Liverpool has dropped 3 huge points at home to Crystal Palace. City are 2 points ahead having played an extra game than us. We win today and we go back to the top. We win today and we go three crucial points ahead of Liverpool with only 6 games to go. Every game is a cup final now for the boys and Mikel.
Team News
Strange decision to start Zinchenko ahead of Kiwior, because Kiwior has been doing better than Zinni and one bad game doesn’t mean we are going to hamper his confidence. If it’s purely for rotational purpose, I can live with it. Gabriel Jesus makes his way into the starting XI with Rice anchoring the midfield alone with Havertz playing the more forward role today. Trossard starts today ahead of Martinelli whom I think will come-in at some point to give Saka some rest.
Frankly, I had hated the concept of playing Havertz as CF but he has been doing better up top than he does in midfield. Gabriel Jesus does the dirty work but is not as clinical in front as you would expect your CF to be. Trossard gives me some hope though.
Liverpool is suffering the way we did last season. One loss and everything has gone bonkers for them. They were unbeaten at home from god knows when, and suddenly Atlanta wins 3-0 and they can’t even keep Crystal Palace to a draw. City, on the other hand, have gone full beast mode.
We need to win today. At any cost. First, because Pep is not going to drop any points now and the only way we win the league is by winning all our games. Second, I hate Aston Villa.
Right, a very short one today. See you during the game.
Oops. Missed the match. But looking at the replay , shows how poor Raya was. For the second goal , if he stayed on the line considering ESR was alongside Watkins and in fact got a toe in when the latter shot , might have saved it if he stayed on the line
I will say this, never ever has a manager spent so much on players without goals in them…between Jesus, Havertz, Vieira, Zinchenko, White, Jorginho, Eddie and even Rice, although that’s not really his MO, even though it might have seemed different considering his positioning against Bayern, we’ve spent well over 400M without once targeting a single clinical finisher
TRVL
What about the goalkeeper debacle – Ramsdale was his must have goalie but then Raya flapped his eyelids as well as his hands and ooops there goes another 30million quid down the drain. Emilio is a classy goalie who had reached his prime (as Argentina found out to their advantage in the last world cup). Today he stuck the middle digit of his gloved right hand right up El B’s left nostril. The Arsenal camp is not a happy ship – lots of back stabbing etc.
there’s a lot of noise online surrounding the notion that MA got the tactics all wrong from the get-go, whereas I would suggest otherwise, at least on this day…the fact remains we had loads of scoring opportunities, as no one even marked Havertz for the whole of the first-half…maybe Unai knew full-well that this player alone would never decide a match, unless he was given a half dozen chances from 2 feet out…therein lies the problem, our recruitment practices, which continually targets half measure and ill-equipped for the task at hand players
Norg-as you should know by now, I was never in favour of letting Emi go, regardless of the whole assurances narrative…since that time I’ve likewise spent countless hours knocking MA for the way he’s butchered the hunt for a suitable replacement, which has been an unmitigated shit show…my earlier list was aimed specifically towards the lack of clinical finishers we currently employ, especially after the gobs of monies spent…Cheers
TRVL
I think AFC is a troubled camp. El B was over promoted for winning the FA Cup during Covid. Gasper is the one who has Josh’s ear and no doubt he keeps him abreast of any failings. Gasper has had the embarrassing situation of sitting down with a player, contract on table, pen in hand when El B changed his mind. That player is now at Newcastle. Only Saka is left as an Emery player because El B knows there would be an outcry if he was dropped or moved out. Saka must be aware of the situation. Fail this season and El B will be in a precarious situation next – especially as others teams will be on the rise.
Tony-if you haven’t watched it already make sure you check out the last round of the Holloway/Gaethje fight…that’s the way to end things…Cheers
Norg—but it’s only the fourth phase of his seven or eight phase master plan and we’re clearly ahead of schedule…normally you would assume that as expectations rise, which has undoubtedly happened following last season and our off-season spending, so should the pressure to prove that he can get us over the hump, unfortunately those metrics don’t seem to apply here at the Emirates…he still has the Kool-Aid crew propagating his nonsense, we’re more relevant than we have been in quite some time, even though that’s more of a reflection of the parity that presently exists, and he was just re-upped again…much like with Wenger and our former bird-wielding captain, Xhaka, unless he goes to the middle of the pitch and takes a steaming dump on an Arsenal kit with Kroenke’s picture on it, he’s seemingly imprevious to the axe…as such, he will likely be here for the foreseeable future, as he doesn’t have the onions required to take his one-trick pony blueprint to another club of consequence
What a complete and utter disaster – Arteta was outthought and out manoeuvred by a manager we sacked for not being hood enough when Arteta’s had ten times the budget.
Add to that he’s just bottled another shot at the PL title when it was in our hands, what odds our seasons completely finished midweek when we lose to Bayern?
The simple truth is Liverpool’s next manager will win a title before Arteta and he hasn’t even been hired yet.
Did I like the result? NO
Did I like the Schadenfreude? I am reveling in it.
1. Don Unai pulled down Tets pants and spanked him. Revenge is a dish best served cold. Even if he wasn’t the manager Arsenal wanted/needed his treatment was despicable and KSE deserves all the embarrassment
2. Third season in a row where Tets start bottling it in April after spending 700mill.
3. There exists a chance that Don Unai will end up with a Trophy and our Apprentice manager is standing there holding the Bottlers trophy and the Nil, Nil draw at City in the other hand.
4. Le-Grove in total melt down and Don Unai living rent free in Pedro’s head. Best one yet.
Let’s see what will happen on Wednesday, don’t have much hope and Tuchel will have studied this match closely for the return leg in Munich.
Killroy-thanks for the LG update…it couldn’t happen to a nicer fellow than that nattering twat Positive Pete…as for the match itself, I, like yourself, despised the result, but took some pleasure in the karmic fuck sandwich that Emi and Unai served up again to their former employers…their double over us could be our undoing, although I hope that’s not the case
regardless of today’s result I’m still surprisingly hopeful that things aren’t over for us on either front…I just don’t think that Bayern or City are the the kind of teams that will invariably take a mile if given an inch…the only thing I really dread is the very real possibility that MA will go into full-bore defensive mode from here on out, as even he knows that he fucked the pooch too many times on the recruitment trail, so we have a fuckload of cooks in the kitchen but no fucking chef
Wednesday all eyes will be on our manager in training and see if his fucked up starting line up against Villa was for the purpose of having Jorghino ready for Bayern and returning to the line up that was most successful. We are hurting at LB and attack what’s knew, has been that way for a few years. Jesus got to go plus the other dead wood in attack and midfield, but then as you readily acknowledge who is going to be the chef in cooking up a trophy winning squad. We will be in the same position that we were in before the start of this season, with one important exception, PSR breathing down our neck.
The worrying point here is we never once looked like we’d beat Villa who have looked half the team that played us last night.
We need fast, fluid football that is slowed by Zinchenko , Havertz and Jesus so we played into Emery’s hands. How Unia would have loved our starting line up!
Wolves next away who will think they can get a result. Pochetino will be licking his lips and Spuds won’t fear us.
Yesterday we lost our fear factor with what El B sees as our best starting selection.
Where teams found our electrically charged movement too much and we scored for fun.
Now Emery has shown our midfield up once again by cutting the supply to our very predictable right sided attack.
Putting Rice under continual pressure with stifling Ode measured passes through the channels or back and forth across just outside the opponent’s penalty area is how we lost last night.
Raya is a joke keeper matching our joke manager.
My take is back to we will win no serious trophy as in CL or PL under El B. 5 years tells us El B’s inconsistency with his tactics to shoehorn his pets in.
LG is funny with Pedro bots out in force quelling the honest negative El B chatter. Same shit different day with LG. Pedro is still loyally touching his toes for his masters’ pleasure. as there was no pleasure in our football v Villa: only lost dreams.
Can anyone see City dropping points with their last 6 games? They are experienced winners each to a man, something El B hasn’t experienced as a player or manager. Only as assistant cone placement manager for Pep.
Bayern are sure to look at our loss when th mirth and merriment. Wednesday’s result is really not in our favour needing 3 goals without reply.
Never going to happen unless the ref screws up badly and reduces Bayern to 9 players as I doubt we’d beat a 10-man Bayern.
I honestly can’t see what there is to be positive about going forward.
We got beat by a cup football specialist manager. Josh and Daddy rue will what could have been had they backed Unia by what Unai is doing with Villa.
A bad day for all real Gooners.
Spot on Kilroy El B thought he’s better than Unai even though Emery keeps handing El B his arse on a silver platter.
El B has always believed in his god like prophecy where only Josh and Pedro have bought into the process’s levels and spent half a billion GBP to
facilitate El B’s patois no one else understands.
Anyone here willing to bet on PL success now or lifting the CL trophy?
Back to the drawing board it is then and another 5 years of almost-there torture.
Can anyone tell me where the fcuk we are now because I even considered I’d woken up this morning in my unfamiliar suite and hoped it was a parallel universe.🤔
Waking up my MacBook revealed reality differently.👀😱
So I headed for the pool.
Another 5 years should do it. Pedro will be near retirement so will adjust course if he’s still got all his marbles. Any bets?
Have to say LG was pure Comedy Central last night.
So, El B went for his balls being in 2 baskets as last night’s selection suggests and picked up here.
Failed abysmally on all counts including persisting with Raya with Ramsdale wanting to prove a point. Last night was just unnecessary and El B was clueless as he rolled out his predictable subs: like Eddie was going to do something special? Takes off Ode off in favour of minute less ESR who looked lost.
El B has managed to nullify our impetus and speed of our game. Last night we were pedestrian in midfield and Jesus needs 3 or 4 guilt edge chances to score a goal so what chance him scoring? Ditto Havertz and Eddie.
Where were the goals going to come from?
Onto Munich and if we go back to Havertz up top, one could accuse El B of throwing the PL in favour of the all crowning CL and pure narcissistic levels of adulation for winning 🏆
Except unlike the PL the 2nd leg is a hope and a prayer at best. But El B sees it as the path of least resistance to joining the managerial gods and thus top jobs.
Just 2 games? PL then? 7 games!
Should we have expected anything different really?
I’m probably the biggest LIR mug here as I honestly thought El B would keep to the winning recipe for all remaining games and put PL importance ahead of CL for this season.
I was hoping TRVL warnings were over cautious logical thinking in my misguided thinking. Kudos brother next time I’ll pay deeper attention to save the needed mind numbing hours of today as it all sinks in yet again.
Tony
I switched off LG a while ago – Pedro is so far up his own arse (and El B’s) he reminds me of Angela Rayner – gobby bitch.
Lose on Wednesday and I think we will crumble. Will Stan & Josh do anything – I doubt it in the short term but at the end of next season if we do not look like achieving anything it will be goodbye El B.
I haven’t checked if this is correct but on the radio this morning the news / sports presenter said yesterday was the exact same fixture as when the wheels came off last season.
If correct then the chances are Arteta knows it and completely bottled it. Arteta really loves racking up the unwanted records.
Marc – I am not a doom monger but it makes you wonder where AFC will finish when Man U and Chelsea get there act together. Add into the equation Villa and the Tiny Tots.
Cunt.
Always will be.
Emery has his bitch.
Six easy points this season.
And they played Thursday.
Norg
I got a sign die ban from LG about 2 years ago but it was funny seeing it all again. Traffic looks down page wise. I’m surprised some of the better poster don’t try here as newcomers get good receptions.
I’m hoping Stan sees that Chelsea and Manure are about 12 months away from any consistency, but I doubt we’ll be much more advanced than now where familiar patterns will blight us with El B as they have for the last 3 seasons. There will be a top 8 soon enough.
Marc
What was your take yesterday from the Emirates? Fans leaving early?
Norg
He just continues to make decisions that don’t make sense. Zinchenco has looked poor all season especially with this inverted full back bollocks – he gets injured and we put Kiwior in as a makeshift and then go on a 10 game unbeaten run of 9 wins and a draw away at City.
Zin comes back Arteta starts to fuck about and we lose to Villa and cock up against Bayern.
I’m so fucked off its a joke.
Tony
I’ve only ever left early once and that was a similar thing to yesterday. Whilst my take is you should stay to the bitter end its hard to blame people when everyone can see its not working and Arteta makes subs that make the situation worse.
Art Fraud
That was short and straight to the point – and so true.
as for the League title, the next 10 or so days will be telling…
04/17—we both have tough CL return fixtures
04/20—we’re away to the Wolves, whereas they have a FA Cup final versus Chelsea
04/23—we’re home to Chelsea
04/25—they’re away to BHA
04/28—we’re away to Spurs and they’re away to Forest
we both have 4 matches in 11 days…of course, results will have an impact on each subsequent fixture, good or bad, so this should be the most significant 10+day window so far this season…hopefully Ode’s injury won’t see him on the sidelines for this very crucial period, although it would be difficult to imagine him partaking in all 4 even if it’s just a tweak…this is why selection rotation is so vitally important come the business end of the season
Art Fraud…don’t you dare mince words, just speak your mind bud…Cheers
Emery toys with the cunt, like a bored cat does with a mouse.
And look at Alonso, a world class player and manager. This cunt was a shit player and equally shit manager.
And yet the slags still think he walks on
water though.
They deserve each other.
Art Fraud
I couldn’t understand why we bought him as a player – he was slow and wore a wig made by Lego. In fact he could be described perfectly by the second half of your name.
NORG
It sums us up.
We could have bought Alonso and Suarez but ended up with this lego haired loser.
We don’t deserve to win fuck all, when you appoint frauds.
I spent today screwing the nut and trying to absorb that game while looking for positives. Not easy. Some really good stuff on here that I enjoyed reading. Very little to be optimistic about but it’s not quite over. Lose or draw with Wolves and it will be. Marc’s point about switching Zinch for Kiwior makes really good sense. It didn’t need to happen. Zinch spends the entire game looking to play killer through balls. He doesn’t compromise. Play a poor pass, just go again and do the same. And he gives me weird Gus Caesar vibes as a defender.
The maddening thing is we had two days more rest than Villa, and the good play and movement in the first half counted for nought when the second half started and they dominated. Great half time talk – not! Maybe Win laid a clutch a dog’s eggs in the changing or, more likely Stubborn El Bastardo came up with a spontaneous plan which confused the players.
Really disappointing but City can and might fuck-up. I’m not ruling the title out yet, especially if we can beat BM. Can the team fly to Munich via Dubai I wonder?
I no longer read plastic Pedro’s sycophantic cant, but I’m delighted if people are calling him out. Fuck him – he deserves every bit of it, not least for all the racist shit he used to spout about Emery!
Norg–Wenger didn’t actually want Arteta, as he was trying to finagle a 11th hour deal for Jagielka, which never materialized…scrambling for late window options our frugal professor offered them less than half of Mikel’s MV, which wasn’t well-received, but when they informed the player/captain he immediately forced their hand, as he was so thirsty to play for a team that mattered…never feeling that he was properly appreciated at the club or international level, thus the enormous chip on his shoulder, and knowing the sun was setting on his career, he not only signed up to be a Wenger locker room cop, like Per, he likewise agreed to a pay cut
now this might seem to infer that he held a deep affinity for our club, but you know what they say about making assumptions…there’s no doubt in my mind that this self-absorbed lightweight would have done likewise if any club of historical consequence had thrown him a bone…to make matters worse Wenger did the very thing that haunts us to this very day, he shoehorned him into the DM position, one that he hadn’t played since his early twenties at PSG…thus the origin story of MA’s love of all things shoehorn-related…square pegs, round holes = the modern day Arsenal Way
“not least for all the racist shit he used to spout about Emery!”
Bang on Kroenke – Pedro’s too fucking stupid to even see the irony in Arteta also being Spanish, he’d go fucking mental if anyone blamed Arteta bottling it (again) on his ethnicity.
“Can the team fly to Munich via Dubai I wonder?”
As long as they stay clear of Iranian airspace.
City are two points ahead, so need 2 draws or a loss with us winning all our games.
We have a better +5GD.
Forgetting City play Madrid and possibly a final, their run in is a relatively simple one:
Chelsea home FA Cup who their youth and 2nd string players will start.
PL remaining fixtures
BHA away
Forest away
Wolves home
Fulham away
Spuds away
West Ham home
Our remaining PL fixtures:
Wolves away
Chelsea home
Spuds away
Bournemouth home
Man Utd away
Everton home
When we had our blistering pace form and free scoring run, I was convinced El B could keep that form going of the reminder of the season. Marc, rightly suggested otherwise, but I just felt that El B couldn’t make the same mistakes three seasons in a row.
Was I gullible or just hoping against hope? Both I think!
We’ve been here before, regrettably where we look for positives in our last 6 remaining games. We can’t think what Pool or City are going to do?
My prediction is this. We will drop more points than City, especially if Rodri stays fit, as their stats are incredible with Rodri starting, but maybe we’ll drop less points than Pool.
2nd or 3rd will be our finishing place.
El B supporters will use this as a CL football next season win/spin, and we only just missed out being better than last season.
Gooners who use reality as their logic, and not their emotions will see this as another failure to keep consistency because of exactly the same issues as past seasons.
El B is a bottler of the highest order.
None better than El B as a bottling football manager, but then El B is still making rookie mistakes could hardly be referred to as an experienced football manager let alone a successful one in almost 5 years with us.
Best reference is El B is a very flawed manager.
A manager making such repetitive, hugely costly mistakes, financially and player wise, such as El B has would have long been dispensed with.
Like you all I’m hurting deep in my gooner emotional bank. El B looked clueless against Villa and will again in our remaining games if the opposition play like Villa containing Ode and Rice until we ran out of ideas and steam we will continue to drop points.
The beat Arsenal blueprint is out there and El B who may play 40 formations during a game that are just different players playing the same football but from different positions: mostly from out of position. White a CB playing intricate football in their final 3rd or penalty area very poorly more than finding the right service to Saka, Ode et al. Why? He’s a back line player, not a creator or triangle maker in tight spaces.
Zinchenko, Jesus, Eddie and others have no right playing for us. Idiot fans are calling for a summer clear out. I mean fcuk me, shouldn’t nearly 5 years in, we have a squad to seriously challenge City & Madrid for top honours instead of being a poor relation?
Shouldn’t we only need a LB to save Timber playing out of position, and play to his great RB strengths we saw so little of? That and a quality striker as Havertz isn’t a 20-goal a season 9.
Can we trust El B in the TW after the botched Raya fiasco and buying Havertz to solve our scoring problems?
I am passed thinking about any league success this season. I tried that and failed. Next season I start fresh again with hope and dreams.
The only solution is to get a new manager. It’s what winning clubs do except currently United and Chavs who have chosen badly; thankfully!!!!!. Ratcliffe will get United firing with the Glazier siblings all still sucking the club dry, which is so good to see.
Long may the glaziers own Manure. Top owners for me closely followed by Todd Boehly: the Chavs anti football owner. Again, I’m an interfering-Boehly fan for now.
Problem is as Norg has pointed out these 2 clubs have the money to eventually get it right. We will probably still have El B.
My Gooner positivity has run dry. Only feelings of what could have been had we had an experienced manager, and not our rookie mistake laden idiot.
So, 2nd/3rd is what I see happening and that is a positive view. We could scrape 4th is Villa going on a run after taking our scape.
Marc
I wasn’t suggesting you left early, I just saw that some left and wondered if the mood was really that bad? Disappointment wise it would have been off the charts, as with us watching from home or hotels. Our supporters generally stay and are less fickle than other teams supporters.
Let’s face it, we can’t be fickle as we never win major trophies even where there are only 2 or 3 teams in the race to win the league.
I’m wondering when Josh & Stan are going to wake up and smell the El B coffee and feel they need a new brand of better quality football and players playing in their best positions?
Now, there’s a novel thought, players playing in their best positions.
A quick reminder that El B said last summer, “We have to get this window right”.
Then he bought Havertz as our league winning addition who could play in five positions.
At the the beginning of the season El B wanted to get rid of Gabs and play White or Elneny at LCB. Half of the leagues best CB pairing. He ruined our best buy: Timber playing when injured.
El B stumbles over his best selections and then changes winning teams and has no clue about rotation and we lose very winnable games where we should be at least 6 points clear of City.
Zero variation of our in-game management as he is clueless of how to change a game when his tactics or what El B sees as tactics are completely wrong.
We came back from Dubai a different team, so why didn’t we go back to Dubai when we had the last break to keep the collective winning momentum going? Psychologically, it would have worked on our opposition’s’ mindsets’.
There is only one problem at our beloved team: El B!
Remove that seemingly immovable galaxy football object for better – not hard to do and we should start to be better as a club.
Inexperienced, gifted managers and old highly successful players like Alonso are generational.
Can we compare El B to Alonso?
That’s your answer right there! Poles apart as a winner as a player or manager now. Our imposter continues with his new emperor clothes and flatters to deceive each season.
Here’s a simple question probably TRVL can answer better than I.
Villa mostly played with 3 at the back overrunning the midfield often with 5 to contain us.
El B was unable to counter this tactic and, as a result, the long term midfield battle was won by Villa as was the game because of that tactic El B couldn’t handle or change.
Their 5 in MF also contained our potential for counters making Martinelli pretty much an ineffective passenger because of the useless Zinchenko and Jesus.
My midfield would have been Partey, Ode and Rice to counter Villa with White moving up to Midfield leaving us 3 at the back with Kiwior as LCB with big Gabs and Saliba.
I felt Rice and Partey would have keep Villa at bay. Kiwior could support Marts and also tuck in Midfield for better off the ball positioning.
What’s your thought’s TRVL and anyone?
Tony
Kiwior is an ideal LCB – with Saliba, Gabriel they would be very strong. Arteta does not like Gabriel – not his signing. Gasper bought him as a player to be polished by Big Per.
Why is Partey still only on the bench – does he still have issues?
The problems lie with the favourites – Havertz, Zinnie & Jesus.
The yes man who doesn’t want to say yes anymore.
Carlos Cuesta is one of the three main Spanish coaches under El B. He is a player favourite. Carlos has ambition . He would like to manage a club but it is most unlikely he will be taken on by a premiership side. However he has been noticed by several Championship sides and he is friends with Ben Knapper – formerly of Arsenal now at Norwich.
Tony
I didn’t take your question as an implication that I’d left early just wanted to make my general position clear.
Its strange that fans are getting more frustrated with things but there’s a huge blind spot with a lot of them that they don’t connect this to Arteta.
When it does come the ending for Arteta will be brutal.
Marc
It took a long time to get rid of Wenger as Stan had the impression the fans loved him – some did and unfurled silly posters bearing message such as ‘Arsene knows’ etc etc etc – vomit inducing crap. The snake oil salesman was desperate to get rid of Wenger and first tried to take on Klopp and then Pep. IG even flew to New York to meet Pep and then Pep arrived in London and Wengers bottom lip hit the floor. I think El B’s departure will not be so long winded – the real discontent will be with the star players. Saliba’s desire is to play for Real Madrid – he could be the one that starts it off by this time next year.
Norg
No argument – I just struggle to understand (I’ve had the conversation in the ground) where fans are moaning about something Zinchenko for example but don’t connect who picked him and told him to play as an inverted FB.