4 areas of improvement that will guarantee trophies

by .

I’ve spent the last year getting hammered by you lot in the comments section for my rational disdain for our manager, now things are clicking for people, I’m being told that I have not had a consistent view on Emery. ARE YOU KIDDING ME! Someone was so angry they called me a melon shagger. Even our trolls are Waitrose levels of middle-class.

‘Pedro, you’re the sort of guy that secures the bottom button on a waistcoat. I bet you take Aldi’s ‘wine of the month’ to dinner parties and start a conversation piece about how the sommelier game is one giant margin driven ruse. You probably think Barolo plays as a wingback for Brescia, you ingrate bespawler’

I’ve had it with the internet.

I watched the horror show of Watford back again. I liken it to clicking a Whatsapp group chat video from your mates that are builders. Always deeply regrettable.

A few things stood out that could be fairly quick fixes.

Topline, massively oversimplified, but here goes.

Speed:

We are very slow. Did you own a Nintendo Wii with the tennis game back in the day? Did you ever give it to your Grandma to have a crack? When I watch us play out the back, that’s what we look like. We take an age to set up perfectly. Then we missile the control pad into the Baccarat Crystal and Bronze D’Ore Chandelier. Amirite, trolls?!

We transition the ball in a very one dimensional way. It’s almost too choreographed to work. We have good players, so the system will always create goals, but I’m not we’re optimising our approach. This squad, with the right system, should be delivering 90 goals.

We need more urgency in our build-up, we need to move the ball with more purpose, and we need to mix things up so it’s not easy to counter.

Variety:

We are easy to set up against because we do the same thing over and over. We shit the bed in the first half when Matteo lost the ball from one of those new-age goal kicks. Then we repeated the feat in the second half when Sokratis couldn’t even find a player on the edge of the box.

We are practising a new approach in-game and it feels like a brand new endeavour every time we try it. When Pep came to City, his ways looked clunky, 4 months in and it looked amazing. We are a year in, we’ve signed two ball-playing centre backs, we have a sweeper keeper and we have midfielders who should be able to create space and turn under pressure. The approach has never looked worse. I am not against new ideas unless those ideas are costing us goals and making us look like utter fustylugs.

Part of the reason it looks so bad is we do it over and over. We need to mix things up when they’re not working. Cleverly spoke to James Olley at The Standard and basically said they knew how we’d play, but they were shocked that when we’d been sussed, we didn’t change.

Structure:

Norwich are the hot thing at the minute. Who knows if their success will last. What we do know is they have a philosophy and a vision of what they want to do. Their passing out the back was brilliant at the weekend. They beat City’s press really well and they moved the ball at pace. They had a midfield that sat in front of the ball. Players dropped deeper in the box. Everyone knew their role. They play like a new Premier League team, and sadly, they are currently playing the way I suspect Emery would like to.

A few differences. Arsenal offered no midfield protection to the back 4 at the weekend. Xhaka was supposed to be the pivot, but he was all over the place. Matteo and Ceballos were not being led, they careened up the pitch, or panicked and dropped deep into the backline.

Where was our captain instructing them to occupy the space in front of the defence? How did management and the senior players not address the blitzkrieg of shots that showered our goal? It’s staggering how bad the on-pitch management was on Sunday.

Pressing:

When I first wrote about Emery’s hiring in two widely panned posts (day 1 / day 2)… now both classics, I wrote this pearler.

‘He’s a manager who makes players go to war for him, and I’m telling you, we’ll see a massive improvement in the effort, attitude, and footballing output.’

This felt true, especially during the first 4 months. The players ran further and appeared to have grown some balls.

Where has that gone? Our players look lethargic and we do very little pressing. I thought that was a speciality of his? Our players seem to be letting bad things happen to them. Watford was a disaster, we let them get at us and we collapsed. No leadership, very little fight and a capitulation.  These are Emery’s players now, how they behave on the pitch is down to him, because if players weren’t up his standard, he’d have them out by now.

We need to get back to working harder, running further and being a menace on the press.

I’m not saying I have all the answers here, but I am pretty certain if he sorted the above we’d win the league.

Let me know what you think in the comments, melon shaggers. xx

P.S. Help a fellow gooner.

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Un na naai

Jean Tigana just wasn’t very good. Which is why Fulham was his level.
Sol Campbell is a nut case
Les Ferdinand didn’t make it because he wasn’t very good. Paul once was a similar age and did make it as a manager.

Mmmmmmm

Un na naai

Wright is god
As I thought

Nothing to offer. Served

Ishola70

I hope this isn’t all about Mane being the black man out of the three Wrighty.

That would be very unfortunate.

Three posters here have said that Firmino is more important to the Liverpool front three than Mane. The current Liverpool front three and how they click collectively.

You disagree that’s fine.

But my initial post was only stating which players I thought were most important in that Liverpool current front three in order.

WrightIsGod

Ishola

Nice try. I can accept that Salah is deemed better than Mane but not Firmino. End of.

Stats and ability prove that no matter what you or WengerEagle believe in how much of a foil Firmino is, he isn’t as good a player as Mane and especially not Salah. So please allow it.

Un na naai

Wright is god

Where did I say there is no good black coach? I didn’t. Stop acting like a pissy school girl.
Already said I want vieira.

I said no black coach has got a top job because until now there have been no top black coaches.
And then you bring up sol Campbell like he’s Brian Clough 😂

Ishola70

lol Wrighty it isn’t about whether we allow it.

You have your view and others have theirs.

That’s the way it can and should be. Differing views.

You forget Valentin lol. He put in a word for Firmino as well.

Un na naai

Ishola

Allow it is rude boy street speak in London for “be quiet” or “leave it”

Un na naai

Sol Campbell took a near impossible job because it was the only one offered to him. He miraculously save them from relegation and left because they had no money. He has not received not a single job offer since, meanwhile some of his former teammates receives phone call asking them to apply for jobs they are not even interested in. For example despite his disastrous short stint as a manager, Paul Scholes is still viewed as potential manager. Loooool Wenger hasn’t received an offer Neville and Scholes aren’t in management Neither is John Terry Campbell never served as a coach… Read more »

Ishola70

Don

How do you know Wrighty was talking rude boy or the queens english?

Are you pigeon-holing him? lol

Un na naai

Val

And what does your link prove? That there was a racist coach at gillingham a few years back

How does that prove that black coaches are getting passed over for top jobs based on skin colour? It doesn’t.

It also doesn’t back up the wright is mongo’s assertion that mane is better than firminho and anyone who thinks different is racist

Same guys on here adore Henry and vieira so it’s just victim culture nonsense.
Boo boo.

Un na naai

Ishola

Cause I’m from south London and I know what low it means

RodneyKing

Liverpool may, and it’s debatable, struggle to create chances if Firmino was out injured. But I think that they’ll be in a far worse position if anything happened to Mane – based on his current form.

WengerEagle

WIG

The point is that there are more players out there like Mane than like Firmino hence him being harder to replace for Liverpool.

If Firmino left tomorrow, they’d struggle to bring in a similar type of CF to knit the midfield and attack together. Not that Mane would be easy to replace himself but I think you’d sooner find a goalscoring wide threat.

WrightIsGod

Un na nai In case you haven’t clocked im dealing with a number of posters at the same time. No response to Valentin’s post yet…. In 2003 Pavel Nedved won the ballon d’or over Henry, like wtf? Racism has so many nuances to it. It’s not just colour it’s heritage and societal difference and even with colour there’s different shades (literally) to it, certain degrees of acceptability. I really don’t want to get into a socio-political debate but unless you’re fully emerged in it and have lived in it you will ever know. I know you haven’t because of the… Read more »

WrightIsGod

RodneyKing

Back from the dead.

There’s no question the importance of Mane, it’s actually laughable the Mane > Firmino is even being questioned.

Un na naai

Wright is god

No. Henry was not treated any different to a white person. That’s a stupid thing to say
It is a level playing field. If you think it’s not it’s because you’re just not doing very well and your pride won’t let you take fault so you invent a trivial reason and find someone to blame.

Like feminists do because they are fat and lazy
You need to listen to a bit of Candace Owens or Jessie Lee Peterson
You seem to think that being black is a one size fits all philosophy
That’s racist man.

WrightIsGod

Un na naai

My days. Your last comment just proved the ignorant clueless prat you are. We’re done here.

“A wise man told me don’t argue with fools. Cause people from a distance can’t tell who is who.” – Jay Z

Marko

Listen if anyone knows about racism or the plight of the black man not being taken seriously in the management world sporting or otherwise ask a white guy. Don knows all about that stuff he gets his information from the most solid of sources

Marko

Also feminists are lazy and fat. How does he know? He just fucking knows. He’s ahead of the curve really. Next he’ll be telling us where the Persians went wrong and how lazy Eskimos are

WrightIsGod

For anyone who isn’t aware Jesse Lee Peterson is an American far-right political commentator.

I won’t be listening to anyone from the far right anytime soon.

Guess Pedro let’s anyone post on here these days.

salparadisenyc
China1

Sol Campbell has achieved more as a manager than arteta did.

Yet people want mikel

Bojangles

I am not going to get involved in this racist argument going on here this morning. I just want to state my own experience of living in two se Asian countries over the past 8 years. I have been venerated in both simply because of the colour of my skin. No matter how much I try to dissuade people from treating me this way it falls on deaf ears. It has nothing to do with me for what I am, it is simply the colour of my skin. None of us are responsible for the skin we were born with,… Read more »

Dark Hei

Wright

Lets just put things to bed.

I don’t think Firmino is as talented as Mane but he plays a more crucial role in the Liverpool team because he plays with his back to goal allowing Mane and Salah space to work their magic.

And I don’t think those 3 have any issues with their colour………

Tony

Arteta No! Vieira Yes for me.

How about we keep race, religion and politics away from this blog.

Don
Now you’ve fallen out of love with Unai, shouldn’t you revert back to ‘Don’?

You could add ‘Don Alita’ or ‘Don Slayer of Muppets’

Is it time for a new moniker, Don?

Anyway, enjoy your posts or I should say the posts that aren’t political, religious, race or with any football content.

Just kidding about the last category 🙂

Tony

ES
Looks like your Saracens are in the mire with salary caps. Be interesting to see how that unfolds.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/article-7474679/Rugby-news-Premiership-clubs-poised-demand-Saracens-kicked-league.html

Tony

Chavs and Bin Dippers losing last night will be a Euro wake up call and could become a bigger distraction from the PL for them. Shame Watford, Brighton, Wolves, Burnley et all aren’t in European cups. Emery’s next club should be in China or the MLS. That’s his level as was blatantly obvious during the collapse at the end of the season going from 3rd to 5th. Some, including me, wanted to see what happened in the summer TW and what Emery would do to improve on our end of season lack of form. We chose to sit on the… Read more »

Guns of sf

Freddie will get the nod

Tony

Pedro I haven’t bought into Raul’s ‘Del Boy’ antics in the summer’s TW. Does he have a plan ‘B’ having bet the house on this season for CL? Yes he did well in the summer but as to how well and putting the company into debt for the next few years to do so is not the best way to run a company. For Raul I’m very much undecided whether he will be successful for us. Ditto Edu. Like the guy but waiting to see what kind of sauce he has. Emery’s sauce is Branston = pickled with the lid… Read more »

China1

Sorry tony but brandston pickle is BRILLIANT in a cheese sandwich so I’ll have to disagree with you sir

peanuts&monkeys

Has Arsenal sacked Emery yet?

Guns of Hackney

Arsenal players blow two goal lead. Go out on town to celebrate at managers bequest.

This is why the culture of abject failure didn’t leave when Arsene did. It’s a disease that is through the entire club.

How is edu and Raul also sanctioning this shite?

Tony

GOH
I read that article in disbelief .

Un na naai

Wright is god Everyone in the western world is free to pursue the life they want. Nothing can hold you back if you are determined enough apart from your own personal limitations There’s nothing racist about that. Nobody holds black footballers back in England. It’s just not true. If you are good enough you are good enough regardless of colour. Using Henry and pele as examples only serves to reinforce my point. Jess Lee Peterson is not far right. He’s a black guy who wants black people to take responsibility for their own lives and achieve their potential. There are… Read more »

Guns of Hackney

Tony

Alas I was not shocked. It’s endemic of Arsenal.

No one is culpable and no one takes responsibility. It’s disgusting.

Valentin

Un na naai, You wanted a example of how a white big name was chosen ahead of black good coach. Antoine Kombouare was in charge of PSG when was released (sacked) so Ancelotti could take over. It was the midpoint of the season and PSG were top of the league 3 points ahead of Montpellier. Ancelotti’s PSG finished runner up 3 points behind the winner Montpellier. His PSG side despite players of poor quality was hailed as playing great football. Ancelotti record at PSG was mediocre. And his record in domestic cup is worse than Kombouare. Since his unfair PSG… Read more »

Gentlebris

And maybe now people will begin to believe that Liverpool are no big deal. City is far superior to them. A city side with Liverpool’s focus is the big big deal.

Gentlebris

*are far superior

Valentin

Pedro,

It is more than a few toxic people still left at the club.
It is a lack of authority from Emery.
It is a lack of respect to him by the players.
It is a fractioned squad with faction. I said cliques in my initial comment.
It is management more preoccupied by how things are seen by the outside rather than fix the issues.

The sun may be a shit tabloid, but clearly there is something seriously wrong within the club.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/football/9948941/arsenal-emery-orders-players-show-solidarity-watford-draw/

Pierre

For the next couple of games it’s all about regaining our confidence. The only way to do that is positive results. Arsene Wenger said “You go up by the stairs and come down by the lift, that is confidence ” and that is exactly what has happened to Arsenal. The confidence in the team is rock bottom after the Watford performance , we have taken the lift / elevator down to the basement. A 0-0 v Eintracht and a scrappy 1-0 win v villa will get us back up to the ground floor, but that will not rebuild the confidence.… Read more »

Guns of Hackney

I guess the next the games will either save or lose emery his job (hopefully).

Frankfurt should be a win.
Villa. Ditto.
Forest. Ditto.

But, I can see us losing two of these games so perhaps that’ll be the last we see of Unai.

Valentin

GoH, Just catch up with your comment. Were you talking about the sun article that I linked above? I was not surprised as I have been told that before. Complete lack of authority and accountability. Players don’t listen to what Emery is saying. They doze off during his video sessions. There are now clique within the squad: the French speaking one, the Muslim one, the young one, the disaffected one and the loners. The only one everybody seems to like is Lacazette who is always smiling and friendly. Xhaka is said not to be well liked. Taking himself way too… Read more »

Guns of Hackney

Valentin

It’s all relevant. I don’t doubt there are factions in every club and I’m sure there was at arsenal back in the heydays with the french and English. I don’t care about that if it doesn’t affect the game.

I just don’t agree with being allowed to go out on the razz after drooping two points. Those players are now not accountable. They never will be. Pathetic.

Valentin

GoH, What I have been told is different than before. There will always be people grouping by affinity, being cultural, religion, politics, background. I was told that it is starting to spill into personal animosity. That should not affect performance on the pitch, but it will. It is also a symptom of how things are bad behind the scene. I don’t believe that Emery is the kind of man who know how to fix that issue. At PSG, there was also cliques and Emery tried to stay out of it instead of trying to resolve the issue. That just exacerbated… Read more »

Un na naai

Valentin But what evidence do you have that this was because he was black? He got the job in the first place so surely the guys who hired him didn’t all of a sudden develop a hatred of black skinned managers while they guy was seemingly delivering results? Look at how Chelsea treat their managers? If the next big thing is available they bin who they have immediately Race and nationality doesn’t come into it. Anyway. It’s a tired old trope There will always be racists. Always. From every corner. You aren’t going to end that with slogans and banners… Read more »

Bojangles

I agree that Emery has made some fuckups this season. Just 5 games in and we do seem to be playing worse with each passing week. I understand people wanting Emery out, the future, after the Watford game, does seem bleak. But I’m getting the feeling that some folks here are wanting us to lose games to speed up Emery’s departure. Hopefully I’m wrong on that score.

Gentlebris

So Emery ordered the guys to go attack some chicken breast and Priorat as a way of getting the best out of them. Great insight.

Tony

Don I just assumed you, like most, were prepared to give Emery the benefit of the doubt and time. We then had a very rocky and at times lucky 22 game unbeaten run. Then it all went downhill after we had injuries. Emery had no answer so decline set in. No recollection if you were onboard at the beginning, so apologies if you were against the hiring of Emery from the off with that decision not being AKB driven as it was for the usual suspects. Anyway, it’s all immaterial now as Emery is as lost as he was at… Read more »

Gentlebris

Frankfurt should be looking at this Emery’s Arsenal the way a ghetto boy just back from school in a hot afternoon would look at ice cream.

Valentin

Un na naai, Kombouare was hired by the previous owner. QSI had inherited him as a manager and he did not fit their vision of a big name white coach. Logic should dictate that you don’t sack a coach when your team plays good attractive football and you are top of the league at the midpoint. They finished runners up that season so no improvement. Since they have had numerous coaches and none have played football as attractive than he did. Most have played a slow possession based game that is the exact opposite of what teams that win the… Read more »

Tony

I very much doubt fans want us to lose games to force Emery out, Bojangles. More a case of fans wanting to see Raul and Edu act decisively rather than leave us in a position of having to play catch-up with too little time to do so. Waiting for 3 crocked defenders to come back as good as they were or better than before their injuries is futile if Emery has no plans B & C. Points are going to be very tight for 3rd & 4th spots and we can’t rely on City’s CL ban. Missing out on 4th… Read more »

Gentlebris

Isn’t it great that the two most horrible managers in the league are ManU and Arsenal’s.

Who knew this in ’03!

Gentlebris

It’s either Raul fires Emery now or leave him be till the end of the season.

No point firing him in February when top 4 is no longer achievable.

Valentin

People keep repeating the tired excuse giving the benefit of the doubt and if you didn’t you are an AKB. Would you give Sam Allardyce or David Moyes the benefit of the doubt if tomorrow one of them was to replace Emery? Or would you say from the appointment that it is a mistake? People were so happy to see the back of Wenger, that they lost all sense of judgement. A quick look on the forum of his previous clubs would have reveal some serious issues with him. A repeated lack of success/progress in leagues with all his clubs… Read more »

Gentlebris

‘I very much doubt fans want us to lose games to force Emery out, Bojangles.’

Whatever takes us forward is welcomed by me. We continue this
embarrassing lukewarmness under Emery and miss top 4 eventually or we lose a couple games in a row, Emery gets shown the door and the new guy gets us top 4. Which would you prefer?

Valentin

Most people who want Emery out don’t want Arsenal to lose more games because it will be making it even more difficult for his successor to achieve top 4. We want Raul and Edu to be decisive.

What I find very difficult to stomach is the sheer hypocrisy of some who were publicly wanting to lose games under Wenger to speed up his demise.

Guns of Hackney

I don’t think we have to wish Arsenal to lose games…it’ll happen organically.

Gentlebris

‘Most people who want Emery out don’t want Arsenal to lose more games because it will be making it even more difficult for his successor to achieve top 4. We want Raul and Edu to be decisive.’ Unless the results get seriously ugly, Raul can’t act, he doesn’t have such power. If Emery wins some lose some he will not be fired, Raul will have to wait until Emery fails the top 4 target before he could have a genuine reason for firing him. Only the owner could say ‘fuck this is not the football I want my team to… Read more »

Bojangles

New blog

Tony

Valentin “What I find very difficult to stomach is the sheer hypocrisy of some who were publicly wanting to lose games under Wenger to speed up his demise.” Then you are not as smart as you think you are if you don’t understand the difference between Wenger‘s protests and Emery’s. It was always thought here – rightly or wrongly – that if Emery wasn’t achieving his KPIs /targets, he would be fired. Accountability is supposed to be in place after it was exiled by Wenger for 22 years. So we wait to see what Raul & Edu are made of.… Read more »

Gentlebris

GOH, If we had played as woefully as we did against Watford and got a result, trust me, the EKBs would shout you down here if you tried to point out the play was poor. The results dictate the moods, if we win against Frankfurt, Villa, Forest and got a draw against United, people would begin to believe Emery is back on top of things…. until he fails when it matters and land us in Europa again. See it gives me joy to win every game, after the game against Liverpool I felt so terrible, so terrible it would be… Read more »

Tony

Gentlebris
Amen to that.

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