In Today’s podcast @shotta_gooner and I wax lyrical about everything, including Arteta, This is what we have all been waiting , for ,surely? We saw everything come together against a good team. Arteta made some big calls and was vindicated, if we can moan when it’s bad we have to cheer when it’s this good.
What stood out was how well the “deadwood” played, For me this showed that we do have a very good squad, with depth, and that the rebuild is nowhere near as big as many people think. For the first time since the restart, I’m full of hope.
Marveous.
Pedantic George.
Positively Arsenal 
Very pleasing game. We responded well to going behind but must admit I expected it to be a case of ‘yes, but it probably won’t come to anything, they’ll catch us again’. Then, 1-1,2-1,3-1. All deserved really on balance of play.
From there our creation died off a lot, until later on when there were quite a few good situations we weren’t able to capitalise on, but have to be really pleased with the day’s efforts and result. Excellent day for senior players who came in. could pick out nearly any of them for deserved praise but again caught eye that in many ways we look better with a striker who can engage with centre backs and play with back to goal.
If it comes to pass this is Laca’s final year, and seems possible it will be, really hope we are looking at a striker who can play like that.
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I am so pleased we won, not just because it was good to see such positive signs, but mainly because I have come to loath Leicester, Vardy, the media love in, the parking the bus and sneaky break out goals, the cheating, the fouling. And Brendan Rogers.
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I am loath to point this out, but of course I meant loathe.
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Just seen the Pepe penalty incident. There is no fucking way that is overturned for anyone else but Arsenal. It wouldn’t even be looked at.
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markyb
That’s thing. Reckon it may just have been right, but only realised it after they showed, long after incident, some super slow mo, enlarged images (focusing in where bottom of legs/feet fill screen)
Funny thing is, I’ve never seen that before on any VAR decision and I’m not sure if it’s actually part of process, nor that the decision was made with benefit of those images.
I’ve only ever seen them before a handful of times, stretching back a number of years to pre-VAR days- pretty sure at least a couple of them in our games- and think it may actually be a Sky thing- ie produced by their own technicians.
One I thought of immediately was Kieran Clarke’s blackleg trip on Auba in cup game! Hard to imagine how it could be missed even on a very quick review of incident.
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Mentioned this few times before but I am being unrealistic in thinking it should be possible to have huge commitment to playing from back but also put a big focus on recognising when not to?
Apparently conceded on 6th min or before in 3 of last 4 league games and two of those were from passing mistakes. Only one though, yesterday’s, from the sort of situation I have in mind. Feel like a big part of all the work behind playing out should be recognising those situations where you need to abort, so to speak. Yesterday’s was a classic.
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Passing into Willian guaranteed trouble (and not because it was Willian!) Maybe it’s hard to get measure at home of how quickly a picture changes. In yesterday’s case, from not a good situation to an awful one (think there were three of them right on him.
Think for instance it may have been case that if Xhaka had wanted to boot it to safety he would have to have realised danger well before it looked as bad as it was at the moment of striking pass. But despite that still think there should be a way of dramatically reducing likelihood of getting caught like that, if only in first ten or twenty of game. Extra emphasis on being more cautious in early runnings or on high alert or something.
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A win is very nice, especially away to a team that has consistently beaten us in recent years, but does that mean that we can see the tunnel, let alone the light at the end of it?
Are 4 shots on target, one a penalty, really good enough?
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jjgsol
You’re not satisfied with 3-1 away win to strong team, 3rd in league, after going behind early, with some regulars including star man rested, after a very short break between games, following massively important result?
What are you comparing us to in terms of acceptability? Us at very best, between say 97-2006, City now?
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More than fair enough for jigsol to raise the shots on target stat, but as he knows I always prefer the total shots tally. But what I don’t understand is the ‘expected goals’ stat that is trotted out these days. On Adrian Clarke’s Breakdown he was fulsome in his praise of the display, and ended by saying that Arsenal had 12 shots to Leicester’s 8, but their respective ‘expected goals’ was massively different in Arsenal’s favour. What actually is an expected goal?
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I totally enjoyed the win but football history tells us one game never tells you alot wheather it’s a loss or win.
Games after Europe are particularly hard to call and it may have come down to us being able to change more players because of the amount of injuries they had.
The young lad who was torn apart by Pepe and two further injuries meant Brendan could make no real tactical changes with personell only with shape and that makes a big difference as we have found to our cost in the past.
Even then the second half was very close so we shouldn’t get carried away with this game however if we win a run of games and avoid defeat against the spuds it will set us up for a good run in.
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36pts to play for and we are currently 8pts off 4th spot
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forever heady
Not a clue how, exactly, they come up with figure but presume it means quality of the chance. Calculation based on distance to goal, clear or defenders in way, central or acute angle etc.
Must be based on where shot takes place, not (necessarily) where receive ball, so Bergkamp’s at Newc would be last bit, not moment ball came into him. Maradonna’s 2nd when he took shot not when picked ball up.
Kanu’s from near corner flag at Chelsea would be very low xg/ probability, Giggs hitting bar with an open goal very high.
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Granit Xhaka has featured in the last 12 consecutive matches for Arsenal, completing the full 90 minutes in every fixture during that time. [@LacaZte]
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Man City 4-1 Wolves
city have 11 EPL games left and need 22pts maximum to be certain of the title – 7 wins and 1 draw
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..
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just think George if that old fool Wenger had stood down we could have had Pep and all those billions of £ city spent
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New post is up
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