Good morning all.
Another early start for us away at Burnley, and another different type of test for our fragile form. They beat us at The Emirates but we cant be that bad again. It truly was a horrible display, but we have improved recently and are playing much better than we did then. Then again, it’s away at a real lump it and kick e’m ground, so it could be a battle. That said, if Spurs can brush them aside, why shouldn’t we?
There are some fans still holding on to the prospect of a revival good enough to get us into European places, personally, I can’t see that, but you never know. If such an upturn is possible, a win today would look like a necessity.
It appears that we have a fully fit squad with only ESR being a doubt, so Arteta has no problems there. Burnley , on the other hand, have all sorts of injury woes. Let just hope at the final whistle we still have no injury problems as we have a lot , if not all, of our eggs in the EL basket and we will need a full strength squad for our encounter with the Greeks.
Anyway, best of luck guessing the team selection and best of luck to those selected. I’m going to stick my neck out and predict a comfortable 3-1 win for the lads.
Pedantic George.
Positively Arsenal 
These are the matches I dread, where all too often rotaional fouling and reducers are waved away on the game-management ticket, VAR is at its pedantic worst and we somehow manage to get a player sent off for two minor indiscretions, neither of which were deserving of a yellow.
So yes, I am in that sort of a mood this morning.
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The lunchtime kick-offs have never been a favourite of mine although the Sunday night ones must surely be the worst? I used to dread watching Arsenal play after an international break so I guess today could be worse. Agree with George, Burnley will likely be a battle, they will put in a ‘performance of the season’ and Nick Pope will turn into peak Gordon Banks. Hopefully we will overcome that little lot, assuming the refs don’t chuck in their tuppence h’penny’s worth.
Really enjoyed Forever’s article, by the way, so sorry it took me a week to comment.
I too am a big Bellerin fan but I suspect he is less of a fan of the club, possibly since AW left the fray, possibly since our fans have consistently revealed themselves as peak knobheads in the league.
I followed his progress from way before he made the first team and was playing in the U21’s etc; I got to see him up close at places like Barnet and Borehamwood where the fans’ seats are about 8 inches from the touchline. His pace was unbelievable. Certainly the fastest I’ve ever seen. He was also the only current player I was lucky enough to meet and talk to, an incredibly rare event these days, sadly. I met him in the Directors’ Entrance at the Emirates following a Champions League home tie (remember those?); he was incredibly charming, charismatic and modest. All the more striking as he had provided a glorious assist with a solo sprint from the half-way line to tee up a tap in for his mate.
Suspect he’ll be gone for big money this summer, enjoy him while we still can.
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surprise team news for AFC, Chambers starts at right back,
Leno, Chambers, Tierney, Luiz, Mari, Xhaka, Partey, Saka, Odegaard, Willian, Aubameyang
Subs: Ryan, Bellerin, Gabriel, Ceballos, Pepe, Holding, Lacazette, Eleney, Martinelli
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Burnley: Pope, Lowton, Tarkowski, Mee, Taylor, Brownhill, Westwood, Gudmundsson, McNeil, Vyrda, Wood
Subs: Peacock-Farrell, Stephens, Rodriguez, Pieters, Bardsley, Long, Dunne, Brady, Benson
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1-0 to the arsenal, aubameyang
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Five Burnley defenders can’t make a challenge and Auba makes the breakthrough.
Pass and move one twos through the middle of the pitch, straight up the pitch in a vertical line?
It’s been a different football team since a ten was reintroduced for “non-football” reasons. having an eight/ midfielder who can pass and move along with Xhaka helps.
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The state of the pitch!
They have no shame.
No be fair looking at his first touch at times Kia’s Willian might have made it into this Burnley rugby football starting eleven. With the aid of some bleach.
Good game to give Chambers a run out IMO.
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ah for fucks sake, a xhaka clearance bounces off a burnley player into our net, awful stuff, we should have been about 4 ahead by now, but instead its 1-1,
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Thatalmighty tosser Macmananananann Almost had an orgasm, twat
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The experts will blame xhaka but we all know it’s another big error from Leno making that pass on that pitch.
That’s three or four match turning gifts against this season from the German…
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It’s been said many times, too many times, but we wouldn’t be Arsenal if we didn’t make things as difficult as humanly possible
Should have been out of sight by now
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HT: Burnley 1-1 Arsenal
Aubameyang with our goal, we really should have had at least 3 more, PEA missed one or two good chances, as did Saka. Then awful pass by xhaka hits a burnley player and goes into our net.
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Please not another Wolves
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pepe is on for willian, we needed a change as we are not on top like in the first half
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lacazette was brought on earlier for odegaard who did not have much influence on this game
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fucking hell a clear handball and VAR do not give us the penalty, it was as clear as you could hope for, but its AFC so not given
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ten minutes to go, Partey off, Ceballos on
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Pepe with an awful attempt from a tierney cross, really should have scored there
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red card and penalty given to AFC, but looks like VAR will over turn it
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its been overturned, rightly so
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Like they overturned Luiz one. What is Puppet wanker Walton going to come up with re the handball I wonder?
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FT: Burnley 1-1 Arsenal
threw away the win, had more than enough chances to be 3 or 4 ahead by the time xhaka handed them their goal, then to compound it VAR fucks us over by not awarding us a clear handball penalty, we also hit the post deep in stoppage time, we stay in 10th
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Shame that Saka had his worst game for a while – pitch got to him as much as anything. Its as unatural to put water on the pitch as leave it off so no complaints on that score. Surprised Odegaard went off as thougth he was the only one trying to really work hard and inject pace. Think the pitch and sitch would have suited Martinelli, but we’ll never know. Oh well, it was not to be and in the end could have lost it as well as won it.
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Yet another complete PGMOL stitch up with the clearest penalty going, incredibly unlucky at times , but this team can also be extremely wasteful.
Yet another shit team and shit manager they have failed to beat.
The players and manager should be absolutely livid over this one.
Unless Arteta can bring out a more ruthless streak with some talented players, he will not move this club forward at any speed.
Hard to think of another team so adept at throwing things away
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Spurs and Liverpool coming up soon, more PGMOL misery on its way.
Pepe should be forced to do extra training
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11 games left, 11 wins this season, 11 defeats this season, its not been a good season so far
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Arteta will get away with it this season whatever happens, but might not next if this is repeated
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Some great opportunities made but not scored. Dodgy decisions. Bucket load of mistakes. Proximity my arse!
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A strange game, we were totally the better side but we failed ourselves in so many areas and was again failed by the officials.
We have been saying for two years we look dangerous to ourselves when we continually play the ball backwards and so it proved again.
Long before Granite made that absolute howler there were several players who had the opportunity to play a positive pass but chose a negative one each time decreasing the space and time for the next player.
Xhaka ultimately payed the price for sprinting to take responsibility to provide another option however the player who can see everything in front of them should make the decisive decision and on this occasion this was Leno.
Although a good shot stopper Leno once again proved he cannot command his area. He also flapped at a few corners which never fills you with confidence.
I would be more annoyed about the penalty if this a 50/50 game against a good side but because we had and failed with so many chances to score it’s difficult to moan about because it should of been of no consequence.
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Dan Critchlow
@afcDW
Ben Cottrell has posted on his Instagram story that he’s out injured for the rest of the season. Another blow for the u23s #AFC
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Mikel Arteta left Turf Moor disappointed on Saturday, and just before that he sat down for his post-match press conference over Zoom.
Here’s what the manager said:
on creating chances…
We created, but we didn’t score enough. We gave a goal to the opponent and then don’t get the decision that we should get. It then becomes very difficult to win the game.
on whether we should have had a penalty for the first incident…
I think it’s obvious and clear, I think there is no debate about that. If that is not a penalty, then would someone explain what a penalty is in this league.
on whether he have to congratulate Burnley for defending well…
Well, there were open situations that we created. One v one situations, cut-backs in the box. We hit the bar, the post, we got a shot blocked when their goalkeeper was already beaten. But as well, when you come here and you want to be one of the top teams, you have to come here and win the game comfortably. We haven’t done it because of the chances, because we gave a goal to the opponent and because you need the decisions and we didn’t get them.
on how frustrating it was to give the goal away given the level of control we had…
Yes, but it can happen in football. We did it usually with Bernd trying to use the holding midfielder in that situation and we scored a goal with Auba, all the way from Bernd Leno. We conceded one [other] chance and that chance comes from Bernd Leno deciding to kick the ball long and we could not control the second ball with an open structure. It’s what it is, it’s the way that we play and the way that I want to play. We just have to know the risk and the rules that we have in certain areas in terms of the type of balls we have to play. But it is what it is.
on how he stops giving away cheap goals on a regular basis…
Well, we are talking about it all the time and just trying to nullify anything that we give to the opponent. In the last few weeks, we have done that. We have to improve that individually, as in the end we have to make decisions on the pitch and it looks easy from the outside. It’s not that easy away from home, but if someone makes a mistake because they’re playing the way we want to play, I will always support them. If someone is hiding and doesn’t want to play and then makes a mistake, I’m not going to have that.
on whether this is the end of any realistic European chances via league performance…
It’s really complicated at the moment. It’s true that the feeling that I have with the way we are playing is that we can win any game, but as well, as you mentioned before, if you are giving something to the opponent, obviously the game is all the time on the line. This is where, in my opinion, we have the biggest margin of improvement. But anything can happen.
Copyright 2021 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.
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The Bald Gooner
@TheBaldGooner
·
38m
Arsenal have took just FIVE points from Wolves, Villa, Burnley and Southampton home & away as well as losing at Everton and Spurs, whilst also dropping points at Leeds & at home to Palace. We have been very unlucky at certain points but that is crap. Can’t be ignored
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I think we seem pretty set for tenth maybe scramble ninth. If Mikel thinks that is unacceptable we he resign at the end of the season or will he accept the unacceptable and carry on.
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I did not see the match and have only what I have seen here to go on.
3 shots on target. Marvellous. That is one for every 30 minutes of the game.
Burnley had 5.
No shots on target mean no goals and no goals means no wins. Simples.
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yeah jigsol, PEA, Saka x2, Pepe all butchered very good chances, we also hit the woodwork twice which are counted as off target, and we had the clearest of clear penalties not given, this was a game that we should have won at a canter
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Hear the pricks at MOTD did some feature on ‘Scream of the Season’ where they drew attention to Lacazette after a foul. First comment on first Arsenal tweet I looked at today was some dickhead knocking us for it. Plays very nicely into bullshit notion of us ‘not liking being tackled’ etc.
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Totally agree and as if there wasn’t enough talking points!
Of course Dyche also made comment.
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Somehow never worthy of comment when some other player of the opposition does it to get our players booked or sent off. I hate the MOTD wankers. Show is all about them.
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I have a new respect for the likes of Palace and Southampton fans, who keep coming back for mid-table dross year after year.
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Jeorge Bird
@jeorgebird
·
25m
U23s midfielder Jordan McEneff has signed a contract extension with Arsenal. He’s currently injured.
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we currently have 38pts from our 27 games, so in our remaining 11 games we will have to pick up 18pts to match last seasons 56pts, so just the 6 wins needed in the 11 upcoming games
we will have to score 21 goals to match last seasons 56 goals, we can expect to concede less than last season, as it would take the concession of 20 goals to match last seasons 48
by the way we have already lost 1 more game than we did in all of last season, 11 compared to the 10 last season.
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our next 3 EPL fixtures are Spurs (H), West Ham (A) and Liverpool (H), which is a tough start to our remaining fixtures, with the EL games in between
our other remaining EPL fixtures are
Sheffield Utd (A)
Fulham (H)
Everton (H)
Newcastle (A)
WBA (H)
Chelsea (A)
Crystal Palace (A)
Brighton (H)
and if we progress in the EL to the final we would have 7 more games in that competition, with the final only 3 days after our final league game v Brighton.
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This weeks podcast is up.
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