We are visiting Anfield today. One of the most important games of the season, clash of the No #1 and No #2, and two teams fighting for 90 minutes to sing ‘I am better than you’ at the end of day. Quality wise, we are on par with them. It will all come down to the players and their passion to beat the best team in Premier League and the manager to devise a strategy to neutralise the Mo Salah threat while breaking that defence to score some goals. Trent is gone so that’s a relief, we always hated his long balls to Salah.
We haven’t won at Anfield since 2012. In recent years, we have proved to be a match to them sharing points in our last 6 encounters. Today is the day to reset both these numbers.
Their new striker, Ekitike, had a wonderful start in Liverpool color. He has scored 2 and assisted 1 in his first 2 games. We have got our own fighter up top in Gyokeres, who scored 2 against Leeds after a sus first game. It’s the battle of the Forwards primarily and we will see who is the geezer of two.
Then, they have one of the best CB of recent Premier League era and we have got one for the present and future. VVD has enjoyed his fair share of praises, but Saliba has taken over. They have the best player on the planet in Mo Salah which we don’t have answer to as Saka is injured but we as a team have better chemistry, better defence and a better midfield to counter that advantage.
Team News
We needed everyone for one of the biggest games of the season, but unfortunately we are without 2 of our main team players. Saka is out injured for about a month and Odegaard for probably a couple more weeks.
Smart teams anticipate such kind of scenarios and cover it in advance. Last season, Saka and Ode injuries would have meant we go into the game with Nwaneri on the wings and no idea who as the sole playmaker in the midfield. Today, we have options. Madueke is a premier league player, played in the Chelsea team against the likes of City and Liverpool and he knows what it takes to play in such a game. Eze, another premier league ready transfer, can cover the Odegaard’s position, without any drop in quality. We overpaid for both of them, but at least we have the confidence in both these signings to continue what Saka and Odegaard does.
Saka is a big game player and it’s impossible in current football world to replace him with a similar player. There would be some drop of quality on the right wing but it won’t lose us the game. Same for Eze.
Arteta will most likely stick to his back 4 of Timber, Saliba, Gabriel and Calafiori. The Italian will have a massive job today to handle Mo Salah who has a great start of the season with a goal and assist in previous 2 games. If he fails, we have MLS on the bench who can do that.
In the midfield, we would see one Eze coming in for Odegaard. Rice and Zubimendi will keep their place. I am not sure if Arteta will ever try one of Zubimendi or Rice in the middle with both Odegaard and Eze on either side, but if he does, it won’t be today.
Front 3 will be interesting. Madueke on the right means Martinelli will keep his place at the left and Gyokeres will start in the middle. Martinelli is menace for defenders with his pace and he is a big game player. For me, he starts today and he will end up benching Madueke once Saka is back.
Don’t be shocked if …
On the referee part, we are not in luck. Chris Kavanagh would be officiating the game, the last time he did that in an Arsenal game was against Chelsea in March. He ignored the Cucurella handball in the penalty box and totally missed to see Fofana stomping on Declan Rice. This is the same lad who red carded Declan Rice against Brighton for kicking the ball away where in fact he didn’t kick it while missing the leg kick only a fraction of second before, also totally ignoring Joao Pedro kicking the ball away a few minutes later. I am not really conspiracy theorist but lets just say he was born in Manchester and as far as I know, those cunts don’t really like us.
Wrapping Up
I think we will make it today and break the Anfield curse. 2-1 to boys with Martinelli scoring one in a counter and Gyokeres proving his worth and letting the world know he has arrived. It’s not going to be an easy game at all but lets see how much we can keep our focus on, not let Salah break free and keep our heads in the game. It’s too early in the season to make 1 single game important for the title, but having earning all 3 points against a top 4 teams given you the luxury to not think about a draw later in the season against a bottom half team – like Manchester United.
We have some big games coming up after this, so a loss could derail the confidence. Hopefully the new signing in Eze was able to get in the mix comfortably and Madueke does 9/10 of Saka on that right side.
Also, please don’t laugh about Tottenham, they lost to a mighty Bournemouth at home with 1 shots on target to theirs 6. Thomas Franc is a great manager, but so were Mourinho and Conte, you can’t coach the Spuds to play football, can you?
See you during the game.
Two thrilling matches today New Zealand v South Africa and Australia v Argentina both games had bonus points. A repeat next week for round 4 of the Rugby Championship.
no doubt Killroy, these early season breaks are like a giant kick in the pills…not to mention, things are usually a little more frenetic at the end of the summer window, like with that ridiculous Sterling reach, which simply wasn’t the case this year…don’t you worry, if what we’ve seen thus far is indicative of what’s to come, there will be plenty to complain about in the coming weeks and months…let’s hope we come out of the break with a new plan in mind, one’s that’s more complimentary to the skillsets of our best players…not holding my fucking breath though
TRVL
Looks like Saliba isn’t indestructible after all, it’s being reported he’s going to miss Forrest, City, Newcastle and Bibao in the CL.
How true? You never know with MA and his spinners.
Good to see Dowman getting England game time for the U19s. The lad, if handled right, has elite potential, but not under MA’s guidance.
As for the new plan? I think it will always be wishful thinking on our part.
We will always play; same shit, different day, not to lose football, and fall short at the end.
Happy to be proven different, but haven’t for nearly 6 years along with you and LIR.
Wash rinse and repeat.
“Happy to be proven different, but haven’t for nearly 6 years along with you and LIR.
Wash rinse and repeat.”
Pretty much sums it all up.
Watching Dowman get kicked to shit by the Spanish under 18’s without an ounce of protection from the officials shou be a worry for the Arsenal hierarchy.
Dowman is very brave on the ball , some seem to think that the brave players are the one’s that go flying into tackles but they are wrong. Dowman must have been fouled close to 10 times in the first half v Spain before a card came out, but he continued to drive at the Spanish defenders and made mugs of them with his exceptional skill , so the only way to stop Dowman was to kick lumps out of him and that is where the officials should take control but the referee was incredibly lenient.
So what is the answer because as night follows day it is guaranteed that Dowman will suffer a bad injury playing at this level of football with such a poor level of refereeing.
Should the under 18 coaches tell him not to be so aggressive in his willingness to attack the defender to protect himself from injury or should Arsenal be looking at a video of the game and come to the conclusion that they would prefer to protect their player from the inevitable injury.
I know some will say it’s a man’s game and players shouldn’t be wrapped in cotton wool but the fact is that Dowman hasn’t signed a contract yet and is already worth tens of millions off pounds with a potential to rise to hundreds of millions if he continues to progress at such a rate.
It would be sensible to protect him or they may regret allowing him to be kicked from pillar to post by young lads who have no answer to his incredible skills , under wenger we lost too many of our young players to broken legs as back then it was often said that to beat Arsenal you have to kick Arsenal .
fortunately now we have a group of players and a manager in the first team who would protect him on the pitch so maybe that is the best place for him to reach his potential .
Merino or gyokeres as striker may be a serious question to be asked in the coming weeks.
They are like chalk and cheese in their approach to the game and I think it’s fair to say that neither are up to the quality of our previous strikers like ian wright, Henry, Anelka, RVP or even Aubamayang.
Gyokeres is all hustle and bustle and is often seen in physical battles with the centre back , whereas merino is rarely seen in a physical battle as he prefers to drop into the hole and link the play and is more difficult to pick up . Inside the box it is often similar with gyokeres battling with the defender to find space whereas Merino uses his brain and has a good intuition in the box of where to find space.
Merino is a very good header of the ball , is calm in front of goal and strikes the ball cleanly as he has good technique.
Gyokeres may ultimately score more goals as a striker due to his willingness go in where it hurts and his hunger to score is probably greater than Merino, so Arteta may have a choice to make in the future if gyokeres is not finding the space in the box, though in fairness we have had 2 tough away games so the jury is still out but I would imagine that Arteta may put Merino up top on occasions to see how he links up with Eze, zubimendi and Madueke.
Eze had some criticism for his performance v Andora the other night but i thought he played with intelligence and calmness throughout and never looked rushed.
He could ,with a little bit of luck ,had a couple of goals and assists and then the perception of his performance would have been different.
Half the trouble with fans and the media in this country is that they are way too impressed with work rate, as an example I would put a Ozil/Odegaard comparison in which one is considered lazy and the other considered a tireless worker who covers every blade of the pitch.
Both players are/were considered to be the creative hub of the side and their primary job is probably to create big chances for their team mates whether it being the final killer ball or a pre assist.
Ozil under wenger and for real madrid was probably in the top 3 in Europe and had the stats to prove it, his numbers fell away towards the end of his Arsenal career probably due to not having the freedom or trust he enjoyed under wenger as both Emery and Arteta put more emphasis on work rate than creativity.
I suppose the question that could be asked is would Odegaard have been more creative under wenger , the answer is probably yes , so it is up to Arteta to unlock the full potential of Odegaard as his creativity figures are nothing special especially last season and this season so far as he is as yet to create a big chance this season and last season even the likes of declan rice created more big chances than Odegaard.
With the arrival of Eze and Nwaneri it should give Odegaard food for thought as another average season like last will unlikely guarantee him a starting place in the line up .
Arteta has so many attacking options out wide and centrally that it will be interesting to see how he sets the team up when they are all fit.
Will he continue with a double pivot in midfield of Rice and zubimendi, personally I’d prefer we go back to the one holding midfielder to allow an extra player higher up the pitch to support the striker as at the moment it isn’t working as we are the 2nd worst team in the league for creating chances from open play.
Madueke has had a decent start to the season and has probably played his way into the side especially with saka out
Will Arteta break up the midfield trio of zubimendi, Rice and Odegaard to try and give us more creativity, does he trust zubimendi to hold the midfield the way Partey did. Will he play eze in the inside left position or will it be a case of him hugging the left touchline similar to martinelli I suppose eze could have a similar impact to the way grealish has started at Everton as they are similar type of players who glide with the ball and always have their head up .
The staring line up barring injuries will probably be
Raya
Timber
Mosquera
Gabriel
Calafiori
Odegaard
Zubimendi
Rice
Eze
Madueke
Gyokeres
crickets…
Looks like Forest have decided to relegate themselves by appointing the Fat Aussie Bastard as manager but bad timing for us.
First match with a new manager is never a good time to play a team.
Marc—Ange kind of makes sense from a tactical standpoint, but he’ll have to make some defensive adjustments if he expects to stay beyond this season…Nuno seems to have an expiry date baked into every managerial job he takes…for those who still aren’t sure if it’s a him or “them” thing, the evidence is mounting when it comes to the former
Hi Ambarish
I sent you a short email about a week ago. If you’ve not seen it, I’m happy to send it again. Otherwise, is there any chance of a reply please?😊
Marc
There seems to be a massive self-destruct button somewhere in the Forest Stadium and their rotund owner has enthusiastically pressed it. No way they get better as a result of replacing Nuno with Postecoglu. Fun times.
Kroenke
No Ambarish won’t send you nude pictures.
Kroenke
I don’t get Forest – one of the owners loses his rag when the team massively overperformed and now brings in a manager who almost relegated the Spuddies.
TRVL
Some managers are like that – Conte and Mourinho always follow the same path.
Yeah, that geezer Marinakis will end up fucking Forest back to the championship.
Nice goal by Madueke for Ingerland.
What happened to the petition against the signing of Madueke, maybe Arteta is not as dumb as many on here think.
it’s looking to me as if the dumb ones are the those who signed the petition or agreed with the petition.
Marc—these managers burn hot so things usually flame out in 2 to 3 years…that said, they typically get results, which is why it’s so dumbfounding at times…the saving grace of Nuno over Conte and Jose is that he’s never given full say over personnel matters so usually the team doesn’t need to go into full rebuild mode following his exodus…Nuno probably viewed last season as a resume builder for him and likely felt that if he stayed on with what he considered to be undermanned side, in light of their scheduling demands, and things went sideways, it would be a two steps forward and four back scenario…it will be interesting to see where he lands next…if it’s at a bigger club, kudos to him, if it’s at another aspiring minnow, it will be a serious egg on his face moment
Although we have a strong squad numbers wise there is a potential problem if we pick up anymore injuries over the coming weeks when the games come thick and fast.
Despite having saliba out defensively we should be OK as the signing of Hincapie gives us more cover , plus mosquera put in a very assured performance v Liverpool and of course Ben white is poised to return.
Norgaard is also close to returning so the midfield looks quite strong with Merino, zubimendi and Rice available.
The potential problem would be offensively as we have Saka , Havertz and Jesus out for a prolonged period , so it is important that we keep as many of our attacking options fit and available or we may experience a similar problem as last season when injuries to our offensive players derailed our season , although despite this we managed a distant 2nd in the league and a champions league semi final.
Odegaard looked impressive in the week against very weak opposition, it is time for him to deliver and I think he will..
Madueke was excellent v Serbia so should start v forest and if Eze doesn’t start there will be huge disappointment for the fan base though it will probably be on the left wing. Let’s hope that Odegaard plays more centrally as a no.10 to give him more opportunity to bring Eze into the game..
I can’t see anything other than 3 positive results this week v forest , bilbao and city as we look to put the defeat to Liverpool behind us.
Havertz & Jesus out – no problem, it gives better players chance to play. Both players are the highest earners at the club.