We have a game against PSG on April 29 and Thomas Partey, due to his idiotic yellow against Real Madrid, will be suspended from the game. Mikel, in his last press conference, wasn’t sure about Jorginho’s availability for the PSG game. So, we don’t have a DM for the biggest game of our season, the semi-final in Champions League. However, the positive thing is that we can use today’s game and the game against Crystal Palace on 23rd to find a solution.
There’s a problem as well to this. We are sitting on 2nd position and Liverpool has a 13 points lead with 6 games to go. We won’t catch up to them, lets be real. Also, there’s a very good chance (still) that we end up outside top 5 and don’t qualify for the Champions League next season . Forest is sitting on 5th position, only 6 points behind us. We have to not only prepare for the PSG game, but we have to make sure we don’t lose games, confidence and our form while doing so. A conundrum Mikel needs to go through!
Ipswich are a tight team. They will most likely get relegated after a sensational Premier League promotion but they can make fun of you sometimes. They don’t have anything to lose and this gives them some freedom to cause chaos. We have to manage this chaos, from the midfield. I’m a big Partey fan but we have only 2 games to find a solution for PSG game, and I would rather let him sit on bench. There are a few options we can try –
Move Timber to LB, put Ben White back to RB and promote MLS to midfield. A midfield of Odegaard, Declan Rice and MLS should be able to hold the fort against Ipswich and if it clicks, we find a solution.
The second option is to keep the defence line as it is, with Kiwior + Saliba as CBs, Timber on the right and MLS on left and introduce Nwaneri in the midfield. This is the best solution according to me, we are disturbing only 1 position (Thomas Partey) and keeping the rest of the winning squad in their position.
Mikel might also bring back Merino in the midfield and put Trossard up top, this is the most likely solution but I have never been convinced with Trossard as a striker. Against PSG, with Donnaruma in their goal, he wouldn’t be so much effective.
Back to today’s game. Calafiori will not be available along with the usuals – Havertz, Tomiyasu, Gabriel M and Jesus. It’s Ipswich last chance to survive the relegation and I am pretty sure they will put up a fight. This is the third consecutive year where we are playing on a Easter Sunday, and we have drawn the last 2. It makes me nervous a bit, but we should go through.
Also, it would be exciting to see one of the Nwaneri or MLS start in the midfield, because (I know you will come after me) ultimately we would have to improve on Odegaard.
We need to win, and we can do that in first half. Lets start the usuals, score couple of goals and then introduce Nwaneri / MLS in the midfield. We can start with that line up against Crystal Palace to practice one more time.
What’s the weather there? We have been suffering with this heat and the only thing keeping me sane is football. See you during the game, I have my set up ready.
In the hope of a turnaround tomorrow night,who are we meant to shout for tonight? I know your thoughts on Barca KP but might they actually be easier to beat than inter? Hard to know. Yamal is something else. Only that Georgian kid at psg whose name I can’t spell is close to him in terms of excitement. Wouldn’t quite have Saka at their level,maybe just a rung below. That Dumfries is having some season. Mad to see Schez and miki playing against each other in a semi,most Arsenal fans probably presumed they’re both retired (think schez actually was). Anyway who am I meant to be cheering for?
You got there before me about Miki KP. Martinez has just scored his 9th goal in 13 ECL appearances. Havertz is our top scorer for the entire season with 9. Anyone defending Arteta had better start by explaining that stat. Where are the goals????
Barca cracking up,not used to getting refereed by a neutral! No sympathy for them. That said Italians are a shower of cheats aswell,spent the 70’s and 80’s buying refs and games. There’s no teams out there for the romantics anymore,with the honorable exception of Bodo/Glimt.
We are probably going into a war with our neighbours. What a sad affair, but a necessity after 26 Hindus were killed in Jammu and Kashmir. The terrorists asked them to lower down their pants to check circumcision, and asked them to recite Kalma to distinguish between Hindus and muslims. Terrorism has destroyed the head of India and there’s nothing we did for 75 years of independence.
A black out and drills will go tomorrow in most of the places here in India. I don’t want war, there will be losses to lives, economy, jobs, people will not get foot on their plates and it would take some time to recover from the aftermath but the killings were horrendous and there’s no stop to that unless we do something about it.
Barcelona will get a decision in their favour, this will go to extra time and they win on penalties if I have to guess, lol
Here you go 5-5 on aggregate now.
Scary stuff Ambarish, I hope it is averted at the last minute. Stay safe above all else.
Good to see you’re still able to enjoy the football at least, cracking game. Think inter might nick it in et.
Almunia
It happened already few minutes back. India targetted 9 terrorism centres in pakistan. Indeed scary stuffs.
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Inter got the lead again, let’s hope they don’t blow it away. They just need to go full Mourinho (or Arteta) for next 15min. I hope they do, I hate Barcelona as much as any other Arsenal fan.
Lamine Yamal missing one in the final minutes.. could have won it for his team.
Inter surely going to finals now.
Ambarish – the war with Pak was inevitable but you mentioned what the terrorist from across the border did to tourist. But you failed to mention our own internal terrorist who attacked our own citizens because of their faith fully backed by a fascist regime headed by the most incompetent PM ever. You don’t want me to enumerate the no of lynchings , demolitions of households of a particular community, a railway policeman going on a killing spree inside a train again asking people’s faith. Many more such instances against our own citizens with ruling regime doing nothing to stop it. Pitting one community against another for power is for long a classic move of power grabbers.
War is never an answer to anything. It’s destined to ensure mutual distruction and decimation of millions of lives. We never learn.
Madhu
With 1.4b population of mixed faith and following, frictions are always going to happen, irrespective of the government. Checking for circumcision and asking their wives to go and tell Modi was the worse you could do.
No one wants war but if you sit quietly, it’s only going to be worse.
What do you expect from Terrorist and you cannot say 1.4 B mixed faith things happen as an excuse. Attacking anyone by asking their faith in anyway is reprehensible. Either ways power grabbers won’t pay, infact they consolidate power on the back of suffering. its innocent citizens who will pay. That’s the reality. Good night
Well, the country is United against the Kashmir attack, irrespective of caste, creed, religion, political inclination. Everyone felt the pain. We will fix the internal problems on our own, not with the help of Pak.
Have a good one, I should have not brought in politics here I know.
That match served up more excitement in the warm up than Arteta has managed in his entire managerial career.
United to the extent of abusing a slain soldiers wife by the trolls of the regime just because she called for unity and not to persecute a particular faith and Kashmiris across India. We should have the moral courage to call all kinds of bigotry.
The issue with India vs Pakistan isn’t conflict its religious conflict which never ends well.
I, for one, didn’t abuse her. She lost her husband, and she asked for peace for local Kashmiris. They are trolls. Trolling gets you likes or some twitter money but trolling doesn’t kill people. Terrorism does.
Marc
“Except that demands the question – then why did Madrid fucking sell him?(ozil)”
This may answer your question Marc.
Who sold debruyne ..mourinho
Who sold salah ……..mourinho
And who sold Ozil ….mourinho
Say no more.
this ought to be a rather nervy semi following Inter’s somewhat shocking victory, especially considering the manner in which they won…that 4-3 scoreline reeked of a Barca last gasp victory, which is something they’ve kind of mastered this season…I would suspect that PSG and those within our club favoured Barca to make the final, so the stakes have been raised, rightly or wrongly, as both likely viewed Inter as the 4th best side remaining in the competition…not sure if I prescribe to that notion, but I likewise picked Barca to take home the crown
looks as if Dembele will be available to play, which certainly doesn’t help our cause…even so, the ghosts of CL past will undoubtedly have them in a mental pretzel (keeping in mind that it’s not as if we’ve shown the capacity to rise to the occasion since MA’s arrival)…as such, it might come down to which side can play just loose enough to create more chances…this should favour us, as we’ve been playing with house money ever since Rice’s two in a million type performance against Real
hopefully MA will return to a bit less structured scheme, which is how we got here in the first place…last time out he opted for a far too predictable gameplan and paid the price early on…frankly I wouldn’t be shocked if he rolled that dice again, as he’s a smug fuck who’s his own worst enemy at times…if it were me I would try to return the favour, by employing a shock and awe press from the onset, as they might come out a little tentative…that said, this could prove fatal if our conversion rates continue to flounder and we likewise provide them with odd-man rushes on the counter…with this in mind, I believe the two biggest factors will be PSG’s ability to punish our high-line versus our ability to pressurize Donnarumma into making mistakes…he has them in him, so we just have to give him enough rope to hang himself
if I had to hazard a guess, extra time could be in the cards again tonight…if that happens we would be wise to make a concerted push in those 30+ extra minutes so as to avoid penalties like the plague…Raya has one stellar penalty kick performance in his CV, but I think Donnarumma’s size and experience would favour him…Cheers
Trolls who are supported by the regime and who follow the PM handle. You cannot hide behind words when there are enough evidences that these trolls are under the patronage of ruling party. Thats the fundamental difference. A regime headed by party which supports two Nation theory , persecutes a party of citizenry due to religion, doesn’t protect them from attacks and bent upon making India as a mirror image of whom we hate. Strikingly the army chief of Pakistan talked about two Nation theory and the ruling regime of India speaks in the same language.
There have been deaths on both side of Kashmir after last night’s bombing. It’s again the innocent Kashmiris who are killed and their lives destroyed while the powers that be consolidate their powers and stay in ivory towers. History proves again and again that War is not the answer to anything.