Match reaction vs Pool

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Originally Posted by Fist of Lehmann

I remember posting at the start of the season that Ozil was a great start, but that we needed at least 2 more Ozil level signings to properly compete. My thinking was based on some simple maths. Overall we've done very well to date but the Premiership is an asymmetrical race, everyone plays everyone else at different times so it can take some time before the results start to even out.

What we saw on Saturday may have been the start of our evening.

So to a degree I understand the reaction. For years we've been sold the vision of cake tomorrow instead of cake today. This year we've outperformed expectations, people started to believe that the cake had finally arrived. But for me cake this year would be ahead of schedule.

When you make structural changes to a business, or social reforms, or in fact any fundamental change to a large complex system, often those changes take time, months or even years, for their effects to filter down. Chelsea won nothing in their 1st year of Russian mafia money, Man City didn't win the league until their 4th year of obscene oil money spending.

The change is there, definitely. We culled deadwood ruthlessly, even when cancelling contracts or allowing free transfer cost us money. We sold no first teamers (unless you count Gervinho). We broke our transfer record on a single player by more than 2.5 times and signed the second most expensive player in Premier League history.

Whether this is sustained change though remains to be seen. Our last 5 transfers were Ozil + 2 frees (Flamini and Sanogo) and 2 loans (Viviano and Kallstrom). The difficulties aside, signing Count Draxula could have been the marker put down, a clear sign of intent. Aside from whatever he did on the pitch it would have given encouragement to a tiring squad, and renewed faith that the management was as motivated to win things as they were.

As things are now, people are starting to wonder whether the cake was illusionary.

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Very good post.

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Originally Posted by selassie

I do agree we have made progress this season and appear to be more organised but one of the reasons I have raised concerns post Liverpool and probably why many others have is because of what looks like a lack of planning on our part when approaching these crucial games, one thing I will say about Arsene is he appears to be very reactive and not proactive in his approach, be it tactics, team selection or his player recruitment policy (if one exists). Nobody is saying we are all doomed and rubbish, legitimate concerns are being raised about our manager and the team, that's the way I see it anyway.

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This is one of my biggest qualms with the modus operandi at the club. Everything appears to be as a belated action of a consequence we have just had to endure/incur. Nothing seems to ever be stemming from us taking the initiative any more....or to coin a phrase the club likes using at timely occasions, 'being ahead of the game'.

Being ahead of the game is the foundation upon which not only the Wenger legacy is built upon but the Hebert Chapman one is too. I'm not ashamed to say that I really do love Wenger and desperately and I mean desperately want him to be THE guy to take us forward..... After all, he is an Arsenal man and has been here the best part of 20 years. However, there are times when he makes it very difficult to defend him though which as a fan of a family centric club like ours can hurt against the mouthy arsewipes of other fans and the media.

I think it is easy to lambaste people for complaining whenever we lose. If you do it whilst we are winning it often comes across as superfluous complaining and nit picking for the sake of it and people aren't always discerning enough on this board and in general to tell when somebody has a genuine concern and point of view or when they are simply splitting hairs arbitrarily. The point at hand being made subsequently being swept by the wayside or being ignored all together as a consequence.

It is also quite churlish to say no forward steps have been taken. I for one was quite happy to see Wenger break the record on a 20-25 million transfer last summer and he went and broke the record 3 times over. Bloody hell, I thought. That act alone told me things are different but the more pertinent question is, how different? and is Wenger changing and adapting to the changing game quick enough? Is he thinking on his feet, is he boxing smart any more? You can't keep flogging us tomorrow. The time has to come eventually and the time is now.

His targets were a forward and a DCM last summer. He managed to sign neither of both the repute & potential long term standing. That was a pitiful way to meet ones targets at best even if the overriding feeling was elation (and relief) from the Ozil signing in a position which whilst more than welcome was not the most obvious. If you're going to cheap out, be found wanting or lacking in quality in an area in the modern game....you better damn well make sure it is in your forward line because you WILL be found wanting. And again...and again. Let's not pretend that forwards costing the most amount of money is a mere matter of glamour and prestige alone. You would be hard pressed to name a team who has won a major trophy without a world class forward and that is very difficult to get away from....and that's before even touching on the entire 1st halves of terrible, lethargic, football we periodically put out which we sometimes cannot recover from.

We were lining up here to ridicule the backline Liverpool were going to play against us and yet they may as well have had the day off because only their midfielders and Forward line saw the ball. As far as I'm concerned as soon as last Summer's window shut, January was always going to be a point of contention as to who Wenger would get in, because it was almost certainly going to be necessary. No point thinking...phew we got away with that one (in regard to transfers in the summer)....the pressure will only be back again in the next window, so we really ought to stop this lame routine of going into seasons with glaring holes and simply 'making do' or as Wenger says more often than I care to hear 'taking a gamble' on injury prone/young/untested players. At least not when we have cash reserves sitting in the bank.

I have said it before on here but we don't match up / compete with our former selves never mind with the current might of City/Chelsea. This Summer really should be make or break, but we kind of said that last summer, so it becomes increasingly harder to escape the feeling we are being strung along.

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Originally Posted by fakeyank

I think that statement is a bit premature. We seem to be heading in the right direction quite a few times every season. Some things that are common to Arsenal's season in the last 7-8 years:

- Go on unbeaten runs of 10-11 matches where we it seems like we made improvement from previous seasons
- Be the leader or there abouts the top 1-2 and then completely have a car crash Feb/March
- On the occasions we are close to the top, we sure as hell make sure we dont sign the needed players
- Finish above Spurs by the end of the season and it feels like we did something worthwhile
- Fuck around all through the transfer window making shit bids and/or not making a bid at all

The only reason I see that there is some progress this season is Ozil and the money we paid for him. I am now sure that the board is no longer holding AW back in terms of transfer funds (not that I ever felt like that before either but this just proves it). There really is no other reason why I feel that we have made progress so far.. We have all seen these false dawns! I hope all the skeptics are wrong though!

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You're right about false dawns but it's been a while since we've sustained a challenge for this long. We got the most points of anyone in the 2013 calendar last year. It's not just a short, good run and as you say the Ozil signing showed a bit more intent. It's not enough, but it's a start.
I am nervous about a collapse, Wednesday's game is massive now. Lose that one and I fear for us.

I think the FA cup game against Pool is bigger. Not because it's the cup but if we get back on the horse and give them a good kicking that will say more than beating a very ordinary Utd. Not that the Utd game isn't important, they all are now. Pressure on, let's see how we handle it this time around. Differently would be nice.

They're important for different reasons. Liverpool because they are a good side and after the mauling we got on Saturday it's a chance to show it was a one off and we can beat them as we did earlier in the season. Utd because as ropey as they've been this year in our minds it's a 'big game' and we have been notoriously patchy in those.

I'd love nothing more than a good thrashing next Sunday but to tell you the truth; it all depends on how we do against Man ure and if we've recovered from the 5-1.

Liverpool obviously did their homework and knew where our weakness lied, they will come at us again from the off and an early goal for them would be such an anti climax i cant bear thinking about it.

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Originally Posted by Blink 1nce Quince 2wice

This is one of my biggest qualms with the modus operandi at the club. Everything appears to be as a belated action of a consequence we have just had to endure/incur. Nothing seems to ever be stemming from us taking the initiative any more....or to coin a phrase the club likes using at timely occasions, 'being ahead of the game'.

Being ahead of the game is the foundation upon which not only the Wenger legacy is built upon but the Hebert Chapman one is too. I'm not ashamed to say that I really do love Wenger and desperately and I mean desperately want him to be THE guy to take us forward..... After all, he is an Arsenal man and has been here the best part of 20 years. However, there are times when he makes it very difficult to defend him though which as a fan of a family centric club like ours can hurt against the mouthy arsewipes of other fans and the media.

I think it is easy to lambaste people for complaining whenever we lose. If you do it whilst we are winning it often comes across as superfluous complaining and nit picking for the sake of it and people aren't always discerning enough on this board and in general to tell when somebody has a genuine concern and point of view or when they are simply splitting hairs arbitrarily. The point at hand being made subsequently being swept by the wayside or being ignored all together as a consequence.

It is also quite churlish to say no forward steps have been taken. I for one was quite happy to see Wenger break the record on a 20-25 million transfer last summer and he went and broke the record 3 times over. Bloody hell, I thought. That act alone told me things are different but the more pertinent question is, how different? and is Wenger changing and adapting to the changing game quick enough? Is he thinking on his feet, is he boxing smart any more? You can't keep flogging us tomorrow. The time has to come eventually and the time is now.

His targets were a forward and a DCM last summer. He managed to sign neither of both the repute & potential long term standing. That was a pitiful way to meet ones targets at best even if the overriding feeling was elation (and relief) from the Ozil signing in a position which whilst more than welcome was not the most obvious. If you're going to cheap out, be found wanting or lacking in quality in an area in the modern game....you better damn well make sure it is in your forward line because you WILL be found wanting. And again...and again. Let's not pretend that forwards costing the most amount of money is a mere matter of glamour and prestige alone. You would be hard pressed to name a team who has won a major trophy without a world class forward and that is very difficult to get away from....and that's before even touching on the entire 1st halves of terrible, lethargic, football we periodically put out which we sometimes cannot recover from.

We were lining up here to ridicule the backline Liverpool were going to play against us and yet they may as well have had the day off because only their midfielders and Forward line saw the ball. As far as I'm concerned as soon as last Summer's window shut, January was always going to be a point of contention as to who Wenger would get in, because it was almost certainly going to be necessary. No point thinking...phew we got away with that one (in regard to transfers in the summer)....the pressure will only be back again in the next window, so we really ought to stop this lame routine of going into seasons with glaring holes and simply 'making do' or as Wenger says more often than I care to hear 'taking a gamble' on injury prone/young/untested players. At least not when we have cash reserves sitting in the bank.

I have said it before on here but we don't match up / compete with our former selves never mind with the current might of City/Chelsea. This Summer really should be make or break, but we kind of said that last summer, so it becomes increasingly harder to escape the feeling we are being strung along.

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Outstanding post! :gp:

Who/where are you likely to rotate for Sunday? I assume you will given your fixture list...

If Rodgers' comments are anything to go by we won't be dropping many, if anyone, injuries permitting.

Flamini will definitely start - back from suspension.

In truth I expect to see Flamini and Arteta together which I don't really like but given the shellacking we got on Saturday, maybe it's for the best.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Blink 1nce Quince 2wice

This is one of my biggest qualms with the modus operandi at the club. Everything appears to be as a belated action of a consequence we have just had to endure/incur. Nothing seems to ever be stemming from us taking the initiative any more....or to coin a phrase the club likes using at timely occasions, 'being ahead of the game'.

Being ahead of the game is the foundation upon which not only the Wenger legacy is built upon but the Hebert Chapman one is too. I'm not ashamed to say that I really do love Wenger and desperately and I mean desperately want him to be THE guy to take us forward..... After all, he is an Arsenal man and has been here the best part of 20 years. However, there are times when he makes it very difficult to defend him though which as a fan of a family centric club like ours can hurt against the mouthy arsewipes of other fans and the media.

I think it is easy to lambaste people for complaining whenever we lose. If you do it whilst we are winning it often comes across as superfluous complaining and nit picking for the sake of it and people aren't always discerning enough on this board and in general to tell when somebody has a genuine concern and point of view or when they are simply splitting hairs arbitrarily. The point at hand being made subsequently being swept by the wayside or being ignored all together as a consequence.

It is also quite churlish to say no forward steps have been taken. I for one was quite happy to see Wenger break the record on a 20-25 million transfer last summer and he went and broke the record 3 times over. Bloody hell, I thought. That act alone told me things are different but the more pertinent question is, how different? and is Wenger changing and adapting to the changing game quick enough? Is he thinking on his feet, is he boxing smart any more? You can't keep flogging us tomorrow. The time has to come eventually and the time is now.

His targets were a forward and a DCM last summer. He managed to sign neither of both the repute & potential long term standing. That was a pitiful way to meet ones targets at best even if the overriding feeling was elation (and relief) from the Ozil signing in a position which whilst more than welcome was not the most obvious. If you're going to cheap out, be found wanting or lacking in quality in an area in the modern game....you better damn well make sure it is in your forward line because you WILL be found wanting. And again...and again. Let's not pretend that forwards costing the most amount of money is a mere matter of glamour and prestige alone. You would be hard pressed to name a team who has won a major trophy without a world class forward and that is very difficult to get away from....and that's before even touching on the entire 1st halves of terrible, lethargic, football we periodically put out which we sometimes cannot recover from.

We were lining up here to ridicule the backline Liverpool were going to play against us and yet they may as well have had the day off because only their midfielders and Forward line saw the ball. As far as I'm concerned as soon as last Summer's window shut, January was always going to be a point of contention as to who Wenger would get in, because it was almost certainly going to be necessary. No point thinking...phew we got away with that one (in regard to transfers in the summer)....the pressure will only be back again in the next window, so we really ought to stop this lame routine of going into seasons with glaring holes and simply 'making do' or as Wenger says more often than I care to hear 'taking a gamble' on injury prone/young/untested players. At least not when we have cash reserves sitting in the bank.

I have said it before on here but we don't match up / compete with our former selves never mind with the current might of City/Chelsea. This Summer really should be make or break, but we kind of said that last summer, so it becomes increasingly harder to escape the feeling we are being strung along.

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:gp: