Well, the footballing gods work in mysterious ways, and no doubt, right now, they are teaching Mikel Arteta a thing or two about how you treat people.

We’ve lost 3 games we should have done better in. 7 points, which would have ben par the course for us this season, would have us choking out top 4 right now. Instead, we’ve exited with 0 points. A really, really poor haul.

There’s obviously a lot of vitriol in the system right now, that is the way of the world, it’s a results business and Arteta has bottled this run as hard as Unai Emery did in his first season. The difference in this run is that the luck really hasn’t worked in our favor.

The worst performance was Crystal Palace, two uncharacteristic errors killed us. Brighton, we were killed by literally two goals off quarter chances. Then today, Southampton buried us with a lucky second phase transition from a set piece.

Nothing has gone right for us in any of the games, keepers have had worldies, woodwork has stepped in, no one has had had the guts in front of goal to make something happen.

People will point to all sorts of things when it comes to this run, but for me, the central focus sits squarely on how Arteta has managed his squad this season.

Sambi, Eddie, Cedric and Nuno showed today that they are all more than capable of holding their own in the Premier League. All four of them should have been integrated into the squad through the season and given minutes. If Arteta had done so, we’d be sharper right now, and there’d be more confidence in our play.

Really, if Arteta was braver, he’d have looked at Kieran Tierney and Thomas Partey coming back after the international break and put Sambi and Tavares in. The Ghanaian main man was always going to be in bad shape and Kieran Tierney would have been in a bad state of two 90s for Scotland. The job at Palace was manage the opening 34-40 with a deep block. Sambi and Tavares could have done that. If you rest our two fragile stars there, they might be available now. In December, when Arteta knew Tomi was on the edge, he should have given Cedric minutes, but he didn’t trust him.

Nuno was perfectly fine today, he dealt with everything well, he was good on the ball… why did Arteta create all that drama with him twice? Why did he defend Xhaka as the left back when he knew it was a mistake?

These problems stem from Arteta being extremely transactional in nature and too controlling of outcome. He treats certain players like dirt, then complains about quality when the demoralized can’t deliver from day one. All players need rhythm to perform, especialling those that are young trying to find their way in the game. Arteta and his staff should have known that.

I saw some people popping off at Eddie after the game. He had very little service today, but his pace gave is balance and a different dynamic. Why didn’t he get great service? The team isn’t used to playing with someone that can run for the ball. Give him some time and he’ll be a different animal.

Losing three games in a row like this is more than the blip I was expecting. It’s doubly worse because now we have to manage Chelsea, United and West Ham. What we have to hope is the manager doesn’t give up like a chunk of the online fanbase.

We need to see a reaction. Football works in mysterious ways. One mystery is that despite losing 3 games on the bounce, TOP 4 is STILL in our hands. Beat Chelsea, we are back on, because confidence will be high, and we’ll only have 6 games to manage.

I know, I know… why do this to myself?

… because I’m a fan. And when I give up on games before they’ve happened, I become one of those awfully boring people that can’t find joy in life. Football is about big stories, we still have time to shape our one.

The only positive you can take from today is there wasn’t much to criticize from the performance outside not sticking the ball in the net. Southampton had nothing, they scored a lucky goal, and Forster had a world class performance. People citing effort are wrong. People citing a tactical error are wrong. We were just unlucky today. Sport is fucking weird sometimes.

What can we do for Chelsea? How can we surprise them? Are we capable of digging out a disgusting 0-1 win that is totally undeserved? I want to feel embarrassed after our game next week. I want to apologize to my Chelsea friends for a shameful win. I need to see something better from Arsenal.

Arteta has moved to the apathy stage with the project. He can turn that around. He needs to, because once you move beyond that, you enter the Emeryzone, and no one needs to be that.  The fans have backed the project hard this season, it’s time for Arteta to give us something unexpected and prove he has what it takes.

Let’s see what Wednesday brings.

Check out the podcast and video below. Stay until the end for a rallying cry from Matt.