Arsenal vs Brighton - Player Rating and Match Reaction

[HCZ_Reborn]

Player ratings are easy. I’m giving every single player zero. The title may have been over but you don’t put in a performance like that, that horrible cunt Gary Neville can’t hide his delight. Where was the pride today?…fucking Estupinian scoring? Fucking Undav scoring…was this a charity match where we let spastics score and politely applaud because it’s all for a good cause.

I don’t want Arteta anywhere near this club anymore….feels like the whole stadium needs disinfecting after that rancid shit. The season we’ve put together and it ends like that?. What an absolutely fucking disgrace. Wouldn’t piss on any of those players if they were on fire and I had a bursting bladder

[Marc Overmars]

What a way to throw the towel in.

Not much else to say really.

Gave it a go this year which is commendable but hard to ignore just our amateurish this has been. Can only hope mistakes are learned from next season.

[Letters]

I suspect the Everton result was a factor.
Which doesn’t mean this result or performance was acceptable but I think the players knew the title had gone. Not good enough to throw in the towel, but let’s face it City had won it anyway.

[Marc Overmars]

I suspect the Everton result was a factor.
Which doesn’t mean this result or performance was acceptable but I think the players knew the title had gone. Not good enough to throw in the towel, but let’s face it City had won it anyway.

There’s a way to go out and this isn’t it.

It’s weak and confirms a fragile mentality.

[HCZ_Reborn]

There’s a way to go out and this isn’t it.

It’s weak and confirms a fragile mentality.

Exactly…you go out and show pride…you don’t let Brighton strut about like they are Barcelona

[Letters]

There’s a way to go out and this isn’t it.

It’s weak and confirms a fragile mentality.
Agreed. But it makes no difference to our final league position.
You know it, I know it and I think the players knew it.

[HCZ_Reborn]

Agreed. But it makes no difference to our final league position.
You know it, I know it and I think the players knew it.

If NQ was here now and not doing a stock inventory of water and tinned food for the day the globalist army takes over, he would (and in this case rightly so) talk about pride. Other results don’t make this acceptable, you fight to the end even if it’s a lost cause. We pull this kind of pathetic shit far too often

2001 - Losing 3-0 at home to Middlesborough

2003 - Losing 3-2 at home to Leeds

2008 - Failure to win five games in a row

2010 - Losing three games at Spurs, Wigan and Blackburn

2011 - Losing away at Stoke and home to Villa

2014 - Losing 6-0 at Chelsea, 3-0 at Everton

2016 - Losing 2-1 at home to Swansea, blowing a 2 nil lead at West Ham

[Marc Overmars]

Agreed. But it makes no difference to our final league position.
You know it, I know it and I think the players knew it.

The title was gone but it doesn’t change that this and certain other performances have been completely unacceptable. City are significantly better than us, no one would argue against that and we all suspected they would beat us to the finish.

We’ve shit the bed though and that’s just something we need to accept. Once we understand that we can hopefully learn from it. Next year we should know a bit more about what it’s going to take to be successful. Not just in the league but I want to see us make a fist of the other competitions too. None of this going out for the greater good nonsense.

[HCZ_Reborn]

Stupid little Liverpool supporting bitch on Twitter twisting the knife, the kind of person you know is a twat because even though they were born in England they claim to hate England (Irish parents)…sorry you hate the country you were brought up in…maybe fuck off and don’t come back?

Fucking hope Leicester bury them tomorrow, arrogant bunch of shits.

[selassie]

That was really bad, bordering on embarrassing. The title was lost a few weeks ago and we've done well to put up a relative challenge, even though we know we won't win it. Anyway, that performance today was shocking, awful everywhere.

[Letters]

If NQ was here now and not doing a stock inventory of water and tinned food for the day the globalist army takes over
:haha:



he would (and in this case rightly so) talk about pride. Other results don’t make this acceptable, you fight to the end even if it’s a lost cause.
I don’t disagree. But I think the Everton result must have got to them. I think they knew the game was up and that got in their heads. But I agree that’s not good enough, you run to the line.

[HCZ_Reborn]

The title was gone but it doesn’t change that this and certain other performances have been completely unacceptable. City are significantly better than us, no one would argue against that and we all suspected they would beat us to the finish.

We’ve shit the bed though and that’s just something we need to accept. Once we understand that we can hopefully learn from it. Next year we should know a bit more about what it’s going to take to be successful. Not just in the league but I want to see us make a fist of the other competitions too. None of this going out for the greater good nonsense.

Not sure I agree about all the trophies. We’ve won the FA cup enough times for now….league cup is a nothing trophy. Premier league and Champions League only

[Marc Overmars]

Not sure I agree about all the trophies. We’ve won the FA cup enough times for now….league cup is a nothing trophy. Premier league and Champions League only

I feel it’s more about fostering a winning mentality.

Obviously PL and CL take priority but for a squad that’s won nothing and is now back in the conversation it’s important to get that first trophy for the group.

[Letters]

I don’t think our mentality is as suspect as you imagine.
There have been slips here and there but aren’t there in any season?
For every slip there have been plenty of games where we’ve been under pressure and won, or we’ve dug out wins from losing or drawing positions.
The thing about City is that they don’t slip when it matters. They seem to have the ability to get their slips out of the way in the first half of the season and then from Christmas onwards they’re basically flawless and mow everyone down.
The only way Liverpool got the better of them was to be basically perfect till they were so far ahead it was basically won by February. I’m not saying there’s no room for improvement but overall I’m not convinced we could have done that much more this season. But we have to sort out the games vs City next year, that’s a 12 point swing we can’t give them and win the title.

[Marc Overmars]

I don’t think our mentality is as suspect as you imagine.
There have been slips here and there but aren’t there in any season?
For every slip there have been plenty of games where we’ve been under pressure and won, or we’ve dug out wins from losing or drawing positions.
The thing about City is that they don’t slip when it matters. They seem to have the ability to get their slips out of the way in the first half of the season and then from Christmas onwards they’re basically flawless and mow everyone down.
The only way Liverpool got the better of them was to be basically perfect till they were so far ahead it was basically won by February. I’m not saying there’s no room for improvement but overall I’m not convinced we could have done that much more this season. But we have to sort out the games vs City next year, that’s a 12 point swing we can’t give them and win the title.

There’s certainly reason to think this group is stronger than we’ve seen for many years but of course time will tell. Big season next year back in the CL and if we struggle to make an impression in that coupled with an inconsistent league campaign, then we will have to ask how much better it’s going to get with Arteta.

We’re on the cusp now, time to break through that glass ceiling.

[HCZ_Reborn]

I don’t think our mentality is as suspect as you imagine.
There have been slips here and there but aren’t there in any season?
For every slip there have been plenty of games where we’ve been under pressure and won, or we’ve dug out wins from losing or drawing positions.
The thing about City is that they don’t slip when it matters. They seem to have the ability to get their slips out of the way in the first half of the season and then from Christmas onwards they’re basically flawless and mow everyone down.
The only way Liverpool got the better of them was to be basically perfect till they were so far ahead it was basically won by February. I’m not saying there’s no room for improvement but overall I’m not convinced we could have done that much more this season. But we have to sort out the games vs City next year, that’s a 12 point swing we can’t give them and win the title.


Dropping 12 points in a period of 7 games…suggests there’s something very wrong indeed with our mentality

I hate to go all NQ because frankly if I believed all he did, I’d just hang myself from the futility of it all

But we’ve become far too used to this, winning two games from seven is not something you can do and expect to win a title no matter what you’ve done before hand in a season…it’s just untenable.

There’s no caveats to be found here, no bigger picture….this is plain unacceptable….and there’s no yes but to act as a qualifier

[Chippy]

There’s a way to go out and this isn’t it.

It’s weak and confirms a fragile mentality.

It's time to get rid of the rookie manager and get someone in who knows what they are doing. If Arteta and this shower are set free in the Champions League, it will be fucking embarrassing. God help us.

[Letters]

There’s certainly reason to think this group is stronger than we’ve seen for many years but of course time will tell. Big season next year back in the CL and if we struggle to make an impression in that coupled with an inconsistent league campaign, then we will have to ask how much better it’s going to get with Arteta.

We’re on the cusp now, time to break through that glass ceiling.

I do wonder whether Arteta can take us any further.
There’s a big summer coming up, we don’t have the squad to complete in the CL right now.
Arteta definitely deserves another season to try and push us on. Changing manager is. Massive disruption, there’s no guarantee that would help.

[Mac76]

It's time to get rid of the rookie manager and get someone in who knows what they are doing. If Arteta and this shower are set free in the Champions League, it will be fucking embarrassing. God help us.

I said that a couple of weeks ago and got crucified

Good luck :good:

[Mac76]

Player ratings are easy. I’m giving every single player zero. The title may have been over but you don’t put in a performance like that, that horrible cunt Gary Neville can’t hide his delight. Where was the pride today?…fucking Estupinian scoring? Fucking Undav scoring…was this a charity match where we let spastics score and politely applaud because it’s all for a good cause.

I don’t want Arteta anywhere near this club anymore….feels like the whole stadium needs disinfecting after that rancid shit. The season we’ve put together and it ends like that?. What an absolutely fucking disgrace. Wouldn’t piss on any of those players if they were on fire and I had a bursting bladder

All good except Ram was trying to inject some energy into it and so was Nelson when he came on

[Marc Overmars]

25 goals conceded at home. :lol:

Guess we should have suspected that will catch up with us. Can’t keep going life and death to win matches and expect to have any composure to win a title.

Better options in centre midfield are needed.

[HCZ_Reborn]

I said that a couple of weeks ago and got crucified

Good luck :good:

You said it in response to a game where most of us expected to lose before kick off but despite the disappointment of giving up a two goal lead we got our first point there in seven years. But then as now, the problem hits a snag when you’re asked who you’d replace him with. If there was an obvious replacement, I’d have been metaphorically waving the Arteta out banner all season. I still haven’t forgiven him for games we lost over two years ago…Im bitter and spiteful like that.

We need someone who can take us further…ok who would that be?

There’s only two premier league managers who would definitely be a step up…that’s Pep and Klopp

Outside of the premier league? Well it’s not even worth considering…most of European football is a complete wasteland.

The issue is that anyone who could potentially be better than Arteta that we could realistically get, would potentially be a lot worse

Eddie Howe has managed Newcastle very well, but even if he keeps on improving with them realistically they will only let him go by upgrading him with a bigger name.

[HCZ_Reborn]

25 goals conceded at home. :lol:

Guess we should have suspected that will catch up with us. Can’t keep going life and death to win matches and expect to have any composure to win a title.

Better options in centre midfield are needed.

We haven’t come close to getting the balance right between defence and attack

We’ve scored 48 goals at home in 18 games, which is the highest total we’ve achieved in five years

But we make ourselves vulnerable to the counter with the attacking way we play. I still put this down to our central midfield not being good enough (people talk about the loss of Saliba but we had still only managed two clean sheets in 13 home games when his back went)

[selassie]

We haven’t come close to getting the balance right between defence and attack

We’ve scored 48 goals at home in 18 games, which is the highest total we’ve achieved in five years

But we make ourselves vulnerable to the counter with the attacking way we play. I still put this down to our central midfield not being good enough (people talk about the loss of Saliba but we had still only managed two clean sheets in 13 home games when his back went)

We've been suspect at home all season, even earlier on in the season when we looked really good we shipped goals at home in some matches.

I agree with you about Central Midfield, we need to invest relatively big there this summer. Also, I think we need a minimum 3 quality additions to the team / squad, first team player material.

Our squad is good but has many faults, we need to improve the quality significantly.

[Niall_Quinn]

Player ratings are easy. I’m giving every single player zero. The title may have been over but you don’t put in a performance like that, that horrible cunt Gary Neville can’t hide his delight. Where was the pride today?…fucking Estupinian scoring? Fucking Undav scoring…was this a charity match where we let spastics score and politely applaud because it’s all for a good cause.

I don’t want Arteta anywhere near this club anymore….feels like the whole stadium needs disinfecting after that rancid shit. The season we’ve put together and it ends like that?. What an absolutely fucking disgrace. Wouldn’t piss on any of those players if they were on fire and I had a bursting bladder

Yeah, it was hard to miss Neville twisting the knife. When you have wilfully blind commentators like this it's easy to fall for the narrative. In the real world, that foul for the first goal was part of the set piece, no doubt. Just. lunge at the ankle, the guy goes down and because he can't get up in the split second where is man is free Neville compounds his coy avoidance of the foul to focus on the inaction of the defender. Nice. He was also a little bit lopsided on the clear penalties that were waved away. I'm still confused about VAR. With VAR that first goal never happens. And the pens get given. So what actually triggers VAR?

That's not to disguise the shite performance and the fact Brighton, notwithstanding their "special" tactics, passed us off the pitch.

[Niall_Quinn]

If NQ was here now and not doing a stock inventory of water and tinned food for the day the globalist army takes over, he would (and in this case rightly so) talk about pride. Other results don’t make this acceptable, you fight to the end even if it’s a lost cause. We pull this kind of pathetic shit far too often

2001 - Losing 3-0 at home to Middlesborough

2003 - Losing 3-2 at home to Leeds

2008 - Failure to win five games in a row

2010 - Losing three games at Spurs, Wigan and Blackburn

2011 - Losing away at Stoke and home to Villa

2014 - Losing 6-0 at Chelsea, 3-0 at Everton

2016 - Losing 2-1 at home to Swansea, blowing a 2 nil lead at West Ham

I don't need to do an inventory. It's in my head.

Yes, the pride thing. And I mean the PRIDE thing, not the "pride" thing which was actually on display today. When Saka went down screaming because he was lightly bumped I almost puked in embarrassment on his behalf. But I held it back because I quickly realised the guy has no dignity.

But we're nowhere near pride. We're still trying to master the basics. And there has been some progress. But a long way to go. Which is why I said 2 years before a thought about a challenge, IF the progress continues. About half the team has to go though before that stage.

[Niall_Quinn]

Stupid little Liverpool supporting bitch on Twitter twisting the knife, the kind of person you know is a twat because even though they were born in England they claim to hate England (Irish parents)…sorry you hate the country you were brought up in…maybe fuck off and don’t come back?

Fucking hope Leicester bury them tomorrow, arrogant bunch of shits.

Sounds a bit racist if you are a limp dick. But I get you. Love it or leave it - I'd rather pay for the ticket than pay for your rent month after month.

Would simply advise you reserve the passion for things that matter, rather than football. And yes, yes, two years ago you could have said the same about me. But I got better.

[HCZ_Reborn]

Sounds a bit racist if you are a limp dick. But I get you. Love it or leave it - I'd rather pay for the ticket than pay for your rent month after month.

Would simply advise you reserve the passion for things that matter, rather than football. And yes, yes, two years ago you could have said the same about me. But I got better.


Football is a classic form of escapism from the banality of life, and when someone sours that to the extent Arteta and the collective of Pansies on the pitch did so today you want to go full Begbie and glass anyone who accidentally knocks into you when holding a pint (figuratively of course, I leave such atavism to the truly mentally defective)

But in truth, the things that matter are not the things going on in the world most of which are tiresome anymore than it is football. It’s the things you can exhibit a measure of control over. The things you can take and build upon.

I spent my time away from here in pursuit of this and although frustrating at times especially recently (through no fault of my own) these are merely obstacles.

[HCZ_Reborn]

Yeah, it was hard to miss Neville twisting the knife. When you have wilfully blind commentators like this it's easy to fall for the narrative. In the real world, that foul for the first goal was part of the set piece, no doubt. Just. lunge at the ankle, the guy goes down and because he can't get up in the split second where is man is free Neville compounds his coy avoidance of the foul to focus on the inaction of the defender. Nice. He was also a little bit lopsided on the clear penalties that were waved away. I'm still confused about VAR. With VAR that first goal never happens. And the pens get given. So what actually triggers VAR?

That's not to disguise the shite performance and the fact Brighton, notwithstanding their "special" tactics, passed us off the pitch.

There is something to be said for playing to the whistle. But it seemed so blatant that they could be forgiven for simply assuming a foul would have been blown for.

Mitoma is an excellent player, his speed, agility and ball control have perturbed many a full back this season. But for all this talk of good football it was more a case of one long ball played out to him when we had foolishly pushed up too high

We should do a Bayern Munich and neutralise the threat by buying him

[Niall_Quinn]

I did actually watch the game, from about the 25th minute.

What happened to Matinelli? At a guess I'd say he was targeted early on and booted out of the game. Sensible, because he's the best player out there by a mile. Or maybe it was just bad luck, because it's very obvious that Trossard bloke is no replacement.

White though. Why is he playing at full back? He's so unsuited to that role. Are we really that short of options?

Brighton are dirty bastards, but they do it well. Not knocking them for that, it's part of the game. And they mix the agricultural stuff with a very tight passing game. Which we couldn't live with. Because we weren't prepared to boot them off the field too. Which we should have done. Fight fire with fire and leave it to the crowd to put the ref on warning. That's what home advantage is supposed to get you. But we let them play their game. So naturally they had the upper hand from start to finish. They looked like the home side.

We really, really, really need a striker. A player that can go in elbows and studs and win the ball in the air and just be a menace for every speculative ball punted up the field. Jesus is not that. He's a good player, but he's not the guy who is going to wrestle back the game when you are getting owned. Instead he drifts out of it. Bouncing back in with the odd moment of skill which makes you think he made a contribution. But it's the stuff that doesn't make the highlights reel that's so important. The stuff players like that scrote Kane does for 90 minutes. Every barge, every elbow, every header back to the central playmaker, every time he drags two defenders and creates a hole. We should sign him. Why not?

I don't want to jump on Arteta, because he's the first manager in two decades to demonstrate progress. But I was a bit perplexed by the subs. When your are being out-passed and out-fought, why do you take off the two players that maybe, maybe could have upped the effort and replace them with a lightweight luxury player like Nelson and a the footballing version of the invisible man Partey? Game was over, 100% for certain, when those two came on. And I'm not getting at Nelson (haven't seen him much this year in fact) but I just can't figure what he was supposed to bring. Partey needs to be sold while his myth still carries water.

Then he brings on a scatter gun trio including ESR who hasn't played since the dinosaurs roamed.

Seemed a bit desperate and lacking in thought.

Bottom line though, they were played off the pitch, at home, when the gypos still have Brighton and Brentford to play. So, as things stand, we can fairly safely say the players still don't care as much as they should and still take their incredible privilege for granted. They might claim otherwise, but we have the results to prove it.

Next steps come in the transfer window. A striker, if nothing else. Don't do that and it's another year wasted. Get rid of the deadwood like Trossard and Partey and White and replace with the finished article if possible, youth if not. And if the full back cover is really that light, do something about it.

NO CHANCE of winning the title next season. NONE WHATSOEVER. Guaranteed.

But another season of teaching this lot how to kick a ball and then coaxing them into believing they are men with balls? Who knows?

As for now, same old Arsenal. Apart from the 81 points. The 81 points is quite surprising really.

[Letters]

Dropping 12 points in a period of 7 games…suggests there’s something very wrong indeed with our mentality

I hate to go all NQ because frankly if I believed all he did, I’d just hang myself from the futility of it all

But we’ve become far too used to this, winning two games from seven is not something you can do and expect to win a title no matter what you’ve done before hand in a season…it’s just untenable.

There’s no caveats to be found here, no bigger picture….this is plain unacceptable….and there’s no yes but to act as a qualifier

Well, allow me to retort. I think there is a "yes, but", and here it comes.
Yes that run isn't good enough but...
2 of those points dropped were at Anfield. Yes, we were 2-0 up but Liverpool have a very strong home record and with the penalty miss and Ramsdale's heroics at the end we could easily have lost it. You could see it as a point gained just as much as 2 points dropped. 3 of the points we dropped were at The Ethiad where...I mean, I was disappointed we didn't do better there but they're basically walloping everyone right now, they're in that mood and they've certainly got the measure of us. And you're counting yesterday's 3 points when the title had already all but gone. My guess is the Everton result got to them yesterday. I was talking to someone last week and said I was still deluding myself that City could yet slip. He agreed but said that the first slip had to be at the weekend. As soon as City cruised through that one the game was up. We knew it, the players knew it. And look at the players they rested and still easily got a result. We just don't have the resources or squad depth to do that.
So that leaves the West Ham and Southampton results. Both unacceptable. Although if we're talking about mentality, coming back from 3-1 down to get a point...obviously we shouldn't have been 3-1 down, but would we have come back like that in any other season of late? Not a chance.

So sure, we've had our wobbles but even with all that if we'd just drawn one of the City games then all other things being equal we'd have started yesterday 3 points ahead of them with them having a game in hand. With their better goal difference they'd still have been favourites but we'd have had a chance. As it was a point behind and them having a game in hand and them winning yesterday...

I'm not happy about yesterday, you run to the line. But we're seeing a lot of strange end of season results right now. They've won enough "must win" games this year to make be believe that our mentality is significantly better than it has been. We always knew that injuries and inexperience would most likely cost us, and so it's proven. But it's not normal to be winning 15 out of 17 as City have, they can put out a 2nd string who would win most games. We just don't have that depth and we all knew we didn't.

There's a big summer coming up. We've got the CL place now which brings the money and prestige to attract big players. We have to make a statement this summer and push on next year.

[Mac76]

@NQ

100% correct about the striker, it's what we need the most

Partey is clearly going to drop down the pecking order given we're looking to get Rice or Caicedo

White seems to divide opinion almost more than any other player, personally I think he's been great this season but as things have gone on and Arteta has predictably played both White and Saka into the ground, that partnership has lost its energy

I've seen him be very good defensively but without Saliba we've been shot at the back

And i suspect you missed the earlier Trossard appearances where he was really effective, I guess Arteta's been busy coaching it out of him

So no, we don't sell any of them except maybe Partey, as he's injury prone and we could get decent money for him before he's too old

[Mac76]

@Letters

Past results are irrelevant, we did enough in the first 40 minutes in the Anfield game to win it, it was the only time i thought we really could win the league

But we showed we weren't mentally ready when Xhaka acted like an arsehole and broke our focus - coupled with the terrible subbing of Odegaard for Kiwior, which was a clear demonstration of Arteta losing his nerve, plus his failure to replace Zinchenko with someone who can actually play left back far too late in the game, that was why we only drew

Our confidence was then gone and the West Ham and Saints results were, IMO, a direct consequence

We, in particular Arteta, simply weren't ready for this title challenge

[Letters]

We, in particular Arteta, simply weren't ready for this title challenge
This is true, but given that last year we were flailing around failing to finish Top 4, despite that being in our hands at this stage, I don't think we had any reasonable expectation of a title challenge this year.
The goal this year was Top 4, it's been a nice surprise that we've been genuine contenders this year and therefore a bitter disappointment that we haven't finished the job.
But holy shit, 15 wins out of 17. Win the next one and that will be half a season where they've got 50 points out of 54.
Sure, we've wobbled but don't all teams? We knew injuries would cost us, they have. We knew inexperience could cost us, it has.
I'm disappointed, but it always felt like a bridge too far this season. It's actually because we've been so unexpectedly good and stayed in the race so long that it feels so disappointing. There were a couple of times where I started to think "holy shit, we might actually do this!", but there was always a nagging doubt.
We need a good summer in the transfer window and push on next year. But I don't know how you stop this City team. It's not like we're failing where others have succeeded. Liverpool only beat them by being basically perfect till the title was all but wrapped up in February.

[Marc Overmars]

Well, allow me to retort. I think there is a "yes, but", and here it comes.
Yes that run isn't good enough but...
2 of those points dropped were at Anfield. Yes, we were 2-0 up but Liverpool have a very strong home record and with the penalty miss and Ramsdale's heroics at the end we could easily have lost it. You could see it as a point gained just as much as 2 points dropped. 3 of the points we dropped were at The Ethiad where...I mean, I was disappointed we didn't do better there but they're basically walloping everyone right now, they're in that mood and they've certainly got the measure of us. And you're counting yesterday's 3 points when the title had already all but gone. My guess is the Everton result got to them yesterday. I was talking to someone last week and said I was still deluding myself that City could yet slip. He agreed but said that the first slip had to be at the weekend. As soon as City cruised through that one the game was up. We knew it, the players knew it. And look at the players they rested and still easily got a result. We just don't have the resources or squad depth to do that.
So that leaves the West Ham and Southampton results. Both unacceptable. Although if we're talking about mentality, coming back from 3-1 down to get a point...obviously we shouldn't have been 3-1 down, but would we have come back like that in any other season of late? Not a chance.

So sure, we've had our wobbles but even with all that if we'd just drawn one of the City games then all other things being equal we'd have started yesterday 3 points ahead of them with them having a game in hand. With their better goal difference they'd still have been favourites but we'd have had a chance. As it was a point behind and them having a game in hand and them winning yesterday...

I'm not happy about yesterday, you run to the line. But we're seeing a lot of strange end of season results right now. They've won enough "must win" games this year to make be believe that our mentality is significantly better than it has been. We always knew that injuries and inexperience would most likely cost us, and so it's proven. But it's not normal to be winning 15 out of 17 as City have, they can put out a 2nd string who would win most games. We just don't have that depth and we all knew we didn't.

There's a big summer coming up. We've got the CL place now which brings the money and prestige to attract big players. We have to make a statement this summer and push on next year.

That Southampton game was diabolical and the moment I felt the title had got away from us. Even if we had miraculously won that game 4-3 it wouldn’t have changed anything. That’s the worst team in the league and remains the only result they’ve got in months FFS. The fact we were even 1-3 down to begin with told us a lot more than snatching a point at the death did. You can’t be involved in as many ping pong games as we’ve been this season and expect to have any composure at the finish line.

City are a machine and maybe it was inevitable but there’s no doubt we badly let ourselves down when it was in our hands.

[Letters]

That and the West Ham games are the ones that pissed me off most. Anfield I can accept, they're a good side at home. But those two, nowhere near good enough.

[Mac76]

all true, though I do think there was something about how we got battered in the second half at Anfield, after doing so well in the first, that left scars

I cracked open a bottle of beer when i got home last night (after going to the pub first ofc...) and sat quietly thinking about it all - I did feel a sadness for the players - we can have a go at them for some of these performances but it's just been a tough lesson in, as Letters says, what you need to do at this level to contend with a team like Citeh

My views on Arteta are very mixed but I do respect most of the players and they will be hurting right now - yes, yes, I know people will say that they can sob into their big piles of cash etc so who cares, but still it's all relative - I don't think they 'bottled' this season but they did freeze at times, there's a difference

I'd like to feel more optimistic about next season, but with Arteta in charge my jury will be out until he proves that, instead of heaping all the blame onto the players as he appears to have done yet again yesterday, he's prepared to take a long hard look at himself also, as I believe our falling short has at least as much to do with him than any player

[Letters]

I believe our falling short has at least as much to do with him than any player
I'm not that sure you can blame either.
City could get 94 points, I think we all know that if they needed to win those games then they would.
So I don't think that us not getting 95 points is much of a failing.
You can certainly look at games here and there where we could and should have done better, but overall I don't know how we compete with a side who have the squad depth to compete in all the major competitions at the same time and can rest players like they did yesterday and still cruise through games.

[Marc Overmars]

all true, though I do think there was something about how we got battered in the second half at Anfield, after doing so well in the first, that left scars

I cracked open a bottle of beer when i got home last night (after going to the pub first ofc...) and sat quietly thinking about it all - I did feel a sadness for the players - we can have a go at them for some of these performances but it's just been a tough lesson in, as Letters says, what you need to do at this level to contend with a team like Citeh

My views on Arteta are very mixed but I do respect most of the players and they will be hurting right now - yes, yes, I know people will say that they can sob into their big piles of cash etc so who cares, but still it's all relative - I don't think they 'bottled' this season but they did freeze at times, there's a difference

I'd like to feel more optimistic about next season, but with Arteta in charge my jury will be out until he proves that, instead of heaping all the blame onto the players as he appears to have done yet again yesterday, he's prepared to take a long hard look at himself also, as I believe our falling short has at least as much to do with him than any player

He’s made mistakes for sure. Main one being yet again failing to use his squad when certain players weren’t delivering anymore. I think we all agree Kiwior and Jorginho should have been starting games before they eventually did. Saka has gone AWOL for a month but somehow still finds himself starting every game while Trossard who’s generally done well with the limited game time sits on the bench. Tierney, who looked like a bum yesterday but who can blame him has been frozen out while Zinchenko’s effectiveness wore out after teams began exploiting the space he’d always leave.

Big summer ahead, we need to go hard and be ruthless with the squad.

[IBK]

Yesterday was a debacle, but for me the game had the feeling of being one game too far. We ralllied against Newcastle when - for all of the release of pressure in the title race - there was something to play for. Not just the slim hope that the unexpected could happen in the title race, but desire to atone for last season.

This team has been running on fumes for weeks. Certain players have been run into the ground, and it shows. I am not going to go all out for Arteta in this - but I have heard people liken the league to a marathon type race where you need to pace yourself for a strong finish, and I am not sure that we have had the nous, or the players, or the squad size to do this. With our first choice 11 fit and firing we are a match for anyone - including Citeh at least at times in our home game against them. With key players absent, the replacements mean a drop in quality - at least playing the system that Arteta prefers. The shock yesterday was that we also fell well below the required level in terms of mentality and desire - and I feel that Citeh's result at Everton was partly to blame for this. We had all seen that game at Goodison Park as a Hail Mary that on obdurate and counter-attacking Everton with relegation to avoid might just get something (as they did against us). The fact that Citeh not only won but blew them away must have been deflating for our players as well as us fans. Without the league title, we basically had nothing to play for, and once we went a goal down we looked like this.

So I feel resigned rather than angry today.

I do hope, however, that we can learn from this game - and from our drop off over the past month. We to recruit need 3 or 4 players above the level of most of our current ones if we are going to push on next season - a striker; in MF and at RB in particular. We need another Saliba type CD. We ned to learn how to rotate before players blow up. And we need to learn to focus at home like we often manage to do away. I do think that there was an element of underestimating Brighton - or at least their energy and desire. we seemed so flat and ponderous yesterday - and have been too vulnerable in a number of home games this season.

I have to say that for all his defensive frailties it looked like we missed Zinchenko yesterday. But also I feel that we have become over dependent on him; Partey (our decline has coincided with his form going off a cliff), and Martinelli - just as we were on Saka earlier before he ran out of juice.

It actually wouldn't surprise me if we win our final 2 games, but this end of season has shown the need to reach another level in terms of sustaining form and focus if we are to improve again.

[Letters]

I have heard people liken the league to a marathon type race where you need to pace yourself for a strong finish, and I am not sure that we have had the nous, or the players, or the squad size to do this.
I don't know how you do that against a side who have basically, to continue the analogy, run at 100m pace for half the marathon.
We just don't have the squad to keep up with them for that long. I think we all knew it from the start.

[Mac76]

I have to say that for all his defensive frailties it looked like we missed Zinchenko yesterday.

I've been waiting for someone to say this - i did think about it a little, but let's be honest the danger came from the other flank with Mitoma and Estupinian

If you want to know if Tierney did ok or not, i noted Mitoma was on the right for Brighton earlier on in the first half, perhaps De Zerbi thought Tierney would be a weakness...

...clearly not, as Mitoma swapped flanks and on that side in the second half he trashed us

tbh Brighton probably would have gone ahead earlier if it had been Mitoma v Zinchenko

[Marc Overmars]

The thing is, we did actually give ourselves the best possible chance to win it. We went out of all the cups early and were left with a game a week and only one goal.

We let ourselves down and I believe we could have done more in this run-in, regardless of what City have done. From the position we were in to not even take it to the final day and also possibly now finish a sizeable distance from City is quite shit whichever way you want to look at it.

[Mac76]

I don't know how you do that against a side who have basically, to continue the analogy, run at 100m pace for half the marathon.
We just don't have the squad to keep up with them for that long. I think we all knew it from the start.

yes, but none of us expected us to get as far as we did, when Citeh beat us at the Etihad that was supposed to be that, but then they slipped up and we won about 7 games in a row

no matter how many times you repeat the 'Citeh are a machine' argument, for me that is not enough of a reason, given how close we got

if we'd beaten Saints and West Ham - just those two games - we'd have 5 more points

those results had nothing to do with Citeh, they were the result of inexperience, both Arteta's and the squad

ok, so Citeh's players have more experience and wouldn't psychologically slip up like that, I get it

it's just frustrating to know we had the ability and with a bit more guile, mainly on Artea's part, we could have got there

[HCZ_Reborn]

So I was curious as to whether 12 hours on I’d feel any different from yesterday

I don’t….all this stuff about reacting to the Everton result is a pathetic excuse. What’s more illuminating is that we’ve lost three times in a row at home to Brighton and if anything have moved further away from neutralising the threat they carry.

This is not a case of holding your hands up and saying they were better on the day…it’s examining why that was the case they didn’t do anything they haven’t done all season. Which suggests that a) Arteta got it wrong with his tactics or B) The players just weren’t up for it or C) Both

Arteta is quite right to apologise, we aren’t some provincial club that punched above its weight we are one of the biggest clubs in England….standards should always be high and there should be hell to pay when they are not met. Yesterday was a game where I genuinely felt ashamed of every player on the pitch….they simply did not try. They didn’t like being kicked about and just gave up.

[HCZ_Reborn]

The thing is the more I look back on it the more I see tactical failings

Arteta bemoans the second half performance but it was clear to see that holding the high line wasn’t working because both Enciso and Mitoma were quick enough to hold their runs so as to not be caught offside from long balls into them but equally quick enough to outpace the defence. Now granted White was flummoxed by Mitoma even when we did drop deep and that should call into question whether we should persist with him at right back.

A player like Xhaka is completely useless to you in games like this, Jorginho and Partey should have started. Partey to double up on Mitoma and bully him. Jorginho to play the kind of passes Brighton were playing to put our attacking players in.

I don’t buy that we didn’t have the personnel to win comfortably yesterday

[Letters]

The thing is, we did actually give ourselves the best possible chance to win it. We went out of all the cups early and were left with a game a week and only one goal.

We let ourselves down and I believe we could have done more in this run-in, regardless of what City have done. From the position we were in to not even take it to the final day and also possibly now finish a sizeable distance from City is quite shit whichever way you want to look at it.

I'm disappointed we haven't pushed them a bit harder, but I think we just ran out of steam.
We all knew that we don't have the squad depth of City and that injuries would hurt us and that's exactly what's happened.
There are definitely individual games where we should have done better, but I'd suggest those are mitigated by some excellent wins. Overall it's been a good effort from where we were last season. I'm disappointed, although not surprised, we haven't finished the job. We should have taken it to the final day though. That Newcastle result was fantastic and showed that we were trying to keep going. I still think the Everton result probably got in their heads. I think we all knew the game was up after that.

[IBK]

I've been waiting for someone to say this - i did think about it a little, but let's be honest the danger came from the other flank with Mitoma and Estupinian

If you want to know if Tierney did ok or not, i noted Mitoma was on the right for Brighton earlier on in the first half, perhaps De Zerbi thought Tierney would be a weakness...

...clearly not, as Mitoma swapped flanks and on that side in the second half he trashed us

tbh Brighton probably would have gone ahead earlier if it had been Mitoma v Zinchenko

I don't think there is such a debate about Zinchenko v Tierney defensively, but what Zin does by coming inside is provide another passing outlet - helping us retain and recycle the ball. So its not about Tierney per se - its whether in the system Arteta plays we rely on Zinchenko's ability to keep possession - which I think we do.

Of course it's all hypothetical and open to interpretation, but IMO the reason we find Brighton difficult to play against is that they are good both at keeping possession and breaking at speed. I think that Zin helps us retain the ball. Mitoma is a fine player and I agree that he destroyed Ben White in the second half but Zin helps us offensively - Tierney had only 6 or 7 touches in the first half IIRC.

[IBK]

I don't know how you do that against a side who have basically, to continue the analogy, run at 100m pace for half the marathon.
We just don't have the squad to keep up with them for that long. I think we all knew it from the start.

Perhaps - but maybe a slightly more judicious use of the players we have available might have helped. Like I say, player quality and squad size has been an issue for us. All hindsight now of course, but we have certainly blown up over the past month...

[Letters]

Keown's thoughts - similar to mine, talks about squad depth and how the Everton game would have made us a bit flat.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Mmkt-8wEJI

[Mac76]

I think that Zin helps us retain the ball..

I don't - he often gives the ball away in dangerous positions and gets the opposition onto the front foot - you could pick this out 2-3 times in every game, so he doesn't provide safety and when he isn't giving the ball away, he just slows our attack down by clogging up the midfield, taking too many touches and often not doing much with his passing

[Marc Overmars]

Sorry but I just don’t buy the Everton game excuse. If that was really case and that game made them essentially give up, quite frankly they’re cowards.

[Letters]

Sorry but I just don’t buy the Everton game excuse. If that was really case and that game made them essentially give up, quite frankly they’re cowards.

I wouldn't be calling Keown a coward personally. I mean, he's been there and done it. He also talks about squad depth, we all knew that was going to be a problem.

[Mac76]

Sorry but I just don’t buy the Everton game excuse. If that was really case and that game made them essentially give up, quite frankly they’re cowards.

i'm not sure 'cowards' is the right word, but I do think Arteta could have tried to lower teh pressure by saying "whatever, fuck it, just go out there, play good football and show Brighton how it's done"

he clearly had them all fired up about winning the title which is all well and good, but once that's gone you've got to have a motivational plan B - but of course Arteta doesn't do a Plan B so ...

[Marc Overmars]

Yeah maybe not the right word but I just don’t understand why they’d throw the towel in. That’s literally all they’ve been fighting for this season. The likelihood of City slipping up was slim but at least be there to capitalise. Just sounds like loser talk to me.

Liverpool never had that attitude and they pushed City to the extreme. They missed out twice with 90+ points but they also created a monstrous team as a result of that never give up attitude which did win the league and everything else to go with it.

[HCZ_Reborn]

No I think Cowards is the exactly right description. As soon as they saw that Brighton were prepared to get physical…they decided they weren’t up for it

[Letters]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/65595331


Data experts Nielsen's Gracenote suggest it was not a case of Arsenal 'bottling' the title, with their current total of 81 points exactly matching their projections.

Instead, it is Manchester City raising the bar even higher, with their calculations showing City have "outperformed expectations by seven points since mid-January".

Data :bow:

[selassie]

I don't think there is such a debate about Zinchenko v Tierney defensively, but what Zin does by coming inside is provide another passing outlet - helping us retain and recycle the ball. So its not about Tierney per se - its whether in the system Arteta plays we rely on Zinchenko's ability to keep possession - which I think we do.

Of course it's all hypothetical and open to interpretation, but IMO the reason we find Brighton difficult to play against is that they are good both at keeping possession and breaking at speed. I think that Zin helps us retain the ball. Mitoma is a fine player and I agree that he destroyed Ben White in the second half but Zin helps us offensively - Tierney had only 6 or 7 touches in the first half IIRC.

I think a lot of these debates per say come down to us not having a strong enough squad. I am not suggesting that if we kept our starting XI fit all season we would have won the league, but right now the system and the performance level is reliant on pretty much our core starting XI being fit. As we have seen over the past few months and especially yesterday, our performance levels drop off a cliff when we have core players missing. MO touched on it earlier but our defensive record at home or more importantly recently has been actually really bad, we are conceeding 2 or 3 goals on average in a lot of games.

We have run out of steam and we are clearly not quite good enough when it comes to mounting a challenge on City to the final day.

This summer is going to be really crucial in terms of recruitment, we need to get it right and we need to purchasing players who are capable of slotting straight into the First XI without an obvious performance drop, this summer is not about finding gems, it's about finding quality players who are ready to contribute right now to a CL and PL challenging team, that's the standard we need to aspire to.

Obviously other factors come into play such as Arteta and the coaching staff and even the players within the club continuing to develop / improve, but we need to get the basics right first otherwise next season may not be anywhere near as enjoyable as this season.

[HCZ_Reborn]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/65595331



Data :bow:

The data gathering method used to create a points projection is often just as technically sophisticated as tossing a coin 500 times and basing your prediction on where it’s likely to land based on where it’s landed the previous 500 times. Add some XG into the equation for good measure and you’re essentially doing little more than reading tea leaves.

Yet it couldn’t predict City winning the games that it did yet none of us batted a single eyelid about it

The two fixtures where I could have conceived of them dropping points they’ve yet to play but we’ve crumbled to dust before we even got to that point.

As far as I’m concerned the points dropped at West Ham, Southampton and Brighton were eminently winnable fixtures. More so when you drop 15 points after 29 games and drop a further 12 in the following seven I’m literally amazed anyone can reach any conclusion but bottling it

[HCZ_Reborn]

Ultimately titles are usually won, one of two ways. The first is to go on a run of winning games from February-March to the end of the season. The second is to build up such a substantial lead that it doesn’t matter if you have the odd unscheduled bowel movement.

Either way if anyone can tell me who last won the league despite going four games without a win I’d be grateful because I sure as hell don’t recall it happening in my living memory

[Mac76]

I think a lot of these debates per say come down to us not having a strong enough squad. I am not suggesting that if we kept our starting XI fit all season we would have won the league, but right now the system and the performance level is reliant on pretty much our core starting XI being fit. As we have seen over the past few months and especially yesterday, our performance levels drop off a cliff when we have core players missing. MO touched on it earlier but our defensive record at home or more importantly recently has been actually really bad, we are conceeding 2 or 3 goals on average in a lot of games.

We have run out of steam and we are clearly not quite good enough when it comes to mounting a challenge on City to the final day.

This summer is going to be really crucial in terms of recruitment, we need to get it right and we need to purchasing players who are capable of slotting straight into the First XI without an obvious performance drop, this summer is not about finding gems, it's about finding quality players who are ready to contribute right now to a CL and PL challenging team, that's the standard we need to aspire to.

Obviously other factors come into play such as Arteta and the coaching staff and even the players within the club continuing to develop / improve, but we need to get the basics right first otherwise next season may not be anywhere near as enjoyable as this season.

That last point is of concern to me - I'll keep an open mind but there's a potential version of next season that could be a bit grim, where Arteta fails to learn any lessons on squad rotation, teams and tactics, we lose some useful good players like Tierney, Balogun and Nelson but don't recruit sufficiently, other teams get stronger and we have an unkind early fixture list (which as we know, with the exception of this season, is pretty much the norm) - it could be a Chelsea-like season if we're not careful

think of the opposition now, it's no longer a big six but a big seven or eight - us, Citeh, Man Ure, Chelsea, Newcastle, Liverpool, Brighton, possibly Villa and possibly even Spuds if they themselves don't implode as much as I'm hoping...

[Mac76]

This is interesting - while Brighton, Newcastle and one or two others are also fairly low, we're by far and away the least-rotated side

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FwLdPuTWcAEcEUB?format=jpg&name=small

[HCZ_Reborn]

This is interesting - while Brighton, Newcastle and one or two others are also fairly low, we're by far and away the least-rotated side

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FwLdPuTWcAEcEUB?format=jpg&name=small

Yeah and Chelsea are equally there to show the folly of over rotating. But it is a concern, I felt we rotated too often under Emery and it showed that he had no idea what his strongest side was. But ultimately what we do is run players into the ground and then act surprise when players brought into replace them haven’t had enough match play to really find any kind of form.

I think what perturbed me the most was playing senior players in the Europa league and the fa cup when right off the bat they should have been treated as incidental fixtures.

The champions league is the premier European competition so yes of course we should play our strongest team (especially as we are not likely to be seeded and will have to face one of the big European sides in the group stage).

I do genuinely wish there was someone out there who struck me as likely to take this side further than Arteta otherwise it feels like too much of an unnecessary gamble. Though part of me would like to see Arteta sacked just because I dislike him so much, wipe that smug superior look off his stupid face

[Letters]

More so when you drop 15 points after 29 games and drop a further 12 in the following seven I’m literally amazed anyone can reach any conclusion but bottling it
Well, there are a few factors.
One is the thinness of our squad, we always knew that injuries and fatigue could cost us, they have.
Another factor is that our run in was harder than City’s. We had to play 3 of the Top 6 away. So one could reasonably claim that we were always more likely to drop more points in the run in and because of the above.
But also we were never that far ahead to begin with. There was a fleeting moment when we were 8 points clear but that was only half way through the season. After that every time it was 8 points it was with City having a game in hand. And they just kept winning them, and every other game.

We have definitely dropped points that we shouldn’t have, but do you really think we could have got 95 points? That’s what we’d have needed given City just keep winning. That feels unrealistic despite our amazing form for much of the season, for the reasons I’ve given.

City are just better than us. They’re better than everyone. And we all know how they’ve got there. What I don’t understand is why no one calls them out on it. The fawning over them is nauseating. They’re not a plucky underdog come good like Leicester

[21_GOONER_SALUTE]

Yeah and Chelsea are equally there to show the folly of over rotating. But it is a concern, I felt we rotated too often under Emery and it showed that he had no idea what his strongest side was. But ultimately what we do is run players into the ground and then act surprise when players brought into replace them haven’t had enough match play to really find any kind of form.

I think what perturbed me the most was playing senior players in the Europa league and the fa cup when right off the bat they should have been treated as incidental fixtures.

The champions league is the premier European competition so yes of course we should play our strongest team (especially as we are not likely to be seeded and will have to face one of the big European sides in the group stage).

I do genuinely wish there was someone out there who struck me as likely to take this side further than Arteta otherwise it feels like too much of an unnecessary gamble. Though part of me would like to see Arteta sacked just because I dislike him so much, wipe that smug superior look off his stupid face

I do agree with you that Emery didn't know his best 11 when he was with us, but as shown again with the Villa stats, it was pretty much of an anomaly for him.

It might be that coming directly from PSG (where face it, he was forced to rotate a lot) he carried that bad habit with him.....but all the things we criticised him for, silly rotations and poor defending have been corrected in his subsequent clubs pretty fast.

We insisted on blooding this Rookie and well it can definitely be argued that by Rookie standards he's achieved amazing things.

But to say experienced managers, who've made most of the mistakes he's still going to make with us, cannot improve this team...as it is now...is quite silly to me.

Whatever happens, Arteta will probably get one more season, but I cannot currently fathom how he will be able to get this team to perform better in the league next season when they'll be playing the best in Europe every other week. Who knows, it'll probably be all over in January as usual.

Lets see though, we've waited 19 years, another 5 or 7 years in the wilderness should be ok for us to bear, no?

[HCZ_Reborn]

Well, there are a few factors.
One is the thinness of our squad, we always knew that injuries and fatigue could cost us, they have.
Another factor is that our run in was harder than City’s. We had to play of the Top 6 away. So one could reasonably claim that we were always more likely to drop more points in the run in and because of the above.
But also we were never that far ahead to begin with. There was a fleeting moment when we were 8 points clear but that was only half way through the season. After that every time it was 8 points it was with City having a game in hand. And they just kept winning them, and every other game.

We have definitely dropped points that we shouldn’t have, but do you really think we could have got 95 points? That’s what we’d have needed given City just keep winning. That feels unrealistic despite our amazing form for much of the season, for the reasons I’ve given.

City are just better than us. They’re better than everyone. And we all know how they’ve got there. What I don’t understand is why no one calls them out on it. The fawning over them is nauseating. They’re not a plucky underdog come good like Leicester

I think we should have probably got 94 points yes. I never expected us to go to Liverpool, city and Newcastle and not drop some points no….but I expected us to win the other games and saw no reason why we didn’t other than mental weakness.

If we fell short on GD or one or two points I could accept that.

But we didn’t, you seem to think I’m saying not winning the title was bottling it. No I’m saying not pushing them every step of the way was bottling it.

[Letters]

But we didn’t, you seem to think I’m saying not winning the title was bottling it. No I’m saying not pushing them every step of the way was bottling it.

Ok. Well I don’t really agree but that position is more reasonable.
I don’t agree because I don’t think we crumbled under the pressure. It might have been a factor but we’ve won a lot of “must win” games this year, including last weekend. I think our drop off has been more to do with injuries and fatigue. Those are the things which always seemed likely to cost us and they have. Inexperience in handling the pressure was probably a factor, but I’m not sure it was the main one.

[Letters]

Either way if anyone can tell me who last won the league despite going four games without a win I’d be grateful because I sure as hell don’t recall it happening in my living memory

Not quite what you’re asking but Arsenal did go on an 8 game run of
W2 D2 L4
In 97/98, which isn't exactly stellar.
But, crucially, it was all before Christmas. There was time to recover.
The thing about City is they seem to have the knack of slipping up here and there in the first half of the season, while staying in contention. Then in the run in they’re basically flawless which means unless you’ve got a serious lead - and we never had that - you’re getting mown down unless you can match them stride for stride.

I don’t think our positions are too far apart. I don’t think we’d have won the league anyway, but we could and should have made City work for it rather than handing it to them.

[HCZ_Reborn]

Ive looked at the period to which you refer and in fact the longest we went in the league without a win was three games

[Letters]

Ive looked at the period to which you refer and in fact the longest we went in the league without a win was three games

Yes, I did say that it didn’t meet your exact criteria. But as an extended run it’s not exactly the stuff of champions. But early season you can get away with it.

[Mac76]

We insisted on blooding this Rookie and well it can definitely be argued that by Rookie standards he's achieved amazing things.

But to say experienced managers, who've made most of the mistakes he's still going to make with us, cannot improve this team...as it is now...is quite silly to me.

Whatever happens, Arteta will probably get one more season, but I cannot currently fathom how he will be able to get this team to perform better in the league next season when they'll be playing the best in Europe every other week. Who knows, it'll probably be all over in January as usual.



yes, this is why i think if we were Ambramovic's Chelsea we'd be showing Arteta the door and getting someone in who has CL experience, knows how to rotate players and adapt tactics and style to suit the circumstances.

we won't though and sure, we probably should give him the chance to show he can learn from his mistakes, but i think we could well fall disastrously short next season.

tbh if we do terribly and it means he goes, then it could well be a blessing in disguise, rather than have years of his just doing well enough to keep his job but us always being fundamentally flawed

of course the irony is that at the piont when he is a genuinely good manager (if he ever gets there), he'll bugger off from his own personal training ground to Barca or somewhere

[HCZ_Reborn]

I do agree with you that Emery didn't know his best 11 when he was with us, but as shown again with the Villa stats, it was pretty much of an anomaly for him.

It might be that coming directly from PSG (where face it, he was forced to rotate a lot) he carried that bad habit with him.....but all the things we criticised him for, silly rotations and poor defending have been corrected in his subsequent clubs pretty fast.

We insisted on blooding this Rookie and well it can definitely be argued that by Rookie standards he's achieved amazing things.

But to say experienced managers, who've made most of the mistakes he's still going to make with us, cannot improve this team...as it is now...is quite silly to me.

Whatever happens, Arteta will probably get one more season, but I cannot currently fathom how he will be able to get this team to perform better in the league next season when they'll be playing the best in Europe every other week. Who knows, it'll probably be all over in January as usual.

Lets see though, we've waited 19 years, another 5 or 7 years in the wilderness should be ok for us to bear, no?

The problem you and Mac76 have is that you talk of this better, more experienced coach

But you can’t name him

Chelsea make moves to remove their coach if they can be guaranteed a better person…in the past that might have been true but they replaced Thomas Tuchel with Graham Potter

There just isn’t this parade of experienced and top managers to choose from.

PSG for example replaced Pochettino with Galtier from Nice.

I genuinely wish there was an outstanding candidate to go for. The way there was ten years ago when it was obvious we should have moved Wenger on and brought in Klopp


At this moment in time it would feel like ditching Arteta for the sake of it and as much as part of me would like to do that because I don’t like him, it doesn’t feel like a sustainable move when there isn’t a glaringly obvious replacement

[Marc Overmars]

It can’t be denied that despite the crushing disappointment of how this season has ended, Arteta has delivered something meaningful and that’s CL qualification for the first time in 6 seasons. Will probably be our highest points tally in a generation too.

Far too early to talk about moving on from him, he’s earned the right to carry on. Whether he will learn from his mistakes or not remains to be seen, but his rookie years are over now and he should have gained enough experience to evolve as a coach. He’s won a cup, rebuilt the team and flirted with the title. Roll on next season.

[Mac76]

It can’t be denied that despite the crushing disappointment of how this season has ended, Arteta has delivered something meaningful and that’s CL qualification for the first time in 6 seasons. Will probably be our highest points tally in a generation too.

Far too early to talk about moving on from him, he’s earned the right to carry on. Whether he will learn from his mistakes or not remains to be seen, but his rookie years are over now and he should have gained enough experience to evolve as a coach. He’s won a cup, rebuilt the team and flirted with the title. Roll on next season.

I do agree, my Chelsea point is just another way to explain how short he is of where we need him to be

if he does learn then great, but by then we almost certainly will have lost Balogun, Tierney and Nelson, all of whom are players we should be hanging on to IMO, and that will be significantly down to him - so in other words we'll continue to be suffering from the mistakes he's made already - but again i recognise a new manager, unless we got them in quick enough to prevent those players from leaving, wouldn't solve that

and no HCZ i don't know who it is, but that won't stop me from saying Arteta is far from perfect

[IBK]

I think a lot of these debates per say come down to us not having a strong enough squad. I am not suggesting that if we kept our starting XI fit all season we would have won the league, but right now the system and the performance level is reliant on pretty much our core starting XI being fit. As we have seen over the past few months and especially yesterday, our performance levels drop off a cliff when we have core players missing. MO touched on it earlier but our defensive record at home or more importantly recently has been actually really bad, we are conceeding 2 or 3 goals on average in a lot of games.

We have run out of steam and we are clearly not quite good enough when it comes to mounting a challenge on City to the final day.

This summer is going to be really crucial in terms of recruitment, we need to get it right and we need to purchasing players who are capable of slotting straight into the First XI without an obvious performance drop, this summer is not about finding gems, it's about finding quality players who are ready to contribute right now to a CL and PL challenging team, that's the standard we need to aspire to.

Obviously other factors come into play such as Arteta and the coaching staff and even the players within the club continuing to develop / improve, but we need to get the basics right first otherwise next season may not be anywhere near as enjoyable as this season.

Pretty much. Your comments re our home form are correct as well - and we were shipping goals when saliba was in the team too. The problem is that we press high - and this is exposed particularly when at home, the onus is on us to attack. Funny how 2 seasons ago we were much more effective defensively but we don't seem to have found the balance - does Arteta trust too much in our ability to retain possession further up the pitch?

I am also worried a bit about last season. For all our successess this season - it can't be denied that several of the stronger teams have underperfomed from where they would normally be expected to be. That said, the main disappointments for us have come against teams in the lower half of the league.

[IBK]

I don't - he often gives the ball away in dangerous positions and gets the opposition onto the front foot - you could pick this out 2-3 times in every game, so he doesn't provide safety and when he isn't giving the ball away, he just slows our attack down by clogging up the midfield, taking too many touches and often not doing much with his passing

Not sure I agree wholly. I think that Zinchenko offers passing options that a more traditional LB simply doesn't provide. He takes risks that can expose us yes - but by the same token we are not the same going forwards without him. This for me is the dichotomy with Arteta's current team in general - the fine balance between attack and defence sometimes goes wrong. And here is where I feel we need to find more ruthlessness in finishing chances. It certainly seems as though we create many goal scoring chances but are not efficient in putting them away. A proper no 9 might solve this?

[Mac76]

Not sure I agree wholly. I think that Zinchenko offers passing options that a more traditional LB simply doesn't provide. He takes risks that can expose us yes - but by the same token we are not the same going forwards without him. This for me is the dichotomy with Arteta's current team in general - the fine balance between attack and defence sometimes goes wrong. And here is where I feel we need to find more ruthlessness in finishing chances. It certainly seems as though we create many goal scoring chances but are not efficient in putting them away. A proper no 9 might solve this?

I think the "Zin v a traditional left back" arguement isn't exactly my point - there's two different aspects to what i think is wrong with Zin

1. i think Arteta should be better at picking the right team for the right game - in other words Tierney, as a proper LB, should have had a lot more game time this season, not because he's a better/worse player but, for example against Southampton at home, Liverpool away and Citeh away, plus other games i don't have time to try and remember, he'd have been a better starting option to give us more on that flank - an extra person in midfield was not what was needed in those games, which patently proved to be the case

2. Zin as a player isn't up to it, he makes too many high-risk errors and so we pay too high a price for what he allegedly gives us in midfield (which even at the best of times i think is exagerrated)