We face a Utd team buoyed by seven victories from seven under their new manager, with 19 goals scored and 4 conceded in that run. A number of players, notably Pogba and Rashford, have been thriving since Mourinho’s exit and ,presumably, enter the match with sky high confidence.
However, it cannot be ignored that the fixture list, or maybe mr Woodward, has been kind to Ole in this early stage of his tenure : only one of the games has been against a *spits* top club, and the rest have been against more modest opposition, with all 5 league opponents coming from bottom 9 teams in league currently, including 3 of current bottom 4, and 3 of those fixtures at home for them.
But *spits* Spurs, in what was billed as their first big test, they passed, with all three points. if memory serves correctly it was a good open game for much of first half, with Utd possessing a huge countering threat and the extra boldness, freedom and decisiveness Solskjaer has given to the team’s attacking players. In Rashford, Pogba and Martial in particular they possess serious speed, athleticism and quality for exploiting spaces, turnovers and any lack of numbers in defence. Gulp.
The timing of our game with them is interesting because they have not yet been made to pay for their new more adventurous approach : Mourinho may have failed miserably there, but he had not suddenly become an idiot. He was too cautious, certainly, for both lovers of the real beautiful game, and considering the options at his disposal. His caution and all the manifestations of it were not detached from reality, though. ‘Sometimes you eat the bear, and sometimes the bear eats you’ applies to all known formations and philosophies within football. Someone is going to exploit Ole’s style soon, quite possibly forcing a reaction, and hopefully that can be us.
Now then- how will we play? My first two thoughts were ‘don’t play into their hands by allowing them huge space to counter in’ and ‘we’d probably better go at them’. Not quite a massive contradiction, but pretty close, and a hint why the management lark isn’t easy. I guess I stand by the first thought more than the second : I believe we have to go at them; but I also believe we really have to try not to play into the hands of a team with such countering weapons. I’d be happy to feel the game out for at least 15 mins and be very focused on not allowing an early break.
So that’s how, sort of, and now to who. Not a clue. I suspect Ozil will start, and think he might just be perfect for exploiting this new, as-yet-unconquered Utd system, supposing they don’t add an extras hustling type in centre mid or sit much deeper. Safe to say, there aren’t many like Ozil, and so this Utd have not faced his kind, and it seems possible he is precisely the type of player the new set up may be vulnerable to. Fingers crossed.
Elsewhere…it all seems hard to predict for me. Unlike with his predecessor, I am not sure where Emery stands in terms of prioritising competitions. If this is our 3rd priority, will the lineup reflect this, or does he more or less pick a team without consideration for what follows? I’ll guess it’s somewhere in between. In which case, maybe rests for both Kos and Kola, with an outside chance of Mavropanos coming in.
Anyway, formations schmations, it’s Utd at home in the cup. We will find out almost instantly if Ole is a true Ferguson man. A fairish ferocious contest, or pure filth. If he brings our friend Rojo- who must have played about 10% of his Utd total against us- in from the cold we have our answer before kick off.
I’m excited and don’t have a clue how it is likely to go. If I try overcome my lily-livered pre game pessimism then that leaves me with a still nervous 50: 50 feeling, same as before Chelsea, and West Ham.
COYG
Rich @Whatsinaname81
Positively Arsenal 
ashley young booked for deliberate handball
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alexis and lukaku off with rashford and martial on, they are going for the counter attack
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ball just not falling to us in attack, need a little bit of luck or a little bit of magic to get level here, maybe even both
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lingard booked for dissent
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Tom Ede
@TomEde1
50m50 minutes ago
.@Aubameyang7 is the first player in #AFC history to score on all seven weekdays within a single season
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we really need to be quicker in our passing and decision making around their area, its all too fucking slow
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We are too honest.
Kolasinac got kicked in the box but stays on his feet. No penalty.
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that was shit defending and even shitter goalkeeping, cech should have been able to palm that out of danger
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We just made Pogba look like Usain Bolt there.
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We are so vulnerable on the counter. Have worked hard, won a lot of balls in midfield, some decent play, possession, but we let too many things go.
Defensive injuries, defensive mistakes and vulnerability to the counter attack, a microcosm of our season. Still a work in progress
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lingard should be off here for his involvement in that little bout of handbags
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kolasinac and rashford booked, but of course lingard cos he is already on a yellow gets away with not getting a second, its a disgrace from another PGMOL game manager, and of course their pgmol game manager in the VAR booth
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I really loathe Manure.
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utd take off lingard, again all i can say is the officials are a fucking disgrace, it really gets my goat that just cos he is already on a yellow the ref refuses to book him, when are the refs going to actually start to enforce the rules, and stop this bullshit game management, which is nothing short of a shame on the game.
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Ozil really not making a case for himself.
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ten minutes of stoppage time to be played, now imagine the lift that would be if the ref had done his job and sent off lingard
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guendouzi booked
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COYG! get one and they will kack it.
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Pogba throws himself to the ground at every little opportunity.
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that is an awful tackle by pogba, no booking of course
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should have been a yellow for Pogba.
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Pogba with a scissor tackle on Niles from behind.
No card.
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We need to try lobbing over defences. Quite a few good runs in behind by Laca and Auba but no pass attempted.
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FT: Arsenal 1-3 Man Utd
let in some very soft goals, and were more huff and puff than free flowing in attack, team lacks pace. We had dominant spells, but never had utd really struggling,
both sokratis and koscielny had to go off injured which really fucked us up. lets hope both are only short term injuries.
Arsenal currently on an awful run of form, we have lots 5 of our last 10 games in all competitions, we are out of 2 cups, and have a big fight on our hands if we are to get top 4, Europa league the only thing we can still win this season.
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Now I have to do the write up and I don’t fancy that. Fuck a duck.
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we have no idea how to break down packed defenses, only tactic is to try and get an overlapping kolasinac in behind and do a cut back.
The team seem muddled in what they are doing
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ManUre think they are great but man things went against us today with the two centre backs going off. Poor old Arsenal. With Guen and Mesut on and before number three looked like it might happen.
But ManUre stuck to their game plan and it worked. Better to have started Guen or Mesut than Iwobi?
I still love you though Arsenal.
COYG!
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Phh. Disappointing night. Calamitous if Kos and Sokratis both out for a while.
I know Lukaku’s a mighty fellow but not sure how you can generate force to break a jaw, if that’s what it is, when just trying to find somewhere to put your foot down from near standing start.
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Didn’t play badly at all in some aspects, but familiar failings, perhaps understandable with the injuries we are getting at the back, I remember some bad spells but I don’t remember so many bad injuries especially to defenders.
AMN did well, but we miss Hector, anyone would.
The lenient ref didn’t help.
I suspect top four is going to be difficult until emery gets a year under his belt and we strengthen, but the way we play and are set up, think we do stand a chance in Europe, as we did last season.
Going to be an up and down season, highs and frustrations.to be expected in the circumstances
A final word, fuck off shearer, this managerial genius never fails to twist the knife
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One of those games where things just go against you throughout. We had Utd at arm’s length and then Socrates goes off and we just fall apart, then just as we are looking to get back into it Kos also goes down. Am more annoyed by the injuries than the loss as I think without the injuries we don’t lose. Hopefully it’s not too bad for both Kos and Socrates but very annoying night all round.
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We handed that victory to them by being too timid to play our best player from the start. I’m beyond pissed off with the ‘tactical reasons’ bullshit. It’s just plain and simple cowardice and it gets what it deserves.
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George
Think it could be a record-breakingly short write-up for you after that.
It wasn’t awful but it was bleurgh.
Feel pretty flat afterwards but not in mood to dissect it myself and going to try not to dwell on it and enjoy weekend instead.
Have a good one, folks
(ps I’ll prob be on here first thing tomorrow joining in the mass dissecting)
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The first goal was brutal. Afterwards, with the exception of the period right around the break, they had us where they wanted us.
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mandy the injuries to our defenders certainly created problems for us at the back, but for me the most annoying aspect of tonight’s performance was just how one dimensional and toothless we were in attack, and also how we basically ignored the right side of our attack, even when we had players running free on the right, Iwobi seems very tunnel visioned, he seen more of the ball than any of our players but it was repeat and rewind for the most part, said during the game, I don’t know why he was not switched to the right for a while to see if that would have an effect.
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https://mobile.twitter.com/Matt5cott/status/1088923202598912000?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet
Matt Scott has posted an illustration of our defensive injuries, on tonight’s evidence I would expect one or both of Kos and Sok to join Bellerin and Holding on the long term list. Missing the scale, but looks self explanatory.
Not sure how any team or manager is supposed to operate effectively under such circumstances, we wait on this eves two injuries, but with our luck, I fear the very worst, I cannot remember anything like this at the back.
If these two are out long term, the club might have to act in the market if they really want a chance of qualifying for the CL. Monreal available but probably rusty, Xhaka is not the very best at the back, and he repositions to the back, the MF really suffers.
Some issues are self inflicted, but this team have been bloody unlucky, unless there is something wrong with fitness and training
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defensively, both from midfield and in the actual defenders, we lack outright speed, yet our tactics see us play a game where real speed is needed for us to be secure in defense.
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Blow wow!
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Agree Eduardo, we were toothless for much of the game. I remember when for all the problems at the back, we had lightening, skilful, attacking players,ox, Theo, alexis , Ramsey Ozil, Rosicky and others,players who would just attack in waves. Not blaming emery at this stage, there is much we don’t know, I suspect this summer may start to be telling on a number of fronts ,but where have those days and those type of players gone?
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next five games, only city an outstanding team
Cardiff (h)
Man City (a)
Huddersfield (a)
BATE (a)
BATE (h)
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I hear you Passenal!
One thing for sure is that we have not improved our defending, injuries or not.
I see no reason for goals 2 and 3. Players are not running back or tracking their man. I would like to see us play more on the counter if we have a bunch of injuries defensively. That is what teams are killing us with…along with the long ball.
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torreira has really gone off the boil,
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It’s up
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Yep, dude watched Martial run right by him. He was not the only one jogging back all the same. Kinda embarrassing watching that.
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