Arsenal get back to business this week.
We have one more game left of preseason.
12 more days until the start of the season.
2 more players to buy.
About 7 that need shifting on.
Edu has a wide-ranging interview in The Athletic authored by James. There’s some nice bits in there, it feels like Arsenal are trying to get ahead of the PR this season, versus waiting like they did last year.
Some points that I thought were interesting:
He confirmed what I told you last season, Champions League was a stretch goal, making it back to Europe was the objective. It was totally fine to feel pain because we blew top 4 from a good position, but the whole purpose of goals and objectives is that you don’t change them. If the club thought Europe was a good enough target for the youngest squad in the league in their first season, then pivoting to top 4 when it’s doing well would be unfair. The corporate equivalent would be reducing a salesman’s commission when they sell too much. You don’t punish overperformance, you applaud it.
This season though, Edu has made it clear, he expects the club to move to the next level because all the pieces are in place.
There was also a bit of a dig at Unai Emery, Edu basically said it’s really hard to recruit for a manager that doesn’t have a clear plan. Don Unai was indecisive on the pitch, he was indecisive with player management, so there’s no reason to think he wasn’t indecisive with the players he wanted to sign.
There was a story a few years ago that Unai Emery brought a magical presentation to his interview, that might have been the case, but it was Arteta the struck first with a detailed analysis of exactly what he wanted to do.
At the second attempt, Arsenal hired Arteta. I think Don Raul stepped away from that decision and put it on Arteta. He needed a fall and likely realised putting more of his stooges at the club might not be good for career longevity.
Mikel is ruthless about how he expects Arsenal to built to a title challenge, he knows how he’s going to play, the types of players he needs to make it work, and Edu is happy bringing that to life.
It’s clear that when he arrived, the club was a bag of shit… just look at where the line-up was.
Edu is quite specific about the problem he inherited. A group of older players on massive salaries that didn’t give a shit about greatness. It’s hard to sell players that don’t have value. Schalke took on Mustafi and Kola and they joined a coup within a month. That’s what you’re dealing with. Europe knows the eggs we’re trying to sell have mostly been bad. That’s why we can’t get cash for them.
Edu has shifted 16 first-teamers since the Bournemouth game. He hasn’t gotten a lot of money. But he basically said terminating deals for shitty players is better than letting them stink out the dressing room. Remember when the players tried to down Arteta? Bad eggs are toxic, they bring everyone down, when you kill them, their absence oxygenates an environment and allows new leaders to emerge. I think the biggest issue for Arteta was some of the biggest names were the most problematic. If you have massive talent, you’ll always carry an outsized weight in a dressing room, that’s just how sport tends to work… so when your World Cup winners have downed one manager, why not the next?
That’s part of the reasons Arsenal didn’t sack Arteta during that shocking run. If they had, you create a club culture where the players know the downing of tools will get them another roll of the dice with a potentially more favorable manager. Football is a game of emotions, managing them when pressure is coming from all angles is difficult, but when you have a plan and an agreed vision… you can shut the noise out.
Edu and club leadership needs to be commended for working through the kinks. The whole point of signing Arteta was that 1) he was already one of the best young coaches in the world 2) if he could hone his management skills under us, we’d be getting a next-generation manager at the start of their career 3) if we could rough out the learning process, we could have ourselves a gem before bigger clubs find out.
This is the season when we find out if that theory will hold.
What we know already is this:
- The coaching is really paying dividends. If you can get a team of 23 yr olds to 69 points without a striker, something is happening that is working.
- The reputation of what is going on is traveling around the Premier League. Gabriel and Zinchenko don’t give their best years to a project that isn’t going anywhere. They are here to win, they are a level of signing that is a hard indicator that the footballing world gets that the Arsenal approach is a good one
- Our best young players are signing new deals. We’ll likely finish the summer with Saka, Martinelli, and Saliba committing to the long term. That is huge for a club that had been on a very poor run with contracts.
My favourite part of the piece was when Edu was talking about Gabi J. He said he wanted him to join, but not the player of last season, he wanted the Gabriel that shines.
I love that. No blowing smoke, just pure honesty, because last season Gabi J was trailing Lacazette for goals up until March with roughly the same minutes.
It would seem that so far, we have an invigorated player, and we might just see a side of him this season no one has witnessed before.
The business we have to do is clear over the next two weeks.
We need to sign an experienced #8 that looks like Tielemans.
We need to sign a Nico Pepe replacement if we can shift the Ivorian. I’m a little worried the player has ‘I’m committed to Arsenal’ posts rolling up, obviously the realisation no one will pay him what he seeks, but I’m sure we’ll come to a deal and shift him on loan somewhere. He’s just not suited to what we’re doing and he needs to play at some point.
Pablo Mari has a lot of interest, Lucas Torreira might end up at Valencia, Arsenal are moving out Bernd Leno to Fulham… Ains, Reiss, and Runarsson will all find homes.
Then we’re cracking.
This season is going to be immense. Spurs, hate them or hate them, have signed decent players. Chelsea will add more names but might be weakening. United have a fancy hip coach. City and Liverpool added top tier talent. We are in for a helluva ride, but I feel ready, and the hope IS real this time.
P.S. Get yourself one of these shirts if you didn’t yesterday. This is a limited run, once they’re gone, that’s it. If you want to buy one. Jump on this LINK and type LG10 on purchase to get a 10% discount.
Remember to sign up to our Patreon if you haven’t.
THEN you can jump on our latest podcast that covers the Chelsea game.
Wonder who the Dortmund player was that Edu referenced as someone who AFC wanted to sign but changed their mind when all they asked about was $
TomJuly 25, 2022 20:16:11
“Edu throwing Emery under a bus, tells us more about Edu, than it does about Emery.”Of course. People getting their panties all wet because Edu said some things to back their agenda.
Edu serves Edu first , Arsenal second.
Tom
And you wonder why people question ether you’re spurs or not. Can’t help yourself
Now there are 5 subs, The Arsenal need to sign 2 thug players, who will be cheap, but who can sit on the bend as warning to the opposition players/managers. Why you ask? Because history proves in the last 20 years that when Arsenal has a sniff at glory, opposition target the Clubs playmakers with cynical challenges. Why 2 thugs? To rotate when one is ‘doing time’ 😛, there is another in reserve to come off the bench for retribution if you like. As The Arse become more of a threat by the week, the cynical challenges will come. Lets… Read more »
*bench
GD4
Are you sure you’re a Gooner?
Gnarleygeorge9 I like how you think 😄. I agree that whenever we get going, teams go out and hurt our key players. Really think there’s a conspiracy against Arsenal winning the league again, unpopular opinion I know. Cazorla, Diaby, Ramsey, Van Persie, Wilshere. What do all these players have in common? All difference makers who got cut down because we were too good and that’s how you stop Arsenal. Fabregas suffered from this too but he’s a more durable player(playing since 17 and still playing) Bissouma would have been perfect for that. But moving on, maybe we can still get… Read more »
Un, not sure how you managed to make the Spurs connection from that post tbh..
You could say I was extremely uncharitable to Edu, too harsh on RR, and too impressed with Klopp……… either one might’ve been true.
But Spurs? Lol.
Un, generally I’m not impressed with football managers and executives blaming their predecessors for their own slow progress.
JohnnyGunner,
Mom just called, it’s time to get out of the basement and
eat some leftovers loser. Why would I answer to a loser like you?
TT
Extremely uncharitable to Edu = Confirms Anti-Arsenal agenda, which is a typical Spud thing to do.
Too harsh of Rangnick = United did beat Spurs last season, which could have stopped Spurs securing 4th, and you’re still seething about it….
Too impressed with Klopp = Liverpool always beat Arsenal, and he handed Spurs 2 points last season, which helped them secure 4th….
We can all read between the lines with your subliminal messaging, which undeniably confirms your Tottenham allegiances….
Dear Rich.
Can you please stop referring to Tottenham Tom as TT…
TT
Is that you Thomas Tuchel?
Some of the Arsenal teams that came after Henry’s departure from the club(2006-2018), were talented enough to go for the title but they lacked physicality and weren’t durable enough. We went from talented and physically dominant players like Vieira, Toure, Campbell, Lauren, Keown, Adams, Bergkamp, Edu, Petit, Lehman, and co to Van Persie, Cesc, Cazorla, Vermaelen, Koscielny, Denilson, all players with talent but little to no physicality. The ideal scenario would have been having Kante, Essien, Gabriel or even Saliba type players mixed with that second group of players.
Rich, try mastering reading the actual lines before attempting reading between them.
Ralph rangnick was absolute banter I was truly sad to see him go
Crap manager miles out of his depth, zero credibility at Utd. Excuse after excuse. Took the Austria job whilst still supposed to be working for Utd.
Damn he was a complete car crash. What a pity he didn’t stay
I also don’t buy that Ronaldo is the root of so much trouble at Utd I really don’t Love or hate Ronaldo, he didn’t only score a hatful, but he scored clutch decisive goals and when he played their points per game was way way higher which I don’t believe was a coincidence Dang nick couldn’t manage him and his big ego so it became this whole nonsense about how Ronaldo was magically somehow making them worse and Ten Haag has never managed a team with a big name before so he’s probably just intimidated by Ronaldo. But again it’s… Read more »
*Tunes in to to LG comments, Sees a bunch of Emery debate*
-Clicks… out-
Have a Good Ebening.
Naiga
Exactly.
Rich
Think Henry….
The best teams focus on the collective, when Ronaldo plays, they have to play to his strengths. Building a team around Ronaldo’s strengthens a few years back, was a no brainer, now I’m not convinced it’s worth the hassle. He’s a big shadow for younger players to live under, remove that shadow, and others will step into the light, they spent a lot of money on Sancho, he’s the future for United, not a 37yr old. Ronaldo isn’t a long term solution, and he’s not going to elevate United to the PL title while he’s there, so what’s he doing… Read more »
Lol, Le Grove comment section showing itself up once again as a bunch of middle aged man children who treat a different point of view like it was a wasp to the face. Unai Emery failed utterly at Arsenal, PSG, & Spartak, but has done well with Valencia, Sevilla, and Villarreal…maybe instead of bitching at each other for fucking YEARS as to whether he was a good manager or not you could probably agree that he has innate talent but trouble with communication as he’s never succeeded outside of Spain. I’ve tried to be polite but you guys really are… Read more »
Titi?
No way….
“you guys really are a bunch of obtuse argumentative cunts”
That’s the nicest thing anyone ever said about us, thanks mate.
The corporate equivalent would be reducing a salesman’s commission when they sell too much.
–
It’s called being capped. It doesn’t matter who your corporate overlord is the world over. The same thing happens. The banker always wins…
Calling others obtuse, argumentative, cun*s, is a great way to start an argument…
Stones + glass houses spring to mind.
More reports of a deal with Juve for Arthur. Edu, just get the YT deal over the line to make this a spectacular window
Everyone seems to hate Arthur
Is he really that bad? I never followed him closely, but my understanding is he was great in Brazil, and great when he joined Barca. His form dipped for one season and he got sold. Mixed bag at Juve.
In prime wenger days this kind of player was ideal as he’d get them on the cheap and rejuvenate them.
But like I said o haven’t followed Arthur properly.
Is the gate justified?
Hate*
But yes YT is the obvious choice and who I would go for. Good price, good player. No particular downside with the deal. Get it done pretty please edu
its LG china probably not. im in the same boat as u
Jabbereacky “Unai Emery failed utterly at Arsenal, PSG, & Spartak, but has done well with Valencia, Sevilla, and Villarreal…maybe instead of bitching at each other for fucking YEARS as to whether he was a good manager or not you could probably agree that he has innate talent but trouble with communication as he’s never succeeded outside of Spain.” This. I’m probably the last person here that hunts Managers. but he had to go. 100% behind Pedro. Some of you have terrible memories!!!! I sat in that half empty stadium against Frankfurt looking at the Emery out signs. Very sad. Nice… Read more »
*Saliba. *their agenda. It’s late, time for bed!!!
Just based on Edus interview, he mentions collective responsibility and says there are no Arteta or Edu signings, it’s all Arsenal signing. There he said it and it bodes well for Pedro to understand this. Emery was also Arsenal’s signings and it always would.be a mess when Arsene left. The manager after Arsene would always be the most difficult job and case in point Moyes after Fergie. So emery took the fall and again whatever happened at that time was an Arsenal decision. Good on emery that he resurrected his career elsewhere. We can move on as well as Emery… Read more »
If 7 trophies in 2 seasons in Paris is failing miserably? Then I really hope I fall flat on my face in a similar type of way… Emery’s record at Lorca +Almeira was also excellent. I can accept Emery might have been the wrong person for Arsenal, but it’s taken us 30 months just to get back to 5th, which is exactly where he finished, and was only 2 points off, when he was sacked. That’s not a dig at Arteta, who I’ve never called to be sacked, but just proves that we were on a downward trajectory, and dismantling… Read more »
Good post bar usual Emery crap.
Emery>>Arteta by long shot. OFC it might change.
No excuses! No CL no job.
this will be a great PL season.
“I can accept Emery might have been the wrong person for Arsenal, but it’s taken us 30 months just to get back to 5th”
ya? do go on
“Emery’s record at Lorca +Almeira was also excellent.”
nevermind
its not like i hate the guy. its not like i think he should quit mgmt. but everything about his tenure at arsenal was TERRIBLE
don’t see why thats consequential.
it is really heartwarming to see how untieds riches have turned the whole world of euro football against them. hopefully barca crashes and burns this year and that process starts w them
Rich Emery wasn’t the problem if you see things holistically. He had to deal with a power struggle between Raul and Mslintat, etc. Where he had done well, he always had the backing of a DOF. He didn’t had it here. But he is well loved by many of Le Grove because he is the anti-Wenger of the post Wenger era. He is the coach, not the manager. He is supposedly excellent in tactics and a great coach in contrast to Wenger. Eventually it was just down to false expectations. The assumption that all Arsenal needed for success was proper… Read more »
i like that dark hei. no crocodile tears. dont disagree w anything there
The problem is people taking binary approaches to look at Emery He was the wrong manager for the job, he failed his second season badly and we played boring football AND he had almost no say on transfers, was not backed by the club, was taking over from Wenger (impossible shoes to fill overnight), he overachieved in his first season with a dreadful squad including not a single winger. For some reason people who like Arteta are really defensive about the latter points because they feel it’s an attack on Arteta to recognize the full picture including the difficult circumstances.… Read more »
Like let’s be real if Arteta was going into next season with Emery’s first squad the same people attacking Emery now would be saying the squad is dismal and that coming 2 points behind third and making the EL final is a huge achievement.
You can’t make it up
‘But the football was dreadful under emery’
It sure was.
And whilst it’s usually better these days it’s very often been exceptionally boring under Arteta as well. It even got a new nickname Donutball lol.
Glass houses…
Emery wasn’t backed with the players he wanted Zaha over Pepe a player he clearly didn’t want for about 50m more than he was worth. He was the wrong fit in the end but the cards were stacked against him. his English was a issue and getting messages across lost in translation, the overplaying from the back was a terrible tactic though the goal we conceded against Watford totally self inflicted. The media as a whole have been pretty anti Arsenal and when the mainstream braodcaster of matches had a interviewer greet Emery after a poor result with ‘Good ebening’.It… Read more »
TT – if TT is genuine then all I can do is apologise for the constant attacks accusing you of being a Spud when in fact it was never you TT, but Tottenham Tom described as TT I hope that makes sense TT:) And yes Tottenham Tom does have a penchant for our Spud neighbours and gets a tingle for Klopp. Far more of a tingle in fact than he does for Arteta I’ll leave it there and wait for his community care helper TR7 to join in. A quick question! Who am I Tottenham Tom who is my alter… Read more »
China1July 26, 2022 05:22:21 ‘But the football was dreadful under emery’It sure was.And whilst it’s usually better these days it’s very often been exceptionally boring under Arteta as well. It even got a new nickname Donutball lol.Glass houses… This is a great comment China. Under Arteta, I can think of less than 10 games that are memorable in terms of attacking football. Auba, AMN, martinez and Pepe practically carried us to that FA cup win. We played always like underdogs. There is a reason Gambon refers to Arteta has Tapas Tony Pulis. We have Jesus, Zinchenko playing well, scoring this… Read more »
Incase you’re having a bad day, remember Bayern Munich once bid £80 million for Hudson Odoi and Chelsea refused to sell.
Arteta has done wonders with the turn around. It required guts and he delivered. He is not perfect, but he deserves praise for Arsenal returning to being a proper club.Keep the levels rising and the club will soon be a title challenging club.
One thing is certain is the squad is considerably better now
Even if for some reason we have a bad season and the manager loses his job, you’d certainly feel the next manager would take over a good squad of players who are overall very much on the up, so it’s a bit less worrying than in previous years when the squad was basically always just a shambles
If we get Tielemans in the squad is very nearly one that can compete for big titles. Not quite but nearly
“Incase you’re having a bad day, remember Bayern Munich once bid £80 million for Hudson Odoi and Chelsea refused to sell.“
Surely not?
Apologies for the name calling, whiskey and commenting can be bad bedfellows
We’ve all been there Jabberwocky!
Lemar to us for 92m was our biggest swerve. Arteta apparently rejected a recent cheap offload offer to us.
Football appears full of massively hyped and overpriced players.
I wonder if we will view Sterling as a great swerve by end of next season
I do expect Chelsea to gobble up players now . Boehly appears to want to do late high offers on a scatter gun basis . Wouldn’t be surprised if he attempts to go after our targets if only to try and generate PR
I agree in principle that if we have the resources Arsenal should bring in 2 additional players specifically a CMF to rotate with Partey and Xhaka and a Winger to replace Pepe. The priority for me is the CMF as it has been since the end of last season and I am unclear why Arsenal have still not moved for Tielemans who is in final year of contract with Leicester and appears to want to leave. He is a good player with several years experience playing in EPL. The wing position is dependent on the departure of Pepe and finding… Read more »
I’m glad Edu set us straight. There’s me thinking that we tanked at the end of last season and let the Spuds in when all along we had achieved our goal of Europa league football and CL wasn’t on our radar. If anyone seriously believes that shite they need their head examining.
Bard,
With transfers you can have your first choice target and then a back up if that doesn’t come off. Of course we were aiming for CL but ending up in EL would have clearly been secondary target. No need to be so binary about things is there?
“You can’t make the argument Emery was our problem, when it’s taken Arteta 30 months, to take us from 8th – 5th, and deliver our first season outside Europe for over 20 years.”
This comment here sums up everything on the Emery debate. He was just the “wrong” person at the wrong time for us.
Seems like we might be having it hard landing the players needed to complete the squad. I hope Edu remembers we can always loan 1 or 2 players to hold fort.
I don’t blame Arteta to resorting to playing defensive fine margins football in his first 18 months, if you haven’t got the players with the right skill set + characteristics to play a certain way, and you send your team out to play that way anyway?.. Then we’d be setting our team up like lambs to the slaughter, changing styles isn’t an event, it’s a process. Most managers would have struggled this last few years, Emery certainly wasn’t faultless, even if with the players at his disposal, I don’t think 2018/19 was the disaster some made it out to be.… Read more »
Rich ” if you haven’t got the players with the right skill set + characteristics to play a certain way, and you send your team out to play that way anyway?..Then we’d be setting our team up like lambs to the slaughter, changing styles isn’t an event, it’s a process.” Lambs to the slaughter , are you sure? Those same players had reached 6 cup finals and had a 2nd place in the league in the previous 7 seasons I don’t call it a process , i call it bullshit. What normally happens after a couple of victories( in pre… Read more »
Those same players had reached 6 cup finals and had a 2nd place in the league in the previous 7 seasons
No, they didn’t. The main players of the success over that period of time had all left. Sanchez, Ramsey, Koscielny, Cazorla and Ozil were by far the best players in the period of success you cite. By the time Arteta took over, only a washed up and disinterested Ozil remained.
The team Arteta took over had achieved nothing of what you suggested.
Excellent contribution Ollie.
Westham;s new signing , Nayef Aguerd: West Ham signing has surgery on ankle injured in Rangers match
This is the worst nightmare from the preseason
Hope we get through unscathed
Great one Ollie we all know Pierre is being disingenuous. Besides he disliked Emery who was a very good “cup manger” and a poor “league manager” so how then can he big up the team when we were doing so poorly in the league and on a downward league table trend although we always found our way to cup finals. Don’t get me wrong, it’s always special to win cups but the best teams always do well in the league and that’s where we want to be as a team, not a Villarreal or sevilla type who’re excellent cup teams… Read more »
“This season though, Edu has made it clear, he expects the club to move to the next level because all the pieces are in place.”
I have not read the Edu interview but from the above excerpt, it’s safe to assume the next level is
-CL football (via league pos or Europa) I’ll take league pos coz we can finish 8th again and still win Europa.
-More goals in the EPL
-Better defensive/offensive performances
I need to see this saliba contract
Pierre The league in 2015/16 was weak, we finished 2nd on 71 points, scoring just 65 goals. To give that some context, Emery finished 5th, with 70 points, scoring 73 goals, in 2018/19 You consider one a success, but the other abject failure, Emery additionally took us to a Europa final with largely an ageing squad, at the end of a cycle. Arteta secured 5th last season with 69 points, scoring 61 goals, that points tally is only marginally short of Wenger in 2015/16, which secured him second. Had Wenger not sat on his hands and actually strengthened the squad… Read more »
Rich “Our squad has been an unbalanced mess of insignificant quality, and that’s just taken us time to fix, if you sack the manager? But the manager isn’t the problem? Then all you’ve done is play an expensive game of musical chairs, and the fundamental problems still remain.” Spot on. Been saying this endlessly but it falls on deaf ears. I hate this naive bollocks that you rinse and recycle managers. It’s a very lazy way to argue, which is why it’s driven so hard by the media. Let’s point the finger at someone and then make him responsible for… Read more »
Bobn16 the club’s major weakness over the years since peak Wenger is tolerance of failure and the pursuit of mediocrity. Not making top 4 was a failure of resources ( no Jan buys/loans ) and nerve. Dressing it up as ‘not being a goal’ is dishonest. I’m relatively happy with the transfers given our second level status but is it enough to disturb the top clubs ? I very much doubt it. Pedro’s boast that we are planning to win the Prem in 2 years is ludicrous.
The Bard BobN16 is right. You are far too binary. How do you know this player we ‘should have bought’ according to you, in January was available and would have given us more points? You are making an assumption. Might have done a Lukaku. Perhaps he got injured? Perhaps we achieved less points with this player, whoever he was. We have more information available to claim that losing Partey for 12 games was why we lost 4th place. Again it’s an assumption but it has a pretty conclusive basis. He missed 12 games. One third of the season. Our points… Read more »
The Bard If we can clear the deck? And secure another 3 top players before Sept 1st? Then I’d fully expect us to pull away from the chasing pack between 6th + 3rd, and get on the shoulders of the top 2 teams, creating a gap between 3rd + 4th. Our first 11 can now give anyone a game, we just need a bit more quality in depth + specificity, in order to push those fine margins over the line, and ensure consistency in our style of play. If we ended up with something like this: Ramsdale, Turner, Hein Tomiyasu,… Read more »
https://arseblog.com/2022/07/edus-and-donts/
Lovely positive read from arseblog today
Feel good factor is well and truly back, unless you’re Tom
We’re certainly not light years away now, and when you consider there would only be 6 players north of 25 in that squad, that would be hugely encouraging over the next 3-4 seasons. Rich I have a feeling we may surprise a few this year and be a lot closer than many expect. I’d expect us t give a good battle for second this season, I feel that optimistic after seeing Jesus and Eddie looking so incredibly sharp but the performance against Chelsea was something I’ve not seen to that level in a long time. Yes it was only a… Read more »
AFC – excellent.The Bedwetters will always be screamers & doomers.It’s part of their DNA ..Being miserable ,pessimistic & negative is what they thrive on.Seriously can’t understand how they get any joy out of Arsenal at all.Always looking for the slightest angle to have a pop at Arteta/ Edu.I mean why? Surely it stands to reason if they( Edu/tets) are a success Arsenal are.
Benkind
Same here
Minimum expectation for the season: top 4 in the league.
No ifs and buts.
Some horrible comments here. Emery failed utterly at PSG? In the past 10 years, list the PSG managers that were better than Emery. Based on points per game, goals scored, and trophies won. Emery’s ball was atrocious at Arsenal? So atrocious that Arsenal fans were singing ‘We got our Arsenal back’. How do you compare two managers that managed the same club? Their records in the club and Head-to-head. Emery’s record at Arsenal Arteta is still yet to reach 70 points in the league. Arteta is still yet to get better than 5th. Arteta is yet to get to the… Read more »
Olumide
The only fans who sang that were arse holes who didn’t realise how lucky we were to have Arsene Wenger as our manager.
To go from him to emery is like dating Adriana Lima and then getting rid of her for Waynetta Slob
Un
I guess a lot of Arsenal away fans are arseholes then, according to you.
Bard
You think the club are pursuing mediocrity?
We’ve won more under Arteta than spurs have in 3 decades 😂
Olumide
Yeah. There are more than a few who I’d term under that bracket
Well, at least they’re not bleeding arseholes…
Fookin ‘Ell boys.
Calm down a bit.
All you are doing is setting us up for a fall.
Whatever happened to being quietly confident.
As said before we are having victory parades before actual victory.
The proper season isn’t too long away now.
Then we go apeshit.
Freddie LjungbergJuly 26, 2022 13:38:54
Well, at least they’re not bleeding arseholes
I couldn’t disagree personally
“I couldn’t disagree personally”
I bow to your superior knowledge on the subject matter in hand…
What’s slightly grating in all this is if the worst comes to the worst and Arteta finishes 5th or 6th he will not be held to account in relation to all the big grandiose talk that goes on now pre-season, All that talk will be forgotten about. If he was held accountable for not matching up to these big expectations this coming season then you could understand and reason with the big talk. But he won’t be sacked for coming in 5th or 6th. It’s good isn’t to talk the talk but face no consequences for not matching up to… Read more »
Un I’m not worried about our first team, there’ll get plenty of results when fresh, my worry is continuity in our style of play, because the way in which we defend, is imperative to the way we attack. Not just the athletic + technical profile of our defenders, but the technical security of our forwards, in order to sustain attacks, and keep us up the pitch. There’s still a few weak links in our squad, and when every point is vital, and wins + losses against the teams around us, cost more than 3 points, that will likely bite us… Read more »
I’m actually delighted Edu has come out and publicly thrown down the gauntlet for the coming season and what’s expected so that there’s no longer this vague set of goals set for Arteta. It’s top 4 and seemingly challenging for a trophy or bust. Consistent positive football should be expected too. Finally some expectations set on him.
Kinda makes Mikel ‘s recent comments on the top 4 now being a top 8 now a bit strange… maybe they’re not both on the same wavelength
We still on about Wenger huh? Jaysus has he still not gotten a managerial job since getting the boot at Arsenal? I wonder fucking why
Marko
He won’t be sacked for not finishing top four and plenty including myself will give him the benefit of the doubt if he finishes a close fourth again. That’s not sackable finishing close to fourth on points.
If he finishes quite a way off fourth he still will not be sacked unless he tanks below 6th place or so.
It’s not strange that he said the top eight in the EPL is so competitive.
He is giving himself a safety net.
If he finishes quite a way off fourth he still will not be sacked unless he tanks below 6th place or so.
So he’s a protective species then. Top 4 top 6 top 8 why even talk about any expectations cause he’s never going to be considered for the sack is that it? Kinda begs the question then how much money are the kroenke willing to piss away before they expect a return
Marko
“So he’s a protective species then.”
It’s quite clever what Kroenke has done.
If Arteta and the team really succeeds then we get all the plaudits. Young manager, youngish team and we are well on course and things are looking great.
But if expectations fall somewhat beneath then the same line will be put out that we have a young manager and youngish team and we will need a bit more time to see things really come to fruition.
It’s a win win situation unless Arteta obviously really tanks on expectations.
Anybody seen what stadium updates we have yet?
New screens etc…
Define really tanks though? Poor football despite all the money spent? Failing top 4 from a winning position? He’s already done that. How about if he does it again I suppose
I love The Arsenal Opinion Podcast, but please drop the AOP. My slight dyslexia keeps showing AOP and you’re anything but that!
OAP
There should be no ifs and buts with regard to top 4. Nearly half a billion dollar spent should result in at least qualifying for CL.
For me City are the favorites again to win the league. Liverpool, Spurs and Arsenal should finish top 4 although not necessarily in that order.
Un if Spurs are your benchmark it’s a low bar mate.
Crimson
I was thinking the same.
They were also putting a new wrap around the stadium and refurbishing the roof as well as the bigger screens.If someone is local, I’m over an hour and a half away in Essex, be great to have an update.
Marko “Poor football despite all the money spent? ” Yes obviously not top football played and missing out on top four by a significant points margin which would signify itself by finishing 6th or below. Along those lines I would have thought. I can even see a scenario where fans will still go along with it even if there is a seen a more adventurous attacking type of football played but still being significant points away from top four. But of course these green shots and feel good factor could see Arteta meet these higher expectations and he gets top… Read more »
Along those lines I would have thought.
So not what Edu and Pedro are saying.