I will eat the humble pie after the match if I am wrong, but what in the real world is Mikel doing in team selection? We are playing Fulham away in 30min, team sheet is out and Thomas Partey starts at RB. Gabriel, White, Zinchenko and Calafiori are not even on bench due to injuries but you have Tierney and I am sure he can fill IN as a LB against the likes of Fulham. Thomas is having a great season but putting him at RB puts him at a risk and the midfield is brazen of his skills. Jorginho is filling up in the midfield. Playing Partey at RB also mean we are weaking our right side because Timber is now going to play at LB. I don’t understand this infatuation to have a midfield in defence, I’m sorry. If the idea is to play the game virtually with 3 defenders and allowing Partey to move into the midfield during the play, I don’t understand that as well. You are better off in a 3-4-3 set up if that’s the case.
Martinelli makes way for Leandro Trossard because of his poor form. The games are coming thick and fast and it shouldn’t be a problem, he will get minutes to compete and displace the Belgian. Mikel Merino sits on bench, Jorginho gets to start ahead of him. Gabriel Jesus can’t replace a non-performing Kai Havertz, which tells a lot about him.
We dropped 5 points against Fulham last season, and we certainly would be hoping to do better than that. Manchester City dropped points yesterday, and we could go 4 points ahead of them if we win. We have 3 ex-gooners playing for Fulham, ESR whom we wanted to succeed at Arsenal, Leno – who was also a fan favorite during his time at Arsenal and Alex Iwobi, who is in great form for Fulham this season.
Craven Cottage is a tough place to visit and Fulham is having a good season so far. I don’t see it as an easy game and the likes of Jorgi, Kiwior, Trossard and Havertz would have to show their importance today.
I am expecting a tough game, but hoping we would win 2-0 with Saka and our captain on the scoresheet. I will keep it short today, do let us know if you are happy with the team selection and if it could have been better.
See you in the comments section in 30 min.
If we had only signed Cole Palmer, oh wait our MA fabs boys said he is not good enough. Anyways we have mighty sterling who MA coached to a superstar in City.
Ambarish
The fonts work fine on the Android pad. But don’t know why ,on the Android phone your post is fine but our posts still monstrous size , still.
Sorry to trouble you mate. For the time being , now I am using the pad so it is fine.
Chelsea are playing exactly how we should be playing.
With youth and attacking intent.
Difference is Chelsea FC find a way and want to win trophies, its in their DNA.
They will sack, spend, sack, sack, spend, spend, sack until they get there.
Their team all on long contracts look they could dominate in the years ahead.
Us silly cunts, will still be waiting for a another cunting process with this useless cunt of manager.
AF
It looks to an observer that El B is over cautious. Two top two finishes have come not through domineering play but because other usual contenders have been in turmoil all at the same time (except City). Klopp ran out of Steam, Chelsea had the pieces but could not put them together, Spurs were being Spurs and Man U were just spending for the fun of it without making any progress. Whilst we finished near the top El B has been rewarded by the board and is now the second highest paid manager in the Premiership. What a waste.
AF—I’ve so missed your indelible capacity to perfectly incorporate the word cunt in every single one of your posts…kudos to you for your tireless efforts, if only our cunt of a manager had your unyielding commitment to excellence we would have solved our bride’s maid dilemma quite some time ago
I likewise agree with your Chelsea sentiments and even though I would rather find another way to get shit done, if given a choice between MA’s multi-phased clusterfuck and the sack and spend MO of our neighbours, I would choose the latter without any hesitation whatsoever
as for their attacking style of play versus our much more mundane set-piece dependent approach, give me the former every single day of the fucking week, which once again begs the question, why did we change our script when it appeared as if we were so close to figuring our shit out…for me there’s only two possibilities, (1) the signing of Havertz and, to a lesser degree, Rice and (2) MA’s selfish desire to rewrite his own narrative
in the first regards, if Rice had simply come here with the sole purpose of becoming the best DM in the world and Havertz had never arrived, I believe we would be much farther ahead by now, so long as MA wasn’t given total control when it came to recruitment…as to my second point, it’s clear that his fragile ego has suffered at the hands of all the chatter surrounding his cut and paste tactical approach, so this dipshit thought he could change this narrative by going a completely different way…now it appears as if he would rather live in the shadow of managers the likes of Jose and Pulis, instead of Pep and Wenger, which makes him an incredibly sad fuck…Cheers
it’s difficult to imagine us running out of backline options considering MA’s defender-heavy recruitment practices, but we’re starting to look a little thin at the back…a couple of those injuries appear more minor in nature, like with Gabs, Zinchenko and Cala, albeit the latter two have been injured on multiple occasions this season, then we have the habitually injured Tomi and White, who will be out for several months, following his knee procedure
beyond the obvious, that we can’t field our best back 4 with Gabs and Cala both shelved, I’m more than a little concerned about us having to waste money in January at the totally wrong end of the pitch…let’s face it MA hardly needs a good reason for buying another defender, so I’m sure he’s already hatching some nonsensical plans…he likely has a room full of minions scanning the internet for anyone 6’4 or taller with a dominant left foot, who at some point since their 10th birthday played at least one match as a defender…let’s hope he doesn’t lose sight of the fact that we have bigger fish to fry, from a long-term squad construction perspective, and the last thing we need to do is throw good money after bad again
AF
Always a pleasure to see your undiluted look at our manager and would proffer this to your limited adjective armory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26ClGxCylSM
Would love to see the Arsenal faithful adding this to their MA song sheets.
TRVL
I needed a laugh today so thanks had me chortling away. Football wise you’ve left nothing to add.
Have you or anyone detected a slight negative PR shift? Normally, we see only how much the sun shines out of MA’s fat arse, but there was one that called MA shameless ( I thought that was his 2nd middle name after cnut). I guess the word shameless would be like soft porn for you AF lol.
Another article was claiming he got the last window wrong not getting the most needed target. Shocker I know because for 3 months he’s been lauded for Merino & Calafiori, some even pumped the Sterling decision. Now Edu has left the building it’s beginning to look like open season on MA is starting, which is music to my ears.
Should be our club song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdB-8eLEW8g
I was only skimming so maybe there are more. I hope so because he’s been unaccountable for at least 3.5 years, and that’s being generous when you consider Emery’s plight.
TRVL
Axed Manure chief Dan Asworth apparently has been added to our sporting director list.
I don’t know the guy, but if I were looking at his Manure record, I’d be asking why?
You know much about him?
Tony—all I know is that he was highly thought of by industry folk during his time with both BHA and Newcastle, which is why he was paid a handsome sum to help ressurect a clearly disjointed United side…his appointment was short-lived due in large part to circumstances beyond his control, as their hierarchical structure had a lot of overlapping job descriptions which led to some in-house angst…this all came to a head when everyone wasn’t on the same page regarding several transfers maneuvers, the continued employment of ten Hag and, most notably, the subsequent hiring of his successor…Sir JIm felt that DA was more of a delegator than an identifier of talent, which was evident when he hired outside analysts to perform tasks the boss felt should have been well within his purview.
“Ashworth is primarily an operations manager, according to people who have worked with him, rather than a transfer guru”
btw Richard Garlick has a close connection with DA, due to their days together at West Brom…I don’t think he remedies what ails us, as we clearly need someone with an eye for talent and the ability to get business done in a timely fashion…I fear that his employment here would simply ensure MA’s continued predominance over all football-related matters, which would make this a “same old, same old” hire
What we need in Edu’s replacement more than anything else is the ability to identify a high level high calibre replacement for Arteta.
Its not going to be long now before the Kroenke’s ask why Arteta’s finished behind 2 managers both in their first seasons – one of which has just won the PL after spending £40 odd million, the other taking over a complete basket case that’s gone through more managers recently than Daniel Levy does in an average season.
“Despite criticism and comparisons to Stoke City in recent weeks, Arteta says he is ‘not worried’.
“Watching the games back and seeing what we created in open play and what the opposition have created from open play I don’t know if we can do much more than that. Especially when we watch Fulham in previous games and how they’ve played.
“Also, the set pieces are a consequence of what we do in open play and what we do defensively. It’s a phase that is part of that.
“I know you guys see it as (picks up two separate water bottles) this is set pieces and this is open play, but I see it as (picks up a bottle of Gatorade and begins to swirl it) this is open play and set pieces – they are all together with the restarts.”
upon reading this a couple words that I haven’t used for quite some time instantly came to mind, the first is milquetoast, which speaks to our current style of play, and the other, ignoramus, requires no further explanation…stupid is as stupid does
Marc
What is the thought of match day punters that attend games? One of my season ticket holding friends said the feeling towards Arteta seems to be changing. The question is being asked ‘what happens if we finish below Liverpool & Chelsea where their managers are new to the premiership’.
just for a little perspective, Club Brugge beat Sporting today
It should be quite interesting to see our lineup against Monaco…you know MA will do everything possible to avoid having to start Tierney, as he never wanted him here in the first place
Good morning dear Gooners.
I say plates MLS and Ethan. What is the worse that can happen. No MA will move all the pieces all over the place to accommodate his fav. This guy will kill our academy and it infuriates me that Per as academy head just accepts these nonsense. I cannot stand sterling in the squad and on the pitch when one of our academy starts could have done the same job.
Afternoon all
Thanks TRVL for your thoughts on DA, seems I was right to have concerns.
For tonight’s game totally agree Madhu let Skelly and Ethan loose if anything goes wrong they can be subbed and MA can say ‘not ready yet’. The fans boys will nod in unison what a good decision by MA it was.
Sicknote KT looks like he might get a call up tonight even though MAhas long held reservations the Mirror reports. I like KT as he’s the old Stuart Piece type LB who takes no prisoners. KT’s problem is he’s great at whipping in crosses, but we only had aerially challenged forwards; still do.
Too late for me so a morning game when I get up. Being a home game I’ll go with a 2:1 win from…. ……wait for it drum roll…………. set pieces… Enjoy lads..
Thanks
But he is a cunt. So I am not lying.
The manager I rate is the Brentford one.
He can coach a team with smaller resources and they score goals, despite losing Toney.
There front two are better than our 2 lumps of cack, Havertz and Jesus thats for sure.
They keep scoring after one minute, so he can motivate a side as well.
If Chelsea get their 2 forwards , we wont be winning fuck all for a long time.
I would have anyone but this fraudulent cunt and his sleep inducing formations , tactics. Including Hag,
If Tierney can’t start tonight surely the club have got to tell him if he can find a club in Jan he can leave on a free?
At least get him off the wage bill.
So far this looks like a mid-summer friendly