Hello and how are you? Well, we are back in business again, and as the debacle of the League Cup final starts to fade in the rear view mirror, we now find ourselves up again Championship side and 1976 winners Southampton, for a FA cup ding- dong at Saint Marys.
Thankfully the injury inducing inter-lull is over,115 speculation will be packed away until the next ‘break’, and Peps apparently off and the Arsenal are back in action, or at least some players might be.
As you know, ten Arsenal players were sent home from international duty, and I’m sure we are all shaking our heads over this, and wondering who will actually be available, I’m sure Southampton are rubbing their hands together in anticipation for this match. Grrrr!
Everyone on Planet Arsenal is hoping the lads can deal with this match head on and bounce back from the no-show of the League Cup final. Southampton are currently 6th in the Championship and have had a good run of form, in their last five they are four wins and a draw. Tricky?
The Arsenal have Rice and the Zube looking doubtful, and Hincapié not so wunderbar either. Myles is set to return though.
Obviously Merino is long term crocked, Eze’s out as are Martin and Madueke.
So many injuries mean we may well see a splash for the Salmon and hopefully Red Max will be in flight for us again.
The boys at statto HQ have given the Mighty Cannon a 74.2 % chances and Southampton a 9.9% chance. But is that taking into consideration the injuries or the run of form of a fully fit first team, they didn’t tell me?
Next up, even more Cup action as we head into to the Champions League quarter finals and face up against Sporting at theirs.
So COYG!
Dedicated to my Dad who died on the 30th of March.
Mills
Sorry to hear that Mills, my thoughts are with you and your family, and I’m sure I can speak for all our regulars too.
Pedantic George.
Positively Arsenal 
Sorry to hear that Mills, I lost both my Mum and Dad in the last two years and it’s really not easy and at this time your emotions must be very raw but time does diminish the hurt. I know that doesn’t help at the moment.
I remember 76 with a lot of affection, good ol’ big Lawrie stuffing manure was special at a time when the F.A.cup was massive. It was the season finale and the coverage started early in the morning and went on all day.
When smaller teams got to the final the whole town would be there and there would be special reports on the tea lady and the local butchers and bakers.
Fast forward half a century (shit is it really that long) and although the F.A. cup is special to our club, in reality the cup final won’t even be the the biggest game of the day. It will be just another game at an end of season weekend.
Arsenal saints games always seem to be high scoring in my mind and although we went through a period under Arsene where we didn’t like going to Southampton in the main we used to have their number.
We have obviously concentrated on our heavy fixture list and this game being of least priority (unless you’re counting confidence….I had to put that in or Ed would punch me) but our opponents have a much bigger game Tuesday and may even rest players themselves.
I was trying to think of old games against the saints and the biggest memory was coming out of the pub walking towards the dell and the team news came through on the pocket radio that Kenny Samson had been dropped and Tony Adams was to be Captain. Considering his age at the time it was surprising that none of the other senior players had got it. We came away that day with three points and the rest is history.
I’m hearing our present Captain is fit for the game but obviously won’t make 90 + minutes. This game is a manager’s nightmare, trying to rest as many players as possible but still putting out a team that can win the game.
Sitting here now my priority is risk no one who needs to play in the run in but when the game starts I’ll be chomping at the bit to win the game. Getting the balance right will be difficult but we are ARSENAL and our squad runs deep COYG.
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To George and Ian, many thanks for your kind words, they mean a heck of a lot to me, and on behalf of me and my bruv (whose always reading the blog) and my family: THANK YOU!
COYG!
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sorry for your loss Mills, regardless of the age it is a devastating hit and will take time to get over. My Dad died 16 years ago, and my memory of the funeral day was Arsenal related, fucking Almunia throwing the ball into his own net a couple of times in a 3-2 home loss to WBA
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team news
Eze and Hincapie are out, Arteta says Hincapie’s injury is a bad one
Madueke is out but the injury is not as bad as first feared and it might only be a matter of days, not weeks for him
Timber and Odegaard are in contention to be included.
Merino of course is still out.
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Madueke actually travelled with the squad for the cup game tomorrow. Remains to be seen if he is in the match day squad.
By the way Arsenal will be in our home kit tomorrow, and Southampton will be in their yellow kit.
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thats very kind, THANK YOU Ed!
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Arsenal U21 team v West Brom U21: Ranson, Hamill, Clarke, Ogunnaike, Washington, Ibrahim, Agustien, Julienne, Ferdinand, Mooney, Bailey-Joseph.
Subs: Porter, Owusu-Gyasi, Marciniak, Hashi, Zecevic John
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Arsenal U21’s 1-0 West Bromwich Albion U21’s.
Demiane Agustien gives Arsenal the lead against his former club
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FA Cup quarter final result – Man City 4-0 Liverpool
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HT: Arsenal U21’s lead WBA U21’s 1-0
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FT: Arsenal U21’s 1-0 WBA U21’s
Aguestine with the goal
Max Dowman, Marli Salmon, Tommy Setford and Andre Harriman-Annous were not with the U21’s today so some if not all of them may be involved in our FA Cup game this evening
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Ed, I didn’t see the travelling squad. What is the situation with Sweet, Nichols and Dixon have they travelled and is their anyone else that might be included.
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Ian you will find that Sweet is on loan at Dagenham and Redbridge
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Arrizabalaga, White, Mosquera, Gabriel, Lewis-Skelly, Norgaard, Odegaard, Havertz, Dowman, Martinelli, Jesus
Subs: Raya, Saliba, Gyokeres, Madueke, Calafiori, Zubimendi, Harriman-Annous, O’Neill, Salmon
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Chelsea beat Port Vale 7-0
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HT: Southampton 1-0 Arsenal
we are fucking about here, slow ponderous play, other than Dowman none of the non regulars have put in any sort of performance that would suggest they are pushing for a starting spot, Havertz, and Odegaard have been off it, sloppy is probably the word for both of them.
Arsenal need to really up the pace in the second half.
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no half time subs
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10 minutes into the second half and we have not upped it at all, still sloppy as fuck.
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Calafiori, Madueke and Gyokeres on
Lewis-Skelly, Odegaard and Jesus off
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Gyokeressssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss draws us level, come on Arsenal
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Gabriel down injured, looks like its his knee again
Saliba coming on
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Zubimendi on
Havertz off
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about 10 minutes left to play, need to get this won as soon as possible, could do without extra time and penalties with us having CL game on Tuesday away in Portugal
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the Gyokeres goal
https://x.com/i/status/2040528535471747118
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Dowman with a good shot but its too close to the keeper
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we work a good corner routine but Martinelli’s shot is several yards wide
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and just like that we are behind again, woeful defending again from us,
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we are into six minutes of stoppage time
awful shot from Martinelli
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Martinelli booked for pushing the ref to try and take a quick freekick
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FT: Southampton 2-1 Arsenal
we got exactly what that performance deserved, woeful, so much for the PR guff from Arteta about seeing fire in the bellies of the players after the cup final defeat.
Ian will probably be ok with this defeat, until we throw away the CL and EPL too.
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Arteta telling the players during the week that all remaining games are cup finals was a death knell for this team.
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Arsenal have broke me, that performance tonight, following up on the CC final performance, or should I say non performance for both games, and the shit football we have played for so much of this season has got to me. That a 16 year old, Max Dowman, was head and shoulders our best player tonight, despite not being outstanding, is a real condemnation on this team, squad and manager.
I’ll give the Sporting Lisbon game on Tuesday a miss, I’ve more enjoyable things to be doing than watching another game of Artetaball small details suck any enjoyment out of following Arsenal.
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I’m never happy with a defeat and feel shit tonight especially as Gabriel might be injured.
Sometimes when you try and mix and match the players just don’t gel and I think that’s what happened today.
I obviously wanted to win but I think it’s easy to say play your best team in every game and then go to the next because the modern fixture list doesn’t allow you to do that.
Mikel didn’t think it was important to play his best team in the league cup final and I think he was hamstrung today because of injuries.
I still maintain the two most important games after the cup final are bournemouth and city.
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ian if we lost Tuesday night I’d say the season will be in freefall, and also Arteta would also rest players v Bournemouth for the second leg Sporting.
Also Ian its not purely about fielding our best 11, all the players we have are massively talented, that our football is so sterile is an indictment of our tactics. Its the small margins nonsense from Arteta again. when your set up is all about the small margins then you make every game rely on the small margins, that catches up with you in the end. Liverpool won the title last season cos they didn’t worry about the small margins, they kept going for it, the accepted the risk of defeat, I don’t recall them ever saying last season, “if you can’t win don’t lose”.
All season long in the EPL we have been playing the small margins. We’ve ran players into the ground cos they kept having to play the 90 minutes cos games are nearly always still in the balance when we made our subs. The small margins have consumed the thinking.
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I really can’t see Mikel resting players for bournemouth as at this moment it is the most important game.
Normally the Champions league is always the most important but this season the domestic league is way out in front of our priorities.
When you get a block of injuries or players not firing at 100% then you have to narrow your focus to one competition and that’s what we need to do now.
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As for Max I think a lot of people are judging him as a sixteen year old and not just on his performance.
He is obviously hugely talented and exciting going forward but because he is young there are many parts of his game missing.
His decision making still has to be upgraded, he was tackled lots of times yesterday because he tried to run when an easy pass was the better option.
Knowing when to pass and when to take a man on is difficult for a young player and it was something that the lesser Ronaldo struggled with when he was younger. This was especially highlighted on some of the chances we did get on the break although he is certainly not the only player to struggle with that.
Defensively he gave Ben absolutely no cover but that is really to be expected and tactically we should of set up differently.
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the thing that struck me during the game yesterday about the football we were playing was how we seemed to be almost playing to win corners, White and Martinelli were the two players who got the ball the most in wide attacking areas near the opposing area, and White had the opportunity many times to put in a first time cross, or take option to drive at their area, and he would slow up and casually put in a cross that in nearly all cases either hit the defender or the got blocked or half blocked by the defender, we won lots of corners from it, and on the left Marinelli kept getting the ball with only one defender near him, and he’d make an initial little attempt to take him on, but would then slow down, maybe try another little attempt at taking him on without ever committing to actually going for it, and slow it all down and again like white either knock it off the defender, or he would more often than not turn back and play it back out the wing or into midfield and several times the ball would be played back to Martinelli again but then with the whole Southampton defence in place. We played like the aim was to win corners, and don’t get me started on the quality of them yesterday or even the tactics or constantly using short corners yesterday, Jovier must have been watching Hockey during the week.
Another observation of our play, and it not just about yesterday, but in general, why is it our players don’t or can’t take first time shots,(our goal yesterday was unusal as it was an instant first time shot) there is far too often, when a ball is there to be hit, a little touch or two is taken, and by then a defender has just enough time to get near, and the actual shot is then rushed by our player or it gets blocked. The Havertz chance in the CC final a prime example of us taking far too long to get a shot away. Odegaard, even Rice who has a good shot on him, so often takes that needless touch, its like the think they have far more time than they ever do, or more likely they are either hoping a passing opportunity will open up, or they are trying to be careful and not have a stat man be critical of them giving the ball away with a first time shot.
I said it last summer when we brought in Gabriel Heinze to the coaching staff, that it wasn’t another defensive coach we needed, it was an attacking coach to help our attack function with speed, purpose and with some one touch inter play. But alas that is not on the Arteta agenda
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yes Ian on Max, as I said yesterday he was by far our best player without actually being outstanding, and in fact his part in their first goal was very bad, he actually didn’t bother his arse trying to stop them coming out with the ball and then just stopped in their half.
In attack he did cause them trouble but he had no end product, he shot when he should have passed and then passed when he should have shot.
there is as always with young players, especially very young like Max at 16, an awful lot of increasing his match ratings cos of his age, and not on actual impact.(I’m sure I am doing it with Max yesterday too) Madueke caused them probably almost as much problems in his short time on the pitch but no one would say he played particularly well.
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just seen a stat, Terry Neill and Arteta in the same amount of time as Arsenal manager, just under 7 years, both won 1 FA Cup, and Terry Neill was hated by a large chunk of Gooners
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Ian have a look at some of these Gus Hedges quotes and tell me is it not Arteta down to a tee
Drop the Dead Donkey (TV Series 1990–1998) – Quotes – IMDb
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Morning talent base. Are the afterburners on full thrust? You bet
Coach, if I could input into your mental mainframe for a moment
Anyway, heads down, chins up, chests out, terrific, well played team.
Yes, well, publicity-wise this is a rather regrettable gonads-in-the-guillotine situation
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The Arsenal Women are out of the Womens FA Cup, lost 2-0 at home to Brighton
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FA Cup Semi Final Draw
Man City v Southampton
Chelsea v Leeds Utd
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Ian seeing as you mentioned him yesterday I thought you might like to know that Will Sweet, along with Harrison Dudziak, Cam Ismail, and Josh Nichols are being released by Arsenal this summer.
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The turnover of good talent at youth level is crazy nowadays. It seems like unless you’re an Ethan or Max you just get released.
We don’t even seem to follow the Chelsea model of getting loads of cash for the talented youngsters they just go.
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Gabriel back in open training today as well as Rice and Trossard. Apparently no Saka, Eze or Timber seen so we’ll have to wait until Mikel’s update tonight.
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Saka, Eze and Timber are all out, with both Saka and Timber possible for the weekend game
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Zachary Van Der Straaten scored the only goal as Arsenal U15s commenced their Premier League NEXTGEN Cup campaign with a 1-0 win against Shijiazhuang Kung Fu in their first group game in China.
Arsenal: Lo Presti, Matthews, Sando, Van Der Straaten, Wyatt, Raymond-Callendar, Bonaventure Yetna, Maghoma, Munoz, Jallow, Twenboa Kudoa
Subs used: Luton, Laditan, Emmanuel Ahaneku, Aliadiere, Asiegbu.
Not used: Van Djoy, Davison, Day King, Okafor
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George, sent the Sporting preview over. COYG!
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Up and running
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