A guest Post by @Wilsheristic that looks at the promise that this team holds.
“This is the Real Arsenal!” This hair-raising statement from the commentator resonated among the fans as we celebrated the showcase of spectacular football during the game against West Ham. Arsenal had showed us all a teaser of the movie we have all been waiting to watch. In those twelve scintillating minutes in the second half, Arsenal unleashed the fury of its wrath. On the press. On the critics. More importantly, on the cynics. Fan ecstasy dominated all around while pessimism crumbled.
The performance against West Ham was exhilarating, but I intend to use it more as a reference point than as a focal point for this post. Arsenal is on the cusp of reaching the light at the end of a tunnel and I do not say this without reason.
Lets first foray into the exhausted topic of player exodus. Arsenal’s colossus, Arsene Wenger, had recently claimed that he had in his hands a near-finished product in 2010 – a team which was on the verge of having the potential to replicate the performances of Arsenal’s best teams and one oozing with class and chemistry. This dream was shattered when the procession started. Regardless of the reason, a lack of loyalty among these exiting players was painful to see. You thought loyalty along the lines of “Other clubs never came into my thoughts once I knew Arsenal wanted to sign me” (Bergkamp) was a thing of the past.
Then came Wenger’s masterstroke: Tying six British players down. Six players from the same nationality contracted to play together for the better part of the next 3 years (at least). The move doesn’t guarantee the fact that all these players are going to end their careers at Arsenal but it does, unquestionably, breed loyalty. The list includes Wilshere, who is destined to be the captain at some point and who will no doubt demand loyalty himself and Jenkinson, who has an Arsenal DNA in the true sense of the word (Take that Fabregas!). Add to this list, Cazorla, Podolski, Giroud and Arteta, the last of whom had taken a massive pay cut to join Arsenal. Think about it, all these players are in the first (2nd for Arteta,Per) years of their contracts and if Newcastle and West Ham games are anything to go by, boy, this team has got some potential! Suddenly, you have got newly contracted players who are saying “When I heard the song the fans made for me, I felt I could die for them” or “I don’t kiss the badge and go to another club. I am here to stay.”
Sure, you might argue that our season with these players hasn’t been the most remarkable. To understand that, you have to consider the aspect of team chemistry. Wenger’s teams have always played well given time to gel (The Fabregas-Nasri-JW connect didn’t develop overnight). Giroud’s defence-dwarfing passes to both Poldi and Gibbs gives you a glimpse of a budding partnership. Poldi’s passing to teammates despite being one-on-one with the GK gives you a glimpse of a budding partnership. Santi congratulating Gervinho for scoring a goal in AFCON gives you a glimpse of a budding partnership. So, be patient. Good times are waiting.
Next, our strike force. Lets make a few things clear. We are the fifth most prolific scorers in Europe this season. We average over 2.2 goals a game. We have scored only one less goal than Manchester United after selling our main striker for £23m. And, we are just getting started. Let’s discard the possibility of a new striker for the meanwhile. People have been quite critical of Giroud until now and he showed them who’s Boss at Brighton and WHU. At least for the meantime. The near miss against Chelsea at home earlier in the season derailed his confidence. He rounded Cech to have an open goal but didn’t hit the target. Happens. But this is a guy who has top scored in his previous two leagues – one of them being Ligue 1 (Fun fact: Only one goal from headers). That his confidence is growing with every game and that he absolutely loves Arsenal fans, can catapult him into a lethal weapon. I think people have read or seen enough of Walcott to form a positive impression on their own. The dark horse here is Podolski. The importance of his partnership with Gibbs was highlighted when the latter was injured which coincided with the our lack of chances going forward and our defense starting to leak goals. Once the partnership was restored, the goals magically started to reappear and the defense presented a better picture. Surely not a coincidence? Podolski contributes immensely to our offense (part of that thanks to Gibbs) and has become the ultimate assist machine. Him and lazy? No thanks. There’s also the small matter of Joel Campbell and Gervinho, who is in roaring form in AFCON.
Imagine adding David Villa to this fold. *Goosebumps*
Our defense and midfield have been examined enough for me to jog past them, although, I would like to highlight a few points along the way. Prior to injuries to Diaby and Gibbs, our team resembled a fortress. Unfortunately, their injuries exposed an area we were found lacking in: “top quality” injury backups. With Ramsey moulding into the new Arteta (Wenger: CDM position is made for Ramsey), Jenkinson excelling as Sagna’s understudy, an impressive Coquelin on the horizon, Rosicky providing cover for Jack and Santi and a new DM imminent, Wenger has hit the nail on the head. Santos has drawn abuses from almost every section of our fans so much so that we have all conveniently forgotten how critical his goal against West Brom was last season. True, he has had a succession of poor games but in no way does that imply that he is inept. If Wenger, the man who orchestrated the Invincibles run, trusts him, so will I, blindly.
Finally, finances. A lot of people have spoken about this and I will try to have a piece of the pie too. It is safe to say that a part of the reason we haven’t exactly splashed the cash over the past few years is the stadium debt. However, if recent bids are anything to go by, we are on the way back. A bid for Hazard valued at £32 million in the summer and a mysterious £30 million do give you an impression that we are starting to flex our muscles. Though I am no expert, I wouldn’t be surprised if we are not far away from £45-60 million bids. That we managed to finish in the top four whilst having a heavy constriction of finances and whilst being burdened by debts, speaks volumes about our manager and his players.
If the midfield trio of Wilshere, Cazorla and Arteta doesn’t breed optimism, I honestly have no idea what will.
I hope I have proffered a convincing insight into our bright future because I, as an ardent supporter, believe we are on the rise. Let’s galvanize the rise. Cynicism (read Piers Morgan) will only serve to pile on the pressure. Let’s cheer the players on their road back to glory instead of booing them on their way to the tunnel. I will leave you with one of Arsene Wenger’s quotes which, sadly, emphasizes his own situation.
“The biggest things in life have been achieved by people who we would have judged crazy. And yet if they had not had these crazy ideas the world would have been more stupid.” – Arsene Wenger
Positively Arsenal 
Excellent post, wilsheristic. Lord Olivier is really beginning to make his mark. Most importantly though it is becoming clear that AW has created , yet again, an extraordinary group of players and is building it around a British core. I detect that slowly supporters, press and media are beginning to realise what is happening at Arsenal. Support in the stadium was much more impressive last night btw.
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I agree with Frank, excellent post.
R-eposted from y/day
ZP
You better get a move on or you’ll be late for the game against Stoke RFC.
What a game last night. 1 lucky team (with a little dodgy defending included) and 1 superb passing team. Only 1 point but thoroughly entertaining stuff.
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Good idea , dups.
What an adventure, ZP, got to be done. Perhaps advisable not to wear your colours for some parts of that journey. I think you know what I mean. If you set out now you should arrive for the beginning of next season and see Lord Olivier’s first goal of the campaign. The one in which I reckon he will be top EPL scorer, if he isn’t this year, that is.
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What really bothers me about Kieran’s injury is that it happened in that period when the linesman is going to flag for off side but hasn’t yet because the player has not played the ball. Ball free, Player in offiside position, Kieran engages, Player plays ball, Kieran injured, linesman flags offsde. What a fucking stupid rule.
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Kieran out for three weeks
Does that include Munich or will he be back ?
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Don’t know Anicoll5. But it is good to see your “rosé” specs here.
I thought my boy Theo had a good game. If that left footed curling shot had gone in, well, I, I might have been tempted to quote Ray Wilkins: “My Word!”
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Here is some transfer deadline day gossip:
“Bergkamp lined up to replace Brady at Arsenal”
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I thought there were some great moves last night Fins when it all clicked together like clockwork. Theo buried the ball in the corner – very well taken.
For me Poldi was the the man though – his best game and since having a few games off because of sickness he has been playing like a man possessed.
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We played some fantastic stuff last night (watching my DVR) so much so that Craig Burley, who was doing color commentary on my feed, after feasting on all the negatives of Arsenal and bigging up Pool, by late 2nd half was forced to admit that the Scousers passing game was poor. Pity we conceded two cheap goals. As Gains observed, apart from being caught on the wrong side of Henderson and one or two misplaced passes, Santos had a decent game. He was wheezing by the end showing he is not back to full match fitness. Pool tried to shoring up their left sided defense by bringing on Enrique but with Santos and Poldi we simply ripped their right side to bits. Don’t expect the misery brigade to see any positives however. Santos is just another in a long-line of players who must be made scapegoats.
A lovely welcome to my boy ZimP, fka Mandana, the footballer.
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I agree with Gains and the Author,Santo CAN play.If we get behind him it can only help.
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And Shotta too it seems
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Marvellous stuff (once again). Thanks.
I thoroughly enjoyed the game last night. Thoroughly enjoyed it. Especially the 2nd half of course. I would wager that anyone who didn’t enjoy that doesn’t like football. We were scintillating at times in that last 45, same as we were against West Aam in fact. I’ll gloss over the defensive “errors”, I think in time that will be put right anyway. Going forward we were simply too much for ’em, ‘Pool were overwhelmed. Great goal from Theo and Le handsome man may be well into double figures before the season is out. I haven’t even mentioned Jack. What’s not to get excited about.
Arsenal.
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BTW,this place was a haven last night.An absolute joy
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Harry @ 10:11am: We should also big-up Aaron. Yesterday I wrote that Diaby would be start but both Wenger and the player made a mug of me. He excelled in the Arteta role. Of course, as recent as two weeks ago the pompous, prissy, know-it-alls felt he would never be good enough. Thank heavens he is British and not Brazillian. He excelled in supporting Santos when he goes forward. The deflection from his shin for the Henderson goal was just bad luck.
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Yes Shotta he was excellent indeed. Starting to find his again rhythm now. It was only a matter of time. I’ve paid heed to those who have pilloried him in the recent past anyway. They have shown time and time they don’t know their Arse(nal) from their elbows.
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“rhythm again”. ‘Scuse my typos. Was a late night and I’m no spring chicken anymore.
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anicoll,
I guess Walcott has a little way to go before he can match the 100 cap man Podolski.
I’d like to think that some of Podolski’s finishing will rub off on the younger players. After Reina had made two good saves from Theo he gave it some welly for the goal. No lucky deflections needed!
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I agree with Frank. Fantastic game last night. Great atmosphere.
And I agree with Shotta. Two soft goals for Liverpool.
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team chemistry ..wise words! .. also lets not forget how we could have dominated much sooner but i guess a team that just built a new ground and fielding a bunch of youngsters with no real experience, humiliating united and chelsea for the title in 07-08 would have been too much for the establishment…
i have mantioned in other posts too about the possibility of first gen getting burnt from expectation, fans/media pressure, and it so happened. and i dont think wenger promoted them out of necessity, i believe it was always his plan..wilshere was always going to continue the cesc legacy…and a reply to all them bigots who wanted to belittle arsenal for fielding foreigners….
the team, players, manager and board have faced a lot of criticism for things which were out of the club’s control and influence, and those who make blogs should know better than promoting an agenda of change simply cause they cant get whats going on….
it is only a matter of time till it all clicks. the desire is there, the will is there just a little bit of experience and a bit more ruthlessness and there is no way arsenal wont titles in the near future.
considering that wenger will be able to spend a bit in the summer i reckon he will go for the player who calms the team with his calm finishing, a flair “henry” type player to place the ball in the net easily and comfortably like in the case for last night.
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Great guest post by the way from Wilheristic. On an intravenous drip of positivity ?
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Muppet @ 11:05am – To some, most of us on this blog wear rose-colored glasses and are blind to Wenger and the Board short-changing this team. Else the club should desperately bid for a world class defender before 12:00 pm GMT. But how do you legislate for Sagna slipping and Vermaelen making such a wild swing? Individually, these are very good players. It must be the Pat Rice effect. After all, Steve Bould is a demi-god or used to.
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Hunter ,you are a joy.
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Shotta,
Absolutely. These are good players and the clarion calls to replace them with any other players is as you say desperate. There seems to be some wild consensus that “any” player will do – even a little known danish left back or an untried centre back from Turkmenistan. Ludicrous. The individuals that could probably improve our defence are all at the most elite clubs and are not available.
And To put things into perspective, our defence is actually no worse, statistically, than Spurs, Liverpool, Manchester United, or even I think – the chavs. The stand out defence is City, which is understandable as that’s their style. Interesting also, that Man U have conceded 2 more goals than us in the league (31), but are sitting at the top.
Also, I think people don’t understand the balancing act between the defence and the attack. We could if we wanted to, park the bus, but that would restrict the attacks. We have a philosophy of attack, as it’s 3 points for a game. If you have 3 games, and you win 2 and lose 1, that’s 1 point more than if you draw 2 and win 1.
Yes, we need the ability to keep a clean sheet if we can. But that’s a work in progress. On the training pitch. Not by wholesale changes.
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Hunter !! Haven’t see you for a while ! Good to see you on here.
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Great post, really good and I’m guessing written before last night’s match which utterly bore out everything you said.
Ramsay was immense last night. When you consider he was playing in an unflashy role mostly just helping out the defence when it was under the cosh or needed an out ball then providing the grease for all the mouthwatering star cogs in our chain (metaphor overload alert) he still managed to impress.
Some of the best football I’ve seen in a long long time.
All I can say is hats off to Liverpool for not conceding about six.
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Muppet @ 11:41 am – Thanks for the statistical reminder that our defending is not as calamitous as most pundits and bloggers claim. But in a game of fine margins, especially at the very top, individual errors are killing us. As for those who finger Wenger’s attacking philosophy as the underlying problem, how quickly they forget the early part of the season when we were so defensive minded, keeping 8-9 men back behind the ball and never look like scoring, not even on a slow night in a whore house. On the positive side, we could easily have scored 4 or 5 goals last nigh.t Steww says six and he has better eyesight than mine 🙂 .
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If we were facing teams who were playing football through us, round us and over us fair enough I would agree we needed new personnel and a shake up in the coaching
Truth is many of the goals we concede are down to our own often inexplicable errors – tighten it up and the three points will come
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I totally agree Anicoll. I fear though, you are pissing in the wind trying to be rational on Transfer Deadline Day.
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I don’t think the errors are as inexplicable as all that. My personal take, being at the game last night, is that for home games, we have a much more attacking shape.. sometimes 8-2, making us vulnerable to counter attacks, whereas, other teams, and to a certain extent, us, for our away games, have a shape of 4-4-2, or 4-1-4-1 i.e. a lot more compact, and ready at the back.
And to corroborate this, for both goals we conceded, we were on the back foot. Yes, you can single out individuals, but the problem is that they are having to be a lot more sharp than, say, when defending from a static position.
Actually, to be accurate, the first goal came, like some others we have conceded, when we tried to play the ball out from defence. And again, it came in the first half, where opposition teams have more energy to harass and press the ball.
In any case the obvious solution is to keep our shape more, but it’s a balancing act, as suggested before, between defence and attack.
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The people who say Bayern are going to maul us, are in for a surprise. The team is getting its passing sorted out and our speed on the counter is scary.
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Oh they are not all inexplicable Muppet – some of them though ………………..!
Quite right about keeping our shape and trying to play ourselves into games better, it always seems to take about half an hour before we get tight on the opposition
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So, this is where everyone is…
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Quite a stable of writers your putting together here George,another fantastic write-up and bang on the money about this teams English/welsh core surrounded by brilliant foreign players who appear to be good blokes/pros as well,I said last night on here that this teams getting better every game,I haven’t changed my mind, I’ll be cheering santos on at the game on Saturday because guess what? Getting on his back and booing him doesn’t work, it doesn’t take Dr. Spock to work that one out.
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hey there muppet ..yes yes ive been in adventures with the commercial arsenal blogs…i had a go at them all for their disrespectful stance towards the team/club they are meant to support..as you can imagine they all kicked me out hehehe cowards.. they couldnt deal with solid arguements nor my freddom to form opinion on their bullshit opinions..hypocrites the lot of em….
just yesterday i was in arseblog news and couldnt stop laughing with commentators who have just realised that arsenal;s agenda the last 7 years has been to make it into champions league while spending as minimum as possible…..doh as homer would say…
something they should have realised the momment they saw world cup winners getting replaced by 17 yearolds …. something they should have understood when the club talked about time, patience support and belief…something that should have been clear to them the momment it was known arsenal embarked on a 450m investment and with the handicap of the property market which delayed the sale fo highbury flats…something they should have figured out when hillwood confirmed in agm meeting 2010 that the manager needs to create surpluss of 24million per annum to cover for losses mainly via transfers and players sales….something which is evidenced by the fact that the sposnosrhip the last 7 years stood at only 5,5m per annum.
its all there in front of them and they still complain about transparency..they must be thick…
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I love this place
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Hunter,
.Yeah.. it makes me laugh when the club gets accused of having no ambition, when the stadium move costs were estimated at around £500 million:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2002/oct/22/newsstory.sport6?INTCMP=SRCH
So if we had gone into the transfer market and spent over £200 million+, can you imagine the state of finances today ?
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Muppet it seems we are not as deluded as feared. Wenger admitted that our attacking philosophy makes the team a little vulnerable. “its a bit of a price of our philosophy [that we open at the back] but I feel we are too nervous.”
Add the nerves of the jelly fish supporters and it becomes a perfect environment for Murphy’s Law. Mind you, I am not blaming the supporters. The players and coaches must take the lead.
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Muppet January 31, 2013 at 1:47 pm
thast why the owners feel safe having an economist technocrat as their football manager and general advisor..if the numbers dont add up he wont do it…unlike others who dont even look at such things and just say “do it! we will sort the finances out later, we will give our stadium and training ground to the banks if we have to”
we have reached the point were wenger gets abused for being repsonsible with the clubs hard earned money …crazy situation…..
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you know the biggest truths are things you always suspected and get verified later on by others statements/ definitions.
take last night ” i cant fault the spirit and attitude, they just make mistakes because they want to do so well” somehting i mentioned in aclf two weeks ago (as kosser) about the players eagerness to do good they end messing it up a bit and the consequent goal that they will conceed till they settle on the game, and i was dismissed and pointed towards wenger;’s inability to motivate…
this has been happening even since the cesc years..you could see that our boys were so nervous and anxious to do well their nerves were off the roof…as soon as they went one down they started playing and releasing/showing on the pitch their training/work
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Shotta – yes. It’s a bit of a high wire balancing act.
hunter13 – yes. Agree. I think it’s easy to criticise the austerity of the board/Wenger, but when you look a the numbers involved, it’s not hard to see why they are risk adverse. Of course, we hope that once the stadium debt is paid off, and better commercial deals are signed, and with some FFP being enforced, then the we start to compete a bit more financially for the top players. But as well, I hope that young players continue to come through the system. It’s not all about buying trophies.
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well said muppet, that was the plan ever since 06 , i just find it strange that the fans couldnt get it…
i like to call them weak for falling for the rivals and media mockings….
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History would be a lot different if the Taylor incident never happened.
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i also think the same evil, but even that incident they managed to turn it into a negative for arsenal…our player;s ankle was hanging from the threads of his socks and the people here were accusing arsenal for “not liking it up ;em”
disgraceful savage behaviour
when dudu came back they labelled him a cheat cause the poor lad sought to get out of the way of a clash with celtic;s boruc to avoid possibly injury. who can blame him?
rooney does it to gain three points nothing is said about it ..dudu did it because psychologically the injury was still playing games in his mind but immediately “assasinated” as a cheating foreigner
its one of them occasions were you want to nuke the f.a and all the newpapers headquarters and media outlets
to be fair a club;s pr spokesman should have come out and put things right. protect the players, the manager, the club.
wenger then thought : ” ok you trash my foreigners and burn them, will you do it to your own too i wonder? “…enter jack theo aaron kierran oxlade carl
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Adrian Clark has very kindly given this site a leg up several times on twitter .His match analysis and co-commentary on Arsenal player are refreshing and informative.I would be very grateful if people could Email Arsenal,com and ask that Adrian does every match.Also if people could at least retweet my attempts to promote this site ,that too will help a lot .Thanks
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Yeh, Wilsheristic. Good stuff here bro!!!
I did not know that Arsenal had such a good scoring record and that from a team that team that is new ,as you have noted (that little fact has been lost on so many), that is quite impressive.
Yesterdays game was a real joy even thought we should have won it but these draws and near losses are going to turn into wins. There is too much quality throughout the squad for this not to happen and we have the best manager in history in charge. Blow wow!!
Walcotts strike was wicked! he really did have a good game last night. What impressed me most as his movement with and without the ball, he seemed to make the good decisions for the most part. I love how he is coming along.
I also wanted to commend Ramsey for his overall play but specifically how he tracked back and defended for Pool’s second goal. The man busted a gut and made an excellent slide tackle. To bad that Santos was also trying hard to get a tackle in and got in the way. I don’t fault him, he was trying to right his wrong.
There is a light at the end of the tunnel and it is not on the front of a train. This team is coming and is going to shock the world. The only thing needed is stability. We have signed the youngsters and signed some mature players who I doubt will want to leave at this point, so I dare say that this team will get that stability. Hopefully, the supporters are starting to buy into the plan as alluded to by Frank.
ARSENAL!!!
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Yet another great post. Great comments too. This place is an oasis!
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Very good post, I agree and the facts do bear this out. Mainly, I am thrilled with this growing understanding between the front three, it gets better by the match, and the all round role played by Olivier has much more to it than meets the eye, he holds the ball well, has an eye for the through pass, and as we saw the lobbed pass, heads magnificently and wins the majority in the air, and is unafraid in front of goal, and more recently we discover has a ferocious shot in his range. It’s too early to tell, but arsenal may well have found its traditional larger than life centre forward, the latest in a long and distinguished line.
On the negative side is overcoming the mental block, the fear of failure, the first half timidity and the inevitable mistakes that arise from lack of confidence and shall we say trying to hard.It’s not a new problem either. The solution is not quick fix, it tends towards character. I personally see Arteta as a major part of the solution.
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Something I haven’t heard too many people talk about is the way Olivier Giroud lays off the ball for his teammates. For a big guy, he’s got very delicate feet. I think the boy is going to be a massive player for us for the rest of the season.
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I agree about OG’s lay offs. Actually, I cannot say that I have watched a better player. The pass to Podoliski when Cazorla scored and the pass to GIbbs for that wicked strike, were two passes of extreme quality. He is a special player.
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A better player as far as those neat little passes.
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