I sat in and listened to the podcast that Matt and Johnny recorded last night as a fan because I had builders over. I was trying to pinpoint what was so depressing about the Crystal Palace draw when listening to them. I think it’s that Arsenal almost never create joy in bad moments.
The Arteta model has always felt like it’s there to do the bare minimum to get the job done.
Not too much.
Not too little.
We are the Goldilocks of football teams.
We started well again, took the lead, then retreated like we were peak-Atletico.
Except we are not that. Their ex-midfielder gifted Palace a way back in as he tried to run a midfield on his own again. Then we gave away another goal. Then a few things changed, we had more of a go, we were rewarded with a late, late equaliser from Lacazette.
A last-minute goal in the 95th should feel exciting, but it didn’t. The whole game had an inevitability about it as soon as we conceded. You didn’t feel the confidence was there to win the game. We didn’t know how to find the right gears and we didn’t know what to do about the fast football Palace were playing.
Arteta performances are very one-geared. We win and it’s not that exciting. We lose and it’s not exciting. We draw and it’s not exciting.
I’m not sure that’s a vision the fans are going to stand behind for very long.
The players are not the problem now. We have young, athletic, and technically gifted footballers. We can break the lines, carry the ball, we can go short, there’s speed everywhere… but it’s still boring.
Graham Potter finished 15th in his first season. 16th in his second season. He’ll still get the support of Brighton fans because he delivers performances that thrill.
Performances buy you time. Time buys you the ability to make your ideas work harder. But right now, I’m looking at the Spurs game and it feels like it was an exception to the rule.
We’ve trusted in the process, but the question now isn’t about process… it’s about the system. Why is it still sputtering?
Yes, the team is young.
Yes, we have tasted the promised land.
Yes, we could very well win our next three games.
… but something still feels off. It’s a new set of players doing the same things as before. We need more green shoots.
Luckily / worryingly, we have the chance to rectify the shitness this Friday against Aston Villa. A team that knows what they are doing, one that delivers big moments, one that has an identity that is exciting that took less than two years to implement.
Arteta has to show something out there because we need something to believe in.
Palace 2-2 at home wasn’t the sermon I was hoping for, so let’s see what comes next.
Right, listen to the podcast. Johnny and Matt delivered it for the first hour and they slandered me. Absolute slags.
See you in the comments. x
1sr?
2nd?
We stopped playing football in favor of caution after going up 1-0 against Crystal Palace at the Emirates instead of going for the jugular. Our style of play is depressing these days.
Last night’s game was a mare.
We were lucky to get the point
Trophy
We seem to play well for twenty minutes or so then we fade away and play turgid tippy tappy.
It’s the coach , we play like he did .
Viera’s team played like him by playing strong with purpose.
We will not get any better with the current set up.
Spurs allowed us to look better than we are , but that lasted 30 mins.
Like the bears in Goldilocks we are probably going to be left with a clean up of the house once Arteta’s time is down at the club.
How inconsiderate of Teets.
We’re playing our worst ans most boring football since the 70s.
Nailed it Pedro , its just plain boring to watch Arsenal do the same damn thing over and over again. CBs take the ball pass it to Partey , he passes it to ESR , ESR to Tierney , Move breaks down , pass back to CBs . Repeat .
We can’t control a midfield battle against a Palace team without Zaha with home support behind us. We had enough time to prepare for this after international break. Unless Arteta and his team can figure out how to bring intensity and aggression into the game, this has the potential to turn the season into a déjà vu of last season’s pre-christmas run.
All the superfans in hiding leaving just us bedwetters to talk shop.
Arteta has not shown any progress in 2 years as gaffer. He’s out of his depth at this level.
Good coach? Maybe.
Good manager? No evidence in support of this whatsoever.
Team are still too deep most of the time.
Arteta still doesn’t trust his players and is still overly frightened and cautious.
Nothing will change while Arteta is around, this is on him.
Two years with nothing moving forward,. The players have it in them but are held back by his boring approach.
Being a mid table team now is hard to accept.
He will bore us to death.
We could win our next three games. But we are more likely to lose them. Fundamentally I look at Arteta and think he’s playing Football Manager. He’s set his team up with formations that he’s pinched from elsewhere. He’s picked players that have attributes that match his ideas. In-game, Martial is brilliant. In real life… he’s just Antony Martial. I look at Arteta on the touchline and he just doesn’t get it. He’s clearly thinking “but he’s supposed to win the tackle there, run 30 yards, long range pass to that guy, cut back to him and score, WHY IS… Read more »
The spurs game apart, there has been nothing to excited by this season. Our game play is so dull and depressing, slow,, backwards passes. We always look under pressure, no one making runs apart from to come to ball and pass it back. Tierney was so exciting, and now looks for a backward pass 90% of time. Going forward looks a struggle. Pepe not positive enough for all his pace and skills, and we always seem to make the wrong pass killing momentum and end up having to chase back with gaping holes in midfield. I thought the point in… Read more »
If you put more trust in your players with a more progressive positive outlook then many times they will respond in a positive manner.
Do the opposite and you get unconvincing drab football for the most part.
Spot on I don’t expect us to win every game but I want to be excited watching my team- we are so dull the goals were shit and gave them away but the overall performance was dull and I can’t get up for a last second equaliser, where has my club gone?
What has Arteta football really shown us over the past few years apart from terrible football that is worse than Emery, while being heavily backed.
Plain and simply he is not a good enough manager at the moment. We are affording him to luxury to learn and mess up while he learns on the job at our club.
It is disgraceful how far we have fallen and the people in charge letting this happen are criminal.
Yes, we have tasted the promised land.
When??
Yes, we could very well win our next three games.
But we wont!
Was like watching a boxing match, with no one throwing any punches. Dull.
Every time, Arteta needs to do this and Arteta need to do that.
Arteta needs to fuck off!
We’ve trusted in the process, but the question now isn’t about process… it’s about the system. Why is it still sputtering?
I never trusted the process as most on here, so who is we Pedro?
It’s handbrake football, exactly the same football that for the most part Arteta played under Wenger.
Al
This is what I said a few weeks ago.
Allowing Arteta learn on the job in a massive club like Arsenal is so criminal and pathetic to witness.
How is the club hierarchy allowing this to happen?
Pedro really need to tell us when we tasted the “promise land”.
What a first half win against Spurs at home isn’t the promised land ffs!
Emery won one of the best NLD games(4-2) we’ve seen in recent years and no one marked that as a “promise land”.
What’s wrong with you guys?
Lol
Viera didn’t even need masterful tactics to almost take us down. Probably told his team, “I’m not losing to a rookie. Period.”
Pedro deflecting to pull the trigger as always. New players, same archilles heels. But no one’s responsible. Tepid write up as tepid as last night’s performance.
“I look at Arteta on the touchline and he just doesn’t get it. He’s clearly thinking “but he’s supposed to win the tackle there, run 30 yards, long range pass to that guy, cut back to him and score, WHY IS IT NOT HAPPENING LIKE I IMAGINED?!”
@Biggles sumed it up
We got over run in midfield.
Palace worked harder and chased more.
Tierney seems to have been told not to go forward.
Tomi seemed to not know what to do.
Yet again the in-game management was completely absent.
We are boring.
We are one dimensional.
We are soft.
We seem to over complicate our play.
We pass backwards more than we pass forwards.
Arteta is the Spanish Southgate. Football’s cure for insomnia.
Arsenal 2 Crystal Palace 2 Arteta could not get the team to beat Brighton without their best player and he could not beat CP without theirs. Arsenals 4th attempt to beat CP at home , post Wenger and they still have not achieved it. In fact , x 7 times Arsenal have played CP since AW left and have only won once. (Wengers last season as manager against CP 41 win (h) 23 win ( a) In a nutshell , the problem at the club these days-far too many of its employees are overrated and overhyped by the supporters. Eg… Read more »
A blue whales anus can stretch to approximately 3.5 feet, making it the second largest asshole on the planet, just behind
Diet Pep fanboys
I think we need a different filter with which to view our performances. Too many are watching Arsenal as if we are building some sort of footballing juggernaut. We’re not, we are mediocre team with a mediocre manager currently going nowhere.
Not mad, not annoyed, just not interested in watching the same abject performances that this club gives you game in and game out.
If that is Goldilocks football as Pedro suggests, its time to go into hibernation.
Out of Arsenal’s last 23 home games, we’ve only won 8.
Inexcusable? Nah… Keep making excuses for the rookie. No style of play in 2yrs, no domination of teams, but he’s doing amazing so far.
Next game will be better & if it’s not, the next one will be, surely.
Thing is, I feel like the club have the right strategy; get young, fast, technical players in, hope they bang and then sell them on for a profit.
The problem here is execution. Arteta has the players he wants but doesn’t know how to use them.
You can have the best plan in the world but if you can’t execute on it, you’re fucked.
Does this team have a forwards coach, because of not, it should unless that is not part of the project
That is a post I can get behind Pedro. I am not sure there is a team that plays worse football than us at the moment. There are so many concerns all over the pitch. KT is looking like the complete shell of a player he was at times last season. I wouldn’t be surprised to discover 90% of his passes last night were backwards. Partey really just isn’t that good and Odegaard is showing himself to be exactly what many thought, a massively limited footballer. If only we had a team full of ESR’s. He is about the only… Read more »
8 wins in our last 23 home games???
Fuck me…
He has to go. That’s about one win in every three home games.
SHOCKING
Pedro You didn’t feel the confidence was there to win the game. We didn’t know how to find the right gears and we didn’t know what to do about the fast football Palace were playing. You do realise that all this is down to coaching? So what on Earth is Arteta building on during training? Or is he pulling a Wenger where his training regime is now set and he won’t change it/ adapt it to solve any team issues that appear after a game? I am only speculating but I do find it odd that the team is still… Read more »
Arteta’s football killing vibes. There, I corrected it for you pedro. Unless he goes we will still see the same shit. Performances are indicators of where football teams will end up. Klopp showed what he is all about in his first 6 months. So did pep and Tuchel. Even Vieira last night showed you can start building an identity in a very short period of time. Potter has a lowly Brighton playing good football. But Arteta needs 5 years and 500 mil? It is a joke. We aren’t asking for a league title here. We are asking for an identity… Read more »
People seem to be missing one big factor that has been evident , the fact that these players are so unfit, look at the energy levels of the palace players, hunting the ball in packs, forwards putting in a shift , both in defence and attack even though we are the ones with supposedly younger players. It seems what we see when the club releases its weekly training videos is all they do, just pass, pass and pass. Fans where applauding aubamayang quite rightly for chasing and winning the ball back yesterday, but you see strikers in other teams doing… Read more »
Have to say, Ben White was dreadful for the the 2nd palace goal and equally gabriel for their first. If you analyse their goals , for the first , when Benteke received the ball he was 30 yards out from a standing start and Gabriel was about 5 yards away from him.. At this point Gabriel should have stepped forward to engage Benteke as he should know that Benteke hasn’t the skill set to beat a defender, instead Gabriel backed off and allowed Benteke to move on to his strong side to get the shot away The 2nd goal was… Read more »
Frost
“””Out of Arsenal’s last 23 home games, we’ve only won 8.””””
To put that into context
Wenger tool 47/57 available in his last season and scored 54 goals in 19 matches.
2nd highest home points tally ever
Highest goals scored in his 20 plus seasons.
Wenger as I have always stated, kept this club together under KSE.The club now slowly unravelling.
Arsenal who will soon post multi million pound losses for the year and out of Europe are in serious decline.
And if Newcastle ,get their act together.
Probably terminal.
Pierre
I would say they both bottled it against two powerful forwards.
I’d been willing to give Arteta a lot more time than a lot of other people on here. However, the lack of style, the lack of fitness of the players and most importantly the results can’t be argued with. I think it’s time for the club to cut their losses on Arteta.
I find Arsenal really depressing thesedays. No vision. No identity and the football is boring. No chance we’re gonna end up being near top 4 unless things massively change and soon.
We’re a mid table club now and one that has not kept up with teams around us who have all improved
we were rewarded with a late late winner from Lacazette
—————
Pedro
I don’t think Lacazette scored a “winner”…….
I’m impressed with palace’s recruitment, Eze, Olise,Eduaord, Anderson , Gallagher and Guehi look real quality to me.
When Eze, Olise, Gaĺagher and Saha are together, they could do real damage to the opposition and I’m sure Vieira will have them playing to their strengths.
Arteta is out of his depth. The ownership needs to take responsibility and save him from his misery. In doing so it saves the club money as Guendouzi can be brought back to partner Partey instead of scouring the market for another midfielder.
Arsenal continue to be an unbalanced team and the lack of control in midfield is a major concern. When we played Xhaka alongside Partey in midfield against Spurs the team look a lot better than it has done in the games against Brighton and Crystal Palace. Xhaka may not be many supporters idea of a top class player, but at least when he plays there is a semblance of control in midfield. Odegaard playing alongside Partey was completely ineffective and it did not get much better when Lokongo replaced him. My personal view is that playing both Smith-Rowe and Odegaard… Read more »
This is Arteta in his 2nd full season and his third season in charge. he should have been sacked twice before. One after that horrible run of defeats, One after Villareal neutralized us easily. Over the coming weeks we will witness his third sackable moment. He needs to go. Villa and Leicester aren’t easy opposition and I wouldn’t bet on us to win those matches from what I saw of those two years.
I could barely count the number of matches that Arteta’s football impressed me. Even then it is in patches. Tottenham this season, Man United away when we won with a pen ( it was gritty more than great football), Chelsea draw away with 10 men ( gritty more than great football), Man United at home when pepe and Sokratis scored, Slavia away 4 nil win. There may be a couple of league wins that were good football that I may have missed but all in all, I wouldn’t count 15 games that we were so good in in two years… Read more »
ES
Agreed on ESR and Odegaard in the same team. All they do is taken up the same spaces.
Wouldn’t surprise me if Arteta drops ESR and keeps Odegaard in, which would 100% be the wrong decision.
Emirates There was a lack of control in the middle and Xhaka could have provided that somewhat but Arteta didn’t help matters by having Partey as the only recognisable central midfielder all alone in the match. He should have started Partey – Lokonga from the beginning in central midfield. Now people will point to individual errors from Partey and Lokonga. The errors were made because the team and these players were not comfortable with what had go on before in the match. The dye had been cast in the match. If these two had started then the team may have… Read more »
Matt
I would agree with you that ESR is the better option. Odegaard has not played well in last two games.
What should also be of concern is that the team are reverting to black and square passing in
defence and that suggests to me a lack of confidence in the midfield.
“Arteta performances are very one-geared. We win and it’s not that exciting. We lose and it’s not exciting. We draw and it’s not exciting.”
Ha ha, well said.
Emirates
Our midfield has been questionable for a long time now.
It’s nothing new.
4 major problems with Arsenal in my view : 1. Energy level or intensity of our play goes down after the first 10-15 mins or even before that if we concede a goal in the first 15 mins 2. Players are mostly rooted to their positions/zones on the pitch, there is very little flow or movement. 3. Partey needs another Partey like midfielder in the middle playing alongside him. He can’t do it alone. Most of the fans wanted an elite CM in the summer, Arteta chose to stick with Xhaka. 4. Auba and Pepe are unpolished players who hamper… Read more »
The simple fact is, of all the millions lavished on these overrated players post Wenger. Arsenal most reliable and robust players are still Laca and Xhaka ( Wenger signings) and the most talented Saka & ESR play in the Wenger mould. KSE have overseen a total car crash. Before them, Arsenal were a top 2 team, now we are an entrenched top 10 side with a novice in charge and the likes of Steve Round assisting him. And to think Palace gave Vieria’s his chance at management before Arsenal. Arsenal went for Arteta instead, even though Vieria had better credentials.… Read more »
On a different point I do not blame Ramsdale for second goal. Had he stood his ground he would probably have saved the shot, but he moved slightly to right where he anticipated the ball would go.
It was a mistake, but I think that many other goalkeepers would have done likewise.
Yeah you can add this zonal play as being a problem as well along with this over cautious retreating back to our own goal as a whole side and being weak when facing opposition press.
They are very big problems.
TR7
Partey did not play particularly well and we don’t need a second such player in team.
What the team needs at moment is a defensively solid and athletic defensive midfielder plus
a goalscoring attacking midfielder. At the moment we lack both.
The main problem for me is Arteta doesn’t know any other way to play other than the 325. Getting the ball out to Tierney and crossing isn’t a great plan. It is rigid. All the players take the same space everytime we attack. Tomi inverts and makes a back three, Lokonga takes the left space to cover for Tierney, Whoever plays leftwing (ESR or Saka) comes in the middle to link with Odegaard, Pepe or Saka on the right are isolated with no help from tomi, Auba is there just to run off the shoulder and Partey is the protection… Read more »
The problem Arteta created for himself yesterday was by moving Odegaard to bring in Pepe on the right , it meant that Saka had to play in the left channel and Smith rowe was taken away from the left channel. Agsinst Tottenham, saka and smith rowe were dynamic playing in the right and left channel, by moving both players Arteta basically reduced the dynamics in the side. Of course , by changing saka and smith rowe , it means that the relationship built up with smith rowe/Tierney and Saka / Tomiyasu was lost to the team.. It could be that… Read more »
ES
” the team needs at moment is a defensively solid and athletic defensive midfielder plus a goalscoring attacking midfielder. At the moment we lack both.”
When posters criticized Arsenal sticking with Xhaka and signing Odegard you called them negative fake fans.
I have never been convinced by Partey defensively and I think I have said this before.
For me he is a strictly CM player that can venture forward. His attacking play has actually improved a bit since he has joined. His defensive play hasn’t.
To be a much more solid side we would need a better defensive midfielder playing alongside Partey or just behind him.
So I agree with Emirates Stroller on that one.
As I posted earlier Arsenal’s current problems relate to a lack of balance in the current team.
At the end of game we were playing with 4 forwards in the team with only Lokonga in midfield.
It may have got us out of gaol at the end of the game, but had CP not gone defensive we might
have been crucified by a more experienced and better team.
And Odegaard.
Let’s hope he has a few more opportinities with freekicks on the edge of the opposition penalty area because as a whole as an attacking midfielder he looks very much so so. Flits in and out of games far too much with no consistency or real influence in matches.
He’s going to have to really motor and improve considerably from what we have seen so far to become this world class player that Rich thinks he can be.
For as long as people keep offering up the excuse of being a young team then those same people won’t grasp the reality of the situation namely the team , the squad the manager simply aren’t going to eat again at the top table Do you get an extra point because you have x number of players under the age of 24? No of course you don’t so why are people even offering up that lame argument? I truly worry about the likes of Saka, like Tierney , like ESR because in a blink of an eye they will become… Read more »
When I watched Gallagher at WBA and not of course WBA
Should read
When I watched Gallagher at WBA and not of course Chelsea
Terraloon
People love new. They love new players and they love new young players even more. It gives a sense of freshness and vigour.
But it means nothing if the team as a whole are not playing vibrant football and also if these individual players don’t live up to the billing over time whether they be young or old. It doesn’t matter about age.
Partey is average thats why Ayew captains Ghana.
Not a great CM too, Saul played that role at AMadrid.
Gallagher was good in the match.
But he was good both on and off the ball.
I was mostly impressed with him off the ball. His pressing of Arsenal players and winning the ball.
The players receive the ball under pressure and look to pass backwards, the players receive the ball with relative time and space and have no idea how to progress it forward so we pass backward again. It is so boring and listless. Although Pepe had some silly moments yesterday I appreciate that he is positive in his play and does try to make things happen. ESR is always brave in his play too and it probably stopped there yesterday.
We are in trouble if Pepe is seen as a plus.
He may have a go but boy is he erratic and also unaware as a player.
Not great intelligence as a footballer.
It’s maybe harder to win titles with young teams but you have to see the potential is there (i.e. good performances!), otherwise the best young players will start leaving and it will all have been for nothing. We’ve been there before under Wenger – and even then the performances were *far* better in general.
It’s a reality of football that every manager is on a countdown to a firing, results and performances are the only way to buy more time. At this point I think Arteta has used up all of his ‘new inexperienced manager’ buffer and his countdown is well underway. Even the most ardent supporters surely feel like he has to be judged under the same parameters that any other manager would from this point. I know comparisons to PV are cheap but a couple of thoughts nonetheless. Interesting to hear Patrick was encouraged into management at City, both managers seemingly ‘made’… Read more »
We may see Auba on the left wing in the next match. I know that people just love that lol.
Arteta is going to be very tempted to play Lacazette upfront in the next match.
8 wins in 23 home games is a sackable offence, that is absolutely shocking. I wonder what it will take for us to see change.
Arteta must be the only generational manager I know that needs to have absolutely perfect conditions to win a game of football.
Other sides can miss essential players and still put in performances, as we saw with Chelsea on the weekend, and Palace and Brighton against us.
Villa and Leicester will be tough, and even Watford is not a foregone conclusion, nothing is under this manager.
Arsenal with so called lesser defenders and the Europa Cup treadmill in the way had the 3rd best defence last season.
Now after wasting another £100 plus million on more defenders that simply were not needed , are leaking goals.
12 already this season.
Which goes to show- you should always spend most of your resources on attacking players, because they ultimately make the difference.
ps. Where is Mr. Waffle?
If he loses against Watford then that should be a sackable offence on it’s own.
Yeah Liverpool are good but Watford were awful in that match.
If Danny Rose turns up with Watford and we can’t beat them then that is inexcusable.
Sid
Partey is average
Nail on head but like Pepe he cost so much money he haves to be selected even when the players alongside him aren’t able to compliment his strengths
Partey overrun and was targeted. Soon as he lost that ball for the goal 4 2 3 1 was needed to help him in midfield which I blame Arteta for. Sambi’s mistake you’ll get with young’uns, hopefully this experience will help him. After we scored we started to play safe as though we couldn’t believe we were ahead. Arteta needs to install courage in the squad. Too many times a sideway/backwards pass was chosen when a forward pass was on. Classic horseshoe shape ball movement has got to stop. Still like to keep Arteta until Xmas and make an assessment… Read more »
New narrative by the arteta in boys, we are a mid table team lmao We finished 8th last season and now after spending 150m, it is justified that we can finish as low as 10th.We are a top 6 side. We spent poorly in the summer or else we could compete for top 5. Ode and white were unnecessary signings. Ode never impressed me during his loan and white is the definition of mid table side CB. Saliba and a new CM would have made us a very strong side. Imagine another player in the caliber of partey playing alongside… Read more »
Le Prof
””””Still like to keep Arteta until Xmas and make an assessment then as this young team is till gelling.””””””
I hear, Arteta comes alive when the Christmas Tree Trophy is up for grabs….
Defending Arteta is getting more difficult by the day. There’s no joy watching Arsenal. The football is turgid and excessively orotund.
No need to start enumerating how wayward we are under Arteta and am sure very soon, the owners hands will be forced into correcting the nauseating anomaly we are all witnessing.
However, time waits for no one.
CG – “And to think Palace gave Vieria’s his chance at management before Arsenal.”
When you look at his record in charge of New York and Nice there is nothing to suggest he would be a worthy candidate, Remember, he has still only won 1 game out of 9 as Palace manager.
Eddu –
If Guendouzi is the answer, it’s a bloody stupid question. I would never want to see that headless chicken and his crappy attitude in an Arsenal shirt again.
I’m sorry, but this team is showing zero signs of gelling. If it were, I think people could excuse some of the results and performances, but I see no evidence of gelling.
Name me one player who is showing improvement? ESR is probably the only one you could say and he is probably the one who seems least restricted by the system and is always looking to progress the ball forward – much to the frustration of Arteta I would guess.
Groundhog Day once again. Honestly, it is hardly worth commenting since everybody keeps circling back to the same points, the same defects, the same lack of progress. That is what is so dispiriting. Villa is now a big game, and one they will really fancy. Two points, one of them very lucky, against Brighton and Palace, when all the pieces of the jigsaw are supposed to be in place, tells its own story. A stuttering mid table side, outplayed in two games against teams with less ‘stars’ but coherent tactics, players well coached who have confidence in their positions and… Read more »
Yawn! Same shit football, manger, and owner. Same result mid to lower tier rubbish. The only thing missing is that adidas should have us playing beige kits to match the sentiment. Yay we tied Palace. More interested in Viera then the match.
Let’s look at the facts.
Most of the players have regressed under Arteta. We play a brand of football that is boring and easy to play against. It’s all very well criticising players like Tierney but watch him play for Scotland and then watch him play for us. Worlds apart. Same with Partey.
PV4 showed Arteta up last night. He is not capable of leading us forward and he is certainly not capable of getting this group of players to play a more dynamic and threatening brand of football.
into the red
We were lucky to draw both games against Brighton and Palace.
That is the truth and worrying.
Inside Right CG – “And to think Palace gave Vieria’s his chance at management before Arsenal.” I am not starting , he should be the Arsenal manager. Simply stating that if the club was going to appoint a rookie. PV was the better candidate because of his limited Nice experience. After all Both ex Arsenal Captains Both ex Man City connections, IF Arteta was born in Senegal and not Spain and Vieria born in Spain and not Senegal – we would have PV as manager. Thats why the Rooney Rule was brought in, to stop this. either way, neither are… Read more »
Terraloon – “I see glimpses of Tomi being a decent player but I haven’t yet worked out what he is being instructed to do.”
I think the problem is that Tomi hasn’t yet worked out what he is being instructed to do. He has joined the drama series known as the Manager Arteta Mysteries.
I think we have lost posters in recent times not just because of Pedro’s stance on Arteta but also because some just can’t stomach Arsenal as a midtable club.
They soldiered on when we fell out of top four but there was still talk of recovery but now it seems clear we are indeed set for midtable for the forseeable future they have got on their bikes.
IR
Yep either or both probably apply
CG, yes completely agree. I know some on here wanted Vieira as manager out of nostalgia. Agreed, he would have been a slightly less risky option as manager because he had started establishing a managerial record, even if it is less than stellar.
Conte would be a fine manager, but I’m just concerned how his cheque book dependency could be made to fit with the club. We need someone who can make a good dish out of most of the ingredients we have.
Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results
Imagine dumping £50 million on a ‘ball-playing central defender’ when your midfield is barebones, even with Xhaka.
When some of us dutifully made that point all summer, the entire defense of the misallocated transfer funds was … “that’s what Mikel wants”
It’s obvious that Mikel doesn’t have a clue about what he wants or what he’s trying to do.
Vierra’s first job was at NYC FC while Arteta’s first job was at the Arsenal. One manager has his newly assembled team playing to a definite style after 3 months, the other is lost at sea after 22 months in charge.
I still think Potter is a decent shout. I heard someone say on here that he may not be up to the task of managing Arsenal. That’s a comment from the past. What is the task of managing Arsenal now? Europa League qualification. That’s not a major top task anymore. For Potter with Brighton to outplay most of the teams he faces is impressive. And he would have quite a modest task when first joining Arsenal. Just Europa League qualification and then he could look to improve over time. I don’t think the Conte’s of this world suit Arsenal at… Read more »
Frankly the same problems are still there, that were under Wenger, Emery and now Arteta. I want to believe in the team, and I really wish them well but if the game isn’t going exactly our way the key players don’t seem they want to fight… to make their own luck… as Gary Player used to say. It’s all well and good Arteta saying that we gave away “cheap goals” but he needs to think… why did this happen and more importantly WHY DOES IT KEEP HAPPENING? The goals that we’ve conceded in the league the vast majority of them… Read more »
*gave away