Match Reaction v Brighton (away).

[selassie]

“Anyone would be better than Wenger.”

Emery was better than him

[Letters]

Emery was better than him

Well. His first season was marginally better.
But then this season it all went to shit

[Niall_Quinn]

Same shit players we had before the break, so it's not a surprise nothing has changed after it.

[Letters]

Right, but these “shit players” finished 5th last season with 70 points and got to the Europa League final. Not a patch on the top 2 but pretty much as good as anyone else.

How has it all gone quite so wrong this year?

[Marc Overmars]

Performances were still a bit duff last year but Auba and Laca bailed us out a lot. It’s the attack that’s gone to shit this year. Auba has no support, if he doesn’t score we’re hugely unlikely to win a match. Points to how dysfunctional the set up of the team is.

Only 41 goals from 30 games so far.

Last year we scored 73. So 32 goals shy of that with 8 games to play.

Lacazette has sadly been a complete waste of space this season. He has no business in the team and certainly should not be keeping Martinelli out.

[Mac76]

Do you mean that in the sense that other managers (like Klopp, say) were available but we missed the boat?
Or do you mean that had we still been in the CL we’d have been able to attract a better class of manager?
Disagree with the latter if that’s what you mean. Throw enough money at someone and I don’t think that would have been much of a factor.

Yes, more the first reason than the second but i don't entirely discount the second either

[selassie]

Well. His first season was marginally better.
But then this season it all went to shit

I do agree with you Letters, I know its rare!

Wenger had past his sell by date with us and should have gone no matter what, but i agree we have regressed since he has gone.

[selassie]

Yes, more the first reason than the second but i don't entirely discount the second either

Yep totally agree Mac, a few seasons before Wenger left there was a lot of top quality managers available. We made a real mess of the Wenger out situation, but it's what we do, we are Arsenal!

[Niall_Quinn]

Right, but these “shit players” finished 5th last season with 70 points and got to the Europa League final. Not a patch on the top 2 but pretty much as good as anyone else.

How has it all gone quite so wrong this year?

The football has been getting worse, year on year. Slow, plodding, sideways, backwards. Don't know what the last 2 games have been like, but I'd lay money on it being the same old story. The players always take the easy option. When they can move the play on, they instead reset and slow everything down. Constant prodding and probing but at 1mph so no threat is actually posed. It's a boring style and an ineffective one that Wenger perfected and first Emery, now Arteta can't shake.

We went from playing like Arsenal, dynamic, fast, ambitious, to trying to play like Barca. But without the hundreds of millions of investment required to pull that off. So instead we just became this one paced, tip tap shit machine that's pretty much unwatchable and utterly ineffective.

We're also playing in a shit league brimming with mediocre players. The modern PL is packed with turds who can't pass, can't cross, can't shoot, with the few notable exceptions. So depending on how shit everyone is around us dictates where we'll finish. We're a million miles behind Liverpool and the gypos, but in the vicinity of shit heaps like the spuds and Utd. This season, maybe a little worse, unbelievably trying to hang on to absolute pub outfits like Wolves and Sheff Utd. But at least teams like that will fight with the limited resources they have. Our lot won't. Too pampered. Let away with it in a terrible culture that rewards mediocrity with stupid money.

We've settled for second best in every aspect for well over a decade now and that causes rot. As I have said for years, I wouldn't mind so much if the football was worth watching. But it's unbearably awful. There's no enjoyment, just pure frustration.

Football in general is swirling around the rim, but we're pulling the flush at Arsenal.

[selassie]

Performances were still a bit duff last year but Auba and Laca bailed us out a lot. It’s the attack that’s gone to shit this year. Auba has no support, if he doesn’t score we’re hugely unlikely to win a match. Points to how dysfunctional the set up of the team is.

Only 41 goals from 30 games so far.

Last year we scored 73. So 32 goals shy of that with 8 games to play.

Lacazette has sadly been a complete waste of space this season. He has no business in the team and certainly should not be keeping Martinelli out.

Yep agree with this.

Sad thing is, Emery could have been a hero last season, he absolutely blew it and that was IMO the start of this sad downward spiral we find ourselves in. IIRC, we were 3rd and a couple of points clear of 5th place last season with 5 games to go and que the COLLAPSE.

We now find ourselves in arguably a much worse position than we were prior to Wenger leaving.

We have a squad full of players with little to no resale value, we have no spine outside of Leno & Auba, we by the sounds of it don't have the budget required to rebuild in the way we need to. TBH, whilst Kroenke is a leech, he has actually invested a fair bit of money into the football side over the past few years, problem is Wenger and then Emery have both made bad moves in the market. In the case of Emery, he managed to actually make our defence worse and that is some feat, still scratching my head on how he managed this. He spent money in the process too, it's actually quite funny!

Midfield is a complete mess too, I wouldn't batter an eyelid if everyone of our midfielders was sold, same with the defence too with the exception of Tierney & Saliba.