Never Mind The Quality, Feel The Entertainment
Aug 19th, 2014 by 'holic
I feel the need for a somewhat defensive post about the goal-less draw with Besiktas tonight mainly because of the reaction on social media sites, but actually that is not how I feel about the game. For much of the ninety minutes I saw two commited teams trying to fashion an open contest on a cabbage patch of a pitch, which by the way was the same for both sides.
The match could have had a sensational opening, Ba trying his luck from the centre circle and thankfully Wojciech Szczesny got enough on the effort to tip it onto the bar. Just minutes later the Arsenal ‘keeper denied the same player. Besiktas, with former young Gunner Ozyakup prominent, were giving it a go in front of their vociferous following.
The visitors hit back though with Alexis Sanchez fashioning a couple of half chances for Olivier Giroud. If match fit the Frenchman might have notched one of them. That he isn’t, which is why Yaya Sanogo has been preferred when available thus far. As the half came to a close the Frenchman was set up by a fabulous Aaron Ramsey chipped pass but he took a rusty air shot. Hopefully in coming games we will see the improvement that only games can give at this stage of the season. That having been said, should a quality goalscorer come available before the end of the month we should be in there. Not surprisingly there aren’t that many available, so a premium will have to be offered.
I took a step back from the immediacy of Twitter responses towards the end of the half, and actually enjoyed the battle of wills unfolding in front of me. You expect a degree of tactical awareness from a Slaven Bilic side, and I thought their willingness to trade openly was a testament to their belief they could pull off an upset. That made Arsenal’s defensive discipline all the more pleasing. Calum Chambers, one slip on the rutted surface aside remains a more than capable deputy for Per Mertesacker. I am tremendously impressed with his start to a career in an Arsenal shirt.
The second half started as the first had ended. A great chance for the Arsenal but Aaron Ramsey just not quite able to apply the finishing touch to a Giroud through ball in a twist of fate. Demba Ba took out Mikel Arteta in the build up to a great chance for Sahan, and Mathieu Flamini came on for his customary yellow card. Unfortunately Aaron Ramsey made a premature departure after picking up a second yellow for a tug at Ozyakup, who tumbled somehat easily and theatrically. A lesson learned for Aaron hopefully. He made it easy for a weak referee to show that card.
Still the ten men could have nicked it when Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain brought a fine save from Zengin, who managed to turn the effort onto the post. One could argue it would have been no more than Arsenal deserved on the night, but at the same time I would understand Besiktas fans saying that their team did not deserve to lose, and I would agree.
The quality might not have shone through tonight, but it was hardly likely to on such a poor playing surface. I rather fancy we may see a more disciplined counter-attacking game from Besiktas next week on the carpet at the Grove. An away goal would certainly put the cat among the pigeons, but I have to believe with the Germans returning, and another ninety minutes at Goodison under the belt, that we will be stepping up a gear in the home leg of a fascinating match-up.
342 Responses to “Never Mind The Quality, Feel The Entertainment”
Well in !
Right at the end! (Of the last post)
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Oh, and the game?
Bad pitch, our team back after vacation and all in different stages of coming back to competitive games, with a few key players who have been to the world cup, and without one of our two best midfielders to get the team to click.
Sure, we could (should?) have done better, but it is harder for a team that wants to play neat triangles and speedy, precise counters, to get up to speed early in the season, than a more direct team, built more on muscle and willpower.
Especially after Ramsey’s second yellow, I’ll just nod my head at the result, if not the performance, and say “fair enough” and hope our home game doesn’t end up 2-2.
I’ve never been the one to scream for a defensive mid, I’d rather see two or even all three midfielders share that responsibility and interchange both in attack and defence, but sure, it would be great to control these kinds of games a tad more, and that is not always done by adding more creativity. Sometimes you just need to win back the ball earlier and have a bit more calm, and I can see the need for a player to step in and provide that, especially during games like today, when the neat stuff doesn’t work out (at all!).
Having that said, Chambers might well be that player. He is showing all the signs isn’t he? If I had to chose, surely I’d go for another center half to free him up for midfield duty behind Ramsey and Özil.
Again, not a great performance, but a hard game, very early in the season, away in Turkey.
I’ll take that and a 2-1 at home.
2nd again???????
Well, almost.
🙂
🙂
Close but no cat, Steve T, as ‘holic might have put it. Just pigeons.
Well, nothing less than a win at the Ems will suffice now, whereas a score draw will be sufficient for the visitors. Squeaky bum time in the making.
Top Half?
Nice write up h.
You saw the same game I saw, ‘h, and also the entertainment. What would football be without it, eh?
What Steve T said.
Gregoire from the last drinks: may I humbly, politely, respectfully request that we cut out the personal attacks like “naive, entitled” etc. etc. ? Please, pretty please? No reasons for those. Let us keep the discussion substantive.
FYI, I have grown up following Arrigo Sacchi’s Milan, followed Barca closely through their early nineties excellence, but never supported either of those teams and following Bergkamp to Arsenal (after the 98 WC) fell in love with this club and its football, despite being not from London. I have seen enough Euroepan football for my 37 years. And if you read my posts here since I joined this august establishment a few years back, you won’t find much negativity from me.
If you compare the relative quality of these two teams, and given that both were in early season, and the way we approached the game and failed to change tactically in mid-game it was a poor performance. A collective poor performance except for the defense. When I say collective I include the manager here.
Think about it this way. This was our 13th UCL qualification match. And this is the FIRST time we had failed to win. Against the 3rd position team in Turkish league. In our last two visits in Turkey we scored 8 goals against a much better Fener team.
Yes, we would most likely win the tie. Surely. And we will progress well in the season. But there still remains systemic problem in this side that if not addressed will see us short of PL or CL success.
Dr F – I was characterising the sentiment of your opinion – not you personally! My intention is never to fall out with fellow Gooners! I just disagree wholeheartedly that it can be dismissed as a ‘poor performance’. It was a scruffy, attritional 0-0 draw – the type you sometimes get in these away European games….
Dr F.
Agree with your assessment if the game, even if I still believe that pitch, early season form and a tough ground was huge factors in us not managing to adept to the situation. When things are already balancing on the edge, it’s harder to show the guts to try something new. And when the simple things don’t come of, even if you try to play a simpler game, you will lose the ball more often, creating less chances and inviting more pressure.
I am not blaming the pitch. I’m saying that when we have a bad day, it is easier to cope in our natural habitat. I’m not saying we can’t score without neat triangles, I’m saying that when we can’t muster our skills to play our regular game, being away I’n Turkey doesn’t help.
Point is, I believe we played a bad game, but I’d rather look towards the next than dwell considering it was our second for the season and the circumstances really did not suit us.
If we play like this ten games in, against the equivalent of a third placed Turkish team, I’ll worry. Today I just hope we get better, and hope we sign that centre half.
Oh, and make subs a bit earlier. In the future. That would be nice.
Toby@14: Excellent points all. Agreed. I am not worried that much — I am sure Arsene would address the obvious flaws before the transfer window closes — and we will play better anyway , much better. We have never failed to comfortably beat these third tier European teams in early stages of CL. The toughest away game we had was in Udinese in that awful start of 11-12 season, and they had Di Natale. We had still managed to win.
Oh, and for everyone else’s reading experience, I was answering Dr F from the last round of drinks.
Dr. F., I’m with you.
Pretty poor from Arsenal today. I’m a little worried.
Holic, Looking forward to the entertainment factor when I actually see the game. Still think a buzz haircut for the pitch, would have been a nice gesture. UEFA has guidelines for pretty much everything else!
Feel bad for Arteta, being as this will probably be his last season with us. Hope he bounces back quickly.
Nothing but praise for our new recruits!
Good night all. Good debates here.
As always, we saw the same game, ‘h. Cheers.
Dr. F, no that was NOT a poor performance. NOT in a million years. In fact I think the boys did great to even agree to warm up on that pitch. We train on excellent pitches, we make sure the our stadium pitch is ALWAYS in perfect condition for football and what do we get in return? UEFA allowing opposition teams make us play beach volley, farm volley or in the case of Milan a few years ago recently-tilled-farm volley. Fuck ’em!
A competition that rakes in billions should not be played on the type of pitch Beskistas provided for this game. Never! Except of course they changed the rules that specify the type of pitches football should be played on, in which case I would start looking for a beach Volley team to support. I might as well watch the real game you know.
If I was any of those players or Arsene I would be personally writing to UEFA to inform them that I won’t participate in their competition on a shitty pitch again!
Homer@17: We will get much better. I hope we finish this what has been a remarkably positive transfer window with the final pieces of the puzzles all fit in. Once that is done we can expect the kind of success this great club has been so patiently preparing itself for.
Cent @ 19: No disagreement about the awful playing surface . Difficult to play passing football. But greatness resides in rising above the obstacles and limitations. We saw the pitch and our game plan should have been tuned to that. At least that is what I hope Arsenal players are capable of.
I think this Arsenal side now has enough quality and experience to find solutions on their own and be told the truth when they fail. They can handle it.
I only saw bits of the game and have discussed it with three knowledgeable Gooners who seemed to see roughly the same game.
Firstly the result is not a disaster by any means but I am thankful we didn’t drop behind. We have yet to register a goal from our attack in two games .
Thankfully our defence held firm and Chambers is doing a wonderful job. This was his first senior game outside the UK. That’s some learning curve.
I think I am in Dr. F’s camp regarding the need for quality reinforcement. I said the other day that I always feel Wenger is inherently conservative in the market. His inclination is not to buy rather than to add players yet his team lose one player per match for a few weeks and next week, while not down to the bare bones we face a big match with Gibbs, Ramsey and probably Arteta absent . If we sustain injuries at Everton we will have an issue.
The quality of reporting on the transfer market is pathetic and clearly excites some of our number more than the others. The fictitious medical is the new red herring. Manolas has apparently not left Athens and reports of his arrival are premature. Rabiot sounds much more likely but if he arrives this will definitely rule out the fabled DM.
I was interested that a recent report by Jeremy Wilson in the Telegraph, one of the few journos trusted and briefed by Arsenal made an amazing comment that ‘ Wenger will be allowed to spend all of the Vermaelen transfer fee!’He also hinted that the £100 million cash reserves needed to factor in wages not mentioning that despite expensive recruitment we had shed the salaries of TGSTEL, Park, Sagna, Fabianski, TV5 , Eisfekd and Djourou.
If we don’t sign a better striker than Giroud we won’t win one of the two main prizes. Sanchez looks too small to play through the middle . There aren’t many top strikers around but the great goal by Higuain tonight shows you the difference between a top striker and a decent one.
OG is a valued member of the squad but not good enough to be the main striker at Arsenal. There we are the 19th August and I’ve said it. How I hope those words are rammed down my throat over the season. But I don’t expect them to be. And Sanogo is nowhere near good enough at this stage to compete with him.
Over to you Arsene.
(Mary Jo Koch) Reading your intelligent post has helped me recover from the ordeal of following the game live on Twitter for the first time ever. I began to question my manic depressive diagnosis since I was much less depressed than what felt like 75 percent of my timeline. My husband hates my dooming and glooming, but I’m a chirpy optimist who blamed the draw all on the pitch and the ref and was enthusiastic about our new players.
Giroud is fortunate there are laws against burning unfit strikers at the stake. The venom toward him is appalling. Apparently, only Giroud and Chambers played tonight.
I am much more concerned about the seriousness of Arteta’s injury than anything that happened tonight.
I’m having fun unfollowing people tonight. When I started the account three months ago, I followed too many people because I wanted to attract followers.
Welcome MJ, et al.
You all make this place what it is…
ttg @22 what you said. I was going to say the same thing too, we need a striker. Sanogo and Giroud cannot win us the league, forget the CL.
To be competitive, we need at least three more signings. Sadly that is not going to happen. Pretty soon we will run Chambers down the ground, he is only 19.
I thought that was rather poor fare, personally, and we might actually be in trouble in the second leg if we go behind.
I think we’re wasting Alexis playing him wide and would prefer a 4-4-2
There are certain players who should probably be in this side who aren’t going to play much, when everyone is fit. Funnily enough, Ozil is one of them. He shouldn’t be, but where does he fit into a 4-3-3 if Giroud and Alexis are two of the front three and Ramsey and a holding midfielder are two of the middle three?
Ozil wide left? Think not… Cazorla out of the team? What about ickle Jackie Wilshere? No future? Theo?
Nice headache to have but we have too many players who can play the same sorts of positions and the ones missing out are too good to be sitting on the bench every week. Sales imminent IMO, starting with Podolski and probably Campbell.
Such a pain in the arsenal… for a decade, not enough good players. Then BOOM, far too many. 😀
I’ve not even mentioned Oxlade-Chamberlain and as for Ryo Miyaichi, that appears to be Japanese for “on loan to a Championship side”
Still, it could be worse.
Probably.
On a night when the referee was as rough as the cow paddock the game was played on I guess a draw serves our purpose well enough. But the manner of it was worrying.
In a time when players are paid princely sums funded in the main by king’s ransoms extracted from their dedicated supporters, is it really asking too much of them to actually be fit and ready for the start of a season? What should have been a majestic sweeping aside of second rate Uefa Cup-type opposition by the knights of Arsenal today looked more like a weekend kickabout by school kids on Hackney Marshes. In fact I’m sure more exciting matches could be seen at such places.
And it’s certainly not because we lacked our Teutonic knights (enough said about them), because practically no-one else looked up for the joust. Wtf have Santi and OG been doing to get so pathetically out of touch? Does playing so few pre-season matches have anything to do with it?
And why, why, why, do players insist on putting their hands on opposition players when the ref whistles up a free every time they do so? How incredibly daft was Rambo? No excuse of course, but at least he can now play his heart out against Everton without saving anything for the following Wednesday. Not a match I’m looking forward to though.
It’s all very well saying we need our best fit for Spring and shouldn’t risk them getting injured now, but I see the risk of falling behind early in the title race as a far bigger risk. And we’re still losing players to injury anyway. Results-wise we have been lucky, very lucky, so far, against very ordinary opposition and I’m happy, very happy, that our luck has held. But why does it have to be this way?
Footballers today are mollycoddled to within an inch of their wallets, and need a sight more accountability, imo.
Öskar
As for Campbell I suspect he’s being held back as a possible make-weight for a proper striker.
Öskar
well said Oskar.
Oskar, I dont see why we are not using him. He could have performed way better than Santi today. Why are we still keeping him if we cant use him, especially for a game like this one. I will keep saying it, we need another striker. Sanogo cannot be our back up striker, and think we will win the premier league or CL.
We can’t have too many quality players. If we go the distance in all four competitions, that is 64 games. No one is going to play that many. Even our first-name-on-the-teamsheet players are going to play high a 40s of games at most, defenders perhaps low 50s at the outside. Ozil, Sanchez, Theo, Santi, Rambo are all looking at 20 games out.
As for the Bestikas game, an away draw in Europe should be considered a decent result, and especially an away game that far east. To say we are teetering on the brink of elimination is pure hysteria. It is a truism to say there are no easy games anywhere these days, but that is what makes it a truism.
The away-goals rule means there is an anomaly in the CL that an away 0-0 draw and a home 1-1 draw puts you out, whereas a 1-1 away draw and a 0-0 home draw sends you through. We have to win the second leg. That is all there is to it.
NBN – agree that we cant have too many excellent players.
Thats why passing on Fabregas still seems like a catastrophic mistake. For me he’s a better player than Wilshire ,Ramsey, or Carzorla. Why allow him to go to Chelsea and enhance their already strong first eleven?
To my mind, only Ozil would make it into Chelseas starting midfield line up (though it pains me greatly to say it).
I’d love to be wrong, but I cant shake the notion that Fabregas could well be the player of the season as Chelsea win the League title ( a situation that would be truly hateful).
If it turns out that we buy another playmaking midfielder before the window closes,(and I would include Khedira as one),the passing on Cesc becomes even more bizzare.
Water under the bridge now,and some of this bars most respected drinkers (hello,Steve T!) will heartily disagree, but I honestly think this decision will come back to bite us on he arse.
Only the addition of a Marco Rues type signing would explain passing on Fabregas to me. Even then, I’m not sure theres much in it.
In other news — no doubt in my mind we need a world class striker and a centre back.
In all the talk of bad pitches, recent and past, have never heard the following proposed:
At Colney, would it be wise for the Arsenal to dedicate some of it to a bad pitch — something to practice on just before going on trips to godawful midlands and northern fields, like at Stoke, Hull, et al.? OK, there’s a risk of turning ankles, but at least there might be some advantage to being exposed to less than ideal conditions beforehand.
Bayonne – I’ve wondered myself. We know that opposing teams are going to try set the pitch to make it difficult for Arsenal (the teams you mentioned plus the worst example, AC Milan). Why don’t we train for this? So many misplaced passes today because of the speed of the pitch.
I really didn’t see the pitch was an issue. We passed the ball crisply at times and created several good chances.
Only Giroud struggle to control the ball and there’s no point pretending that was the pitch. Can someone half fit find form playing 4 times in 11 days? Or do we turn to no goal sonogo at some point? (“Why doesn’t Giroud run more?” Asked in full sincerity by my girlfriend yesterday.)
Great spirit saw us earn a creditable draw. Big game Saturday against a quality team you’d expect to be fresher than us. Right now I’d take a draw. 7 prem points and champ league qualification would be a tidy return from these early tests. That said, we can’t be as inviting to Lukaku on Saturday as we were to Demba BA last night, they had chances.
Between our lumbering strikers and arteta being injured and being arteta, I really hope we get some business done. Quality not price is important. Alexis is already looking wonderful, but over the 25 man squad we have some ground to make up.
on his transfer plans…
Not at the moment, no. I have nothing special to add on that at the moment. Honestly, we are not close to signing anybody.
http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/20140819/wenger-on-draw-red-card-and-defence
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Well i guess we’ll have to make do with what we have.
If everyone is fit then, we’ll have a decent chance, otherwise we’ll be short as usual….
We could play Alexis up front, maybe a 4-4-2 or a really fast passing gamewith campbell and theo on wings…just sayin’ . I guess it’s up to Arsene, to be fair we’re not up to full fitness yet and more games should do that!
😀
Will this be the most costly departure of this season?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/aston-villa/11044183/Arsenals-Tom-Fox-close-to-being-appointed-Aston-Villa-chief-executive.html
BB – wouldn’t take that at face value, arsene loves a bit of transfer propaganda.
Bayonne Jean: there is a pitch at Colney that they deliberately mismanage which is used to train on before games at stadia where we know the pitch will be shit.
And while the pitch wasn’t the only reason we didn’t win last night, it certainly didn’t help and from what I could see the reason for Ramsey not shooting when he had that chance in the second half was that the ball bobbled up but for some reason there were no replays of that situation so not entirely sure. Anyway, like others have said it is quite baffling that UEFA have all sorts of rules for this and that for staging a CL match but the grass can be in pretty much any shape and there will be no repercussions that I know of.
BB: Arsene Wenger saying “we are not close” usually means nothing. Again, we are talking about a man who said he didn’t even know who Cazorla was (like any manager wouldn’t know who a Spanish international is!) a few days before he was signed 🙂
As for last night on the whole, far from a disaster even though it was frustrating. Most players mixed and matched and did some very good stuff and some much less very good stuff. I see some are calling for a new striker but I am still quite convinced that Alexis IS that new striker in not too long. Also, the Arteta injury was desperately unfortunate but the silver lining is that there is still time to get a replacement in should he (as I am 99% sure will be the case – that looked like a ligament damage to me) be out for an extended period of time. Now, that replacement may actually be Calum Chambers (that slip aside, another excellent performance!) but that would leave us short in other areas.
Right, got to get back to work – drinks on me as usual.
Meanwhile Tony Kroos today played his second full Supercup game for Real since returning from Brazil…
Apparently only Arsenal is giving extra holidays to its WC winners. Why?
Öskar
Lars,
I think your right on the striker front – in that Alexis is that “new striker” once theo comes back. It’s the most logical reason for him to come here.
While I would prefer to see another top striker the player I think he’ll buy is a DCM. I don’t think Wenger can seriously explain forgoing the opportunity to sign Cesc by claiming there are more priorities and then proceed to leave a gap in DCM. While Diaby and Chambers could possibly do a job there, neither are proven players at the level we need for that role.
And in that regard, if we have to put £30m on the table for a player like Carvalho, then I feel we should just go the whole hog and get someone like Pogba.
Morning IF. Leaving aside my personal feeling for the treacherous, traitorous, ship jumping DNA finding rat for one second I think when you just consider football reasons then you are spot on as to why we did not re-sign Fabregas. The fact is that having spent £40 plus million on Özil his position has been filled. As you rightly point out we have numerous alternatives in that position. If we had ever been serious about bringing him back it would have meant selling at least two of our central midfield players. I firmly believe that we have money spend and I also firmly believe that we need to strengthen in other areas. I would suggest that these are a lot more urgent than trying to find another creative midfield player.
Nothing wrong with an away draw in the CL, Ned. But a goalless away draw leaves us vulnerable to the away goals rule and the way we’ve played in our first two games doesn’t fill me with as much confidence as the actual results normally would. If we go one down to a sucker punch early in the second leg, how much confidence should we have then? Or are you confident we won’t?
I have a sneaking suspicion that at least one, maybe two, big name signings are dependent on our qualifying for the CL. If that is the case we should be fielding our strongest side to ensure no stuff-up. Otherwise, imo, we are gambling when there is no need to.
Öskar
Could someone help Oskar repair his record? It seems to be broken.
Regarding the pitch, worth bearing in mind that it’s a very exposed open-air suburban stadium where the grass has been baking under 35°C sunshine day in day out, with very little rainfall at this time of year I’d wager. It’s very difficult to maintain for even the most experienced groundsmen, and I’m sure it would have been the same in most Mediterranean or Eastern European venues in the middle of August. You won’t hear me complaining.
There should have been a 😉 in my post and it was directed at #42.
It’s okay, Lars, I know when I’m targeted! You’re quite right of course, but I can’t seem to resist when it becomes more and more obvious that it’s only us being so generous.
Give a dog a bone… 😉
Öskar
Uncle Charlie: then again the heat doesn’t make the pitch uneven which was the main problem. I don’t mind the grass being yellow-y, but such an uneven surface has nothing to do with heat.
Re the pitch, the game wasn’t played at Besiktas home ground due to refurbishment going on there. It was played at the Ataturk Olympic Stadium, the best in Turkey, and should have been in much better condition than any suburban ground.
Öskar
If I was to play fantasy football manager with the players we’ve got, I’d say our most interesting team (as in, not the most stable, but not with a huge apparent inbalance), on paper, would be something along the lines of:
Szcz
Bellerin Mert Kos Gibbs
Chambers
Özil Ramsey
Alexis Giroud Walcott
Four really speedy players on the flanks, and at least three of them very capable of defending as well as attacking (Walcott still the big question mark when it comes to that, but we should be able to carry one player on one flank), two hugely talanted midfielders, a very technical but defensive midfielder to mop up, and Ramsey to help out in front of Gibbs when necessary. Oh, and our best CB-partnership on the field.
If we can keep one of our full backs a tad withdrawn when the other one attacks a block of Mert, Kos och Chambers + one full back or Ramsey (quite the tackler when he is on form) would be what the opponents have to get through when countering.
I have no eartly clue as to why I’m talking about this, instead of the game yesterday.
Probably because I’ve said all I’ve got to say about it, and I’m bored at work and I’m very excited to have my Arsenal back after the summer.
Looking forward to Everton!
Toby – Bellerin rather than Debuchy?? Aren’t you tsking “interesting” a little bit far?
COYG
Pangloss!
I am talking about all our players that could conceivably be concidered to be one injury away from starting a game (i.e. our first or second choice) and with me playing Chambers in midfield, and Jenks out on loan, Bellerin must be concidered to be that. That makes it a choice between Debuchy or Bellerin, and Bellerin excited me more.
I’m not saying it’s our best eleven, and a lot of these players might go through bad patches and not deliver and have to be swapped.
I don’t for one second think Chambers was bought just to play full back and that is why Jenks is out on loan. Had that been the case, surely we would have gotten at least the first (of two) centre backs by now. I think Wenger is ready to give Bellerin a chance, this season, and I think that is why Jenks is out on loan, not because of Chambers. That probably means Wenger has seen something in him, and I thought he did great in pre-season. Him running onto flicks from Alexis would be a sight to see, and Alexis is more than capable to help out when it comes to defending, as we’ve already seen, to cover up for a bit of rawness and attacking flair. He is educated at Barcelona and Arsenal and this might well be the season before his breakthrough.
I am well aware this might never come to pass, but this is the reasoning for me to pick him over Debuchy when deciding on my “interesting” eleven, that should also be capable of delivering.
Steve T is correct. This team is three players short: CB cover; DMFer to help/step up from MA8; top striker who can keep pace with our other forwards and take the half chances we missed last night.
I suspect we will buy two of those and juggle to cover the third. Depends on 1) qualifying for the group stage and 2) whether we can get our ‘big target’.
howdy
well that was lumpy and clunky,wasn’t it
and not just the pitch
mind you
half expected to see a turkish me
staggerin’ across it at half time
a la trev’s brilliant Ode to a Shightingale
i’m hopin by the time we get them
on our snooker table
recruits new and old
will know each others middle names
and favourite colours
cheerio
Bath.
“a top striker who can keep pace with our other forwards and take the half chances we missed last night.”
Something we have missed for the last two seasons. Ever since RVP left? We have started our third season since then and have still not replaced him.
Oskar, I don’t agree that the Ataturk Stadium is the best in Turkey. Like most Olympic stadiums, it’s very under-used and very detached from the main city. The 3 big Istanbul teams have state-of-the-art inner-city stadiums (including the one that Besiktas are currently building). But hey that’s another story.
If our big target is an attacking midfielder – Reuss :), Pogba :), Khedira or a DMFer – Carvalho, Rabiot then that man is Alexis with Walcott back on the right. I am assuming we will sign the Greek CB or equivalent to add the necessary cover there. I can’t see us shelling out the sums that Cavani or Falcao would demand. I also can’t see an internal solution other than moving Alexis to the middle.
So it looks like my hubris of yesterday has come back to bite me and now the second leg seems to be on a knife edge. I still think we’ll do it in our own back yard, but definitely not comfortably.
(By the way all observations are based on having seen precisely 0 seconds of the match.)
The results of the last two games, and the already-mounting injury list, change nothing about our transfer requirements. We still need a CB (badly) and DMF (just as badly). Meanwhile, the bleating flocks are out in force on this very subject – here’s a selection of their complaints:
1. Giroud is rubbish (last night alone proves it).
2. Wenger’s refusal to buy a proven goalscorer is bordering on negligence (someone actually said that on F365).
Spot on Maestro. We saw the same game and thoroughly entertaining it was too.
Mertecielny central defence to be restored at the weekend with Chambers patrolling in front of the back 4? Or was Kos looking a bit slow and limpy (due to injury) in between being a hero last night? We’ll find out soon enough.
Giroud getting pelters? Standard. Not fully warranted IMO. He always does a great job in the air and in defence. Still, it’s goals and assists that justify his wages.
UTA!
Bath (& Steve T) @ #55
Squad wise we are definitely short, prob. in the ways that you describe. It’s not a lack of talent, it’s a lack of credible depth.
One thing I’m certain of, without further squad strengthening the big prizes will not be captured.
I hope The Arsenal can make it happen because we’re close to being real challengers. Arsene must know that, right?
http://www.fifa.com/aboutfifa/organisation/news/newsid=2423945/index.html
I think that the failure to address the striker situation is a major flaw in our system. We have no go to player. We have no get out of jail striker. The sort of player that when we are really up against it that can pull something special out of the bag. The sort of player that can be anonymous for 80 plus minutes and then produce that one bit of magic that turns a game. For all his qualities, Giroud is not that player. Never has been and never will be.
As a result of this failure we don’t scare teams anymore. Teams don’t have to defend deep or hold back against us knowing that we don’t have that threat.
This may change when we have both Alexis and Theo available? Who knows? But to start a third season without a top class striker I would suggest is bordering on criminal. I don’t think we will ever improve significantly until this is addressed.
Steve T@ 64, exactly what you said.
If Giroud, Mertesacker and Arteta are knackered is it their fault or did AW play them in every game last season when he should have rotated more? Saying Giroud and Mertesacker played in too many games in the World Cup is a red herring because neither played in all their country’s games.
A forward line of Theo, Alexis and Giroud I think has enough pace and goalscoring ability to put the frighteners on anyone, but it’s as if we always need more than we, er, need because someone important usually spends too long out injured.
‘With everyone fit…’ I keep saying to myself.
Otd@45: I agree with you that it is likely there is a signing or two dependent on CL qualification, including of a CB. It is the most probably explanation for Vermaelen both being allowed to go and not yet being replaced. As I pointed out in two parts earlier, a 0-0 away and a 1-1 at home and you are out. A 1-1 away and a 0-0 at home and you are through. So we just have to win it. It is going to be squeaky bum time.
TS: Agree with you @61 about the criticism of Giroud being misplaced. With Sanchez one side of him, Theo on the other, and Ozil and Ramsey pinging the ball off him, he will look quite a different player. But as Porco says @67, “With everyone fit…” So agree with you @62, too. We need more strength in the depth of the squad.
64 – well said. I’d add that part of the problem is that whilst giroud is good but not great, we have no alternative when he is off form or unfit. The only people scared of Sonogo right now are arsenal fans – true innit – and whatever we think of his potential a loan would serve just as well for a year. Praying to Dennis that we buy a pwopa naughty striker ASAP.
First of all, I second Holic’s welcome to Mary Jo@ 23. And if you’re on twitter, give her a follow. Intelligent and humorous 😉
Uncle Charlie @ 47 You’re tugging at my environmental heart strings, mate. Drought conditions (like much of Greece). I’m spoiled and ashamed 🙁 Thanks for the education.
Steve T, since you persist re a striker. My best uneducated hunch is that AW believed Alexis would be working miracles sooner than later
(forget what he says in the press).
I don’t see us signing any big names until we’ve clinched our qualifier.
Lars @ 63: Does that mean some of the promising La Masia scholars — who are not under any professional agreement yet — suddenly become available to join their mentors Bellerin and Toral in North London? 🙂
It means Barca can get all their transfer business done in this window before their ban begins.
Joke.
About Giroud: awful as he was yesterday — and visibly unfit (especially compared to someone like Debuchy who played more minutes than him in the WC), that guy is definitely a bon vivant and had enjoyed his holidays in manners probably not any more in vogue among professional footballers 🙂 — he will quickly get better and give us consistency and stability in the attacking third for much of the season. He will score a good amount of goals and provide many assists, can handle the physical and mental side of being the focal point of an otherwise highly technical attack and will pacy wingers on both sides would be more effective.
However, against the top teams he is not going to turn a match around by his individual abilities. He will give the best defenders a very hard time with his physicality and clever off-the-ball runs and his link-up play with the runners from midfield, but he would not scare them by his inventiveness and pace.
We definitely need more variations in our attack. Some of that could be achieved by personnel addition/changes, but sometimes we don’t even use whatever we have at its optimal. Yesterday, for instance, we should have stretched the game down the flanks and Jack — who actually was quite decent as an ersatz right winger last season in a few matches — could have moved out, use his dribbling abilities down the flanks and get Giroud in for a few more crosses or make attempts himself from right cutting in. When we get stuck within the context of a match, we tend to get stuck. We actually have much more creative abilities in the side than we can bring out in those cases.
Trev @ 73: Thanks. I get that. But then in the next two windows they cannot even sign their ‘own’ cadets from La Masia etc. , right? Along with their unscrupulous buying, they do also rely on this pipeline.
NBN: Yes, I want to see Giroud, Alexis, Theo, Ramsey and Ozil all playing together in good form and in good physical shape…. for all the critical games in the season.
That’s almost certainly pie-in-the-sky thinking. However, a prolonged run of those 5 together in decent form certainly makes us serious contenders but not necessarily winners without grade A backup for the games when they cannot be played.
All very obvious, I know…
UTA!
Trev @ #73 – It’s Farca.
True, True Storey. 😉
I wonder whether Giroud’s lack of ‘oomph’ is actually down to the state he finished last season in, as opposed to a loss of fitness in the summer due to any holiday activities.
Has he recovered from the complete overuse of last season ? Is the psychological burden of doing it all over again so soon weighing on him.
I don’t know, and I can almost hear Oskar gnashing his teeth together at the thought of it, but the guy took a pounding last season and, however much he is paid, he is still only human.
I din’t know what the state of his relationship is with his wife and young daughter after his Y-Fronted shenanigans with the model in the hotel room, but that could also be dagging him down.
Maybe it’s all just self imposed nonsense but that doesn’t mean it isn’t real. At the moment though, he looks awful and someone needs to find a solution – and fast, ‘cos Sanogo, however willing, is a million miles from the answer.
Oh dear, din’t = didn’t, dagging = dragging,
Damn spill chicken. 😉
I have no problems with Giroud not being fit, i have problems with Giroud not having the attitude right. This was an important game, he had to step up and when needed he was nowhere to be seen.
How many times did Alexis make great runs and when he looks up, he sees an ambling striker, so what is he supposed to do?, he tried doing it all and it wouldnt work.
I dont think so we should sell Giroud because he is plan B, the direct robust approach when our intricate play will not come off. yet he needs an absolute rollicking for his performance yesterday.
Chambers excellent again but then why do i sense he will be our DM soon!!!!.
Is the magician back saturday? come on Mesut time to show who is the real deal not a certain dna so and so.
Interesting how these things work. Last week the “agent blogs” were saying this guy was about to sign for Manchester United or Arsenal. A lesson in the importance of critical thinking?
http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/football/28868727
If the BBC have been running this story for the last 24 hours, shouldn’t the lead (“Crystal Palace are expected to announce their new manager within 48 hours.”) have been written to say Crystal Palace are expected to announce their new manager within 72 hours? Or at least edit the article to say “within 24 hours” after the first 24 hours expired?? Maybe get a Goonerholic-style clock in the article to count down the seconds until the new manager will be appointed???
bt8b,
As long as Campbell and Sanogo are still here, i’ll disregard any rumours on us signing any more strikers. Still it’s good to hear that everyone wants to sign for us now… 😀
Vermy’s replacement though couldn’t come fast enough!
Once he’s here, push Chambers into DM position and we’re good to go!
Although left back now looks vulnerable….
82 refers to this article: http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/football/28860902
Sorry for the omission. 🙂
BB. It’s like a game of “whack-a-mole” at the county fair. Whenever you whack one on the head another one pops up somewhere else. You are right about left back though if Gibbs stays injured for long. Monreal is very capable but Flamini or Coquelin out of their depth.
“whack-a-mole” –
Isn’t that a fancy avacado based dip ? 😉
Oooh, tattle rags going large on a Monolas, Carvalho, Reus treble swoop… Wow, would be so sweet it is difficult to even imagine. Go straight to title favourites with that haul.
Make it happen Arsenal 🙂
El puno @87, you wish, THAT WOULD NEVER EVER HAPPEN
Does anyone know the reason why liverfool pulled out of the Remy deal. I definitely won’t mind him in our squad.
Remy’s bollocks were not the same weight (left was a bit short crust), that’s why.
Louic Remy at Arsenal?! God forbid.
88 – the first two names entirely feasible. The last… No more outlandish than Ozil would have been this time last year. There’s money and need, so let’s see 🙂
bt8b, BB: The Flamster played left back for much of the CL run in 2006. It was said at the time that he was the best right-sided midfielder playing left back in Europe that season.
I think that realistically speaking, any signing right now hinges on our CL qualification. I am really worried about the return tie, albeit we are playing home and should be beating Besiktas’ of this world, absence of Arteta and Aaron especially worries me.
NBN,
I take your point about flamini as backup. As i think he’ll actually be used quite a lot in many different positions if we keep collecting injuries.
Might I add that it’s a little like Neuer playing sweeper, not preferable but he’s competent enough when called to, as he has shown countless times in the WC!
🙂 …. 😀
@91, sure first two definitely realistic, but we can only hope and wish right?
Remy definitely better than our second option in the striking position, some folks might even pick him ahead of Giroud, just saying.
NBN. I based my reticence about Flamoini as a left-back now on his brief performances there last season, which were nowhere near as sharp as in 2006. If he turns out to be our best choice I will a.) support him and b.) worry.
Eandy,
Am a little less worried about Besiktas at home, we’ve done many countless teams that are much better. Playing Besik in turkey .. is like playing Stoke on their good day. It’ll be different at home!
Anyways if we can’t beat them then we shouldn’t be in the CL ..!
Don’t really think any signings are reliant on qualifications, rather they probably depend on how much the player wants to be paid and how much they want to play for us (Thank you Alexis! for not choosing Pool!)
🙂
Re: Trev @86. Indeed. That is “whack-a-mole” with two accent marks on the final e. 🙂
We are definitely a bit light at the moment. Need a CB badly. Then DM. Then striker. The players we have are of an excellent standard but I think we need a bit more to go up against squads with as much strength-in-depth as we will face this year.
Trying to guess what the hell Arsene is doing in the transfer window is something I have been remarkably unsuccessful at down the years. Therefore I am trying to keep away from the rumour mill and see what turns up on .com before September. Not easy when even the calmest of heads on here are allowing themselves to dream of the Cavanis and Reus’s of this world!
Come on Arsene and Ivan- go buy us something pretty…
Er… Boom ?!
Well in GSD!
Agreed SSY.
And well put Trev. And I’d offer that perhaps the attitude and the physical weariness are tied, Vinay. Mind & Body and all that. Even [fill in the blank marquee player] has off days. No one calls them shit when it happens, rather, just an “off day.” And its not like OG wants to be shit. No sane footballer possibly could. I think there’s a lot more going on than we can see from our 10,000 foot view.
And yes, Kroos is playing preseason friendlies with Madrid. So what? I don’t expect Arsenal to follow their game plan, philosophy, or ethos. Ancelotti is a great manager, but that’s an altogether different discussion. And to act like its simple as 1-2-3 is seriously disingenuous.
Perhaps our new signing Shad Forsythe in the physio’s room has advised AW to give the German WC winners some time. He was such a big deal when we got him. And everyone said, Yes … Finally, an upgrade in the physio room!!! What, we’re going to then ignore his advice?
Happily, AW is apparently not doing so.
Cheers BB.
I’m quite proud of that, actually. That was my first goal!
*does dancing celebration so bad that Crouch and Sturridge don’t know what’s hit ’em*
GSD! GSD!
He scores without knowing!!
We need to sign someone like that!
😀
I like your team Toby but would make one change. OG is not in good form for whatever reason, so I would replace him by the Ox. We would then have a front three that could tear the heart out of any defence, and be totally flexiblein the roles that each of them plays.
Whether Chamb2 is ready to play DM is a wait and see……
Good goal GSD (Goal Scoring Dude!) – we could do with you in the first team right now 😉
Well in GSD.
Donald Trump and his ilk will no doubt be happy about this story. Heartbreaking really.
http://www.marketplace.org/topics/business/british-pubs-popular-disappearing
The abuse directed at Giroud on the interweb and twittersphere is ridiculous. Because of the World Cup he and many other players are still in the pre season stage. His first time on the pitch was the game against Monaco. When we used to play those pre-season games against Barnet with many first team players, one of the entertaining/amusing aspects was the poor control and passing of international players on their first appearance of the season. Giroud’s performance against Monaco was consistent with that level. He then came on for the second half against City and scored. He played around 30 minutes against Palace. There is no way he is match fit with that amount of playing time so needed to play last night in order to gain match fitness. If he is still performing at the current level come the games against Man City and Villa then such criticism would be fair.
As regards our Germans. Kroos has been on the pitch for a couple of games. In the first I thought he was about as useful as leaving a traffic cone in the middle of the pitch and apparently from the report I read there was an unspectactular performance in the second game. As for the players returning for Bayern against Dortmund, they were poor and convincingly beaten by Dortmund.
Finally, the bleating about DNA boy (Sanogo’s retweet of his tweet made me laugh), Barca decided to offload him because although he started well every season for them his performances tailed off to an unacceptable level as the season progressed. In their initial announcement there was a snide reference to this which they subsequently edited out. While I would not blame him for our collapses in his final seasons with us, the Barca criticism of him is consistent with our second half of those seasons. Since he departed, our second half of the seasons appears to be better, even though not yet consistent enough to win the league.
Cesc Fabregas?
The only right and smart deal was made by his parents when he was a nipper.
After that he thought he is smart and right.
Never mind the bollocks….
Joeos,
You really must stop adding facts to the headlines ………. 😉
We have bought a 19 year old right back prospect from Southampton. Due to lack of numbers he has been pressed into the role of emergency centre half. Due to even more squad shortages when we get a centre half back there are some that now want him to play in midfield. We have wide players that if we get one injury to our forward will now be played in the striker role???? Surely after just one league game we are better than having to play players out of position already??????
Can I also say that if we are genuinely waiting to see what happens in the champions league qualifier before making any signings then I think that could not be more wrong. We need strengthening regardless of whatever competition we are in.
I’m keeping quiet, Steve, for fear of being proved wrong when all the transfers-in-progress are finally completed !
Are there any ? Who knows.
It seemed to be generally accepted that the squad needed strengthening. So far, we have strengthened the positions in which we have bought. It will be a big dampener on the pre-season optimism if we don’t now deepen the squad too.
I don’t really believe that buying or selling clubs can possibly benefit by leaving deals to what is becoming relatively last-minute. Our early business was done very efficiently. If it is not backed up by the necessary additions to the replacements we have had so far, we will be in trouble.
Still, the new physio department is doing well – none of the Germans has been injured yet. 😉
Steve @114 This is true but I think it’s the cash flow consideration that is the predominant driver there not the pressure of competitive games.
I’m much happier at the idea of Chambers at DM than I thought I would be. I imagine it was someone on here who pointed out that having Mertesacker to guide him through games would develop him even faster and he has shown quality far above what I expected. Certainly an option I can see us using this season for certain games even if we do get another face in.
Very, very good read http://t.co/BMva8RgMEg
Methinks Chambers can be a good DM if given the chance and why not?! He’s clearly talented and we know he can play CB and RB already. Problem is when we have a full squad, he’ll be on the bench and that’s a waste to not develop him further.
The problem seems to be lack of depth and hopefully Arsene is working on that, realistically though don’t see too many players joining us unless there’s a huge change in transfer policy! Just Sayin’!
Will be happy if we can get Vermy’s replacement (..and maybe Gibbsy’s if he’s out for a few months). Not too bothered about strikers (or lack of if you believe what you read 😀 )
Looking forward to a less injury prone season and for the new players to gel!
OX int. : http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/20140820/ox-we-have-to-push-on-from-here
Another one http://bit.ly/1uT53Dr
Well, here’s another take on the match as I was lucky enough to be there. That stadium is probably one of the worst I’ve ever experienced and was definitely not designed for football. Don’t be deceived by its Olympic Stadium status; the Olympics never happened here and one gets the impression that they rather gave up on finishing building it. Stuck in a godforsaken, barren and windy, no-mans-land part of Istanbul (a bit like Wembley really though I’ve never been to the new one) it’s interesting to read reports about the poor state of the pitch. Despite having the run of the part of the stand we were housed in it was impossible to actually discern that because of the running track between us and the pitch. The stadium was built for athletics not football.
I have never heard such a cacophony of sound at any football match ever and I was actually at probably the greatest Highbury night ever for the Fairs Cup Final in 1970; most probably the pinnacle for Highbury in terms of noise and atmosphere. Such was the noise, long before the match kicked off, that some of the Arsenal players were wearing headphones while warming up! At times it was difficult to concentrate on watching the game because of the shrill ear busting decibel levels – god knows what it’s like to play under such circumstances. If only we could create a percentage of something like at The Grove who knows what more we could achieve!
It was really interesting to meet so many committed Gooners who had travelled from Cyprus, Bulgaria and Russia with some few ex-pats like myself from Turkey – I don’t believe many travelled from London given the price of air tickets at the minute. A comic moment: as we got through the turnstile, we had to turn in any loose coins (into the Red Crescent box) and lighters; only to go straight to the kiosk selling food and drink in the ground to be given loose change and free lighters offered up by the staff. What was that about?
Of course, we had too many players with below par performances but, under the circumstances given how motivated these Turkish teams are by their supporters, a nil-nil draw didn’t feel such an awful result to me even though I’d had to travel most of the day to get there. I suspect we’ll see rather a different match at The Grove in the return leg. All in all, it could have gone either way but I’m confident we can finish off the job at home. It’s interesting how different things can seem when you’re actually there.
A big thank you to Arsenal for ensuring they got my tickets to me as well as to my hostess (whom I’d only ‘met’ previously on Facebook) for chauffeuring me there, providing me with accommodation and taking me for a post-match breakfast on the Bosphorous! Now, if only the Ox’s shot had rebounded into the net from the post …!
Great report Bodrum.
I was actually wondering to myself earlier if you were going to post.
Worth the wait.
Honestly, Is Chambers doing it with smoke and mirrors or what? Only started a few Premier League games, never started a game in Europe — to my knowledge at least — whilst playing his favored left back position but now he is playing excellently in both leagues but in a different position. 19 years old and as poised as you like. So far he looks like the best of our new signings. Knock on wood.
Thanks for the eyewitness report Bodrum Gooneress. It is important to get the view from the stadium. Here’s hoping your prediction for the second leg is accurate. A drink of you choice on the bar.
Bodrum, Thanks for the eyewitness account. If the match had been held at Besiktas’ real stadium, the old or the new one, that trip over to the Bosphorus would have been much easier, if my geographical memory serves me right. Noise level might not have been much different though. 🙂
Excellent report Bodrum. Great to get some perspective.
I must admit I’ve been a bit confused at how “We’ll walk this one; we’ve won every other qualifier we’ve ever played” changed so seamlessly to “Doom, doom; we’ve been held to a goalless draw in a cauldron of noise on a cow pasture; we’ll never manage to beat this lot at home”.
COYG
Bath, Trev. I have said numerous times before that I will pass judgement when the window shuts. I am sincerely hoping that we have enough time to do the deals that need to be done. Previous windows have left me less than confident. We have been here do many times. I am just hoping that those in charge have the ability to ensure we are where we should be at the start of September.
Great stuff Bodrum. Really interesting read
Thanks Joe (and others). I appreciate your response because I’m an avid reader here but a bit shy of posting because of a bad experience of posting on Steve Gleiber’s forum some years back. I hope he’s remembered – RIP. It wasn’t him that put me off by the way.
Thanks for that very good report, Bodrum. Glad to know you had a nice time out there.
Great report Bodrum. Don’t be shy- I’ll post if you will…
You’re quite correct! I’m so impressed that Besiktas is rebuilding the same stadium in the same area near to Dolmabahce, it would be (for me) the equivalent of building a stadium close to Buckingham Palace! Yes, breakfast could have been nearer 😉
@B8B I had mentioned you in the ‘you’re quite correct’ post but it wasn’t picked up?
If we’re playing fantasy lineups
Ospina
Debuchy Mertesacker Koscielny Gibbs
Arteta
Özil Ramsey
Walcott Alexis Cazorla
Giroud is not prolific enough. I hate to agree with Lineker, but Huge Fucking Bignose (that Is what HFB stands for, right? 😉 ) should be scoring more than he does and as I don’t think we’ll get the best from Alexis if he is shackled wide, he goes into the middle in a fluid front three, switching with Theo as the mood takes them.
That midfield looks very weak though.
Ospina in goal for me because of two things, both perhaps harsh and one ridiculous, but good enough for me.
Harsh perhaps but fair – Szcz basically chucked a goal away against Palace by coming far out of his goal when the defender was comfortable. They got a corner and scored. He makes too many rash decisions.
Harsh and ridiculous but fair (to me) – The second reason I’d drop him is because he insists on wearing short sleeves. That’s an affectation and I don’t like flashy goalkeepers. The Polish Grobbelaar? Eat the bench, Woj.
😉
Thanks for the link Cent, that really was very good to read!
Bodrum Gooneress: Thanks for the sense of the atmospherics in Istanbul.
Cent: Great link
Combine the two and you get a much better perspective on a 0-0 away draw.
Steve T: I suspect it is the other way round: prospective signings waiting to see if they will have CL football with us.
bt8b: support and worry is our default position, is it not? 🙂
Bodrum Gooneress,
Thanks for the insight. Great report.
Nobody to fear in here, by the way. Except Wolfgang Smallballs that is.
No respect for age or gender, that one. 🙂
Cheers, gents. Articles like those two are on of the reasons I persist with Twitter, there is always a chance someone will Tweet/Retweet something that will lead you to these gems you might not normally come across by simply searching the Internet.
Support.
Worry.
Support.
Worry.
Tough to do on a mobile device. 😉
“At least two weeks.”
Must be Shad Forsyth’s take on three weeks. 😉
http://news.arseblog.com/2014/08/report-arteta-out-until-after-international-break/
You’re just guessing about Shad Forsyth, Homer (#103). I was the first here to note his arrival and to welcome it. But I’ve yet to see a single thing he has said or done in relation to his new appointment. Not that I expect to, I’m happy to let him do his thing and wait to see improvements in our fitness (none seen yet). I’m certainly not going to second guess him.
My concern is that, with Schürrle playing for Chelsea this week we seem to be the ONLY club giving our Germans extra holidays (noting that neither Real or Chelsea have midwinter breaks, which is the excuse repeated most by those happy with the situation). Fortunately we’ve struggled through, just, without them. I wonder if you’d be so content if we’d lost either game.
And Kroos wasn’t playing in friendlies, both games were cup games, equivalent to our FA Cup.
Öskar
PS: Yes I know I’m repeating myself, but new players keep coming into the discussion, in this case with guesswork and incorrect facts.
Ooops, the Spanish Super Cup is the equivalent of our Community Shield, but played over two legs. It’s a big deal in Spain, unlike ours.
Öskar
@141 Real Madrid do have a winter break they play freindlies during it but still a winter break and Schürrle did not start a match in WC.
One week isn’t a winter break, Jude, it’s one week, and they play during it to keep up fitness levels.
Öskar
And Schuerrle played more than four times as many minutes as Poldi in Brazil.
Öskar
Dude! Let it go! (no new players mentioned). 🙂
We are doing okay without them.
If Arsene and Stan decide they can’t play until this weekend then I will trust their judgement.
Why don’t preseason goals, carry any weight here. Well, they do with me. Just ordered # 22 for my first ever Arsenal squad shirt. I’m going to flaunt it everywhere (grocery store, the mall and gas station) 😉
Which brings me to Bodrum Gooneress. You too, know what it feels like to be far away from the home of Arsenal. Your travel adventure was a very satisfying read for me. And you’re not the first to observe “how different things can seem, when you’re actually there”.
Hope to someday experience that first hand.
Oskar, you are persistent like a cat. And I mean that as a compliment (even for one who calls himself Oskar the Dog, no less 🙂
Well, I wouldn’t say guess. Surmising maybe, based on facts available (presence of new physio and missing Germans) and objectively reasonable conclusions drawable therefrom (reason for missing Germans). Maybe AW is finally learning from past years and mistakes? Tho the last bit is probably guessing – or more like wishful thinking.
But pure guessing would be more like, Alexis will score 20 goals this year. Or the notion that Kate Beckinsale really IS my type. Well, that’s more like fantasizing. Hmmm …. Yep, best leave that right where it is.
At any rate, I anticipate a pleasant surprise line up-wise come the weekend.
Ned@136. You may well be right. I sincerely hope you are not but that does make quite a bit of sense.
ABB. Pre season goals are just that. No more and no less. It’s important to have a decent pre season but the primary objectives are fitness and sharpness. Pre season friendlies are not classed as first class matches either.
Good luck with the new shirt. It will have a certain amount of rarity value I must say.
🙂
‘Ok’, ecg? An added time winner and a goalless draw which leaves us vulnerable to the away goals rule? Lucky, I call it.
Oskar is my dog, Homer, and he takes all the blame for these posts, not me. His opinions can be taken either way, and always with a large dose of NaCl, because on rare occasions he has been known to be wrong (like the time I told him that cat food is made of cats and he goes rabid for it now in preference to his Eukanuba). His problem is he tends to vacillate between iconoclasm and advocatus diabolising with a touch of Nietzsche’s Übermensch (he’s a schnauzer) and even, occasionally, the plain logical.
A pleasant surprise this weekend? I’m expecting pretty much a full complement for Everton, less the physio room inmates of course.
Öskar
I think that the decision to give the Germans their full holiday is a good one in principal and as an isolated decision is sound.
We have not managed to prepare properly for this expected absence which has left the squad short and left the original decision about the Germans open to some debate.
I feel the area we have failed in has been in the transfer market. After selling TV we needed another central defender before the season began. That is where we knew we were missing a body and it has proved touch-and-go whether or not we’ve had to call Mertesacker up to cover ourselves.
In the next week or two we will see the return of our Germans and the transfer window is only open for ten more days or so- then we can see where we’re at for the year.
Let’s just make sure that those available for the next couple of games find some fluency and get the results we want.
GSD – fair points, I just think that having TV still in our squad would not change situation in any way since he still cannot play even now. I do, however, think that we should have bring in a replacement much sooner.
Eandy- good point about TV’s injury.
In that case we knew before pre-season that we could not rely on him and needed to find another player. Given our other early activity was good this seems an odd thing to let get this close to the wire.
There was a suggestion here a day or two back – I can’t remember from whom – that something had happened to bring forward Vermaelen’s transfer, maybe Barca’s offer was time-limited. I can’t believe that we don’t have a replacement in mind, and I don’t believe that.
It’s also quite possible that any deal completed once CL qualification has been secured will be on better terms. It’s obviously a risk to wait, but it seems a reasonable risk to me.
Whatever, the powers that be are waiting, either through their choice or because of “the working of The Market”, so we shall have to as well.
Of course, it’s also possible that TPTB are idiots and have no plan. I see no evidence to support that possibility. Since it neither seems reasonable, nor makes me happier, I choose not to believe it. You are, of course, free to believe what you choose.
COYG
It is far from ideal, but I think the transfer market will be virtually dead save for the odd deal here and there for yet another few days. After the CL qualifiers is when the real action will start and I don’t expect us to sign anyone before Thursday at the earliest.
The transfer window really should shut before the season starts, something like August 10 or thereabouts. It’s ridiculous the way it is now.
Afternoon all.
Thank for the report holic and the view from the ground Bodrum.
Didn’t see enough of the first half to make a fair comment, saw the most of the second half though, thought we might of sneaked it, but a draw was probably fair, the pitch and the ref were equally inadequate for such an important game, although Ramsey should of given him the opportunity to show the second yellow.
A draw away is far from a bad result, but with no goals it does leave us in a difficult position, the solution though is simple, come out firing on all cylinders and get two quick goals….
Simple this footballing lark. 😉
*should NOT of given him
Pangloss KNOWS !!! 😉
Sorry, I believe Pangloss has made a very plausible analysis of the situation. 😉
As one man ponders “getting creative” many others ponder “going mental.” 😉
http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/aug/21/arsene-wenger-arsenal-mikel-arteta?
Cheers, 8ball,
So, it’s the “needed” quality that is the fly in the transfer ointment.
Depends whether we are looking for “super” or “top, top”……
Anyone know which is better ?
Bodrum @ 129
I well remember Steve Gleiber’s website – like some others, present landlord included, he was a proper Gooner. RIP.
There used to be some hilarious confrontations there, mostly between somebody with the handle “Chocolate” and another person whose handle I forget. With little moderation, the level of vitriol exchanged could be breathtaking although, unlike some other places of more recent times, usually with an undertone of light-heartedness.
Sorry to hear that, for you, it wasn’t always the case.
Some volunteers kept the forum going for a while after Steve’s death but it understandably lost something along the way.
I subsequently migrated to Arseblog but eventually tired of that and gave it away to only now bother with this establishment.
Thanks for the memory.
UTA.
Trev…perhaps Super Top Top 😉
Pangloss knows….as normal!
Steve T @ 113
That is the thing. I do not see Chambers as a right back. He has, as many talanted players (look at Gibbs) played in several different positions in his career. Southampton called him, really just before he made his full debut, for “a tall, talented, creative midfielder”, and their acadamy knows quite a bit about creative players. In his career he has mostly been playing down the flank, either as a right sided midfielder or a right back. He has the stature that is constantly bounded about as being very important for our future impenetrable DM, he is aggressive, he has good stamina and speed (one of the best things about converting a right back instead of a centre half into a midfielder – the full back usually have a bit more in that department) but he is also very good on the ball, with excellent close control. For Southampton, 61% of his passes went towards the opponents goal so he is looking to get involved in play as well.
For me, has has most of the needed strengths, and his tendancy to commit to challanges that might be a bit of a problem when you are the last man, is more easy to live with in midfield.
To sum up. He is 19. He is managed by Arsene Wenger. He has played a grand total of 22 games for Southampton and 2 for Arsenal. He has not been playing in just one position in those games. He might well end up somewhere else and I would not see that as an emergancy solution. Look at a player like Bale, who went through positions based on what his strengths really was, and ended up in quite a good position for him.
I can understand the argument of not wanting to put him there if you want a ready made solution NOW. Absolutely. But that says nothing about Chambers suitability for the role. He might become and excellent DM, and I believe the plan is for him to become one. Therefore it can’t be called panic or pressing a player into the wrong position. I think it is his position. I think that is what is planned.
So rather than calling it a panic-move if we start playing it there. I think it is just the opposite.
I think it is a planned move.
Still – have have no problem understanding if you don’t want to give him time to develop there, right now, and that we need a world class signing to just come in and own the position.
But that is another question.
Soldado should be available for pittance, he still can’t get a game for the Swamp Dwellers. Maybe he just needs a proper club to play at and a decent manager!
Addendum to @164
I said I don’t see Chambers as a right back. That is not true, it is just not set in stone yet. I can absolutely see Chambers as having a career as a right back. But I believe he has several roads open to him at this moment, with this team and manager, and I think that were he ends up can be in a different position to the one he played twenty odd game for Southampton, mostly as second choice, in.
Toby, interesting, good points.
I was treating a lad of 14 last week who has ankle, shin and knee problems. For his age he is very tall and has a very lean physique. He is also very frustrated at having to play Right Back for his football team, a decision based on “well, that’s where he’s always been”.
I said to him last week that I didn’t think he looked like a right back. His long legs would get him from box to box very quickly, if he has the stamina and technique to play in midfield. If he has the strength, he could make a tall striker or, if he can read the game, he could make a centre back.
Full backs generally spend a lot of time twisting and turning and throwing their bodies into challenges – something better suited to a player with a lower centre of mass, and a bigger muscle mass on the legs to withstand the physical demands.
Calum Chambers, to me, looks better suited to the midfield or centre back role for the same reasons.
@Toby and @ Trev
I concur! Chambers could look good as a possible DM, have said so repeatedly, all he needs is to be given a chance to find out what his best position for the team is.
Maybe that’s why we have not rushed into a DM buy yet, although one may come eventually. I think once we have got Vermy’s replacement, we’ll push chambers a little forward.
Judging by what’s been said, we have not gotten anyone yet because our targets are either unavailable as of yet or do not want to join us.
I join the many frustrated that we have not bought a forward, DM and centre half. But won’t be too surprised if we did not do any more business this transfer window.
It is of my opinion that if we could keep most of the team fit for the season, we may not even notice these inadequacies in our team, with a little juggling of positions with who we have currently.
My 2 cents.
I actually felt the same in terms of a DM. Even though crocked, the likes of Dembele/Capoue who are rotting at spuds, can be easily convinced to come here. Of course levy may not approve but i think thats a target worth pursuing because they cannot be so bad just because they played for a shit club.
Same way with Lamella, he cannot be as bad as deemed to be, so if the rumors of Poldi to Galatasary is true, then is Lamella not a good option?. Better than Joel, i think so.
Chambers needs to be treated with kid gloves. He is a talent, no two ways about it but then we have seen a lot of talent come and go. We need him to be here for a long time and pushing him wherever there is a need is not the right way to go about it. I have absolute respect to the boss but we cannot do the same mistake he has done before by playing players out of position. Chambers may go on to be very good wherever he plays but right now playing him as a dm is not right.
BB@ 168, keyword being IF, and just like you I don’t see us getting even 85% of the team fit at the same time. That’s just the truth, we are one week in the season, we already have about four players already out, so go figure.
So… Pool signed Balotelli, looks like we dodged a bullet there!
😀
SAG,
Believe you me, I share the frustration!
As I am going by what we have previously done in these situations, I choose to look on the more positive side. After all, we did sign Shad Forsythe to look after the team’s wellbeing and we definitely managed to nick Alexis from pool! (who have now got Balotelli it seems!)
I look forward to be proven wrong when Arsene signs 2 or 3 more players but do not think it shall be so in this transfer window.
While chambers may not have been signed to play 1st team football regularly(he may actually have been?!), he definitely exceeded all expectations, so yes , throw him in the mix! Only way to get better is to play and 19yrs isn’t too young.
So in essence yes I am hopeful if a little more so than previous seasons.
Hasn’t AW said that he sees Chambers as a DM? Given that AW saw something in Chambers that no other manager saw (just as he saw a world-class striker in an indifferent young winger called Henry), perhaps we shouldn’t worry too much about second guessing where AW plays him.
Arsenal are the smallest and lightest team in the Premier League – average: 11 stone, 5ft 9in.
Buy big & heavy, Arsene.
Vinay @ 169 (also touching on BB @ 172)
I agree that Chambers should be treated with respect, and if possible, not be thrown into the deep end. That is not to say he isn’t to be thrown into the water at all.
As BB says, he is 19, he is not a 16 year old talent. He has played in this very league for a season. We should not overplay him, we should not give him jobs he isn’t up to, if nothing else as that might end up getting the crowd on his back. Absolutely. But even if 19 isn’t that young, at least it is young enough for him to perhaps not be sure as to where his best position is.
Most of the players in this Arsenal team was probably the creative midfielder when they were 12. These are the kinds of players that come to a club like ours as that creativity and control is needed in every single position. Gibbs was an attacking midfielder quite far up the ages. And it shows.
Again, I have no problem saying we shouldn’t play him 50 games this season. I have no problem saying it might not be such a bad idea to get a ready made product, both for our title tilt and to let younger players develop at a more leisurely pace.
But neither of those arguments say that Chambers, if he was to be deployed at defensive mid, would be out of his depth, or played out of position! So for me, it’s more of a discussion if we should entrust that job to him, alongside Arteta and Flamini, this season, or get another player to do that job as well, rather than discussing if it is him being played out of position. Some position are more interchangeable than others, and for some players even more so, and Chambers has played in midfield far more through his career than as a right back, if you count all his years playing. It is not as if he isn’t familiar with it.
I actually believe he is being played more out of position at the moment, as a centre half, and he is doing a great job of it.
We bought him for 16m pounds. 16m! He was absolutely not bought to play in the reserves for three years. I really do think he was bought to play regularly, if be depended upon totally. He is 21. He is ready to play. He has played as a midfielder for years. He has two other players, both with many years of experience, to rotate with in that position, Arteta and Flamini, so it isn’t as if we are relying on him to be our only player, and have to play him through bad spells.
So again, I can’t see this “being played out of position” as a thing. As a professional on the highest level, he has 20ish games as a right back. It can’t define his entire Arsenal career that that is where Southampton could fit him in at that moment in time.
He is a great prospect, already a good player and if he has the skills, and we have the need, I have no problem in letting him get a run of games as DM.
And again, it’s a whole other discussion if you, Vinay, or Steve T, or anyone else believes we should accelerate the team by getting a 25 year old who has played there for years. I can see that argument as very, very valid.
But I don’t think Chambers is one for the future, he is one for now. And I don’t think playing him as a DM now would be playing him out of position, it would be playing him in one of the positions that he can make his, that he has the skills for, and that we need to fill.
@SSY,
Get HULK you mean?!
😀
@NBN,
Exactly, but play him. Don’t let Chambers sit on the bench, put him in the 1st eleven!
Am optimistic that we actually got ALexis and an above expectation Chambers! This is a good season shaping to be a better one!
*if NOT be depended upon totally
Thanks Trev, thanks Uply.
Trev – I trust you appreciated that my posting above was simply describing my beliefs and conclusions, enabling you to express yourself in a common idiom with uncommon accuracy.
COYG
Right, sorry for the long post. I had probably already made my point. In short all I am trying to say is that if DM is where he ends up it probably isn’t because we didn’t buy someone else, rather the planned position he was to end up in.
And that is why I think we’ll buy one centre half during this window, and not a DM. And probably just one. Mert and Kos to be the first on the sheet, with the new buy as back-up, with Chambers perhaps playing a game or two there as well, but mostly he will be a young player to understudy the ageing players of Arteta and Flamini.
Right back will be Debuchy with a back-up of Bellerin and perhaps Chambers at times, depending on opposition and injury situation.
With Toby, NBN & others in this discussion about Chambers as the long-term solution to our DM conundrum. Everything about his playing style and his strength favors such a position, and learning the positional discipline in Arsenal defense alongside Per et al. would help him in that aspect. He was trained as a midfielder, Arsene thinks he would be a good central player, more tellingly he hasn’t spent a single minute on the flanks since he joined us, and I think we will start seeing him play the DM role now and then this season.
Given his age he will have a few steep crests in his learning curve, and would spend some time injured , and cannot be our DM solution for this season. So the question is whether we buy another defensive minded MF for this season, or make do with Arteta-Flamini-Chambers and maybe a somewhat versatile CD whom we will sign. In previous seasons Arsene has gone for that latter route, being ‘creative’ with players we have, but our limitation in this position is so pivotal that it may make more sense to buy a defensive minded ( fast, technically and tactically strong and with a physical presence ) midfielder who can deputize comfortably in the CD role and have Chambers continue his education primarily in the center of the defense. It would of course be ideal if we get TWO defensive players, one specialist CD and a specialist MF, but we may have to choose one between these two positions.
I think Arsene (as we all) would like one more established and experienced goal-socring threat. Not sure what is the deal with Poldi, I guess his old-school 4-4-2 second striker playing style doesn’t convince Arsene fully, and it may be too late to teach an old horse new tricks. But against most opposition even if we get Poldi for thirty odd minutes on the pitch and play for a while to his strength he is going to guarantee us a goal or two. Which really is a rare ability to have and not to be easily scoffed at. The question is, can we get a Poldi with more directness cutting in, better passing and dribbling?
I think Campbell can be that player if given a chance, but I agree it would be risky to take that chance and we may see one of them leave in favor of a more experienced and established player than Campbell, but someone more suited to our playing style.
@DocFaust
I actually think we’ll cash in on Poldi if not this season then maybe the next, he’s not getting any younger and truth be told, we did not really use him too much.
Will be sad to see him go though.
NBN @ 173: I fully agree with your comment, but sometimes we forget that by the time Henry came to us he has already shown the world the glimpses of his abilities. I believe he was France’s top scorer in both ’98 WC and ’00 Euro. Aresne’s initial discovery of him in Monaco — where he took him out of the reserves to play for the senior team — where he very quickly flourished and even after Arsene left was one of the key players when Monaco again won the league in 97.
He had totally lost his way in Juve, of course, before he came to us.
In that respect bringing Vieira in from Milan — even before he himself was officially announced — when he really was a total unknown in football to play in the center of the midfield of his new club was also equally demonstrative of Arsene’s abilities to spot a talent. 🙂
Hi everyone.
Steve T @ 149 Hey! 😉 *Chuckles (nervously)
Now I see we are still linked with Tiote. Physical yes! But his judgement is suspect 🙁
BB@181 — I am sure we will sell him (instead of either renewing his contract or letting him go for free the year after) next year, was wondering whether we might actually expedite the inevitable but letting him go before the window closes and get someone with similar penchant for scoring but more dimensions to his game. Very very hard to find.
abb @ 183: I think we can safely ignore that rumor. 🙂 (Famous last words).
@184: “…expedite the inevitable BY letting him …” 🙂
Dr Faustus haha! Certainly, but I do agree that we need some physicality in the midfield. Just not someone who seems hell bent on collecting yellow cards! 🙂
All I can say is that we need someone really physical, strong and hopefully have some ball skills in the middle of the park. I don’t know how Wenger intend on achieving that, but guys we can’t rely on Arteta and flamini to carry us through the whole campaign. We have done well so far with transfers, hope Wenger is not going back to his conservative ways again. Sell Poldi? Then what, Campbell and Sanogo? Please don’t get me started.
@DocFaust
Well, if we want to persist with the current formation,… we could just swap Alexis for Poldi’s position.
More dimensions ( and penchant for scoring to come?!) to game added with immediate effect.
But am not in favour of this, selfishly i want to see a game or two with Alexis up front when we’re firing on all cylinders! Should be a revelation and a sight to behold!
😀
@SAG
I get your reservations about Sanogo (although i think he’ll come good faster than most would wager) but Campbell?
He hasn’t even started yet, so let’s give him a chance, he may bomb but he may turn out brilliantly. It’s effectively a ‘new’ signing of a striker for us no?!
😀
@BB, I see where u are coming from with Campbell, but I have seen enough of Sanogo to know that we cannot rely on him to be our second striker. This is Arsenal we are talking about, if we really want to go for the PL or even CL trophies we have to do better than that. And I can’t see selling Poldi, a far way forward for us, what with the whole depth issue, and he can actually score goals. God knows we need all the goals we can get.
Let’s not forget about AOC ! Is it not true that every time he comes on as a sub, he makes things happen (quickly, too) 🙂
@SAG
Well, i would not want to sell Poldi without getting a competent replacement, but what i think would happen is that he’s probably the next in line to go and would be least missed by us should we elect to play Alexis in his role.
If it was up to me, i would have kept Vermaelen!
🙂
Liverpool have agreed a fee for Balotelli.
This worries me.
They were good to laugh at when splashing mass amounts on mediocre no-marks, but this is a true quality signing.
Said before, but I’d love Balotelli for £16mil.
Decent price, huge potential, open competition with Giroud. Offer us something different up front physically and technically.
No seething, but I’m certainly interested to see how he fares if he does go to Liverpool.
#FreeManolasCarvalhoReus
Reckon this is our last chance to cash in on Poldi. He’s 29 and not set the world alight with us. With AOC, Theo, Gnarby The Panther and some fella called Sanchez about I reckon we’d take anything over £10mil. He’s a squad player and we can improve elsewhere with the cash.
We may have money to spend at the big boys table now, but we will never be able to ignore the financials. If a smart deal comes in we will take it I reckon.
Porco Rosso Knows.
#FreeBalotelli
good morning. porco, i am not worried in the least about balotelli to liverpool. suarez is sane compared to him, and sulks less. brentan will have about six good games out of him all year, a couple red cards, and maybe 15 goals in all competitions. his attitude will help liverpool to fifth place, one above tottenham and two above the red mancs bastards.
Bang
Last one. Versatility is a great asset, but we can’t plan a season with the same player playing 2/3 positions long-term. If Chambers is our 2nd right-back who plays there if he is in midfield? If he plays right-back we have no genuinely defensive midfielder option. What about if we get centre-back injuries
Same with Sanchez. If he is our back up to Giroud and our creative wide player with pace what happens when he is injured? All on Giroud/Theo to carry us, again. We saw how that went. Theo isn’t even fit now.
I guess we all know we are 3 players short of a complete squad. Over to you Arsene and BIG Ivan.
UTA
Mario will lead David Brent a merry dance. He thinks he’s a man manager because of Suarez knuckling down last season after he didn’t get his move to Arsenal. He ain’t seen utterly bonkers yet.
199 – The bites and racism bans say different in terms of games missed.
El P,
Sanchez is a.k.a …… ‘The Squirrel’.
(http://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2014/aug/15/alexis-sanchez-arsenal-barcelona-premier-league-la-liga)
When he gets up to speed our opponents better watch out for their nuts. 😀
As for Balotelli, we dodged a bullet in my opinion!
Ditto Scruz! 😀
el puno, but not in terms of goals scored or effect on season.
bath knows. just wait until a cold day in november at stoke when he gets his legs ripped from his body…brentan won’t know what hit him.
Have we forgotten Bibliogate Bibliotelly?!?!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ui43ITOnF7E
Good luck to pool sorting that one out!! Look forward to many sending offs and sulks!
😀
Soon to come in the Champions League. Barcelona v. Liverpool. AKA
Bitey v. Barmy.
Who knows what they will do next? Is that why they sign these players??
And why oh why do some of you drool over Neuer, every time he comes off his line. Yet when Woj does it, you go bonkers! Remember folks, keepers, just like girls, just want to have some fun!!! 😉
And so does Mario! 🙂
Well in Bath!
😀
Abb. What about the girl keepers then. 😉
#160, Wenger says we have to get creative in CM w/Arteta out.
#174, doesn’t surprise me that we are the smallest & lightest team in the Prem.
So, is it any surprise an aging 33 year old DM Arteta cannot play twice in the space of 3 days? He’s injured in his second game of the season. That he’s injured so early in the season tells me we need more physical presence in MF. He cannot handle that role anymore against tougher opposition. The physically strong and imposing Palace even gave us a tough time.
On August 1, I posted I was surprised we hadn’t signed a DM yet. A week into the Season & I’m not surprised at all. Once again, I have high hopes for the forthcoming season but yet I find my optimism is waning. Come on Arsene, sort it out.
The amazing thing too is we’re the 5th richest club in the World and we act like we’re skint.
Hi 8ball ! The more the merrier 😉
204 + 205 – both fair points that I can’t argue with. We will have to wait and see 🙂
So who goes where in the ADM/Cavani merry go-round?
#FreeADM
Got some errands to do, but a little shout out for all the links, posted this set of drinks. From a very serious subject to light hearted fair, we thank those who contributed xx
I have so much work to do today, and yet it seems procrastinating at the bar is the task for day!
A couple of drinks have commented on the economics of the transfer window and whether we are trying to balance the books before doing more business.
I took a bunch of numbers made up by the media, made up some of my own, and gathered a couple of numbers from the Arsenal site. And so with my disclaimers in place, this is my accounting so far:
Looking at transfer fees, we sold Verm, which pays for Debuchy and Ospina; we sold Vela, Eisfeld, and got some cash from the Cesc sale, which pays for 11 out of the 16 mil for Chambers; and there is of course Alexis for a cool 35 mil. So the net in transfer fees is about 40 mil.
There are of course salaries to consider and I’ve assumed Ospina about the same as Fab, Debuchy about the same as Sagna, Chambers about the same as Verm, and Alexis about the same as Bendnter, Park, and the other minor players combined. So the net increase in salaries is about zero (at least for this season).
And finally there are the new Emirates and Puma deals, which are about 60 mil total. Of course the old deals have expired so the net increase in cash flow is about 40 mil.
So Arsenal’s net spend this transfer window is about zero.
And that’s how you run a business!
BB @206. That video. Gets me every time. 😀
At Vinny 211, exactly what I have been saying. We can’t rely on Arteta and Flamini to handle that part of the midfield. We need a beast, seriously smart beast in that center circle.
Next thing, Wenger will us that Wilshire can play as a DM.
Nice poachers goal , bath, and happy to egg you on. 😉
I don’t think David Brentan Rogers man-managed Suarez at all last season. I think Suarez behaved himself purely in order to attract Real Madrid or Barcelona.
Having achieved that, he then bit someone with the world watching in order to force a move away from Liverpool which, after all, is his normal modus operandum.
Good luck with Balotelli, DBR, – totally different kettle of fish.
Over easy, mate. 🙂
One point not to overlook is that if Chambers is being groomed to be our DM, we need an experienced fill-in short term. Yet what top, experienced player will come knowing that he will be out of the team in a couple of season’s time and looking for a new club when he is a couple of years older than now, and possibly the wrong side of 30, when long-term contracts are harder to come by? So reeling in that sort of DM may be proving difficult for that reason more than we are not trying to land one.
Dr. F: I don’t think it is so much that Poldi’s natural role as one of the 2 in a 4-4-2 doesn’t convince AW as that AW doesn’t set the team up in that formation very often these days, except late in games that we are still chasing.
Trev @219: and not one that smells too well, either.
Good shout Scruz, that’s exactly what I hope will happen, in fact I’d be made up if he does worse than that as he could be surrounded by journeyman players who don’t give him decent service and are still learning each other’s names in the car park before their next game.
@216 göönsterham
Let’s face it, with Suarez pool had teething problems but with Balotelli, i look forward to seeing Rain Man the sequel! With all due respect to Hoffman, but Balo would be better and he isn’t even acting!!!
😀
wallet exhausted
gonna have to temporarily
dip back into me old job
and you can fuck off fer a start
i was a respected man
of some repute
my achievements are great and many
indeed many grate
.
jeez who do i söund like
.
stand back and wait for the explösion
perhaps not a good word to use
for a man with my accent
gonna pay more attention in future
and
long may several here
say the same wants
again and again
whaatss that ?
CB- DMF – TDK – ASDA – SMPTE
world class pimple popper
.
the whole world and its granny
can see what we need
😉
.
Howdy all
THE ARSENAL!!!!!!
o yes
Vinny, Arteta getting injured had absolutely nothing to do with having played twice in a week. It was an injury that you can never do much about, his foot got caught when tackled which caused a twist. That happens every now and then and is pure bad luck.
Thank you cba and Lars.
I say that TDK is as much needed as JVC, cba. And don’t forget we need to fill the VHS position too if we want to be seriously considered as a title winning material.
I thought ECG’s maths in an earlier post were about spot on. We did of course begin with a significant accumulated cash reserve and we appear not to be dipping into it too much…yet… although one senses that there is a willingness to do so by the board which is possibly not shared by the manager.
We don’t know this of course and sadly a lot of hysterical outpourings by our fans are the result of believing tabloid press or radio or mickey mouse website analysis which is designed to provoke just such a reaction. Most of us who drink here do so because most of the posts and commentary are devoid of this over-hyped and misinformed claptrap.
But occasionally I think we all would like to get a glimpse of what really is happening at the club. Frankly I have talked to the Chairman, listened several times to Gazidis and digested hours of Wenger’s commentary on teambuilding. To be honest it confuses me and depresses me in equal measure because I don’t always believe the public message nor do I detect a coherent thread.
For instance do we or don’t we need a DM? Does the(2 week??) injury to Arteta necessitate an investment in a new player in this position when we might not have bought one before if he hadn’t got injured? Surely its as big a risk to start the season with no fit , experienced back-up to our centre backs and jeopardise our Champions league qualification by so doing?
Perhaps the confused nature of our planning is a very good reason for not being transparent. While confidentiality in dealings must be vital I think supporters would really like to think that our planning is based on more than AW’s changing whims.
TDK?
Glory days – C30 C60 C90 GO!
Indeed, Lars. Nor can the blame for Arteta’s ankle twist be laid at Shad Forsythe’s door. The healthiest fittest player on the planet can do little to avoid an injury like that. If I’m not mistaken, it’s more the muscle pulls and strains that we’re hoping to see a decrease in.
ttg – please stop sniping at Wenger.
I’d be REALLY interested to know what evidence you have, apart from mysterious “contacts”, that our manager has ever been unwilling to spend a penny less than he believes the club can afford.
You may disagree how much that is; you may believe that we should risk the club’s future in order to secure an elusive world-class player; you may even think that someone else would do a better job of recruiting and developing talent and might have done better than lead the team to a UEFA Champions League qualifying position despite having had little or no money to spend on securing new players.
I have no objection whatever to you holding such beliefs. I don’t share them but I agree that differing opinions are the lifeblood of a community such as this one.
Please, please try harder to resist the temptation to qualify ever positive thing you have to say with constant references to how much better things might have been. There’s an old quote from Stanley Baldwin that I think has relevance.
I’ve now read the whole of ttg’s contribution@229 and not just the first paragraph, which prompted my rant above.
I think there is further disingenuity in the third paragraph where you say that you cannot discern a trend in the combination of the club’s transfer business combined with what they say to outsiders in public and in private.
Surely the whole basis of your posts is that you do discern a trend and that you don’t like it?
I find the best way to cope with the way that the media report Arsenal’s public pronouncements is to ignore them. I’m fortunate enough to be privy to their private pronouncements; I have never spoken to the chairman, nor have I listened to Gazidis or Wenger, but unless I had had the opportunity to prove my absolute discretion to the Chairman, the Chief Exec or the Manager, I wouldn’t expect them to say anything to me that they wouldn’t say to the press. Naturally, if I had ever been admitted to the confidence of the senior management at Arsenal FC I wouldn’t be able to pass on anything that they’d told me.
So, I have to try to determine the club’s transfer policy by observing their transfer business. I see a willingness to spend what funds we have to strengthen the squad. I look at the past few years and conclude that we had little or no money in 2011 to replace Na$ri and DNA boy, that we had enough money in 2012 to purchase the contracts of Podolski, Giroud and Cazorla to try to replace the Dutch Skunk and that last year we had enough for Higuain but were gazumped, that we then had enough to trigger Suarez’s release clause but not enough actually to trigger his release but were able to pick up the player that RM released when, as was generally expected, the acquired Gareth Bale’s services.
It’s easy to characterise the acquisition of three good ‘uns and two duds on the last day of the transfer window as a trolley dash. It’s easy to describe two serious, but ultimately unsuccessful attempts to buy a top-class striker and the opportunist purchase of a world-class midfielder in another window as a clusterfuck. Just because it’s easy, doesn’t mean it’s correct, and I don’t describe either summer 2011 or summer 2013 in those terms.
I recall the January window of 2013 when, as I recall, Kieran Gibbs was injured in the last week, there was no confidence in his backup, and Monreal was brought in within a couple of days. If a club can arrange its transfer business efficiently once, I imagine they can do it more than once.
I’m happy for anyone to hold other views, and most of the time I’m happy to sit back in silence while they express those views, but every so often I crack and feel the need to express my own, which are essentially that we’ve got a decent team, a decent manager, a decent stadium and decent history (and by “decent”, I mean a bloody sight better than average) and that on this occasion, “steady as she goes” seems a better bet than “time for a change”.
COYG, and good night all.
Bugger. “I’m fortunate enough to be privy to their private pronouncements” in my fourth paragraph@233 should have been “I’m not fortunate enough to be privy to their private pronouncements”.
Otherwise a standard “the” rather than “they”… and I proofread it twice before hitting “submit”.
COYG
Masterful Pangloss, truly masterful. A bottle of Macallan 25yo on the bar for you. Slainte.
By ‘decent’, I would mean ‘bloody good’ actually.
So, Pangloss, as you know I have suspected all along, you actually admit you know nothing at all. 😉
Bloody good post though.
Required reading before every transfer window.
I agree in principle, Lars, that the transfer window really should shut before the season starts. But it actually works to our advantage the way it is. That is, so long as we continue to miss automatic CL qualification and quality players wait to see if we get in before committing.
Chambers as a DM is pure wishful thinking, imo. He might be,the greatest ever in the future, but a heck of a risk to take now with a tyro. Khedira still looks possible to me.
Poo getting Balotelli and the likelihood of Manure getting Di Maria are both a little worrying, although the latter probably means they won’t be pursuing Reus and I still have hopes there too.
As it stand, what has the window brought us? Debuchy, in my view a minor downgrade on Sagna,. Chambers, an excellent, adaptable youngster, but not as yet a genuine upgrade on TV. Ospina, an improvement on Flappy but unlikely to get more than minimal first XI opportunities. In addition Bendtner, Park, Aneke, Boateng, Eisfeld and Vela have all gone, without making any real difference. That leaves only Alexis representing a real step forward, and good as he is it simply isn’t enough to merit the optimism I see in these drinks rounds. In fact how good is he? And will he, like Özil, take a season to bed in before bringing it weekly?
I have high hopes of Özilla hitting the ground running as he did last year, and this time maintaining form through midyear and beyond. But I won’t be thinking titles or trophies unless there’s a real kick in the tail of this transfer window bringing us one or two more marquee players. And you know who I want – Reus and Khedira, or Hummels. Maybe Cavani or Falcao on loan perhaps. That sort of marquee player. Otherwise we may be struggling unless we get lucky with minimal injuries for a change.
Öskar
I omitted to mention Campbell, also a useful addition but unproven at Premiership level. And I expect him to end up on loan or used as a make-weight in a deal still to be done.
Öskar
To be strictly accurate Campbell was not an addition since he was already with us. But you know what I mean!
Öskar
Pangloss. Freudian typo? 😉
Re: SAG @218. LJW may just have strained his karma a couple of weeks ago when he said in a published article that he was not a defensive midfielder. A few short weeks later and that’s exactly what he could be playing. 🙁
Pangloss@232: I was wondering which Baldwin quote you were referring to, “Never complain, never explain,” or “A platitude is simply a truth repeated till people get tired of hearing it.” Or even “the only defense is in offense.”
I can’t think of an industry, save perhaps for acting, where the acquisition of talent is so complex. Money, availability, ego, and all with the additional complication of a limited but deep-pocketed A-list of potential employers. And whomever you acquire has to be fitted into a small team which has regulatory limits on its size. If you are Google, you just go out and buy the best engineers and the more you can get the better. None of this having to offload incumbents to make room for new talent. Imagine the shenanigans that would go on if Apple and Google and all the other big tech companies were restricted to hiring 25 or some other equal number of engineers on fixed-term contracts. Not to mention what would happen to salaries for the top talent, and the bidding wars that would trigger.
Balotelli, Sturridge & Sterling. That’s going to seriously rip apart a few defences this season. Great gamble for L’pool at £16M imo. They’ve just made themselves title contenders
If I were a L’pool fan I’d be grinning ear to ear.
When I saw Balotelli play against us April 2012 for Man City at the Grove, although he got sent off, I thought he had that swagger, physicality, power and that menacing look that you just don’t know what he’s going to do. I’d take that risk for a season.
Whatever they’re smoking over there at L’pool, it must be some good shit.
Interesting observation, Ned (#243), but having worked for IBM from mid ’70s to mid ’90s when they were the world’s largest, most successful company, I can assure you that recruitment was never as random as you suggest. Yes, the objective was always to hire the best, but budgets were strictly monitored and adhered to at the risk of public disembowelment by senior management if a cent was overspent. And that rule applied every step up from the local stationary budget to major new investments in plant, technology and the personnel to run them.
One of the key reasons IBM lost its preeminent position was it became too big and unwieldy with too many empires built by corporate executives who lost sight of the company’s prime functions. Interestingly, had IBM followed the demands of the US government after the anti-trust case of 1972 immediately, instead of fighting the issue for a decade or more, it might have been properly positioned to fight back against the Apple and Microsoft incursions into its business. As it was, it wasn’t.
I doubt it’s changed all that much since, and Facebook, Google et al would do well NOT to allow its minions to chuck company assets around like water as you suggest lest the next megamonolithic corporate identity usurps their roles similarly.
Cheers
Öskar
* Just checked my facts and the antitrust case was begun in 1969, not ’72.
Öskar
God, us lot really just need to watch a few players in red and white kick a football for ninety-odd minutes, don’t we?
Ain’t that the truth, Toby?
Ned@242 – I was thinking of a remark regarding power and responsibility, but some of the alternatives you suggest are also apposite.
(Thinks: Must go and look up a few more Baldwin quotes.)
…and thanks for the kind words, baff and Trev. May I offer you some of this excellent Macallan?
Pangloss
Perhaps my angst might be due to the fact that I invest quite a lot of money into the club and to quote the estimable Steve T we are not always in my view ‘ the best we can be’. I have great loyalty to a club I have supported passionately for over 50 years but this extends in my case beyond a tacit acceptance of everything they do . In my view the very real reason forums like this exist is to surface concerns and transfer windows are one of those times.
The difference between sniping and constructive criticism is one I’d like you to clarify.. It would be hard to look at Arsenal’s transfer activity ( as you have in a rather rose- tinted way) in recent windows as always coherent and strategic. This year has been much better in that we have brought in real quality but I still detect a rather puzzling thread. There are bound to be ( and need to be) areas that the public ( even those with an emotional and financial investment in the club) cannot be privy to and we are porky served by the media that convey what is apparently going on.
My position on transfers is normally to let things emerge, they change so quickly anyway, but every so often I find it appropriate to comment on my perception of events.
As for sniping at Wenger I believe the man to be an extraordinary talent and one that we will only appreciate fully when he is gone and we are struggling to replace him. But as he is earning £8 million a year I find it in order as a double season ticket holder to express criticism of him where appropriate. This might be construed as sniping by some and if so I don’t apologise. While a genius I do think he appears to be inconsistent in some of his thinking( I’m manifestly not a genius and so am I and you may detect this in my contributions from time to time!) and I think this is most apparent in team- building. My concerns are fairly similar to those of many other supporters including many in this bar and come the 31st August they may be miraculously resolved.
The Baldwin quote I guess you meant was the never complain/ explain one. Sorry but that runs totally contrary to the way a multi- national brand needs to present itself to those who invest their emotions or money into the club and certainly is not my modus operandi either
A usual TTG misprint- porky should read poorly- apologies although it adds an element of mystery
Ttg – Thanks for the clarification.
I have no objection to your views, although I don’t agree with them. I was simply asking you to express them which you have now done.
I guess that if you’re paying for two season tickets you’re a lot less inclined to take a “rose-tinted” view of things.
The Baldwin quote I had in mind referred to exercising the power to criticise without needing to bear responsibility for their consequences, and was, perhaps, a little harsh.
Anyways… Thanks again for the clarification. Can I interest you in a little of this Macallan?
TTG. I’m very much with you. Be the best you can be. I don’t think we have done that for years now. My view is that we have always had money to spend, we have just chosen not to. I think our net spend was something like 11 million in 8 years. If that is being the best we can be then I’m sorry, I don’t get it.
As others have said, I will wait until the window closes before making any final comments. But I do think we are a good few players short. I also think there is no need to be a good few players short. Like TTG and many others who spend fortunes every year I don’t for one second consider it disloyal to ask questions of the manager and the board. Had we made the required investment last year it could be argued that we would not have to face a tricky champions league qualifier? Purely hyperthetical now but a question I’m sure that I’m not the only one to have asked?
We have stood still for a number of seasons in my opinion. The recent freedom of information report disclosure told you that on average there were 5000 empty seats at every home game. How long will it be before those empty seats end up not being sold in the first place?
As I have said many times before. Never ever be afraid to ask questions of those in charge. It is not disloyal and it is not anti Arsenal.
SteveT – We disagree about the impottance of maintaining cash reserves. Fair enough.
If your repeated assertions that asking questions is not incompatible with loyalty are in answer to points that I have made, I’d appreciate it if you would provide references to those points, if not I’d appreciate your making that clear.
Thanks in advance.
‘Balotelli, Sturridge & Sterling. That’s going to seriously rip apart a few defences this season. Great gamble for L’pool at £16M imo. They’ve just made themselves title contenders’
Yeah, except Liverpool didn’t win the title last season because of their defence. They can rip apart defences all they want this season but if they concede 49 goals again, they can forget any title.
“Never Mind the Noise, Feel the Entertainment”
There’s a song along those lines …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2A6ItHeFus
Let’s see if Balotelli can get through the season with zero red cards.
Pangloss. They are not in reference to any specific point that you have made. It is a general point that I have made.
Football is now very much a business. A business is only as good as it’s assets. Our main assets should be on the pitch. What happens on the pitch determines everything else. It sets the tone for the whole business. In my humble opinion we could be considerably better on the pitch. I’m bored with being told how much money we make when we don’t invest it in the areas that really matter. I’m bored starting every season being what I consider to be 3 players short. Especially when I don’t think it had to be that way. A net spend of 11 million in 8 years would suggest to me that we should have invested more in the areas that were most needed.
Now I know we have had a stadium to pay for but we were all told when The Grove was built that this would not impact on transfers. Well that clearly has not been the case.
In my humble opinion I think we could have been a lot more productive in the transfer market with the money that we have had at our disposal. I don’t think we have come close to being the best we can be.
We have 9 days to address areas of weakness that we all pretty much agree exist. 9 days to address the same areas that we all highlighted last season. If they are not addressed then I think 4th again is about the best we can hope for.
As I said, just my humble opinion.
Hi all. Been a huge week at work and i have thoroughly enjoyed checking into the bar each morning, night and in between to catch up on all the holic thoughts after the besiktas match.
Some truly great reads above and that is one of the best parts of this bar. You can be completely connected to everything arsenal in a second and be part of it all by doing absolutely nothing.
I must add that the bar Is all the richer when Oskar and his supporters and his most staunch opposition are on fire…
I never like to miss a minute when the drinks are flying thick and fast.
It is a bit like an Arsenal soap opera.
You cant wait to read the reply post….
Cheers Holic for a top establishment even from just a far away observer this past week.
Vinny: I feel you have a very rose-tinted view of what Balotelli did that day. He could and should have been sent off on several occasions (including one potentially career-ending assault on Alex Song) and was quite possibly our best player that day.
If he all of a sudden has grown up he could be useful for Liverpool, but it is far more likely that he will score in the region of 8 goals and get sent off twice.
SteveT, Ok thanks for making that clear. I hope you can see how making those assertions about disloyalty in a post that started by explicitly agreeing with someone with whom I was having a discussion might have caused confusion.
I have to disagree with your conlusions, however. A net spend of 11 million in 8 years would suggest to me that we didn’t have much money to spend.
I’m sorry that you were let down by comments that spending £500m on a single project wouldn’t affect expenditure elsewhere. I hope you’ll forgive me for thinking that you were, perhaps, a little naive to take those comments at face value. (Incidentally, I don’t remember seeing or hearing those comments; I just remember seeing them quoted, but that’s beside the point.)
You go on to give as your humble opinion that we could have made more of the funds we have. Is that the funds you believe we had, or the funds that we actually spent? If the latter, then I’m all ears to hear how we might have spent more wisely. I acknowledge that Park and Santos didn’t turn out particulrly well (although I recall a massively positive impression from Santos in his early months) but I don’t remember how much we spent on them, nor what else was available at the time. Nor , incidentally, do I believe it’s possible to have a 100% record in the transfer market.
I’m genuinely confused by the regular statement from those who would admit to not being on the sunny side, that deficiencies in the squad are obvious to all and are not being addressed. OK, that’s clear enough. What confuses me is why so many people conclude that the reason for this is something other than that the players needed to address those deficiencies aren’t available for the price we’re willing to pay. We differ about how much money is available and whether or not more can be made available. That’s fine. What isn’t fine, in my humble opinion, is the constant sniping about this with the underlying suggestion of a hidden agenda or a conspiracy by the people in charge of those aspects of the club’s activity to do something other than what is, in their opinion, best for the club.
You’ve often said that you just want the club to be the best it can be, indeed this has become something of a mantra for those whose glass is half-empty, but I’ve never seen any explicit statementof what we should do otherwise, or what we should have done, that isn’t hedged around with implicit assumptions about there being much more money available than was being bid.
Speaking of glasses, I note that yours is now completely empty. Some Macallan?
Pangloss
Many thanks the McAllans is a personal favourite and going down well thankyou. I’m strongly into Islay malts and happy to put a Lagavulin on the bar if it is of interest
ttg – I thought that more united us than divided, and Islay malts are a particular favourite of mine. The Lagavulin is of particular interest and I hope you wn’t mind if I leave it by abb’s teddy bear to look after until the sun’s over the yardarm. Many thanks to you too.
Why am I getting worked up about Balotelli to Liverpool? Here’s his Serie A stats from last season:
Goals 14
Assists 6
Yellows 9
Reds 1
Compare them to Giroud’s Prem stats last season:
G 16
A 8
Y 4
R 0
PR: you can also add that only one of Giroud’s league goals came from the penalty spot so Balotelli scored less in total than Giroud did from open play alone.
Porco
Your stats are interesting. I think the reaction to Balotelli is a sign of what some might call ambition and others their desperation. I was against us signing him but if we had Zi don’t think there is anyone better than Wenger for handling problem players. Interestingly in the recent Article on Liam Brady referenced in this bar he mentioned advising AW not to sign a player because he was troublesome. Apparently Arsene replied, ” Ah but Liam all the best players are troublesome!”.
If you offered me Cavani at £51 million or Balo at £16 million I wouldn’t think about it for very long before taking the Italian but he is a fruitcake.
Sorry when responding initially about Balotelli I should have inserted Liverpool at the start. I meant that some may see their willingness to sign him as ambition, others as desperation.
Good spot Lars, which just throws the general perception of Mental Mario into sharper relief than before.
I mean, he’s clearly a good quality, powerful player who can score a goal or two but his historical stats are not overwhelmingly brilliant. I always thought of him as a dependable 15+ goals a season guy but having done my research (just now), I find he’s solidly in the 10-15 range.
This surprises me, but what wouldn’t make me even bat an eyelid is what most football fans would say if offered Balo or Giroud. I bet over 90% would say Giroud is a bit rubbish and Balotelli is ‘world class’, simply because that’s the nonsense narrative that the press try to feed us.
I feel a lot better now.
The comments made about our spending were made before construction actually started. They were made by various board members at more than on press conference. From memory, the explanation given was something along the lines of that the repayments would be covered by the extra revenue generated. The comments were very real. I’m sorry if you don’t remember them and I’m sorry if believing them made me naive. When you are next in town I will introduce you to those who sit near me. You will find that I’m far from alone in my views on what the club should be doing with it’s revenue.
Last year at about the same time the main debate centred around our need for a holding midfield player and a top striker. A monster fuck re Higuain was followed by the embarrassing shambles that was the Suarez bid. We then spent the season relying totally on Ollie G and in the end the bloke was shattered.
The chance signing of Flamini proved beyond all doubt how much we need a top quality player for that position. Arteta has been a worthy addition (all be it 3 years to late) but he is no spring chicken. There were times last year when he looked very laboured.
We will obviously agree to differ re the clubs finances. My view from the figures released by the club has always been that there was/is more money available than we have decided to use. Gazidis can’t keep saying how good our finances are, how we have a record turnover, how we are one of the top five wealthiest clubs in the world and then fall back on the argument that we have no money to spend. For those of us struggling to meet the increasing costs of a season ticket this simply does not wash anymore.
I’m not at this stage going to start naming names of players that I would want at the club. Suffice to say that I think we have sufficient funds to allow for the purchases we need to show some significant improvement. As I have said before, if Giroud picks up a knock and is out for months then I for one am not confident in the back up players we currently have at our disposal.
One final point. I am not a glass half empty person. I’m probably one of the most optimistic people around. I am also very much a realist. I deal with reality and tangible evidence that is put in front of me. That is what I base my opinions on. For those reasons I’m more than prepared to wait until the transfer window shuts before coming to any final conclusions about the business we would have concluded. There is still time to address what I consider to be the deficiencies in the squad. If there are some who drink in this bar who feel our squad is good enough then the very best to you all.
Lars. Balotelli is a good player. He is potentially an excellent player. He would certainly have improved our striking options. However, he is also 100% bonkers and for that reason alone, regardless of how good he is or might become, I would not want him anywhere near our club. I think he is more trouble than he is worth.
TTG
Cheers for the clarification and stats-wise you make a reasonable point (even though Cavani scored over 20 league goals a season 3 years in a row for Napoli, falling to 16 + 2 assists for PSG last season – maybe put that down to new environment-itis).
Porco. The stats are indeed interesting. If our one and only striker scored 16 league goals last season then I would suggest that that demonstrates even more our need for a top quality striker. I think OG is a top player and brings massive amounts to the side. But he is not and never will be that prolific striker that we have missed massively since the departure of RVP.
Pangloss, Steve T: The monks have been beavering away at the numbers on transfer spending over this (to date) and previous four seasons:
If you create a league table of this season’s Premiership clubs, we’d be 7th in net spend (£72.2 million) over the past five years, 5th in buys (£228.5 million), and 4th in sells (£156.3 million).
Tops of the leagues at this point with 10 days of the window to go:
Net spend: Man City £309.5 million
Buys: Chelsea £473.8 million
Sells: Tottenham £225.3 million
Steve T: you are spot on about Balotelli’s bonkers quotient. And Liverpool will find out the hard way how right your final comment on him is.
Steve,
What about a front 3 of:
The Ox – Alexis – Theo
?
I agree we need more goals up front but I fear we won’t get any more strikers this window. Hence my suggestion works only with the resources we have already.
Proco. I accept that we have goals in other areas of the pitch but when was the last time Theo played a whole season. The Ox is not prolific and is still developing. We were saved by the unexpected goals of Rambo last season. As for Sanchez, I’m still not sure what position we have signed him to play in. I have no doubt that he will also provide goals. All of that said I am not a fan of playing players out of position unless it’s really necessary.
Yes Steve exactly.
Like I said before, I repeatedly say to myself we could be contenders if we could keep the key guys fit most of a season.
Which we never, ever do.
“I am not a glass half empty person. I’m probably one of the most optimistic people around. I am also very much a realist.”
Heh.
Good one Steve!
🙂
SteveT – I’m sorry if I upset you by using the word naive. I was aware of its potential to do that but couldn’t (and still can’;t) think of a better term. The alternative to saying “Spening on the stadium will not affect our future transfer business” is to say, “Well, obviously, we won’t be able to spend as much on players as we would otherwise” and that would be close to suicidal. I’ve said above, and I apologise to all for repeating it, that I ignore what Arsenal are reported to say about transfer business, policy and funds. Since I’m not in a position to learn what Arsenal say etc etc other than via reports it means that I have to rely on what I can deduce from the clubs actions.
I recall being jumped upon a few years back when I suggested that the clubs finances might not be exactly as reported in the media; terms like fraud were suggested as appropriate descriptions of theie behaviour if there had been any deviation from strict truth.
I think you’re right not to rely on Giroud’s backup to provide as much as Giroud himself, but surely all that means is that Giroud deserves to be first choice?
I also suspect that most of my nearest and dearest would put me towards the pessimistic end of the spectrum. One of the things I love about this place is that having somehow adopted a positive persona when here, I feel I have to maintain it and I’m always surprised at how little effort it is.
For what it’s worth, I agree with you about Balotelli. I also had misgivings about re-signing Fabregas, though I was never as entirely opposed to it as you have been.
Ned. There was something published in one of the nationals about 6 months ago that looked back at the last 10 seasons I think it was for all premier league clubs and their net spend. We were bottom. Just off the top of my head we have taken approximately £65 million from Citeh, £50 million from Barca and £25 million from the Mancs. That is before I even think about any others.
Pangloss. The statements about our spending prior to construction even being started were made at various national press conferences aired to all the media. The financial statements are released each year by the club and for as long as I remember have been available on the official web site. If these are deliberately false or misleading then perhaps the board should be asking serious questions of themselves???
Joe. He he. I am realistic enough to see what does or doesn’t unfold in front of me. I am optimistic that we have the capability and resources to deal with the areas that need dealing with.
🙂
Pangloss, apologies. My view of Cesc was purely personal and had nothing to do with his football ability. I never ever fell for this Barca/homesick DNA bollocks. Sadly it looks like I was proved right. None of that however detracts from his football talent.
Its tough to say whether ballotelli will be a hit or miss because he himself is not sure of it. Pool may think this is their marquee signing and thats that. He is a talent albeit eccentric. Is he the only option, of course not. You offer me Falcao, eyes closed Falcao. Ballotelli is a firecracker. He will have games when he will bulldoze opponents and in others just so poor that you want to shoot him. Arsenal cannot take a gamble like that because any striker we sign now will need to be our main striker and not someone who can add up to Giroud. Hence i dont think so Mario was the man for us.
Reus rumors refuse to go away and keep me dreaming. Khedira may just end up somewhere else than to us the way things are going. if we really wanted him, we would have got him so i doubt of that happening. He just may go to united.
Everton will be tough. I said in an earlier post that we will have a stuttering start and we need to limit the damage till oct. I will take a draw on this one. I am sure we shall see the same everton approach like last time when we saw them hustle us of the pitch and honestly out play us. We need a quick start or else this can be a long evening. Is the magician ready to start?????
It is the “Day Before Everton’. *gulps 😉
Toby, my lad @247. That is exactly what I did last night. Watched the Community Shield game, again.
Last season there was only one player in the EPL whose PRESENCE repeatedly ignited the pitch. Suarez.
See the same qualities in our Sanchez. The hunger, the fire in his belly. Thank you, Arsene 🙂
All this talk of transfers and DMs and net spend and stadia and Wenger and Theo and racist ex-Swansea managers and bellends at the LMA and old Twitchy’s hilarious defence and formations and systems and goalscoring and assists and Balotelli and the window (transfer not bathroom) and being the best we can be (TM Steve T) and still being 3 players short like always and getting a hiding from Everton and resting Germans…
…all of this has distracted me from the real business, which is: it’s matchday 2 tomorrow!!!
The Oz returns. Calum Chambers is awesome. Per should be back in. We have Monreal at left back (OK maybe that one’s not so good). Alexis will get another 90 to warm to the Prem.
Let’s get in the mood!
You’re absolutely right Porco.
But when I look at .com and see 6 names to cover 4 positions (Bellerin not listed as 1st team player) and read on here that Calum might be used / bought to be our DM I just can’t help but start to ask questions.
Was it clever to sell / loan out two of our defensive palyers?
Will we add players to cover these positions?
Who could that be?
So again, you’re right and I’m happy that match two is coming and will me distract from my thoughts and worries;)
So at the end of all this drinks. We all accept that we need at least 3 signings right? Well knowing Wenger,that’s not going to happen. Every season, we tell ourselves all we need is one or two more sigings and never happens. And please all this stuff about all we need to do is keep our players healthy and we should be fine need to stop because guess what,we have never being able to do that and most likely will continue. We still have diaby and he most likely will not play,but 45 mins all season. Sign a DM,CB,ST already.Maybe if we had done what needed to be done last season we won’t be fighting for CL qualification right now.
SAG, we have introduced 5 players into the squad, I think we will see pigs flying over the Emirates before we add 8 new players in a single transfer window.
Right. Enough of this. I need puns. TREV!
Joeos @288, I know , it’s crazy that we already have signed 4 players and the team still needs more signings. That’s why I don’t see us signing but one more player. And that is a lot for Wenger in one season. It’s just unfortunate that we get so close to been able to challenge and just find a way to fall short either by our own doing or not. Oh well next up, Toffees, let’s go COYG!!!!
Great debate TTG, Steve T, Pangloss, Porco and the rest,
I checked in a couple of times at work and you certainly kept thoughts of Arsenal at the front of my mind. As if they were not already.
I’ll simply say that we do seem to have more money available to spend now than we have had for a while and that there are wise heads in charge of allocating it to maximum efficiency. I would like to see us do a bit more this window but there is still time for that.
Can’t wait for Everton tomorrow. If we can keep picking up results through this tough start without everyone available then in a month’s time when we’re closer to full strength we could be in a great position. There is a chance to keep putting points on the board tomorrow.
We have not played well yet but there seems an encouraging togetherness in the team which counts for a lot on difficult away days against well-managed, quality sides. We’ll need that and more against what I imagine will be a really well-motivated Everton side but I still feel positive- hopefully our quality will start to show through.
We can win this.
Last season at Everton we were overrun very early on especially by Naismith and Lukaku who was deployed on the right wing and mullered Monreal. We need to guard against a similar fate tomorrow. Possibly Arteta’s replacement will be Chambers and this may give us greater defensive stability. It does require us ( a point made earlier this week by El Puno) that there is only one young tyro not three and we don’t want to turn him into another Phil Jones who seems to play every week in a different position. I happen to think that AW is waiting to see how he does in that role before committing expenditure on a central midfielder but if we do this we need to ensure that we get another central defender in fairness to Calum Chambers.
The Cavani/Giroud swap story was broken by the Daily Mail. need I say more about its likely veracity?
GSD
Been around here for what I would guess is five seasons at least now, been more active in periods, last season, not so much, at least as a provider of drinks. That is why I am taking this, albeit a bit late, opportunity to tell you I’ve really enjoyed your drinks since you made yourself known a while back (an occasion I have the privilege to remember since it was, you know, a really good post).
Keep it up!
Toby,
Thankyou very much.
I gave it ten minutes after I posted and refreshed the page. Your response has just made me break out into a massive smile! As I sit in front of the computer typing this I’m grinning away like the Cheshire Cat. What a great place this is.
A round on the bar for everyone!
Cheers
“I am not a glass half empty person.”
I can vouch for that. I have seen Steve emtpy glasses completely only to then go and have them refilled again very quickly!
Cheers Lars. I asked for puns, and you are at least sniffing a pun in the bum.
Oh, and Lars, btw, I really should join you on one of the trips to the Tollington soon. Been here way too long without meeting the protagonists.
Nicks it in midfield and drives at their defensive line laying it off just before the crunching tackle comes in…
Through on goal, but lays it off unselfishly for the (somewhat) new somewhat dinosaur-like signing.
Scores with his tail!
The Gentleman is back: http://arseblog.com !!!
That photo… ha ha ha! The valet must have had to spend a long time in front of the photoshop machine. 🙂
Nice one Toby!
That team ethic will get us far.
We need a moment like that against the blues. Just a moment of magic to get us going.
Just to clarify, I am not suggesting that we need a moment EXACTLY like that. I will be somewhat flummoxed if any of our players manage to score with their tail…
Fock it….. I’ll take a goal anywhichway!
😀
Cheers for the link Dr. F.
The descriptions of Sanogo are priceless.
I actually remember Gallas scoring with his arse for us a few seasons ago…
Toby@306: And that alone must have justified in his mind the #10 he used to wear on his back. 🙂
I’ve just got it. GSD is has been here and looking in for a good few years. No contributions, just an observer on the periphery. Always here but through choice, with nothing significant to add. Now, if that is not a typical Arsenal “like a new signing” then I don’t know what is????
🙂
Was thinking The Ox needs to start tomorrow.
Looked sharp in Istanbul. Darn near got us the away goal.
And he covers the wings well. Ox left, AS, HFB and then Ozil back in the middle with Flamini and Rambo. Something to give width. And I’d like to see Flamini shut down that diving, rolling queen Naismith.
Saw a few comments from the Guardian this AM along these lines and thought, hmmm … sounds good, that. But does it?
SteveT@308
🙁
Otd@245: Point well taken. Budgets are always at the sharp end of U.S. corporate life. I was mostly trying to make a point about the demand for top talent in football exceeding the supply by an order of magnitude in excess of anything typically seen in any other industry, and that making it an atypical labour market, compounded by a small set of top clubs competing for the very best players available. And not to get into a debate about IBM’s troubles in the early 1990s, though they might resonate with the state of modern football club ownership, wasn’t one of the root causes of them that Big Blue broke its social contracts with its employees and its customers in order to put the interests of its shareholders first?
Steve T@280: the monks are beavering away on a long-term series of transfer spends and were hoping to have it done by just after the current window closes (but as you can imagine there have been one hell of a lot of transfers in the Premiership in the past 10 years that they have to track down). It doesn’t look at this (early) point as if Arsenal is anywhere near the bottom of the league; if nothing else it looks like there will be a couple of clubs with negative net spends (i.e. sales were larger than buys). I’d guess we’ll end up top of the bottom half of the table. The monks have done our 10-year net spend and it is £40.9 million. What is certainly true, if not exactly a surprise, is that we have been more aware of/adept at balancing the transfer books than any of our main rivals. Liverpool’s net spend looks to be 3.5x ours, the Mancs’, 4.5x, Citeh’s 9x and that of boys from the bus stop on the Fulham Road 10x.
These are our nets
2014-15 (to date) £41.8m
2013-14 £32.5m
2012-13 £8.6m
2011-12 -£17.5m
2010-11 £6.8m
2009-10 -£31.0m
2008-09 -£3.5m
2007-08 £13.4m
2006-07 -£17m
2005-06 £6.8m
Note there are four seasons in there where we were net sellers. That compares to one season for the Mancs over the same period, two for Chelsea and Liverpool and three for Man City.
Here’s a little warm-up for the Everton game
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqsQKAHpIGQ
Ned. I’m very grateful for your efforts. I must say that they make very interesting reading indeed. Our 10 year net spend is £40.9 million. This includes £41.8 million spent this summer. So up until this window we had a net spend over a 10 year period of -£900,000. That includes the £40 plus million spent on Özil????
I must say that I find that even more staggering. How, up until this transfer window we can actually show a profit in the transfer market over 10 years I find quite bizarre for a club of our standing.
Lars@295 knows.
🙂
Hey! What’s this empty glass with a slight odour of Lagavulin? Where’s that bloody teddy bear?
So, abb left a dypsomaniac bear in the bar the other day. Who knew?
COYG
@313 – You’d prefer the Glasgow Rangers model?
Evening, all.
Long day at work.
I enjoyed the Pangloss, TTG and Steve T debate above. I’m firmly in Pangloss’ camp though.
P.S. I think loving Arsenal gives anyone/everyone the right to criticise and raise concerns about the clubs day to day running, starting a defense of your critique of the club by telling us how many season tickets you own(ed) or how much you have put into the club sounds, in my opinion, childish, ignorant, show-off-ish and seriously insulting to overseas fans. Been able to see The Arsenal every other week in the flesh is a privilege!
I still maintain that the transfer sums spent or not is, to a large extent, a red herring. There isn’t a club in the Premier League that couldn’t spend £50 million on one player – but the wages that comes with such a player is a totally different kettle of fish and THAT is where we have been struggling, I believe. Now, you could of course argue that we could have used some of our spare cash to “subsidise” ourselves but that is a choice of strategy that you can’t really say is wrong or right I suppose. But it is worth noting that many of those years where we made a profit we did so because we sold players to cover what would otherwise have been significant deficits.
My view is that on the whole, we have done most things correct over these past few years. There have been mistakes of course, like Silvestre and Andre Santos and in hindsight we could probably have made the Puma and Emirates shirt sponsorship deals shorter in duration without losing too much money on that but like I said, on the whole I think we have done pretty much what we could have done.
Cent @317, I have to disagree.
It is indeed a privilege to watch Arsenal in the flesh though not recently as great a privilege as it was formerly.
However those who pay through the nose to exercise that privilege on a regular basis have done so in escalating amounts over the last 20 years to sustain the “self-sustaining model’. I do think they have a particular right to raise their concerns, and to justify their concerns on the basis of their financial commitment to the club.
I don’t see how that is in the least bit insulting to overseas fans.
An overseas fan who feels insulted by a local fan justifying his/her dissatisfaction with the club on the basis of how much it costs him/her to watch them, needs psychological help.
Cent @ 118/120, both links were excellent reads mate. The DesiGunner one you posted a while back that reminded you of my writing style [;)] was a good read as well, gave the guy a follow & I think I will do the same for the ‘Steww’ guy from the #118 drink.
Bodrum Goonerness @ 121, really enjoyed your take on the match, getting to an away game, let alone a European one is on the list of Arsenal related things to do 🙂
Just had a quick look at .com and noted that our only points away off the top seven last year were 3 from Spuds. We must do better this year but…
That was good day.
Just read that last sentence in an Arshavin accent. Wink
Bath, I appreciate that people spend tons of money to go see the team live and that said money also goes a long way towards sustaining the club but basing a critique of the club on the fact that you spend money on the club reeks of an “I’m a better fan than you who is not privileged to be able to spend on the club” attitude which suggests, if it’s not clear enough, that people who are not privileged to be in your position do not have the same right.
No need for me to go into the kinds of sacrifices overseas fans make in the course of following Arsenal because I know and appreciate the fact that local fans make more than financial sacrifices to follow Arsenal too.
I will just ignore your last paragraph.
Cent
I am taking your comments in the collegiate manner you normally intend them. Pangloss and I were debating and I underlined why I thought I had the right to criticise. I certainly didn’t mean this in a show- offish way nor have I any idea how much I have put into the club. But a I do think paying supporters have a right to criticise or comment just as I feel all supporters do. Some clubs have been exploited by their fans and I have never felt this about Arsenal. I love going to see them and I always have but my interest in them makes me ultra keen that we give ourselves the best chance to succeed.
I hope that clarifies the point and that you understand where I was coming from.
The correspondence between Ned who produces such useful stats and Steve is very enlightening and certainly it does appear that until this season we had a negative net spend despite the Ozil purchase. That’s an amazing comparison with our main rivals and shows to me a) what a fine manager Wenger is to have kept us competitive in that time and b) have we been constraining ourselves too much when with extra expenditure we could have achieved a fraction more.
I think we should get Di Maria!
Ok, I’ll leave now…
😀
Thanks, Ttg. And just to clarify further; I think every Arsenal fan has the right to criticise the club; I also think that justifying the criticism by how much one spends on the club does not sound right and dis-credits the people who aren’t able to directly spend financially on the club, just as I think anyone who justifies his/her criticism of the club by the fact that, for example, he/she has to stay up at awkward times in India to watch Arsenal play dis-credits those who are fortunate enough to be able to just take a five minute walk from their homes to the stadium at 3pm on saturdays because no matter how close one lives close to the stadium one still has to make other sacrifices to be able to get to the games.
TTG; I love reading your comments. Just saying! By the way, I never knew what ‘just saying’ means! It’s normally accompanied by … 😉
Cent. Is your comment about an alleged disparity between overseas fans and fans in the UK directed at me???
Bath , spot on sir.
BTM. Did you really waste your valuable time typing that ?? Why would I want us to be like Rangers? Or Leeds , or Portsmouth ? Or any other club that has run themselves into the ground ???? You have known me long enough now. When have I ever suggested that???
Supporting Arsenal is not just a privilege, it’s a birthright passed on to me by my father. It is something that I have passed on to my children. Both of my kids were in Arsenal attire when they were less than 24 hours old. Does that make me any more of a fan than anyone else ??? Of course it doesn’t. But supporting The Arsenal is like nothing else. If I have misgivings then I can’t change. It’s in my blood. It’s been part of my life ever since I can remember. If there is something I don’t like I can’t just up and leave and go and support someone else. That is why it gets so incredibly frustrating.
The club has changed. Is it a privilege to go every week???? Well at least 5000 ticket holders who don’t turn up would tend to disagree with you Cent. This may be down to the face that as far as the club are concerned I have moved from being a supporter and am now a customer. I am nothing more than the average business client who turns up on match days.
Cent, you agree and disagree with who you choose. That is the wonderful thing about this bar. But before you make a final decision check the figures supplied by Ned. If you are happy with the way the club is run then I raise my glass to you and wish you all the very best.
Steve T, if the shoes fits…
Seeing as the shoe fits, firstly, that thing about the 5000 who don’t show up at games is perfectly dealt with here http://www.7amkickoff.com/2014/apple-lovers-outraged-as-local-produce-report-shows-10-discrepancy-between-apples-sold-and-apples-consumed/ (with ‘Holics permission, of course.)
If you now see yourself as an Arsenal customer as opposed to supporter, that’s your choice, which to be fair I suspect has been borne out of your experiences from following the team.
My post wasn’t about if I agree with people’s criticism of the club or not, it’s rather about the words used to justify the criticism. I could agree with the criticism and still disagree with the grounds it was based on.
Finally, I’m really not too fussed about how much we spend or do not spend on transfers, I would be bothered though if all of a sudden we had ‘arry or Mourinho running the club together with Real-Mardid or Barcelona’s boards or Presidents.
Whatever drug Atletico Madrid players use before the games, I woud suggest Arsene to try it on ours.
What a team work and ethic, remarkable. Playing full 90minutes in high tempo, going hard in tackles, high pressing, fighting for every ball, tactical discipline- this is what a quality team should look like. And this early in the season. Great work from Someone.
This is the first football match I see after our awful display against Besiktas and I felt like I was watching a completely different level of football tonight.
I can only say that we have a hell of a work to come close to physical, fitness and tactical standards this Atletico team possess.
It seems our injury issues are remarkably similar to last season and the impact they cause deeper into the squad.
We get one then two short term injuries in a critical position we are already short in.( short term as 3 weeks at arsenal)
We then overplay someone we didn’t intend to play and someone not familiar with that position.
The team doesn’t fire because we are forced to play certain players out of position, such as cazorla.
it would also seem our attacking and speed options this year revolve around returning players making this enormous impact.
Theo returning who usuually ends up gibbs like
The ox returning who is already gibbs like
Gnabry returning who is already gibbs like
We await the 3 germans return
We now will await artettas return (our second non playing captain)
We awaits gibbs return (again)
We await diaby to return and actually start ( again)
We are then usually forced to rush players back who then go into the revolving injury merry go round
The players who are overplayed start to display injury signs or fatigue (wilshire) (giroud)
Shad Forsyth – he has certainly made an impact. We are crocked in game 2 of the season
Cent. Petha
Bodrum Gooneress thankyou and I enjoyed your terrific report on the Besiktas game. It was. Uh better than the game itself- just saying:)
Cent. Perhaps you might want to actually read what people say before getting on your high horse. If you actually bothered to read what I had put then you will realise that my frustration is the the CLUB now treats you like a customer. You will go back to see that I have always and will always be a supporter.
I appreciate that from your distance you don’t get to games. As I have said previously and on many occasions, that makes me no more or less of a fan than you; or anyone else for that matter. What it does do though is allow me to sample the feelings of those who do turn up week in week out. Many who sit near me hold similar views. Again, not a dig at those miles away, just a fact. You can compare the empty seats to apples as much as you want. If I were running the club the fact that so many did not bother to show up would be a concern. The fact that those who were being told that they had a ten year wait for a season ticket and were being offered one in two would also be a concern.
If someone wants to express an opinion and base it on the fact that they are season ticket holders then good luck to them. If someone else wants to justify an opinion by detailing their match day routine then good luck to them too. Both are equally valid in my book and it is good to get a different perspective.
Your final paragraph does not do you justice. You really have no concern over our transfer policy?? In what world would we get the Madrid or Barca boards? Or Yap Yap or Maureen for that matter???
Pretty much everything I am reading here about Poo and Balotelli was being said this time last year about Poo and Suarez.
Here’s hoping … https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50ZLU9RMrf8
Öskar
Toby,
Sorry I wasn’t around to oblige with the puns. A very busy day at the end of a very busy week.
Some good stuff above and much to agree with in many posts from all sides of the Pangloss – ttg – Steve T debate.
Bath and ttg – completely agree with you re Cent’s comments.
Cent,
I don’t think anyone is trying to play the “I’m a better supporter than you”, card.
But believe me, the amount of money some of us are now spending on tickets does make us feel entitled – as is any fan – to criticise if we feel that things are not all they could be.
Yes, we are lucky to live close enough to attend matches regularly, and there will be some who spend on tickets who still share your views on the right to be critical.
After the first Interlull we face Man City at home. My ticket for that one match, in Block 91, will be priced at £128.00. For this season the price of my ticket is £2,199.00.
Over the season you can easily add on another £1,000 in travel, food and drink costs.
So, my base cost for supporting the Arsenal this season is £3,200, which
is repeated year after year. That is not a trivial sum. I don’t have to do it, but I want to do it becuase, like thousands of others, I love supporting the team.
If you pay a premium price for any service or product without feeling you are getting the best possible return, you are bound to feel entitled to criticise.
If you feel that makes me a consumer rather than a supporter, then come and sit next to me some time.
If you feel that makes me “childish, ignorant and show-offish”, I’m afraid that is your problem, mate.
Steve, sorry I misread that part of your post.
I think you have misunderstood my last paragraph, I meant that I’m not bothered about our transfer business because I trust the people in charge of that department of our club to make the right decisions, as they have consistently done. I will be bothered if Maureen, ‘arry, Barca and Madrid boards or their presidents were in charge of our transfer business because I do not like their ideas of running a football club properly.
Trev, again, I’m not saying you or anyone else is not entitled to criticise Arsenal for any complaint you have, all I said and I’m still saying is that basing such criticism(s) on how much you spend financially to get first hand experience of Arsenal is not right in my eyes.
Well then try this comparison.
If the club sent me a ticket free of charge to attend every match this season, I would not feel I had any right to criticise what they were offering me.
If they refuse to let me in unless I pay £2,200, can you imagine that my feelings might be a little different ?
Evening all. Is everybody feisty these days? >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
And just to be a bit more clearer on the subject, I’d like to state that the bit in the earlier debate that ticked me off was this part of Ttg’s post @251 “I find it in order as a double season ticket holder to express criticism…” So I ask(ed); would he not find it in order to criticise if he wasn’t a double season ticket holder? Does his season tickets come with special rights to criticise?
P.S. Ttg, you kindly cleared it up earlier so the question is no longer for you.
Let’s be real guys, our transfer policy has not been the best it could be. And with nine days left, am not feeling it would be any better than previous years. Yes we have done the minimum that needs to be done, but what’s next, how do we can we keep doing the same thing and expect a different result. Can any one seriously tell me that we can win the PL with this squad? Forget the CL, becos that my friends, will most likely never happen. We get so close and just put the brake on, don’t know why, but it’s just not good enough.