The big one is tomorrow. Arteta rolled the entire season on Europa League. He has to deliver.
My big fear?
Galaxy brain.
There are so many temptations and potential traps that could down us.
Do you bring David ‘BIG GAME’ Luiz back in the mixer?
Does Auba start?
Does he risk Tierney or Lacazette despite them having no game time?
Internet people are saying we should roll all the dice. For me, that’s dim thinking. Nothing wrecks an Arsenal plan worse than an early smack in the face. Losing players that are important to the system isn’t good for the system. Also, losing players for the final would also be disastrous.
I’d prefer to lessen the risk by playing fit players who want to perform.
The biggest galaxy brain worry is rolling out a Villareal tactical plan built for Manchester City level players. We’re not there yet. 20-year-olds in the false 9 role is not going to work tomorrow. We need to have a simple plan every single player can follow. That means the right players in the right positions. We have enough fitness to deliver on that vision.
Auba is fit, he wants to lead, he’ll have horrendous memories of his miss last year, that desire to prove the world wrong will be key. That feels like a huge boost.
Martinelli was on fire at the weekend, he’s in form, he should land a starting role.
Odegaard created 5 chances against Newcastle, if you’re playing Auba, you need him on the pitch.
Then it’s tough because you have Lacazette, Saka, and Pepe pushing for starts.
We need to win 1-0. Simple as that. Then we’re through. I would prefer destruction. I’m not sure we’ll get that, but we certainly did away for Slavia Prague.
If we win, Arteta has made a second final in two of the toughest ever seasons. That’s good work. He’ll still need to win the final, but it certainly takes the edge off the league season.
I don’t even want to contemplate a loss.
Whatever the result, there’s still a lot of introspection about this season to be had. It’s not been good enough. A trophy won’t change that.
… but, it’ll go a long way. It’s the memory zapper in MIB. We all need a memory zapper for this season.
Fingers crossed Arteta has something special lined up.
Biscuit maybe but best team no way !
Arteta definitely doesn’t even know his biscuit.
Conte is the man we should go for
Conte is building something special at Inter Milan, so that may not happen.
why would Conte come to us? Where we are now Better to have a good DOF and someone like Potter provided he brings bissouma with him!
Conte is not leaving title winning inter to come to mid table Brexit arsenal
Gotta nip that one in the bud.
Arteta will never cut it as a manager he is a coach period. I have never been embarrassed to be an Arsenal fan in 52 years but today I am
PostrockydaveMay 7, 2021 09:02:05
@sid I tend to agree.With the players we have, we couldn’t have done worse.But who would the manager be?
If Emery is in the finals, anyone but Diet Pep would have taken us to the finals and won.
Tee Cee Can you really see Conte coming to an English team such as Arsenal where the squad is wafer thin in quality? When he went to Chelsea he took over a squad that yes had failed to turn up but they had one the league the year before and knew how to win . Reflect on the players he had Kante, Cesc, Courtois, Costa and so on. He would in all probability just laugh when asked to come from a CL club to a club that doesn’t have even EL, few quality players It’s a pipe dream to think… Read more »
It was easy to be taken in by Arteta’s rhetoric in his original press conferences when he arrived at the club. He talked a very good game and in his opening 3 months he really stamped his mark on the team. We looked more disciplined, more organised and performances and results improved….I was impressed with his start. Lockdown and covid had a very negative effect on Arteta, he got himself involved in non footballing matters, he started to flex his muscles and for me this is where it started to go wrong. The club allowed him to treat players with… Read more »
Speaking of positivity…. here’s me wondering where Pedro is this fine morning.
Was looking forward to reading a review ‘from a different perspective’ today.
Peeeedddrrrroooooo…. come out, come out wherever you are
How ironic that ‘The Bard’ a title that is associated with probably some of the greatest quotes ever made, should use another quote totally ignorant of it’s context. Hansen’s “you don’t win anything with kids” is so well remembered because he was proven completely and utterly WRONG!. Yet the guy is using it as a defence of Arteta. Hillarious!
the players must be totally confused, play well and you get dropped, no continuity of best 11, formation or playing style etc. etc.
Emery proved he can be defensively solid as well, looool
Dragging Pedro was typical scapegoating. Well, it’s also our duty to filter what messages we absorb from any “Arsenal Influencer”.
Pedro doesn’t guide your opinion.
The first priority of any manager must be to get the team to play to more than the some of its parts – on this measure alone Arteta has failed abysmally as evidenced last night.
Really looking forward to Pedro’s blog today
Foxy,
Yeah, to regain that playing identity and replicate it consistently, with a great eye 👁 for defending.
Terraloon I may be swimming against the tide, but at least I don’t make hasty judgments. Tony thinks that he is a world authority on every subject that he cares to post on whether it was politics, the pandemic, the benefits of living in Thailand and his viewpoint on UK or football matters. The reality is he is an expert on zilch apart from perhaps body building. As I posted yesterday I think that Arteta is a good coach as many professionals including Guardiola has expressed. However, I think that he has shortcomings in the management department not least with… Read more »
Supreme leader is still digesting the humble pie, lots of alka seltzer will be needed.
Lol of course he’ll still be in the dug out next season, we made the same mistake with Emery after the Europa league final and here we are with a much worse manager making the same mistake
I prefer hasty judgement over dithering and fence sitting
Emirates
Whatever any professionals like Pep have said about Arteta is to be honest a bucket load of bull, the evidence on the pitch has shown that he’s really not good at Amy aspect of this managerial thing, we need to focus more on the shambles on the pitch than whatever praise singers in the media are saying
You know Rulli has to be one of the most error prone keepers we’ve played against… ever!
Yet over two legs, Rulli faced only FOUR shots at his goal… FOUR…
To which, one of those 4 shots was one of the dodgiest penalties I recall ever given to us.
Which is more depressing ? Getting up this morning and remembering that shit show or knowing the charlatan probably won’t get sacked so next season is a write off already
Cazorla “Looks more and more like Arsene Wenger WAS a genius. You arseholes have got the arsenal you deserve.The level of disrespect he got was disgraceful and shows the delusion of fans now that would be happy with a cup and a top 4 trophy.” 100% correct… For me , Le groaners celebrating Wenger and Ozil leaving shows a lack of understanding of the game. Since Wenger left, despite spending fortunes , the football has been dire . Since Ozil was discarded our results and performances have nosedive, and it is no coincidence that our attack has struggled since Ozil… Read more »
With Emery in tat first season you could at least see or sense what he was trying to do with the overlapping full backs and cut backs and high press however long that lasted but you could sense what he was trying to achieve, we blitzed through Napoli and Valencia in the Europa that year, you’d feel if he was in the opposite dugout that we’d at least create something from the kamikadze football we’d have been playing but with Arteta he rather hooked off our only goal threat with 10 mins to go and then threw in a poor… Read more »
Things nosedived after Pat Rice left too.
I’m afraid I’m with Bati ES. Apart from Pep I don’t recall any reputable source lauding Arteta’s ‘genius’ (insert word of your choice). And quite frankly I doubt Pep has a clue what is needed to manage AFC, a club without the bext players and a bottomless pit of money to spend until you get it right.
Potter would be interesting and a worth a shot. He’s earned the opportunity, unfortunately Arteta didn’t and we’re paying the cost.
Having listened to the podcast, ive gotta say fair play to Pedro. He held his hands up about Arteta and fair play to him, he doesn’t deserve loads of shit as he does write a good blog.
You were all told on here how Arteta won that FA Cup.
Basically ten men behind the ball with sporadic counters and backs against the wall. It was never going to be sustainable over a longer period.
So enough with the crap about covid and him getting into other non-footballing affairs.
He was always going to be exposed as not good enough and limited over the longer period.
Let us ignore each player’s individual skill first. If I compare the way we play with other big teams like PSG, their forwards are always in the move to support the ball carrier. It creates passing lanes. There are many double passes. For us, Laca is the only one doing it. The others just wait for the ball the come. Yesterday, our attack missed Laca big time in the buildup.. Why the coaching staff didn’t train the players to be more mobile and support each other. Even Emery’s team passed the ball better than us. As for players individual skill,… Read more »
Get a really good manager in is the first step. A manager that can read players. Get rid of the dross, the weak and the slow, bring back loanees like Saliba and Mavropanos who are doing well on loan, sign fit, fast hard running creative players. Then create a culture of blitzing teams, out working, out running and out gunning the opposition. You produce and you play whatever your age. You don’t and you are not part of the panel no matter what your wages or ‘reputation’. This is what Pep has done and Tuchel is now doing. Arteta is… Read more »
How many of those players feels proud wearing that shirt every week? I don’t see Arteta in one either. This was the biggest match for half the team playing in their career so far, and how many gave their 100%. #ArtetaOut we need a rebuild and we got fucking Willian. Mikel told Saliba and Guen to fuck off. He literally preferred Willian over Martinelli for a full season. He messed up ESR game by trying to integrate Odegaard. Preferred Xhaka all day long, why not bring in Azeez and give him game time for next season if the season is… Read more »
Guardiola only wanted Arsenal to have the charlatan and to get him out of man c. Killing to birds with one stone.
Do you think its in Guardiolas interest to make Arsenal stronger?
Andy…there were.multiple sources stating that Arteta’s coaching was top drawer….lots of old Arsenal pro’s.
Shame he didn’t have the man management genius of Wenger who could wrong the very best out of even average players.
Wring not wrong!!
Pierre the Wenger devout was “impressed” by Arteta early doors.
He was impressed by his defensive shapes and his backs to the wall FA Cup win.
All from a Wenger devotee.
It’s hilarious.
Bellerin and Pepe have very poor attitude. It almost felt like Bellerin didn’t want to be on the field and Pepe is lazy in general. Partey is capable but too casual for my liking. Arteta obviously has major issues with his own attitude and lack of managerial nous but there are many players at Arsenal who don’t give a shit.
#ARTETAOUT There is seemingly a deeply-held belief in some corners of football, including the Arsenal boardroom, that Mikel Arteta is a truly great football manager in the making. The theory appears to be that spending three and a half years as a close contact to Pep Guardiola on the Manchester City bench has conferred some deeper level of understanding about football. Maybe he is. Maybe it will. But simply being Pep adjacent for a prolonged period of time is not and never has been a qualification for managing at the top level. After a wretched Europa League exit at the… Read more »
Ish…4th best defence in the league?.. I’m not sure if that’s Arteta’s problem..and he has many.
based on recent good performances I would have gone with
Leno
Cedric Chambers Gabriel Tierney
Elneny Partey
Saka Auba ESR
or if Tierney not fit a back line of
Chambers, Holding Mari, Cedric
But not another experimental side with players out of position
Fuck the process.
TR7
yes Pepe had a shocking game , even Willian would have been better maybe
Bellerin had no right to be playing ahead Cedric or Chambers based on past performances
Swkmoon
“4th best defence in the league?.. I’m not sure if that’s Arteta’s problem..and he has many.”
You don’t understand the post.
It’s hilarious that a Wenger worshipper was “impressed” by Arteta at any stage.
Arteta’s PR machine is fcuking incredible.
We’re in big trouble
Ish…point taken
Let’s not all pretend this decline started just a couple of years ago, it started way back in 2005, the decisions made by Wenger and the club have been disastrous. The persistence of playing alumina in goal when it was obvious he was not good enough, the signings, I went through the list and it was obvious where the club was heading, names like, cygan,Andre Santos, squilaci, chu young park, amaury bischoff, chamarkh, sanogo,silvestre, Gervinho,Kim brokeback kallstrom myachi,lucas Perez, mustaphi,elneny, xhaka when we could have got kante, arteta. Does that list scream ambition to you? All under wengers watch and… Read more »
The reason why we have a decent defensive output is because we sacrifice so much in attack.
Goals scored are more valuable goals conceded if you want to be a CL side. (Ideally you marry the two)
Since im a modest person, i will start by forgiving all the posters that called others ghouls and Emerystas for critcizing Diet Pep.
All this talk of decline.
Yes we were declining and we have fucking doubled down on the decline with this charlatan Arteta in place.
Trust the process! We are told!
My reply to that is…
No process that brings out zero progress is worth trusting!
Pedro deserves every bit of the negative banter that comes his way.
Every teeny weeny bit.
He’s been appealing with the Arteta nonsense so he shouldn’t get off so easily because he put up his hands.
Another Arteta-loving YouTuber called anti-Arteta gooners “rats”. That’s how divisive Arteta was and will ever be.
Tempo of our game under Arteta is dismally slow and the primary reason we have become a mid table club. Even Emery managed to get us play at a high tempo for 15-20 minutes often in 2nd half just after the break and as a result we won quite a few games under him. With Arteta we play at snail’s pace.
“Dragging Pedro was typical scapegoating. Well, it’s also our duty to filter what messages we absorb from any “Arsenal Influencer”.Pedro doesn’t guide your opinion.”
Duzie, Pedro’s a big boy and he also knows that the nuclear warhead heading for his face is fair game. If you mock and shout down people whom had doubts on Arteta then you HAVE to be right in what your saying. If not you fall into the Boris Johnson division.
*been appalling
Get Potter in, and this Con artist out of our club.
Majesticgooner May 7, 2021 10:47:28
it [this decline started] started way back in 2005.
That must be some kind of trolling or written by the worst kind of plastic fan.
Arsenal reached the Champion’s League final, but started to decline before.
Rafa Benitez is free
Get him in for 2 years to stabilize the club before we go off on another managerial junket.
The best thing about this Con artist, he exposed in this forum people who know football and could see he was a Con artist from those who think they know football lol.
Now a simple question choose 1 or 2
Who is the better manager,
1- the Bum Emery or
2- the Con artist Arteta
??????????????
Andy 1886 There have been many pundits who thought that Arteta’s appointment as Head Coachwas excellent. Of course many have now changed their tune. Kroenke and the Board will need to make some very serious decisions and quickly. It is clear that the club needs a clearout of playing personnel and if we are going to make progress some new players need to be recruited. The question is do you sort out the management before those decisions are being made. Frankly I suspect that Arteta will be given the boot at end of season if serious money is going to… Read more »
I don’t know how finishing consistently 4th and 3rd…whist making the CL final and winning a few FA cups…with a 2nd thrown in…can be called decline…. plateauing maybe?…
Get Bielsa or Brendan in and give them 2 years of time to fix things at Arsenal.
I’ve had time to reflect on last night and although still raw; the mood is lifting. I’ve supported Arteta all year and even thought that no matter what that support would stay strong, but after the lacklustre performance last night, I just don’t see where he can take this team. He is a rookie and he has made mistakes but our problems are bigger than him alone. I don’t subscribe to ‘players won’t come’ because we do not have Europe, we pay well and are in London, players will come to us if the vision is right. However, we are… Read more »
Valentin, what did we do after the final? We started dismantling the team, viera ,was made to leave, without replacing him, edu also left.
Meant before we got to the final.
P.S If Arteta does go… Has to be Brendan Rodgers for me… If we could get him to come.
We all know when decline really started.
It was in Wenger’s last few years when he brought crap for decent money.
Emery could have turned it around perhaps to some degree from the position the club were at when he was sacked but he wasn’t given the opportunity to do so.
Then we really shit the bed with the Arteta appointment. Yeah FA Cup won but it’s soiled with Arteta’s overall shitness of the side aside from the FA Cup.
Marc and RH. I am waiting for your comments regarding who is the better coach, Arteta or Emery.
The moral of this story is.
Don’t judge managers on the back of FA Cup wins.
Judge them on something more substantial than that.
No to Brendan Rodgers or Benitez.
Thats 5th place at best.
Someone better
Thanks for the podcast Pedro, a sobering listen as it was.
Crucial decisions need to be made very soon. And we must keep protesting against KSE.
Or even more pathetic don’t judge managers on the back of Charity Shield wins.
There were some posters on here that were absolutely purring about Arteta because he beat Liverpool in a Charity Shield.
A glorified friendly match ffs.
I remember waaay back when Pedro told me that Arteta was being brave for even thinking about the Arsenal job. I told him not to be silly, that being brave was reserved for the likes of emergency services, the armed forces and others like them. Pedro’s response? He told me He was going to be Man City’s next manager. Really, he did. Arteta thinks he’s special. He feels entitled. That’s why he wanted to move from Man City to Arsenal — rather than to do what others have done and to put the hard graft in AND LEARN HIS TRADE.… Read more »
Even after we became the invincibles when we should have made signings to kick us on , who did we sign ? I’ll tell you who, frank sidekick, eboue, flamini, van Persia, who turned out the only one to make an impression, we also let go, wiltord, Kanu, parlour and keown. Man Utd were signing Wayne Rooney to add to Ronald, Chelsea were signing drogba ,cech ,carvalho
@Ishola70
Yeah these Arteta groupies really want to hype that Community Shield win. Embarrassing stuff.
Flamini wasn’t a bad signing overall for what he was meant to do in the side.
He was actually signed because he had a very good season with Marseille which culminated in a good performance from him in a european final they got to.
Eboue was a bit of a different matter and Wenger fucked around with that signing as well as the player himself. He was just about passable as a fullback and then we had the pain of watching Eboue playing as a winger.
A good coach design a system to suit the players. Tuchel knows he has fast forwards. He sets up plays to take advantage of that. We also have fast players like Pepe, Martinelli and Auba. Arteta’s system is just so slow and boring.
I’d take Brendan as coach and Ragnick as GM.
We need a manager that’s good with young players as we have a very strong group from 17-21 and with our limited revenues it’s vitally important not to alienate or screw them up.
Our team is not as bad as it’s showing. It’s obvious more could have been extracted from this current bunch. For example, 17 goals in 19 home games (less than Newcastle) with Auba, Lacca, Pepe, Saka, Willan(Ha!) Martinelli, Ode and Smith Rowe as your offensive options is nothing short of,,,,,Offensive.
Thats on Arteta more than the players.
Flamini kept Diarra out of the side.
That really upset a lot of fans.
The deterioration started when Wenger tried to implement socialism
Also was it just coincidence that Wenger signed these players that had Balkan heritage all in one phase.
We know he loved his African signings so he may well have just syphoned into the Balkan territory.
Something to do with liking their life stories along with them being footballers.
I can imagine Wenger liking Granit Xhaka’s life story key to the house and all.
Ishola
“He was impressed by his defensive shapes and his backs to the wall FA Cup win.”
Winning any major trophy is impressive in England, especially if you have 2 beat what are now the 2 best teams in Europe to win it…..
However, post lockdown i was rarely impressed with the football we were playing and it gives me no great pleasure to say that I have been proved correct about the treatment of Ozil(and others) and the precedence it set, plus of course it led to our chronic lack of creativity.
Success over adversity.
Wenger loved those stories concerning players.
And those Balkans fitted the bill perfectly in that respect.
Arsenal uses high wages to attract players to sign. TP is making as much as Auba. Now that we lose the revenue from Europa games, we can’t even afford to pay those wages. I wonder whether the club will again request a deduction of x% of the salary from every player.
Pierre
The manner in which Arteta won the FA Cup wasn’t impressive. It was backs to the wall stuff.
And you should be ashamed to say otherwise.
Wenger beat Man United in a FA Cup final but was so displeased at the manner in which it was won that he vowed never to win like that again.
One could say that cups are won by players and the league by managers. Take the last wenger FA Cup win for example.
Ishola
“A glorified friendly match ffs.”
In the whole scheme of things , yes the charity shield can be regarded as a meaningless friendly , which would be the case if it wasn’t for the fact that the teams who compete in it, first have to win a major trophy in England …hence why Arsenal have probably competed in it more than any other club since 1998 other than United
Pierre
It’s a warm up match for the season the Community Shield.
The players are not even fully fit and prepped for the season when it is played.
And you really want us to think this Shield is greatly significant,
Ishola
“The manner in which Arteta won the FA Cup wasn’t impressive. It was backs to the wall stuff.”
As per usual , you talk out of your arse.
There were games that we played back to the wall football but the FA cupfinal was not one of them.
We beat Chelsea because we were the better team and had more attempts at goal , so hardly backs to the wall stuff.
Probably better to get your facts right before spouting off.
Personally I loved Arsenal’s FA cup win, back to the wall or otherwise.
Isbola
“And you really want us to think this Shield is greatly significant”
Its you that’s making a big deal out if it
There you have it.
Pierre was impresssed that not only did Arteta win the FA Cup but also very taken with Arteta following that up with the Shield win.
No wonder the club take the piss with the fans when they are so gullible.
Isn’t it strange that since Arteta left Man City they have improved no end and we have gone down hill fast.!!
He is a deluded dickhead who thinks himself so highly with no reason to back it.
We cannot continue like this he is destroying the club.
Ishola
Have you ever heard of the saying ” thick as shit”.
And of course Pierre is very, very big on the FA Cup because that’s all his hero could win in his later years.
Spanishdave
“He is a deluded dickhead who thinks himself so highly with no reason to back it.
We cannot continue like this he is destroying the club.”
Sadly I agree with you ….as someone once said “IT’S TIME TO GO”
“
So it seems that there are plenty who want Brendan Rogers. Wake up ! He has already turned us down and that’s when we were in better shape.
He is managing a side who are competing for the CL and have recently won the league. Why would he take a step down ?
Ishola is a fully signed up member of the entitled be careful what you wish for club.
Only fools are eligible to join…