This blog was written 24 hours before Arsenal’s loss to Stoke. Everything football and media-wise from that game reinforces my findings and conclusions.
Positivistas: This is not a blog about me per se but am using my experience to explain to our audience the meaning of a contrarian world view and how it applies to the football club we so love and support. After all so much is written and said about this club on a daily basis which, to me at least, is confusing and contradictory and makes absolutely no sense. Hopefully this essay may be helpful in providing a rational and logical perspective.
A contrarian according to the Webster on-line dictionary is defined as:
“One who takes a contrary view or action, especially an investor who makes decisions that contradict prevailing wisdom, as in buying securities that are unpopular at the time.”
Contrarian investors are usually successfully because they buy stocks when they are cheap due to their unpopularity and profit from them when their value rises over time.
Contrarians Rely on the Unbiased Data
As a self-described contrarian I will therefore typically disagree with or proceed against current opinion or established practice. But contrarians do not disagree simply to be disagreeable. Any successful contrarian investor, will base their opinions and findings entirely on the unbiased data, meaning it is subject to robust statistical analysis and not stitched up to suit a particular viewpoint.
Thus, for example, in my last blog I did not prescribe either an attack or defense oriented approach this season after analyzing 21 years of data demonstrating a widening gap in Goals-Against between Arsenal and the winning teams in the premier league. The data was clearly suggesting a more balanced approach where the club not only aims to score more goals but also concentrate on conceding less.
It may interest you how I arrived at this outlook. Twenty years ago I became one of the increasing millions of Americans whose employer no longer offer standard pensions, the alternative was a defined savings plans, in my case it being the very popular 401(k) retirement plan. Initially I was one of those passive investors who followed the conventional rules proclaimed by brokers, investment advisers and the mainstream media, i.e. always fully invested in the market regardless of highs and lows. Despite repeated evidence that the stock market is a dangerous place for uninformed amateurs I was like a lamb to the slaughter buying high and sell low.
My “Damascene” moment was the 2008-2009 crisis when, like almost all my American cohorts, my retirement nest-egg was almost totally wiped out by the stock market crash. I then learnt, like millions, how the big investment houses and banks such as Goldman, Merrill-Lynch, Deutsche, Barclays, etc., engineered the bubble arm-in-arm with the mainstream media, conveniently bailing out before the shit-hit-the-fan.
Public Sentiment Is A Contrarian Indicator
It is well known among all academic studies that when it comes to market performance public sentiment is a contrarian indicator. The public is inclined to buy on good news when prices are high and sell on bad news when prices are low; clearly a losing proposition.
Contrarians partially attribute this to Freud’s theory that unconsciously we human beings are often motivated by our primal instincts of fear and despair. Thus, for example, I was one of millions in 2007 who feared missing out on the rising market, refusing to sell when the market was topping out. Similarly, when the market hit rock bottom in 2009-2010 and the Feds were pumping trillions in the market most of us missed the monumental increase in stock prices out of despair that the market would ever recover again.
Similarly, how many times have Arsenal fans acted irrationally based on fear sown by the mainstream media that the club is on the edge of disaster because of a run of bad results. Despite 21 years of history showing Arsene Wenger is the most knowledgeable, most accomplished and most consistent manager in the league, fans have been frequently stirred and motivated to drive their greatest ever manager out of the club. At the very moment they are acting most irrationally the club is usually digging itself out of a hole. Last year was no exception. While the mainstream media was rushing to wager bets as to how soon Arsene Wenger would get his pink-slip, between April and May the club won 10 out of 11 matches to not only move from 8th to 5th in the league but to also secure its 3rd FA cup title in four years.
Mainstream Media Can Never Be Neutral
Much related and connected to public sentiment is the role of the mainstream media which is often the purveyors of public opinion. Contrary to conventional wisdom that the media has a neutral, unbiased interest in reporting facts, when it comes to money and investing they have a commercial interest in propagating fear and despair. Fear sells. It generates newspaper sales, listeners/viewers in radio/television and clicks on-line.
No commercially-oriented media company benefits from the boring up and down behavior of the market. To the contrary, if a media company is commercially dependent on investment banks, brokers, mutual funds etc., it is in their objective interest to hype a rise and fall of the market. At the very least, there are commissions to be made by market insiders when stocks are heavily traded.
Oftentimes a media representative, like a broker, may be professionally aware that the market is set for a fall, but because his or her commission is tied to generating new sales, he/she continue to induce more lemmings to invest, leading them like little lambs to the slaughter. No wonder so many of us were fully invested in worthless mortgage-related stocks during the last crash.
No Interest In Boring Arsenal
Similarly no commercial media house has an interest in “boring, boring” Arsenal. Just in terms of sheer numbers, supporters of the football club are clearly a fertile market for media exploitation. For example, from the reports I have read, Arsenal has the biggest online presence among football clubs worldwide. Since Wenger transformed the club into one of the biggest in England, there are now huge expectations by fans season after season. Correspondingly among these fans is chronic anxiety that the club may be falling behind its better financed rivals, not only to the traditional commercial giant Manchester United but the nouveau rich externally financed clubs, Chelsea and City.
It is no surprise that not a day passes without an alarming story in the mainstream media portending disaster at Arsenal football Club. Take for example, this week’s headlines from a Google search:
Liverpool join Arsenal in race for Jean Michael Seri: Reds in talks with Nice – Daily Express
Liverpool on brink of signing Arsenal target Jean Michael Seri – Daily Star
Liverpool Set to Sign Ligue 1 Midfield Star Seri Ahead of Arsenal, Tottenham – Sports Illustrated
It begs the question has Arsenal ever publicly disclosed an interest in signing Seri? Does the club ever get into a bidding war for any player? Any informed fan should have the answer to both questions.
Public Sentiment Is Against Arsenal
What of the current predictions by the media for Arsenal this season? As evident below is all doom and gloom:
- 6th Place – Guardian (Writers predictions)
- 6th Place – BBC (Writers predictions)
- 4th Place – ESPN (Writers predictions)
One wonders what are the factual bases for these predictions. We have had 21 years of Arsenal averaging 3rd position in the premier league and never falling out of the top-4 except last season. This new campaign the club has kept all of its top players from the previous season and furthermore strengthened the squad with: (1) the second highest goal-scorer from the French league, and (2) a left-back who made the Budesliga best XI for the last season.
The fundamental data is therefore indicating the current squad is deeper and better qualitatively than it was last year and, arguably, better than it has ever been since 2005. It seems to me a clear case of the mainstream media once again discounting the facts and data and simply emphasizing current negative public sentiment. What a surprise!
Contrarians are usually in a small minority, at least initially. I am therefore amongst a precious few who will confidently wager on a title challenge. In fact I will go further and predict Arsenal will most certainly regain its top-3 position. Only a total injury disaster will prevent this achievement and, if they are allowed to get away with it, undue referee bias.
For the sake of irony, I will conclude with the following disclosure: Information in this essay is not investment advice. Please consult a financial professional to help make decisions suitable to your particular situation and risk tolerance. That should take care of the bleeding football “experts” writing blogs, tweeting and doing podcasts.
Postscript:
Arsenal this season may well suffer from undue referee bias and another penalty embargo but vs Stoke they were statistically dominant despite being denied two penalties and a good goal ruled offside. The following summary was obtained from Whoscored.com:
| Stoke | Key Metric | Arsenal |
| 11 | Shots | 18 |
| 4 | Shots on target | 6 |
| 63% | Pass Success % | 88% |
| 64% | Aerial Duel Success | 36% |
| 7 | Dribbles won | 13 |
| 19 | Tackles | 16 |
| 23% | Possession | 77% |
I rest my case.
Positively Arsenal 
Including those stats Shotta was sadism. (Banned smiley)
What’s the name for those who fit into neither category I wonder? Suppose just an ordinary boring old fart who loves his club?
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I strongly agree with you my brother.we are also believe that referees have bias against Arsenal. The Gunners were denied two penalties and one goal cancelled claiming that our man lacazatte was offside which was wrong.
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Good question gf60 and I don’t have the answer. I will only observe that whether we like it or not, as human beings we are very susceptible to “group think”. It is very evident among those of us who call ourselves Gooners which is arguably makes us just another groupie. Step out of line and you are hammered. Thankfully, at PA we have screened out the extremist, mindless members of the group.
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Bookmakers know all abut this and price things accordingly. They know what people want to back and encourage them to do so by creating falsely priced favourites. However, as you say, it requires nerves of steel to go against the markets. With regard to the officiating it has only recently dawned on me that there seems to be a difference between the FA Cup and the League in the way our games are reffed.
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That’s the real “magic of the cup” Tim
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gf60/Shotts: perhaps the answer might be a new category, that lists its own criteria for belief?
My question to you both, is that we only have a small amount of basic phenomena, that is endlessly changing and mutating, and is totally relational, so would the new category be truly different or just a mixture? Plus what if both sides of any thought process considered itself contradictory, what then? Who is the truly contradictory contradictor? Even by stepping seemingly out of that dimension of thought, how can we be free of it, it would mean a negation, and how is that possible? Everything is defining everything else at any given moment, direct partners change but still the relationships go on?
I have no answers myself but lots of questions!
Also gf60, is there any such thing as boring? Your pieces this summer, made the summer for me, very interesting to read your memories and thoughts on games. Plus “old” is a relative term( what isnt?)everything we are made of and look at is billions of years old, already. Old? We are ancient!
I liked you piece Shotts, good grub for thought,the bit that grabbed me the most was the last section, and how the established media made its predictions on the final AFC positions for next May, as you point out not on the previous years but on their own fantasy. Thanks media. But if we break them down analytically, we ask why are they an authority? How can they be?
Also wondered if you thought Freud went far enough, to me he didnt get to the root of things which was desire, it seems to be the motivating force, and the cause of most(not all) suffering?
I heard this yesterday:” thanks Arsenal for ruining my weekend”. Pure narcissism. The victims of AFC not giving them the chance to release serotonin/endorphins of joy! Next it will be ” I want my money back!”, and Im not joking about that.
Cheers again Shotts, keep on writing on, and many thanks.
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The weekend made me realise a few things about myself, not many of which made me particularly proud. I knew Spurs would beat Chelsea, and when they equalised I had that sort of sick “here we go again” feeling. When Chelsea scored the winner I was up on my feet and dancing around (well, a sort of arthritic hip kind of sad shuffle) and then knew that I had never really hated Chelsea, but just Jose. And then unforgivably I realised that if selling Sanchez to City meant Man U not winning the title that I would be quite happy with that too.
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My take, and Lord no I have no stats for it, is that between top level opponents the bus prospers for a win,say two or three times out of ten, with a couple of draws, and five wins for the attacking side.
That is something like on average (actually it doesn’t exist but let’s pretend) and obviously it matters how good the attacking team is, as well as how good the bus (sometimes it is a very expensive bus), but if we call it a good attacking team, though not a league dominating and crushing (Bayern, PSG) and a decent defend and counter/bus, I think those numbers are roughly correct.
In other words, regardless of personnel and even performance, the bus will prosper sometimes but normally the good attacking team wins. Sometimes (more often than not) you eat the bear; Sometimes (not that often but seemingly so, given the pain) the bear eats you.
I find it useful to think of it in that way as it should remove some of the unpleasantness of losing in that fashion. It is an inevitability that it will happen sometimes.
Less pleasantly, if those ball park figures are near right, losing to it in the second game means we lose some margin for error over the season.
A life lost (and i guess you get about 5-8 of them for a good title shot). It’s early, but it can still comfortably be made up either to be on track for the norm (of succumbing two or three times out of ten) to it, or bettering that, which we likely need for the title shout, depending on the games against the likely other top 7, i.e big games, which also happen to be less likely to be full on attack vs defence (counter/set pieces).
It happens, and there is a long way left. There’s some cause for worry -we could well have lost twice to the bus/break combo, and the defence has been at least a little off what is required; and some cause for optimism, the attack has generally looked good, as though it should be better this year, and we could of course have very easily won both games.
Then ‘luck’ , and our ref friends. The ‘luck’ has not been kind so far. The bus nearly always requires a good dose of luck.
You have a good chance with such numbers and such limited space of closing most opportunities down quickly, but depending on the number of them there should still be a few decent openings, and then there is the luck of the bounce.
There’s also the fact that the bus effort requires a lot of physical contact, including challenges in and around the box, and so you often need a bit of ‘luck’ from refs. Many a smaller teams effort dies at the hands of a pen. And once behind…different ball game.
Next up, some supplementary stats, not from me of course, which support my conviction defensive teams have changed massively in recent times and barely resemble challenges of old
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Those stats:
https://www.premierleague.com/news/456796
Of the top six wins with least possession (Stoke are new entrants at six from Sat’s game) since Opta began recording stats in 2003/4, none are from before 2012, and four are from 2015 onwards.
Winning with possession stats that low- around 20%- is no doubt a rarity and will remain so, but the stats imply that playing that defensively, with that little of the ball, intentionally, is a relatively new phenomenon, and is clearly on the rise.
It’s a reasonable bet than in each of those games the lead which the bus was ultimately able to preserve came some time before the end; i.e. the bus which they started with became a mega-bus, with a corresponding loss of interest in possession, some time before the last stage of the game, once a lead was established.
Nevertheless those stats still seem good for inferring current bus football is different in kind and degree to what very defensive efforts used to look like. The bulk of my conviction comes from a strong feeling that I don’t remember games looking like this when I started watching football, and for a long time afterwards. I felt there was no way I could forget such shite if it had been there often from the beginning.
I fucking hate it. Such a horrible way to lose when you do lose to it, such an unfortunate development for the best of football when so many teams adopt it so heavily. But it’s here, and a huge percentage of our plans about how to prosper should have the reality of it firmly in mind
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Foreverheady
90+% sure the refs for cup games are selected directly by the FA’s refereeing arm (Elleray might still head that); while all premier league games are selected and reviewed by pgmol themselves.
For that reason, I always find it a little odd that Twitter is constantly full of pleas and abuse to the FA over pgmol actions in the premier league. Desperation, I guess. The need to howl at somebody in the absence of Pgmol themselves on there.
Far as i’m aware, the only major input the FA has in prem refereeing decisions is in adjudicating on bans, whether they are overturned, retrospective stuff,etc. Funnily enough we do better, Spurs and others do worse in that domain than in the pgmol one.
Who reviews the performances in the cup games and whether they count in the important performance table (important for international hopes, bonuses, etc) for refs. I’ve no idea. However i suspect there is a definite separation there, and they have significantly less to fear for their immediate prospects by giving a big call our way.
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2 fullbacks head out on loan
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our u23 game is live on arsenal player this evening, kick off at 7, Jack Wilshere expected to play
https://pbs.twimg.com/card_img/898219203978711040/IxVqioCk?format=jpg&name=600×314
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Arsenal now down to 31 players over the age of 21, just 6 too many.
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Arsenal fans want Ramsey to play the box to box role like how Coquelin plays the DM role, as in be a DM. Experts the lot of them.
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Thanks Shotta
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one thing I’ve noticed sine the Stoke game, a lot of the Ramsey haters are now hating on Ozil, and a fair number of them are big Jack Wilshere fans. Could this last fact really have anything to do with how they view Ramsey and Ozil, almost as if they think its Ramsey or Ozil’s fault that Jack is not in the team.
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I came across the writings of Michael Hudson* in 2006 as a broke graduate, I wish others had discovered his descriptions and projections of the US housing bubble at that time.
*one of those world famous economists ignored by the frothing extremist zealots who set our economic programme (literally a programme!).
Is Michael Hudson like the Arsene Wenger of the economic world? Appreciated by those who have worked in the field, heckled by those proffering a less credible model of their own, one that is exposed by his knowledge?
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Rich the park the bus defensive style of football really only came in when the changes to the offside law were made. Now instead of four in a line with their hands in the air calling for offside, the defensive sides now put at least two banks of 4 tightly together sitting deeper, leaving little space for attacker to run in behind, and all those bodies to try and pass through, or shoot by.
the differences with a Stoke and a Jose team is the caliber of attacker, Jose can win the league or CL by being defensive and having a couple of brilliant attackers do the damage on the break, where as Stoke can’t achieve anything like that cos they just can’t afford those kind of attackers.
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Wexit
Oxit
I want my Arsenal back nudge nudge wink wink
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We saw the magic in the cup during Proberts now famous display in front of a huge audience. What a prized collection of turds there are underneath Riley’s arse. Unacceptable.
Fortunately for AFC Aluko is not in the same class as the former Madrid player Jesse and dispite a two goal headstart Hull couldn’t finish the job. No small thanks to the big skill from little Cazorla.
After that failure Riley gave up on the cup.
However, we haven’t seen such blatent fixes as we saw on the weekend this early in the season. Dean at SB (he’s going for the top job which is why even a blustering numbnet like me could predict a well behaved performance from him before the LCFC match – he’s that F’ing predictable!), Norwich away the season after, Everton last season, all occured in October/November and then there were some matches thereafter.
Therefore Shotts if Riley has made a choice to publicly and so obviously tilt the deck against the Arsenal, this early in the season, no chance of a title! Sorry to say.
Riley is committed to a hard Wexit, he has to be when AFC buy Sanchez for the same price that City spend on Bony lol, Scudamore can’t be having that!
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seemingly Arsenal have sold Ismael Bennacer to Empoli. He had an impressive loan spell in France last season.
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Arsenal.com says Wilshere and Holding both expected to play for our u23’s v man city u23’s this evening. I wonder will Chambers be included too, surely he needs game time as well.
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gf60: I have been still mulling your question and the many replies. Still think the vast majority of us human beings are subject to “group think”. Its in our DNA. How many of our forbears in the hunter-gather era would venture outside the group in pursuit of dangerous prey. Only the bravest and most daring could step outside the tribe to pursue a non-traditional method of hunting.
The problem with group-think, at least in the modern-era, is the group will avoid and simply reject any reality that deviates from the conventional, acceptable way of thinking. If you have any doubt simply log on to twitter and see how it is conventional after a defeat to attack Wenger, Ozil, Ramsey, Giroud, i.e. the usual suspects, for the poor result. For example, after Stoke, myself and a few others were at pains to repeatedly tweet and post on blogs, that we were simply cheated out of the game by a shockingly inept or corrupt group of officials. It took at least a day to somewhat turn the tide, at least on twitter, as many others began to show the evidence of the blatantly erroneous decisions against us.
PS: We have to salute our own @blackburngeorge for his rather successful war on group-thinking on twitter. Despite his aggressve opposition to some of the biggest accounts, the biggest bloggers and the biggest podcasters George has a relatively large substantial following. I daresay he is the bravest and most daring.
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Fins: As I said in the blog, Riley can only cheat us ad infinitum if OUR fans allow it.
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adrian clarke’s the breakdown
https://www.arsenal.com/news/analysis-what-went-wrong-against-stoke
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problem is shotta, that a whole section of our fan base will not admit that Arsenal have a problem with officials. I seen a fair few yesterday list off supposed favors Refs have done Arsenal in recent seasons, and I must add all on the list were proven to be correct calls by the refs, some when the actual rules explained and not what people and pundits especially think the rules are.
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Redknapp: “Carl won’t be involved tomorrow but Cohen will be involved for sure. I’m not sure whether he’ll play but he’ll be involved.”
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Chuba Akpom being linked with a choice of clubs – Leeds or Celtic.
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Great again Shotts, although the stats purely for this game are worrying ( I know you would never normally draw any conclusions just from one game). That amount of possession only producing 6 shots on target and 6 shots on target producing no goals is a poor showing.
The biggest thing for me on the day is it looked like much of the problems were caused by ourselves and that Stoke really didn’t play well at all.
However at the end of the season I would be very surprised if we are as low as 6th
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Fins: I note your pessimism about our chances of winning the title based on the Riley factor. Perceptive readers will note I said we will challenge, not win the title. I think it is a statistical certainty we will come in the top-3, Riley or no-Riley.
I would be more optimistic if we improve our quality in deep-lying midfield. Xhaka is good but he has no foot speed. I saw Adrian Clarke’s breakdown and it wasn’t his foot speed that cost us the goal on Saturday but his decision to push up to recover the ball, with Ramsey already in the attacking third. This left a big open space for Berahino. I agree with Adrian, both he and Ramsey were too slack defensively for a title challenging team. I wouldn’t mind another quality midfielder challenging or complementing Xhaka.
Who knows what will happen between now and the close of the window?
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xhaka does have the tendency to cause himself and us problems when he goes chasing his mistakes, didn’t his two sending offs come when he tried to make up for his own mistake, a missed tackle on the first one, then seen him take an opponent down, and a miscontrol or bad pass seen him try and retrieve the ball, (just like on Saturday), and then he took the opponent out, at least on Saturday he stayed on his feet and avoided even a booking.
Clarke pointed out on the goal too, that Monreal made two errors, I also like how AC pointed out that Ozil was our one midfielder to track back on their goal, and was right to pass the attacker on to Monreal, but that Monreal done the wrong things.
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Thanks for the clarification Shotts.
As all can tell my cynicism is strong but as those observational texts to you during the first fifteen minutes of that match against Stoke record, it is hard to ignore such odious smell!
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I remain optimistic going forwards on Xhaka’s defending.
If Arteta could do it (with an older and wiser and head) then Xhaka as he passes 25 should reach the same levels if not above what we saw from the former skipper who truly deserved to win a title with the club!
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Ed, sounds about right
I blame Mourinho (or Mourinho and the media) as well for completely legitimising ultra-defence and anything-to-win football here. If it’s good enough for the richest clubs to use when they feel the need, then of course no reasonable pundit can object to the rest using those tactics.
Combine that with the notion and reality that the astonishing rise in prem tv money means a vast swathe of clubs are consumed above all else with a desire to stay in the league, with anything else a bonus; that because of money survival matters more now, and in a more literal way.
It also is easier, undeniably, to organise and play reactive ,defensive football than to play another way. My man Rinus Michels backs me up fully on that, and he remains easily the most convincing authority on the game whose thoughts I’ve ever read.
A perfect negative storm
Michels
“Counter style football uses a more wait-and-see approach and is more reactive. You try to profit form mistakes opponents make in their build up. This style is easier to carry out in respect to individual tactical and team tactical aspects ; in other words it is easier to play. It is less vulnerable and ,because of that, also more successful. An attacking style of play requires players who grew up playing this style of football in youth matches. This is not necessary when playing counter style football”
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Bennacer gone as well then. Any more in next day or two and after some slow movement initially you could describe it as an avalanche (and hope it’s a precursor to someone good coming in)
Bennacer looked an interesting player to me and his loan went much better than they do on average (in team immediately and stayed, part of a big upturn in form for them).
Can respect some players want to crack on and get playing though, and I expect it’s part of our sensible policy of selling youngsters at cheaper prices but with excellent sell-on fees. 30% apparently for the Turkish/Dutch guy- Oyzakup(?) who went years ago and could bring in 5 or 6 million.
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I’m no Contrarian but I agree Arsenal can, and will compete to win the title so long as this squad is intact come the close of the window.
I base my conclusions on a squad that last season put up a consecutive run of results in two phases during the season that makes manifest of the potential therein. Only Chelsea put up a winning and unbeaten sequence of results to better ours. Please note, they did theirs without CL football. Our better winning and unbeaten sequence of results was achieved with CL football.
I am hoping Wenger uses the next 11 for the Europa League, whilst using the first 11 for League games on a weekly basis especially during the busy period of CL and International breaks.
Leicester and Chelsea have shown us the huge benefits of playing one game weekly in the league. I believe we have a chance to do the same this season.
We will need a lot of luck with injuries plus the odd result going our way when we have played badly. Unlike most, I am far from pessimistic about our chances.
At worst, I am confident of a top 3 place and at best being champions. That was my view of things before a ball was kicked and in anger this season and the Stoke result has not changed a thing.
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Sneaky old pgmol (and Sky).
Check out his ref watch column this week. Oh, he picked the offside, which he says correct, but didn’t include the pen claims
http://www.skysports.com/football/news/11095/10998997/ref-watch-spurs-jan-vertonghen-should-have-been-sent-off-against-chelsea-says-dermot-gallagher
If familiar with his columns you’ll know this is 100% consistent with his ways. Choices are always telling
Why they bill him as an ex ref, instead of mentioning he still works for pgmol, and spends match days in a studio in Salford watching games and corresponding with the media outlets and advising them on decisions and rules…feck knows. Give the man his dues!
They even have a little meeting with the match of the day crew, with a little dvd they bring along of selected incidents, before the show to discuss talking points. Lovely
They do speak the truth occasionally, if it corresponds with what they want. For instance the explanation of why Pogba’s wasn’t a second yellow is perfectly good, and the exact same argument should have been used with that Coquelin furore two years back, when he made a couple of innocuous challenges while on a yellow, and Gallagher probably used his column to join the rest of the media and bemoan him not being sent off.
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Genuinely interesting article Shotta, well done and thanks.
Agree with Shotta also in respect the pressure VAR will bring to bear on formerly corruptly biased officials looking to carry on in their well-furrowed field. Quite rapidly, the officials ‘still screwing up despite VAR’ will be come the story over and above all other considerations. Naturally, they’ll seize their opportunities in areas of genuine doubt or genuine 50:50 calls, but how many of those are there, per game?
Oh, and this blog ain’t going nowhere, as George says.
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yeah Rich, Bennacer gone, with Willock now stepping up to first team squad and AMN too, it left him well down the list of potential first team players, so probably best he went in search of first team football somewhere.
with jenks and bramall out on loan we only have 6 players too many over the age of 21 left on the books, so we are very likely to see a fair few more leave in next 10 or 11 days.
Gibbs, Debuchy, Perez, Akpom, Campbell, Toral,all likely permanent transfers out, also Macey & Iliev could go on loan too.
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Thought you’d all enjoy this little nugget:
Phil ‘the chief’ McNulty
“This is a crucial season for Spurs after two near misses in the title race and they need to get the feel of their new surroundings quickly.
Tottenham’s performance, if not the result, actually provided ample evidence that they can succeed at Wembley.”
So, that’s a near miss where they finished third behind The Arsenal (yes you read that sentance in the correct order).
A fascinating study in propaganda (fake what mate?) if nothing else. It’s impossible to satirise these Arsenal holes anymore then Steve Coogan already did twenty plus years ago. Ah-ha!
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ArsenalAndrew I can not agree with you that VAR will make the officials do their jobs without bias or even corruption. We seen in our first two games how a PGMOL man in the booth reviewing the refs decisions backed the ref even when admitting they were wrong. PGMOL policing the PGMOL, now how will that change the attitude of the PGMOL, not one iota is my view, after all its the PGMOL that claim their refs don’t make mistakes as it is. Now they are not going to change that view.
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Eddie and Rich: All this panic-mongering in the MSM, twitter and blogs about moving players was completely artificial and made-up. The data and the structure of the transfer market indicate it is a perfectly predictive, repetitive cycle; most transfer activity is in the last week when not only selling clubs must sell but buying clubs must buy.
PS: I am sure Newcastle will be active this week as Rafa is not one to go straight back to the championship without an effort to strengthen his squad.
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Rich: Thanks for giving the low down on Dermot Gallagher, that PGMOL rat. Is he still spewing the PGMOL propaganda on TalkSports? He knows/they know it is a very friendly audience. I stopped listening to them over a year ago.
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http://babagrumpy.blogspot.co.uk/2017/08/arsenal-who-let-sheeply-zombies-out.html
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Couldn’t agree more about our title chances being reliant on injuries (not unique to us) and how seriously we treat the Europa League. If we can keep a central core of players fresh for league games (most especially) those following Europa games then it can do us nothing but good. That core may, of course, change as the season goes on.
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Shotta
I’ve never been one for Talksport (rare sense from me i think) so don’t know on that one. Seems likely though- especially since they and a number of other radio stations were bought not long ago by… Newscorp (Yep, more Murdoch)
So someone could conceivably, even probably, get their low-brow from the septic Sun, high brow form the Times, debate from Talksport, plus all the wonderful Sky analysis, while imagining they enjoyed a rich varied diet of media viewpoints, when in fact they all have the same dismal source and more importantly share morals, ethos, networks and Lord knows what else.
If Gallagher works for the one, very likely he’ll work for any of the others- so he probably does add radio to tv and print.
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shotta I know how the msm work on transfers, all I have been stating is that we are way over stocked in players over the age of 21, in fact 6 too many, that is after moving 2 out this morning.
by saying six too many, all I mean is that 6 of them can not be included in our BPL 25 man squad. so if they stay they just do not play league games. So it is very likely indeed that six players or more will leave AFC in next 10 days.
Reports today suggest that both Jon Toral – Derby and Hull, and Chuba Akpom – Leeds and Celtic, have at least a couple of options each after them.
Gibbs, Debuchy and Perez all being linked with moves too.
Joel Campbell another who is unlikely to make the 25 man squad might find it hard to get a new club as he is still in the rehab stage of coming back from a big injury.
Campbell and Cazorla could both be here but not be included in the 25 man squad, if we are still over the quota.
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Arsenal Women have resigned Germany international defender Josephine Henning
The experienced 27-year-old helped us lift the 2016 Women’s FA Cup last year, before joining Olympique Lyonnais at the end of the 2016 Women’s Super League season, helping the team to win a historic treble.
Read more at https://www.arsenal.com/news/henning-returns-arsenal#hvS8aaSekFWUt5lp.99
Read more at https://www.arsenal.com/news/henning-returns-arsenal#twpsPVRYD0Cw5s55.99
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Arsenal FCVerified account @Arsenal 37m37 minutes ago
#AFCU23 to face @MCFC: Macey, Holding, Bielik, Pleguezuelo, Maitland-Niles, Willock, Wilshere, Dasilva, Malen, Nelson, Nketiah
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Subs: Keto, Dragomir, McGuane, Gilmour, Osei-Tutu.
no striker in the subs
According to the Independent, Juventus, Napoli, Man Utd & Man City are interested in Arsenal midfielder Marcus McGuane, he is a sub tonight, who has a year left on his contract.
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