The Supporting Starts Here
Aug 16th, 2013 by 'holic
The taxi to the station, the train journey through the Thames Valley, the delights of the Hammersmith and City followed by the Picadilly Line. Stepping out on to the Holloway Road for a lungful of home and a sight of sky. The stroll to the hostelry of choice to enjoy the company of faces both familiar and, doubtless, new too. Football, I have missed you.
For today I would like to concentrate on who we do have, rather than who we don’t, as we prepare to welcome Aston Villa for yet another adventure into the unknown, and yes, at this stage it is the unknown.
Wojciech Szczesny is likely to start between the posts, but ahead of him the options are limited by the confirmed absence of Thomas Vermaelen and Nacho Monreal. There are also rumblings about Bacary Sagna despite the fact that he did train today, but a starting quartet of Carl Jenkinson, Per Mertesacker, Laurent Koscielny and Kieran Gibbs looks pretty good to me.
The midfield options are similarly restricted by a fresh injury for Mikel Arteta and the long term absence of Abou Diaby. There is a suggestion that Santi Cazorla is not up to speed for a full ninety minutes so he may start on the bench. Assuming Tomas Rosicky is fit I would personally start with him in the hole ahead of Jack Wilshere and Aaron Ramsey. I can understand any call for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain to get the nod instead.
The front three pretty much picks itself. Theo Walcott, Olivier Giroud, and Lukas Podolski have got goals in them, and frankly will have to carry us through the early fixtures assuming we are not close to adding real quality to the striking department. Yaya Sanogo should be fit to take his place on the bench and may get a Premiership debut if all is going to plan in the second-half.
Villa leaked goals for fun on their travels last season so Paul Lambert has added Jores Okore and Antonio Luna to his squad over the summer. Let’s hope they don’t prove to be an immediate success!
The ‘holic pound is swayed by the fact that we still have enough fit players to put in a performance against opponents on an upward curve but possibly not yet at the level they aspire to. Regulars will know I look for value most of the time, and I reckon there are goals in this game. I’m grabbing the 40/1 widely available for a 4-2 home win. It is just a pound, after all…
There are obviously wider issues at the moment which have been done to death online, in the press, on tv and radio. It is getting a little bit daft watching people who agree that we are not where we want to be going into the season falling out with each other nonetheless.
All we can do is get behind those who will be in red and white tomorrow because whatever may ail the club at the moment is not down to them. There was a feeling that the negativity around the Grove was having an effect in home games last season. The players don’t deserve that, and thankfully the away performances in front of a more appreciative support kept us in the picture as the season unfolded.
It is the way of the modern crowd to be quick to vent their displeasure in what they feel is the only avenue open to them. I would suggest, however, that everybody at the football club is well aware of where we currently fall short. The negativity probably harms the side we all undoubtedly have massive feelings for. We are all hurting to one degree or another. I’m of the opinion that I would sooner hear songs ridiculing our thrifty nature than a chorus of destructive jeering. Then again I accept that my age has eroded some of the rebel in me.
At this stage I have but one observation about the situation. Were I Stan Kroenke I would be knocking some senior heads together. I’m sure he would rather his executives were putting as much effort into supplementing a threadbare squad as they are sloping shoulders to deflect blame.
Congratulation Max
The two Young Guns enclosure tickets for the Villa game were won by Max Howick. Max and his mate will now join the thousand strong army of 12-16 year olds who will have tickets for just a tenner and should add to the atmosphere at the Clock End.
Have a great day Max, and have a good weekend, ‘holics.
455 Responses to “The Supporting Starts Here”
COYRRR’s!!!
Boom boom bang!
FFS well in H2H 🙂
Top stuff ‘H. Great call to arms.
2 predictions for you. Arsenal will win 4-0 tomorrow and I will get spectacularly banjaxed. Both sound good to me.
See you tomorrow.
Btw I’d start Ox in front of Rosicky. I’d also start Cazorla in front of Poldi if he’s fit.
Trophy?
Nice touch Holic, there is nothing we can do about our lack of activity in the market so get behind the red and white and cheer them on. I feel a 1-1. Benteke to score first and get the boo birds tuning up their tonsils. A late Kos goal to save the day and keep the rumblings a little less toxic.
Im still scarred all these years later after our marquee signing of the summer of 76 to see us lay an egg versus newly promoted Bristol City in a 1-0 reverse on opening day.
Hoping for better but will be a bundle of nerves as i have been for every game since Edward Heath was PM, why we put our selves through this is amazing.
Got to be quick off the mark at this level tabs, mate. 😉
Nice one ‘h.
Time tp put all or fears behind for a bit and indeed get behind what we have got. The lads that, lest we forget, had the best record in the final third of last season in the PL. Yes we all wanted reinforcements, but as you so rightly point out, failure on that front had nothing to do with the lads that will be doning the glorious red and white tomorrow afternoon.
After an afternoon of wheelin’ n’ dealin’ I’ve managed to procure the necessary channel to catch the game, so, bring it on…….
And Heh @video link in previous drinks. But really, who didn’t see that coming?
Excellent preview Holic.
I don’t see a high scoring match tomorrow. Back to the 2-1 prediction for the Arsenal for me.
If fit I would definitely start with Rosicky as he gives us extra urgency in midfield and Podolski up front. The German has to find that hammer again.
See you tomorrow with a Gorgeous George Memorial Brown Envelope.
Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Yes!
100% with you, ‘Holic, on getting behind the team on Saturday. The XI on the field will be the best we can field. They deserve our best support. For 90 minutes all the debate/argument/abuse about adding quality not quantity should be put aside in the cause of securing three points. Plus it is the first game of the season, at last. Chill and enjoy.
2-0, my monks reckon.
Sagna 50-50 apparently. I wouldn’t take the chance given the Fenerbahce game on Wednesday, especially as he is the emergency centre half. The Corporal is a more than decent deputy to be pressed into service on Saturday.
Records presence before jumping in the car to drive home to Oxon before reading the post. (Based in Cardiff this year).
COYG
Whats Tabs said. Hope you (and many others) have a great day out tomorrow ‘holic.
Great drink last blog Lars 🙂
And great post Holic, I’ve missed this kind of League Match Preview from you 😛
Currently having a Drink with Mates at Finsbury Park (slight prep for Tomorrow at the Tollie 😉 Very Nice Kopparberg Cider, Opening Time possibly… 8) ) along with a Spot of Bowling. Looking forward to the start of the new season!!! 😀
Tar Heel @5 – That Bristol City game was indeed a let down. Went to the Game as an 11 y/o fully expecting a Supermac hat-trick. He had promised us one after all! 🙂
H2H @6 – Too quick for ma mate that’s for sure 🙂
As for the wedding video, it was the miserable bride’s bloodied nose at the end that got me. Since posting it though I’ve been told it was one of these new fangled surreptitious adverts for Heineken. Certainly had me fooled, but then I’ve always been a gullible fucker. Maybe that’s why I still think we’ll make world class signings in what’s left of the window!
Well played Holic. Nice perspective.
‘H: You Ropey please, if still possible Sir.
Tabs: That video at 209 in previous bar had me rolling on the floor. That was needed with all the hysteria presently among the fans.
Very good preview of the official start of the season, Guv. Hopefully the Emirates crowd will get the memo and cheer our boys to victory if not for anything just so TaBS can get banjaxed.
Rest assured that I’ll be getting banjaxed win lose or draw Cent 😉
At TABS, after the dross of the previous 2 seasons and the relegation fights there was that great expectation that summer that we were on the up.Somewhat like we felt this year after the great run in and the promise of shiny new toys. Then the balloon popped.
Still hopeful that we can do something but it will be a slog. Keep the faith I suppose.
Aye just let it all unfold with fingers firmly crossed.
It seems like Zelalem will be fast tracked into the first team squad; at least until more reinforcements arrive. I don’t think it’s a bad idea, as he held his own during pre-season and looked very comfortable.
TaBS @16, great idea!
Falcao anyone?
Back on the market due to tax issues according to Marca.
at Bath
We will never pay his wages but it would be worth a punt
Oh yeah, I’m going for a 3-0 Home Win tomorrow, need that score to win a free Away Shirt heh heh 8)
While it is extremely disappointing that the season starts without any money being spent, from the squad that beat Man City, we have lost Arteta but gained Rosicky, Sanogo and Frimpong. They should be good enough to get a win tomorrow provided the crowd gets behind the team.
More blogs, 23 drinks already. Relentless.
tabs, I saw the video and let’s say I found it curious that someone was filming, it’s almost as if it were staged.
Baff, Treasure of the Sierra Madre, very good 😉
As for Falcao: bullshit story in Marca; transfer story involving Real Madrid. Nothing new, ignore wildly.
Cheers, ‘holic. Looking forward to tomorrow, the good old Eurostar journey and all!
It was staged Ollie . See @13. Advert for Heineken apparently.
It did make me laugh though.
Ollie, glad you enjoyed it. It’s my all time favourite.
“Signings??? We don’t need any stinkin’ signings!!!”
COYRs
Top post ‘holic — great to read an article with the calmness and measured tone that you invariably provide us!
Very excited and full of blind hope and a sense of misplaced invincibility as I am every year. We are The Arsenal for chrisake!
I’m in Greece at the moment and haven’t yet been able to locate a bar showing the game but have the trusty iPad to keep me and the boy fully engaged for a few hours… So please, if anyone can find a good stream, please share…
Goals, lots of them and a clean sheet — with our back five? No question.
Come on you REDS…………….
This blog really is a class act! While others whine and pontificate, this one gets me right back to where I should be… Supporting the team and willing em on to victory….
After which time I can get back to whining and pontificating…
Szcz
CJ Per Koz Gibbs
Jack Ramsbottom
Theo AOC Pod
Giroud
Oli hatrick in a 3-1 win…
How to be a football pundit;
Look what team has spent the most money(regardless of whether the club has a new manager) divided by the media love in of a recently returned arrogant coach (regardless of fact was forced out of previous job as coach of one of the teams in a 2 team league for fucking up and alienating everyone including Dorita la tea lady) and voila! There’s the 2 raves for the league…
Heineken eh? Coincidently my current brewery (although I have Amstel on tap).
Not sure how your supposed to get people to drink based on that, what’s the slogan going to be?
Drink our beer and fuck up a bride?
Does give a whole new meaning to the phrase – wedding crasher, though.
I don’t have a candygram for Mungo, but I do have a mail for Impec 😉
Oh, and shall I call you ‘Howard’ now rather than Dr Jones, baff? 😉
No just you stick to Dr Jones, young Ollie. 🙂
Oh.
Many Happy Returns Porco.
Oh yes, many happy ones maestro.
I’m raising a glass of Marstons Pedigree to you as I type.
Oops, wet keyboard 😉
Holic-you’ve lifted my spirits. Even with the chronic mismanagement of the squad (imagine our bench tomorrow) we must get behind the lads who do play and pray nobody gets injured. A good start is so important this season.
I would go with TR7 and the Ox tomorrow and leave Santi on the bench. I didn’t think Sanogo was fit but more power to him if he is. Gnabry may well get some game time tomorrow.
You raise a good point re Kroenke. It would be nice to believe he has some interest in the club
COYG!!!!
Thank god proper football is back.
We still have a great team.
COYG.
many happy returns, porco. I hope you get to celebrate wildly tomorrow evening for all the right reasons.
I’d like to see gnarby and young gedion on the bench, and get a quarter hour playing time at the end of an injury-free 2-0 victory.
Many happy returns Porco!
Happy Birthday Porcamberwell (or… I’m lost with people changing names).
You around tomorrow Scoops?
You Tollie bound tomorrow Porco?
If not, many happies when it happens.
Matt (2) @ 29 if you are in Athens or close to, the game will be shown at the Arsenal supporters club at Ambelokepi. If you are on one of the Islands you may be able to find it in a bar/coffee lounge on OTE.
Happy returns, Porco. Turning one under the new name?
Heh @NBN
Jack Ramsbottom, Norris? Does it involve Wellingtons, or Wolfie?
Greetings from eastern France. The temperature has been 33 degrees and it has been quite delightful. Unfortunately my beer fridge gave up the ghost but that was soon rectified I can tell you.
A great call to arms Holic. I can’t imagine a day when I still have air in my lungs that I don’t support The Arsenal. But I think it was H2H that said the squad was anorexic and sadly he is right. If people have not grasped that the way this window has been handled at least borders on the shambolic then I would respectfully suggest that there have been lots of heads in vast amounts of sand. I sincerely hope we get a decent result tomorrow to head to turkey with, but I won’t be counting too many poulets just yet. I must say that the condition we enter this season worries me greatly.
To all those going tomorrow I hope you have a fun packed day.
Onwards and upwards people. Onwards and upwards.
Hopes for tomorrow, 3 points, The Crowd fully behind the boys, and then come the final whistle a nice loud long chrous of Spend Some Fucking Money !!
Cannot believe the position we are in heading into a new season,then again after the last few this is almost zen like 🙂
Hope H2H has Plenty of medicine for the season ahead we may need it 😉
Holic,
If your about i never got an email for GTs stone and would like to still contribute if i can?
Cheers all.
Love that it was the first preview for the REAL season. Well tempered Holic.
Now then, lets get off to a great start to the season. The team we have should put in the effort so lets get behind them.
An early morning kickoff here. Hope to see everyone here in the bar that’s available.
Does anyone else find the ” Jet Lag” excuse for Santi a little strange? Did he not have to travel for the game with Spain in which he scored and got an assist? Do you only get jet lag one way? Anyway.
First game tomorrow. Lets do this!
Looking at physioroom.com there are no return dates given for Sanogo or Frimpong –I take this to be a bad sign. So we have possibly got four fit defenders, the luxury of five fit midfielders although no DM and three strikers. How on earth can a team with £154 million in cash reserves start a season like this?
It was me indeed Steve.
Chippy, I’m well stocked and on 24 hour a day standby. 😎
Thanks Chippy.
If you have a Paypal account you can send a donation to gooner(at)goonerholic(dot)com
ttg, Sanogo and Frimpong both trained today.
H2H,
Good to hear buddy – Hope all is well !
Ive got a sneaky feeling some of the medicine found its way into the Teapot in the Emirates boardroom, hence the total lack of urgency !
God only knows the shit storm thats going to hit if the next two weeks turn bad !
Holic,
Afraid not are they easy to set up ? Or I can transfer you the money ? Or post it ?
I thought frimpong was the next to be gone
Standing ovation for that post Holic. Nail on head.
Glad the bollocks is nearly over and we get some actual footie. Can’t wait to get behind the lads.
COYG
Looking forward to seeing Gnabry too. And to watching super Aaron Ramsey carry his pre-season form into competitive football. And to watching Theo notch the first of 25+ goals this season. And the HFB bully those Villa centre backs. And Santi, the little magician.
I love our team.
Cheers all. Nice write-up barkeep. Many apologies in advance for my team selection…the devil made me do it.
BMBD
Easy enough Chippy. I think you can even transfer money without opening an account.
https://www.paypal.com/uk/webapps/mpp/send-money-online
holic
thanks for the update. It makes things a bit more promising!
Top man ill whizz it across in the morning as popping out for a few cold ones – Let me know all received ok ! Till tomorrow Holics, some vouchers behind the bar for the regulars,
Up The Arse !
Good stuff Holic. Love the pre- season nerves, Buzzin’.
Great piece guv’nor. Good luck to all in the Tollie and especially to those in the Red and White.
COYG
Your all g… oh wrong comments.
ttg: strange, as Frimpong was certainly very present on today’s training pictures.
Hello Pip!
sorry about 67, Ididn’t see ‘holic’s 55
Hi Ollie, et al. New season new hope and all that.
Kuyt out next Wed, what a shiner!!!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2395775/Dirk-Kuyt-shows-black-eye-clash-Jonathan-Guzman.html
Heh @ Pip! Quality!
Not too bad Chippy, thanx and I hope all is well at your end too sir.
I’ll be sure to cross Highbury House off the delivery list. 😉
Nice one zeN7
Pip, I saw that 😉
Can’t wait for kick off now. Good one ‘holic
Sorry boss, good blog again.
Wind@12: Kopparberg? No no no no no! That disgusting Swedish excuse for a cider should be outlawed, it’s got nothing to do with proper cider! Start drinking Strongbow, and from there you can begin to learn what cider is really about 😉
Holic@33: Candygram for Mongo? You can never go wrong with a Blazing Saddles reference! That is one of my all-time favorite movies. I must have watched it about a million times in my teenage years, I knew almost every single line by heart.
Wish I could be at the Tollie tomorrow, but being at the pub with well over 100 Swedish and a few English Gooners won’t be too bad either!
Thank you Guvnor – everything I could have wished for in a season preview post 😉
Come tomorrow at 3pm, I couldn’t give nine tenths of two thirds of the tiniest shit who we haven’t got. With one (OK maybe two) exceptions, there is not one player on our current squad list that I am not 100% delighted is playing in the red and white. And I can’t bloody wait to see ’em tomorrow. (And the rest of the Tollie lot too, natch).
Oh and congrats Max and many happy returns Porco. I shall raise a glass to you both once I’m back from the offie.
It’s Friday night. What are the Brits all supping? Just about to convert from hops to malt here.
Merkans, your night is coming 🙂
Bath @8,
“If fit I would definitely start with Rosicky …….”
You might have to, old chap. 😉
Gents
Just wanted to quickly tip my hat to the barkeep and all who drink in this fine establishment.
It’s never easy being a Gooner (or so it would seem) and this place keeps me sane and zen like in the darker moments. I think the overall tone of the place is a credit to both Holic and all those who post, and it’s in stark contrast to many, many other blogs and media outlets. The debate in here is always civil, passionate and informative, and it’s extremely rare to find anyone acting like a bell-end.
We all have our different views on where we are right now, but the love for the club really shines through at all times, and that’s what matters.
I have no idea what the next fortnight will bring, or the season ahead. But I know I am all the better armed to face whatever lies ahead for having this place to come to, and all of you to discuss it all with.
Big up the lot of you – get those fucking voices up tomorrow, remember who you are and what you represent and I’ll see you back here, zenlike as fuck tomorrow night.
COYG
Zen7
Top eighty? Eighty-two or three? Happy days!
Long live the resurrection of the ‘holic pound and may it turn out for all of us. We colllectively could use the sight of four Arsenal goals and three Arsenal points.
CYOG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
🙂
Hellasgooner: Cheers mate — will check out OTE
Lars, heh, Strongbow isn’t cider either. You have to go to Brittany or Normandy for the proper stuff. Probably a lot weaker, but a lot tastier.
Re: Lars @77. I could knock out a horse! 🙂
Many Happy Returns Porco !
What ZEN7 said @81.
Holic,
Excellent preview. Agree with every bit of it, despite feeling that this summer has been more frustrating than any of our “selling summers”.
Tomorrow, though, is for other things like meeting friends again and getting absolutely 100% behind whoever we manage to get on the pitch.
See you tomorrow, with an envelope and a thought or two for GoonerTerry.
Hey snowy,
Loved the Hokey Cokey, by the way. Sorry, had to dash off for that confounded work stuff earlier.
See you tomorrow, top man.
I thought Bretagne cider was super strong?
Or Breton cider
Matt(2) @83, its on OTE sport1 HD.
Excellent preview Guvnor, the gnashing of teeth is firmly on the backburner – the boys in red & whte will do us proud.
Ollie knows re cider, Strongbow is factory stuff, the real McCoy is produced by smaller brewers. Plenty to choose from here on the Devon / Dorset border where I now abode. Normandy is best for Calvados – a great Calvados matches / beats most Cognacs. Strangely enough, there is one licenced producer of Engish style calvados based in Somerset, its pure nectar.
Happy birthday Porco and everyone have a great time wherever you are watching the match.
Ollie@84: yes, but you have to start with the beginner’s stuff and then learn from there 🙂
(not that I am in any way an expert in the field of cider, mind)
Hey Trev *waves* Looking forward to it mightily mate.
In other news, I see that whilst I was at the offie our Rambo has posted up an instagram picture of himself in a training top with a sweet little ‘ready to meet up with the squad’ caption.
I bloody love that kid. After all the shit he’s taken from the whinier more spiteful ‘supporters’ he’s still fucking stoked to play for the Arsenal and keeps on showing us all how proud he is to be here.
So glad he’s back on Twitter, and I hope the trolling fuckers don’t drive him away again at the first error he makes.
And I really hope he has the most epic of seasons so he can shove all that hatred back down that miserable bunch of fuckers’ faces.
Snowy @ 93
Amen.
The most fcuked up thing is that the boo boys will convince themselves that he’s succeeding because of, rather than in spite of, them.
Starts the move up field, head up with confidence because we are The Arsenal…. Passes thru midfield…
Indeed N7, I fear you are right *sighs*
I hope he’s learned (hard as it undoubtedly must be) to pay them no heed. Fortunately they don’t get to pick who’s on the team sheet each week.
“I’ve been told it was one of these new fangled surreptitious adverts for Heineken. … Maybe that’s why I still think we’ll make world class signings in what’s left of the window!” – tabs #13
Who had you in mind, tabs? The one in white who looked all class but left the field injured in her first game? Or the one in red with the fancy footwork who brought the house down?
Oskar
Hi ‘holic,
I’d like to say that I hope you get to see more of a contest tomorrow than a certain cricket team has put up but that would a lie. I hope we similarly stuff Villa 3-0, although 4-0 might be more accurate, no?
I notice the link to making a donation to Gooner Terry and must see to that at once. For many the season will not be the same without him and it’s a sentiment I can relate to all too well. I’m not sure watching the first few minutes of this new season is going to be easy without a friend of mine who was so passionately Arsenal to share it with.
Nonetheless I hope you and everyone in attendence enjoys tomorrow’s game and we are in a position in a couple of weeks time where we are flying both on and off the field. I’m confident this will happen because I believe in this club, COYG!
Where are the lurk-assisters when you need them?
COYG
Stumbles, trips over and lands on arse…
Spare a thought for those less fortunate on this great day … in particular ME and any other gooners located in central NZ where we have again been rocked by earthquakes since another ‘big one’ struck at 2.30pm local time yesterday.
You’d have to experience it to know what it’s like having hundreds of shocks a day, never knowing whether that creaking which happens every few minutes is going to subside or develop into a massive house-shaker.
I’m expecting at least 4 goals tonight to ease the tension. Although, with Arsenal games now on delay here, I won’t get to see it until 1.00pm Sunday (NZ time), ie, about 10 hours later … grrrrr.
Please leave several drinks on the bar, I’ll need them! Ta.
Oskar
Snowy @93, spot fucking on! Have one Lars’ tab.
Good start to the season Holic! At the game
tomorrow! Lets get behind the team and make
a positive statement and ease the bullshit
around the club. Only concern is the 5 games in 2
weeks before the window closes. Lets hope
Wenger gets his 5 wins!!!
Top post (again) N7.
‘holic, here the Brit is supping Amstel, and I’ve had an hour longer this evening to do it (GMT+1 😉 )
Cider is not to bad for one or two, after that it’s just too fizzy and it doesn’t flow out as easy as lager, if you catch my drift.
Strongbow’s not too bad, but I prefer Magners, I’ll have to hook up with Ollie to try his conoseur shit. I always thought that true scrumpy was from Devon/Somerset, but what do I know
Here, what is the summer mostly a cafe/restaurant is now starting to look more like a bar, the billiarters and darters are in to practice for the upcoming season (starts in two weeks) I just had a 170 check out, my first ever, so I must have had a good few up. 🙂
ps, I started typing this a good 45 mins ago.
It’s a dirty job, but I thank the lord that I get to do it. 😎
Well in Snowman!!
Oh and well in!
Cheers folks 🙂
And well in Oskar for the TaBS glory position – and hope it all settles down soon, seismically speaking, in your neck of the woods.
God love ya H2H. Way to take one for the team.
Have another drinky poo and hope to see you here tomorrow.
I trust your summer was aces.
Sad news Oskar, you guys are definitely in my prayers.
Thinking of you and other expat Gooners, indeed all in NZ tonight Oskar.
Holic, it’s SRO at the bar! Never seen it so jammed pack with holics! 🙂 The din here is loud and boisterous, you can feel the excitement, smell the brew, and see the smiles of everyone here. And you must feel so proud, too. So cheers to our beloved Arsenal and the best bar in the goonerverse!
And Oskar, you have my prayers. xx
Porco, haven’t forgotten you lad, Happy Birthday ! Now safe travels to everyone heading to the game and looking forward to all the match reports. Goodnite everyone.
Nite nurse!
In other news, especially for TaBSY the Hamster Slayer*:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=453890187974751&set=a.167782276585545.35542.157809760916130&type=1&theater
Some of the comments are a belter – gotta larf at the paranoid hysteria at a parody of…paranoid hysteria…
* See Twitter for details…
Sorry to hear about the shakes Oscar. Hope they settle and there’s no major quakes. A stiff drink is sitting on the bar for you.
I’ll bring my boots, Trev.
Dream of victory Gooners.
Mines a Glenfarclas 15 yo.
Hi Nurse. Best wishes to you and yours, Oskar. Hol’s I’m getting right on that PayPal…meant to do it sooner.
It’s time to remember what makes the muskrat guard its musk…come on you Reds!
BMBD
Stay safe Oskar. Best wishes to you and yours.
Nursie been and gone. Enjoy the season. 😉
Stay safe Oskar.
oskar, definitely feel your pain/fear. i went through the ’71 and ’94 quakes in los angeles, never been so frightened in my life. it’s the waiting, for every aftershock, that exhausts you. be strong.
uply@91, devon cider is delicious, if you find a good producer. we did back in ’04, visiting my in-laws in sidbury, not far from branscombe. on the flip side, when it’s bad, it can be ‘orrible…a stone’s throw from sidford was a seller, she came out of the byre arm full of cow baby-making, cleaned up, tipped us a quart of their home-made, and we were on our way. got it back to the house and the taste brought us right back to the byre floor…where the stuff clearly was made. so there’s good cider and bad cider from the west country…
friends are coming back this weekend from normandy, with (i hope) my requested bottle of french absinthe, and their promised bottle of calvados… mmmmm. will make for an interesting saturday night (when we’re scheduled to see them).
‘holic, this merkan is going to be starting with old speckled hen, in the bottle, then moving on to templeton rye this evening. you’ll be waking up to get to the game when i’m going to bed 🙂 see all you other non-goers here at the bar, 6:55 am local time (norcal and pik share my pain)!
Killer backdrink, late greetings all.
Thanks so much for the BeeDay wishes. Been an awesome day filled with outstandingly lush accessories (I’m getting so metro in my old age…) and great company.
Lars, really sorry to upset you but my birthday session was about 50% Kopparberg-fuelled! Wrong I know but it’s tasty… By the way, um, Strongbow??? Sure, if you hang out in graveyards and wear only black.
So stoked that football is actually back. That stuff you read online 5 times a day throughout summer? That’s not football, that’s a pale, reflected image filtered through shit-stained glass made from poo-splattered sand.
It’s back, boys! Now let’s get out there and roar the lads on to victory!
Cheers NorCal.
Stay safe Oskar.
Happy Birthday, Pink Pork. 🙂
Stay safe, Oskar, and Scruz, I recall the ’71 quake vividly and would not care to see a repeat. Not likely there will be in Minnesota of course but my heart goes out to all in earthquake country.
Come on the Arsenal and Gooners everywhere. Like the maestro says, now is the time the supporting begins.
seriously, bt8b. i got a worse repeat in ’94 (i HATE early morning quakes), and yet i live a few stone throws from being ON the san andreas.
that said, i’d much prefer an early morning earthquake to an early morning tornado. and to either i prefer an early morning irish coffee 🙂
Scruz – there are clearly even better early morning activities to awaken the senses… 😉
football, of course…tsk, tsk… now just what did you think I was referring to?
BMBD
lonestar, i thought maybe you meant…football. though it did remind me i was glad ‘holic chose to spell it “merkans” rather than “merkins”…
Heh.
Looking forward to kick off. This will be the first match for me and the baby. Should be good stuff.
BMBD
Thanks for the kind messages guys, and you’re dead right, scruz, it’s the waiting which gets to you. You may hear of our 6.9 earthquake back in Blighty or elsewhere, but what you don’t hear about are the hundreds of aftershocks daily, some in the high 4s and 5s … not as bad as the big shakers but you never know that until they fail to develop into one. You’re on edge constantly, aware of every creak and shiver which might be the next biggie. And it will go on for weeks … this current wave began with a big one on 21 July and yesterday we got another one. No-one, from seismologist to crystal ball-gazer, can tell you with anything better than guesswork when the next will arrive or how big it will be.
Hurry up football and take my mind off it please!
Oskar
The big network TV package seems to be coming through so far with live coverage of tomorrow’s match. Not that they don’t have lots of chances to screw things up of course …
Damn Osakar.
Take care out there!
Common you gunners!
My wife is sick of me; the earth rattles; business crawls; football deliver me. God help me.
Im not really ready for it. Or … Maybe im too ready for it.
Damn. What time is kickoff again??
Oskar, we had days of it after 94. I still get sick over it. be good to yourself, and freaking out after is noooormalll.
here’s to a bracing arsenal win to take your mind off of them. a couple of good, stiff drinks on the bar to settle your nerves.
Stay safe, Otd and all other NZ Holics. And CA ones, too.
Earth should only move in very specific circumstances….
Bt8b, Mundo 2 is carrying the game live, if your cable provider carries the channel.
Uply, which is this Calvados clone in the Western reaches of which you speak?
They seem to be writing about us.
http://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2013/aug/16/premier-league-us
One thing about that advert though. I can’t see the Bronx going for Sunderland.
NBN. I saw that about Mundo2 but now it appears the game is also on NBCSN meaning higher prominence. 🙂
Great post, measured as always. I’ve missed the match previews and the holic pound 🙂
take care Oscar, stay safe.
Cheers ‘holic. Fantastic preview as always…
FUCK the silly season. This is what it’s all about.
Pumped out of my mind. Come ON you Gunners!
A few trembling hours left now ‘Holics! The football is here again and it will never leave us. WATCH IT! WATCH THE FOOTBALL!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MusyO7J2inM
Football starts again tooday, hooray!
Hooray indeed Ollie.
Here we go 🙂
Oskar, stay safe!
Oummmmmmmmmmmmmm… ah, fuck that shit, there’s a game on today! 🙂
Hello football.
http://www.angers-sco.fr/actualite/1103-J3-le-SCO-continue-sur-sa-lancee-
Good to see one of our players had an assist in Ligue 2 yesterday.
Well I clearly remember a couple of weeks ago, some random ITK pseudo-journo twitting about the announcement of his signing being made in the next 48 hours. ….
Some people thought that because he was from my side of the channel, he was more credible.
Heh. 😉
See some of you in a few hours.
(I assume ‘holic is posting from the Tollie already 😉 )
Couldn’t help another backdrink, I’m wetting myself about football being back.
Just want to say thanks again for the happy returns guys. I feel really special this morning, and not in the hungover sense!
COME
ON
YOU
REDS
BTW Lars, I hope you read my 120.
Kopparberg vs Strongbow = owning a Porsche Turbo 3.8 vs being kicked in the balls
Yeah it does and I am not going to see whole match…and both CL qualifiers since I am leaving on holiday today -_- ..never been that torn about anything.
On one side I am excited since I have not had proper holidays for 3 years, on the other ..Arsenal is fucking back and I want to watch, cheer our guys, celebrate every goal and be frustrated by missed chances and so on! 10 days out of it right from the start…I really hope that I will come back to see us qualified in CL with few proper signings announced on .com.
Game day. Bring it on. To all those going have a great day and sing your hearts out. Enjoy boys and girls.
Come on the Arsenal.
…and so commences nine or so months of headaches, bad gut feelings, involuntary screams of agony, almost uncontrolled rage, nerves on the brink of collapse… and so, so, so much fun! FUCKING LOVE IT!
Time to head off out. Take care everyone and say ‘hi’ to the Tollie for me 🙂
NBN, the “english calvados” I refer to, suggest you visit their website http://www.ciderbrandy.co.uk
Scruz, agree with your synopsis, Sidbury is about 15 miles to my west.
OtD and all other NZ gooners, hope the only shaking is caused by the gooners jumping up & down every time we score. Keep safe.
All other holics have a great day.
Oscar @97 heh both looked pretty useful 😉
Stay safe mate.
Oh forgot, Eandy have a great holiday.
Snowy@114 – heh 😀
As for the hamster, shhh! 😀
In other news I’ve just missed some putt putt train in the middle of fucking nowhere to watford. Now have to wait until 10 15. Unlikely to make opening time. Not happy.
tabs, that’s your id telling you to pace yourself, pal. 🙂
Morning all, time for a leisurely morning before a wee jaunt up to TNHOF.
COYRs
Great news on arriving at the station: “Engineering work across the network this weekend – Replacement Bus services may be in operation – Sorry for any inconvenience”
Fantastic timing, railway people.
First day of the new season – middle of the summer holidays – but you’ll never beat The Arsenal.
See you when I see you at The Tollie. Still hoping for 12.00.
COME ON RREEDDDSSSS !!!!
Actually, I posted that and immediately felt like a selfish prat.
Apologies to folks trying to deal with earthquakes – Terry’s family on the first day of the first season without him.
COYR.
See you later, bath. 😉
Wise words Bath 😀
On my way now.
COME ON ARSENAL!
Have a great day out all of you lucky enough to be in attendance. I got another busy scheduale today, I hope to catch the game live, but it’s looking highly unlikely at the moment, so I’ll have to go into media blackout and watch it as live later.
Enjoy the game ‘holics.
COME ON YOU RIP ROARING REDS.
Mr “H – a measured ministration meliorating the melodramatic menticide of the mental mephitis that was the summer. Thank you.
Mr Otd, Mr PR, contrasting fortunes, and I cannot add further to all who have posted already, so thank you to all for the more thoughtful and erudite posts to them both. I agree with all whole-heartedly.
To Zen7 (aka Mr N7), Mr Lars and the many others whose inspirational posts, and drinks, over the last few days have me motivated and very excited about the coming season, another thank you.
BT8B – cheers, “zen until then”, was supposed to be a metaphysical determinant, however Arteta’s injury re-zoned “then” until oh shit that’s seriously bad right now so no more immediate zen. But only until I’d consumed a few drinks at the bar so it’s back to Oooooooommmmmmm and whenever.
Fantastic posts and drinks over this last week, top quality, rational, passionate and constructive debates as always – summarised so well by Mr N7@81 top drop and drinks on the bar for all.
…. COYRRR’s
Lloydie –
@ 162, that was metaphorically memorable… Now on to resplendent reality. Come on you Reds. Let’s do these villains.
BMBD
UP THE ARSE
Tumbleweed?
COYG!!!
Come on boys!
Get the three points against this Villans!
Morning all. Lets go!!
Come on arsenal! giroud get in there ! 🙂
Spend some fcuking money. Errr, oops
Yes. Nice composed finish. Great start!!!!
Great start boys
Looking good and sharp.
good morning, all. I. AM. GIROUD.
what a way to start.
now theo limping, shake it off, lad
Get in there!
finding it hard to type and watch, now a penno. great save, chez, hard luck.
Rash keeping on the penalty, as is his habit. New first team keeper please.
Come on. Come on.
Gibbs down, now. gotta wrap him up, get back on kieran!
crap, Gibbs done. jenks on to lb, or Sagna?
Well. Fuck.
Lets go Arsenal. Heads up. Play on. Get that win!
This match is nuts in the last ten minutes
Jesus.
The Polish Grobbelaar nearly fucks it again. Come on FFS.
What on earth is sczesny doing?
a good cuppa at halftime and the team talk need to gee the boys up.
That was fucking exciting!
rough game, Taylor inconsistent, two moments of brilliance and a number of madness. lets see a better second half, bring on santi for jack and let’s win this one!
lol, cent, it was that! 🙂
That was pretty typical really. Loads of the ball, all over the place at the back, not too many chances made. I’m not surprised the defence is a bit shaky in the circumstances and having that keeper behind you, with him quite likely at any point to appear thirty yards ahead of you, can’t do anything for your nerves.
Never trust a keeper who insists on wearing short sleeves. 😉
What a mess of a game. Are either team going to finish with 11? Very ragged and Taylor doesn’t have control. We can still get there but we need to have more composure. And we need a game changer. I like our team but we are a squad that will fight and grind out results, but we need a step up. Also Arron and jack play too close to each other.
agreed, norcal, about aaron and jack. they seem to want to play the same position at times.
on aaron, anyone notice he is picking up som footwork from santi? he is better able to get out of blind alleys, so far.
Emerges early, blinking from the dressing room… Tosses remains of halftime orange into the bin… Jogs down the wing and punts the ball right across to the far side…
Agreed Scruz and Norcal.
Football at last a new season…feels bloody familiar though.
Still got enough to win this I’m certain, subs at the right time will be key. Ref has been appalling….and our Pole needs to let the defenders defend.
Giroud is getting robbed every time he works hard by the ref.
Cazorla is on….
Feisty half, this is what we’ve been missing. Now to win it. Good that we have santi and Poldi on the bench.. Wilshere’s got to stay calm.
…Rosicky’s turn and outside foot pass…
Giroud flick on
Bang
Assist
Well TaBS will be proud. Well in Pangloss!
Thanks for the classy assist TJ, and simply splendidly tabbed Cent.
Well in Pangloss 🙂
Arsenal almost scored our goal!
well in, pangloss, way to start and finish the move.
Taylor fucks us.
Unbelievable. What a mess up by the ref. Perfect challenge from kos
Wtf
Horrible call
double fuck from Taylor.
Was that Kos getting abuse from the fans near the dugout just then or the lino?
Zen?
Oh dear.
Taylor just gave them the game and took our best center back off for this and the next game with 2 non cards. Fuck off!!!!
Hard to see a way back from this. Massive Fuck up from the ref today
That should be a second yellow for Vlaar
Yes, the referee’s a cock.. But there is certainly no top-4 team at the Emirates today
haha, watching a Japanese stream, “ROSSKI ROSSKI ROSSKI..!”
rozza Giroud on fire, great save guzan. COME ON, ARSENAL!
Hard done by Mr. Magoo
time fucking wasting. ugh.
oh, that deserved a goal.
For a minute there I thought we were playing Man U at OT with Tim Riley reffing. This is the worst. Can’t the crowd throw stones or something at this inept ass? And while most teams were busy practicing football Aston villains seem to have been honing their diving skills. Bastards.
well, fuck.
As bad as the ref has been, he’s been world class compared to our performance in the transfer market this summer.
Bloody useless.
Bollocks
Start the over-reaction……
Sad that it’s come to this, but we can be fairly sure of activity in the transfer market now. Didn’t deserve to lose this game, more down to luck than anything else.
Look how empty the ground is ffs.. that’s embarrassing
looks like it has already started, bmgedo.
Podolski man of the match? 😉
a. Awful, just mind-bogglingly awful refereeing.
b. No DM. No DM. No DM. Arsene, there is no DM in the team and in Arteta’s absence no one capable of playing the pivot role either.
c. Hangover from the idiotic international friendlies.
d. A very concerted and deliberate physical game plan from Villa. Good team but with a bit more level-headed refereeing they cannot win this game.
3. TR7 was excellent. Ox for the 45 minutes he played. Giroud in patches. Everyone else looked ordinary, may be a few good touches by Santi and Jack.
Taylor is a walking clusterfuck.
Bit soon for it all to have gone pear-shaped. The football gods owes us big-time after that.
Well, the 8-2 has happened a couple of games early this season. Who’d have thought it? Down to the bare bones and with no additions we’d look so unprepared? And red cards and injuries thrown in just to hammer the point home.
But will Wenger do anything other than sign a trolley full of cheap tat?
Sorry,Mathis has been coming and it was so preventable.
sigh. can they rescind one yellow and thus the red?
In the end it’s just one game out of 38 games. Poor performance though.
kozzer way hard done by. got ball on the first, didn’t get man on second. that was the game right there.
I am starting zen from today. I mean, If the club doesn’t give a shit why should I.
So, keep calm and watch all of our players getting injuries, no new signings, us out of the CL, 10 points behind the leader in mid September.
So, remember, just calm your nerves and practice zen, everything is going to be fine. That’s what I’ll be doing.
Anthony Taylor, you fucking cunt
Oh well, not to worry. It’s only a game. Only 54 to go. Shame that bench of game changers could not play more of a part.
Never mind.
how would you rather, lurky? no amount of internet screaming and virtual chest beating/hair pulling is going to bring about any change, no moreso than boos and chants directed at the manager.
and faustus, well written. especially the DM part.
4 shots on target? We did really well.
I wonder how many noughts a result like that adds to our “transfer targets??????” Assuming we have a plan anymore that is????
If there were boos at the end please don’t tell me that anyone is surprised.
It was just one game……. But Villa at home should be 3 points every season. Every season!
Horrible from Taylor. Should have been better from Arsenal.
I don’t know where we go from here. A few injuries…check. A red card….check. Who plays next week at Fulham after playing a full game in Turkey on Wednesday. Poorly played Arsenal.
Alright then. That went well.
Well, this is not a great shock to anybody, is it really? I certainly hope not as we have been watching this go on for 9 years now.
The REALLY simple management “plan” – Arsenal FC 2005-2013:
– Sell your best players (mainly to opposition teams so as to double the weakening effect)
– Buy, well, almost nobody and even when you do only do so to plug the holes in the team (and NEVER the SQUAD) that you physically have no bodies to play in
– Constantly talk about signings that never, EVER happen
– Constantly talk about the market, the climate, the new stadium, the increased competition, anything to deflect the view of the masses away from the total and utter negligence at all levels of the current management structure of the club
– Blame the ref for ALL the above just in case
Meanwhile, yet again, YET AGAIN (how do I stress that point even further…Where are the “Super-Caps” on this keyboard?!) we have had the collective wool pulled over our eyes.
Central Defender? Why buy one of those when clearly Vermaelen (who was utterly awful pretty much every single time he pulled on the shirt last season so why his future return would be something worth waiting for is totally me), will be back once we have lost enough games to guarantee losing any chance of winning ANYTHING yet again? Mertesacker and Koscielny will obviously never get injured or suspended (oops!) and so everything will be fine.
Defensive midfielder? Why buy one of those when we obviously have such a wealth of choices in that position? Arteta will never be suspended or injured either…Oops…Arteta out for 4-6 weeks and BOOM…Total disaster and even fucking Villa are tearing holes in us down the middle of the park.
Winger? Well, that would be for teams that actually cross the ball to create chances when EVERYBODY knows the best way to win a football match is by moving the ball relentlessly through the middle of the park for 90 minutes. Surely no other teams have figured out that two banks of 5 when they don’t have the ball will strangle the life out of a team playing like that? Oops…9 years watching teams do EXACTLY that.
Striker? Oh, pulllleeeeeeasssse. Strikers are simply overrated. Goals aren’t the be all and end all of football, you know.
I am sorry but I have spent season after season watching this happen and feeling “ashamed” to say anything about it in the face of the following impermeable Arsenal Formula sworn to by the vast majority of Gooners:
– At the end of the season see us in a simply horrible scrap for a Champions League spot but get through it, celebrate on the pitch and off it by telling everyone that we are blessed to be in the Champions League again and how lucky we all are. Not to mention how wrong all the doubters were when they claimed that a team that didn’t actually challenge for a single competition would be a failure come the end of the season.
– Get into the Champions League and start the bullshit machine up…We are on a run now and the players will go from strength to strength on the back of this. Confidence is everything.
– Cue “Wenger should be judged on his performance in the transfer market, not in July.” He has money to spend, right?!
– Follow this up by, “the club is doing everything it can but the right players simply aren’t available at affordable prices.” I am beginning to think that the right players at the right prices are, for example, Messi, Ronaldo and Goetze for £3.75 and a packet of crisps (each, not for all three…We aren’t THAT unrealistic). Anything more is just terrible economics and the unsound market will obviously take the blame for this disgraceful situation.
– Buy almost nobody at all and certainly not a world class player to replace the world class player that has just left.
– Cue “Wenger should be judged at the end of the season, not in August).
– January – Lather, rinse, repeat.
– End of season – Lather, rinse, repeat.
We have been screwed royally, plain and simple, but WE are the reason that the club does nothing to stem the flow or even admit that there is a flow that requires stemming. Pointless infighting about when exactly a manager should be defined by his actions (or inactions). Endless debate about whether or not a sound business model is the way to run a football club or not. Spurious lambasting of anybody that actually has totally, genuinely, completely, simply had enough.
There can surely be no more hiding places after this dismal performance today…
Oh, sorry, we just blame the ref.
Kept my mouth firmly shut at the end of last season even though I knew that the Arsenal Formula would get kicked into overdrive again. Kept my mouth firmly shut as we fucked up almost an entire transfer window yet again. Kept my mouth firmly shut until AFTER the first game of the season saw a gross injustice befall our team who, if not for the ref were completely dominating a very average Villa side, were we not?
NO WE WERE FUCKING NOT.
Let the flood gates of totally dispassionate Arsenal Formula-based nothingness open…
Correct me if I am wrong, looks like Ramsey will be playing as a CB, and Podolski at LB against Fulham.
The only problem is who is going to play at LW and DM.
However, me and Arsene are zen and we do not care about it, all we care is contemplating and making our beautiful ikebanas.
So, those of you who are not zen, think about becoming zen, or else find the solution for LW and DM position.
Spend Some f***Ing Money… On The Referee.
So…we waited 4 months for that. meh. I’ll check back in September.
bmbd
Anyone who does not think that Arteta is Arsenal’s most valuable player, then watch a replay of this match, if you can…..
Does not look good for Fenerbahce, and if it goes the way one fears, then why would any player worth bringing in want to sign for Arsenal?
bmgedo @227
Over-reaction?! REALLY? 9 fucking years of this shite and you attempt to belittle anybody with an opinion of just how disgraceful their performance of the current heads of our club truly is with something quite so trite?
More Arsenal Formula for you…
…no, you clearly don’t need it.
Seriously, you actually believe that the enormous weight of evidence to suggest that this was EXACTLY what was coming is meaningless and, what, we should be happy that our shirts are red and the club turns a great profit? And you believe that with all that evidence and nothing, literally NOTHING done about ANY of it yet AGAIN, there is no case to be answered regarding a total negligence at all levels of management?
Move aside please as there is not enough sand to go around for me to stick my head in it too.
Please can someone provide an estimate of the twitter meltdown as compared with the meltdown in this bar? Ten times, twenty times? Thanks in advance.
don’t know what to say. the feared disastrous start to the season starts to take shape. we do look worse than those around us right now.
Incidentally, this would be a good time for Man U to get done over by Swansea as Moyes would avoid a lot of meeja flak which would be directed at Arsène.
Bearded Gooner @ 249
HA! I actually considered that paying each ref £1m per match would end up with a cost of around £75m guaranteeing every trophy that we want…
Cheaper than a couple of those footballer thingies!!!
Pangloss @ 255
But surely a meltdown is to be expected, no? We have just got done, at home, in our first league match of the season in a completely predictable manner by a second-rate bunch of cunts.
We have added a red card to one of only two central defenders that we have in the squad thus offering ZERO cover and the usual list of injuries in positions where we have ZERO cover (a theme developing here?!) has only served to further decimate that which AFC has worked so diligently to decimate for so long and so successfully.
Judge them when, exactly?!
End of last season?
Transfer window?
End of the transfer window?
End of the January transfer window?
End of the season?
WHEN DO WE GET TO THE POINT WHEN WE STOP GIVING THE MANAGEMENT OF OUR CLUB LICENCE TO FUCK WITH US?!
Not been on here for a couple of Seasons now. No surprise with that result. It’s been coming for years. I’m sure Suarez must be dead keen to join us now…
Its only one match. 37 to go. Too early to panic by any stretch.
But that was vintage arsenal. Pretty but pointless passing.
No incivenezz in their box. The one goal we did get was on the cou ter attack. Lets all just think about that. Love OG but ….
AW – i am incensed, sir.
Ox off? He was one of the few doing something. Theo was utter dross.
Poli on after 90 mins? WTF sort of man mansgement is that?
Gonna be a long season. And lets all get ready for football on thursday nights in fucking khazakstan.
Now, where the hell is my drink?
Norcal – good to see ya back.
I ran 10k in 49 minutes today.Which, for a gentleman of my advancing years is quite pleasing. We lost.It happens.
Homer,
Agree with almost all of that apart from the too early to panic bit…
2007 was too early to panic!
Thierry and Lurky — I think the fundamental problem is we do not seem to ever make the worst-case scenario analysis and always go into the season with a sort of best-case optimism. I get that trying to sign the very best may drag us down to the end of the transfer window, but not having any covers for pivotal positions is just outrageously incompetent planning.
The moment you let Coquelin go — IMHO he was a very capable player, and could have filled in the DM gap today easily, and I saw no reason to loan him out, he would have happily stayed and played 25 odd games between different competitions and providing versatility — you are by logic bound to have a replacement in.
Last season we did the same fucking thing. Let Song go and then take half a season for Arteta to finally find his best in the pivot role. If that is the way we want to play, a Pirlo-esque pivot and not a DM, then get someone in early because it is a very challenging position, needs maturity and discipline none of which are Ramsey’s — wonderful player though he is becoming — string points now.
A disciplined DM/pivot and we do not concede any of these three goals, bad refereeing or not. Simples.
I am not the one to join in the meltdown, but if some Arsenal fans feel rather too disgruntled to stay an optimist I can see where they would be coming from.
larry grayson,
10k in 49 minutes is good at any age.
And yes, we lost. It happens. Predictably so these days.
“WHEN DO WE GET TO THE POINT WHEN WE STOP GIVING THE MANAGEMENT OF OUR CLUB LICENCE TO FUCK WITH US?!”
When we think of a sensible alternative?
The options, as I see it are:
o Mouth off an awful lot about how bloody terrible the manager/club management is/are;
o Give up watching football;
o Suck it up, cross our fingers and hope.
Perhaps I’ve missed something?
Doctor Faustus,
As ever your point is well made. The problem is the constant repetition of this and other themes. Frustration is simply the result of basic intelligence outweighing very flawed (if any at all) planning.
Bayonne @ 251: Yep, going into the season without at least ONE capable cover for Arteta (who, let us remember, before he joined Arsenal was rather injury prone and he is past 30) with CL qualifiers looming is inexcusable.
AKB…
No I’m not drunk 😀
Pangloss,
Surely a sensible alternative is to make their positions untenable by a complete show of no-confidence.
We keep on buying the shirts, we keep on buying the season tickets and, worst of all for me, we keep on stretching the timeline yet further to allow for further mismanagement.
When does the damage become so great that we are allowed to agree that there is even damage taking place?
Fuck, I am actually beginning to sound like a Black Scarfer….
This IS bad.
Mark the Spark,
You SO are!!!
🙂
TW,
You are, of course, entitled to your opinion. If you believe that the measures you propose are sensible, then I recommend you put them in place, and you would be quite right to encourage others to do the same.
For myself, I believe that my third proposed option, “Suck it up, cross our fingers and hope” is the best. It may, indeed, not lead to the best outcome for the club, but I am convinced that it is likely to lead to the best outcome for my long-term health.
A small drink on the bar for you, Sir.
just dont see the point of this manager and his staff. utterly useless and pointless. who at Arsenal has the balls to correct things.
The ref was really terrible. But we cant really blame him for our defeat. There was a lot of the usual passing with no end product. The only player who added a bit of directness was Rosicky. Jack had a very average game. Overall, we were at our usual baseline; just like last season. The booing was deserved, don’t think it was directed at players, it was aimed at the manager and board who have acted like village idiots in the transfer market until now. Cant really blame the fans for that. There is gonna be a meltdown. We got shafted by Avilla, not effing Barca. Our transfer inactivity has contributed a lot to our present situation. We are light in so many areas, it defies belief. If the inaction continues and our results get worse, AW is in for a ride to hell and he deserves it.
The amount of Spuds texts I’m getting all wanting Wenger to stay.
Sad but true, AW has overstayed his welcome.
Cheers mr grayson. Sell done.
At 42, id love to go under 60!
Sorry Thierry, but by lumping every season we haven’t won something together as if they are one homogenous lump is completely and utterly wrong and way too simplistic.
I’m fucking gutted as i thought we had an excellent opportunity to address the squad weaknesses all summer and haven’t, but I still expected a win today. The karma gods have really laid it on thick to Wenger and the board (need to blame someone, not entirely sure who tho!) haven’t they? Weve been crying out for a DM, so we lose our only one just before the first game, we really need defenders, we lose one to a red card and Gibbs and Sagna shit us right!
Norris @ 276 : “but by lumping every season we haven’t won something together as if they are one homogenous lump is completely and utterly wrong and way too simplistic.” Absolutely agree.
To paraphrase Tolstoy, “every unhappy season is unhappy in its unique way.” 🙂
However, I guess the question is do we learn the lessons of failure well? By evidence, most likely not. Right?
Pangloss,
Cannot agree with your “politics” but certainly agree regarding the state of our respective health!
A small one for you too and thanks for the drink.
DB10**,
That would be nobody for 9 years now.
Abhi,
I agree totally with all that you have said apart from the very last part. Arsene Wenger has done nothing differently this year than in any other of the past 9 years and, far from the hell of a ride of which you speak, we are all thrilled (apparently) that he is discussing a new contract.
Like so many others I still want him to finish what he started, to succeed again and leave us in good shape when he goes, but I just know that isn’t going to happen and, like so many others, I find that the truth is hard to swallow.
He will continue to lead us this merry dance for as long as we continue to pay his huge wages and make the board sums of money that must leave the likes of Roman wondering whether or not he picked the right club!
Seriously, spend like a billion pounds to keep the fans happy or fuck all and be worshipped beyond reproach for a period of time that was as long ago as George Graham managed our club for in total.
“Politics”, TW? Anyway thanks for the drink.
Thierry you’ve been missed.
At what point do you say enough is enough?
Oh, the last world class player we had that we sold to a sort of rival has just performed a world class finish.
Big fucking sigh.
Thiery @ 278: Now the great irony would be if this result forces us to buy some covers — okay players, not the top of the list we have apparently been looking for — pronto, and then miss out on those targets because of money/squad positioning etc.
Staying with the Russian literature theme — a situation of such black humor worthy of Gogol or Pelevin…
What Pangloss said @271.
Are you angling for a drink, Cent? Oh, bugger it – a drink of his choice for Cent please, Barkeep.
Norris,
“Sorry Thierry, but by lumping every season we haven’t won something together as if they are one homogenous lump is completely and utterly wrong and way too simplistic.”
But surely they are EXACTLY that…One repeated and predictable failure after another for the same reasons, season after season after season.
“I’m fucking gutted as i thought we had an excellent opportunity to address the squad weaknesses all summer and haven’t…”
Yet again, we have failed to address the gaping holes in the team and the result of that is plain to see, both in foresight AND hindsight.
“Weve been crying out for a DM…”
Yes we have…Why, have we not bought one to fill the huge, fat, gaping wound that is the DM position?
“…we really need defenders…”
Yes we do…Obviously that is why we have bought quite so many of them.
I repeat, we are making the same bullshit excuses year after year, season after season, window after window for the same bullshit problems.
We have never replaced Campbell, Vieira, Henry, Cole, Pires, Freddy, Seaman, Song, Cesc, the Rotter and the list goes on and keeps growing and yet each season should be taken in its own special bubble of context.
Ok, last season should have been Wenger’s last and the total mismanagement of the transfer window and the total negligence of the needs of the team should be enough to ram that point home.
I am sorry to say this but I am actually done with Wenger, Kroenke, Gazidis et al. Fuck them all out the door before they sell it and replace it with a net curtain!
Pangloss and Cent — ‘suck it up’ is actually never good for health. 🙂
You need to process your disappointments and frustrations, whatever way you want. I think reasoned criticisms and expressing disappointments at not addressing the fucking obvious is a rather healthy response than shimmering resentments.
Just a thought. 🙂
North Bank 1,
Thank you sir. I am never truly sure whether anybody here really “gets” me! I have been accused of only being here when things are bad, but that is so far off the mark it is scary!
And yes, he IS world class and he DOES have an EPL winners medal. Probably find himself another lying around at the end of this season too.
Sigh is about right!
To finish up…
“At what point do you say enough is enough?”
Sadly, I think I just did @ 284.
Wenger can leave, n take the 70mil with him, build a new freakin stadium, buy himself a bunch of 1£ players n keep testing his shitty experiment there!
Good to see ya Norcal..
Dr F
For me, I was prepared for a few years in the wilderness, as the club paid off the huge debt and set about trying to turn themselves into a modern big club with all the far flung pre season tours merchandising and branding deals and the bending over backwards to corporations.
Wenger has done a great job keeping us up near the top of the league and we could (even should) have won the league at least once. Now, that’s not to say he hasn’t fucked up along the way, course he has, any manager in post that long will give far more rope for his detractors to hang him with (Tony Blair?) 🙂
And Wenger didnt have the cash that other managers did to get him out of the holes he put himself and the team in (that’s my take on things anyway).
But this summer? I felt we would finally see the club emerge from its self imposed shackles, with Wenger finally and gloriously allowed to go out and sign the players he always wanted to but couldn’t, not just one, but 3 or 4 top class players….
That hasn’t occurred (no shit Sherlock) for what ever reason (need to blame someone, but who? Wenger, Law, Gazidis, Stan? All of em?) and now we are in the position where after just one game, a lot of fans have had enough. I can completely understand that. A signing or two would have engendered enough breathing space and good faith, yet here we are, discussing sacking our manager after the first game of the season.
Wow..just wow.. did not expect that at all..The absence of Arteta was sorely felt but the defending especially by Sagna was harebrained at times.Unbelievable lack of composure.To let Agbonlahor streak through as if he was Messi was embarrassing and the Ref wins the prize for the most incompetent display in a long time.Never seen such awful refereeing.
Positives are Giroud getting of the mark and TR7 being excellent.That’s it.. Negatives are a whole bunch mainly with the squad.Not reinforcing after this surely has to be manager sacking offense.We’re down to the bare bones.Kos out, Sagna looks like he’ll be KO’d soon as he was wobbling so many times,Arteta should take his time and come back to full fitness,Wilshere just coming in to this season fit and risking him by playing all matches considering the thin state of our squad will surely burn him out.
Villa played the counter game to our standard way of playing perfectly. Being physical and fast on the counter did us in today and it’ll do so in the future against better teams than this very average Villa side.
Instead of wasting further time on Suarez please buy massive reinforcements to augment the squad for now Arsene..
Doctor Faustus,
That isn’t irony, it’s a repeating history lesson in how to not succeed in your chosen profession but get a huge salary bump from the board because “football is a business” after all.
And my resentment is certainly not “shimmering”!!!!!
p)
Thierry. Unwittingly, I think I’ve answered your post! Anyway, I would have countenanced Wenger leaving the summer after the league cup defeat to the mighty Brum. The wretched relegation for at the end of that season was more than enough reason to sack the manager, never mind what followed it with Cesc, Nasri and the start of the next season…
TW, please forgive me if this sounds a little personal. It isn’t meant that way but several of the other regular drinkers who, as far as I can judge, agree with you, are probably drowning their sorrows in the Tollie rather than here.
One of the many things I don’t understand about your case is the assumption, which is so confidently stated that it appears to be a proven fact, that the club have not been active in the transfer market. It’s certainly true that the club have failed to make any significant transfers, but I am totally unconvinced that they haven’t been active. The club may well, by their actions in this and/or previous windows, bear some responsibility for their lack of success, but what evidence is there that they haven’t tried, and tried to the best of their ability?
A recent complaint has been that Wenger puts a value on players that he wants and is unwilling to pay more than that. This is another criticism that I simply don’t understand. If I think that a house, say, is worth £250,000 and the owners refuse to sell for under £275,000 then I’d be daft to pay that. I might well be wring in my estimate, and it might be characterised as stubborn for me not to offer more than £250,000 but surely I would be open to far more serious criticism if I paid more for something than I believed it was worth? Also, as has been pointed out ere recently, if others in the club believe that Wenger’s estimates are wrong, they should back their own judgement and offer more. (I note that your ire is directed more widely than at the manager alone, so this point cannot be addressed to you.)
My position – my politics perhaps – is that I support the club. It’s of vital interest to me that the club continues to exist and to compete at a high level for the foreseeable future. It’s easy, after 9 years without a major trophy, to think that we should simply “splash more cash”, but to me the enormous risks that running down our cash reserves would entail are simply too great, and in this instance “steady as she goes” is the more attractive course.
For = form.
Norris,
Nail on head sir. 2 years too late and you know as well as I do that he won’t going anywhere any time soon anyway.
Same shit, different season.
@247 – A well thought out post that I agree with.
As for over reactions, I’d rather have those than no reaction at all. Being passive just gets you the same old same old, summer after summer. Taken for granted, lied to and patted on the head and told that everything is fine.
The club takes the fans for fools, but why wouldn’t they?
A recent complaint has been that Wenger puts a value on players that he wants and is unwilling to pay more than that. This is another criticism that I simply don’t understand.
I think a bottle of milk is worth 10p, but I’ll never get one for 10p so I pay the going rate.
Thierry @ 290 — Not sure whether you felt offended by my comments. Not meant — everyone has their own ways of coping: looking for absurdity, irony, black humor is mine. Football and Arsenal are terribly important for me, but at some level my mind processes this as ‘simply a form of joyful entertainment’ so when Arsenal things get this ‘shitty’ I automatically live this paradox on the side of ‘lightness’ than a sense of doom.
The season is in a bleeding mess, but this too shall pass…
Doctor F,
Thank you for pointing out the dangers in “sucking it up”. I will try to follow your excellent advice. Sadly, I rarely hear the reasoned expressions of disappointment to which you refer, probably because they are drowned by the unreasoned expressions of rage which are rather more common.
I appreciate that in the calm of this excellently run bar, those criticisms are likely to be more audible than elsewhere; maybe the sound of rage that I hear is coming in through the windows.
Cynic – Why do you think a bottle of milk is worth 10p? Have you worked, for twenty years or so, in a job that required you to assess its value?
Good to see lots of new faces in the bar tonight, and a few old ones too.
Meditation mats are in the far corner. Green tea is on tap and I’ve a mantra to share that’ll allow you to spend the next three days playing keepy up on the astral plane, well away from media, old and new.
Bitch of a day, absolutely nothing went right. Ref had a howler, but we have to be able to deal with that and Kos (who i dearly love) should know better. Players have to pick themselves up now and go again. I hope they have more bollocks than some of the support.
All the rest – I’ll give my view on 2 sept. Until then, I’m just behind the team and that’s that. I think they need us right now.
COYG and Ommmmmmmm
It doesn’t matter if I had. The going rate is dictated by the person doing the selling. If I don’t agree with the price, I either buy it and take the pain, but have drinkable tea and cereal in the morning or I refuse and have to make do with shitty black tea and toast.
Toast that has shit like Utterly Butterly on it, if I don’t pay the going rate and enjoy lovely butter.
At the end of the day you pay the going rate for things or you have to make do with shit that will do a reasonable job but is ultimately unsatisfying and unpleasant.
Oh Pangloss, thanks for the drink and pls stop talking too much sense and allow people whine. People have their mind already made up, you can’t convince anybody to change their mind, at least not today.
Milk farmers are forced to sell milk almost at a loss to the big supermarkets, so fuck knows where this 10p valuation comes? Bloody tight Arse! 🙂
What can I say, Norris. Arsene Wenger is my mentor.
Anyway, got to go. Wake up folks, before it is far too later than it already is. Demand more. You’re worth it
(L’Oreal is expensive as well but fucked if I’m using Aldi Apple Shampoo)
Good night
Thank you, Cent for asking so nicely. I’ve been looking for an excuse to find a dark hole to crawl into and hide in for a bit. I’ll, err, get my coat.
Lurky @ 248
Spot on.
Might be time to line the pitch with bonsai trees.
Cent
That’s the thing tho… I would love my mind to be changed! I dearly want Wenger to come good, to reclaim his mantle, to shut up all those clueless never done it pundits and hacks who he is allowing to assume the high ground, saying, we told ya so…. Twats like Savage, Durham, Samuels and the rest of em… I’d dearly love the boss to rub their noses in it instead of vice versa.
But this summer, so far, hasn’t shown that is a realistic prospect.
I don’t want him to leave, being hounded out like some low life common spud manager…
Its hard to look at today’s defeat and the lack of transfers as separate issues at this point. If we had gone on to win today (saved the first penalty, cazorla’s shot off the post bounced in instead of out, ref didn’t mess up as bad as he did – small margins), the transfer problems being highlighted above would still be present, but be a separate issue, and to me that is how it must be viewed. The decisions today robbed us of points, we were unlucky to lose. Going from 1 all with us dominating, to being a goal down and a man down, there was only going to be one outcome.
The real issue at this early stage is the threadbare squad. With our injuries seemingly heading back to the usual alarmingly high levels after a relatively better year last year, we need even more cover.
The next two weeks are immense not just for Wenger but for the club as a whole. The Champions league qualifiers are must-wins, transfers need to be completed, and we have two derbies to contest.
At least football is back.
Pangloss — Let us start with the position that we should not spend money that we don’t earn or don’t have. Even though speculate-through-debt is an appealing idea — and unfortunately is the financial zeitgeist today especially with people in charge of our economic affairs — for a football club it is akin to gambling and can have serious repercussions. So let us not spend what we don’t have.
But then when we choose to spend what we have, and if we want to ‘move up’ and buy something for that reason we surely cannot blame the market for not lowering the price to what we estimate. You can choose not to buy, of course, but then you will not have that desired good, equally obviously.
To continue your house buying example to its logical conclusion: say you are leaving in a overcrowded old house that is costing you too much to repair and your neighborhood is not quite what it used to be, for the sake of your and your children’s well being you really need to a bigger house in a different location, you can complain all you want about the bloated real estate market, but you won’t be able to make that move happen unless you play with the market. So either you stay in a place and in a situation not to your liking or you play with the market, or , or, you wait until the market calibrates itself to what you think is the true valuation.
I think we plan on doing the latter, but the question is how long are you to wait? When do you make teh decision that the market is not going to calibrate anytime soon?
Pangloss with good sense @292. I love this bar.
One loss doesn’t ruin a season.
A fucking shower of shit !! No more excuses enough !!
Cent @ 302 — It is a little too condescending to tarnish all critical comments as ‘whine’ . I think most (not all) criticisms in this establishment today has been measured and reasonable.
Can you honestly look back at the match and say that we would not have a MUCH better chance of not conceding any of those goals (referee notwithstanding) if there were a quality, experienced DM playing in front of the back line? Look at your DVR recording of the match again, or later at Arsenal player, and you would see that those are precisely the types of situations a real DM is there to protect against.
I love Ramsey & Jack, but they are different types of player, and don’t have that tactical discipline.
This was also blatantly obvious in the Emirates Cup whenever we played without Arteta.
It is one thing to be optimist, generous, patient. Another thing entirely to ignore the obvious.
Good post, TJ.
Norris, you don’t need anybody to talk to you for your mind to change, what you just need to do is take a step back from all the morass facing us now and think things through for yourself, this article might help you http://waynegooney18.tumblr.com/post/583659046 everything is not perfect at Arsenal but things are way better than they’re made out to be and could definitely have been worse.
Inexplicable loss to a side with class so far below our own.
Were all seaching for a salve. And bloody pissed off.
Lets not all jump to conclusions.
I for one am glad Bac – my main man Bacary Sagna – is ok and walked off the picth. That was a potential neck breaker. Benteke totally leaned into him. Oh and btw AFC defense kept him largley quiet.
There were other problems, sure. But benetke wasnt the problem. That useless, cheating fuck. (Read here: do NOT mess with the Bacinator). And above someone said he had a bad day, well, i humbly disagree. He worked his socks off as usual and was put of position balf thematch.
Anyway gooners, lets not lose our shit. Set back: yes. Maddening: definitely. Bar day at the office. Lets not get all twisted up.
Drinks on my tab. Lars has been so generous, let me pitch in today!
The FA cup is ours this time. And well finish top two. Thats right – i said it.
BTM …i need back up – Where are you???
ROAR !!!!
Bloody great start to the season those in red and white should be ashamed with the this sort of performance.
Fucking awful!
Homer @ 314: Sagna has injuries: http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/wenger-on-villa-injuries-and-transfers . So does apparently TR7, Gibbo, Ox . 🙁
Dr F, there is a reason I did not pick on anyone in particular, of course there have been measured criticism and I have absolutely no problems with that but if anybody thinks the shoe fits let them lace it up and wear the fuck out of it!
In other news,
1. Carlos Vela scored for Sociedad.
2. RVP had just scored a brace.
3. Prepare for Gervais hat-trick in Italy.
Make of that what you will.
In other-other news.
The voices on the street are that Sagna, Gibbs, Wilshere, Rosicky, Ox, Ramsey are doubtful for Wednesday.
Add to that injured Arteta, Vermaelen, Diaby, Monreal, etc.
Not that I am worried in any way. I am slowly drinking my tea while reading beautiful koans.
Pangloss @ 292
Sorry for the delay in service, I was actually reading back everything that I had written in the hope of finding the part where I even claim, let alone state as proven fact, that we have not tried to sign anybody whilst also trying to keep up with the events at Swansea (a team renowned for how hard they are to beat at home – or so I had rammed down my throat the las time we failed dismally to secure a win against them). That Van Persie really is something, isn’t he? Obviously he is yet another in a list of unavailable players as. even more obviously, there is no way a club trying to win trophies would actually sell him, let alone to a direct rival like us.
And therein lies ALL of the problem. Time after time we sell the very best players in their respective positions in all of the league and have absolutely NO PLAN WHATSOEVER to replace them. That is basic negligence.
The best thing about your house buying example is that it only serves to yet further prove my point…YOU do not decide what you think a house is worth, the MARKET does. You may offer something in the region of what you think you will end up paying but inevitably, after a period of negotiation in which all parties have to feel that they are getting the required value, you pay roughly what the market dictates. Buying a bargain house is usually a huge headache in that there is usually a reason why somebody is happy to let a house go for less than everybody thinks that they should. (Injury prone, inconsistent houses for example!)
That is why the price rise and fall so often and so violently. The market will ALWAYS be a free market at its base level and thus refusing to pay what is simply the going rate for a house will simply render you homeless.
Regarding your position (yes, that is the word I was after!) I do not believe that splashing the cash is the solution. I believe that actually having a plan in place, NOT crowing at the press about how rich we are BEFORE signing anybody and then leaving it all until the very last minute thinking that any other manager would be quite so stupid as to sell us a quality player so late in the day for anything less than a ridiculous price is a plan. Surely a better plan than the one in place for the past decade.
Finally, I have just seen some guy called Bony knock a composed finish past a quality goalkeeper from a position very similar to that of Rosicky’s today when he blazed it high and wide. Thank Dennis he didn’t score 31 goals in 30 games last season in Holland and sign for Swansea for a transfer fee of £12m or the fans of Arsenal could be forgiven for thinking that there are (were) players available that could actually improve our team for reasonable prices. He is playing with some guy called Michu who doesn’t look too shabby either. Imagine if he had been bought for only £2m?! We could be even talking about how consecutive Swansea City managers have a better eye for a bargain than our illustrious gaffer.
What a load of old bollocks all this is when you really think about it.
Cynic @ 295:
Thank you and totally agree with you, word for word.
Taken for mugs, all of us.
Chamberlain out till November.
Just mentioning. Not that I am worried at all. These koans are wonderful, the sun is shining my corner of the zen garden, all is calm and quiet.
Doctor Faustus @ 297:
Not at all sir, was just following on with the irony theme!
A drink on my tab to show there are no hard feelings 🙂
Cent @ 317 — See, despite your best attempts you are still angry inside, and an anger which triggered by the result today. You are expressing that at those who have over-reacted (yours, and I may share your opinion) but the cause of the anger is the result.
We try our best to rationalize this Arsenal/football addiction, but deep at heart it is a form of inescapable irrationality verging on mild psychosis/neurosis .
It is Arsene’s job to take a distance from the emotions. But for fans the responses would be as varied as the spectrum of human types, it is a job of reasonable minded fans to take distance from others’ ‘over-reaction’ but let them have their say without prejudice.
Anyway, I am off for the day. Sunny afternoon here in Boston.
Injuries and cards far worse than the actual result today.
Whatever our mistakes this summer (and, lord, there have been some), losing four players to injury in the opening game of the season, when you’ve already lost your skipper the week before, is fucking cruel.
Cent’Berry @ 302:
How wrong could you possibly be whilst intending to show how much better and open-minded you are than everybody else here.
For the record Wenger and Co. PLC have had 9 years to change all the minds in the world. I worked really hard to become this despondent about our team, our manager, our board and our future and changing my mind was the hardest thing to do, even when I knew, deep down, that I had to change it.
To accuse me or anybody else of being closed-minded after the amount of support that Wenger and Co. PLC have enjoyed and for the length of time, without ANY worthwhile end product to show for it, is flippant and rude of you and I expect more and better from the members of this fine establishment.
Now, off you go and tell me why I am so very wrong again…
Norris @ 307:
EXACTLY the point I have been trying to avoid making for the past 2 years. I genuinely believed that Wenger and Co. PLC had a plan that, eventually, would see us with a decent enough stash of cash that we could get rid of the shite and replace it with the quality players needed to actually, at the very least, challenge for a trophy or two…
…Sadly that time has passed. I no longer believe anything other than they are a bunch of wizards behind the curtain and their lies are designed to obscure the fact that the are nothing more than ordinary men making extraordinary salaries for less than ordinary results.
But yes, I felt exactly the same way you do right now for a very long time indeed.
Well fuck me. Thanks for the heads up Dr F.
Hey, at least hes alive. And walking. That makes me happy.
Time to go to the Jameson then.
Football … Bloody hell.
N7
“Losing four players to injury in the opening game of the season, when you’ve already lost your skipper the week before, is fucking cruel.”
I think the word you are looking for is not cruel, but deserved. Well deserved and quite logical. That is what you get when you have a 14-players squad and want to play 6 games in 2 weeks with them?
Dr. Faustus spot on regarding Coquelin. Why he is loaned, considering he is not replaced, is still a mystery for me, just like many things this summer, including lies, bad moves, lack of plan, stupidity, ineptness, did I mention lies.
Not that I really care. Just a thought that pass on me while contemplating .
Cent’Berry @ 313:
You are actually directing traffic from this bar to the page of the most ridiculous lunatic ever to claim to be a Gooner!
This guy claimed that “Cesc signed, Rooney done, Suarez done, Fellaini offer accepted”.
He has, of course, been deleting ALL of his tweets on a daily basis so as to now claim that “Cesc done but cannot unveil him to the press until some other things happen. Rooney agreed terms but United haven’t accepted the offer, Suarez wants to come but we have to qualify for the Champions League proper to activate “the clause” (the clause that the premier league have read and have categorically stated ONLY forces Liverpool to inform the player that there has been an offer) and Fellaini wanted too much in wages.
If he is actually for real he is the most absurdly deluded Gooner of them all or Ivan Gazidis’ son and we will all be laughing all the way to the Champions league winners circle after completing the signings of the century from all of our rivals or he is a seriously disturbed young man who has found a great way to garner attention on Twitter.
For me, he is a regular looney with a penchant for writing things that he knows that people WANT TO HEAR, whether they are true, lies, ridiculous or credible. Mix all of tha up at once and the next thing you know, you are the chosen one!!!
His article that you link to is so riddled with holes it is laughable. So many errors of history, so many assumptions made without ANY actual evidence other than the unquoted sources in the press that we have suffered the brunt of for years on end and it is nothing more than a foolish attempt to get people to spend MORE time believing that Wenger and Co. PLC do actually have a plan at all and that he is, in some amazing way, privy to it all.
Taken for mugs by Wenger and Co. PLC and now by a 14 year old with a reasonable command of the English language.
This just gets worse!
Lurky
Totally agree re: Coquelin, but I think losing four first team players in the first game of the season is bad luck in anyone’s language.
Not having adequate (or any) stand ins for them, that’s another story…
“I believe as well we could have won the game with the players that are on the pitch, and that’s the most important thing to focus on.”
No, the most important thing to focus on is that you didn’t.
I made the mistake of reading the comments on Le Grove this morning before the game and it was toxic. Fuck knows what it’s like now.
But, the rants following the game today are not surprising. I was going to say that you couldn’t make it up:
A threadbare squad, already lacking depth all over the pitch, but especially in defence, is fucked over even more by injury and suspension. Somewhat predictable.
Butbit it didn’t need to happen. Get rid of the players that weren’t good enough, but surely do so only when you have replacements. And please don’t talk about super, super quality. We were beaten by Villa. At home.
I have nothing but admiration for AW. But he’s making it fucking difficult for me to continue believing in him.
Just watched the post match interview on the BBC. Same old guff.
Spirit, gave absolutely everything, quality, attitude, spirit etc
N7,
I agree, bad luck.
However we were riding the Lady Luck in the final months of the last season.
This summer we should have bought her a beautiful diamond ring, a par of golden earrings and a new branded dress.
Instead we kicked her in her ass with our arrogance and self-obsession.
Now, excuse me, off to get drunk, this zen thing is not my cup of tea.
Doctor Faustus @ 316:
Was literally just reading that. Full to brimming with Arsene classics such as:
“I’m absolutely hugely disappointed because we’ve come out of a 10-game run in the last season without any defeat and we start the new season with a defeat at home.”
Lest we forget that Arsene has been living off past “glories” for so long, we are reminded that last season, by the thinnest of skin of our most rotten of teeth, we clawed our way into a ECL qualifier.
Just in case that one flew over our heads, we get this next gem…
“It’s a massive blow and that’s why the solution is not to sit here and say, ‘Yes we’ll buy and keep you happy’. What is important for us is to win football games with the players who are on the pitch and continue with what we did last year at the end of the season.”
BUT WE DIDN’T WIN WITH THOSE FUCKING PLAYERS ON THAT FUCKING PITCH, DID WE ARSENE?!??! WE DIDN’T WIN ANYTHING LAST SEASON EITHER WITH THE SAME FUCKING PLAYERS ON THE SAME FUCKING PITCH. FURTHERMORE WE DIDN’T CONTINUE WITH WHAT WE DID LAST YEAR, WE FUCKING LOST 3-1 AT HOME TO A RANK MID-TABLE TEAM.
“Could we have won the game with the players that were on the pitch today? That’s for me the real question. And I say yes.”
Yet again, as if to ram home the unreality nail, we get the same old bollcks. Why Arsene? Because you are completely deluded?!??! Nothing could be more obvious than the fact that the group of players we put out today didn’t have the tactical knowledge, discipline, patience or skill to break down yet another two banks of 5 resolute, strong defensive performance by a team visiting our beautifully furnished, comfy and HIGHLY profitable home.
“We want our fans to be happy…My job is to make the fans happy. We haven’t lost the game because of that. That’s what I just want to convince you of.”
Go on then…Convince me…
“…we are on the market, everybody knows that we are ready to buy players. Everybody knows. Until we buy players, we have to win football games and it’s not an excuse not to have bought players to have lost the game.”
EVERYBODY KNOWS…?! EVERYBODY KNOWS…? I simply cannot shake the idea that this is such an enormous lie that the whole Suarez saga was designed in the full knowledge that Liverpool would never sell him to us and so it was a perfect way of making sure that “everybody knows” without actually doing a single fucking thing to correct the issue…WE DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH QUALITY PLAYERS TO WIN ANYTHING AT ALL, EVER! Not even the poxy Emirates Cup after getting destroyed by Drogba, yet again.
Sorry, NOT convinced.
“After that, if we do not spend the money, it’s because we do not find the players.”
Players? What players? There are players?! That kick balls and score goals and win tackles and know stuff like how to drink our of a lucozade bottle without actually putting it within a foot of your mouth?! Best get us a few of those. Oh, wait, we can’t? Why not…Oh, there aren’t any and it was all a terribly disturbing dream.
“I’m not the only one to work on that. We are a team who work on that. We are ready to buy the players if we find that the players are good enough for us. That’s all we can tell you.”
Woah there Nelly…..What the feck is that?! How come we are suddenly, well, “WE”?! How come “we” are a team of people trying to find players? Is there a typically managed and planned anti-Arsene agenda at work so that we may forgive him for all of this bollocks after all and blame the owner? The owner that has done nothing but demonstrate an “I give a fuck” attitude since the day he chose to never, EVER address ANY of the problems facing the club from the fans perspective?! Like, it’s all “their” fault and “they” don’t really care as they have so clearly demonstrated so tough shit.
PS – My new contract will have a huge, market-defying pay rise included without any obvious results to back that up but i will refuse stubbornly to pay anything like the going market rate for the players that we so obviously need to achieve the results required to justify such a pay rise…
Boom tish, see what I did there?!
Ah, fuck it, I could take that interview to the cleaners all day long. Any of us could, should we choose to. Obviously the sand with head placed firmly inside is the position of choice for most of us these days. Maybe a bit of sand is just what is needed right now because sense or logic is NOT something we are going to get.
Dr F, have a great day out.
Thierry Wrightkamp @252, get over yourself will you? Did I really “belittle anybody with an opinion of just how disgraceful their performance was blah, blah, blah”….by stating an over-reaction was coming? You’ve just spent the better part of the last three hours ranting, raving and over-reacting over one match (I know, you will say it’s the last nine years!). I am not going to “move aside” as I did not enjoy today’s match anymore than you did.
Certainly appreciate your passion but you need to have a drink (on me) and be ready to support on Wednesday.
Look forward to hearing from you when we turn things around, which we will.
Just checking in. TW, I agree with almost everything you have articulated over these pages. The last few months have been an embarrassing shambles. A total mess. So we start the season embarrassing short and run the risk of losing even more. If the best we can do is to suck it up and cross our fingers then we have gone from being fucked to proper fucked. I genuinely have no idea anymore who is responsible for what. The club seems leaderless and totally rudderless. I have little to no idea what is going on anymore.
The squad is as thin and devoid of quality as I can ever remember. People say a plus is that we have not lost anyone. The fact is that we have nothing left that is of interest to the big boys.
Higuain should have been an arsenal player. We should have agreed the deal and paid the asking price. Good management involves the odd sacrifice. We should have bit the bullet and sealed the deal. Apart from us ending up with a top quality signing it also sends a message to others that we mean business.
I can’t remember who it was above that compared transfers with house prices. They asked if it was ridiculous to pay 275k for a house valued at 250k. Well the answer is it depends on how much you want the house. It’s simple supply and demand. If it is your dream house and you intend to settle there for the next 25 years then it is a bargain. Ask the mancs if 25 million is too much for an injury prone 29 year old???? I’m guessing you will get a pretty unanimous response.
I have never felt this disillusioned about the whole club as I do now. I feel totally and utterly let down. To say lets wait until September 2nd just does not work for me. We have a really tough qualifier coming up. If we fail to get through that then I dread to think what will happen. Just to sit back and keep your fingers crossed I’m afraid is just burying your head deeper and deeper in the sand. People need to wake up to the reality of it all and they need to wake up now.
Bmgedo. I am interested to know how you think that this squad will turn things around? I say that because I just can’t see it, and I really don’t see us having the time now to deal with the squad deficiencies. Just my opinion of courses
Steve T, I hear all you say and I agree with some of what you say, I just have one question; after waking up to the reality what do we do next to make the situation better?
Sorry, one other point. How is signing no one being active in the transfer market?????? I might look through the Ferrari showroom window but it doesn’t mean I have bought one????? I can look at as many cars as I want but if the end result is that I’m still walking then it has hardly been an active search???????
Cent. I will be totally honest and say that at this stage I don’t really know. I know what in my opinion should have been done but I am with TW. This is not something that has just happened. This had been building up for years now. The fact is that we are not a big club anymore. We have mildly surrendered that status. At the end of May I had answers. By mid August I really do not know how we claw this back anymore. This is not just about today for me. This is the culmination of years and years of mismanagement.
Be the best you can be. It’s all I have ever asked. Sadly, I don’t remember us ever being further away.
bmgedo:
I accept the drink, from one Gooner to another, but I would like to qualify my point in a calmer manner so that it may be understood.
The use of the words “over-reaction” are sufficiently powerful in the world of AFC these days as to be used to completely negate any opinion that is different from the Arsenal Formula driven opinion. It is unnecesarily and widely used in a bid to belittle anybody that sees fit to feel differently about our club. It is destructive to any form of real debate and we are, I believe, invited here to debate in this fine bar, are we not?
Furthermore, actually pointing out that any difference of opinion from anybody would be an over-reaction immediately after the game IS trite. It is also ungentlemanly in the great spirit of the aforementioned, invited debate.
That said, I think that you misunderstand fully one point…I am NOT a fair-weather fan and I am NOT only here when things are bad. The reality, as I see it, is that we haven’t “turned things around” for 9 years now. The inexorable slide into mediocrity is something that I have been feeling, seeing and experiencing since the very first time I wrote a piece regarding Vieira’s departure from the club with any plan for a replacement in such a pivotal position. EVERY SINGLE ONE of 137 comments that followed that piece took me to the cleaners. How could i have been so negative. How could I want the club to fail. How could I even dare to question Wenger when he has done so much for us all.
And from that day on, all these years later, until this morning I was still, regardless of other people’s opinion of my mindset, desires, wishes or affiliations, totally willing to say thank Dennis for that Wenger has fixed it.
Today I have changed my mind. Read back over previous posts at the end of last season if you do not believe me. Even then, when all was obviously in such a bad state, I STILL refused to call for the change that I now see as inevitable. I am still not for one moment thinking that we will actually do anything about it either. Come the end of the season we will get all the usual rubbish about Wenger’s hands being tied, this time by a Scrooge-like board and owner, and the whole Usmanov debate will rage again nd we can all go back to feeling lucky that AW once won stuff for us, Stan Kroenke hasn’t sold us to the bastard Usmanov and “competing” for 4th place is like winning a trophy.
I just don’t see the current structure doing what is necessary to put together a side capable of at least a challenge on one or two fronts. Fuck, a Carling Cup would seem like winning the World Cup right now. Even BIRMINGHAM can say they have managed that more recently than us, although we all know that, to our emotional expense.
I apologise if you feel that I am ranting, or indeed if I actually am ranting, but I also feel that speaking what you feel is a healthy part of the emotional healing process and I also believe that silently reading, time after time after time, how lucky we are when i believe that we are no longer right to feel that way, waiting for the change to occur so that I can say “Phew, that all feels a lot better now, doesn’t it” is the way to eat yourself up and cause untold damage to your emotional well-being.
Maybe I am unreasonably “guided” by the irrational love that I have for Arsenal Football Club. Maybe my expectations are totally ludicrous and a company with £170m in the bank should actually ignore the gaping holes in the personnel available to achieve the day to day work required to make that company a success. Maybe I am just downright wrong and Arsene Wenger & Co. PLC really do have a master plan that involves us becoming successful once more.
Maybe, but the time to believe that those of us that are tired of the lies, broken promises, raised salaries and hiked ticket prices are so very wrong has passed. The time to wish is dead. Wenger 1.0 will always be one of the greatest managers the game has ever seen, but version 2.0 just has too many bugs.
I hope that is a little more “balanced” for you. If not, well, tough! It’s the best I have!
The drink was great and, whilst i am ordering another, I respectfully offer to buy you one too 🙂
Steve T, I love an honest man. I agree with you that this did not happen overnight but unlike you I do not see it as a result of years of mismanagement but as the price we have to pay for deciding to build a new home with OUR money. There are things we could have done better but then there are also a whole lot things we did better and they outweigh the things the did badly by far.
Let me begin with Wenger’s opening paragraph of his programme notes today.
“Welcome back for a game that we have all been gearing up towards since the Premier League fixtures were announced in June(please particularly note that last bit..we have been preparing for today for two months. Lord help us if the game was just sprung on us!!!!)
I will return to this theme of unpreparedness but first I want to acknowledge some exceptionally passionate and lucid outpourings from Thierry and Dr F particularly. I was sharing some of this thinking with Gooners travelling back from the match and in the rather unstructured way that discussions take place after games I received lots of nods and comments of hear.. hear. I feel your pain Thierry and believe me so did lots of Gooners. It was an awful day made worse by a poor refereeing display and one pivotalquite wrong decision but we only played for about twenty minutes and manifestly lacked organisation,characters and passion (I’m looking at you Theo).
At the end of the game Mertesacker applauded the fans and Jack walked around the ground applauding all the remainining Arsenal fans. He was utterly exhausted,running on empty since the 70 th minute but he cared about the performance and was apologising to the supporters. Most players bolted down the tunnel although the admirable TR7 who was by far our best player had every reason to seek the solace of a warm hydro bath or whatever they have after games nowadays.
The big problem was that yet again we have totally misjudged and mistimed our pre-season. Unless Fenerbache are thrown out there is a grave risk that we will not be playing Champions League football this season. Not because of the performance today but simply because we just won’t have a credible team to represent us.
Sagna,Gibbs and the Ox (who played well)all went off with quite nasty injuries and Ramsey was limping for the last part of the game after the foul that got Benteke booked. I understand TR7 is feeling an injury and LJW is knackered as referenced earlier….oh and Santi is clearly not match sharp. So Mr.Wenger I am relieved you focused so thoroughly or we would have been totally unprepared for the new season! What a threatening and versatile bench we had today with one defender on it.
Something struck me tonight when I was trying to rationalise how we could find ourselves unable to build an adequate squad for two out of the last three close seasons. We ought to realise that Wenger’s achievements have to be coupled with those of Dein. They are inseparable in that they complemented each other perfectly. The Wenger flair with frequent indecision neutralised by the Dein business nous. I have never understood why Dein has received so little credit other than his association with Usmanov (and perhaps his earlier intro to Kroenke!)He was an integral part of our success and we have not replaced him. Gazidis finds it hard to criticise or control a man who interviewed him for the job and who earns a healthy multiple of his salary and he is not very proactive in the way that Dein was in suggesting new players for the team. Gazidis has let us start two recent seasons in a state of complete unpreparedness .
Over the next week we must sign two or three players simply to put a competitive team on the pitch at Fulham. We have only one available CB if he comes unscathed through Wednesday and no LBs.
I suspect our desperation will make signing those players within Wenger’s parameters of value even harder to achieve
I tried to kid myself I was excited about the new season but as I got to the ground today I met so many others (similar to the drinkers here who both love and understand our club…and we were all worried and incredulous in equal measure. I thought the crowd were pretty decent today only slagging Wenger when the game had clearly gone but boy do I hate the modern predilection for leaving with twenty minutes left if your team is losing. Sadly I feel we may often have a half-filled stadium for the last ten minutes of games this season. What an awful and totally avoidable state of affairs
Steve T: You’re right. We don’t look that good and after today’s injuries and suspensions we’re only going to get worse.
Sagna at LB. Almunia-like goalkeeping. Injuries. Suspensions. Bad luck yes. But pretty piss-poor management not to have supplemented an already threadbare squad.
Super, super quality. Its arrogance. No one thinks our starting 11 is super, super quality, but to suggest it is, is delusional. Spending an additional couple of million to get decent players is what big clubs do. What do we do? We fart-arse about, quibbling over fees, but what value do you put on a home loss to Villa?
I don’t understand the complete inaction. I don’t understand why this has been allowed to happen. Spend an additional 15M on players like Gustavo and Williams than you think they’re worth, because, hey, guess what, we need them.
I feel totally let down. Not by the players, but by AW. This is his mess and he needs to sort out. Sharpish
Steve T:
“we have gone from being fucked to proper fucked.”
That!
Reading through your posts, I understand exactly what you are saying. I don’t see where any possible improvement can come from without at least 5, 6 o maybe even 7 quality players coming in, at least two of them world class players, and we ALL know that simply will not happen.
I too find the house-buying example bewildering, especially given the inflation-busting wage increases that we give AW every time his contract renewal comes up. Obviously the tooth fairy leaves the extra cash under his pillow and it is not us, the foundation of the club, the reason it was even viable to build the new stadium in the first place that foot the bill.
Active buying Ferraris is indeed a most expensive business and one that shows immediate and noticeable results. Looking around the whole garage and then claiming there are no Ferraris that are good enough for you just makes you a wanker, in my opinion and what you would truly deserve would be a clapped out old Mark II Escort Mexico with a pretty paint job that goes REALLY fast in a straight line but is fucking dreadful in the corners and, if it gets you home at all, it will be a case of limping it into the driveway on three cylinders, a wish and a prayer.
But it’s ok, because the Mexico was once considered a great car even if it is a piece of junk now that as not changed as all around it has been forced to by the general market, the desire of the buyer and the different equipment available that didn’t exist when it was a genuine success.
How’s that for an analogy?!??! 🙂
Finally, “Be the best you can be. It’s all I have ever asked. Sadly, I don’t remember us ever being further away.”
That is so perfectly stated and so BADLY misunderstood by those that will surely attempt to negate that comment with spurious examples of trophy-less decades in dark days past. Yes, we have had worse teams, worse stadia, worse managers and an emptier trophy cabinet, but we didn’t have the resources nor the fans paying top, top, top dollar to achieve a great deal more. The point is not to be the very best in the world all the time, but the very best that you can be given all that must be taken into account.
We bought a Mexico with £170m in the bank.
That is NOT the best that we can be.
We worked hard to make the money we have now it would be naive, in my opinion, to spend it in a rash, I’d rather the club took their time and after careful consideration/consultations bought players they are sure of than try to appease us and end up spurning the money on Jordan Hendersons, Charlie Adams, Fernando Torres and Stewart Downings of this world, if this approach costs us points in the meantime then so be it.
Cent: It’ll cost us a whole heap more than points. It’ll cost us money, support and prestige. Can’t imagine that many super, super quality players would find us appealing
thundertinygooner @ 346:
I genuinely still miss the days when I used to walk to the stadium and discuss the truly honest feelings of Gooners of all races, colours and creeds. Huge difference of opinion was rife even then, but dealt with in a much less divisive manner than the internet provides for. It appears that may still be alive and kicking and, should I find my way back to London in the future, I will do all I can, of course, to get to a game and experience it once again.
I agree that the team are absolutely not to blame and so turning your backs on them is not the answer, certainly not 20 minutes before the end of the match. If someone wishes to make a statement, surely that can be done by simply not going to the match at all. Hurting the pride of the players who have been actively calling for new signings all summer long is just selfish and short-sighted. If there is nobody in the stadium at the beginning of the match they will be pissed at the management for the state of things, and rightly so. If people leave before the end they will simply be pissed at the fans and that is clearly NOT the intended message, or at least i hope it isn’t.
Wenger built (destroyed?) this team and the players put on the team sheet cannot be responsible for not being good enough to beat Aston Villa if they are exactly that, collectively not good enough.
Thank you for sharing your experience of the day. Thank you for your honesty. Thank you for your empathy.
You have actually cheered me up a little!
Whatever you are drinking and one of the same for me 🙂
Leave it Cent. You aren’t going to convince anyone, neither of us is. Much the same as no-one is going to convince either of us. We all hold our opinions equally honestly and equally tenaciously. It’s a shame that it has come to the point where opinions are this deeply entrenched, but that is, indeed the point we have come to.
Several possible options as to how to deal with our disappointment:
i) Turn inward;
ii) Discuss the reasons for our disappointment calmly and rationally;
iii) State our positions, respect others’ and wait for better days;
iv) State our positions repeatedly and increasingly shrilly;
v) Rant
Dr F would have us go with ii), I’d like to as well, but I just don’t think it’s possible.
TW – my last contribution crossed with yours at 351. I’m surprised by our unanimity. Do you think the barman spiked our earlier drinks?
Cent
How much time do you want to give this management team to make signings. They’ve had months to put deals in place. They should be continually assessing team-building needs and what will happen now is either a trolley dash a la 2011 or throwing in kids who will be publicly stuffed and ruined. sadly (and boy does this hurt to write) look at what Spurs have done this close season even with the distraction of the Bale likely exodus. They’ve signed very decent level premiership quality and they have a squad which is much stronger than ours at the moment. They have a structure that works and while Levy can apparently be a devil to negotiate with they get deals done. If they get Willian and Coentrao and about £90 million for Bale we are in big trouble if we hope to finish above them.
While we’ve always managed to finish above them we won’t this season unless something drastic happens–and if Suarez joins Coutinho ,Sturridge and Sterling upfront for Liverpool (and they are afterWillian too we won’t catch the scousers either
Cent’Berry:
What is the point in putting the club on a strong financial footing if we are not going to “see something we have been planning for some time – the escalation in our financial fire-power.”
Why would Gazidis even say that if the plan were actually to destroy the league campaign in the first 10 matches and maybe even fail to qualify for the ECL?!
Last season the players danced on the pitch because we had secured a “Champions League Place”…What happens if we actually haven’t, after all? How much revenue is lost? How many players, players that apparently don’t even exist, will want to play for us without Champions League football? Then what do we do…Finish this season in about 8th position and try signing world-class players then? Fuck, it wouldn’t surprise me if LJW, Theo, Koscieny, Mertesacker, iPod and Cazorla were gone by the 2nd of July were that to be the case.
Lied to from start to finish. Project AFC is fast becoming nothing more than a cash-cow operation and we are the ones getting milked to pay for it.
The Rotter must be polishing his winners medal, preparing space for the next 2 or 3 and wondering why anybody was confused that he would want to leave!
We yet again go into the same old debate as always when things are not going well and let’s face it they are not, i know it’s only one game but you can’t get rid of thinking how many more blunders are on the way this season. Season after season we look as if Arsene is slowly loosing his touch. Yes times have changed and so many other things in football but for crying out loud where are these changes to make the squad better? We are slowly losing our status of a top European club and that is a fact!
Summer of promises turned out to be a complete pile of lies. At times we looked so bad even lesser teams will cope with us.
Too many excuses too many seasons the same old trend is being followed. This means one thing the management of the club is not up to scratch any more!
ST, TW and Cent
I have to say I can’t avoid feeling pretty much the same as you, and this is not me dooming the season on the basis of one game. The frustration stems from years and years of this shit, and the management team have brought a severe slating on their own heads.
I think we can safely say that a large part of what comes out of their mouths can be taken as smoke screen. Their excuses are feeble and shown up for the nonsense they are by the deals that have gone on under their noses.
Sorry management team, but I think you’ve cocked it up already. Damage limitation from here lads.
Pangloss,
No, I think you did in a bid to convince me!!!!!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
Have another sir!
Just to add to my whining it’s not just a one game it’s the first game of the season and being humiliated at home to Villa is shambles?!
As someone has mentioned above we should be beating Villa at home any time of the season! Especially when it’s the first game of the season!
Also as always Steve T couldn’t agree more!
Pangloss,
Actually, in a slightly more serious attempt to reply to the same question, I think that, like most Gooners, regardless of position, we are both fairly reasonable people with a lot of frustration hanging over us and, as we choose different ways to vent that frustration, it sometimes appears that we cannot actually agree on the source of the problem itself when, in reality, we all know what the problem is, we just differ on the solution.
Matt(2), I think we are saying the same thing with different words; it was always gonna cost us both in the short and long term, short term costs are that we will start some seasons having invested little or nothing on the playing staff or even selling some of them, long term costs are that we will under perform consistently for a period of time which will of course reduce our prestige but the difference is I believe we had to stoop this low to conquer and you think we’ve stooped too low already.
Hahaha, Pangloss mate, to think that I was kinda giving you the same advice a few minutes or hours ago, I think I will give it up now.
TW, you complete bastard. Who do you think you are you calling “fairly reasonable”? Have a bloody drink.
I don’t think you can lump this summer in with the 8 years which preceded it.
Gazidis comments in June made it quite clear that the manager operated with no money for the 8 years prior to this, and that the key goal in that period was continued presence in the champs league. Wenger delivered that, and I think he deserves credit for doing so, in the circumstances.
This summer, we were told, we would finally have real money to spend, and we wouldn’t be shy in doing so. Now, I have no idea what the fcuk has gone on since those comments in June, but clearly something has gone badly wrong. Statements have been made, wild statements, in anticipation of new arrivals who have not materialised. Players have been sent packing (namely Gerv, Coquelin and Miquel) in apparent anticipation of new players, who have also not materialised. From the outside, it looks a total clusterfuck, and today’s events (which – let’s be fair – were tinged with misfortune) have conspired to shine a direct spotlight right at the heart of said clusterfuck.
To be totally honest, I’m torn. On the one hand, I don’t think what’s gone wrong this summer is the same thing that’s gone wrong in summers past (I.e having no money). In fact, the only real link I can see between the two is the bad habits we have picked up during our period of prudence, and the difficulty we appear to be experiencing moving up the gears as a club. If the club is saying that our goal until now has been top 4, but we now genuinely intend to kick on, win things and spend money, and if we demonstrate a modicum of ambition in the next fortnight, I am minded to extend my patience a little further. I don’t think we can turn the ship around completely this season, but perhaps we can make a start.
On the other hand, the creeping feeling persists; we have been lucky to retain a top four spot the last two seasons (as good as the manager has been – and I do believe he’s been good given the available raw materials – you don’t keep overhauling big points gaps without others ahead of you cocking up), and we appear willing to test our luck a third time. It’s nearly two and a half years since the first chant of “spend some fucking money” and, bar a huge bid for Suarez, not a lot seems to have actually changed.
My guess is that the club is divided. I think the board is all over the place and I suspect that Ivan and Arsene do not see eye to eye. I also think Ivan is getting off lightly for his statements in June which, in retrospect, were fucking preposterous, entirely uncalled for and have made a bad situation far, far worse. Shocking performance from an operator of his sophistication, unless he was deliberately stirring the pot, which is almost as worrying a prospect.
I do think that now is the moment to get behind the team, and to wait and see what the next fortnight brings. I know not everyone agrees, and I respect that – I think we’re all deploying different coping mechanisms here. I don’t think we can change anything right now. I don’t think we should sack the manager after one game – in fact, I think any such talk is entirely moot; we aren’t going to turf out the most successful manager in the club’s history 9 months from the end of his contract no matter how many black bin bags are placed on seats.
If we hit 2 Sept without some major movements I think the moment will have come for a proper inquest. Until that time, I don’t feel we have all the data, and I think that any inquest is premature. The picture will look vastly different if, for example, we beat Fener and spend £60m on quality new players vs if we bomb out of the qualifier (which, lets face it, is a possibility) and don’t spend a penny. We need that information to form a proper picture of what’s gone on this summer.
So, I’m waiting. And, while I wait, I’m trying to remain calm, trying to remind myself that we’re only a point worse off than we were this time last season, and hoping for the best.
For those taking the other path, I only ask for a bit of respect. It’s not a case of sticking your head in the sand – we all know what the problems are, how could we possibly not? – it’s a case of waiting a little longer before reaching potentially the same conclusion. I don’t think that’s an insulting or preposterous position to take.
Oh, and I would also add that anyone who seems to be taking enjoyment in what’s currently going on, or proclaiming some sort of personal vindication, can cock off. I don’t aim that at anyone in the bar, I aim it at those elsewhere on the web who are tonight giving it the sage “told you so”s and fucking revelling in the injuries, red cards and such like.
With all that out my system, I shall attempt to return to my proper zen state until 2 Sept. Energies focused on roaring on what’s left of the team – because, lord knows, they need it right now. For what it’s worth, I will also remain behind the manager, until at least 2 Sept.
COYG
Hold on…I have just seen the light…
Fergie’s Fledgings lost the first game of the season 3-1 to Villa and then did the double.
Fuck Higuain, Fellaini, Rooney, Suarez and Cesar, what we need is Gnabry, Eisfled, Ryo, Sanogo and Zelalem!
Arsene knows 😉
Also: I don’t care if Van Persie wins the champs league and we get relegated, he can still fuck right off.
…and in the traditionally slightly more serious followup, TW I’m not sure I know “what the problem is”, so we probably don’t agree on the solution. I think both of us Care, with a capital ‘C’, in fact I think everyone here does. There are a couple of regular drinkers in this establishment who get right on my tits, I think they care too. I hope it’s not obvious who they are.
Very well said N7
TW @360 exactly! Most of us agree Arsene hasn’t been at his best but we all have different reasons why we think he is under performing.
Pangloss, somehow you have managed to make people laugh here tonight, well done!
Ttg, I believe they have a plan for this transfer window so I will wait till the window ends before I judge them. It’s true they had since the end of last season to sort it out but I understand that even the most rigid of plans can be changed to accommodate variables that the planners can’t influence.
Can I just say that this is not about today. Today is the catalyst. I have not seen any of today’s game bit from everything I have read we have been hard done by. But we should have the players to deal with it. For anyone that still does not get it take a look at our bench today. 2-1 down and chasing the game who on that bench can come on and change things? Who do you want to see warming up that can make a real diffetence???? This is game 1, not game 41.
There are those at the club who have spent years making their bed. Now they must lay in it.
N7 (363): Nice one mate.
I really hoped we wouldn’t have another season like last year, or the season before that. My patience has been eroded little by little over the last few years, but I’m still hopeful.
It’s just that this seems all horribly familiar…
Cent, very generous of you to trust there is a plan of some sort. It certainly seems like plan B or C to me, or that they’re hurriedly writing up D as we speak…
Pangloss,
I can be a real cunt when I want to be, can’t I?!??! 🙂
N7,
As ever you speak volumes of truth. I don’t necessarily agree that more time is needed, but then I didn’t think more time was needed about 2-21/2 years ago.
My problem is, if we arrive at the 2nd of September in basically the same shape we are in now, no amount of change CAN occur because the window will be closed and we will start the same old tired tosh about waiting until January. Then it will be wait until the end of the season to judge him.
We have been going through the same motions with the same predetermined but post-ignored milestones for years now. When is enough really, well, enough?
I get how stupid Gazidis was to even think of uttering those words. Foolish on so many levels but, and I ask this in all seriousness, if you did something akin to that in your job, would you not be looking for work right now? The only way that you would survive an event so excruciatingly idiotic would be if it were actually pre-planned in a bid to convince everyone that your intentions (or those of your employer) were different to the ones that you privately had and that it was part of a PR scam designed to hide those real intentions behind something far more yummy for your customers or that you were “shagging the boss” (so to speak!)
Seriously, I simply feel that the entire management structure of the club is totally at sea, without any form of plan and the longer we let them continue on this course the more difficult turning things around will be, if indeed possible at all.
A huge change is needed and, if that is not going to be on the playing side, it simply MUST be on the management side. That leaves us one real decision…
2nd of September, same players, same management, same problems;
or
2nd of September new player or new management and POSSIBLY the same problems.
That “possibly” is what leaves me with one choice.
Could somebody new fix it all? I doubt it. Would they be at least willing to try (and have about £70m or maybe more to get them started)? 100%
Sad times.
Just like I have been saying its time for we get to go. Guys,these clown of a management will NOT sign anybody decent. Why do u guys still trust and believe these guys? Loosing first fucking game of the season to Villa. These fools will end up signing some useless players and then think that will win them the league. At this rate with all the injuries we might not even make the CL
And on that rather sour note, I am going to work…
No rest for the wicked!
Thanks all for the time, the debate, the kind words and the other stuff!
Peace and love to you all.
You didn’t have to be a fucking genius to know that this team needed decent signings. This is just inept Management, unbelievable just unbelievable.
TW
I get all that, but you must know that there is zero chance of a new manager by 2 September? And that a new face at this juncture would cause huge disruption.
I get what you’re saying about the moving milestones, but it’s different for me (and many others) this time. I said in May that I didn’t care if we qualified for the champs league if we weren’t going to spend. At the time, I didn’t need £70m to be spent. £20-30m would have done me, just a sign that the 8 years of waiting had not been in vain. Anyway, I stand by that statement.
If all of this stadium stuff, all the penny pinching and risk taking, has been part of a grand plan that ends with us spending money, competing and (eventually) winning things, then they have my patience and support. Even if we win nothing this season, even if it takes a bit of time, even if there are teething problems as we adjust to a actually having a bob or two.
However, If there is no master plan, if we’ve been lied to for the last decade (as you suspect we have been), if the promise of a better future is nothing more than a lie… well then I’ll be one pissed off zen master, and I’ll want the fuckers responsible drummed out.
I will have a much better sense of what we’re dealing with come 2 Sept 2013. So… I wait a little longer.
Evening Holic’s
Lloris
Walker
Capoue
Kaboul
Vertonghen
Sandro
Dembele
Paulhino
Lennon
Soldado
Bale
See you in a couple of weeks
Have a nice evening!
Haha, Porco, even if plan D doesn’t work there are 22 more alphabets and infinite numbers remaining. 😉
*Appluads Zen7’s 363.
N7
Very good stuff,I think your approach is the only one we can take. I am ambivalent about watching MOTD with the snivelling Lineker and laconic Hansen who we will have royally upset this summer but I’d like to see a couple of the incidents again and also see if they focus on the awful refereeing or just crucify Wenger.
Wenger deserves the criticism he gets for his appalling mismanagement of this transfer window but this game was the game from hell. I’m only surprised the ball hit the post and stayed out in the second half.
Not sure if I believe in karma but if I did Wenger certainly was given a big dose this afternoon. Let’s pray we can survive in Turkey and get some players in asap of requisite quality. I suspect we may well see just how special Zelalem is much sooner than we expected.
Expect Flamini and Bendtner at Fulham next week
Cunt
Cunt
Cunt
Cunt
Cunt
Cunt
Cunt
Cunt
Cunt
Cunt
Cunt
That was in reply to 377
Thierry you’ve been missed.
Cynic
That’s going to look really nasty when Holic bounces the bad smell 🙂
I can’t remember feeling so depressed following the opening game of the season.
We were ought fought, outplayed and outrun by what is a fairly average Villa side.
The refereeing certainly didn’t help but we can’t blame the referee for the current state of our squad. One thing that I think most football people would agree is that at the end of any season any football manager needs to review the season just past and assess his squad of players and how and in what areas it needs strengthening, having done this the manager then identifies his transfer targets – first choice, second choice and so on – he then goes out and completes the necessary business EARLY. Why, why, why does it seem impossible for our club to do this any more? We used to!
I am an Arsenal fan, have been for the best part of 30 odd years and will continue to be so but I find myself, really for the first time, questioning what the club is about, where it thinks it is going and how it thinks it will get there. I bought in to the necessity for the new stadium and I accept that the club has to be run on a sound financial footing (indeed in the long term I think that is the best way to run it) and I realise the need to develop young talent, although young talent so often fails to fulfil its early promise but when we have the money and the need why is it so fucking hard to buy 3 or 4 top quality players who will enhance the squad and improve our chances of actually winning something which in turn will make it easier to improve still further and so on?
I am confused and disappointed. Perhaps some wonderful players will be signed before the end the transfer window? I hope so but somehow I doubt it.
Cheers!
All good TW, hope you enjoyed the drink.
N7 @363, well said.
Haha Cynic, now I get it, you mean 376.
I was seriously confused there for a bit. Good call BTW.
377, I really hope we see you here by then!
TW. Love your escort Mexico analogy. We have always been shit at corners.
😀
Oh, ‘Holic has culled the village idiot already, and now I look like I was talking to myself.
Why gamble on the fortunes of the club?
Points we’re available from day 1 of the season and the Champs lge is too important to be playing games with.
It’s amazing that I said back then we could be 9 points off the league leaders and out of the Champs lge by the time the transfer window closes.
We have learned nothing.
If this manager cannot perform what is a considerable part of his job (signing players to improve the team) then I don’t see how he can continue. Even if he signs them before the window closes he hasn’t done a good job improving the team or their chances.
Every club now knows we are desperate for players and you can bet your arse the “not for sale sign” will be put up until we make them a totally inflated price they cannot refuse.
I wonder if those with the crystal ball still see Luis in an Arsenal shirt come September 3rd? No way he will be a Liverpool player this season… .right?
As thou sow, so shalt thou reap……
….ends.
Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
N7 . We were told when we moved to The Grove that it would not affect our transfer budget. We were told 5 years ago that we had identified the deficiencies and had the money to deal with the problem. We have been told for the last few years that the manager had money to spend. Then there was Ivan’s comments in June.
There is a large air of complacency at the senior end of our club and in my opinion it needs addressing.
Bath knows. Please tell me it’s not that difficult to grasp???
Buggeration. For those late to the party, there was a Spud at 377 who posted a lineup that he expects to be waiting for us in a couple of weeks.
He’s wrong though, as he included Galen
Double buggeration, he was at 376 and is still there.
Fuck my eyesight
And old age
That’s what I meant Cynic.. 😀
Steve
We were quite clearly lied to re: finances. Gazidis admitted as much in June.
All that matters now is whether there’s any truth to Ivan’s claim that the era of fiscal prudence is over. That’s the big picture here. It doesn’t matter who we appoint as the next manager if there is always going to be no money to spend.
MNB. I owe you fuck all you low life cunt. Now fuck off back under that little stone you call home. When you have grown a pair then please try again and address me. You have your instructions until that time arrives.
Now chop chop, what are you waiting for?????
N7. Swiss Ramble would say different.
Either way it is clearly wrong. If the board have lied to the fans then they should all tender their resignations.
Loaning out Coquelin (who I rate) and Miquel (who I think isnt quite up to it, but meh, we are desperados now) WITHOUT even adding to those perilously threadbare positions is looking more and more like monu-mental-ly mental decisions now.
Regardles of how this game panned out, it makes no sense in jettisoning 2 players so quickly. Why?
To help those players adjust to their new teams as quick as possible I imagine.
How blooming accomodating of Arsene!
Steve
Swiss Ramble represents an educated guess.
Put it another way: Ivan tells us for years that there was money. Now he tells us there was no money. Why?
He’s made two directly conflicting statements. Logic dictates that one of them must be a lie.
Ive discussed this beofre on here. I dont believe there was any money, well not the amounts we apparently have this window. I remeber things differently to Steve T, as I recall the manager saying we’d be pretty brasic for 4 odd years while the stadium debt got to a manageable amount. That was before the property crash and other shit storms that Mihir (spud) Bose took great satisfaction in predicting the move being an albatros.
But thats history, there’s enough in the here and now to be debating and getting areated about aint there! 🙂
N7. I firmly believe that with our cash reserves that there was money to spend on improving the squad. It has been mismanaged for years. What I don’t know is who is actually to blame.
Looks like a scoring shot N7; well in.
I literally can’t contemplate the enormity of the idea that we’re actually skint and all the talk has been bollocks.
Steve
I totally agree with you that there were points where we were a £10m player away from the title. I also agree that we haven’t been “the best we can be” for quite a large portion of the last 8 years.
But I just don’t see why Ivan would say we didn’t have money the last few years if it wasn’t so. He was very clear: no money, champs league football the target, all about to change. The first two parts of that make total sense in hindsight – ie why we didn’t sign that missing £10m player, why we seemed so relaxed to be standing still (at best) – the last part remains to be seen.
While I dont hold Dein in such high regard as TTG does, I do the club have seriously underestimated the need for a buffer, an inbetweenie, a business savvy carpet bagging Delboy who can do the deals, leaving WEnger to concentrate on, erm, other stuff.
Not sure why we havent done so. Its not like its been a recent departure now.
@398 – I think we have a big problem. I do believe the era of fiscal prudence is over from the board’s point of view, if it was ever in place in the first place. The problem is that the man who rules the football side of the club is not thinking along the same lines.
And here’s a thought to ponder.
Arsene Wenger is not the right man for a club that has shit loads of money and a need to spend it. He is too conservative, has gone on record many times about not spending big money on big names and I do not think that was a spiel designed to fit the financial circumstances of the club so much a sincerely felt belief that big money is a BAD THING. I don’t think he has the mentality for that kind of club, which is why he has never gone to a job any manager with ambition would crawl over broken glass to take – Real Madrid.
People will now say he has spent big in the past, but he has always sold to cover his purchases. I just don’t see Arsene Wenger as a man who will spend £60m without covering a huge part of that with sales. It doesn’t fit his makeup IMO.
I wonder, actually, how much of the Suarez move is the board and how much is the manager. Whether the Higuain deal was set up at board level and the manager nixed it.
The proof will come in the next 16 days, because it is obvious we need hugely talented players in three positions (at least) and that type costs money thesedays.
Cynic
You can’t criticise Arsene for failing to take the Madrid job, surely? That’s making a negative out of loyalty.
Also don’t think you can make the assumption that the Suarez bid is all the board because it doesn’t fit your theory on Wenger. That’s introducing a big assumption to make the facts fit your hypothesis.
£40m is a shit ton of money. In fact, it’s more money than any current premier league manager has ever offered for a player. And Wenger offered it – either he’s responsible for the transfers or he isn’t.
The same bid also demonstrates that there has been a sea change in the club’s finances. In fact, it’s pretty much the sole point of optimism in an otherwise dismal summer.
N7. How can we not have had money to spend when the board continually boasted about record revenue figure? We were regularly quoted as one of the top 5 wealthiest clubs in football. Yet we still have to make a profit in the transfer market ???? For want of a better phrase, I don’t buy it. Not one bit. I don’t trust Ivan. He may be able to sell shirts to the Indonesians but I am far from convinced that he is a football man, let alone an arsenal man. Just look at the panic buys and who has been brought in? There has been lots of praise for outing deadwood. Just ask yourself how many of those players should have been here in the first place???????? How much have we paid in wasted wages in the last few years? Do we win a trophy for having the most out on loan? Do we win a trophy for having the most players without a work permit???????
Our current state is down to underachieving in the last 5/6 seasons in my opinion. We have sat back and the board have let AW finish in the top 4. Well they may just about to receive one monstrous wake up call.
Is offering 40 million for a player we had virtually no hope of signing optimistic?????? As I have said far too many times now. One massive egg in the most flimsy of baskets.
Steve
I agree with lots of that.
But the simplest answer to what’s been going on is as follows; the board lied. The stadium did affect our transfer budget. The club resolved to knuckle down, spend little and maintain champs league football until hitting a tipping point circa 2014 when the long term sponsorship deals would come up for renewal and the stadium debt would become manageable.
That’s basically what Ivan has told us this summer. It seems entirely plausible to me, and it would also help explain how we’re suddenly able to make an offer at nearly 3x our transfer record.
Like I say, I agree with a lot of what you’ve posted there, but the finance stuff? Doesn’t ring true to me. Why go from spending zip to £40m offers for players if we had the dough all along? And why would Ivan say there had been no money?
Steve @ 412
The club quite clearly thought we had a hope of signing Suarez. They made three separate bids for him.
I don’t for a single moment believe that we make huge offers like that simply to pretend we are willing to spend. Particularly as it wasn’t us who made the bid public – why keep it to ourselves if if was pure perception management?
As I said, I don’t believe Ivan. If we really had to sell big names to balance the books then it is an even bigger mess than I thought it was. I just don’t buy it. For the accuracy of Ivan go back to June and his next 48 tale.
We are in a mess. The club has been mismanaged. Football is a business. The product is on the pitch. We are our own worst enemy. No one to blame but ourselves. You don’t buy a house only to live off of scraps to pay the mortgage??? Just ask yourself this. If we do now have all of this money then how is if we can’t get one deal over the line?????? Not one. Look at the bench today and tell me how that reflects a well run club???? I’m sorry but I just don’t get it in the slightest.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gSFEaI4HdA#at=52
amen to this guy this is how i feel i know.
Well, there you raise the biggest, scariest prospect of them all – that we have no money to spend here and now in 2013. If that’s the case then we’re in deep, deep trouble and it will take all Wenger’s know how to secure another (ultimately meaningless) top 4 finish.
A truly grim picture. I sincerely hope it’s not the case.
I don’t criticise him for not taking the Madrid job, I simply say it shows a lack of ambition and that he would be out of his comfort zone if he took it.
Anyway it doesn’t matter, we’re all fucked because he’s here until he decides to leave. And on a salary like his, I wouldn’t give up until I died if I was him.
N7. The club worked on the assumption that 40 million was a buy out clause. Oh dear me. Got that one wrong. They worked on the asspyion that a quick chat was a legally binding agreement to confirm a fee for Higuain????? Oh dear me.
See a bit of a pattern developing here????
Steve
We don’t know either of those things.
They might have assumed that, even without the clause, Internal pressure from Suarez combined with a near record bid from us would suffice to cause Liverpool to sell.
With Higuain, I don’t think they mistook a quick chat for a legally binding agreement. I think they thought they had agreed commercial terms in principle (which is the precursor to any formal contractual arrangement) and then got gazumped.
I do agree though that neither negotiation leaves us looking too sharp. Especially when we’ve not been able to sign anyone else of note.
I’m not saying we’ve had a good summer – far from it.
There is a very good piece by Jeremy Wilson on The Telegraph website about our lack of activity and the state of the club. It is far from wholly negative, Wilson is not that type, and it includes the following paragraph.
An analysis this week by the blogger ‘Swiss Ramble’, whose grasp of football finances is admired within boardrooms across Europe, estimated that Arsenal had an available cash balance of £154 million. To put that in some context, the combined cash balance of the other 19 Premier League clubs was put at £181 million.
Too sharp??????? It is about as blunt as you could possibly get. This isn’t negotiating a discount on a Mars bar. These are multi million pound footballers.
Gazzumped??? We had no agreement in place. Certainly not one worth a toss. So someone else enters the arena having just come into large amounts of cash as we dither. The rest is history, despite his Dad hoping to see his son play in the prem
We offer 40,000,001 for Suarez? Was that just plucked out of the air or for some strange reason did we think that triggered a release clause???
None of the above smacks of proficiency to me.
Cynic. That can’t be right can it???? I mean, Ivan says so. It’s only in the last 10 weeks that we have had a spare few bob. That has to be all wrong, surely??????????????????
On the other hand…………
Lordgunner. My guess is that he is not the only one leaving today that had those feelings.
Cynic
I like Swiss Ramble a lot, but he’s the first to admit that what he produces is educated guesswork.
We also don’t know what that £154m is earmarked for.
Steve
Gazumping is a phenomena which occurs between the point at which commercial terms are agreed between the parties and the point at which a formal contract is entered into – there will virtually always be a gap of this type in any transaction. If the press reports are correct, it’s exactly what happened with Higuain.
Hitting the hay now. FWIW I understand and respect where you’re coming from and reckon we’re only an assumption or two apart in our thinking.
Fuck knows what actually goes on inside the club. I’ll certainly be buying Wenger’s book whenever he eventually writes it.
Here’s something to ponder. Do you think Kroenke is actually bothered???? I mean, has anyone actually stopped to ask why he is actually involved in Arsenal? What does he hope to get our of all this??? Is he bothered or is this just business to him?????
I can’t wait for Arsene’s book to come out. I will walk into Waterstones and offer half of what they have it on sale for, and see if I walk out with a copy or just a secondhand Beano Annual????? My guess is that I will be reading Dennis the menace and Roger the Dodger before I read Arsene’s thoughts……
The invertebrate eunuch that is MNB returns. Only to vanish in the very near future………
MNB. Hopeful for your boys against Palace???
Up at 4 30 am and home at ten past midnight.
For that.
Thanks Arsenal.
The culmination of Clusterfuck Summer.
To be followed by a savage Winter of Discontent?
I was one of the last to leave the Stadium today – sat up at the top of the North Bank, bemused by what I had just watched and asking myself what the fuck is going on?
Media lockdown required I think…..
Zico @433,
Bingo! Better to let the dust clear from that shambles!
i’m not sure anyone’s said this in quite the same way, but with all the care and hardline valuations, the club allegedly places on transfers. it’s hard to see how buying “affordable” players at 12m and then selling them for 7m in two year’s time with marginal contribution is a successful policy. then there’s too much been said already about santos and park.
Well, well I thought that might get very ugly, but truthfully there’s been a roaring trade at the bar and some fine and valid points made from all sides, with no major shoeings and glassings. Pretty, bloody good given the general mood after that result.
There is much common ground in the drinks tonight despite some perceptive exchanges declaring this not to be the case. But something is afoot. Why shed numerous players to the point of a less than thread-bare squad? Why the lack of signings? Why the mixed messages from the club?
It makes no sense to me, nor does it appear to all the far more rational, cognizant, experienced drinkers out there. And as Mr TW said this has undoubtedly fuelled the frustrations felt by most today.
I don’t play poker but my basic understanding is that bluff, cards close to the chest, wearing sunglasses (go Ivan), feints and deceit are all essential to winning the game (well maybe not the shades). Same goes for negotiations and transfers especially the tasty big deals so it may go someway to explaining some of the the contrasting statements from the club. But beyond that I’m baffled by the summer.
To Zen7@362 and 375, pretty spot-on.
To Mr Cent, Mr Pangloss, Mr TW, Doctor F, Mr Steve T, Mr Norris, all the American ‘holics and all the other drinkers (too numerous to mention) tonight drinks on the bar for sterling work on the back of such a shitty result.
Don’t want to say too much at this point, havent back-drunk because I just got home and I am steaming drunk. But anyway, we knew before and we know now that we have to strengthen. And the failure to do so is a massive failure, there are no two ways about it. Other than that… Ah, fuck it, apart from the match I have had a stonking great day.
See you on the morrow. Or something or other.
Sir chesny had an absolute howler.
Off with his head. Fucking B-leager.
Cant we fire his ass?
Today hurt. A familiar hurt.
Looking on the bright side (it’s taken me this long to find one) the last time we lost our first game of the season at home was 2000-20001 … when we ended up second to Man U by season’s end.
For mine it all started going wrong when we eased off after scoring early, a trait that has become all to common in recent years. Add some unbalanced refereeing (most of the fouls we committed were correctly called, while Villa got away with murder), too many of our players losing their cool, some comical defending, a penalty awarded AFTER the ref had allowed Villa an advantage they failed to take, and another penalty that clearly wasn’t … and the result never seemed in doubt to this viewer who has seen similar all too often before.
Do we have 11 players fit for Wednesday? Frankly, losing to Fenerbahce could be a blessing in disguise as far as our top 4 hopes are concerned – unless AW announces the signing of Falcao, Fellaini, Mata and Luiz or their equivalents in the next few days.
Oskar
The reason there wasn’t much booing at the end of the game was because there was practically no-one left in the stadium to boo.
Oskar
As far as signing players goes, AW signed every one of the team that played today bar Jack, so it’s not like he hasn’t tried. He just hasn’t managed to get the right players to sign. The question is, WHY NOT? David Dein leaving? Aiming too high in light of our recent record? Bad luck? Poor judgement? He’s lost his knack?
I haven’t a clue, but I doubt it’s for lack of trying.
Oskar
Arsene Wenger truly has some Nigerian blood running through his veins, because he behaves like us. Nigerians are known for repeating the same experiments n expecting a different outcome.
Even though I am a novice as far as coaching is concern, but I know that our main problem is our pattern of play. Why should we be playing d barca tiki- taka when we don’t have a Xavi, Messi, Iniesta n Busquet? It nearly worked when we have the Fabregas-Hleb-Rosicky-Flamini combo, but now its really folly to think we can play like that.
All we need are effective wingers in d mould of Navas that can tear defence apart or simply put we get in one creative midfielder (sorry if u think Wilsher, Ramsey n Aterta are creative bcos they are not). We need players like Kroos, Alcantara, or Fabregas.
Or rather we resort to the old fashioned 442 formation.
Wenger should not continue blabbing about how we were unbeaten in our last ten games bcos we know how we struggled to pull that. It was a run of form but a mere determination of getting d forth place.
No doubt we will be linked with all and sundry in the papers today? I think it will be very difficult trying to convince top players to join before we have negotiated the Champions League qualifier. Time will tell I guess. I can also only see transfer prices to us going up at this stage.
Zico, I hear you and feel your pain.
Is this result a blessing in disguise?no choice now but to go and get the bodies we need and fast.
So…a coworker, after years of walking past my office littered with Arsenal paraphernalia, recently declared his allegiance to said club. this afternoon he emailed me asking exactly “what did he sign up for?”
I’m not sure what to say…
bmbd
Picked a really bad week to give up sniffing glue.
Mr Failage @447
Excellent Heh!
After rewatching the match and taking in all the drinks, I am forced to conclude that this current managment/ownership are collectively the physical embodiment of Don Quixote.
We’ve long been found out by the rest of the “Big 3” and Europe on the pitch.
Sorry for the untimely posting…I’ll finish my thought…
We’ve also been found out at the talent discovery and recruitment stage (that South American bloke still hasn’t gotten his work permit, correct?).
Yet we continue to play the same game of negotiation brinksmanship; we continue to overlook decent squad players in favor of “Super Quality” (whatever the Hell that phrase means); and we continue the same tactics on the pitch (and suffer the same reverses for the same reasons).
We are actually worse than Don Quixote. I’ve been saying for years that this club is in danger of becoming Premiership version of the Dallas Cowboys. Well, guess what, here we are. Congratulations.
This comparison holds on SOOOO many levels, but the most appropriate characteristic for onight’s discussion is arrogance. As someone posted above, Arsenal’s current troubles are down to arrogance. In the boardroom. In the Owner’s Box. In the coaching office. In the dressing room.
Sheer arrogance. That we will pay only our valuation (take or leave). That we do not change our tactics. That … (insert observation of the moment).
The Cowboys have the IDENTICAL institutional mentality, and are currently on a 18-year trophyless run of form. But here’s the thing, players know the score and they vote with their feet. I hate the Dutch Skunk, but the fucker certainly knew when to cut bait.
Arrogance is one thing (especially when you follow Al Davis’s admonition of “Just win, baby”), but arrogance in the face of poor performance eventually makes one into a caricature.
I don’t want us to become caricatures.
bmbd
This feels like a watershed moment to me. ACLF and Blogs — both sites that are measured and generally positive about AW — lay the blame at AWs door, as a lot of us do here.
And as iLoonstar Gooner points out, this a failing borne out of arrogance. Most of us appreciate what AW has done, but there is no defence of his current mismanagement, for that is what this is.
I seem to remember a lot of us clamouring for signings in January and whilst we got Monreal, why did we not push forward with Villa? It really is the same old, same old.
But now, AW appears to have lost many, many more of the support. And with the crowd on their backs, it’ll be even harder for the players to turn this around. Bad luck and referring decisions are not the reason for this disaster, it’s the result of one man.
What is he thinking? Does anyone know anymore? What is his strategy – does he have one? Even if he had the will, what kind of a proposition would playing for this Arsenal, represent for top quality players? If we lose on Wednesday night, we are well and truly fucked.
Oskar
“Frankly, losing to Fenerbahce could be a blessing in disguise as far as our top 4 hopes are concerned”
With all due respect, this is one of the less clever statements ever written in this bar, including Redtruth’s and Cusop’s.
I don’t need to explain why, because it is so obvious.
Morning all, not a good morning.
Heh Steve T @ 427.
FFS
This is the way I feel and I am certain the way most of us feel. Agree with every word.
https://www.youtube.com/embed/u06qhRBWcLE
N7 I’m with you.
Yesterday was a series of disasters, most of which could have been avoided.
The Ref’s attitude towards our players was unacceptable from a professional official. Every foul committed by an Arsenal player resulted in a Villa free kick. Villa players got away with murder, they fell down like nine-pins breaking up play and Yellow card offences were let go. As a result our players got more and more frustrated which didn’t help matters when we were up against it.
While we may have been fortunate in not having Szczesny sent off, Kos was punished unfairly for the second pen and the yellow cards!
The injury to Arteta was very significant. He would never have allowed Abonlahor to race through the mid-field, he would have brought him down and taken a yellow card for the team.
Once Gibbs left the field and the defence was reorganised, we lost our shape at the back and we were then all at sea. The mid-field was all over the place. The LJW/ Rambo combo was not a good fit and it was left to TR7 to provide the attacking flair with the Ox.
The bench provided nothing when required, Santi was obviously not match fit and why Poldi was not used when the Ox went off was strange indeed.
Our injuries are mounting up and I fear for our chances in Turkey with a threadbare squad. All this just puts Arsene in the dock for his procrastination in the transfer market. We have 2 weeks to patch up our squad, heaven help us if AW fails to meet our needs with some decent PL quality additions to our ranks.
It can only get better?
COYRs
I missed the first 25 minutes of the game due to technical problem with the cards.
Apparently they were the best.
Had to queue in the rain to get paper tickets printed….shambles.
Great to see the usual suspects in the pub.
I still fancy us to win the league .The quality of supporters worries me though. Sheltered lives?
It’s a bit depressing, larry, I think I’ll do a media blackout for a bit.
Morning all,
Still thinking about exactly what to say about, whichever way you cut it, was a wholly avoidable debacle (just to avoid repeating shambles).
In the meantime, it was good to meet again with lots of Gooners who really care. People like Zico who travelled from Scotland to support that effort. People like Ollie and Snowy, whose outlay to support The Arsenal dwarfs my own £3,000 per season, not to even mention the time they dedicate to it.
People like Holic, Tabs, jackeen (thanks for the Taytos !), and others, who deserve far, far better for the time, money and emotion they invest in a club that appears, at the moment, to care about all sorts of things other than “being the best that they can be”. – Steve T.
There were many factors at play yesterday – from match officials to club officials.
Best to think first – write later.
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