Arsenal

[Steve007]

Chelsea's sole purpose is to win trophies.  If you don't win things or don't look like you are going to win things then you get sacked.  I'd fucking love Arsenal to be run like that.  I want to win!  I don't want to stumble into 3rd/4th, not to beat Leicester and watch players doing a lap of honour taking selfies which was fucking embarrassing, not to choke whenever we have a big game.  Do you see?

 

Wenger is past it and Mourinho called him out.  Mourinho always had the edge over Wenger as results prove.  I'd be over the moon if he was appointed Arsenal manager at the end of the season although I realise he's almost certainly going elsewhere. 

[Steve007]

6 minutes ago, Commander Jameson said:

 

Didn't Wenger actually win something in that season and Mourinho win nothing?

 

FA Cup, which glossed over the cracks.  Don't think Wenger is some sort of genius because we won back-to-back FA Cups.  He should be judged on the league & Europe.  FA Cup was just a nice thing to have as it's ensured our season ended on a high after an an otherwise piss-poor league campaign. 

[Rev]

9 hours ago, The Fox said:

Honestly can't believe any Arsenal fan would want that prick at the club. I just find that completely barmy.

 

If you want us to play like snide bastards with godawful football that gets results, hire Simeone. At least he hasn't spent a decade making personal attacks on our current manager.

 

I find it very hard to give a toss that he's been a twat to Wenger in the past, he did it because it worked. Every time. If he'd said something and Arsenal put four past him as a response, he would have shut up.

 

That said, it feels a bit like replacing someone who hasn't moved with the times with someone who isn't likely to move with the times. His stunts at Chelsea weren't just embarrassing, they were old fashioned. 

[Yobo Ahoy]

16 hours ago, The Fox said:

 

Oh yeah I can really see Levy entertaining that one...

 

It's true though. I mean on an individual level how many Spurs players get into the Arsenal team? Arguably just Alderweireld and Kane. But look how much better they function as a unit.

 

I'm not sure that's even true anymore. Dier is better than any Arsenal DMs, and Alli has been more consistent than the likes of Ramsey and Cazorla. Even Rose has come on leaps and bounds this season.

 

I'd argue you only really have Sanchez and Ozil who are head and shoulders above, and the former hasn't been at his best for a while. 

 

[The Fox]

Dier looks good within the system. I still think he's a pretty limited footballer, like Coquelin. Take your pick from those two really, they're fairly similar.

 

Rose has had a very good season but there's no way he's better than Monreal. Ditto Alli in Özil's position.

[suzzopher]

I am firmly in the Wenger out camp now, it's just the same old shit again this season, the league was there to be won and if Arsenal had played to the ability the squad clearly has they should be leading now and with some room to spare, but no again it's stumble after stumble. There is no leader on the pitch either, nobody can grab the game and drive the team forward. 

 

Looking at who could replace him though is the toughest question. De Boer? Koemon? They are the only ones who could be obtainable and offer something different to Wenger. 

[Rev]

5 minutes ago, Yobo Ahoy said:

 

I'm not sure that's even true anymore. Dier is better than any Arsenal DMs, and Alli has been more consistent than the likes of Ramsey and Cazorla. Even Rose has come on leaps and bounds this season.

 

I'd argue you only really have Sanchez and Ozil who are head and shoulders above, and the former hasn't been at his best for a while. 

 

 

Ramsey has been pretty thoroughly shat upon this season. His instructions have basically been:

 

"Hey, Aaron! You're willing to run around a lot can't you? That's good, because we basically want you to be doing what you did when you scored all those goals. Oh, but at the same time you're going to have to be the deepest midfielder most of the time, to make up for the fact Flamini got booked about 3 minutes into the game. By the way, when you end up doing neither properly, everyone will blame you. Soz! See you at half time!"

[Pavey]

3 minutes ago, suzzopher said:

I am firmly in the Wenger out camp now, it's just the same old shit again this season, the league was there to be won and if Arsenal had played to the ability the squad clearly has they should be leading now and with some room to spare, but no again it's stumble after stumble. There is no leader on the pitch either, nobody can grab the game and drive the team forward. 

 

Looking at who could replace him though is the toughest question. De Boer? Koemon? They are the only ones who could be obtainable and offer something different to Wenger. 

 

 

I am. Even if we replaced with someone who turned out to be bad would be more exciting than this 'almost there' atmosphere that has been lingering/teasing us for god knows how long.

 

I think Wenger's biggest recent mistake was not splashing the cash in January, when we could of improved a squad with real potential to do something.

[The Fox]

Ramsey's workload in this system is enormous and thankless, but there's no getting away from the fact he was very poor yesterday. What he's doing for their third goal I have no idea.

[Pavey]

That sounds bollocks actually reading it back, but shows how ridiculous the situation has become.

[hercules]

Ramsey is not suited to play in a deep midfield two with coquelin. I'm sick of seeing it. He is not that disciplined and he doesn't retain the ball like cazorla does. He pretty much has to play on the right, considering how awful Walcott is and how badly he plays centrally. Who we put in the centre I don't know, we have no control with him in there.

[Rev]

16 minutes ago, The Fox said:

Ramsey's workload in this system is enormous and thankless, but there's no getting away from the fact he was very poor yesterday. What he's doing for their third goal I have no idea.

 

He's been poor semi-regularly, but there's no way he is a worse player now than he was a couple of years ago. He's just not meant to be played back there, his only defensive ability is that he can get back every time it's needed. If he's not considered good enough to be played (essentially) behind the striker and be responsible for making and scoring goals he should be sold and replaced with someone who is.

 

It's exactly the same as the Bendtner on the right wing times. He is still one of the best players I've seen for being stood in the right spot to score a goal, even if he generally fluffed it when the ball appeared nearby. He offered literally nothing else...So we play him as a winger.

 

It's the cumulative effect of those failed experiments that has left us with a weird squad and we're going to lose the title to two teams with worse players but who get played in the right places.

[The Fox]

He's playing in nominally the same position as he was in the purple patch of 2013/14 though. The only difference is his midfield partner's traits.

 

That 2013/14 side (Szczesny; Sagna, Per, Kos, Gibbs; Arteta, Ramsey; Wilshere/Theo, Özil, Cazorla; Giroud) worked brilliantly when all the cogs were in place, but Wenger seemed to recognise that it was too reliant on individuals, given how badly it went to shit (6-3, 5-1, 6-0) when the midfield pairing got disrupted through injury.

 

It looked like he was trying to remedy this with the 4-1-4-1 formation in 2014/15, but that didn't really work out and he binned it, eventually stumbling on the side of Ospina; Bellerin, Per, Kos, Monreal; Coquelin, Cazorla; Ramsey, Özil, Alexis; Giroud/Theo. That band aid worked pretty well for the most part, but it was no less reliant on those individual cogs than the 2013/14 team, so I find it baffling that nothing was done in the summer to balance the midfield out. An injury to Ramsey killed our play and our challenge in 2013/14, and now the same thing has happened two years on with an injury to Cazorla. Coquelin clearly isn't 100% physically but the fact is he looks like a fish out of water without Santi alongside him. Ramsey is trying hard but his effectiveness in the middle is nowhere near what is was when he had Arteta there. How can you have a midfield so reliant on the fitness of one guy? What exactly is the plan here? How do we want to play? Coquelin-Cazorla had clear limitations and should never have been anything more than a band aid solution, but two transfer windows on it still looks like our best option. That is just complete madness and I have no idea what Wenger is thinking. It just seems like he's making it up as he goes along really.

[suzzopher]

Against Swansea I'd like to see the team like this:

 

                            Cech

Bellerin   Chambers Koscielny  Monreal

 

                Elneny Coquelin

 

Ramsey          Ozil               Sanchez

 

                     Welbeck

[Rev]

14 minutes ago, The Fox said:

He's playing in nominally the same position as he was in the purple patch of 2013/14 though. The only difference is his midfield partner's traits.

 

That 2013/14 side (Szczesny; Sagna, Per, Kos, Gibbs; Arteta, Ramsey; Wilshere/Theo, Özil, Cazorla; Giroud) worked brilliantly when all the cogs were in place, but Wenger seemed to recognise that it was too reliant on individuals, given how badly it went to shit (6-3, 5-1, 6-0) when the midfield pairing got disrupted through injury.

 

It looked like he was trying to remedy this with the 4-1-4-1 formation in 2014/15, but that didn't really work out and he binned it, eventually stumbling on the side of Ospina; Bellerin, Per, Kos, Monreal; Coquelin, Cazorla; Ramsey, Özil, Alexis; Giroud/Theo. That band aid worked pretty well for the most part, but it was no less reliant on those individual cogs than the 2013/14 team, so I find it baffling that nothing was done in the summer to balance the midfield out. An injury to Ramsey killed our play and our challenge in 2013/14, and now the same thing has happened two years on with an injury to Cazorla. Coquelin clearly isn't 100% physically but the fact is he looks like a fish out of water without Santi alongside him. Ramsey is trying hard but his effectiveness in the middle is nowhere near what is was when he had Arteta there. How can you have a midfield so reliant on the fitness of one guy? What exactly is the plan here? How do we want to play? Coquelin-Cazorla had clear limitations and should never have been anything more than a band aid solution, but two transfer windows on it still looks like our best option. That is just complete madness and I have no idea what Wenger is thinking. It just seems like he's making it up as he goes along really.

 

He's in the same position, but that was only due to the fact he was willing to cover the ground to get to the edge of their area. If he was lazier, he'd have been starting much closer to the front. But even starting deep, he only had to move forwards at the right time and if he didn't come back it wasn't that much of a problem. Now he has to move forwards at the right time and then cover the counter-attack the opposition create against the attack he was just trying to finish.

 

It all comes down to the weird/admirable amount of loyalty Wenger has, for me. I have to believe he's perfectly aware of the problems and the potential problems, he just thinks that players are good enough to adapt to positions they've never played in (which has only really worked perfectly with Henry, who is a bit of an exception) and good enough to return from injury at a moment's notice. Ozil is a great example of the latter from Wenger's perspective, his injury literally made him a better premier league player because it allowed him to work out even if he couldn't play. And we've essentially got enough cover but the trouble is we're including Wilshere, Rosicky and Arteta as players who can take the strain off Cazorla. Which is loyal and lovely, but it's also unbelievably stupid.

 

To create a squad that simultaneously has too few players and yet so many that could be cleared out without being missed is incredible.

[Steve007]

53 minutes ago, The Fox said:

Ramsey's workload in this system is enormous and thankless, but there's no getting away from the fact he was very poor yesterday. What he's doing for their third goal I have no idea.

 

And why is that?  It's because Wenger is not playing him to his strengths as he's in a more withdrawn defensive role.

 

Ramsey is at his best when he plays central & attacking.  He's pretty much a nuisance when he plays anywhere else. 

[Rev]

27 minutes ago, suzzopher said:

Against Swansea I'd like to see the team like this:

 

                            Cech

Bellerin   Chambers Koscielny  Monreal

 

                Elneny Coquelin

 

Ramsey          Ozil               Sanchez

 

                     Welbeck

 

Personally I'd put it as:

 

Sanchez----Ramsey----Ozil

 

We've been obsessed with the left side of the pitch of late and I think whilst Sanchez drifts inside, Ramsey in the middle would tend to drift more towards the right than the left and he'd take the opposition with him. That should give Ozil more space to be Ozil, which means goals.

[The Fox]

8 minutes ago, Steve007 said:

 

And why is that?  It's because Wenger is not playing him to his strengths as he's in a more withdrawn defensive role.

 

Ramsey is at his best when he plays central & attacking.  He's pretty much a nuisance when he plays anywhere else. 

 

I'm not disagreeing that Wenger has made a mess of the midfield, but you can't blame the manager for Ramsey and Coquelin's play on that Herrera goal. Coquelin drops back far too deep and Ramsey is wandering around in no-man's land. Neither of them checks for a United runner when the ball breaks. It's very basic stuff.

[Rev]

I suspect Coquelin wouldn't have been so deep if he was fully fit.

 

As much as they both should know better, I think it's perfectly reasonable to blame Wenger for it.

[The Fox]

That makes no sense. He's not in control of split second player decisions like that. That's like blaming him for the first goal we conceded against Barcelona.

 

Obviously he takes a big share of the responsibility for the way we played overall, and his two big selection choices (Walcott and Gabriel) were disastrous, but blaming him for stuff like that is some serious reaching.

[Rev]

If we'd signed a defensive midfielder, at least one of those two wouldn't have been responsible for preventing that goal. Either Coquelin would have been rested and it would have been someone else meant to be closer, or Ramsey would have been stood in exactly the right place with the other midfielder closer to the action and Coquelin where he was.

 

The split second might not be solely his fault, but it's very much a symptom of his bad decisions.

[Baring]

Cheer up guys, you aren't in a bad position in the league with 11 games to go. Even if Man City win their game in hand you're still ahead. 

 

It's only 5 points! Have faith. 

[Rev]

Mathematically I agree with you, but the entire squad is out of form except Welbeck and none of them look likely to find it again soon. They went on the pitch yesterday expecting to lose.

[Space Renegade Ulala]

1 minute ago, Baring said:

Cheer up guys, you aren't in a bad position in the league with 11 games to go. Even if Man City win their game in hand you're still ahead. 

 

It's only 5 points! Have faith. 

 

I get what you're saying but it's more the principle of it all though - this season both Man Utd and Chelsea have been, I think it's fair to say, fucking awful. Plenty of teams have beaten them like they were punching bags. Meanwhile, we turn up and gift them points for the umpteenth time because our team is a load of spineless, gutless chumps with an inferiority complex the size of Jupiter. They don't believe they can beat certain teams so they go out there and roll over like worthless dogs. Yet again, Arsenal have failed to beat them. Yet again Arsenal have failed to take the CL games seriously so they can avoid getting paired up with some megabastard super team in the first knockout stage. Yet again Arsenal have a shocking injury list to a point where you have to wonder how any of the physio and training staff still have a job. Yet again, there's barely any action in the transfer window despite there being numerous weaknesses that need shoring up. Yet again, the season reaches the end of February and collapses into a big heap of nothing.

 

I do understand that there are plenty of clubs who would love to be in the top 3, in with a good shout of winning their third FA Cup on the trot, having been in the Champions' League every year for over a decade, instead of worrying about yo-yoing between divisions or just making up the numbers but quite honestly, we've had over a dozen years of this shit. In that time scale, a club that consistent should have progressed to the next level. Instead, it's just stagnated and become a complacent load of bullshit and excuses. And it's fair to say that this year, when others have faltered, when there's been no better chance there for the taking, they've just failed. Again.

 

* They won't though, they'll meet Chelsea at some point and cave like the pathetic losers they are. Yet again.

[Rev]

This season has been even more of a demonstration. Everyone else has met Leicester and got confused and lost, Arsenal wander over and go "decent team, but we should be able to beat them" and then done so. It's if a team is famous for being good (Man Utd, Chelsea, Barcelona) or from a lower tier (Sheffield Wednesday, Champion's League) we can't win. Everything else we get enough points from to win the league.

 

If there were only 8 teams in the Premier League, we'd get relegated.

[The Fox]

1 hour ago, Baring said:

Cheer up guys, you aren't in a bad position in the league with 11 games to go. Even if Man City win their game in hand you're still ahead. 

 

It's only 5 points! Have faith. 

 

That's true, and I think Leicester and Tottenham will both drop points, but it's really very hard to see us winning the next two games given the form we're in.

[Dude Ranch]

Was thinking earlier. A bit of sick came up, actually. I was thinking if it would be for the best if Spurs won it. I mean, what do we need to finally make us sit up and smell the coffee?

 

Good Lord. What have I become?

[Rev]

Steve.

 

EDIT:Why do new pages always come at the wrong time?

[Shimmyhill]

3 hours ago, Rev said:

This season has been even more of a demonstration. Everyone else has met Leicester and got confused and lost, Arsenal wander over and go "decent team, but we should be able to beat them" and then done so. It's if a team is famous for being good (Man Utd, Chelsea, Barcelona) or from a lower tier (Sheffield Wednesday, Champion's League) we can't win. Everything else we get enough points from to win the league.

 

If there were only 8 teams in the Premier League, we'd get relegated.

 

You beat Leicester due to a sending off, it was going to be another loss before that...

 

Anyhoo, while its amusing to see the usual yo-yo of Wenger out/in/out/greatest of all time I do think that if Arsenal don't win the league this year he just has to quit as even with the mediocre team (by championship winning measures) Arsenal currently have they should be winning it with Man City essentially not bothering and Chelsea having a torrid season thats almost beyond explanation.

 

 

[The Fox]

25 minutes ago, Shimmyhill said:

 

You beat Leicester due to a sending off, it was going to be another loss before that...

 

 

 

We also put five past them at their place.