Arsenal

[The Fox]

I like Dixon. Keown I think talks a fair bit of shite if I'm honest, but at least he's bright enough. He's better than a lot of them.

Owen is by far the worst. Just consistently terrible football opinions from a guy who clearly isn't that interested and just enjoys the pay day. His knowledge is really poor even by pundit standards, but because he's a famous ex-pro he's often delivering these comically shit opinions dripping in arrogance. And to cap it off his voice makes Phil Neville sound like Barry Davies. Whoever thought he'd be a good addition to BT Sport should have their bollocks smashed between two bricks frankly.

And yet, undeterred from 2013's debacle, he's just predicted Arsenal will finish 5th again, because we don't have any "Standout players". Yes Michael you utter fucktard, obviously that's what success is all about. That must be why Atletico did so badly in La Liga, Germany flopped in the World Cup, and Portugal were brilliant.

[Steve007]

I've seen a couple of home shirts, but I do quite want to see the 3rd one "in real life". I suspect I never will.

I got the home shirt a few days ago, £45 from sports direct.

If feels ok when I am wearing it but it does feel very cheap. At least the replicas are 'regular' fit and not those stupid skin tight shirts the players wear!

[The Fox]

Cavani will look boss in the skin tight shirt though.

[Scruff]

Will it go up over his cheekbones then?

[Rev]

I know you're joking about Cavani, but with this weird new Arsenal that buy the best players in the world I get scared and confused that it might be a truth.

[The Fox]

PSG will have to sell him if they buy Di Maria. FFP won't allow the move otherwise. I also think he'll be open to moving.

That said, while I like him a lot, I'm not convinced he's worth what PSG paid, and he's probably on huge wages. Could see him maybe moving late on in the window, and while Wenger did allegedly offer £40m when he was at Napoli, I can't see him coming to Arsenal.

[carlito]

Owen is incredibly annoying. Liverpool, of course, being the home of the "standout player" in the last few years as they made that 8th place their own.

Gosh I hope they crash and burn this season.

[The Fox]

It's completely nonsensical to suggest Liverpool will finish above Arsenal when you're using "standout players" as the criteria. Presumably he means "spectacular players who can win games almost on their own". Alexis and certainly Özil don't fit that description, but who does for Liverpool now Suarez has gone? It's stupid. They did well last season through a cohesive team structure with one of these "standout players", but what did they win? What did Argentina win? Portugal? Sweden? Brazil?

Germany absolutely do not have any of these players, but they had the best team unit and as a result won the World Cup. Ditto Spain previously. It's not just Owen who thinks that way though; there's a long-standing and damaging English obsession with big name players, which is why you end up with crap like Stevie and Lamps in the middle being terrible for literally years.

[Rev]

You've got to remember when Owen says "players" he means "strikers" and by "strikers" he means "pacey young ones" by which he means "remember that goal I scored against Argentina?" so it's a fairly unique set of criteria.

[The Fox]

Some stats shit on Khedira: http://www.statsbomb.com/2014/07/is-sami-khedira-arsenals-answer-at-defensive-mid/

Obviously not telling the full story, simply because he's not been asked to play that role before so naturally his graph won't look right. Arteta's graph would also have looked similarly un-DM-ish when he was at Everton. That said, I'd argue Arteta always looked like he had the tools for the role even at Everton, whereas I'm not sure Khedira does.

Arteta vs Schneiderlin is more interesting for me. Arteta seems slightly better on the ball, getting dispossessed less often, but as you'd expect from someone with his lack of mobility, he gets dribbled past more frequently than Schneiderlin.

Obviously these graphs don't present any definitive answers because of all the external variables involved, but they're still quite useful.

[carlito]

Stats are wank at explaining football.

[Rev]

It depends on the stats.

It seems Khedira is more likely to move now they've bought Kroos, so we'll see I guess.

[The Fox]

Stats are wank at explaining football.

That's rather reductive. I don't think clubs pour shitloads of money into statistical scouting models if they are "wank". They're just a tool to give indicators about something, and are more useful for analysing certain factors than others (certainly they're more useful for attackers than defenders).

The only thing wank is when people act as if stats always tell the full story. I don't think professional coaches make that mistake, though.

[g wings]

I don't think professional coaches make that mistake, though.

12.74% of them do apparently

[SeanR]

WISE FWOM YOUR GWAVE!!!

[Rev]

This is probably me being racist, but:

[toythatkills]

I'm quite tempted to go to the Boreham Wood game, just so I can watch Diaby's only appearance of the season.

[Rocafella]

Debuchy confirmed now on arsenal.com

[toythatkills]

Unexpected!

[Dude Ranch]

WISE FWOM YOUR GWAVE!!!

Groin strain, right there. 6-8 weeks.

Seriously, I'd love to see him come good.

[carlito]

Regarding stats I think they are a very American thing and are far more applicable, in the most part, to the less flowing, structured nature of the popular US sports. Its part of the draft/combine cattle market mentality.

A yard run is a yard run but the difference between one chance in the box and the next chance in the box can be vast and they are just far too infrequent for the variation to "settle" statistically.

I see article after article based on Whoscored.com stats and yet anything extrapolated from those stats tells me less that one person who knows the player saying "he's got a heavy touch" or "he plays the hollywood ball over the simple pass".

Sure they are a tool that can be used alongside training and scouting to try and facilitate even more comprehensive analysis but in abstraction they are pretty much bunk.

[SaintM]

Everytime anyone dares to suggest Ozil looks lazy and disinterested, stats are rolled out about how much he runs etc to 'prove' he does great work and people are just blind to his quality. Can't have it both ways!

[The Fox]

I think that just proves you can't always get the full story from casually eyeballing a player, just as you can't get it solely from viewing stats. One can be used to complement or debunk certain impressions suggested by the other.

Özil has a very languid style and is a totally selfless, unspectacular player. People compare him to Fabregas as they play in the same position, but they're very different. Cesc would always capture the eye more because he's a gung ho, all action attacking midfielder who enjoyed a free role in his best years with us. Just as Özil will never match his goal tallies or general chest thumping spectacle, Cesc doesn't have a tenth of Mesut's positional intelligence and subtle movement. Obviously though those attributes are less easily appreciated and, at the risk of sounding like a massive snob, they're at odds with the typical English image of a 'star player'.

[JDubYes]

How far someone's running seem like one of the more reliable stats too, no? Can't really artificially inflate that one.

I do understand people saying Ozil looks disinterested though. His body language is notorious for being awful, and he's not the most defensively-minded, but he's still given far too much of a hard time. Hoping for great things from his this year, especially with a bit more pace (re)injected into the team, The more people there are making runs beyond him the more chances he'll have to show off his often amazing vision and passing.

In other non-news, I've had my customary read of the gossip this morning, and it's all vaguely amusing as always. Several are reporting that the Khedira deal is "off", which is entertaining backtracking and face-saving, considering the quotes from his agent have all suggested it was never on. The other "big one" of the morning is down to there being a picture of Mario Balotelli, taken by (and featuring his significant other), posing in front of the Arsenal badge on some of the promo stuff for the new kit. This, of course, despite probably meaning nothing has been leapt on the manner you'd assume...

Still using it as an excuse though; we get linked with him about twice a year, and to be honest, despite his history, I quite like the idea. I have this naive idea that he'll have grown up a little bit now, and that working for Wenger (less of a disciplinarian than the coaches he's clashed with in the past), and with the team spirit and camaraderie we tend to see, would actually quite suit him. Also; he's very good at football, and it'd be nice to have someone with Bendtner's confidence and at least most of the talent to back it up.

Still, am I mental?

[Rev]

It's clearly a risk, but I'd take Balotelli where I wouldn't have taken Suarez. He's never done anything that wrong really, just a big build-up of sillinesses.

[The Fox]

Balotelli is sponsored by Puma. He probably just did it for a laugh to be honest as he knew there'd be ensuing drama.

I think it's easy to see why Özil has been getting such pelters. A lot of journalists absolutely don't like Arsenal. That's not conspiratorial nonsense, it's just abundantly clear. I'm aware some of it is essentially trolling though and not necessarily anything personal. We have a huge online fan base and are easy clickbait. Then add in some potential residual bitterness from World Cup 2010. And of course for £42m you expect spectacle and dazzling goals and assists, but like a lot of this crop of German players, he's never been spectacular. I think journos and casual observers can't get their head around it. They see him gliding around looking miserable and think "What's he doing?". But then he somehow ends up being an integral component of La Liga/FA Cup/World Cup winning sides. That's no coincidence.

Basically he's just the ultimate team player, and everything he does is for the benefit of the collective. Every performance is the complete opposite of, say, Gerrard vs Chelsea, Beckham vs Greece, or David Luiz vs Germany. He can do better of course, he's not been at his best. But I think we'll see a higher standard from him next season, especially if we let him rest more often.

[Rev]

Sanchez should be a massive help to Ozil. When they're on the pitch together he's a great player to aim for, him coming in the squad frees Cazorla from covering wings to be able to cover for Ozil more so he'll get more of a rest and he'll also take a bit of the spotlight off Ozil too. Win/win/win.

[suzzopher]

Wilshire won't get in the side much this season will he? I mean with Ozil, Sanchez, Cazorla and Ramsey likely to start with Arteta or Flamini there is just no place for him in that midfield unless there are injuries.

[The Fox]

He'll get games - Flamini and Kallstrom both played last season and he's above them in the pecking order. Whether he'll get enough game time to kick on though it's hard to say. He's young, I still think he can come good, but he really needs to start applying himself to rectifying the flaws in his game in the way Ramsey has. Wilshere is still making the same mistakes that he's been making for years (taking up poor positions off the ball, not knowing when to release after a dribble, staying down too long after being tackled) .

At the moment I dunno if I'd put much money on him signing another contract with us to be honest, but I hope he dispels that doubt because he's proper Arsenal and has bags of talent. It's easy to forget how young he is because he's been around for ages, but plenty of top class midfielders were doing absolutely fuck all at 22 years old. Xavi had 3 international caps, Scholes had 0, Pirlo was out on loan etc.

[Rev]

Wilshire won't get in the side much this season will he? I mean with Ozil, Sanchez, Cazorla and Ramsey likely to start with Arteta or Flamini there is just no place for him in that midfield unless there are injuries.

It probably depends on cup-runs a fair bit, but I think that Wenger likes him so he'll get as much chance as he can. Depends on his fitness as much as anyone else's though.