Greenlizard0 Weekend Football Thread ** spoilers ** [3rd - 7th April 2015]

As 'meh' as we've been for the most part of the season, we're actually above City now. :eek:

Their transfers have been very poor though, made a mess of it.
 
Their transfers in isolation aren't the problem. There's something rotten at City. Too many of their best players, the players that were responsible for them winning the League last season and 3 years back lack the mentality to dominate for a prolonged period.

Yaya Toure sums up City. When he wants to be he's unplayable and is the best midfielder in the League but too often he goes missing. At their best City are still the best side in the League imo but like Toure too often they just don't turn up.
 
BaZ87 said:
Their transfers in isolation aren't the problem. There's something rotten at City. Too many of their best players, the players that were responsible for them winning the League last season and 3 years back lack the mentality to dominate for a prolonged period.

Yaya Toure sums up City. When he wants to be he's unplayable and is the best midfielder in the League but too often he goes missing. At their best City are still the best side in the League imo but like Toure too often they just don't turn up.
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Completely agree with that too.
 
drunkenmaster said:
Very much so, he had an abnormal year last year in terms of goal amount so hard to push him out after that, though a year earlier may have been a good time to shove him out. He's greedy, money wise, in a doing weird crap to get new deals or push a move way, the cake nonsense or making up crap about not getting support with his sick brother.

He seems like a bit of a disruptive player in that sense. But he's not consistent enough and that makes it so hard to build a team around him. Most top top players will be 7/10 in 95% + games and only exceptionally rarely have a sub 5/10 game, Yaya seems to have one in every 3 or 4 games. While he might have 10/10 performances and some cracking goals, I think his bad performances hurt the team more than his best performances help the team.

It's far too crucial an area to have an inconsistent player, though with Fernado/Fernandinho as the other two big money central midfielders, him being inconsistent is even more of a problem as neither of them are good going forwards and not particularly good defensively.

A top notch central midfield pair, or trio, to replace what they currently have is really what the team need to go for back to back titles and to really challenge in europe.
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what do u think of arsenal recently?
 
jonneymendoza said:
what do u think of arsenal recently?
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Same Arsenal as we've had for almost a decade, when the pressure is on, failure, when the pressure is off and we've effectively nothing to play for, we can win.

We played this well before and after the Monaco game, but not for the one game that mattered, we played amateur hour, same every year for donkeys years.

If we have a good start to the season and even lead the title race through xmas.... effectively with half a season left to play there was no pressure on. When we find ourselves leading the title before the title race actually matters(the run in and finish) we then utterly crumble. If we conversely screw up the start of the season and trail, when the title is effectively out of reach we can have a great run of form to finish the season.

People will be all like "we've turned a corner", no, this is EXACTLY the pattern Arsenal have had under Wenger for absolutely years on end. We win games when the pressure is basically off, when it's on, we are nowhere.

As usual the step up players who make a difference are those who... lets say, Wenger hasn't beaten it out of yet. Who turned the game, bellerin, with a great goal. Ozil in particular, Cazorla to a lesser degree had been poor on the ball, though Cazorla and most of the team except Ozil were immense in closing Liverpool down throughout the game. First time we've played that well defensively from the front for years. Boy did it help because when Liverpool actually managed to pass to each other(embarrassingly rarely for them) then made our high line look as culpable as always. They should have taken the lead though it would have been an unfair reflection of their performance to that point.

If in some ridiculous circumstance Chelsea managed to lose 3-4 games and Arsenal were right up there with a few games to go... we'd drop back into pressure on, everyone forgot how to play football mode we go into.

The key points of this season happened early on in the league, woeful early season form cost us any meaningful chance of the title... we've been playing like a team with nothing to lose since then and form has been great, but the season is the season and includes the part we ****** up. When it came to it in the CL we lost against an honestly awful team with one epically pathetic performance and one meh performance.

Fans do this, they remember recent form and act like the whole season doesn't count, just the recent part, like it's meaningful and the poor part can be completely ignored. Remember the utter tripe coming out from people what two years ago when we finished the previous season in the best form in the league... again because we were so far down any hopes of a title were gone, after another thrashing in the important CL game. Then people ignored the crap first half of the season and suggested based off only the end of season form that we had a great shot at the title the next year... because only the good part of the season should be remembered, ignore the rest.

Arsenal, every year, 1st to 3rd/4th when it matters, or 7th to 3rd/4th when it doesn't matter, every single year... yet every time we have a good spell people act like it's the first time ever.
 
Purdy said:
You have the 3rd/4th best squad in the league, so you don't really ever underperform over the 38 games in total
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We have BIG money and have some great players, I've always said that. I believe we have the squad to be genuinely competitive for the title almost every year. I think we have a lacking mentality, woeful squad management and a lack of tactics. It's all down to Wenger. He's got a huge and consistently growing budget but keeps around players like Diaby for years, refuses to give Coquelin a chance while instead playing Arteta as a DM then brings in Flamini, sends Coquelin off and only uses him when he has literally no other option and then becomes surprised he's better than two pretty poor midfielders.

We have the budget, wage bill, transfer power to bring in a title capable squad and have done so, it's only the few players we have entirely wasted money on, the ridiculous injury crisis every year, Wenger's refusal to use the best players in the best form at any given time nor really bring through young players with promise and his utter refusal(maybe until extremely recently) to change tactics to suit the game.

I would say maybe twice in the past decade have we changed tactics to suit the opposition, City and Liverpool, we won both games.... it's something Wenger has pointedly refused to do and made comment after comment publicly refusing to do it for years... then wins two important games when finally conceding. If he wasn't such a stubborn **** he'd have been doing that all along.

Closing down Liverpool up to the back four deep in the opposition half is really something we don't do, it put everyone at Liverpool under pressure, from what is already a fragile and mistake prone defence now also injury hit. Smart move, something Wenger hasn't done for years. LIkewise we closed in midfield very hard, Ramsey worked hard doing that though his on the ball play was mostly very poor. Cazorla on the ball was a bit better but his work rate in closing down was fantastic. I've said for two years, Coutinho with space and time can produce good passes but under pressure he disappears almost every time... much like Ozil.

Now if we actually applied this style of playing against the oppositions strength and playing to their weaknesses from the start of next year things may improve for Arsenal. Against City we played deeper, let them come on to us and hit their also currently dodgy defence and their very dodgy defensive midfield on the break, it worked. They had a lot of the ball and really should have scored and maybe won, but it was still quite a different way for Arsenal to play and resulted in a meh performance but a win.

Honestly that is the very first change away from everything Wenger has done to screw the team out of any real chances to win the league in an extremely long time, maybe there is SOME hope at the end of the tunnel.

He's also not rushed Walcott into the starting line up... though he has done Ozil who may have goals and assists but 80 mins of almost every performance has been woeful from him. Bellerin is actually performing and being given a chance to play, Monreal has played more often than expected when Gibbs has been fit. Maybe some extremely small signs Wenger is willing to pick on form or the best team rather than his favourites.

If Wenger plays to the opposition more often from the start of next year and continues to pick our most in form players rather than his favourites.... we'll see.

I suspect however from his comments that Walcott will get a new contract and be played more, that Bellerin will disappear from the first team again, that Coquelin will also be dropped when Wilshere/others are back and it's less easy to fit Coquelin into the starting line up.

We've had false dawns in terms of starting line up before based on contracts, longer term injuries which eventually revert back to Wenger's usual drop the best players and start his favourites. I'd be happy to see the back of Walcott, happy to see Wenger sell on Welbeck, but I suspect it will be more like business as usual at the start of next season.

Ultimately it will take more than 2 games and a few months of picking a good team to convince me a decade of Wenger's mistakes are finally being rectified.
 
drunkenmaster said:
Same Arsenal as we've had for almost a decade, when the pressure is on, failure, when the pressure is off and we've effectively nothing to play for, we can win.

We played this well before and after the Monaco game, but not for the one game that mattered, we played amateur hour, same every year for donkeys years.

If we have a good start to the season and even lead the title race through xmas.... effectively with half a season left to play there was no pressure on. When we find ourselves leading the title before the title race actually matters(the run in and finish) we then utterly crumble. If we conversely screw up the start of the season and trail, when the title is effectively out of reach we can have a great run of form to finish the season.

People will be all like "we've turned a corner", no, this is EXACTLY the pattern Arsenal have had under Wenger for absolutely years on end. We win games when the pressure is basically off, when it's on, we are nowhere.

As usual the step up players who make a difference are those who... lets say, Wenger hasn't beaten it out of yet. Who turned the game, bellerin, with a great goal. Ozil in particular, Cazorla to a lesser degree had been poor on the ball, though Cazorla and most of the team except Ozil were immense in closing Liverpool down throughout the game. First time we've played that well defensively from the front for years. Boy did it help because when Liverpool actually managed to pass to each other(embarrassingly rarely for them) then made our high line look as culpable as always. They should have taken the lead though it would have been an unfair reflection of their performance to that point.

If in some ridiculous circumstance Chelsea managed to lose 3-4 games and Arsenal were right up there with a few games to go... we'd drop back into pressure on, everyone forgot how to play football mode we go into.

The key points of this season happened early on in the league, woeful early season form cost us any meaningful chance of the title... we've been playing like a team with nothing to lose since then and form has been great, but the season is the season and includes the part we ****** up. When it came to it in the CL we lost against an honestly awful team with one epically pathetic performance and one meh performance.

Fans do this, they remember recent form and act like the whole season doesn't count, just the recent part, like it's meaningful and the poor part can be completely ignored. Remember the utter tripe coming out from people what two years ago when we finished the previous season in the best form in the league... again because we were so far down any hopes of a title were gone, after another thrashing in the important CL game. Then people ignored the crap first half of the season and suggested based off only the end of season form that we had a great shot at the title the next year... because only the good part of the season should be remembered, ignore the rest.

Arsenal, every year, 1st to 3rd/4th when it matters, or 7th to 3rd/4th when it doesn't matter, every single year... yet every time we have a good spell people act like it's the first time ever.
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Have we not won games in pressured games against some of the big teams ie liverpool, united and city?

One can argue that we was under pressure to perform and win those games though.

Also, do remember that every team has a hot and cold period in a whole season. We are not the only team who has had a bad start/period. every team has bar chelsea so far this season
 
jonneymendoza said:
Have we not won games in pressured games against some of the big teams ie liverpool, united and city?

One can argue that we was under pressure to perform and win those games though.

Also, do remember that every team has a hot and cold period in a whole season. We are not the only team who has had a bad start/period. every team has bar chelsea so far this season
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Liverpool aren't good enough for top 4, City are playing pretty crap... ultimately the title is out of reach, that is what counts. When we got far enough away from being in a genuine title fight our form improved. When we led the title for half the season, as we approached the important part, we fell apart. Individual games are one type of pressure, but results changing the season completely is a different type of pressure, one we haven't coped with for years.

As for Chelsea not going through a bad period, they've been playing some truly woeful football for pretty much 3 months, but still winning, that is the difference. Pressure on, playing like crap but still winning.
 
Arsenal are performing exactly as expected. We've had our blip and now on a good run of form to cement top 4. As DM says it's very predictable, we might get 2nd and the FA Cup which is an improvement on last year and is really as good as can be expected. It will never get better with Wenger but one could argue that it isn't actually that bad. I would really like a good Champs League run and to properly challenge for the league title, we wont get that with Wenger but on the other side we could easily drop out of top 4 without him. Tough call.
 
Still perform very much like expected for me, 3rd/4th best squad and are probably fourth in terms of spending power. Seems exactly like it should be and the other three will be battling for the title, obviously some with up and down years depending on purchases/manager. (You're crap and under perform in Europe though, although Liverpool are easily the worst English team in Europe)

We'll continue to be 5-7th I imagine with hopefully the odd year challenging (about every 5 years seems to be the trend) after smart purchases and finding a great player and them developing to world class here and staying for a little while. Football sucks looking at the long term as it feels really predictable, just got to live for the next match as they are a fair bit less predictable
 
CliffyG said:
Arsenal are performing exactly as expected. We've had our blip and now on a good run of form to cement top 4. As DM says it's very predictable, we might get 2nd and the FA Cup which is an improvement on last year and is really as good as can be expected. It will never get better with Wenger but one could argue that it isn't actually that bad. I would really like a good Champs League run and to properly challenge for the league title, we wont get that with Wenger but on the other side we could easily drop out of top 4 without him. Tough call.
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You're right it's not bad but better progression in the UCL would be very good. We'll have to wait and see.. will they finally learn from their mistakes? Or will it be another repetition of history :p
 
Arsenal have the exact same record after 31 games from last year, same W, D , L and same points. Consistent, we can give them that!

W19 D6 L6 Pts 63
 
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