Ugh… preseason games against clubs that are our rivals can be really irritating.
If we beat Chelsea this evening, I’ll be knee sliding onto Twitter to confirm that, yes, we are going to win the league.
If we lose, I will build a trench, hunker down, and fire ‘IT WAS TOO HOT’ commentary at the weirdos that’ll get off on the loss.
It’s a no-win situation.
Preseason is good for confidence, but let’s be honest, beating Liverpool in the Community Shield a few years ago didn’t do much for our title aspirations, did it?
The game won’t impact our season, but it’ll make us feel good if we put on a show.
There are two more games left of the preseason. My suspicion is that the club probably know, loosely, who is going to be ready for the first game of the season. I suspect a large chunk of the game this evening will be the starting 11 for the Crystal Palace game that lands in 2 weeks!
Here are some suppositions:
The fullback situation is probably going to look like it did at the end of last season. If KT and Tomi aren’t available, then I’d guess they aren’t going to have enough time to get match fit for the Palace game. What we have to hope is the problems they have aren’t recurring and they aren’t BIG issues. If Tomi has done his calf again, I’m gonna lose it.
Right back is going to be the position to watch. There are three options, Cedric, Ben White, and William Saliba. My guess is you will see Ben White occupying the role. He’s better on the ball than Cedric, he’s a stronger defender, and he has previous doing the role. I also think asking Saliba to fill in there could be problematic. Put the smaller more nimble player there. White also looked really sharp when he inverted the other night.
Not sure if I mentioned this yesterday, but William Saliba is apparently close to signing a new deal with the club. Quite something. Just remember all the folk that spent all last season squealing about how badly he’d been treated, about how upset the player would be, about how Arteta wouldn’t take him back, that if he came back he’d not sign a new deal. Remember those people today. What makes this Saliba story even more delicious is there are stories that Barcelona has been trying to get him to move to them for the past 4 months. The kid was so unphased by a world-class loan period, he pushed away the advances of Barcelona. Wow. Don’t infantilize grown men that are elite alpha athletes. They aren’t bitches. They are the top 0.00001% of humans that can play a global game at the highest level. They like competition.
No doubt in my mind we’re going to start the season with Zinchenko at left-back. Nuno Tavares has taken a loan move to Atalanta (NO BUY CLAUSE), which from a coaching perspective, feels like a really, really good move. KT hasn’t been seen. So hopefully the fact that Zinchenko speaks the language of JcP as well as any player in the world, he’ll click right away. Let’s hope his fitness is where it needs to be!
Our starting midfield partnership this season is going to be Granit and Thomas Partey and I think that’s right, I suspect they’ll roll out today. If they can control the game at home against City, I gotta tell you, I think they can control anyone. Xhaka comes with flaws, but he also comes with a lot of benefits, and he brings out the best in Partey. The evolution for Granit this season is that he will be pushed higher up the pitch as a #8, and that will allow our system to transition to Thomas P and a more advanced #8 like… Tielemans.
It’s also interesting that Arsenal have given up on Lokonga as a #6, they apparently now see him as a #8 LCM, I think that came from Gunnerblog? I agree though. I think Sambi offers more further up the pitch. He’s too young and inexperienced to be our #8 this season, I think that’ll be Tielemans, but he’s a great rotation option and I think people are sleeping on him and he’ll show that this year.
I’m not sure where the front 3 is going to go. Emile Smith Rowe has been absent, I think Gabi Martinelli might occupy the left, Gabriel Jesus through the middle, with Bukayo on the right. We also can’t rule out Eddie occupying the left more this season, potentially playing in a two with Jesus.
The thing I’m most excited about is the tactical flexibility Arteta is baking into the squad. He’s trying to make us unpredictable. He has players intelligent enough now to switch up systems after 15 minutes. It’s a very NFL play-by-play type approach, but being able to switch to something new can backfoot teams and cause all sorts of headaches if you can do it well. It also should help us in the big games. If Arteta can make a formation decision 2 minutes before kick-off, you can be very damaging.
Finally, James from The Athletic said that a data presentation convinced Gabi Jesus to move to Arsenal. Arsenal use all sorts of fancy tools, some proprietary I believe, to show players what their role in our system is, the sort of chances they’ll get, when they’ll bring to the side, and I reckon they probably ran a model that said ‘last season, you’d have scored 20 goals in our system and Arsenal would have finished 3rd.’
Reality here: Gabi Jesus and Zinchenko didn’t move to Arsenal to play for 4th. They’ve been told we’re going to challenge for the league in 2 seasons’ time. Guffaw at that, soil your panties that it’s aggressive but damn… doesn’t it feel good that someone at the club is finally dreaming big?
Right, that’s me done. Get the podcast into your system. Matt and Pedro are going to go On The Whistle so UK fans have something to watch right after the game tomorrow morning. It’ll be Patreon tho. So you’re gonna have to pony up some cash/money to see it.
What did Xhaka do again?
How good is Odegaard!!! He’s going to thrive on the movement around him. Lovely technician.
We can only hope that we don’t get a lot of injuries through the season. The first eleven is really strong. Our second choices not so much.
Jonny, Tomi, Tierney, and ESR aren’t even in the squad. We have plenty of depth next season.
Also Vieira not in the squad plus I think we sign at least one more
Great first half. I like the look of this team going into the season, no need to worry about Tomi and Tierney injuries by the look of things. The only major issue is what happens when Partey gets injured
If this lot can stay fit we’ll be flying
Big Willy Saliba playing like a Don.
Give him whatever he wants Edu.
The boy is a gem.
Zach
I’m hav ing difficulties knowing who’s who inn the Chelsea team tbh
Why didn’t the have names in their jersey
If they don”t have kitmen traveling with them, they can use commercial DTG machines that cause as little as $300 on amazon.com
That’s amateur stuff from Chelsea
We just signed Zinchenko and he has his name printed on his jersey
Put Tielemans in there as well….boom
Odegaard is so much fun to watch, I have no idea how you can love football, but not love Martin Odegaard?….
That Jesus fella is really fun to watch as well.
This team looks so good.
Except for nervous moments from Gabby Maga and the usual lead footed movement from Xhaka we look a pretty formidable side
If we can keep up the high press like we did last 20 mins of Orlando and this half wth our starters not many teams can stand up to that.. but it’s just a matter of health and how much we can keep it up over the course of a long long season.
Love that Martinelli assist.. I want to see more of that action from Ødegaard this season.. go for goals, don’t just look to pass..
Lets see more from the Arsenal – Chaos merchants centrale.
Can’t believe we had less possession and less passes than Chelsea in the first half
Diss
It was 2 vs 2.Xhakae ran away following the ball instead of staying with his man. That’s why Chelsea almost scored.
Rwandan tourism is getting their money;s worth
Good exposure from Arsenal
We’ll be asking for kore when that contract is due for renewal
Watching it on Chelsea website Jason Cindy is shitting his pants says we are a cut above them
Pepe walking for the Chelsea bench, forgot which side he was ono there.
Make sure you get in some more digs at Xhaka.
You think it makes your own life less of a failure to abuse Xhaka constantly?
Rich
Jesus and Odegaard are something else. I said Odegaard would benefit from having better movement and interchange around him. Saliba and White look good too. It’s 2 o’clock in the morning I don’t normally get hard that late at night without viagra…!!
Nelson
‘Chelsea almost scored because of the sheer brilliance of Mason Mount
That’s want I saw anyway
Xhaka seems to play under a magnifying glass it seems
Xhaka has been solid as he was after Mikel switched his position second half of the season
Don’t like the guy but he is not playing. Badly
Pedro
Didn’t say he never has good moments, they’re not very frequent though, although a bit more so lately. 2 assists last season playing further up the pitch isn’t good enough. He’s the most obvious player to upgrade on now, everywhere else we’re good for starters and in most positions we have excellent backup as well.
That aside, great half of football, Jesus looking so damn good, Martinelli and Ode purring, some of the combination play was amazing. Saliba looking like he won’t have any trouble adapting at all. A shame we can’t play that lineup all game.
AFC Forever
We’re now at the stage where our first choice 11 with give anyone a game, specifically at home.
Saliba just makes it look so effortless, physically he’s imposing
Captain chaos Nuno is definitely on.
Martinelli playing no hand break tonight making those trademark runs, curious to see how this shifts with whats surely a load of subs incoming.
Dissenter,
It’s the Xhaka microscope.. the Xhakascope
It only picks up flaws… misses 95% of the game.
You can see I’m tired of the Xhaka bully boys. They barely understand the overall game.
Saliba has a smoothness about him… I love that Arteta is trying White ahead of Cedric.. this bodes well for more playing time for Saliba in season.
Diss
I have ignored that Nig… long time ago.
Xhaka made a good assist.
That was a dive from Alonso. good no call.
“get your head on a swivel, that frenchman just let it fly!”
Rich
Yes. It’s what we have been saying, we’ve been limited with the players we had tactically. Back to front we’ve made some game changing additions. Jesus is just another level & he’ll improve those around him, like Martinelli & Odegaard in particular. We also have flexibility & options too.
Watching Jesus maintain possession just makes me realize how poor our strikers were last year
Xhaka with a Partey special shot.
Good lord Xhaka.
Bonafide scrub
Looks like we are working on defending a lead this half.. sitting back more and countering. Eddie for Jesus incoming.
Tavares is hopeless FFS
Tavares is only here for another week he is defo a weak link bless him
Saliba the best defender out there!
Take of Xhaka.. to protect him…
Please.😉
My, my, my, what a wonderful half of pressing and attacking futbol.
Sign of things to come.
Know it is preseason, but wow!
Tavares is lacking confidence. He needs a Loan.
The ref is a joker blows up for everything
Venga, Dani
I think Jesus is so good he makes most strikers look average. I love his movement, on and off the ball. Intelligent player.
Chelsea have improved this half
Saka bang
Cleanup on aisle Saka! Goal!!!!!!!!!!!!
Saka looked offside there but who cares
🔥🔥🔥
Marquinhos time
Haha Saka trying to learn the Samba dance goal celebration from Marquinhos was funny.
Where’s the Xhakascope on that one?
Twitter buzzing positive for him.
Saliba excites me as does ode and Jesus
Mass subs incoming…
Artetaball in full swing.
Some of the passing and movement has been superb. We’ve clearly worked hard in training.
Mass scrubs you meant right … I kid I kid
I think we emptied the whole bench.
Bit lucky with that 3rd, but who cares…. Fu*k the chavs.
Mass substitutions will destroy the rhythm but boy was that fun!!
Great stuff. Record attendance, finally US aprieciate proper sport. Pedro and AKBs how soft is your skin from all this eggs on your face regarding Saliba. He looks great!
Good game for all the starters. no complaints there.. Now it’s substitute fun time. for 10 mins. and we win the Flo-rida Cup. Very prestigious of course.
There’s a player lurking inside of Tavares
He’s such a great athlete
Rollen what you talking about who said anything about saliba not being a great buy from us ?
Clean sheet now!
I like Tavares too.
Oh Pepe… *sigh*
If we play like that last season we would get 3rd ez
Tavares just needs to learn how to defend his forward play is lovely
He was fun to watch in the league cup last season
Saliba wins for Arsenal.. we all win.
Anyway, like Arteta says… it proves that the loans worked perfectly.
Hope that rumour that he’s extending is true!
All Arsenal games should be played at this time to accommodate west coast fans!
Tavares is such a weird player, breathtaking one minute, petrifying the next, shows up in areas he has no business being.
Tactically + positionally he’s a long way off the required level, interested to see how he develops with regular playing time, he’s got a lot of exciting qualities, if he can just bring them all together
I definitely want him learning on someone else’s time though.
Nige he will defo extend the kid is an arsenal fan and you can see something good is happening here
Tavares needs polishing and game time, loan at good clubb would be nice
“Great stuff. Record attendance, finally US aprieciate proper sport.”
That’s just lazy stereotyping
109,318 fans in,2014, watched a gloried friendly Manchester United and Real Madrid, at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor, Michigan
United vs Liverpool grossed 101k in the same summer of 2014.
The highest world cup attendance was in USA 94 WC
MLS games have surpassed the 75k mark on the west coast.
oh suck ti but, record for this stadium
Our first cup of the season lol matching the spuds earlier 🤣🤣🤣
u r Keser multi Dis
Diss record attendance at this ground they said
Get in!
4!!!!!
Fuck , this just builds hope so much, ready to be dissipointed
Yea, that’s it
Even our subs have stepped up
Lokonga! Very nice
Sambi nice one
Hey look at that Lokongo with the header… 4-0! Love a good Chelsea beat down!
Bring on extensions for Saka + Willy
Sambi! I like him too, he can make it too. New guy at work is a rent bou fan. Can’t wait for Monday lol
What a hammering that was we were great
Whoop whoop suck it Chelsea… you got schooled.
Lovely header. That will do him good.
So nice to have game late to get slightly fucked up!
Fuck ex chelski
Not marked at all but still a nice header from Sambi, great way to end the game.
Midwest, you can have fun with your bro now!!!
Good win
Good performance offensively and defensively.
We need to get some players out, and KSE need to dust off that chequebook again.
3 more top players incoming, and if we can keep our players fit, and we’ll be very competitive
Middy tell your brother they took one hell of a beating lol
AFC.. you know it man.. Got to get my licks in.
This was one thing Wenger resisted for so long
Stopping the team from going on preseason tours
That’s how Chelsea got so well supported in America. They worked super hard touring and touring
Boys, we look like kings. Fuck yes