Arsenal 0-1 West Ham Match Reaction

As I said in the match thread I’m not really interested in holding the players accountable for this result, end of the day…we are set up to play in a way that leaves space behind us. I think this is a foolish thing to do when you are missing so many goalscorers. So with that in mind, I’m not going to do a player rating because I think the players have been set up to fail, by a management and ownership structure so risk adverse that ironically it’s taken a Hail Mary pass of a gamble by leaving us without a single striker and with our second choice on both wings.

Was speaking to an Arsenal supporting mate and I said to him before the Leicester game that we would at most get 4 points from the next three games. He said this was nonsense, but he couldn’t answer me where the goals were coming from. We didn’t lose today because of shambolic defending, we lost 1-0 not 3-2. Could we have done better for Bowen’s goal? Yeah definitely but apart from absolutely worldies you can do better for every goal you concede.

If we play like we did today, Forest is a guaranteed defeat. And by that I mean not that we played poorly (although we did) but the way we set up. Forests are the masters of the counter attack, and as Newcastle have shown to beat us you just need to stick 11 behind the ball and break competently. This was true before we lost all our attacking players

We need to play like a team with no striker, and an attacking midfielder who is clearly not fit…and that is conservatively. The title is over, we need to make our peace with that. With a fully fit side could we have caught Liverpool? Yes I think we could have. But we don’t so we will never know

Focusing on the Champions League :bow:

PSV will be fist bumping and congratulating themselves on their CL semi-final place if they watched this game.

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Originally Posted by HCZ_Reborn

Was speaking to an Arsenal supporting mate and I said to him before the Leicester game that we would at most get 4 points from the next three games. He said this was nonsense, but he couldn’t answer me where the goals were coming from. We didn’t lose today because of shambolic defending, we lost 1-0 not 3-2. Could we have done better for Bowen’s goal? Yeah definitely but apart from absolutely worldies you can do better for every goal you concede.

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I disagree with the emboldened, though we probably had no chance of winning with the way we played and setup today. However there is no doubt that we lost today's game due to poor defending as we had 3 defenders in the box marking space rather than Bowen, who was having his 3rd opportunity to score a pretty basic goal.

It was foreseeable and definitely avoidable and IMO pretty embarrassing, from a team (West Ham) that has been truly poor in scoring early goals, as the stats show.

However, I have said a few times here that Arteta's strength is his system, and now that his system has gone to the dogs with the lack of a passable frontman, its affecting the whole team in many ways as everyone seems to be approaching the game differently and overthinking. No one played with instinct today and cowards passed the buck at every opportunity.

As for the CL, if Arteta can't find a passable frontman to make his system work, PSV will put us out of our misery probably as early as the first leg.

Again, this was all avoidable and I blame only one person for repeatedly tempting the gods despite all the gracious warnings they gave him till January. That is a fact, no matter how people try to revise it and blame others.

The thing is sometimes you concede even when you defend well. The problem isn’t the 1 we let in, it’s the 3 or 4 that we couldn’t score the other end.

As for failure to recruit attacking players that’s a collective failure from manager to scouting to the lawyers to the owners. Injuries ? Well I think that’s again a combination of over coaching and too many games (saw an article the other day about an exponential increase in the amount of hamstring injuries)

Injuries and recruitment failure are the two factors in play today. Nothing really else is relevant. Odegaard probably been carrying an injury for months, Nwaneri our only creative outlet.

There’s something to be said for sure for Arteta putting all his eggs in one basket in terms of tactics but ultimately you can’t polish a turd and the main issue at play was that we have no goalscorers currently

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football...s/ckgzvj97vl2o

Lego haired cunt :lol:

Asked by the Irish woman whether having no attacking options meant that we had only two shots on target

“I don’t want to put it down to that”


Really? Twenty shots on goal and only two on target and you don’t want to put it down to you breaking the only attacking players we have :lol:


Silly, silly man

TLDR, we weren't great, but what do you expect with multiple injuries, an under-resourced attack and referees who are determined to stop us from having a hope of winning the league

There were fans who left when MLS was sent off and tbh I nearly did the same, why should paying fans endorse this fucking bullshit?

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Originally Posted by Mac76

TLDR, we weren't great, but what do you expect with multiple injuries, an under-resourced attack and referees who are determined to stop us from having a hope of winning the league

There were fans who left when MLS was sent off and tbh I nearly did the same, why should paying fans endorse this fucking bullshit?

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I dunno. I think that’s probably the one red this season I don’t have too much issue with. Yeah it was a long way from goal but Raya being massively off his line, meant that Kudus had near enough an empty net.

That and frankly I think it had zero bearing on the outcome of the game

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Originally Posted by HCZ_Reborn

the Irish woman

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Silly, silly man

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Originally Posted by HCZ_Reborn

I dunno. I think that’s probably the one red this season I don’t have too much issue with. Yeah it was a long way from goal but Raya being massively off his line, meant that Kudus had near enough an empty net.

That and frankly I think it had zero bearing on the outcome of the game

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The red was incorrect and VAR should have overruled it. MLS was fouled first, that's how the "goal scoring opportunity" was created in the first place. How VAR didn't pick that up is a mystery. After that it was a clear foul and that's the only thing VAR examined, evidently. Unless they saw the foul on MLS and simply overlooked it because it's Arsenal and MLS - irresistible I would suspect. It ay not have had an impact on the score, but MLS should have been playing from the KO anyway which certainly would have helped prevent that ridiculous goal we conceded.

Arteta's undoing will be his hubris. He'll never be a great coach with this sort of behaviour and clearly he won't be remembered for plenty silverware either.

I still think we need to give him an ultimatum, its 5 years now and all we have is one unexpected FA cup triumph. He seems to be one of those kind of people that you need constantly put pressure on to get results that you want from them.

Its been tiny margins with him for too long, we can't allow this to continue unabated with the kind of talent we are lucky to have right now.

A big, big summer of sitting on our hands awaits.

As for the game, didn't see it because it's a 3pm game but from what Merse was saying we started slowly.

We don't have the individual quality to try and play such an intricate way so I don't really get why we persist.

It's scrotefests or bust right now.

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Originally Posted by McNamara That Ghost...

A big, big summer of sitting on our hands awaits.

As for the game, didn't see it because it's a 3pm game but from what Merse was saying we started slowly.

We don't have the individual quality to try and play such an intricate way so I don't really get why we persist.

It's scrotefests or bust right now.

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Yep 100% agree unfortunately

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Originally Posted by 21_GOONER_SALUTE

Arteta's undoing will be his hubris. He'll never be a great coach with this sort of behaviour and clearly he won't be remembered for plenty silverware either.

I still think we need to give him an ultimatum, its 5 years now and all we have is one unexpected FA cup triumph. He seems to be one of those kind of people that you need constantly put pressure on to get results that you want from them.

Its been tiny margins with him for too long, we can't allow this to continue unabated with the kind of talent we are lucky to have right now.

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Clubs revenues before TV went from 400+ to 600+ mill. I think the board are sitting more than happy right now. Doubt any of them would know the score today if you asked them. That's not what they are interested in.

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Originally Posted by McNamara That Ghost...

A big, big summer of sitting on our hands awaits.

As for the game, didn't see it because it's a 3pm game but from what Merse was saying we started slowly.

We don't have the individual quality to try and play such an intricate way so I don't really get why we persist.

It's scrotefests or bust right now.

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You missed a ridiculous game. Raya played every position on the pitch, even striker by the end. Would have been more useful if he stayed in goal, but it was electrifying to watch - like sticking a live wire up your arsehole, electrifying. Bonkers and ever if we were in the title race I;d have every confidence this fucking around at the back would cost us when it mattered most.

Not sure if our players get fined for taking shots, but none of them were taking any chances.

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Originally Posted by 21_GOONER_SALUTE

Arteta's undoing will be his hubris. He'll never be a great coach with this sort of behaviour and clearly he won't be remembered for plenty silverware either.

I still think we need to give him an ultimatum, its 5 years now and all we have is one unexpected FA cup triumph. He seems to be one of those kind of people that you need constantly put pressure on to get results that you want from them.

Its been tiny margins with him for too long, we can't allow this to continue unabated with the kind of talent we are lucky to have right now.

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Meh to all this shit.
We are a rubbish team punching above our weight. Did anyone actually think we would catch Liverpool? Arteta out.

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Originally Posted by Chippy

Meh to all this shit.
We are a rubbish team punching above our weight. Did anyone actually think we would catch Liverpool? Arteta out.

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We're not rubbish, we're the best team in the league when we can field a team, deploy decent tactics and get a fair shake with the ref. And that happens almost never, so here we are. Second best in the league, rightfully so. and it's a loooooooooooooooooow bar this year.

Injuries we maybe could do something about, maybe not. But injuries happen. Tactics, that's another matter. Our Chinese water torture doesn't work on every opponent so we're inconsistent and that has cost us. The refs are just cunts. They cost us an 8 point spread vs Liverpool, but even then, Liverpool will soon be more than 8 points clear and opening that gap all the way to the end I would think.

After getting so close last year and forcing city to be perfect, even with the injuries and refs, it's a big step backwards this season.

I continue to believe we should have had a punt on Rashford.
Two assists today apparently.
It couldn't be any bloody worse.

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Originally Posted by Letters

I continue to believe we should have had a punt on Rashford.
Two assists today apparently.
It couldn't be any bloody worse.

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To get an assist you usually need someone to stick it in the net…just saying

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Originally Posted by HCZ_Reborn

To get an assist you usually need someone to stick it in the net…just saying

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Well, there is that. But he'd have added something up front. We've got nothing.

An already poor season that’s reached its nadir with this defeat I’d say.

With no options up front I don’t know how we can expect to compete. This season has been a huge waste of time.

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Originally Posted by Marc Overmars

An already poor season that’s reached its nadir with this defeat I’d say.

With no options up front I don’t know how we can expect to compete. This season has been a huge waste of time.

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Like every other season. And probably the next one after this.

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Originally Posted by Letters

I continue to believe we should have had a punt on Rashford.
Two assists today apparently.
It couldn't be any bloody worse.

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We would needed to have sent Sterling back to Chelsea, or Neto to Bournemouth as we've already used up our domestic loans.

Asensio though, is a bit different.

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Originally Posted by McNamara That Ghost...

We would needed to have sent Sterling back to Chelsea, or Neto to Bournemouth as we've already used up our domestic loans.

Asensio though, is a bit different.

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Sterling please :lol:
But fair enough, I didn’t know that

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Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn

PSV will be fist bumping and congratulating themselves on their CL semi-final place if they watched this game.

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I don't think the CL will be taking up our time for much longer

But if we want to be in it next year we need to do much better than we did yesterday

I agree with all the Arteta criticism here, this is on him

In terms of the difference between a defeat and a draw it’s on him. But we do need to accept (whoever we blame for that being the case) that we simply do not have the capacity to score goals, at most with what we have available we can average a goal a game (which is what we have done).
I wasn’t expecting anything more than a draw yesterday, it’s always nice to hope that we’d get an early goal draw West Ham out and score a few more. But I knew when they scored it was game over.
We don’t have the type of player who can take a game by the scruff of the neck with individual brilliance, we can bemoan Arteta for discouraging individuality but we are where we are.
I said the other week (before the Leicester game) that we had to modify our expectations significantly and not so much on here but if you look at the reactions of the Twitter imbeciles, they have reacted like yesterday was a massive shock and not something that’s a reflection of where we are.

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Originally Posted by HCZ_Reborn

we do need to accept (whoever we blame for that being the case) that we simply do not have the capacity to score goals,

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Which is Arteta's fault because of his neglecting the attack in the last two windows, plus selling/loaning a whole bunch of attackers

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Originally Posted by Letters

Sterling please :lol:
But fair enough, I didn’t know that

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Still a valid point though, both Neto and Sterling were panic signings, if you throw into the mix Neto being cup-tied they were strategically a disaster

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Originally Posted by Mac76

Which is Arteta's fault because of his neglecting the attack in the last two windows, plus selling/loaning a whole bunch of attackers

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Which was covered with the parenthesis (whoever we blame for that being the case). My opinion on that is that it’s not cut and dry, and whilst Arteta takes much if not most of the blame, I don’t think he’s singularly responsible at the exclusion of anyone else.
When I’ve spoken about sacking Arteta, I’ve criticised those who own the club and those who are there on a day to day basis for giving one person too much authority. He should have for instance never been allowed to change his job role from head coach to manager.

But ultimately the point is (and this isn’t me disagreeing with you here) is that a lot of people have been critical of the tactical set up yesterday. I think talk of tactics is largely rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic

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Originally Posted by HCZ_Reborn

Which was covered with the parenthesis (whoever we blame for that being the case). My opinion on that is that it’s not cut and dry, and whilst Arteta takes much if not most of the blame, I don’t think he’s singularly responsible at the exclusion of anyone else.
When I’ve spoken about sacking Arteta, I’ve criticised those who own the club and those who are there on a day to day basis for giving one person too much authority. He should have for instance never been allowed to change his job role from head coach to manager.

But ultimately the point is (and this isn’t me disagreeing with you here) is that a lot of people have been critical of the tactical set up yesterday. I think talk of tactics is largely rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic

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Yes, sure all agreed, including that last point

I generally leave it for a while to comment on a game, and try to be as measured as I can when I do.

But as stated above, this was a nadir this season that has exposed issues with this team and the management that bode very badly for Arsenal going forwards.

Which other team do we most resemble? Man City. It provides a little perspective when seeing us through this prism. Football is changing before our eyes. It no longer seems that rigid, system based football is the path to success. I've been struck recently watching other teams play by how possession football has become outdated. We play most of the time at walking pace. Patiently waiting to try to shift a defender out of position to try to create a chance that requires absolute precision and finishing. If teams do not come to try to attack us, we have struggled for 2 years to break down low/mid blocks. But teams have worked this out. There is much more disclipline in defending, a focus on overloading our players coming in from wide positions, and most important of all our opponents are primed for the inevitable moment when we lose possession with our players up the pitch. It's all about quick transitions and exploiting these...and having the rapid, potent attack to do so. Possession is meaningless both in attack and defence...as we have seen with increasing frequency.

It is extremely worrying to me that Arteta has not reacted to this development - either with his approch to matches or recruitment. At a moment when it's all about attacking from transitions and creative MFs and forwards who can explint this, we have neglected these key positions. Where reaction, speed of thought and spontaneity in moments is winning games we are dependent on a seemingly inflexible system. We have had injuries, yes. But since Odegard's return we have been more or less full strength in MF and defence - the areas that Arteta has focussed on with his recruitment. Where has his defensive mindedness got us? For a while now we have been vulnerable to almost every rare counter-attack mounted by inferior (on paper) opposition. Our much vaunted defence is looking ordinary while our attack is almost non-existent.

More worrying is that Sesko and Zubimendi are not targets who particularly move the needle in the changed tactical landscape that is emerging.

Arteta is held out a a master tactician. A master tactician should not be undone like we were by West Ham on the weekend, or frustrated by Leicester until a Hail Mary from Merino after 81 minutes against Leicester. The subs on Saturday were embarassing.

To the game itself. Our players looked like did not believe that they would win that game, and certainly played like the league is already gone. There was no drive, no desire, no bravery, no craft. This sobriquet was harsh last seaon and the season before, but we are bottlers this season. I don't care about the injuries to Saka; Martinelli and Havertz, or at least this does not explain the limp performances we have seen since Dubai. It's like the fight and self belief have drained away since falling at the final hurdle last season. Winning players step up when circumstances are against them. Our players almost to a man have shrunk and handed the title to Liverpool on a platter.

I've largely kept the faith in our manager this far. What I am seeing now sees me starting to agree that we won't win anything under him.

To talk about bottling it is unfair IMO, they've probably just been run down by all the injuries, sendings off etc plus Liverpool's ability to get enough points to stay well ahead

I also think there's a general naivety about a young manager and (in general) young squad, Odegaard annoyed me a lot on Saturday, too far over to the right and often trying to be too clever

I agree Arteta's tactics are our main failing, I think he should be moved on but he won't be, that's why I keep saying we need more ruthlessness a la Abramovic's Chelsea, yes there was a LOT wrong with that regime but they knew what they (and the fans) wanted and second places (even first places sometimes) weren't good enough

And that's not saying the owners are complacent, I just don't think they know enough to realise Arteta's failings and there's no-one at the club to tell them

I think Edu's departure was highly significant, I'm now really concerned some players, e.g
Saliba, will move on as they lose the belief that we can win anything

Oh and while I hate the media pileon with Arsenal, I do think we're embarrassing sometimes with our kiddie 'ultras', cheesy anthems, dogs etc, I feel like this somehow comes back to Arteta's naivety, it's good he's re-connected with the fans but we don't need all this crap

I think we are honestly over complicating things in a way that we don’t need to.

I think there are parallels with Man City for sure, in that you can’t remove key players from a team and expect anything positive from it.

As for our vulnerability to counter attacks, it really is as simple as Arteta’s insistence on playing Partey at 6. It doesn’t work and it leaves our centre backs exposed.


There’s no point discussing a system change that will allow us to become more efficient going forward, because we simply don’t have the players to facilitate this. Even if (as we should do) we swap Rice and Partey around it’s not going to exponentially speed things up. The reason as I kept trying to explain to NQ the last couple of days we become slow and ponderous in the opponents half is that we lack the ability and confidence to dribble past them or execute a swift pass and move style. I suspect strongly that Odegaard is not fit, his constant decision to play more conservatively I suspect is to avoid further injury.

The one thing I noticed is that we were trying to utilise Merino as a typical centre forward by sending crosses into the box, but West Ham are good at defending crosses. We didn’t have an alternative strategy, and the only player with electric pace was Nwaneri who was marked out of the game and eventually went off with a knock (hopefully just a precaution).


In terms of recruitment this summer I think as well as a striker and a winger we clearly do need another ball playing midfielder. The alternative this season is to move Odegaard to 8 (assuming he’s fit enough to even play which I highly doubt) move Saka to 10 (when he’s back) and Nwaneri to the wing.

Playing Rice and Partey against West Ham at home is unnecessary (or at least it would be without the injury pile up we have)

But as for Saturday, ultimately we could have played more conservatively and come away with a point or a scrappy win, but really the result simply reflects only one thing…the paucity of choice available to us currently

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Originally Posted by Mac76

To talk about bottling it is unfair IMO

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Yeah, it's just become a lazy stereotype about us.
We didn't bottle it last season - ok, we lost vs Villa but we literally won every other sodding game. How is one slip in what, 18 games bottling it?
We didn't this season either. There was nothing to bottle - we have never been ahead in this race and have been plagued by injuries which have given us no chance of taking advantage of Liverpool's slips and putting some real pressure on.
That said, we should have had enough to beat West Ham. We're just running out of steam.

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Originally Posted by Letters

That said, we should have had enough to beat West Ham. We're just running out of steam.

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This is where I seem to be at odds with most of the people on here. Because I don’t think that’s the case. Well not so much the running out of steam bit…I just don’t think it’s especially relevant

When you have no strikers, your first choice wingers are also unavailable…your chief play maker is clearly unfit and you are relying on a 17 year old to make it happen for you. I don’t think there’s a question of “should” in terms of having enough to beat anyone.

I was disappointed by the result Saturday, in that I was hoping against hope that somehow we could make something happen from nothing. I’m not being uncharitable to us either, I don’t think there is any team in the league in the situation we are in who can be expected to turn up and win games…with the possible exception of teams that have pretty much resigned themselves to being relegated

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Originally Posted by HCZ_Reborn

There’s no point discussing a system change that will allow us to become more efficient going forward, because we simply don’t have the players to facilitate this.

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I only half agree, as you say elsewhere in that post Nwaneri has pace and Trossard's also capable of a breakaway, the odd occasion in recent games someone's played a searching ball forward it's often led to a good chance or a goal

And in any case it's the way we always play even with Martinelli, Saka (who admittedly I'm not sure is as good on the break tbh but then we never get the chance to see it really) and Havertz

There's a lack of willingness to try anything risky and i think it's the stranglehold Arteta has placed on players

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Originally Posted by Mac76

I only half agree, as you say elsewhere in that post Nwaneri has pace and Trossard's also capable of a breakaway, the odd occasion in recent games someone's played a searching ball forward it's often led to a good chance or a goal

And in any case it's the way we always play even with Martinelli, Saka (who admittedly I'm not sure is as good on the break tbh but then we never get the chance to see it really) and Havertz

There's a lack of willingness to try anything risky and i think it's the stranglehold Arteta has placed on players

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A breakaway is dependent on opposition teams committing players forward, that is only going to happen if teams find themselves a goal down.

If your point is we don’t employ the counter enough even when we are in a position to do so, then yeah definitely agree with that.

But against most teams especially at the Emirates it’s kind of a moot point

I do think we have bottled it. Maybe not by failing to win the league, but certainly when it has come to opportunities to at least put pressure on Liverpool. The manager as good as said so much about Saturday's game, and we did not play like title winners against the likes of Bournemouth; Fulham; Everton; Brighton; Newcastle (not to mention our cup exits). We have been profligate when it comes to scoring from clear chances throughout, and have had more defensive lapses and mistakes than I can remember for a long time. I am not saying that we have a God given right to win every game, but injuries or not our players have not stepped up when needed too many times. When Odegard was hiding on Saturday, when we played with no intent or drive and simply looked limp; when once again we were at sixes and sevens for their goal it's difficult not to reach the conclusion that we wilted when it counted. And this is by no means the first time we have been found wanting when Liverpool have dropped points. While admittedly this has not been the case throughout, too many times I have not seen a team with the fight needed to sustain a title challenge. Objectively, a review of our season won't focus on injuries first and foremost. It will show a team of players who, while they may have faced insurmountable odds in winning the league with key injuries and lack of player investment, failed to reach their potential.

And BTW I specifically said that we did not bottle it last season.

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Originally Posted by HCZ_Reborn

When you have no strikers, your first choice wingers are also unavailable…your chief play maker is clearly unfit and you are relying on a 17 year old to make it happen for you. I don’t think there’s a question of “should” in terms of having enough to beat anyone.

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I just feel there's goals in this side. Admittedly that opinion is starting to fly in the face of evidence, but Nwaneri looks likely, Odegaard can score, Rice chips in here and there.
I basically agree with you though and it's why I think you're being a bit harsh on Arteta. Yes, we are light on squad depth and yes we needed a striker but I'm not sure Arteta is responsible for transfer dealings. And we're still above everyone but Liverpool - they've been lucky with injuries and have had Salah on absolute fire all season.