Well someone had to.
A few goals, back to winning ways ahead of the weekend, no injuries, Alexis scoring again and Ramsey back in the fold.
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Well someone had to.
A few goals, back to winning ways ahead of the weekend, no injuries, Alexis scoring again and Ramsey back in the fold.
Will any kind of win at olympiakos suffice, or does it have to be by two clear goals? (Or more goals than they scored at the Emirates, meaning we could go through by beating them 3-4 in Greece?)
What happens if the scoreline is a 3-2 away win, matching the score when they played here?
Has to be by two goals at least, meaning we have to better their victory over us which was by one goal.
That's us fucked then.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kano
I'm pretty sure that if we score 3 goals and win then we're guaranteed to qualify because we have better goal difference. So the two goals clear only means that 2-1 and 1-0 are no good. Any other victory score means we qualify.
I always figure that as long its in our hands (which it is) then we will do it.
If we play like we did tonight, with the same attitude, pace and energy, we'll piss all over Olympiacos. But if we slack off just a bit we are out and suffer the double whammy of the Europa League. We could have won by 5 tonight. I think we'll win by a decent margin over in Greece. They'll play it super defensively so we'll have to be focused and ruthless in front of goal. Plus we may have a few players back, if more don't get injured.
Ozil was superb tonight. He's starting to deliver the kind of other worldly performances we all hoped for when he signed. The guy glides on the ball and seems capable of turning in two directions at once. And he's never flustered when opponents are pressing. Alexis' energy was spectacular, Santi grew into the came and put in a good performance overall and Campbell was very lively. More of the same needed in Greece.
We will do it but I'm not too fussed if we do finish third
:gp:Quote:
Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn
Ozil :bow:
Heroic 0-1 win coming up.
We played well tonight, really good solid energetic performance. As NQ said Ozil was superb, has been all season.
Good performance, good goals and the two world class players we have showed what they are about.
Can we beat Olympiacos? yes, every single day of the week. However, our record there is kinda shite and the fact that they beat us already and dont actually need to win will give them something to hold on to.
We have been here before, we go away needing a 2-0 win, we score early, miss chances and bow out as "heroes".
Nah.Quote:
Originally Posted by Marc Overmars
Bayern beat Olympiacos 3-0 away, we beat Bayern 2-0.
If my maths is right that means we're due to win there 5-0 and qualify
:cool:
Wow. So few comments on last night. Sums it up a bit really. And the reason I think is that so many Gooners half expected an emphatic result last night, followed by a heroic near miss in Greece. I know this sounds negative, but the problem is that our team's serial inconsistency breeds a lack of expection.
I loved seeing our players turn it on last night, but even the required win at Olympiacos will mean little unless we can start to impose ourselves regularly, and show that we have lost our tendency to implode and are able to function effectively with key players missing. Last night was a start. Again. But I've lost count of the times that we have been in this position (of thinking that we can build on a convincing result) only to be disappointed a few matches later.
Last night was a really good performance but I'm still not convinced we'll do what we need to do in Greece. We've left ourselves in a similar-ish position to last season when we needed to produce the goods in Monaco and we fell short. Admittedly the task is a little easier this time round in as much as we need to win by 2 and we are playing a slightly weaker opposition.Quote:
Originally Posted by IBK
To be brutally honest even if we do qualify we are there just in CL to make up the numbers. I was thinking last night we're miles behind the elite in CL these days (Barca & Bayern), sure...we can give either a good game at home but over 2 legs both teams would destroy us IMO. I also think we're behind Real, PSG and possibly Juve so we have quite a small chance of progressing beyond the last 16 if we do make it through.
Sums my thoughts up perfectly, mate. And I'm afraid that this is where we are at as a club. Its often so near but so far for us in Europe, and we've seen nothing this season to suggest any different.Quote:
Originally Posted by selassie
Can somebody at the club get inside the players' heads and let them know that last night is the level of performance we need every game and in every competition? Can Wenger do that? He needs to if we are going to get anything out of this season. It's very, very frustrating when you see the team play the way they did last night. Pace, energy, determination to hustle and win the ball back, movement, players wanting the ball, accuracy with the passing, accurate crosses some decent crosses, moving the ball forwards up the pitch fast, players getting up and down the pitch to mix offensive duties with defensive. Zagreb are not a poor team, in the few moments where they got some sort of grip on what was going on they showed they have a bit about them too. But they couldn't handle what we were about.
This is what makes supporting this club frustrating and this is why the fans at Stoke and West Brom and Norwich can fuck off when they say we are precious or spoiled and they'd give a left nut to be where we are. Fact is we're under-performing, season after season, and performances like this and the Utd game and the second half against Swansea and so on show it. How is that shitty performance against the spuds or against Brom last week explained away when we know the team can play like this?
This question, plus the ridiculous injury situation, are jobs for the manager to work on and fix. Time for him to earn his keep. With the gypos fucking up all over the place (and that won't last forever), the chavs out of it and a shitty Utd, if we can't do it this season then when? Should Wenger be getting praise because we played so well last night? No, not in my book, because it asks the question what the fuck was going on the rest of the time. And for those who think a team can't be on top of their game all the time, fair enough, the odd slip will happen. But it has to be the odd slip, an aberration. It can't be 50% of the time - unacceptable.
We play like this against Norwich and we'll destroy them. If we don't play like this against Norwich then Wenger needs to be answering some serious questions and the players will need to take a look at themselves and their wallets and the expectant faces of the fans and ask themselves a few hard questions too.
No more fucking around. Let's get this won.
http://sportzwiki.com/uploads/featur...98/Wenger3.jpgQuote:
Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn
http://img.thesun.co.uk/aidemitlum/a...r_1366817a.jpg
Arsenal are 15/8 to qualify from the group which I think is pretty decent odds as I would imagine we will do the business in Greece in a couple of weeks although I fancy we will need to score 3. Olympiakos are not a good side we were just embarrassing on the night. Zagreb aren't good and we comfortably won last night.
In a couple of weeks Ramsey, Ox and Walcott could all be available to give us some options which would be nice.
Good win but make no mistake they are nothing special, so this results is only what we should expect.
We should beat Olympiakos as again they are nothing special but you never know with us, having said that when 4th place or last 16 is up for grabs we always manage to scrape home so it wouldn't surprise me if we do, once we get there though expect the customary spanking from one of the games giants.
Have to say to have lost 3 games and performed as badly as we have done and still qualify would reflect poorly on the competition, a side that has performed as badly as we have shouldn't have the opportunity to advance.
If you finish in the top 2 you deserve to advance :shrug:Quote:
Originally Posted by Özim
We only have the chance to because we beat Bayern - something no-one else has done this season, in fact they've won every game but 2 this year, a recent 0-0 in the league and when we beat them. I don't think that result should be underestimated.
If we qualify we'll have deserved to.
Edit: As for Olympiacos not being all that, they've won every game this year - I guess the Greek league isn't that strong but they've not just won every league game, they've won every CL game too apart from the 2 vs Bayern who...are quite good.
A 2-0 win out there would be a pretty good result.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/foo...last-year.htmlQuote:
Originally Posted by Letters
Ozil also made kore tackles than Flamini last night! :d
:gp:Quote:
Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn
I am more frustrated with last nights result than happy, and the above post is exactly the reason why! To me, the PL is our realistic target of a major trophy this season and we showed none of that against West Brom. Anybody who says otherwise did not watch the game against West Brom... the lethargic ball movement, lack of energy and ideas was just baffling on Saturday (especially when you consider that we were losing)! WTF happened since Saturday and why is this trend so common at Arsenal?! It happens season after season without explanation... one game we play like we could realistically beat the best teams in the world and the next we look like all we ever learnt to do was pass sideways!
I will try and not get my hopes up after such a brilliant performance yesterday.. just leads to more disappointment.
Do you really think that only happens to us? Maybe the issue is how often it happens, I think that's very hard to quantify objectively.
Should Arsenal be measuring their success based on the failures of others? I do not care that Chelsea are 15th in the table or that City got thumped by Liverpool, I care about why my club cannot put out players who play their hearts out every game. I understand defeats happen, what I will not accept is lack of effort and what happened on Saturday was just criminal. More importantly, this wasnt a 'one off' thing for us.. this happens every season.Quote:
Originally Posted by Letters
It's a competitive sport so our success or failure is directly related to other team's successes or failures.Quote:
Originally Posted by fakeyank
So yes, it's relevant.
NQ's call for the desire we showed last night in every game is commendable but anyone who has ever watched sport knows that isn't possible, physically, emotionally, whatever. No team ever plays with the same intensity every game.
So when you say why do we do what we did on Saturday, my answer is because that's how sport is and every team does it in every season. Maybe we do it too often, but we haven't so far this season, if we had we wouldn't be competing. Whether we'll do it too often remains to be seen.
I actually said, "And for those who think a team can't be on top of their game all the time, fair enough, the odd slip will happen. But it has to be the odd slip, an aberration. It can't be 50% of the time - unacceptable."Quote:
Originally Posted by Letters
And it's true. At least 50% of the time we plod. This must be down to the manager and his staff. We all know what it's like to have to get your head in gear or do a shitty job that has been put-off. Highly disciplined people will motivate themselves. For the rest of us we'll wing it unless there's a nasty fucker imposing a deadline with sanctions attached. Those players shouldn't have a choice in the matter, they should be wound up and ready to go every time they step on a pitch. That's one of the manager's key roles. But we know what our guy is like - he "trusts" his players. That's nice and all but we see the result in so many games where we don't turn up. Individual talent drags us through most of those games games, rather than a collective performance. And on the occasions where nobody is up for it we lose at home to Olympiacos. Or worse, we get a hammering. The manager needs to sort this shit out.
Its not a may be, it is a definite we do it too often. If we didnt, we'd have at least challenged for the PL come the end of the season in the last 10 years. Its especially horrible when it comes from a club charging an arm and a leg from fans.Quote:
Originally Posted by Letters
And there will be dips in form by some players over the course of a season, but to see ALL the players playing like shit on Saturday and then the same lot playing like Champions on a Tuesday is baffling to me. Shows a lack of direction and leadership from the management. I like to compare our situation to someone who was the best in the business (Sir Alex) and then think "If he was our manager, would he tolerate the same crap? Would his teams go through the motions in one game and turn up the other, and he be ok with it?"
The answer to that thought tells me where the problem for the club is. It's been out in the open for some time now and people are just taking their time to get used to it. It'll happen eventually, inshahallah..
If the manager is not motivated indeed driven by the need to succeed then you will hardly find it in the players. A manager who is only motivated by job perpetuity, takes solace in bad luck and unfair playing environment. Will only deliver the bare minimum to satisfy the bosses upstairs. When you now have the misfortune of being owned by Mediocre Sam Kroenke, well that just kills it. The talented players will endure...for a while. Lets see what happens if we dont win anything this season.
Rubbish.Quote:
Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn
It's arguable we do it too often but 50% of the time.
That's just one of those 87% of statistics that's made up on the spot.
2 points. Firstly regarding other teams' performances - you can't have it both ways. You are fond of citing the financial muscle of the likes of Citeh and Manure as a reason why we have an uphill battle to win the league. If you want to point out that we are currently doing OK in relation to our competitors, then you need also to concede that the bar is unusually low this season in terms of the relative strengths of most of the top teams. Citeh have had injury problems, and are punching below their weight after a strong start; Manure are scraping wins while playing shite football that does not justify the enormous investment they have made. We all know what has happened hilariously to last year's champions, and Liverpool seem to be recovering after a piss poor start to the season.Quote:
Originally Posted by Letters
What most Gooners are frustrated by is that instead of exploiting this situation, our inconsistency has seen us sink to the level of the competition. Implosions against West Ham; the Chavs and West Brom have seen us drop avoidable points, and flat performances against Liverpool and Spurs - 2 games that you would have expected our players to be very motivated for - have caused disappointment.
Of course teams will drop unexpected points, and we will not always reach the levels of Wednesday, or Manure at home. But when you see what our players are capable of when focussed and motivated, it is completely fair to ask why such performances still seem the exception rather than the norm.
Unlike recent seasons, we have 3 world class players in key areas of the pitch who have remained fit for pretty the whole season to date. We have a more settled squad than most, and clearly have the ability to turn it on - against different types of team - when we want to. I think it is fair enough to expect more from Arsenal than we have seen so far.
I'm not sure that's valid, for much of the last 10 years we've not had the resources to challenge the big boys properly. It's only in the last couple of years we've had the new financial muscle, the new level of signings have made a clear difference. We should have challenged last year, we got off to an awful start which gave us no chance. This year we've not done that, we're in touch and I think we've got a chance. The concern for me is not the mentality - I've highlighted endlessly the hopeful signs I've seen about that - it's the over-reliance on a couple of key players and the perennial injury problems.Quote:
Originally Posted by fakeyank
Is that really different from any other season? The fact that we’re so dependent on a few key players to perform suggests there is a mentality a problem. Far too many of these players switch off. I won’t even start with the injury problems. This is a very boring conversation and I think people are just sick of the merry go round…hence the lack of comments. Tired of seeing the team play great for a few games as if the light has finally switched on to then see them fall back into old habits. It’s why I can’t get too excited with the wins against the bigger clubs. After the Bayern and Utd games, I knew we’d have this sort of patch where we look like a completely different team. It’s tiring.
The Chavs?Quote:
Originally Posted by IBK
Behave...
It was 0-0 till Mike Dean took charge. I'm not having that.
The other two, fine - but these things happen, they happen to every team in every season. That's football.
I didn't see the Liverpool game although from what I remember we had a perfectly good Ramsey goal chalked off for offside that evening.
The Spurs game...well I did see that one and like it or not Spurs are irritatingly good this season. They've only lost once in the league this season and you can see why. There was a perception that they hammered us, I don't agree. We had 55% possession, had as many on target chances as them. We could have lost it but we could have won it too, it was a good derby game which ebbed and flowed, I don't have too many complaints about our performance that day.
I can't agree that our good performances are the exception rather than the norm. As for what our reasonable expectations are, I expect us to be competing for the biggest prizes. So far we're in the title race, so for now I'm reasonably content. If we continue to have too many "West Broms" then I'll agree that's not good enough, while we're there or thereabouts though I'll believe we have a chance of winning the title. I don't expect us to sweep all before us but I do expect us to compete, we didn't last year but the FA Cup retention mitigated that somewhat, this year there are no excuses.
Well, we'll find out in May. I've endlessly gone over some of the hopeful signs I see but the proof of the pudding is in the eating.Quote:
Originally Posted by Power_n_Glory
So long as we're in the mix I'll believe we have a chance.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Letters
You see - that statement (highlighted) is actually up for debate as matters stand. There is no doubt about the value of Sanchez; Ozil and now Cech to the team, but if you look at most of our past 6 seasons, we were topping the league, or nearly topping the league at some point during the season, or putting significant winning runs together without these players. We are undoubtedly reliant on them at present (overly so, in fact), but in terms of our past performances, it is arguable certainly that there should have been more of a step change with our ability to spend the kind of money that have brought our star players to the club.Quote:
Originally Posted by Letters
In Europe - even with our stellar signings, we have if anything gone backwards this season, compared to other seasons.
I guess the real issue is that our new level of signings is at present more covering for our appalling injury situation than driving the club forward. We are back to the old 'step change' debate.Time will tell, of course but the current signs in terms of squad depth are not exactly cause for optimism.
Its a shame, IMO, because I feel that Wenger's famous 'handbrake' is blunting the effect of our new found competitiveness in the transfer market. Glass half empty - maybe - but we have had our hopes dashed too many times to feel anything other than skeptical about our chances going forwards.
We self-destructed against the Chavs. Do you not remember that we finished with 9 men? I have never been a fan of blaming the ref for results. Against both the Chavs Sp*rs and Liverpool if we had played at 80% of our level against Manure or Bayern at home we would have taken all 3 points. We remain vulnerable to teams playing a committed, pressing, game.Quote:
Originally Posted by Letters
I'm a realist. I don't expect us to win every game. But it is the exception rather than the rule to see us playing the kind of committed, effective football that we have seen this team can play - and the talent that we have should see us doing this more often.
I believe we have a chance but it’s not because I think we’re a lot stronger than what we’ve been before or learned from past mistakes. We’re in the mix because other teams haven’t been performing. Not a far stretch from the season Fergie finally stepped down from Utd and we were league leaders. You didn’t believe we had a chance of winning the league that year so why is it that your optimistic for this season?Quote:
Originally Posted by Letters
I've explained endlessly why, the signs of hope I see. Some of the results we're getting, we wouldn't have got those a few years ago.Quote:
Originally Posted by Power_n_Glory
As I've said, the next few games and particularly the City one will tell us more.
I do remember that. And maybe we did lose our heads but the first sending off was nonsense - meanwhile Costa was allowed to do whatever he liked.Quote:
Originally Posted by IBK
Being down to 10 men at Stamford Bridge, for all their troubles this season, doesn't give us much chance.
Even the most rabid of the anti-Wenger brigade weren't blaming him for that one after the game.
Another threshold. Another acid test that's suppose to tell us more. How many more now? I explained this after the Utd and Bayern game. Those games don't tell us more. Just that on some occasions we can put a hurting on a big team. But we'll then put in a woeful string of performances against weaker teams and look uninterested in a few weeks later. We beat City last season but put in a terrible performance against Spurs two weeks later. It's like they didn't know it was a NLD. Not too far from what happened this season.Quote:
Originally Posted by Letters
We've had seasons where we're pepped up for the big teams but lose focus against the weaker teams. It happened a lot during the Cesc era. The season before Ozil arrived we were the only team to beat Bayern at home and was on one of those unbeaten runs in the league...the sort of sign your talking about now. We signed Ozil, lead the league for a while with Ozil and Ramsey leading the charge, both got injured and the title challenge faltered.
The signs you talk of are not valid. We've seen plenty of the same in previous seasons. Scalping one of the big teams and beating our chest, saying 'this proves :blah:', but in the end it doesn't. We're back 4th and haven't taken advantage of our chances to go top of the league and extend that lead. Not saying we're in a an impossible situation but there isn't anything to point to that suggests we've vastly improved this season. No need to list your examples again either.