Hello all.
Today at 4.30 P.M. we take on our big rivals, Manchester City. Well, that’s what we like to think and what much of the media has billed it, not sure what we are fighting for this season all the same. Both teams are out of the title race, and have been since November.
City, with 4 consecutive league titles were the team standing between us an glory, but they have fallen off of a cliff and we have missed the opening. It will still be marked down as a significant win, should we manage that, but I’m not so sure, everyone and their Mum’s are beating them this season. Which is funny.
We seem to be on a little run of not losing, so given their woes, it’s an opportunity to get one over on them , so Mikel’s adoring fans can claim he’s better than Pep. That would be nice for them?
Without Rodri, they look venerable through the middle of the park, sadly, our team gets a nose bleed if they attack in this area, a shame really as other teams get to feast.
The team more or less picks itself currently with the only obvious question being do we play our young reprieved left back, or our gorgeous Italian wonder strike fella?
Of course we might see a few minutes from our new signings, oh wait…….
Anyway, I for one am looking forward to the clash, maybe not quite titans this year, but two team both capable of playing good football, and on e of them is our team.
Up the Arsenal.
Pedantic George.
Positively Arsenal 
Raya; Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, Lewis-Skelly; Partey, Rice, Odegaard; Martinelli, Havertz, Trossard
Subs: Neto, Kiwior, Calafiori, Zinchenko, Tierney, Jorginho, Merino, Sterling, Nwaneri
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Seeing as both teams have been out of form and have shown some patches of form of late, this game could come down to whose the most clinical. Obviously that’s a worry with our shooting boots definitely not on at the moment.
The other factor is the PIGMOL revenge for MLS reprieve.
Just really want three points today so COYG.
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just some of those that I recall playing for both clubs,
Zinchenko and Jesus came to AFC from City, and Sterling is a former city player
further back the transfer that came to a total surprise to us all, David Rocastle, it wasn’t till years later that we found out that he was sold cos he had a bad knee injury that was never going to get better, other to play for both were Patrick Vieira, David Seaman, Sylvino, Richard Wright, Eddie McGoldrick, Anekla, Gael Clichy, Bac Sagna, Stuart Taylor, Kolo Toure, Adebayor, Nasri, Brian Kidd, Niall Quinn, Paul Dickov and who can ever forget Neil Heaney
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breaking transfer news
Arsenal are considering mulling over the possibility of maybe discussing having an interest in working on making progress with talks conceivably perchance to see if potentially it may be plausible to even remotely enter the idea of being involved in some transfer activity tomorrow, if someone special somehow becomes available
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odegarddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd makes it 1=- to the Arsenal in the first minute
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HT: Arsenal 1-0 Man City
odegaard with our goal from a Havertz pass, the german then missed a very good chance and Raya has made a couple of top saves to keep us in the lead, we are too conservative and are allowing city to push on
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One-nil up and playing reasonably well especially going forward but I just can’t see us winning this one. PIGMOL are already on form and our form in front of goal is poor. If we keep giving their wingers time and space they will score. COME ON ARSENAL.
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Haaland makes it 1-1, thats what we get for sitting back and allowing them come on to us, tactical great arteta my arse
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Parteyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy 2-1 to the Arsenal, now that is more like it, go at them, stop sitting back
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Myles Lewis-Skellyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy makes it 3-1 to the Arsenal, oh boy what a goal for him and for the club, his first for the club’s first team
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Havertzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz makes it 4-1 to the Arsenal, we counter attack at pace and rip them open
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Trossard off, Nwaneri on
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odegaard off, merino on
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MLS off, Calafiori on
Kai off, Sterling on
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Kai Havertz has scored 9 goals in 21 EPL games this season, 15 goals in all competitions
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Nwaneriiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii oh boy what a way to make it 5-1 to the Arsenal
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FT: Arsenal 5-1 Man City
Odegaard, Partey, Lewis-Skelly, Havertz and Nwaneri with our goals, why it took city drawing level to wake us up into going at them I will never know, its beyond high time that Arteta took the handbrake off. We can go toe to toe with anyone
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What a great win, it is amazing to feel so happy when I have been proved so wrong and that I know bollock all about football.
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https://x.com/i/status/1886169337091821679
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I feel at the moment that any time a side plays an open game against us we are good enough to win and win well. Where I think we will continue to struggle is when we need to break down a mid/low block defence. Perhaps that is true of most sides, and where we need the fox in the box type player, or the tricksy dribbler, or the luck of the bounce. So to a certain extent, yesterday, while wonderful, didn’t tell me anything new. Havertz worked his socks off, missed a golden chance when the game was there to be won, and scored when the pressure was off. But its good to see our two youngsters stepping up and claiming their right to play at that level,, which is not something we could necessarily have banked on back in September. I wonder who Arteta would sign if he he had the chance to add a quality forward – and how that signing might impact the rest of the team. Would we want to be without Havertz at Centre Forward, or would we look for a different option on the wings?
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The centre forward everyone is describing is Eddie and Mikel got rid of him. Eddie could hold the ball up, very rarely lost possession and was the most natural goalscorer at the club. Letting him go was another total mistake.
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After the glorious win yesterday no-one is mentioning the atrocious officiating again in an ARSENAL game.
After just 13 minutes one of our players was kicked up in air from behind when the ball had gone, in an incident that was a red card. Of course PIGMOL’S man in black didn’t say anything but as far as I could make out from commentary VAR didn’t even look at it.
Then we had the city players waving the imaginary card at the red and no booking for the city player but the obligatory booking for us. Timber tried to take a quick free kick the city player stood right in front of it but no booking in fact the ref has a go at Timber.
This carried on all through the game and then worst and most obvious of all. Trossard brought down in a tackle that possibly should have warranted a yellow card and then in plain site kicked while he was on the floor again nothing.
Carrager , Neville and Redknapp banging on the other week about supporters who made claims of corruption are embarrassing but if they only done a professional job of checking the history of their sport they would see corruption has happened all around the world.
To suggest it’s not a possibility is naive and embarrassing.
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foreverheady you are right that yesterday showed us nothing we did not know already, we can go toe to toe with any team that wants to take us on, although it took city scoring for us to actually go for it. The problem as you say is our problems breaking down the low block and also when we are behind in games. That is why it will be a massive failure if we do not bring in an attacker or two in the next five and a half hours of the window. Arteta has banged on for weeks about how we are short in the forward department, so again it will be negligent if we do not correct a fault in the squad. We are second favorites to win the league this year, and we have to have a real chance of winning the Champions league, so if we fall short in either or both competitions due to the lack of firepower then it will be a disgrace of our own doing.
Sadly Arsenal are it seems a jam tomorrow club, always talking about knowing what we need, and how we will get it in the next window, and not taking a little gamble or risk and going for it, we are risk averse both on and off the pitch. Yesterday’s game actually changed totally when Partey took a chance and shot from outside the area, and low and behold it took a deflection and we lead again and go from strength to strength. If Partey had recycled the ball its just as likely that we would have meandered to a draw or even a defeat. The club needs to act like a big club, but its more interested in releasing a new training top every four weeks than doing everything it can to win the league and champions league
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League Two side Bromley have confirmed that 19 year old CB Maldini Kacurri has joined on loan from Arsenal for the rest of the season
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I heard about that loan earlier today and couldn’t believe it. We have a youngster who has appeared for the first team, regularly trains with the first team and he goes on loan to Bromley. I know we want to guarantee players get minutes but all I can see him getting there is injured. We should be looking at clubs at a much higher level.
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While I understand that in this window getting a striker is difficult and if one you want isn’t available then you shouldn’t panic buy but this situation has been all of our own making.
Mikel never fancied Eddie but we still conned him into signing a new contract. We kept Jesus when the side outgrew him long ago. The Alan Smith, Oliver Giroud type striker should have been signed long ago but Edu’s shot gun approach to signings and ending contracts wasted far too much money.
This window the biggest failure probably wasn’t not getting a big name striker in but the addition of a couple of versatile squad players that would made a difference when injuries or fatigue hits.
I think the board and recruitment team looked at the current situation and thought we only have the CL to go for and that’s a long shot so let’s regroup in the summer when we have more cash, we can move players on and there will be a wider pool of players available.
The draw for which side of the CL we are in looks very important now.
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ian I suspect Kacurri will be gone from AFC in the summer, small fee with maybe a sell on clause
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well ian on transfers in Ornstein suggested that we did not sign anyone cos Arteta didn’t want anyone if he couldn’t get his first choice signings, he didn’t want to bring in squad players, not sure why not, haven’t Trossard and Jorginho been good additions as squad players, another 2 like that would have been great this window. I fear Arteta wants an excuse for not winning the majors.
The first team squad is currently
G- Raya, Neto
D- Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, Kiwior, Lewis-Skelly, Calafiori, Tierney, Zinhenko
M- Rice, Partey, Jorginho, Odegaard, Merino
W- Trossard, Marinelli, Nwaneri, Sterling
S- Havertz
With the possible return soon of D- White, Tomiyasu
and if we are lucky W- Saka back maybe by April.
So that is 20 players available at the moment, well 19 for Wednesday’ CC semi final second leg as Neto is cup tied. Take a look at that 20, if Havertz gets an injury we will be playing one of our wide players as the main striker, also that 20 has 4 left backs not including Timber, its shows some very flawed squad building
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not signing players gives Arteta an excuse for failure if we have more injuries and suspensions. Thin squad but with Vieira, Nelson, Lokonga and Hein out on loan. Thin squad by choice not by some unhappy accident
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David_Ornstein: “On Ollie Watkins, Aston Villa gave Arsenal the opportunity to do this deal or have a conversation on the basis of a £60m possibility. That was something clearly Arsenal were not prepared to do at that value — they decided to suggest around the £40m mark.” “Villa were being serious when they suggested £60m, that’s what they would have been prepared to have a conversation for. We don’t know if it would have led to an offer being accepted, but the door was clearly opened at that level.” “For somebody that’s gone on record to say he’s an Arsenal supporter & it would have been his dream move, perhaps Watkins would have pushed for it if it came close, but it didn’t come close. There was no attempt by Arsenal to go again.”
that sums it all up, Arteta and the club not prepared to do everything possible to push for the league and CL this season. Hoping to muddle through and hope we don’t get more injuries, especially to Havertz.
Its all well and good having faith in Havertz, after all he has 15 goals for the season so far, so likely to hit maybe 25 or more this season, but what is our plan if its 0-0 or 0-1 against a low block with 15 to 20 to go, and Havertz and co not looking like scoring, which of our many left backs will we throw on to left wing to change the game. Still not sure why we did not go all out to bring Evan Ferguson in on loan, surely he would have come here instead of west ham, maybe not, but for me I rather be seeing him come on up front than seeing Zinchenko or Tierney at left wing.
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Keiran is a great crosser of the ball but Mikel doesn’t like playing him. Zinchenko ability to invert is great but he can’t defend.
The failure to get someone who can adequately fill in both of the full back positions means we are probably going to see Partey there again this season. That has been tried and failed for the last few seasons and will fail again.
Kiwior is another that he just doesn’t want to play and that goes for Stirling as well and so the squad gets smaller. Against city our first sub was at 82 minutes.
If you look at the number of players Mikel actually trusts and the fact there will PL midweek as well as CL and rearranged fixtures the squad looks very small.
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there has been a couple of pieces done in the media today which claim Arteta did not give the go ahead for any of the possible signings in January, he wanted only his main long term targets and none of them were gettable in January so Arteta chose to stick with what we have. Also AFC turned down permanent move for Jorginho, Zinchenko and Tierney.
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That sounds sensible especially if our squad was full, he trusted youth players and we weren’t moving players on in the summer.
The problem is he seems to be keeping players for the sake of it, there are several players he won’t play so actual players that are available to be on the team sheet for big games is small.
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New post is up.
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