Good Morning Positive Arsenal,
And how are each of you this fine Wednesday morning ?
Quite chipper I’d guess !
I suspect a lot of you, endured the fluctuations of technology while watching last night’s game, with streams coming and going, and providing a timely reminder of what reliable and comprehensive football coverage provides us. We may despise those damned TV corporations, bloodsuckers, leeches etc, but if that is the alternative their business model is safe for the foreseeable future.
Having dealt with that broadcasting foible a thoroughly enjoyable game took place. Our line up provoked a predictable mix of enthusiasm tinged with caution, with the mix of new faces, old’ish hands and promotions from the youngsters, and even in those promotions the position of Maitland-Niles at right back was a surprise to me. Perhaps the boldest initiative was the bench, with six teenagers in situ. As George said last night with a bench like that the Arsenal game plan is “shit or bust”.
Of the game itself and how these Wengerian schemes might work, or not perhaps? To quote Brian Clough “We talk about it for 20 minutes and then we decide I was right” and so Wenger’s selections and team set up proved that managerial aphorism almost perfectly, with Granit thumping in the first goal just 3 minutes shy of Old Big Head’s proposed schedule. Stand off the player 30 yards out and you will be punished. Did no one at Forest watch the Hull game ?
It is so, so important if you have a mix of young and experienced players that that first goal. After it went in we relaxed and every player had a little more confidence on the ball. Equally after a decent start Forest deflated after going a goal behind, the crowd noise sagged, the night for the home side slowly began to unravel. Very much a contrast to events at Hillsborough in our previous League Cup game.
Having gone ahead Forest kept up their end until half time, with a number of agricultural challenges that on another night might have led to greater official retribution. Martinez was never really troubled once week ahead. NF had one genuinely good player in Pereira, I thought. The rest were worker bees, willing but limited.
As a result, and as you saw, in the second 45 we strolled through the game. I was pleased to see Perez assert himself with a good aggressive goal. It is a long time since I have seen a centre back bullied off the ball like that. I thought his penalty was good as well. Almost like he practiced putting it beyond the keeper and into the corner !
Goal four for the Ox rounded off the evening, good for him and a boost to his still fragile confidence. His passing in the first half was, to put it bluntly, on occasions “wild”. A deep breath required young man.
All round a thoroughly competent performance. Young players all gained valuable experience, Elneny and Xhaka proving a cameo of an alternative high quality midfield pairing, Perez showed he is more than happy to “do it” on a Tuesday night in Nottingham. And NO injuries. Now that is a bonus.
Given it was the 12th anniversary of the death of Mr Clough I thought I would close with a second quote from that gentleman, made on the day the Invincibles passed the Forest unbeaten League record;
“I’m loath to confess they could be as good as us. They are brilliant. It sticks in the craw a little bit because nobody likes Arsenal! Of course there’s a Frenchman in charge, Wenger, and not many English people like Frenchmen. He is a top, top manager”
Enjoy the midweek. We have work on Saturday to look forward to.
Positively Arsenal 
Four is such a nice number. It would be no hardship to suffer that in our goals for column for the rest of the season.
Equally seeing new faces (or rarely seen faces) emerging is often a great confidence booster that we have a well of young talent busting a gut to make it to first team status. As Steww points out in his excellent article it’s very easy to go overboard in praising the youngsters, but it really would be curmudgeonly to ignore the performances of Ainsley Maitland-Niles and Jeff Adelaide both of whom showed talent beyond their years, especially Ainslie who was playing in an unfamiliar position.
Having waxed poetic about Xhaka’s goal against Hull, it’s difficult to match the waxing with last night’s. Hell, it took a slight diversion and the keeper got a touch. About the same distance though and a more than adequate “brownie point” to add to his all-round excellent display. It will soon be impossible for AW to leave him on the bench.
During bits of Forest pressure, young Rob Holding gave a very good performance overall on his 21st birthday and even got a card from the ref. Pity it was of the yellow variety! A bit inexplicable really considering that Lansbury showing no affection for his old club deserved about 3 yellows in the first half alone.
So we turned round 1-0 up and looked good for several more but at the start of the second half it was all Forest and Nic Bendtner went close. To be honest that was about all he did and our birthday boy and the archangel didn’t really give him a sniff otherwise.
Xhaka and Mo Elneny quickly regained control of the mid-field though and a penalty awarded when Akpom was brought down as he went after an astute pass from Lucas Perez. Lucas stepped up to score his first goal for the club. His second followed not long after when sheer determination allowed him to go past defenders and the keeper to tap in. A real effort goal. There was just time for our prettiest goal of the night when lovely interplay between Bielik, Lucas and the Ox left the Ox free to score a fourth. Obviously we can’t draw too much from this but it was good to see the speed and movement of the side. How different to our last League Cup performance at a championship ground.
Now for the Chavs. Another 4? Oh yes please. Keep the faith.
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Thanks A5-delightful goals last night.
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For a few games towards the end of last season I was a bit uncomfortable about our goalscoring Gf but we are rattling them in, and the odd thing is that it is not Giroud hitting the back of the net yet.
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The three goals from open play wee all top strikes and the finishing by Ox anPerez for 3 and 4 excellent Mills. It was also a professional penalty, well struck and directed. Our fifth in seven games !! Bloody hell.
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Lovely stuff young man, lovely. Clough the only non Arsenal manager I ever admired shared many of Arsene’s qualities. As far as getting an unsatisfactory view via internet streaming goes, if you didn’t enjoy it then, like sex you must be doing it wrong. I have BT sport available to me but usually still opt to watch via the Internet on a foreign stream as the quality is comparable and always reliable.
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I rarely watch it on the internet Stew as I have every bloody subscription service under the sun. When I do it is on an old laptop as I cannot risk downloading anything nasty on to my work machine. The coverage was particularly excruciating last night though. Or it may just be NFN ?
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As Rich posted this at the same time as I put up the new post I thought Id add it on here;
Didn’t watch game but seems a remarkably positive result.
None of Saturday’s eleven, plus Giroud, Ramsey, Debuchy, Per, Ospina, able to loan out Wilshere, Szcz, Chambers, Campbell, and we win 4-0 in a tough match.
Depth is excellent now.
As for the youngsters and following on from Steww’s wise advice not to get carried away, how about this team from 8 years ago
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/league_cup/7626710.stm
I don’t remember my thinking at the time but I bet I was very carried away. Hardly a sad tale, as i think 8 went on to be full internationals but, still, impossible to predict the career’s that have unfolded since.
70th minute sub will be kicking shit out of us in 8 years. 71st will be having a night off in preparation for a huge game at the weekend.
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Wenger joined in the round of applause for the memory of Brian Clough.
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Andy I only have BT Sports because that’s who our internet is with and so as an existing customer they give it to me gratis. In fairness the coverage for the league cup has been patchy to non existent in recent years so last night may have been poor. I was out and so watched the match when I got home via the excellent Football Origin site which manages to have it in full and pretty clear quality way earlier than the club site and without the spoiler of the score being displayed (as the club does).
For the rest of the season I have an extremely old, cheap and nasty computer linked to a TV salvaged (literally) from a trip to the tip and the free Linux operating system installed. I spent a couple of slightly frustrating and bewildered hours working out how to install a piece of software which allows it to interpret the high quality Sopcast streams. This software employs VLC media player to display the noise and pictures. A couple of websites provide the necessary links to Russian and Spanish streams which are almost always HD quality. Being spared the British commentary and the huge expense of a Sky subscription makes the small amount of head scratching involved to get this up and running well worth the effort. Plus Sky doesn’t show all our games live.
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It doesn’t surprise me that AMN had a decent game. He’s a good footballer and can cover most positions on the pitch (obviously depending on the level of the opposition). A bit like Iwobi, Hayden (yes he’s with Benitez now), Elneny, Coquelin etc etc.
I’m not sure AW would have risked him as FB against a Prem team but I doubt he’d have looked too ‘out of place’ even then.
Jeff does have something a bit special but he also gives away silly flicks/intricate passes that there’s no need for. When he losses that (or gets better at it 😀 ) he’ll shine. He does have that Henry thing where he can be surrounded, flicks the ball between his own feet whilst he looks for an exit, then he’s suddenly a yard past the opposing player(s).
Akpom should have a couple of goals but for excellent keeping and he put in a really good shift. My only worry with him is that he’s not getting enough game-time and he really needs that now.
Yes, a good night and some real confidence for the future.
I recall the 1st team members letting down the youngsters against Wednesday last season, but hopefully they won’t let them down in the ‘TinPot’ Cup this season.
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Rich’s reminder of that 6:0 over Sheffield caused me mixed emotions. Based on that game, with both Vela and Bendtner excelling, many of us thought that we had our future sorted with respect to strikers. Add Jack and Rambo to the mix and I know most of us, particularly my British friends, were giddy with excitement. Of that group only Rambo and Gibbs are in the first team today and they are not even guaranteed starters.
On reflection the evolution of Arsenal a much stronger and resilient force since that night vs Sheffield is a testimony to the Darwinian laws that apply in competitive football; adapt or perish. Harsh as it may sound, sentiment means little.
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80sirishlegend @80sirishlegend 2h2 hours ago
Panic Buy has been a fantastic signing for Arsenal, it must be said. No sure if I mean Xhaka, Holding, Mustafi or Lucas Perez!
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Alastair Brookshaw @albrookshawAFC 13h13 hours ago
Seems to me that the Chelsea debacle has robbed Jose of the aura of invincibility that persuaded players to put up with his vile personality
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Thanks to Andy Nic’s post I’m watching The Damned United again. Great fun.
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Whats the film like? Ive read the book and somehow it brought back to life the strange world of the greasy hair/brown suit/orange sofa/sideburned-ciggie world of the 70s.
Does the film capture that atmosphere?
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Mills – according to some it plays fast and loose with the facts but that atmosphere is wonderfully captured. It’s funny, has some virtuoso performances and of course invokes the lost world of our youth. Oh and its hero hates Revie who was surely the Mourinho of his day.
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I’ll have a butchers! Cheers Stew.Hope it was a good band rehearsal-on the road soon?
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It is a good film and I enjoyed it, the book sort of irritated me -I don’t like David Peace’s writing style.
Regarding fast and loose facts in the ‘factional” subject Johnny Giles, who comes across as a nasty piece of work so it is not all fiction, sued for libel and received damages!
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Its been many years since I read it, and cant recall the style of his writing too much, but recall it seemed to capture the era really well. Tough to make a film about football and other eras though.
I had a look at a few clips,and ended up watching a few dirty Leeds players getting their fists out.Fuck, the 70s till gives me the fear really badly.
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Chipper indeed Andy. Very chipper.
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oooooooooooooooooo Wakha!
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How about Panic Xhaka, Ed?
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How did the team line up tactically? How did Wenger accommodate Perez and Chuba and where did the Ox play?
Every time I see David Luiz in a Chelsea shirt I reminisce about Rio 2014 and the David Luiz v Johan Djourou discussion. Fast forward two years and David Luiz was sold at a loss to his last European club before he goes back to play in Brazil. Crazy ain’t it?
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Whacker, hacker, attacker, back-packer, nutcracker and hijacker – they are all in the pipeline Gains – trust me – I am a poet
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Mills – it’s a scratch band hastily assembled to play a mate’s wedding. He can’t afford to pay for entertainment so we’re doing it for him. Has meant some pretty intense rehearsal recently.
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Sounds a great laugh! My Dad was in a pool of musicians who used to do it in the days before discos,he stopped around 1966 or so.He said they had to know a lot of songs going back to the 20s etc.Irish stuff and all sorts as they didnt know what requests they would get.They used to do a lot of Django Reinhardt stuff etc,
Hope its a great night!
Talking of which lets hope Norfhampton and the Swans get a result tonight.
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Northampton stiffed with a dubious interpretation of the back pass law
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Sure seemed like that. Hang in there Northampton!
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HT: Northampton Town 1 – 1 Manchester United
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Northampton fans chanting to José ” you’re getting sacked in the morning”! Lets hope so.
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Oliver Kay @OliverKayTimes 7m7 minutes ago
Northampton fans telling Mourinho “You’re getting sacked in the morning” and, more imaginatively, “You’re just a s**t Guardiola”. 1-1
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“You’re getting sacked in the morning” ringing round Sixfields – most pleasant
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Bingo! The PA boys all loving the sacked in the morning line!!!! LOL!!!
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I see we are all on the same page !
ManYoo a fucking shambles so far
Presumably Jose is tearing his lads a new one in the dressing room
Marvellous
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Neil Brooks @NeilBrooksAFC 40m40 minutes ago
A lot of doubts raised about Mourinho strangling the youth at Utd.
Northampton in the Lge cup.
Ave age 26.9
Only 2 players under 26yrs.
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I took the mutts for their evening perambulation and missed the comeback. Which is a shame but I welcome the scoreline nonetheless.
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So used to watching Arsenal it’s weird when a substitution is made earlier than 70 minutes.
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N.b. That is why Jose is/was the Special One
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Accy still hanging on at the Wet Spam.
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Mourinho summoning a substitute like a boorish billionaire in a restaurant about to complain to some flunky about the service.
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grrrr.Come on Northampton make them sweat a bit more.Bloody ManUre!
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A superb strike by Herrera to rescue the Mourinho dynasty at Trafford Park – surely they can’t sack him after this battle of the century ?
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And United win with comedy goal that the Northampton keeper will never want to see again. But he will.
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The Mighty Man Ure putting on top players to beat the serial Champions league winners Northampton.
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Exceptional quality from the team from Manchester – I may even stay on for the no doubt hilarious post match interview.
“You’re just a shit Ron Atkinson” – very good
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Ranieri must be bricking it
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https://scontent-bru2-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/14364818_10154239348802713_5092307328403405841_n.jpg?oh=bfd448b5e70b34a5dd3bdf219df27cc3&oe=5870B45F
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Well at least Northhogwash made them sweat it a bit. Accy giving the Ammers a tough time though…
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Bah Hambug!
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Worst ManYoo side I’ve seen in 30 years
Ferguson must be turning in his grave
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