obviously take Pep and Klopp over… Read more »
Vierra lol
Redruth lol…
I have a feeling that the Norwich City manager ( Daniel Farke) has that something special.
I am interested to see how his team tries to play next season in the prem.
They sold their best player Maddison, and went on to top the division playing quality football.
Bamford I agree that there may be a divide but surely our recent results have been a combination of playing games every 3/4 days, an inadequate squad and a manager who appears to be tinkering like a good un.
Creating a binary narrative is definitely a contemporary way of considering things. Surely it’s shades of grey?
It’s very poetic regarding thoughts of Vieira and I would love to see it at some point, when he is ready.
As others have mentioned though, I would hate to see him receive abuse from ‘fans’ should things go sour and that is always a big concern with club legends coming back to manage us.
It may happen with Solskjaer and Man Utd at some point next season if he can’t improve things for them.
I honestly think we should start putting the groundworks in for Nuno before chavs or utd nab him
Guy has taken Wolves from championship to top7 in EPL
Guy is dripping with sauce and waiting to explode
If Emery fails to deliver CL he should take a hike and let’s have some Nuno
As obvious as it seems to many that Bacary is right to say the squad is better this season than it was last — and thus that Emery has had more to work with than Wenger had last season — I think I can actually dispute this claim (or at least temper it a little). It will take a bit of time to do, but the underlying point I would make is that if you factor in injuries and aging, and if you look at the first 15 players available to both managers in, say, the first week of September,… Read more »
The additional benefit of a new coach might be that Kroenke might release more funds for a project that he has confidence in, with Emery I don’t see that happening.
You’re suggesting that he’d release more funds and believe in Vieira instead of Emery? Interesting piss take that
I don’t know Bamford is it really that interesting? Our squad last season wasn’t very good either. We finished 6th. To me it’s comparing rotten apples from one season to rotten apples from the last season. You might want to eat the apple from this season cuz it’s only slightly rotten. But you really don’t want either one.
Spurs being spursey, and people still saying poch is the dogs bollocks. The only reason why the spuds are where they are is because arsenal have been a mess the last decade and have been falling, Utd the same, even Chelsea appointed the wrong manager this year.which has affected there position. The spuds had a clear run at third and are still struggling. Take Kane out of there side and there a top eight to ten team. Poch still hasn’t won anything, when he does then proclaim him the new special one. You can have a balanced team, you can… Read more »
Up4grabs
Hey now. Don’t you start on Klopp
You know how many hugs and high 5 he gives.
He’s probably top 1 in the world.
And you know how many “points” they have?!?!!
Victorious,
I’d rather steal wolves chief scout for players.
And didn’t Burnley finish seventh last season, we wasn’t clambering to sign up Sean dyche!
Leno is certainly an improvement on last season’s squad. Sokratis and the other newbies to a lesser extent. That doesn’t negate the positive impact Emery has had on the squad. Players like Bellerin and Holding, until their injuries, attained a level of consistency in their performance they hadn’t the year before. Leno has always had potential to be a great goalie but prone to the odd clanger. That was his reputation before Arsenal. Think we can do away with that perception now. AMN and Iwobi have improved and are decent squad players. Ramsey has shown greater maturity/discipline in his play.… Read more »
Joe,
In some ways I feel a bit sorry for him, record points and city are still in front, any other year apart from last year and this and they romp the league.
Just can’t stand the bindippers, also how many cup finals has he lost, and like poch still not one anything in four years if city don’t slip up.
He does like a high five though!
Bamford
The squad was better last season no doubt.
Giroud, ox Theo, Wilshere, cazorla and Sanchez all gone
Only Wilshere got regular playing time though. The rest were either benched, injured or sold. Had we kept all those players we would be 3rd already and certainly would have many more points than we currently do.
BacaryisGod
” If we make Top 4, it will only because others have choked too.”
Wenger made the top four because of failures of others as well in his time.
Midwest
Right, but there are many here who think Emery has had more quality available to him simply because he added four players in the summer. As sensible as this might seem, I think a closer inspection might prove this assumption wrong. Secondly, this claim is going to be central to the anti-Emerylot’s future arguments against him. “He had a better squad; of course he did better.”
So, yes, I think it’s an interesting question.
Not a piss take Marko, I’m giving my opinion – something you do, so very often on a daily basis. You’d know if I was taking the piss. My view is that to convince a manager to take on the project that Arsenal obviously is, Kroenke’s team might have to sweeten the deal by being more ‘generous’ with the transfer budget. Vieira, like a lot of prospective coaches would see the deficiencies in the squad and explain how these could be remedied by reasonable funding. I feel that Emery, apart from being unemployed, was attractive to Kroenke by not insisting… Read more »
Uh oh. Don has gone ahead and contradicted one pillar of the anti-Emery camp’s arguments against Emery, i.e., he’s had a better squad than Wenger had.
Don – So Emery has done better with a weaker squad? Good to know. You make a good argument for Emery.
Ishola,
Wenger flukes it the year spurs had a dodgy lasagna.
Apart from that he never had to really deal with five other teams.
Spurs were average, city didn’t exist until 5-6 years ago. And the bindippers were all over the show.
Occasionally Everton threatens but never really close..
Bamford
Yes. You know I feel we sold off too many valuable players, players many here said were dross.
I don’t subscribe to a partisan viewpoint to fit in.
That said only Wilshere of the players mentioned plagued
The rest were benched or sold so they were of very little use to us.
I would take Zaha.
Un Na,
The squad was better last season no doubt.
Giroud, ox Theo, Wilshere, cazorla and Sanchez all gone
Had we kept all those players we would be 3rd already and certainly would have many more points than we currently do.
We aren’t third because of Xhaka and mustafi, otherwise third would have been sewn up by now.
And those players that have left have done virtually nothing last season, and for there new clubs this year nothing as well.
Cardiff 1/Palace 2
HT
May the Fourth be with you!
It’s all failure.
Whether you don’t get near top four with being a big club like Liverpool or whether you get close but fail.
These teams are failing if they are “choking”.
In fact choking is the wrong term Bacary used.
Choking should only be applied to good teams.
Chelsea, Man United and Spurs are not good teams at this present time. Spurs over-rated as far as EPL goes.
Zaha not good enough, still very unpolished.
Bob my mistake I thought you were actually taking the piss when you suggested that Stan would be convinced and back Vieira which is to suggest that he’s not convinced by trophy laden Emery
That Palace game if they carry on like that it will be a cricket score by the end.
In the last part of the half Palace looked like they could score every time they attacked.
As long as palace don’t collapse, Brighton are safe.
Big help for us tomorrow.
Hate to admit as an Arsenal fan but spuds are a good side. I was one of the few (if not the only one) on here who thought they’d have a good season without signing players last summer. Thankfully, that’s come back to bite them in the arse. Injuries and fatigue I feel has derailed their season lately. That said to be playing CL semis the season they move into their new stadium is something (and worth some of the Poch hype).
“I’ve had a go at CC for claiming to have a ST but can’t say what stand he sits in. Again another full of shit poster.“
I can’t? I absolutely can I simply won’t, certainly not to some jumped up knob clicking his fingers and demanding answers over the internet.
I couldn’t care less if you don’t believe me, that’s your issue though so kindly fuck off with the rest of your pathetic ‘what I say goes’ rhetoric. Might work when you’re battering the wife, but doesn’t wash with anyone else.
Tr7
Disagree, I think Zaha is the best player outside the top 6. Surround him with more quality and he’s a nightmare out wide with space.
We got done by the last three safe sides we faced.
Come on Cardiff 🙂
Up4
I disagree. You keep those guys fit and playing regularly and there’s all sorts of variety there
This were the guys who kept us between 2nd-4th. You add extra quality defensively (Torreira, Leno, papa and a couple more) and a top goal scorer and that squad competes.
Zaha is excellent in dribbling in tight spaces also. Definitely underrated on here.
I get it flopped at Manchester but he’s a London lad through and through. Knows the prem also.
The guys mustard. Always terrorizes us too.
Un Na,
None of them were good enough last year for us, and have gone on to other teams this year and have done nothing, barring Santi.
Would love to have kept him as we missed him so much for two years but after being bitten so many times with long term perma crocks we had to let him go.
With Vieira being mentioned, credit to Sol, who has kept Macclesfield up, despite taking over when they were in all kinds of trouble.
If he can do better next season, then get a Championship job and succeed there, then he could enter the Arsenal manager conversation in 4 or 5 years.
Samesong
I’m a big fan mate, you can go to a big club too early and get spat out, happens. He’s 26, tall, strong, fast, unbelievably tricky, and decisive. Would be a hell of a signing imo.
He also knows the league and the city. Can see him staying here and maybe landing at Spurs unfortunately
CC
No doubt Zaha if signed will be an upgrade on Iwobi and Mikhi and perhaps for that reason I will take him too but he is prone to overdoing his dribbling a bit and becoming much of a soloist. If we can get a player who has pace and dribbling but also intelligence that will help us more.
A big club would have sacked Pochettino 2 years ago.
Elmo
No chance will sol Campbell ever manage arsenal
Tr7
I think that’s him playing to the fact he’s 90% of Palaces attack, he likely feels he needs to do it all himself. If he can integrate what he has with a good side he’d be deadly
It works both ways imo Brighton might not have anything to play for tomorrow and they play better without fear or stress, other way they might be in panic mode and shit themselves Every time the ball in their box..
Bottom line Arsenal has to be up for it and win the game at all costs..
1/3 now ..it’s over for Cardiff and the very likable warnock
CC
“I’m a big fan mate, you can go to a big club too early and get spat out, happens.”
You know this applies to young or untested managers too…right?
cough…cough. ARTETA
Up 4
They were woefully mismanaged by wenger in his final two seasons. With defensive reinforcements and a top striker that was a team capable of winning titles
Dissenter
Yea I’m aware thanks.
Flawless argument you have there, suppose the idea is to never buy young talent in case it flunks? That seems smart.
TR7 “No doubt Zaha if signed will be an upgrade on Iwobi and Mikhi and perhaps for that reason I will take him too but he is prone to overdoing his dribbling a bit and becoming much of a soloist. If we can get a player who has pace and dribbling but also intelligence that will help us more.” I think what you mean is he doesn’t have the real poise and the cuteness of a real top class player. Plenty of times he is undisciplined in his play. When it all comes together for him of course he looks… Read more »
My only issue with Zaha is the price. For the 30-40 million it’d take to get him you could get the likes of Lozano you could get Chuckwese and Fornals from Villarreal. Hell Brandt is going for 25 million. Even given the hoopla around Havertz and Pepe you wouldn’t be paying that much more than 40 million for them
Palace will want big big money for Zaha
The penalties he gets them keeps them up. I’ll fear for Palace’s league status next season without Zaha.
Brighton safe. Hopefully play it out like a friendly. We should have a lot more intensity
Zaha is 26 and plays like a raw player.
Gervinho springs to mind.
I’m not sure how Zaha will perform when the team isn’t built around his trickery to get penalty kicks awarded.
Honestly it doesn’t matter whether Brighton are safe enough.
It’s all on us
It’s one thing to expect good results in other games [away from our control], another to expect the opposition team we are playing to fold easily.
If they don’t beat Brighton at home then it will be a horror result.
Far worse than getting spanked at Wolves and Leicester.
Ishola
‘I think what you mean is he doesn’t have the real poise and the cuteness of a real top class player.’
Yeah, that’s my concern. Imagine a front 3 of Auba, Laca and Zaha – zero coordination and link up play. Liverpool play Firmino along with Salah and Mane for better coordination among the three forwards. City attack is on a different level altogether with Bernardo Silva in it – a player who can not only dribble but also has real footballing intelligence and poise.
Not beating palace at Home was a horror result. I thought my kid brother had lost his mind when he told me the scores, watching the highlights later and seeing what we offered as defending explained it.
New post.
Brighton being safe could go either way for us. They could just go on holiday and be hammered at the Emirates. Or it could free them and inspire them to play well. I still fancy us to beat them by a few goals.
Liverpool goal
Dreadful performance, and we are losing Aaron. Whoever is managing our club must be on something weird. I have had some bad days supporting Arsenal over 60 plus years. Right now I feel I have been catapulted back to the 1960s. Difficult to find anything to cheer about. Valencia at their place may well frighten the life out of this bunch of softies. Oh well, time to open a new bottle.