100TH GAME UNDER ARTETA, WAS IT WORTH IT?

by .

Listen, I simply won’t tolerate it on this website. I will not have you laughing at Aston Villa. They are trying to be elite, people. It’s not funny that the team that went to great lengths to extract Emile from us this summer has now lost 5 games on the bounce in the League. I don’t think it’s amusing to point out that the last time they tasted victory was September 18th. Don’t even dare try to trigger me by saying ‘only two teams have conceded more than Villa this season’ (20) because I like Emi Martinez and he’s dealing with separation issues. None of this is funny and I truly hope their ‘elite’ summer signings some of our fans were pointing at come good… especially those that said they’d prefer Danny Ings to Alex Lacazette.

Now we’ve set the ground rules, can talk about what needs to happen tomorrow? Yes we can.

We need a win.

The club has done a lot of very good work in Phase 3. My target was 10 from 12. If we do the business against Watford, we could be on for that exact number. I suspect that a win will put us firmly in the top 4 mixer. West Ham has been one of the standout sides in the Premier League this calendar year, but I think it’ll be very, very tough for them to take 3 points off Liverpool. United were bounced 2-0 by City (lolololol). That’s as far as it goes for top 4 competition right now.

Win the game should be top 4 proper. No post-Christmas tables for us. That is GOOD news. Not that I want to hang on that post-Christmas table, but are we about ready to admit that the form was more predictive than many gave credit for? 5 months of continuous form was always a good sample, amazing that it was a debate. But, we were in a world where people were getting upset by the use of the word project, so there we are.

The Watford game is very winnable, but the focus simply has to be there. We don’t want the players reading too much of their good press and Arteta needs to make sure they know that you have to show up, even in the games that aren’t sexy. You make top 4 by racking up points in the winnable games. This is the sort of game that should start to form bread and butter, but I’m not sure we’re there yet.

The team has had the luxury of a week off again. There will be a full squad to pick from. I’m not sure there’s much reason to change what is working. There is always the challenge of finding balance. A squad is a living being. If you only water part of it, the neglected areas can wither and die. That’s why there might be some rotation at some point. Martin Odegaard might get some minutes and we could see some changes elsewhere.

Or maybe we’re in ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ territory. I don’t know, I’m not the coach, leave me alone.

Arsenal are making a big deal of Arteta’s first 100 games on the .com. It’s been a literal rollercoaster. But finally, it looks like we’re getting some traction as we head back up the table.

Has it been a success so far?

Depends how you want to frame it. On a football level, it hasn’t been… yet. But I think the Arsenal project so far has been bigger than results, it’s involved more people than just the coach, and it’s been harder work than anyone suspected it would be.

We’ve shipped out a lot of bad eggs, about 21 I think.

We’ve weathered the most consequential mitigating circumstance in sporting history.

We’ve brought in a whole batch of new players that are young, vibrant, and full of character

We continue to give chances to an exciting group of Hale-Enders.

We sacked our Football Director.

We pivoted hard on a new, more modern strategy

The culture at the club has taken a huge reboot.

Arteta is talking about ‘unity’ as the identity he has at Arsenal. I’m not quite sure that’s an identity, but it’s certainly the output of a lot of change, and we can see it on the pitch. We can even see it by the deals that are getting signed by players. Last season was about the young players pulling us to higher levels, this season, it’s about everyone doing that. So you have to salute the work and hope it lasts. Whatever happens with Arteta, you can’t deny that he’ll leave the club in a better state than he found it. Could you say the same of Jose Mourinho who joined Spurs at the same time? How about Carlo Ancellotti? How about Ole G at United?

Arsenal took the hard option when they went with Arteta, but the upsides still feel more tantalizing than if we’d moved on Rafa Benitez. We took the hard option on transfers this summer, fans went nuts about the deals, but it’s hard to deny the direction was wrong. We’re still on a long-term path and that will come with some pain, but this sustainable approach, when it finally delivers, will have us competing at the very highest levels for the very biggest trophies.

It’s exciting. There are no victory laps, but if you have a good plan, good ideas, a good culture, and everyone is united around the singular mission… you have a chance of doing great things.

So let’s see where the 100th game goes.

ACAST | SPOTIFY | GOOGLE | CASTBOX 

810 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Gazza

Auba was poor today how he lasted the full game heaven knows?

Dissenter

This club is Josh Kroenke’s now
…and he looks invested in it. I expect that we will spend at the same pace as last summer’s for a while to come.

Sanmi

Luteo
We created our own luck, we are actually better than most teams in the epl, Arteta has created an excellent defense.

Venga, Dani

Ranieri looked pissed at FT chatting with Mikel

AFC Forever

20 out of 24 points. Only a fucking moron picks holes in that..
Great three points, had Auba been on form that was a comfortable 4-0 or 5-0 win, Arteta doesn’t miss penalties, miscontrol the ball or get his toe on shots on the line. Ramsdaie had nothing to do.

What we know is that we no longer get bullied. We defend balls into our penalty area so much better than we have before. That game we lost in the past. Live these young lads, so much heart.

ESR & Saka were really good today.

DivineSherlock

Get in Lads !! Level on points with West Ham . What a turnaround

Batistuta

How was that not a pen for Everton by the way. Premier League refs are horrible

MidwestGun

I wish you could post pictures on here without a link… Because Josh Kroenke looked hilarious.. still laughing about that.

Sanmi

Gazza
The reason Auba lasts is the same reason CR7 plays 90’ their status keeps the opponent defense from joining attack. And they are positionally aware.

Crimson

Gotta love the win and Ainsley was the man. Fith place.. hate Danny Rose..
Well deserved win
Keeping the undefeated
Nuno, Sambi and Tommy are integral
Benjamin White did his stuff
Laca.. running for 69 minutes and cajoling
Auba.. should of had 2. But love the energy

We have to keep Ainsley..

Venga, Dani

Are we hoping for the scousers to win against west ham then?

Dissenter

Sanmi
How are you doing, long time.no see.
Yea, I think Odegaard will need to get used to being a bench player for a while. It will get worse when Partey and Xhaka return for selection.

Rich

Dissenter

Odegaard just came on scored a good goal, created a good chance for Tavares, that Lokonga almost scored from

Put in a lung busting challenge to stop a counter

Odegaard is a brilliant player, he’s been played out of position, he’s been carrying a knock

We win 1-0 win a very inexperienced team, and your first reaction is to kick one of our players?

Sly

Great win lads

Tom

All we need now is Pool do a number on Westham to complete the round of results going our way.
Ranieri will be sacked with ten games to go with a relegation specialist brought in to save Watford from the drop.
They’re going down.

Gommit

Is there any on the whistle today?

AFC Forever

Dissenter

“This club is Josh Kroenke’s now
…and he looks invested in it. I expect that we will spend at the same pace as last summer’s for a while to come.”

Think you are right. He said they took control in 2018 so this is just the beginning. He talked about the need to get CL football consistently, sign better players and challenge for the PL. Let’s hope so.

Rose and Watford have no room for complaint. You can see in the reply Danny Rose imploring his player to stay down. He was gesticulating madly, so it’s obvious that he was back up on the pitch so we didn’t have to throw the ball back

G8

Watford have 2 ex spuds in the team and sure were also told by ex player that we had no cojones !!.fuck them!

raptora

It was kinda cuntish not to give the ball back. Doesn’t sit well with our values. Oh well. It’d be like that sometimes.

AFC Forever

Tom, yes results have been good today. Spuds 0-0 so they’re four behind us. We’ve got a tough couple of games after the break, Liverpool at Anfield is as tough as they get!

Jim+furnell

Nasty Arsenal . . . Lovin’ it! Game we might not have won in the past

Crimson

Sid and the negative peeps!
Why so silent 🤫

Left Testicle

Yep! Kroenke looks like a dick. Probably surrounds himself with weak ‘yes’ men who don’t have the balls to tell him. Normal people would have good mates who would either have a quiet word or use banter to get the message across. It’s a case of the Emperors new clothes.

Sanmi

Dissenter
Glad to be back

AFC Forever

I wouldn’t give the ball back to them. They were cheating throughout the game, faking injury and rotational fouling. About time we stopped being bullied by these cheats. The tears make it taste so much better. Good to see Conte got Kane firing as everyone said he would- oh well.

Sanmi

We have a chance vs Liverpool. It suits our style . We will play on the counter. Auba needs to step up though. He needs to stop the overhead kicks

MidwestGun

Watford 19 fouls.. and 2 yellow cards.. Arsenal 6 fouls and 4 yellow cards… makes sense.

Anyhow… It was a stop start game.. incredibly happy to get the points.

Sanmi

Only people who don’t watch football are giddy about Conte, he’s super defensive. He won the epl in a season we trounced them 3-0

AFC Forever

TYAG

Good spot. As you say, fuck them and they’re cheating tactics. Ranieri needs to look at himself, not us, because he chose to play that Anti-football.

AFC Forever

*their

Left Testicle

Raptora,
Where have our ‘values’ got us recently? Rose shouldn’t have kicked the ball out. You only do that for a head injury. That’s all on Rose.

I’m not actually bothered about Liverpool in fairness, I expect to lose. Not many teams will beat Liverpool this season. But it could be a good marker of how far we’ve come especially if we put on a good performance as well. But like I said I expect to lose against City, Liverpool and Chelsea .

Crimson

The test will be against Liverpool….
Jacky Wilshere talking sense

LoveSausage

The Smith has 4 goals so far this season, feeding off scraps. Imagine the damage he’ll do once Saka is back in form and we replace Auba. The kid will be a wrecking ball.

Sanmi

Tavares vs Salah will be interesting

MidwestGun

We can have a international break of joy for once.

____
Yep Pedro… Feels good. YOu have to have a picture of Josh Kroenke with his foo man chu mustache and beard though.. next blog or Im gonna be disappointed. 😀

Karsa

20 points out of the last 24. Difficult to grumble about that.

Mark

Mid

” Watford 19 fouls.. and 2 yellow cards.. Arsenal 6 fouls and 4 yellow cards… makes sense. ”

Courtesy of Kevin (No) Friend of Arsenal . Loads of times he didn’t book their players yet booked us for almost any infringement as the stats show. Cunt ref.

But for Aubu we would of won by more. Def looking in better shape these last few games. Long way to go yet , but hopefully we are on the right path 🤞🙏

Crimson

If no club takes Jack. Sign him on for 3 months to cover Afcon?

Sanmi

Our hopes will lie with ESR and Auba as Arnold is a shitty defender

LoveSausage

Midwest,

In Josh’s defence, his idiot father wears a whig and expects people to take him seriously. How’s poor Josh suppose to know better?

AFC Forever

Karsa, yep we seem able to mix it up too as we had to today. Big test at Anfield but one thing we Dois that these boys will give everything

MidwestGun

Mark- yep for once I agree… Im not big on referee conspiracy theories.. but Friend was ridiculous at times. no consistency. And failure to acknowledge repeated fouls by the same players.

Left Testicle

Yes. Josh, the Oktoberfest girl or a goat.

AFC Forever

Pedro

“Raptora talking about values as he chokes on his dying agenda”

He would have been unbearable had his hero Conte managed a win.

Gonsterous

Wtf was auba doing in that game? He buried emery when he missed that pen against spurs and he did the same thing again today.

Then he goes and spoils odegaards goal and then laughs it out.

ESR dug us out or else auba would be crucified by everyone.

Left Testicle

Crimson,
Stop with that silly Wilshere talk.

underrated Coq

Good win in the end.

Time for Auba to be shown the door

Jamie

I want Liverpool to win by 9 goals so we slide up into 4th legit.

Greed it good.

Jamie

is*

Topside Northbank

No way we sign Wilshire even as cover too injury prone for a start.

Plus new rules of more physicality being allowed to go he would get overrun in midfield.

S23

Great win,great 3 points-hanging on at the end.
Wish Arteta’s subs would make sense-Saka was hanging on from 65 minutes,Auba pretty ineffective.
Defence is very good,Tomiyasu was excellent,Gabriel and White are building a very good partnership,also thought Maitland Niles was very good.
Overall pleased with the 3 points and the upward mobility,but as everyone knows the real tests are to come.

AFC Forever

Mark

Well said. We saw the McArthur assault on Saka lead to a ban for Mike Dean and against Leicester Johnny Evans got away with a red when 2 other players were sent off for the sake thing. There is no doubt the Northern based PGMOL mob treat us differently.

MidwestGun

Peds-
Yep… I guess when you have tons of money you can look like whatever you want. But damn it looked like when Kuanee Reeves tried to look like he was a Chinese Holy man or something. Very funny. The girl next to him looked embarrased to be on camera with him.

Topside Northbank

20/24 points very good return after the 3 game opening shitshow.

Can’t help thinking that late Lacca equalizer against Palace has proved to be a big goal the team has kicked on since, game if Auba had his shooting boots on we win comfortably.

Big 3 points going into the international break.

Gonsterous

Our summer signings have been a hit, especially ramsdale, tomiyasu and tavares

Top 5 baby !!!

MidwestGun

Ben White was man of the match for me, he has been in great form. His drive into the box got ESR the goal. And then I thought TT and AMN were excellent. ESR we need to stay healthy … he is basically the heartbeat of our current team. Love him.

TheLegendaryDB10

Realy happy the win. 😀 Our motivation can no longer be questioned. I am really loving this team who does not look like it wants to give up. As much as I still bitch a bit about Arteta, I cannot fault where we are at at the moment. I am absolutely loving what I am seeing. Motivation in spades and a will to win. I have to make a special mention for AMN. The MF was his to take and he did a sterling job of controlling it. So AMN looks like the sub that we are looking for re… Read more »

Left Testicle

Wouldn’t be surprised if Mikel went all ‘Arteta’ on us and went for a back five against Liverpool.

Karsa

Straight after the international break seems as good a time as any to play Liverpool. None of the following games are unwinnable.

MidwestGun

West Ham already ahead… Allison whiffing on a corner.

Gommit

Let’s hope WH wins then we can go above Lpool after the break. This was always a good goal

Topside Northbank

Pedro,

Glad we bought youth the ones that don’t work out we can move on.

To potential signings if you are good enough age won’t matter, you will get a chance.

Old enough to remember and go 80’s under GG got rid of the veteran overpaid core, went with youth and bought hungry players it’s the way to go if you can’t send the money some can.

Lets hope the short term mistakes of signing veteran players are gone Luiz, Willian no thanks.

Nelson

The Pools should have a defender there to protect the GK.

Rich

Tomiyasu with a understated + efficient performance, quietly went about his job with no fuss

White MOM

Up 4 grabs now

Evening,

A great three points, we made the game a lot harder than what it was.
Ref didn’t exactly help.
Neither did aubas penalty miss.
Or an offside rule that could do with changing when you have an incident likes that in the first half.

Aubas touch on odegaards shot was probably instinctive, we all probably would have moaned if he didn’t go for it and it went wide.
Not his best game though.

Arteta continues to win the fans back over. Now get a point at the bindippers and top four is on,

Globalgunner

Our unbeaten record needs West ham to win this

AFC Forever

Midwest

“Ben White was man of the match for me, he has been in great form. His drive into the box got ESR the goak”

I agree. Very good today, with and without the ball

His run led to the first goal against Leicester and it was his shot that led to our equaliser against Palace. He’s our Franz Beckenbauer, remember him?

UTarse

English premier league refs are the worst in Europe and have been for as long as I can remember. Corrupt northern monkeys.

Rich

Left testicle

I’d have no problem with going to Anfield and playing for fine margins

We got a ugly 2-1 win against them at the end of 2019/20, 3 shots to their 24, with only 31% possession

Le Sauce

I am buying into this team with each passing game especially with the back four we have. Gabriel and White have been superb so far especially Benjamin today, looks completely different from the game against Brentford. Auba almost singlehandedly lost us the game today and it has to be said that this team would banjg with a striker in the mould of DCL/Osihmen/Vlahovic

Globalgunner

If anyone makes a viable bid for Auba this December we should take it. No question

MidwestGun

Ha .. Yep I remember Beckenbauer of course. I remember him more as a manager then a player though. I was about 24 for that German WC winning team in 90.

Gazza

Arteta getting better but definitely needs to improve on his substitutions & when despite another win..

Pedro

Topside, amen. We are doing it the hard way.

Did I read that Arteta won more games in his first 100 than Wenger?

Not bad going.

Left Testicle

The more I think about it, the more I’d like a back five against Liverpool. Would be a shame to change a winning system though. AMN was good but I want Partey and Lokonga for the Liverpool game.

Left Testicle

He also lost a lot more than Wenger.

Nelson

I would like to try Partey with AMN in midfield. AMN is physically stronger than Lokonga. His fast closing speed is also quite helpful.

Danny

I read somewhere something about Rose kicked the ball out when they had a player down and instead of throwing it back to them we retained possession which led to the goal.
Anyone else hear that?

Left Testicle

Hear it? We saw it.

MidwestGun

Pedro yep they gave that Teta stat,… on NBC before the game. It surprised me. Thats for sure. Not gonna lie it didnt seem like it.

He has won 2 more games then Arsene in his first 100 53 out of 99.. Wenger was 51 out of 99. He needs the titles now. GG was 56 out of 100. Teta now 54 out of 100.

Pedro

Danny, did you hear we committed 6 fouls and got 4 booked, they committed 19 and got 2?

Karsa

The referee was a joke.

You would think they would at least pretend to be impartial.

Pedro

Midwest, that’s really interesting.

Looking forward to seeing where the next couple of months go. West showing the way against Liverpool

Up 4 grabs now

Pedro,

As much as my opinion has changed and artetas starting to win me over.
I think he’s got credit in the bank now with more people.
I think we all want to see how the team fares against the bindippers and United before we’re all converted to arteta in.

Not saying we have to win them but we need to see a performance, and turn up.

Also I’m pretty sure in wengers first 100 games there were champions league games in their not Europa league pub team games.
Small point but it should be mentioned.

Danny

Left Testicle
November 7, 2021 16:53:14

Hear it? We saw it.
————–
I’ll have to watch it again, didn’t notice at the time.

Pedro

Grabs, you can keep moving the goalposts forever. Every week there’s a new proof point people are waiting on. He has credit in the bank regardless of those results. We are 6 points off top after losing our first three. That is an outrageous return. Beating one of the best teams in the world doesn’t change the dimensions of where we are. We are not title contenders, we will lose games.

The Bard

Gutsy performance against a side that wanted to kick us off the park.
I know he can be a dick but enjoyed AMNs performance. He is a terrific athlete and can play. It was a game we could have lost or drawn so all credit to the team. Wins breed confidence. Long may it last.

bacaryisgod

Pedro-we actually did let it get to us but it was still a great day. I don’t care if we had 11 vs 10 at the end, it’s always going to be nerve-wracking holding on to a one goal lead. There was a lot of bending (panicked clearances, Ramsdale clanger etc) but we didn’t break and the team deserves credit for that. Just look at Chelsea yesterday. I think Auba’s getting a little too much incoming fire. He worked hard and there’s no guarantee that Odegaards shot goes in. The penalty was poor and I’m not sure he should be… Read more »

Jamie

We played hard, they played hard. We didn’t shirk and won the game.

Folk objectively talking about refereeing decisions should also mention the foul on Sissoko leading to our goal.

It’s probably better not to cry too much about the ref, enjoy the win, and enjoy watching replays of AMN bouncing Sissoko off him and making space for Benny Blanco’s mazy run forward.

Up 4 grabs now

Ref was abysmal,

Thought lakonga played well and sensible since he was on a yellow from the nineteenth minute.

Left Testicle

I think I’m missing something. 🤔

Danny

I guess you mean at 11:08, still unclear but I’ll take you word for it, I really dont remember:
https://hohofot.elhighlights.com/embed/k7R9POGrRpClp