Match Reaction vs Chelsea

Why were people calling for Podolski? The guy hasn't played since August. He would have been unfit and sluggish, just like Giroud.

Cazorla maybe but for weeks we've been saying he's been out of form.

What we should have done was make Walcott hog the touchline more to stretch their defence so we could get in behind. Theo was way too central tonight, most of the time he was only 6 foot away from Giroud when we were attacking. He gave us no width when he's the only wide player we really have.

Clearly a tactic but it was the wrong one.

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Originally Posted by hobson's choice

This midfield continues to frustrate, we keep saying we need a striker, but whats the point of a striker, if no one is creating anything for them.

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This gentleman is correct. Frankly its a pretty overrated collection of players our midfield.

Cazorla - Thought he was good, but hes been laughable this season
Wilshere - Nothing player
Ramsey - Are we still pretending he has a shout at player of the season?
Ozil - One of the bottle, not the special one
Arteta - Mediocre
Flamini - Worker
Rosicky - Meh

Its too much to fix. Wenger just needs to go and find a top striker to paper over it all. The man needs his Drogba.

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Originally Posted by BOBN

This gentleman is correct. Frankly its a pretty overrated collection of players our midfield.

Cazorla - Thought he was good, but hes been laughable this season
Wilshere - Nothing player
Ramsey - Are we still pretending he has a shout at player of the season?
Ozil - One of the bottle, not the special one
Arteta - Mediocre
Flamini - Worker
Rosicky - Meh

Its too much to fix. Wenger just needs to go and find a top striker to paper over it all. The man needs his Drogba.

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I have to agree, we are absolute shit. In fact I don't know why we even bother supporting the club. All our players are crap, our manager is crap, I hate those blue bits on the kit, they are crap. And the most laughable thing of all is we're second in the table and through to the next round of the CL. It's all bad.

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Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn

I have to agree, we are absolute shit. In fact I don't know why we even bother supporting the club. All our players are crap, our manager is crap, I hate those blue bits on the kit, they are crap. And the most laughable thing of all is we're second in the table and through to the next round of the CL. It's all bad.

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:haha:

Seriously i dont get some of these people either, if we're really so bad, shouldnt we be super happy that we're 2nd with a big chance of being #1 by new years and being in the next round of the CHL?

I'm not getting too overwrought with this result though it's never good to cede top, we didn't allow ourselves to go mental in the last ten minutes to risk it all and lose it like against Dortmund, which nobody would be giving Wenger thanks to, if we did. Really the onus should have been on Chelsea, being the ones behind us but Mourinho gonna Mourinho.

I just hope that this lack of wins doesn't seep in to the game against West Ham, although they are very poor really so it shouldn't.

Also, I do think we are good enough to win the league and that's not just on potential ability, that's also based on there being no discerning between the title race and a Top 4 Trophy place right now.

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Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn

And the most laughable thing of all is we're second in the table and through to the next round of the CL. It's all bad.

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Second :lol: Same script, but just changed one word huh. Forget about this "1st", "2nd" comfort blanket, do you know how many teams have been first and second at this time of year? Liverpool now...I remember fookin Leeds being top at xmas in recent times. Any fooker can be top at xmas in this league.

Anyway im not saying anything new, everybody knows we need a top striker asap. We need attackers who are about goals and about winning. Ramsey proved he doesnt care about winning when he put the ball out of play when Ramires was down, Ozil squaring the ball to Walcott proves hes soft as baby shyt and not a game-changer even in his own mind. These need a ruthless forward to look up to.

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Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn

I have to agree, we are absolute shit. In fact I don't know why we even bother supporting the club. All our players are crap, our manager is crap, I hate those blue bits on the kit, they are crap. And the most laughable thing of all is we're second in the table and through to the next round of the CL. It's all bad.

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No one is saying this team is shit, but they simply haven't created many chances. That midfield going forward, hasn't been consistently good this season.

You could say we'd have lost this game a year or two ago but we managed to get a point. You can also say we cannot the big games for toffee and should have beaten this robust but very average Chelsea side. Sunderland and Stoke both beat them at home because they actually attacked them and showed no fear. We looked frightened and too nervous to go forward knowing we can be hit on the counter attack.

The defence were solid and error free (nice changce from previous games against those cunts) but the midfield were shocking and so was Giroud. Arteta was left with no options time and again and kep passing it to the back 4 everytime. Where was the movement? creativity? Theo kept runing away from the ball and when he did ask for it to feet, he was robbed easily. Ozil for me was subdue and timid again in a big game. He is our best player in terms of talent but for me he'll never the player to take control of the game and dominate the opposition.

We all know that Giroud isnt clinical and will watse chances so nothing new there but i just think he can sometimes complain too much and get in a bad mood if the ref doesnt give him a free kick. he should stop moaning and work on battering his CB.

Liverpool cannot possibly win both of their next two games so we really should reclaim top spot. West ham away i think we can get a result there but its the bar codes away where i think we'll need to be at our best because they are probably the form team right now (have beaten Man ure, Spuds and Chelsea in the last 8 games).

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Originally Posted by She Wore A Red Ribbon

Wrong.

If we sign a top top striker in the ilk of Costa, we can win the league.

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I agree, but I don't think we will do that. Hope I'm wrong.

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Originally Posted by Jeebus

I would seriously love to know just what the fuck wenger was doing tonight.

Why were no subs made?? It's fucking unfathomable.

If he's have made some changes, Carzola and pods, we might have had a chance of winning the game.

I just cannot understand it :shrug:

Even when the SS guy questioned him about it he had to think a short time for some shit explanation 'errrrr, ummmm, well eerrrrr' Really arsene?!?

I know we've gotta play on Thursday but FFS. Giving pods 10 mins or so wouldn't have fucking hurt.

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Yeah, that was a weird one. We've got Carzola and Podolski sitting on the bench, a few fresh legs would have given us a better chance.

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Originally Posted by hobson's choice

No one is saying this team is shit, but they simply haven't created many chances. That midfield going forward, hasn't been consistently good this season.

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You're never going to put a load of goals past a well organised Chelsea defence and team who have come for a draw.
We created a couple of pretty clear chances but we don't have a striker clinical enough to finish them. We need someone who can take the one chance in a big game like that, get one and we're winning the league.

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Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn

The dropped points at Everton made what happened next almost inevitable. We have bitter experience of what happens when we throw away games like that.

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You keep saying things like this as if we had a God-given right to win that game. They've only lost once all season, that was away at City where...well, we know how good City are at home. They're only 2 points away from us for a reason. I am disappointed we didn't win it after our late goal was cancelled out but Everton are a tough side to beat this year, they're not going to lose many games.

We've had a tough run of games and not come through it that well, we've got a few games now we 'should' win and so far this year we have been winning those. Keep doing that and we'll be up there come May.

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Originally Posted by Letters To Santa

You keep saying things like this as if we had a God-given right to win that game. They've only lost once all season, that was away at City where...well, we know how good City are at home. They're only 2 points away from us for a reason. I am disappointed we didn't win it after our late goal was cancelled out but Everton are a tough side to beat this year, they're not going to lose many games.

We've had a tough run of games and not come through it that well, we've got a few games now we 'should' win and so far this year we have been winning those. Keep doing that and we'll be up there come May.

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I get what NQ is saying with that result. It's where momentum was lost. The team is weak mentally and we carried this disappointment to the next run of games. We haven't played the same since. I give credit for Everton with the way they played but I was also impressed by the way fought there way back into the game after being dominated. That fight has disappeared since and it looks like we're in that cycle where we can't recover quick enough. We've had tough games but it will be criminal if we continue on like this.

i think AW didnt want to change anything because we looked to have contained Chelsea and had a nice shape to us. It was a case of keeping what we have and definitely a lesson learnt from the Dortmund game.

There is a good article in the Bleacher report linking his tactics to that Dortmund game. He didn't know whether to stick or twist! He just froze. I think making no decision at all is really bad and he needs to work on his tactics. He didn't have to make a blunder like when taking off Flamini for Gnarby but you just never know what Wenger is thinking when it comes to subs.

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Originally Posted by AFC Leveller

i think AW didnt want to change anything because we looked to have contained Chelsea and had a nice shape to us. It was a case of keeping what we have and definitely a lesson learnt from the Dortmund game.

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TBF I felt we finished the game strongly, it was our best period. We didn't have them on the ropes but we were certainly the stronger team.

I would rather a point than nothing so it's not all bad.

As crazy as this might sound I think we have a better chance of beating Chelsea at SB as they will no doubt play a more open/expansive game.

Agree re winning away fromh home.

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Originally Posted by hobson's choice

This midfield continues to frustrate, we keep saying we need a striker, but whats the point of a striker, if no one is creating anything for them.

And can Rosicky stop fucking making so many shit passes, he can be such an annoying player, gets in great position, only to fuck it up, with one of his usual shit passes.

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If you think Rosicky was bad you must be livid with Ramsey. Check the comparison.

Rosicky
Passing - 45/53 - 85%

Ramsey
Passing 55/75 - 73%

That's really poor from Ramsey and he didn't win any of his tackles yesterday. He's pushing forward way too much and only completing 50% of his passes in the final third. It leaves us open to counter attacks. We were lucky because Chelsea are really poor on that side.

Another note....Giroud's hold up play needs work.

Passing - 20/31 - 65%

There was a great opportunity to break on Chelsea with Theo bombing down the right. A pass played into his path with have set him off but a missed controlled ball by Giroud meant the move slowed down completely and we lost the opportunity.

Speaking of Theo.....

Passing - 11/18 - 61%

That is pathetic. There is no way he should be playing on the flanks. He's contributing very little to our build up play.

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Originally Posted by AFC Leveller

i think AW didnt want to change anything because we looked to have contained Chelsea and had a nice shape to us. It was a case of keeping what we have and definitely a lesson learnt from the Dortmund game.

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Exactly. There was no need to make subs because we were on top of the game in the latter stages. What we needed was a striker that could bury Giroud's chances, and Podolski would not have buried those because he is completely unfit and sluggish.

Sluggish due to his comeback from injury by the way. When he's completely fit he's definitely more pacey than Giroud so may have buried them.

Even if not fully match fit after a long lay off he must have been in training for a while to make the bench.
He's surely fit enough for 10 minutes, otherwise he shouldn't have been on the bench.

Maybe against a lesser team but in a match like that? If he came on with Cazorla and we let in a goal you'd have said 'he should have kept it how it was, it was keeping them out'. We had chances to win it but not the striker to finish them off. Simple.

If he's not fit enough to come on and do a job then he shouldn't be on the bench. :shrug:
I thought it was strange Wenger didn't bring on some fresh legs but maybe he was learning lessons from Dortmund when we went for it too much and ended up getting caught.

I'm delighted Vermaelen deputised well and looked really up for it. I thought Gibbs and Sagna were sensible and I actually thought Arteta and Rosicky were very good last night. I think that is particularly pertinent as there is a school of people that would absolutely insist that this was the sort of game Flamini should play rather than Arteta. Rambo obviously didn't have one of his best games and Ozil managed to have nice touches without actually really threatening.

I was a little perplexed when Ozil played that ball to Giroud rather than shoot, I must admit. He does that quite often and I think Wenger needs to encourage him to evolve his game from Real. It might have worked when he had Cronaldo, a player without a limitation, but he just doesn't have a player with that same skill set around him now. He needs to take more responsibility and frankly he is talented enough to do so, but he will work it out in time. Yaya Toure also took on whole lot more when he came from Barca to City and look at what a good player most people now realise he is.

Walcott was poor and should have been playing higher up with someone coming in field to cover for him, when it was obvious that he was getting double teamed frequently. Cazorla is really the guy you want with the ball if anyone is to be double/triple teamed.

I thought it was right he didn't start but it was strange Podolski didn't come on. He has been behind the scenes training for quite some time now which should have at least sharpened his instruments for a short cameo...... especially with his shooting power and technique and his tendency to go wide. Wenger is well known to make subs based on fitness/energy levels, which is why not making a single sub is almost unheard of from any manger let alone him. The performance was not that of a well rested sprightly team, bursting with creative ideas, so it would seem strange in the context of the game.

The ball was slipping about the place and the conditions were quick, yet we were really reluctant to try and catch the keeper off guard or just chance it from distance to then follow up a potential rebound. Chelsea did try their chances but fortunately Szczesny's handling is amazing which is a point he will get little credit for but really should.

I didn't think the game was quite the 'will we take the league or not' match it was billed as, and we can take a few positives from getting a point.

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Originally Posted by selassie

I thought we were pretty brutal TBH and this team looks nowhere near good enough or any closer to beating any of its rivals, as in Chelsea, Man City etc.

We lacked imagination, got a lot of the basics wrong and pretty much just huffed and puffed our way to a draw. Our passing was off, at times lacked discipline and in general just looked the least likely of the sides to win.

What concerns me more than anything is this team seems to have gone back to the Arsenal of last season prior to our decent run, I don't know if it's because we are playing decent opposotion but we just look so toothless.

Upfront isn't our only issue either, we are beginning to see problems in Central Midfield again. Moreover Ozil who is suppose to be our star man has been absolutely woeful in the games against City and Chelsea, weak, immobile and afraid to make decisions.

Forget the title, we have a huge battle on our hands to finish top 4 IMHO, it's getting that tight.

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I hate that the warm feeling of a month or so has leached away - but it has. Citeh; the Chavs, even Manure will get better - and Liverpool seem to be moving through the gears and have the best striker in the league. Before the season began you'd have said we'd be fighting for fourth - even with our record in 2013. Nothing we've seen so far this season suggests any different. Ozil's underwhelmed hugely, for me.

There were a couple of occasions when Walcott and Ramsey played perfectly good balls in the final third but the wet surface meant the ball just skidded away out of touch. It might not have skewed the passing stats greatly, but these things can sometimes thwart the likelihood of an early goal until players start compensating a little better for the surface they're playing on.

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Originally Posted by Blink 1nce Quince 2wice

I was a little perplexed when Ozil played that ball to Giroud rather than shoot, I must admit. He does that quite often and I think Wenger needs to encourage him to evolve his game from Real. It might have worked when he had Cronaldo, a player without a limitation, but he just doesn't have a player with that same skill set around him now. He needs to take more responsibility and frankly he is talented enough to do so, but he will work it out in time. Yaya Toure also took on whole lot more when he came from Barca to City and look at what a good player most people now realise he is.

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Great points and a great comparison. Things change when you become a £30m+ player. Yaya embraced that, Ozil needs to too, if he can.

I think Ozil was used to releasing people from a much deeper position at Real, who worked a lot on the counter attack. He's not going to get to do that too much here though, especially if there is a lack of runners beyond the lines early on.

In fairness though, Chelsea did sit back when they didn't have the ball and just organised themselves in a compact unit. Arteta had a surprising amount of space to manoeuvre in for a big game and I don't think he gave the ball away often if at all.

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Originally Posted by Blink 1nce Quince 2wice

I think Ozil was used to releasing people from a much deeper position at Real, who worked a lot on the counter attack. He's not going to get to do that too much here though, especially if there is a lack of runners beyond the lines early on.

In fairness though, Chelsea did sit back when they didn't have the ball and just organised themselves in a compact unit. Arteta had a surprising amount of space to manoeuvre in for a big game and I don't think he gave the ball away often if at all.

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Arteta made the most passes. 92% 89/97. He did well.

It is really hard to have a good opinion in this world of football full of hypocrites and emotional people . Had chelsea had a penalty turned down , we could have heard people saying : " Arsenal were lucky to escape another blunder " or : " Arsenal saved by referee blind eye " ..etc..

No matter how the game was played , Wenger was robbed of a famous victory over Mourinho . A penalty is a penalty . Which was very obvious even an amateur referee could have given it . Even though some excuses say Walcott tried to "exaggerate " .
A penalty is not given or turned down because a player has " exaggerated " A penalty is given when there is a foul in box . When there is a contact between a defending player and an attacking player , it is a penalty . If Walcott had clipped Willian , it could have been a free kick to Chelsea even if Willian had " exaggerated " So how come in reverse situation nothing is given ?
Arsenal players did not do themselves any favour by missing the few chances they created but the penalty was more than enough to win the game . Chelsea is a strong team. So they did not need any referee help to have a result but surprisingly , on this occasion , they needed it . what a shame .

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Originally Posted by IBK

I hate that the warm feeling of a month or so has leached away - but it has. Citeh; the Chavs, even Manure will get better - and Liverpool seem to be moving through the gears and have the best striker in the league. Before the season began you'd have said we'd be fighting for fourth - even with our record in 2013. Nothing we've seen so far this season suggests any different. Ozil's underwhelmed hugely, for me.

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Or you can look at it another way. We came through our tough run of fixtures and are sitting joint top. Now the 'easy' run of fixtures will come up, hopefully we can push on back to winning ways.

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Originally Posted by Alpha

It is really hard to have a good opinion in this world of football full of hypocrites and emotional people . Had chelsea had a penalty turned down , we could have heard people saying : " Arsenal were lucky to escape another blunder " or : " Arsenal saved by referee blind eye " ..etc..

No matter how the game was played , Wenger was robbed of a famous victory over Mourinho . A penalty is a penalty . Which was very obvious even an amateur referee could have given it . Even though some excuses say Walcott tried to "exaggerate " .
A penalty is not given or turned down because a player has " exaggerated " A penalty is given when there is a foul in box . When there is a contact between a defending player and an attacking player , it is a penalty . If Walcott had clipped Willian , it could have been a free kick to Chelsea even if Willian had " exaggerated " So how come in reverse situation nothing is given ?
Arsenal players did not do themselves any favour by missing the few chances they created but the penalty was more than enough to win the game . Chelsea is a strong team. So they did not need any referee help to have a result but surprisingly , on this occasion , they needed it . what a shame .

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Well no not really, even if it had been given we could have still missed it or had it saved, so he wasn't robbed at all.

Flavour of the month Costa missed on last week.

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Originally Posted by Özim

Well no not really, even if it had been given we could have still missed it or had it saved, so he wasn't robbed at all.

Flavour of the month Costa missed on last week.

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chelsea should have been down to 9 men and we should have had a penalty. there is no guarantee we would score the penalty but we should have played at least half an hour against 9 men, chances are we would have scored then. its a fair assessment to say mike dean robbed AW of his greatest chance to beat mourinho by being an incompetent cheating fuck

im not saying we played well either, we didn't, we were the better side just imo but both sides were awful but if the referee actually enforced the laws of the game, we probably would have won. and also, i know we failed to break down chelsea, but why did they not fail to break us down? mourinho has gone to 3 big games this season, spurs united and us and drawn all 3 because he played for a draw in all of them. for such a great manager, thats fucking awful

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Originally Posted by the ollie and the ivy

chelsea should have been down to 9 men and we should have had a penalty. there is no guarantee we would score the penalty but we should have played at least half an hour against 9 men, chances are we would have scored then. its a fair assessment to say mike dean robbed AW of his greatest chance to beat mourinho by being an incompetent cheating fuck

im not saying we played well either, we didn't, we were the better side just imo but both sides were awful but if the referee actually enforced the laws of the game, we probably would have won. and also, i know we failed to break down chelsea, but why did they not fail to break us down? mourinho has gone to 3 big games this season, spurs united and us and drawn all 3 because he played for a draw in all of them. for such a great manager, thats fucking awful

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How often do you see teams down to 9 men? We see decisions like this every day of the week (the Mikel one wasn't a red IMO I agree with Neville, when you look at the other angle), I wish people would stop whining about it (we hear this almost every week on here now) and address the bigger issue, our inability to beat the big teams.

If we'd done our job properly decisions would be irrelevant, the fact is once again we couldn't do it, this has been going on for as long as I can remember.

Also this is Mourinho's first half season back (same with Pellegrino and Moyes btw), he hasn't been in charge of the club for over a decade so it does take time to create the team in your own image.

Theo didn't sell it very well tbh. It was one of those where contact was made but the player didn't decide quickly enough whether to go down or try and play on as he was in a decent-ish position. In the end it looked obvious that the reaction was forced but saying that, it would have been a freekick outside the box all day long.

Refs. :lol:

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Originally Posted by Özim

How often do you see teams down to 9 men? We see decisions like this every day of the week (the Mikel one wasn't a red IMO I agree with Neville, when you look at the other angle), I wish people would stop whining about it and address the bigger issue, our inability to beat the big teams.

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i don't think its whining when asking for the referee to do his job properly. every arsenal fan has pretty much said we were shit last night but the referee was just as poor. look at the city game, 2 goals incorrectly ruled out for offside. we can only do so much but if the referees fail to do theirs, then you can't do much about it.

its a clear red card, he broke artetas shin pad ffs. to break a shin pad means you have gone in with excessive force. did he get the ball? no. was he in control? no. did he use excessive force? yes. thats a red card however you look at it.

and you say our ability to beat big teams, yes so far this season its been mixed on that front. napoli, liverpool, dortmund and spurs all beaten, united, city, chelsea not beaten. mixed bag however chelsea have one win in 4 against the big teams, (unless you include bayern in the super cup in which case its one win in 5) city away record is poor this year and they have to go to the to the top 8 in the second half the season. all their home games are done by january except for chelsea. thats going to be tough.

i stand by what I've said all season, these games decide nothing. we've played city, chelsea, liverpool, united, spurs, everton so far and are above all of them bar liverpool. for a team that can't perform in big games, we have to be doing something right to be above 18 other teams on christmas day. you asked for a team that spent money, competed for trophies and didn't just think the top four is a trophy. you have that this season, why spend so much time being down about and moaning? why not just enjoy it?

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Originally Posted by MOëL

Theo didn't sell it very well tbh. It was one of those where contact was made but the player didn't decide quickly enough whether to go down or try and play on as he was in a decent-ish position. In the end it looked obvious that the reaction was forced but saying that, it would have been a freekick outside the box all day long.

Refs. :lol:

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Nah, look at it again, it's not the initial contact, but he takes his leg from under him following through.

100% penalty, and Theo wasn't 'selling' anything.

I'm happy with a point because a defeat would have killed us mentally. Last season we would have lost that 1-0.

It doesn't tell us anything we didn't already know about this season. We need a striker in January.

It's a huge month.

How much does Wenger want it?

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Originally Posted by 'Coca Cola presents GP'

Nah, look at it again, it's not the initial contact, but he takes his leg from under him following through.

100% penalty, and Theo wasn't 'selling' anything.

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It wasn't a natural landing. In real time it looked forced so I can understand why Mr Bean didn't give it. It was only when you slowed it down that you saw what happened and the level of contact in the tackle.

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Originally Posted by She Wore A Red Ribbon

It wasn't a natural landing. In real time it looked forced so I can understand why Mr Bean didn't give it. It was only when you slowed it down that you saw what happened and the level of contact in the tackle.

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it was a penalty but you see worse not given and non penalties given. Still doesnt explain the lack of chances for the rest of the game.

But as you said earlier, we are still top so not all bad. I know people say Liverpool are a one man team but our dip in form seens to coincide with ramseys dip. Giroud has only scored in one in the last 10 league games I think, which is awful.