Yep, there’s still 12 games to play and Liverpool are ‘just’ 8 points ahead with their next 2 games against City and Newcastle. Yep, they can faulter towards the end when VVD, Salah, Trent would have in mind to end the season injury free for their final pay checks. Yep, West Ham can do to them at Anfield what they did to us at Emirates. Nothing is absolute except two thing – We will fuck up again & Mikel will fuck up again. So yeah, get over with it and enjoy the rest of the season without any hopes and Champions League run while it lasts.
Liverpool dropped points against Aston Villa, and in a game at home against West Ham – who were 17th before the game – we were expected to win and close that gap. With City and Newcastle next, Liverpool can drop more points and we could have taken advantage of it. But hey, we don’t do that here. You drop 2 points, we drop 3 and we let you take the title home. We have been very consistent in throwing it away, doing it the third time now in last 3 seasons.
Lets get back to the game. We started the game with a midfielder as a striker. We substituted a midfielder with a left back who can’t get into the team even AS A LEFT BACK. With 1-0 down and 10 minutes left on the clock, we were craving for a goal so we bring in Raheem Sterling – who has scored exactly zero goals and assisted just one in 294 minutes in 11 games, 4 of which he started; Sterling, who plays in the front line but has twice the amount of back passes than passes forward in red and white shirt.
This is only from the West Ham game. Lets not forget that Thomas Partey – one of the best DMs out there – started as a RB in multiple games. When Odegaard was out-injured, we were playing with 3 DMs midfield – Partey, Rice, Merino.
So, we have spent north of 700m Great British Pound, and there were 3 positions where we didn’t have players. Also, I am totally ignoring that Odegaard needed to be subbed at half time and we didn’t have anyone on the bench to replace him with. No wonder we are only the second best from 3 seasons in a row now, and no wonder we have fucked up when it has mattered the most.
Lets get to the dumb part of all of this.
Everyone, including me who doesn’t know shit about football management and only been watching football for about 15 years, were calling out that we need reinforcements in the front line. Havertz hardly won us a game on his own but even if he was the Benzema of Arsenal, we needed his back up. We also needed a Xhaka’s replacement, a box to box midfielder who is more attacking minded, because our left side was disjointed and we were attacking from the right for like 100 games now.
When Declan Rice was brought in, everyone thought he was a like for like replacement of Thomas Partey, but the latter decided to not give up and kept his position. Mikel, in an attempt to prove himself right, gave Declan the left side attacking midfield role. Mikel, to accommodate another of his poor signings, moved Havertz up top and totally forgot to bring a specialist. He let Eddie Nketiah go, he paid Aubameyang to leave but didn’t get anybody. He brought in Mikel Merino and things got even more complicated for him because he had to accommodate his third signing, what did he do? He put Thomas Partey at RB, played Rice as DM, Merino as LCM, and Havertz up top. That’s 4D chess, and all of it to lose games.
What could have been done?
Again, I’m just stating the obvious. Only one of Declan Rice and Thomas Partey should start a game. Ollie Watkins was available for 60m and could have done the job for 2 seasons, we should have paid. Havertz should have been put back in the midfield to compete with Merino. We should have got a competition to Odegaard and let Nwaneri and Trossard back up for Saka and Martinelli. Gabriel Jesus and Zinchenko should have been sold. Tierney should have been sold. If you can’t find a good competition to Odegaard, you should have called Vieira back. MLS is keeping Calafiori, Zinchenko away from the starting line up, there’s was no point in trying Thomas Partey at RB when you could have just trusted him and put Timber on the right side. Nwaneri was the answer when you were playing 3 DMs in the midfield.
What can you do now?
Nothing. We have lost it this season. For the next one, stop trying square peg in a round hole. Here’s a bitter truth if you are reading this Mikel – I will prefer Wenger’s attacking football over your JDP shit if it means doing enough to finish in top 4. You were brought to win us trophy, and it has been 6 years and 700m GBP. I don’t care if we haven’t lost a game against top 6 in last 30 matches if we can’t beat West Ham and Villa at home when it matters.
Champions League – round of 16 – an easy one but I don’t have much hopes after that too. We pick ourselves up again in the summer and we start again, but let me tell you we will win nothing without a striker, without a Odegaard’s improvement, with Thomas Partey at RB, with Declan Rice as an attacking midfielder, with Havertz up top and with your controlling nature. Oh, and you don’t win trophies from corners.
Over to you guys.
Managed to watch some continental football with Junior for a change. Without Mbappe RM seem less of a threat as they are very creative but unable to convert chances like us.
Watching the Manure v Fulham where Obi is doing well leading the line. Just think if we hadn’t sold Obi to the Mancs? He’s a lot better than Merino or Sterling.
Smith Roe having a decent game and Garnacho is garbage skying most shots.
Watching gwendouzi for Lazio v Milan playing DM
We were discussing Guendouzi to see if he was up to Partey’s level where we thought no but better than Jorginho as a 6.
That said the Italian league is well below the PL on this game’s viewing
OMG the ref is blind and VAR non existent how do people watch this shit. The tackles okay almost made it a hat trick of roll overs but could only manage 5 and a half but had the Cosimoto grimace I can only imagine made the decision for the ref.
We will give Serie A a miss stick to Spanish football. Have to give the Bundesligue a look this week. Was always too late for European football in Thailand
I’m convinced now Partey graduated from the Italian school of shooting. Would make great rugby players.
Tony—the fact that we came into the season without a single noteworthy Striker yet allowed both Obi and Biereth to leave for fuck-all should be viewed as a fireable offence, especially if we fail to secure any silverware again…it’s not as if I’m of the belief that either player would have been a shoo-in starter, but given Jesus’s injury record and Havertz’s penchant for missing absolute sitters, one or both should have been part of a logical contingency plan
Biereth could have easily gone out on loan again, so we could have recalled him if necessary, and Obi could have been given some of the very same late game minutes he’s now seeing at United…I would bet my left nut that Mika was shipped with little to no consideration…I highly doubt MA could have picked Biereth out of a fucking police lineup…in fact, I would strongly suggest that this move was little more than a selfish/short-sighted decision by our resident dickwad who was only thinking about how this might fluff-up his piss-poor “selling” narrative
as for Obi, he looks to have a little Isak in him, in that he has a similar build and is rather tidy on the ball, from a close control standpoint…the fact that we had seriously scouted Isak before Newcastle brought him in should have put us in a much better position to properly evaluate our former Striker asset…now I get why some might view this as a fairly lofty comp, but if you watched the Sociedad version of Isak you would understand my thought process…even if those inside the club didn’t necessarily favour the kid, maybe it would have been wise to have a bit of a rethink considering what’s transpired since Isak’s arrival on the scene
frankly, I still can’t fathom why some halfwit media-types continue to propagate the notion that the Emirates is where you should want to go if you’re a promising young talent…besides Ode and a few he inherited, MA has never favoured younger players…if it weren’t for injuries we would have seen exceedingly less from Skelly and Ethan this season…if you don’t believe that just consider how many players he’s played at LB before taking a chance on Skelly…as for Ethan, even when everyone else recognized his obvious talent, MA still ran the offence through Sterling when we were in desperate need of goals…beyond that, he’s only played him out on the left, which is a position he’ll never flourish in so long as Saka is still in our employ
on a side note, after what I witnessed Saturday by Cuhna, he’ll never land here with MA in charge…he should have never been considered as a January Striker option anyways, as that’s 3rd on his late of favoured positions, but he would have been a much better option, tucked in behind a real Striker, than Havertz
Cunha
Cunha is a quality footballer that i like a lot but unfortunately playing for Arsenal you have to be whiter than white on the football pitch as Arsenal players are treated very differently compared to any other side by the officials as we have seen multiple times this season.
Xhaka is a prime example of a player signing for Arsenal with a hard man type image who soon found out that any slight misdemeanor on the pitch would end in a red card for him, to his credit he changed his game in the last few seasons as he learnt that playing the hard man doesn’t work playing for Arsenal.
Look at our red cards this season , would Rice have been sent off if we were still playing for West ham ….of course not.
Would trossard have been sent off if he still played for Brighton …of course not .
Would saliba and skelly have been sent off playing for any other club than Arsenal …of course not.
So as much as Cunha has the potential to be top quality, I think he may have a type of Eric Cantona arrogance and short fuse that would land him in trouble week in week out playing for Arsenal, so he would be better going to a club like city or Liverpool where the players are not treated so harshly.
In saying that , I hope we sign him and he proves me wrong as I certainly think he has more about him creatively than odegaard who I’ve always believed is a good player but is overrated as apart from one season his output has been disappointing.
For context , over the last 2 seasons
Cuha has 36 goal contributions in 53 league starts playing for mid/lower table wolves , whilst odegaard has 23 goal contributions in 50 league starts playing for the 2nd best team in the league , which is not a bad ratio for odegaard but falls well short on cunha’s excellent ratio.
Thanks for the above TRVL it’s good to be posting with you again after my Madrid time has kept junior and I very busy. We still have 2 weeks left here and are enjoying the Spanish football at least. This weekend is the Madrid derby we are really looking forward to having watched both sides now.It’s going to get loud here as we’re not far from both stadia.
I can see why you watch the Spanish league, as it’s not far behind the PL.
As for Serie A, I had junior crying with laughter with my observational humour adding some Italian voices and my versions of convos between Ref and players and player and players.
Stupid and inane it might have been, but it suited the moment, but at one time poor junior was going a great impression of a fish out of water struggling for air with the biggest “o” mouth shape gasping for all his might.
As his father? It was a joy to watch after what he’s been through in Thailand. My son has pretty much recovered as you and KP will understand from our back channelling. You and KP have had a big hand in that as you both know.
It proves that long term Gooners are one big family at heart where we all look after each other when we can. None of this could happen with out you, Ambarish with LIR, so my deep thanks go to you also for creating such a close knit of Gooners of ALL who write here as the mainstay of LIR.
Back to comedy central that is Serie A; it’s joke football with oscar worthy players: I’m surprised a few weren’t up for best roll over after the slightest of touches last night. Junior and I were guessing how many roll overs for each tackle. One Lazio player managed six and should have been on the Oscar red carpet last night.
We concluded the Serie A players have a an after football life as Hollywood stunt men with their perfected antics of high flying death rolls. Havertz could only dream about getting off the ground that high.
As for their football? Theatrical Championship football at best. Cala, whilst can be a threat up top, and should be playing 9 instead of the hapless lumbering Merino. It seems Italian league football is the stepping stone for older PL players in need of slower and antics football where Kyle Walker is typical of those who will end up in Saudi or MLS football for their last excuse for football pay packets.
It will be interesting if we end up playing Milan in the CL semis, especially with the Italian refs where I honestly believe Mr Bean could be the better officiator. Still, it’s good to see their VAR is similar to when it first started in the PL. How they missed a blatant forearm smash from a defender in the back of a Milan forward’s back, in the penalty area is a Marie Celeste kind of mystery.
I’ll only watch Serie A if I need a laugh in the future.
As for your thoughts on Obi and Biereth, which Ambarish has been rightly angry about here, are spot on. I would go further on now seeing the raw Obi in action, he’s close to being better than Havertz now. Thinks football when making better football decisions, where he stays on his feet, and isn’t aerially challenged by being able to jump higher than 6 inches off the ground.
As for the the chubby 8th dwarf Sterling, Flaky Pumpkin could do better.
Certainly has faster reactions when under pressure, and man can Pumpkin turn on the after burners chasing balls, and then you try getting the ball off Pumpkin. His speed of ball control, especially with his push and run could only see Flaky (Sterling) left in wonderment.
My advice is change Win the dog for Pumpkin.
I guess that makes El B our Snow White. Which of her dwarfs would be closest to Havertz, guys? KP I think you could add much here.
TRVL I am as convinced as you that had we kept our 2 young potential 9 protagonists, and not bought Havertz or loaned Flaky, the points gap between Pool and us would be much closer, especially had we bought a decent 8 instead of Rice who fluffs his scoring lines as much as Havertz.
That means between the pair of them, they need 6 golden, scoring opportunities to bag a goal; unlike Obi and Biereth who are naturals in front of goal; it’s just that they are young and a bit green that PL game time will put right as French football is currently for Biereth.
What excuses can be offered for Havertz and Sterling being time served pros?
Great post TRVL, especially your loan thinking, could you imagine calling in their loans last TW?
Really shows El B for what he is: clueless when judging player talent.
I think the $64K question here is would Obi or Biereth come back to play for El B if he wanted to buy them back?
My thinking is they would say no and be part of the many who have snubbed El B thus far.
Have a good one guys………
Back too the Italian football
I don’t see anything particularly special in obi Martin or Biereth, though I can’t say I have too much experience watching either player except mostly youtube clips which normally only show the positive side of a player.
I watched obi a few times playing for the Arsenal academy and I can’t say I was overly impressed, he certainly didn’t remind me of isak , more like sanogo.
He’s had a couple of lengthy sub appearances for united recently and to me he looks a little clumsy with a poor first touch but also looks capable of finding good goalscoring positions , he also doesn’t look like he is a particularly good striker of a football , and for me that is what is the difference between good and average, players like ian wright, rvp , Henry etc had fantastic technique when striking a ball , I don’t see that technique in obi, he( like havertz )will always get his fair share of goals but his technique ( like havertz) will let him down at crucial times.
As for Biereth, I looked at his goals on youtube and he looks to have the strikers instinct of being on the right place at the right time , again I didn’t see any great strikes so I will hold judgement on that , I would put him as more of a Hojland (man utd )type player, a strong bustling type striker who needs the right service, as we know it’s a world of difference playing a s a striker in the French league compared to the premier league so the chances coming a strikers way can be limited.
After reading the Obi ” Kutch bhi” ( translated to ” whatever crap comes out” ), watched FA cup game between ManU and Fulham . Obi played for significant minutes unlike the token 2-4 minutes he was and would be getting at Arsenal. Being a kid in a big men team mostly he was overawed and gave deference to senior players. But he had a difficult chance towards the end where he stroke the ball between a number of Fulham players getting the only open trajectory. It was Leno quick reflex that palmed it off.
Then , I could understand why Kiddo had the outrageous number of goals in U-18 and U-21 both at Arsenal and Man U. That strike was better than any other Arsenal player , bar Saka , could conjure.
Cheerio Bot !
Hoopah
The sad state of affairs that we currently find ourselves in – no recognised striker – Obi, if still at AFC would probably still be getting splinters in his bum and not get any minutes on the pitch. Clearly his natural instinct is streets ahead of what we currently parade as make weights.
What the F is wrong with US and Trump. Not supporting someone because of your personal loss is acceptable, like India not giving importance to what’s happening in Europe. But USA and Trump shooed away Zelenskyy first and Trump/Elon – I don’t know who the real president is – are now blaming UK to provide support to Ukraine?
I mean come on.. Russia is bullying Ukraine. You let them do what they do, and they will bully you.
– I bet if we go for Kashmir tomorrow, our own mainland, and the same US who isn’t bothered about what’s happening with Ukraine will come crying foul and trying to be the boss… They just can’t do with Russia, so hiding away. What in the heck man..
–
Been personally exhausted from a week due to different things. I know you are bored without Arsenal football, I will try giving something for discussion in. A day.
Ambarish – Trump, Modi, Putin are all school grounds bullies. Bullys always pick on the week and not so powerful and will cost up with the powerful. That’s the trait of bullies and inside they are very insecure and have rather inferiority complex. When somebody stands up to their bullying and confronts them, they get all flustered. For them it’s not about right or wrong it’s about showing that they are powerful and that too against the weakest. They are the most vile, evil and insecure men. It’s a travesty that these small men occupy such high places where they can destroy a lot of peoples life and they are specially good at it.
US as a democracy peaked during the Watergate scandal and then the slide started with Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky scandal and is culminating is Trump. US as a nation we all need is dead and wherever little respect they had. They cannot lecture anybody from now on.
Ambarish, Madhu
Zelensky went into the Oval room bearing a copy of KP’s post describing Trump’s shit flavoured, orange, micro penis. Trump being offended that potential call girl clients might get wind of his personal problem he blew his top. At least he still has two balls unlike that other Dictator – Adolf.
Zelensky was never going to get any favours from Trump after he stood on stage and endorsed Biden.
It appears the sales of Tesla cars have nose-dived.
New post.
@Madhu – couldn’t agree more, though I am a bit leaned towards Modi because of the lack of a better alternative. Congress sucked us up without any development. Modi is sucking up too but we see some progress locally at least.
Ours is a very different problem than a crooked party or politician. A policeman earning 50k/month makes more than what Borris Johnson used to make as British Prime Minister. There’s hardly anyone left who is not corrupt, and those who are, are because they don’t have an option. But this is expected from a 70 year old democracy, we will improve and we will do it faster because we won’t have to figure out things on our own – we see the west, we see the world around us and we see how we can make it better.
Privatisation is costing us the middle / poor classes but I have been very vocal in support of it because of the corruption in govt entities.
NORG
I see the dictator traits in Elon Musk much more than Trump. Trump is a businessman, a fool at best, hates how he was treated by the media and is just out there taking revenges.
Elon Musk, on the other hand, want a say in everything that’s happening around the world. He is vocal towards the British Govt. He was vocal towards the Indian judiciary because it didn’t allow him to destroy the local telecom providers. He literally fought with Brazil government and speaks so often about other European countries.
He has bought himself a platform, where he pushes his own posts by re-writing algorithms. That lad is doing great job in exploring space, and then ruining his legacy in the chase of power. What a shame!
Madhu – spot on mate. Maybe the perspective is better from a distance – like a bird’s eye view.
Our domestic developments are a carefully orchestrated hype . Any one who says otherwise and has a wide following,like e.g. journalists are either incarcerated or targetted by investigation agencies. India has among the highest number of targetted journalists tells a story.
Would say , feel the hunger , if very poor, tension about how education or health crisis will be met , if middle class. Multiple stage taxation on the same item e.g. cars if reasonably rich. But vow if an oligarch who pay less % and total taxes than all others ,with an option to take a hefty bank loan and resettle abroad ,usually GB , Luxembourg , Portugal, maybe now in USA.
Hoopah
My dad retired 3 years ago. He was in a very important position, can’t say exactly what, but was deemed qualified enough to work for Indian embassies in Pakistan, Britain and Belgium. And he did his schooling from a village that had water wells to drink from. Government school and college were good enough, if not the best. You hardly pay anything, you get decent education and you do whatever you want to do with that.
I visit my village very often, there’s only bricks left of that school. It’s still getting money, it still has teachers employed but they don’t give a fuck. They would rather earn some money in private tuitions. There’s no one to check and report that because the principle is doing the same. If the general public speaks about it, the one who should listen is paid to not listen. Everyone’s fucking corrupt in this system.
So, if you have a kid, you need money, a lot of money for his education. The hospitals are getting costlier with doctors who again don’t give a fuck and are there just to take money. They will do 15 reports for a cough and give you a syrup at the end. Government hospitals are either very poor in standard or too full.
The two biggest concern for any citizen in anywhere of the world, education and health, are very costly. And even with costs, you don’t get a good result.
Public is corrupt, government is corrupt, and this whole system needs a reboot.