That was the most enjoyable international break I’ve ever known. Like the Arsenal players I had been feeling a little jaundiced after a frantic start to the season. I was ready for a rest, a change of pace and a diversion from the usual routine. The Dreaded Break coincided with the November writing marathon that is National Novel Writing Month, popularly abbreviated to NaNoWriMo, and so I needed to remove all other distractions from my life, get my head down and focus on my characters.
Surprisingly this year’s novel has only referred to football twice and then only in passing and on neither occasion was the greatest team in all the land even mentioned. My subconscious telling me perhaps that I’d overdosed a little. I really must stop watching the pre season friendlies, charity shields and such. If my various addiction afflictions have taught me anything it is that you derive far less not more pleasure from an over indulgence in the things you love.
I am in fact not even going to watch the match at 3pm today. I’m going to write this, then my daily NaNoWriMo diet of two and a half thousand words and then I’m taking my mum out for the day and will catch the game on Football Origin later this evening. We’ve all seen the insane over reactions and complete lack of perspective exhibited on the internet by those who can’t keep a lid on their obsessions and I do not intend to join their ranks. Let’s face it the result in the Midlands won’t be affected by my not being there or not watching the game live. At least the picture quality will be better this way and I can fast forward any time wasting, which we all know is a Pulis trademark.
I actually won’t be too far from the action this afternoon. After throwing mum from the Skoda in Tintern I’m driving on up the Wye Valley to Hereford to take some photographs as part of a long term project. I’m engaged in photographing all the river crossings over the Wye. I started as you can readily imagine with the title Bridge On The River Wye which has doubtlessly been used before but was too good to miss. I do like a good bridge from the merest plank over a small stream to the mightiest suspension bridge and I would love to dovetail this paragraph with some clever football/bridge metaphor without sounding trite but I can’t so I’ll just go on to discuss the two sides and compare their contrasting styles and standings.
Pulis against Wenger has always leapt out as a beauty and the beast encounter. One a baseball cap wearing troglodyte sending his budget players out to rough up the opposition and stick it high and often into the box all the while hoping for a lenient referee to allow multiple and rotational fouling to go unpunished. The other a debonair, highly intelligent aesthete sending out his expensive hugely talented show ponies to dance and trick their way around the opposition in a dizzying paso doble of dexterity and devastating one touch deftness. In truth this is often seen as a cliché, an attempt to reduce the achievements of one man and raise the profile of the other. You and I know it may be a cliché but it also happens to be entirely true.
Pulis is in some pretty poor company. From Phil Brown to Jose Mourinho to Fat Sam and Mark Hughes there have always been managers who have bought into the media pedalled illusion that you can simply kick Arsenal off the park and that they are weak at defending the high ball and set pieces. Statistic after statistic proves this isn’t true and it is only when one of these brutalist managers is given unlimited funds and the unequivocal support of the match officials that any of them have had any appreciable success over monsieur Wenger.
There are, in fairness, also stats which point to Pulis strengths as a manager of lower ranked teams. No one questions his ability to motivate players, nor to grind out points and occasionally take big scalps from unlikely places. He improved West Brom’s fortunes more than any other new manager when comparing the twelve months before his appointment with his first year in charge.
“West Brom won just 21 per cent of their games in the 12 months prior to Tony Pulis’ arrival at the club. They’ve won 40% of them since then though, an increase of 19 percentage points.” source http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/west-brom-data-improvement-under-10123175
This might be considered nothing more than New Manager Impact Syndrome, but that is thought to be only a short term phenomenon. I think there is more to it and Pulis has doing a reasonable job with the Baggies. He has still said and done many unforgivable things where Arsene is concerned and as such should not and will not be forgiven but he has at least attempted to soften the public comments of late. Nowadays he says things like
“I’ve got absolutely no problems with any of the managers. Nine times out of ten you will have five minutes with them after a game. I don’t know the person. I couldn’t say whether he was a nice guy, bad guy whatever… because you don’t spend time with them. And when you are involved in football a lot of people see you and they perceive you in this image that is projected. Nine times out of ten you turn the cameras off and we are different human beings. Softer.”
He even has a go at being humorous with predictably lamentable results saying that he would be happy to ask Arsene to sponsor him in his attempt to row the English channel, wait for it, here comes the punchlines, hold on to your hats, “I will also ask him the quickest way to Paris!” cue sound effect or Arctic wind blowing across the tundra.
Anyway today’s match isn’t about the relative cerebral gifts of the managers, it’s about one team’s quest for glory against another’s for mid table respectability. Both sides have their goals and both will, I’m sure give their all in their respective campaigns. Historically we’ve always done well over the Albion and in the last 18 premier league encounters we’ve only lost two and drawn two. More recently their home form has been uninspired. They’ve only won one of their previous six and that was against a Sunderland side who have been so poor this season they are only one place above Chelsea in the league. Overall Albion have lost four of their last six whereas the only blemish on our record is the two dropped points against Spurs.
Much today will depend on how well our patched up injury riven squad comes back after the break. Olivier Giroud is still in fine form in front of goal, it’s just a shame Manuel Neuer doesn’t play for West Brom as our huge Gallic symbol can’t seem to stop scoring against him. Good news about Hector but only if you’re not Matthieu Debuchy who was just getting back some sharpness and now will be relegated once more to the sidelines. The life of a millionaire premiership footballer can be tough sometimes.
A question. Am I hoping for too much from Joel Campbell? He’s had a few games lately and should be over any nerves and ready to start strutting his stuff. But time is of course running out for the lad and being so far down the pecking order that it takes every other possible starter in your position to be injured or on loan before you get a game must be dispiriting. He needs to do a Hector or a Koscielny but he surely needs more time to do it. Looks like Ox will soon be back so I fear for the boy, but again Arsenal is a big club and the very best of the best is all that is good enough.
I anticipate West Brom holding out for a draw while hoping to nick a win but how we will approach the game is less easy to predict. We’ve seen our side bamboozle opponents and we’ve seen them incoherent, tired and shattered by injuries. Something in between the two ought to be good enough but a return to form will be really heartening. People say the league isn’t won in November but that’s poppycock. It is won in August, September and October it is won in November just as much as December, and all the way through to May. It’s the one true test of greatness in the sport we love and if we want to win it we need to be able to ride the storms as well as coasting on the crest of the waves. Can we do it? Of course we can. Will we? Today might be a good indication.
Those of you with the outrageous good fortune to be at the game will, I trust, be treated as welcome guests by the Baggies fans, as to the rest of you I hope you get a half way decent commentator and a stable stream. I’ll catch up with you all later on and should you be canoeing under the Wye Bridge in Hereford this afternoon and you see an old man setting up his tripod – please don’t shout out the score.
Positively Arsenal 
Gosh I hope your mum doesn’t impede your progress towards those bridges too much Stewe?
I’m with you on the over-dosing on football; that was one inter-lull many of us needed.
But good news for your radio station in the unlikely event of your losing your long-standing weekly Jokesmith; Pulis is a readymade replacement but the global supplies of tumbleweed could well end up being severely tested.
Also planning on listening to the game as I drive home to London (fortunately unburdened by either parent on this occasion); hopeful that Match of the Day will be worth the pain of getting past Linekar and assorted numbskulls.
Thanks for a great read Stewe, enjoy the game everybody and please, let’s all say a prayer for Pulis’ seemingly still-born career as a commercially viable comedian.
COYG.
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Marvellous Stew – a day for gloves
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Forecast was OK for today but it’s blowing hooley out there. Think gloves may be joined by hat and scarf. And something heavy to weigh the tripod down.
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“a dizzying paso doble of dexterity and devastating one touch deftness”
Thank you Steww.
I hope to use that one-liner later today.
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another great breww from steww.Many thanks!
COYG! etc
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Stew is back and roving reporter A5 is on his way to the Hawthorns. Normal programming finally returned after an inter-lull that felt like ages. Unfortunately that also mean “the mental over reactions and complete lack of perspective exhibited on“ twatter.
Ah. Living the dream [insert that banned yellow blob here]
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I knew that it was a good time for a break and I tried to think all the right, mature things – but I have found the last week exceptionally dull. Its not just us, either: its the whole warp and woof of it. Everton v Villa, Southampton Stoke just as eagerly anticipated as the more obviously mouth-watering clashes. City Liverpool causes me problems: logic calls for a draw and probably anything but a sky-blue win, yet a hatred of all things pool says different. As for us, I feel sanguine enough as I often do when Clattenburg is in charge. Santi to open the scoring from the spot and a brace from JC I fancy.
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Not being a writer, I have long since run out of superlatives for Stewws prose. On these mornings when i’m not going to the games, sitting in a warm front room watching sky sports news and reading Stewws preview has become a regular habit and something I miss when we are not playing.
Pulis has had money compared to other clubs considered to be the same size as stoke and west brom but the media does like to portray he is a bargin basement manger. Much the same as Harry, who is supposed to be a great in the transfer market however noone ever mentions the fact that bournemouth, portsmouth, southampton and west ham all went into administration and the one seson the spuds lost money in the last about twenty years coincided with harrys charge.
Steww, Joal played on Wednesday, a day later than everyone else and travelled just about the most, so a hard game in the cold of brum might not be the be the best time and place to make his biggest statment for a place in the side although I would love him to.
A nice little clean sheet win to get back in the swing of things would be excellent today and im certainly not expecting us to win comfortably by 3 goals or more.
Petr, Per, Francis and Oliver will be important today, the leaders of the team to pull the side through, I think you could probably include Nacho in that. With that framework the electic lights of Kos, Hector, Santi and Mezut will be allowed to shine. The two players ive left out Alexis and Joal are a mixture of tthe two, both willing to work hard, both willing to lead but both capable of brilliance with one having shown it regularly and the other well….COYG
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Another great picture too.
If the Gunners can be on as good form as Steww’s pen and eye then they’ll be fine.
–
Steww was the above piccie taken in Autumn?
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Another twang for a Utd player – Herrera goes off with a twinge.
Tis the season of relatively extreme temperature fluctuations, snow this morning, warmer in the sunshine at the moment.
Alongside early Spring which is another period in which we can and will see a few of these over-played (millionaire) athletes dropping like flies!
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as things stand Utd are going top of the BPL
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some journos reporting that Bellerin and Gibbs both start for AFC today, and that Reine-Adelaide is a sub.
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Arsene: “Ox will be ready for Norwich. Ramsey will be back in full training on Monday and can play on Tuesday. Theo is still 2 weeks away.”
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Gibbsy starts, not surprising after Campbell played two games for Cost Rica (though he’s been working on his stamina) and with big mid-week games coming during the next few weeks.
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Sanchez on the right opposite Brunt. Should be a good battle.
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For about the first thirty minutes before Sanchez runs out of juice.
In the substitute sweepstake I’m putting my chips down on Campbell coming on for Sanchez 60-70 mins in.
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On the other hand Özil has had a welcome and wise rest and is probably chomping at the bit.
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I’ve always thought this Dawson is the better footballer then the former Tottenham captain (he can pass the ball and stuff like that), was he expecting an in cutting Sanchez?
Another interesting battle with Gibbs.
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COYG
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Arsenal team: Cech, Bellerin, Koscielny, Mertesacker, Monreal, Coquelin, Cazorla, Alexis, Ozil, Gibbs, Giroud
Subs: Ospina, Debuchy, Gabriel, Arteta, Flamini, Campbell, Reine-Adelaide
Read more at http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/20151121/team-news-gibbs-starts-at-west-brom#QP2yfcpCQO1ULgHP.99
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man u gone top, Deeney with an OG 3 minutes after he had leveled the game,
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Arsenal with 3 French lads starting and 3 more on the bench.
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12 minutes, Coquelin off with a knee injury, Arteta to come on.
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does arteta have instructions not to pass forward?
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afc been poor so far, Coquelin off injured, replaced by Arteta, Arteta off injured, replaced by Flamini
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Campbell just fucked up a great chance, awful connection
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cazorla slips and falls over as he baloons a penalty over the bar, the ref seemed to indicate the penalty would be taken again and then changed his mind, AFC really have fucked up today big time
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2 minutes of stoppage time to left to save the game
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utd won, and now chelsea win, Arsenal lose, an awful day for Gooners
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shot ourselves in the foot, a poor performance compounded by mistakes in defense, fluffed chances in attack including a missed penalty, and to crown it Coquelin and Arteta both went off injured.
our seemingly annual November blip is in full swing.
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sometimes you need a bit of luck to carry you through, we lost the game in ten minutes tbh. i think that might just be the end of Arteta’s ARSENAL playing career, nothing went right for him today and he didnt even look like he wanted the ball off the defenders. Flamini has been playing well and I was surprised he didnt come on first anyway.
Hector also looked a shadow of his former self, but maybe that was just the game he needed to get back up to full speed.
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Not our day boys and girls. That pen by Cazorla tells it all.
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Outrageous – the Fates, the Fates !
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We shall be bringing you exclusive footage f the penalty – flexible posting time tomorrow though – geography intervenes
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WENGER ON THE DEFEAT, CAZORLA AND GIROUD
Arsène Wenger spoke to the media following Arsenal’s 2-1 defeat to West Bromwich Albion. This is what he had to say:
on the game…
It was a bad afternoon, we missed a penalty, we gave a goal away on set-piece, that is perfect to make your afternoon a nightmare and we missed open goal chances. I believe that West Brom they were strong in the fight and they had one 100 per cent commitment as well and you have to give them credit for that. But overall I felt it dropped a huge blow when we scored and we just had to make sure they didn’t come back with a easy goal and that is where we were disappointed today. But I cannot be mad at the team because they gave what they could until the last minute but we lost a bit of focus at 1-0 – at 35 minutes we were 1-0 up and then at 45 we were 2-1 down. Our defending on that level was very, very poor.
on Cazorla’s penalty…
I have seen a few but I don’t really know what happened. You can talk to him and he is so disappointed and it is difficult to blame Cazorla for that. We have to take it on the chin and bounce back in our next game. It is a big blow today for us as if the game reflects the result then okay but when you drop points when you have come out of a game and think you have not done the maximum to produce you cannot be happy.
on injury problems…
We have two more injuries. One is a muscle problem for Arteta and the other one is a knee problem and I don’t know how serious that is but we will know certainly tomorrow, for Coquelin. Arteta is a calf.
on the mental state of Giroud and Koscielny…
We are competitors, I believe in life they are disappointed like I am. Once your are in the competition you are in the competition, you have to be professional. I fought my whole life to know that when I am at work I am at work, when I am outside work I am outside work. That is what it is about. How much [Paris] affected them, I don’t know. I can only speak for myself. Our best players today, like Alexis, he flew back Thursday night and was not tired at all.
on whether he spoke to Koscielny and Giroud before the game…
They were highly focused and had the desire to play. I just want to say when you are on the pitch, you are on the pitch.
on whether there were emotions before the game…
For me it is a game where we produced enough to win, and after that the influence of what happened, I don’t know. On my side, I would not explain our defeat by that. It is sad and we are all down, but when you are on the pitch you are on the pitch.
Copyright 2015 The Arsenal Football Club plc. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to http://www.arsenal.com as the source
Read more at http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/20151121/wenger-on-the-defeat-cazorla-and-giroud#6B2bQrybmViUXr7a.99
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man city losing 3-1 to LFC, were 3-0 down
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Giroud – 88+22 BPL games, 48 goals, 16 of which have been headers, that is 33%.
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Real Madrid 0-4 Barcelona, Rafa could lose his job over that.
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LFC 4-1 up on city with a few minutes to go, leaves AFC 2pts off Leicester on top, level with city, and only 6pts ahead of LFC, and 12 ahead of CFC, spurs or whu can get within 2 of afc with a win tomorrow
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Bayern Munich gone 8pts clear in Germany
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That was just poor, injuries, November, journeyman cloggers from set pieces, just wish we could put such things behind us……for good!
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Arsenal really missed a trick in the summer, Wenger should have been replaced, the man to replace him was available and willing to come to England, as has since been proved by him doing so, and actually doing a brilliant job so far. He has his team playing great free flowing, fast, attacking football, all the things Arsenal and us Gooners want to see.
A real wasted opportunity we should have appointed ….
Claudio Ranieri
why has the twatteratti not been banging on this particular drum, top of the league after all.
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Thank fuck I didn’t watch that live.
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Shit happens….just ask ManShitty fans….
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oh so typical of Arsenal fans and their need for a scapegoat
Stillmatic
November 21, 2015 at 8:09 pm
I’m actually a tad annoyed now that areblog seem keen to make Joel the scapegoat rather than Arteta.
I mean, what’s with the bias?
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Orbinho @Orbinho 4h4 hours ago
73% possession and just 11 shots. Busy going nowhere.
4 of the 11 shots on target, by the way wba only had 1 shot on target
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No need for individuals as scapegoats, there was something collective,about that. Some poor defending, midfield play, and finishing. Not great in executing or defending set pieces. Not that they didn’t try, they did, just didn’t work. Injuries ….and subsequent fatigue in some are the root cause of this shite November…and shite Novembers past, individual players cannot be blamed for that. They all tried today. But what got me a bit, too many old, old issues came back to haunt.
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Disappointing result for sure, though I thought the effort was there. WB set up to defend and had a lenient ref, makes things pretty tough. How no penalty was called when OG was brought down with the defender giving him a bear hug during the corner kick early second half is a mystery.
That we gave up 2 shit goals is galling, we’ve seen that crap before, boy I’d love to see the end of that. I feel for Santi, had he converted I feel confident a third would have followed. I hope Frankie C is okay.
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we have lost over one third of our games so far this season, 7 from 19, West Ham, Chelsea, Zagreb, Olympiacos, Sheffield Wednesday, Bayern Munich, West Brom, we have only drawn 2 games, both at home, LFC and THFC
in the seven games we have lost we have conceded 19 goals, with 2 goals or more in all of them,
West Ham 2
Chelsea 2
Zagreb 2
Olympiacos 3
S Wednesday 3
B Munich 5
West Brom 2
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Jeez Ed, looking at that, seems poor.
Sure, they need to get their act together a bit, but, not far behind in the league, and I wouldn’t write then of qualifying in the CL either. But clearly some room for improvement
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