Arsenal moved to DEFCON 5. The Redzone. We’re in the jaws of a big fuck-off crocodile, we’ve been pulled into the waters of mid-table, and the death-roll has begun. Not many escape it.
The season feels over before it started. Lots of small bad decisions have snowballed into an almighty avalanche of shite and it’s hard to escape our reality: We are not very good.
The turning point for me was making Arteta the rookie coach into the all-powerful manager. He saw a power-vacuum at a club that lacks leadership and he went for it… he should have been told to fuck off. Instead, Arsenal elevated him because they don’t rate Edu. An embarrassing decision.
It’s amusing because when I broke into advertising after 18 months of trying, my boss at the time quit and my dad told me to apply for his job after 3 weeks of experience. I did. I was literally laughed out the room. A really embarrassing moment in my career, but ultimately, who the fuck did I think I was asking that after 3 weeks?
I was told to fuck off because I worked for strong leaders. We don’t have that under Edu. Arteta was promoted too early and allowed to make terrible decisions right away.
The two biggest?
- Trusting players that always let Arsenal down
2. Giving new deals to old players in the hope they had one last job in them
Granit Xhaka was an abomination yesterday. A non-negotiable should be ‘don’t back a rival player over your teammate’, but here we are a week on after the Alioski incident and the slowest plodder in the league had another disaster class in midfield. We should have moved him on this summer.
On this point. Our letdown players seem to have this thing where they’re so comfortable, they feel they can be affronted by competition. Xhaka was good last season, you can’t deny it. Is it any coincidence that he and Ceballos, both dropped for Elneny and Partey, are dropping 2/10s now they’ve been disrespected?
What did AMN do at the training ground that was so bad he can’t contribute to a midfield with the mobility of my 94-year-old grandma three-point turning her trolley in an Aldi shopping aisle?
David Luiz was an incredible player 5 years ago, but we should never have given him a new deal after the season he had last year. That’s on Arteta, he trusted a player that tanked for us on the pitch. He thought £160kish p/w was deserved based on behaviour behind the scenes. Don’t even get me started on how he was allowed to play on like a wounded soldier after a clash of heads that sounded like a car accident.
Auba. Love him. But it is ALWAYS a risk to sign a player based on emotion. He’s 31 years old, we are not a mega club, should we have given him a 3-year deal? An experienced technical director would have said no. Nagelsmann moaned after the Champions League semi-final that he hadn’t been allowed to sign players of that profile. Rightly so. That’s how big swingers act with upstart coaches. Put them in their place.
Back to Auba.
He was nowhere. he looked disinterested. No fight in him at all. It was a pathetic run out that spoke to the bland season he’s been having. He is not a complete striker, which means you need a special type of setup to get the best from him. Namely, wingers that can go past people and find him in the box. We don’t have that.
Willian, an early sub again, after another nothing game. He was never the player we needed. So many people raised the flag on that signing, yet we invested £250k a week on ANOTHER aging player. It looks like a catastrophic signing for a club that is working from the strategy of signing players that look like Champions League level, but are in fact not. Look at the players Wolves sign, generally cheap, always built for the league, better than ours. Can we not compete for these types? £72m for Pepe versus £23m for Jota? Who would you prefer?
Lacazette looks finished at this level. Pepe doesn’t look like he can compete in the Premier League. The kids aren’t good enough and the environment to blood them is absolutely toxic.
Manchester City doesn’t have great strikers, but they have an incredible pipeline of creativity that feeds them.
Spurs don’t have an incredible pipeline, but they have complete forwards in Kane and Son.
We don’t have complete strikers. We don’t have good wingers. We don’t have good midfielders. Slander Arteta all you want, but this squad is built for no manager in the world. It’s a fucking mess.
When all of our players are playing at their peak, we can bumble our way through games. When NONE of our players are putting in a shift, we are fucked. Arteta did really well to get a turn out of them last season, now it seems he can’t.
It’s not all his fault, but it’s hard not to point the finger at him for continuing the bad decisions.
He is a brilliant coach, but a terrible judge of players. I went at people in the summer who said he was conned. I am rethinking that evaluation because it looks like he has been well and truly hoodwinked by a group of players who are built to fail.
The stats after the game made me queezy. We played 36 crosses into the box and only 2 found players. This is peak David Moyes. Is this Steve Round’s contribution to Arsenal? Is that all we have? Arteta is a progressive coach that can’t recognize our striker has no physical presence in a crowded box? How many hip youngsters in the backroom do we need to suss that strategy is a terrible one?
The club won’t sack Arteta. They can’t afford to. Their pride won’t allow it. But he’s now in that territory with a chunk of fans, which is the moment we live in. There are enough bad decisions you can apportion to him for this to be his responsibility. However, we have to be rational. The squad is not built to his specs. There is no manager you’d want that we can afford. It is going to be a massive undertaking to fix this.
The summer is a tipping point for us. The question is, do you have the team in place to deliver the brutality we need? If Edu isn’t the one, are you going to let him lead it and waste more money we don’t have? It certainly cannot be led by Arteta. He’s made too many bad decisions and the extra responsibility has clearly fucked his main focus, which should be coaching.
Here’s an idea. Sign Rangnick. Milan offered him £4.5m a year. That’s peanuts. Give him total power to reshape the club. Heavily bonus him. Set aggressive targets. Demand a premium version of what he offers the RB franchise. Don’t stick it out with people that don’t have a high ceiling. If you have a junior coach, do NOT have a junior technical director. Build a team around his weaknesses, don’t let him choose who he hires, especially if he hires people he likes to have control of the backroom
Address the job roles. We exited a dictatorship only to put ourselves right back into one with someone not ready for it. That is the weakest of all sauces. It’s seasoning your chicken wings with milk. It’s adding sparkling water to your Bud Light because you have meeting at 0830. It’s having an early night at your best mates wedding. We need to get a proper structure in place to fix the club. We need real hierarchy and clearly defined R&Rs. That should start now because we need to save our season. We have boots on the ground, where is the action?
I’m too furious to write about the path forward right now, I’ll bring that tomorrow. But know this, I fully recognize we hit a terrible tipping point yesterday. The slide is on. Arteta looks like a rookie caught in headlights. Maybe worse, he might have been hit by a truck, now he’s limping in the forest and the bears of doom are tracking him. He doesn’t have the infrastructure around him to solve it right now. He needs to call his pals in high places for advice. He needs to get a turn out of his players. He needs to pull off a miracle and get some pride back into the football, if he doesn’t, this is Emery in season two.
He can turn this around though, Ralph Hassenhutl did at Southampton. He lost 10 of his opening 17 last season after 6 months in charge. He conceded 36 goals in the process crowned by a 9-0 defeat to Leicester. This was a coach known for defensive rigour. He turned it around. He summoned the magic, now he looks like a contender to replace OGS. Mikel needs a run like his. Will he find it? Who knows. He needs to shock the system with something electric. Let’s see what he has.
Right, that’s me done. Off to find the bears of doom to see if I can get myself eaten. See you mugs in the comments.
P.S. Double the traffic when we lose? Seems that Arsenal fans like to blog here when we lose whether I’m pro or anti a particular manager. What a bunch of masochists you are.
Calypso
All i can say is thank fuck Arsenal didn’t beat Liverpool 7 -2 as TR7 would have given Arteta a blowjob and a new 10 year contract.
Jeez red we be lucky to score 7 goals all season under arteta, never in a single game you daft bugger . We make hard work if Dundalk
Weagle Cmon lad don’t dampen the praise now, he’s been immense. You’ve raved about him doing the things he’s done at 39, and rightly so. You think having a guy as the focal point up top doing those things doesn’t elevate his teammates levels? It absolutely does. Taking nothing away from the manager, huge credit for his influence, but the importance of giving the team what’s missing in terms of personnel is huge. Like you say, they had a skeleton squad in place minus a real presence up top that was subsequently filled. I’m of the opinion we’d see a… Read more »
It’s still there and all good. I used to go under the moniker ‘Park Chu-young’s left testicle’ but due to a glitch on my phone I had to keep typing in my name for each post – so dropped it to just ‘Left testicle’. I don’t know why I chose the left – could have just as easily have been the right. 🙂
Charlie The thing is, this isn’t mirroring Emery’s first season in charge. We were actually doing well results-wise at least at this stage of the season under Emery even if the performances weren’t great. It’s mirroring his second season and the one that got him sacked. Terrible results to go with the performances. ‘We’re insipid in the final third, but the overall play means games are fine margins and we’re coming up short narrowly. That’s not the same as getting your arse rammed and someone pulling a smash and grab to sneak wins and claim draws from defeats. It’s largely… Read more »
Avram Grant won the league with Chelsea and still got sacked.
————————
He didn’t win shit with Chelsea.
Charlie It’s not dampening the praise, he’s been their star man but you can’t deny the effect that the gaffer has had on the team. It’s all part of it, combination of Zlatan added, new gaffer, confidence that results and performances breeds into other players. Maybe all we need is new players but I’ve not been convinced by the work that Arteta has done in the near year that he’s been here now. We’re falling backwards now from the high of the Cup run. I mentioned Di Matteo before being sacked by Chelsea, similar profile on paper to Arteta wasn’t… Read more »
*was a smash and grab for us
Weagle I’m not saying anything is being mirrored, but Emery had more up top in his first season and his influence on all fronts became more and more worrying as his tenure extended. I don’t think that of Arteta, though he made an arse of the summer in one department that is now the talking point of nearly every match we play. Yes Wolves had more clear cut chances, but they absolutely didn’t have more opportunities to create them. We had loads more final third opportunities that we failed to capitalise on thanks to poor movement, touch, lack of a… Read more »
Arteta on David Luiz: “Nasty cut and wasn’t comfortable heading the ball. All the protocols were followed. He didn’t lose consciousness. It was just a cut.”
Just a cut??? It broke someone else’s skull. More and more I find Arteta just BS.
Di Matteo didn’t have a similar profile to Arteta outside winning a cup early.
Fine margins talk is bollocks.
There have been plenty of clubs that can give you hard luck stories about fine margins.
Even some relegated teams talk about how they ultimately failed because of fine margins.
All that matters is the end result and the feeling of progression in relation to overall performances.
We are seeing neither with Arteta in charge atm.
Danny
He got to a Champions league Final which Arsenal would have rewarded with a bumper new contract.
I thought it was compulsory to hook anybody with concussion. There was no way anyone responsible should have let Luiz remain on the pitch. The whole point of concussion is that the person may seem entirely unaffected and ok, only to collapse later – the danger is an unknown quantity and you must err of the side of caution and safety. Hiding behind the medical team’s quick diagnosis that he count the fingers held up to him is no excuse.
Ish, you can say fine margins isn’t right, but the league isn’t spelling out that theory. It’s more competitive than ever and games are closer than ever. Hence the pile-up.
Ishola
We are actually regressing under arteta
That Di Matteo even had an opportunity to win the CL with Chelsea as a rookie is an indicator that this scenario is not worth talking about in relation to Arteta.
Newsflash. Arsenal are not a CL club and haven’t been one for four seasons most likely five seasons now.
Each hour that passes I’m more baffled that there isn’t breaking news of arteta getting sacked.
Anonymous Commentator, that’s on you mate. Don’t be so ridiculous.
Arsenal have never been a Champions league club. One Final in 20 years proves that.
Pedro
“you can say fine margins isn’t right, but the league isn’t spelling out that theory”
Fine margins talk is worthless in regards the Arsenal of today.
It’s worthless because the team isn’t playing well.
I can understand fine margins talk somewhat if a team goes down but there is the thoight that both teams played well but the defeat in the end was fine margins between two teams both playing well on the day.
But Arsenal are not playing well and haven’t been for long enough so fine margins are defunct in Arsenal’s case.
One point that most pundits seemed to have missed is the fact that David Luiz went off because he did not feel comfortable continuing. That was the player’s decision and not a decision made by the coaching and medical staff. How on earth was he allowed to continue until half time? Either the doctor did not realise that David Luiz was dazed and unable to head the ball without risk of concussion and in which case he needs a good talking and maybe sacking. The Wolves players has a fractured skull, so David Luiz was at risk of concussion from… Read more »
Calypso
After the final Chelsea gave him a 4 year contract worth millions so I don’t get your point.
What’s the big difference between them Pedro?
He set up Chelsea very similarly in the CL to Arteta in the FA Cup, sitting deep and absorbing pressure before hitting teams on the break. They had a bang average team on paper and had no business winning the CL by beating Pep’s Barcelona over 2 legs and Henyckes’ Bayern in the Final in Munich.
If you’re going to hold the West Brom sacking against him, bit harsh considering he took them up the previous season and they were still above the relegation zone when he was sacked.
Calypso
————-
Ignore my post, he was sacked after the final……..
Celtic will be looking for a new manager soon, would be perfect for Arteta……..
Anonymous Commentator, don’t be so ridiculous. The NLD is coming up soon. After that potential spanking he will probably be sacked.
Then we should get in Nagelsman, if he will come. Otherwise it has to be Vieira. Why Vieira I hear you all ask? Cos I am a romantic and he is the once and future captain.
Danny On 30 April 2008, Grant’s Chelsea beat Liverpool 3–2 (4–3 on aggregate) to advance to the 2008 UEFA Champions League Final, something they failed to achieve under former manager José Mourinho. Chelsea drew 1–1 with Manchester United in the final, only to lose out on the European Cup in a penalty shootout which United won 6–5. In the heavy rain, John Terry slipped on his team’s fifth penalty, clipping the ball off the post and wide. Had he scored, Chelsea would have won the tournament.[39] Three days later, at around 6 pm on 24 May 2008, Chelsea announced in… Read more »
“Look on the bright side , the golf courses open on Wednesday …”
Go Pierre! You’ve been miserable without your golf.
Anonymous
If we’d been having fans in the stadium think he would’ve been sacked already , could be after next Sunday’s defeat though . Interviewers are smelling blood and asking him that question, he’s answering like he knows it’s coming . When it gets to that stage there’s normally no way back . Honestly it’s over for him just a matter of time , like Emery in his last days you can tell he knows that he doesn’t know how to turn it around
I’m truly baffled Pedro, I am unsure what new optics you would need to be alright with arteta getting sacked. We’re in a historic slump of form, we’re relying on a rookie manager to somehow pull this one out his ass and stop the rot, we’re just told to ignore that the squad has been regressed because of decisions he has signed off on. What’s next? Spurs put 7 past us? We are nowhere near where we should be, and there is no cup run that will make me ignore that detail. We don’t pass the eye test right now,… Read more »
‘That Di Matteo even had an opportunity to win the CL with Chelsea as a rookie is an indicator that this scenario is not worth talking about in relation to Arteta.’ You’re being myopic. The point of bringing Di Matteo up is that he won the Champions League as well as the FA Cup in his short stint at the club. Was a young manager at the time, didn’t have a track record of failure behind him. Winning that Chelsea side those honours should have bought him another season at the least but he was sacked by the end of… Read more »
Val
Wish you’d skip the medical expertise volume from your archives, it’s patently obvious you’ve none.
Concussion protocols were undertaken, Luiz passed them. The only measure of pain and discomfort is with him, if he continued he did so because he was comfortable to do so. When he no longer felt that way he communicated that and was immediately removed from the game.
Basic as you like, but of course you have to interject with nonsense about a doctor with no balls to talk to Arteta and Arteta somehow being stubborn. Deary me your ability to conjure bullshit is unrivalled.
Not Viera for the next one please.
I’d like a professional winner this time.
I don’t think Poch’s style works for the players we have too. Not that he’d come to us.
Di Matteo got sacked after winning the Champions league and we’re holding onto someone who won the FA Cup lol
Sitting next to Guardiola doesn’t qualify you for one of the biggest jobs in football.
WE, he was a caretaker put into a situation with elite players. That’s as far as it goes. He wasn’t running coaching sessions as one of the most exciting football machines the Prem has ever seen. He didn’t fix the worst start in 36 years.
I’m not saying Arteta is having a good time right now, but ‘everything has been shit for a year burn him at the stakes’ is so OTT.
Arteta will make a Generational tv pundit, better than Neville
You heard it here 1st!
Raptora
Ref Your post at 11.16
You are entirely wrong concerning dates when Soares and Willian signed contracts.
Soares signed his current contract on 24.6.20 and Willian signed his contract with us on 14.6.20.
Raul announced his departure on 15th August 2020. At the time Pedro was commenting that
there was a whiff of scandal about both signings and you may recall that Arsenal announced that Tim Lewis a Partner at Clifford Chance Solicitors was joining the Board.
Wenger eagle ,
Most of the arsenal fans I know I would say there’s an 80/20 split that want arteta gone
What should be one of the benefits of hiring a young manager is that they are open to new ideas rather than being stubborn and set in their ways. Understanding what’s going wrong and fixing it. I sincerely hope Mikel learns from the mistakes he’s clearly making and takes them on board in order to improve as manager for this team. He won’t get sacked anytime unless we are in relegation trouble which is not going to happen. Come January they(Edu/Josh) need to commit to improving the attacking pieces and come the summer when the dross contracts expire and Xhaka,… Read more »
Charlie
You say that we’re a De Bruyne away but we’re still conceding really cheap goals. We’ve got a negative GD and are conceding over a goal a game. We’re giving up plenty of chances to teams.
I think that we’re an absolute mess going forwards and that even bringing in a world class CAM wouldn’t be the fix. We’re 3 creative/forward players short.
Lacazette, Pepe and Willian are all capable of better than we are seeing but really, we just need to get rid of the former two.
Arteta should be given time to face off with Villareal in Europa, no matter our league position.
I don’t disagree with you Weagle in relation to managers at top clubs not getting reprieves due to just cup wins but failing badly in the league. The point being made was Di Matteo had the opportunity to win the CL. That team he had as a rookie was on a higher level and plain than this Arsenal team of today. So as rookie Di Matteo had more to work with than Arteta does. It’s like yesterday with Emirates Stroller. He kept going on about rookie success with Zidane and Guardiola at Real Madrid and Barcelona but was completely ignoring… Read more »
“I’m not saying anything is being mirrored, but Emery had more up top in his first season and his influence on all fronts became more and more worrying as his tenure extended.” What influence? He wanted a PL ready Zaha brought in, a game changer in every sense of the word, club wanted better He saw from the outset that Torriera was too small for the league and personally scouted Partey, he was literally at one of Athleti’s games to watch him play. If we had Nzonzi on a short term deal like he wanted in the midfield we would… Read more »
“Di Matteo didn’t have a similar profile to Arteta outside winning a cup early.”
Well Di Matteo had already managed at MK Dons and West Brom before becoming assistant at Chelsea and then caretaker
Very different profiles
Both Guardiola and Zidane managed B teams before taking over the first team.
Surely in a game of fine margins it’s managerial ‘sauce’ that makes the difference? If not, what’s the point of it?
Not sure how Ceballos fits into the category of “players that let Arsenal down” or “players not good enough” when our sample size is the season he helped us win a trophy? I still thing he is better in a midfield 3, not in pivot. Although he played in a pivot in the FA cup run, I would put that down to the system only requiring him to disrupt, recycle, shield the back 3, not create, control, and dominate in an 2 vs. Wolves, next to a player that is customarily error prone against counterattacking teams (Xhaka). Right now, Ceballos… Read more »
Raptora You persist in your critique and allegation that Arteta was responsible for turning down of transfers for Mustafi and Lacazette. I suggest that you read properly what people post and not your interpretation. Arteta was appointed Head Coach of Arsenal in December 2019. He had absolutely no say in transfer business at that time. Also it is highly unlikely that any new coach would make a decision about players before he had the opportunity to assess them properly. You keep on rabbiting about all the transfer offers that were made in last window. None of those alleged offers were… Read more »
Sid
That’s just evil , you know we’ll take a spanking
This previous talk from Arteta before of competing in a CL final in three/four seasons time.
He would have to be absolutely unique to do this. It would be a first in top flight football.
No manager without previous experience has ever gone into a club at the level Arsenal are atm and gone on to get to the level of contesting a CL final in three to four seasons.
Never been done.
Weagle
I’m not saying we’re one player from any kind of fix, I’m saying if we had a creator the whole attack would elevate and the fine margins in games would be positively effected. I think pretty dramatically. It’s the most lamentable error to date imo.
We’re much improved defensively, but pressure builds when you don’t/can’t score and that’s the self inflicted issues we’re dealing with. Also, half our conceded goals have come in 2 out the 10 games. We’ve conceded 6 in 8 outside Liverpool and Villa.
correction Willian signed his contract on 14.8.20 one day before Raul announced his departure.
Calypso
“Both Guardiola and Zidane managed B teams before taking over the first team.”
We know this but we call them “rookies” for the benefit of Emirates Stroller.
The simple point is Arteta deserves goodwill after the cup win and shouldnt be sacked until given a proper go of the season.
We have nothing to lose by giving him a fair of a full season. This form isnt terminal, only for the cunts that hope it is.
I don’t need to have medical expertise to realise that if somebody is involved in a serious clash of heads, he should be removed from the field of play. The HAI protocol was so respected, that it took 40 minutes to realise that David Luiz was unable to continue. And only after he said so himself. I am naive but I thought The purpose of the HAI was to always go for the integrity of the player and in any doubt remove him even against his will. No more hero warrior complex that results in head trauma and dementia years… Read more »
“He didn’t fix the worst start in 36 years.”
Neither did Arteta, we were 8th at the time of sacking Emery and finished 8th. United and Spurs were all below us when he was appointed and finished above us.
His league results since the restart reads 29 points picked up from 60. We lost the most points in the league from winning positions than any other team in the division
The FA cup really distracted everyone
Pedro
‘ He didn’t fix the worst start in 36 years.’
Did I not just hear yesterday that this is the worst start to an Arsenal season in 39 years?
And who out of that Chelsea group was elite? They finished 6th in the PL behind Newcastle. The back 5 were excellent and they had Lampard but outside of that they won it with Obi Mikel, Ramires, Meireles, Mata all playing a key part and a 34 year old Drogba up front.
They beat Bayern in the CL Final with Bertrand, Bosingwa, David Luiz and Kalou starting.
Val Once again showing you’ve fuck all medical pedigree. Clashing heads doesn’t immediately indicate a player can’t continue, and it certainly isn’t for another to judge pain or discomfort. Luiz never left the game because he was dazed or confused, he left because the nature of the gash sustained meant he couldn’t do his job without hurting himself. Something only HE could be the judge of. Something he did judge, and something we remedied. But not according to you who feels the need to create a parallel narrative of ball-less doctors and a stubborn Arteta. Speak about what you know,… Read more »
Valentin
A rugby player who is involved in a clash of heads leaves the field and is properly examined
in the medical centre before being allowed to resume. There is a minimum of 10 minutes after the tests are conducted before he is allowed to resume and during the time he is off the field the club are allowed to use a substitute.
However, I have maintained for a long time that a “fit” Luiz should be only used when we
employ three centre backs. He has not been reliable in a back 4. That was demonstrated
yesterday.
Charlie
What will be your tipping point for wanting a change in manager? Genuinely curious.
Pedro and a few on here are just going through the 7 stages – it really doesn’t matter what they think this has too much downwards momentum now and Arteta doesn’t have the skill set or experience to turn it around.
It’s when not if.
All I know is Arteta has brought shame 9n the club by losing to sides at home since the 70’s
Wenger eagle
I’d love that question to go to Pedro as well ,
A league position, standard of play , anything at all , not being funny or anything like that , I’m genuinely curious what would it take for him to say enough is enough . Relegation ?
CC
Agree, it’s mental we have nobody pulling the strings. Thought without question Willian would be introduced in a more effectual creative roll. The frustrations of no creativity run Amazonian in this side. Could trigger ultimate demise.
Weagle
Being unable to course correct, having no direction in January, falling way short of top 4, and not competing in the EL.
Right now we’re stumbling, and Arteta needs to arrest that.
I’m just genuinely curious to hear how we’re supposed to win games.
Did Pedro answer that or ignore it?
Sal It’s mental. Said it yesterday, but the three major decisions that have been most destructive are: – binning Ozil with no replacement – Extending Auba without binning Laca – Rejecting monies for AMN and falling short with Aouar Three decisions that required significant follow-up to justify themselves, and ones that saw nothing come of it. I’ve said already that the Covid summer and the mess that entailed with Raul maybe fair-ish to not be too critical, but still that’s a stretch. We should be a team supporting Auba the CF, with Aouar and another added for attacking impetus. What… Read more »
Chelsea had:
Lampard
Cole
Essien
Drogba
John Terry
Juan Mata
Lukaku
Sturridge
Ivanovic
Luiz
Cech
You can’t see the difference in quality?
We better all look at the competitors for the Europa League.
That’s all that is left for Arteta this season.
Spurs may qualify for the CL without need of a Europa League win so they may not have that real high hunger and desire to land the Europa League. Mind you Mourinho does like his secondary cups.
Being competitive in Europa League is hard to define.
Basically if Arteta fails to win the Europa League along with crashing in the EPL it’s overall failure.
Or will just a Europa League final appearance but losing appease the fans?
Agree on Ozil, big dick moves need to have a plan behind them.
No creator was seriously punching yourself in the face
If we did sack Arteta who could do a temporary job?
I think the club are not ready to sack him so we will bumble along until Jan.
If the players start to ignore him as Chelsea did with Maurice then the season is over .
The club has lost it’s passing ability since Wenger left. I believe that the best thing for Arteta to do is to beckon to Arsene Wenger for assistance and get video clips of Arsenal matches under Wenger to learn the Arsenal way of playing.
He is not the Messiah we have craved. The earlier a new coach is appointed the better.
We need to start performing and move up the table.
Arteta is going to see out the season, the earlier some here come to terms with that the better. I for one think that’s the right decision. Would look very clueless (i know we are not far from clueless) promoting him then sacking him now. The promotion was the silly move, its been done so he should see out a whole season then we take stock.
Time for him to show what he is made of. My advise would be lose the arrogance then go from there.
Omozuafo Frank
“I believe that the best thing for Arteta to do is to beckon to Arsene Wenger for assistance and get video clips of Arsenal matches under Wenger to learn the Arsenal way of playing.”
I believe that Wenger has an extensive home library of videos for most of the matches while he was in charge of Arsenal so this sounds a very good idea.
Pete, I get that you have info that people don’t rate Edu but the Technical Director and the manager need to work together. Edu isn’t a Monchi. He isn’t a Rangnick. His experience is of being the right hand man to Tite, both at Corinthians and the Brazil national team. In my mind, that’s how it should work. Otherwise you get the manager complaining he’s getting the wrong players and the technical director complaining that the manager is just using them wrong. People bang on about the Technical Director/Director of football role but the clubs where it works best are… Read more »
Wenger back!
Noooooooo
Everyone and is dog were on here screaming blue murder if we sold AMN, everywhere on the web Arsenal fans crying that we were selling a prized asset and almost half way through he’s barely had a kick, not like he’s injured or anything like that. 20 million or whatever extra we could have gotten for him down the drain
Receding,
What if our poor form continues and we enter a relegation scrap ( which our form is ) do you stick with arteta to see it out ?
Just think we could have got Grealish for 70mil instead of Pepe
JP, a technical director is not a partner to the manager. They set the tone and vision for the club. Arteta should not be on the level of the TD.
“He wanted a PL ready Zaha brought in, a game changer in every sense of the word, club wanted better”
Yep. I genuinely think Emery would’ve even preferred Ryan Fraser to Pepe; the Scot would’ve suited his system more and held the width on the left. The whole inverted right-wing thing with Pepe was never really Emery’s ideal.
The only player I think Emery really wanted to bin was Wilshere, the rest he would’ve wanted to keep on.
“but the three major decisions that have been most destructive are:– binning Ozil with no replacement
– Extending Auba without binning Laca
– Rejecting monies for AMN and falling short with Aouar”
But keeping Xhaka no actually worse convincing him not to leave isn’t near the top of the list.
Only a generational manager like Arteta would fix our worst start to the season in 36 years by making making our worst start in 39 years.
Pedro
What happened to we have a top squad and we just need a manager with vision and sauce to get them all playing?
If a Tech Dir is a partner to the manager who hires and fires the managers?
Receding
If the results don’t pick up between now and December then no reason why Arteta should see out the season. Can’t be writing off seasons when we’ve still got the Europa league to play for and the league isn’t done and dusted. Way the league is, any team that goes on 3/4 winning run suddenly finds themselves closer to the top so not sure it should be a season where we stick with the manager regardless how poor they’re doing
‘Lampard
Cole
Essien
Drogba
John Terry
Juan Mata
Lukaku
Sturridge
Ivanovic
Luiz
Cech’
Being a bit disingenuous here Pedro. Lukaku, Sturridge and Essien all had no part to play in that CL win.
And we’re not talking about prime Lampard, Terry and Cole here. All were well into their 30s.
They beat arguably the greatest club side ever assembled over 2 legs and a Bayern Munich side that went on to win everything the year after. Massive achievement no matter the personnel.
Charlie
So basically if we are still where we are now in two months time?
January really will be key for us. Simply have to bring somebody creative in.
If the results haven’t picked up by the end of December we will be on the precipice of a relegation battle.
Good job Kroenke’s pride would rather see a $2 billion asset half in value than have someone else sack a member of staff.
Worst start to a season for 39 years is misleading as Arsenal won 6 games in a row after the 11th game.
Paulinho
Turns out your prediction of Wilshere retiring by age 25/26 wasn’t too far off.
Semi-retired for years now. Begging an MLS club to take him on still in his 20s, sad stuff. Really was a superb player before the injuries.
Managers are not omnipotent. A new manager just inherits the same issues. Arteta will likely get the chop at some point, as the pressure gets turned up, next weekend things could turn nasty. I’m just not convinced by the argument that a new manager really changes much. Gabriel was good last night, and at 22, there’s plenty of scope for further improvement. Losing Partey has been a right kick in the teeth, we’ve waited a long time for this profile of player. Willian on a 3 year deal was insane, not really sure who’s responsible for that? Or who’s responsible… Read more »
Rich
If managers don’t make any difference then:
Why did we bother getting rid of Wenger?
Why do clubs pay them so much money?
“Receding, What if our poor form continues and we enter a relegation scrap ( which our form is ) do you stick with arteta to see it out ?” Tricky question Peckobill although i don’t believe we will get into a relegation scrap. If 15 games to the end of the season that is real possibility then of course the sack Batistuta We never actually stood a chance of winning the Europa league under Arteta as far as i am concerned, a lot of what Arteta does is too heavily reliant on Aubameyang who himself isn’t always a game changer.… Read more »
Weagle
“So basically if we are still where we are now in two months time?”
No.
You must have missed the bit where Charlie stated “competing” in the Europa League as well.
We are all falling on the Europa League now.
Raptora
Yes, as I said Arteta made a lot of wrong choices, sticking with Xhaka is perhaps his biggest mistake till date. For someone who can talk a good game he has made a lot of poor decisions. I have a hunch he puts too much emphasis on intangibles such as ‘character’, ‘professionalism’ and ‘team spirit’ to the extent of choosing an inferior player with more ‘professionalism’ over a better player who is perhaps not a consummate ‘professional’. Perhaps taking a cue from what Pep did to the great Yaya Toure
“Managers are not omnipotent.”
No one thought there are.
Just do the job, make the collective better than the individual, build a team that knows what they are doing.
You keep posting like this is the absolute best this team can do and any other manager would have lost 5/10 league games played with them. That’s nonsense
Rich
“We haven’t improved from last season, because we haven’t really improved from last season.”
We haven’t improved from last season because we’ve still got the same manager. deary me…
Ishola
What does ‘competing’ for the EL mean? Winning it? Because anything else is failure, Emery can attest to that as getting smashed in the Final shortened his rope considerably.
WE – Yep, crazy you remember. Back around 2012 I said that. I remember watching him closely after he came back from that long-term ankle injury and you could tell straight away he was protecting the ankle. He would be so concerned with getting clattered he would let the ball go under his feet and lose possession; the sort of thing he would’ve never have done in his first season, when he would be happy to ride challenges and roll the marker before driving into space. Also every time someone tackled him his level for the rest of the match… Read more »