Match Reaction vs Soton (away)

[Ollie the Optimist]

Thats what we are up against and thats why we'll probably not win the league. We cannot win 10+ games on the spin, we dont have the players or goals and when you consider that City have improved their away record and their players seem to be gelling together more and more, its gonna be hard.

Id love a draw tonight but i can honestly see them winning 0-3, they have so much firepower and create umpteen chances per game.

We'll do well to be up there with them this season.

didn't we go on a 11 game winning streak after the villa game? since chelsea, we have played 8, winning the first 7 games, which included spurs and newcastle away (tough place to go this season) we can put some very good winning runs together.

[Letters]

didn't we go on a 11 game winning streak after the villa game? since chelsea, we have played 8, winning the first 7 games, which included spurs and newcastle away (tough place to go this season) we can put some very good winning runs together.

We've done very well this year but we're competing against teams who don't need to worry about injuries, don't need to worry about fatigue. They can just pull more £40m players off the bench and on they go. There's been a clear improvement this year, we're going in the right direction, but ultimately I don't see how we can win the league against teams who have such impressive squads.
I don't see winning the title as the criteria for success this year.

[AFC Leveller]

We did and that was why we are top of the league but City seem to be hititng form right now and have a full squad of quality internationals to choose from. We have played OKAY for about 6 games now and although we won, yesterday was a reminder that we cannot continue to play badly and win all the time. To top it all off, we have 2 of our better goal getters out injured (Theo and Rambo). had those two been fit yesterday then id bet you we'd have won.

[AFC Leveller]

We've done very well this year but we're competing against teams who don't need to worry about injuries, don't need to worry about fatigue. They can just pull more £40m players off the bench and on they go. There's been a clear improvement this year, we're going in the right direction, but ultimately I don't see how we can win the league against teams who have such impressive squads.
I don't see winning the title as the criteria for success this year.

Aguero missed about 6 games for them but they still won every game without him because they had 28m Djeko, 18m Negredo, 15m Navas, 24m Silva etc to choose from. We lost Theo and there goes ur only outlet/pace. Its not realistic to expect us to compete with them right now.

[JonasTC]

We did and that was why we are top of the league but City seem to be hititng form right now and have a full squad of quality internationals to choose from. We have played OKAY for about 6 games now and although we won, yesterday was a reminder that we cannot continue to play badly and win all the time. To top it all off, we have 2 of our better goal getters out injured (Theo and Rambo). had those two been fit yesterday then id bet you we'd have won.

You keep talking about City being this amazing mythical creature who does nothing wrong and Arsenal are doing "okay"... Have you even seen City play? They were lucky to win at Swansea, Newcastle, WBA and Liverpool, won 1-0 over palace and had a corrupt ref help them to win over us, in their "amazing" 11 game run, yet when we win the same kind of games, we're doing "okay". Makes sense.

[AFC Leveller]

You keep talking about City being this amazing mythical creature who does nothing wrong and Arsenal are doing "okay"... Have you even seen City play? They were lucky to win at Swansea, Newcastle, WBA and Liverpool, won 1-0 over palace and had a corrupt ref help them to win over us, in their "amazing" 11 game run, yet when we win the same kind of games, we're doing "okay". Makes sense.

Can you honestly say we've played well against Cheslea, Everton, Newcastle, Cardiff, Fulham and yesterday? NO, i dont think so. We have been winning games due to our excellent defence and 10-15 minute spells where he score our goals. Im not for on second complaining and when i look at the difference between this season and last (15 points better of) i see clear improvement.

However, winning the title is not something i expect, i expect us to continue to challenge and stay in touch but we are competing against a much better squad.

[IBK]

The reason we'll finish 3rd is that the two teams we're trying to compete with have the infinite money cheat on.
We're top of the league, we've won our last 7 games, the first set back and everyone wets themselves.
Tsk.

That's untrue on tonight's evidence. Team selection was wrong and over the past month or so we've tried to get away with turning up to play for 5 minutes then going back to sleep. We did that tonight but and we've finally been punished. It's been coming and it's down to us. We can't blame City and Chelsea for today. That's a far stretch and a cop out.

I've given myself time to think about this, and while I don't want to be knee jerk, I'm afraid that last night summarises in many ways why we should be much more circumspect about our so-called 'progress' than some Gooners are.

I could only listen to the match (switching between radio shows) - but by all accounts, the first half was truly, truly awful from us. How can a team supposedly full of confidence, playing a fixture that lets face it was an essential 3 points if we were to maintain any real pretence of challenging for the title (given our 2 horrendous coming runs) - come out playing like that?

For me, that is totally down to the manager. It started on Monday, when his near-hysterical reaction to Mourinho's taunting showed us a brittle manager who has let Maureen get under his skin. It really was not the best rallying cry for his players. And the negativity continued with his team selection last night. Bringing a non-match fit Arteta in alongside Flamini in midfield was a very poor selection - and one that has made the team look unbalanced almost whenever its been tried this season. It meant that the initiative was handed on a plate to Southampton, and was simply not, IMHO how league leaders should have approached this tie.

The truth is that while Steve Bould has clearly been allowed to tighten us up at the back, we have not looked truly threatening going forwards for a while now. Wenger might choose to praise his team's 'resilience' to keep going in adversity, but as PNG says - we have looked complacent and lacking in focus for a few games now - and its an age old Arsenal problem.

Letters chooses to look at the competition to explain why we won't win the league. Well its that opposition that we have to beat to win things - and compare and contrast them with us. Both Citeh and the Chavs have had games where they have let themselves down this season, but (the City/Watford FA Cup tie apart) - the trend is that both teams have improved as their new managers have found their right balance of players. Wenger's team has not improved - despite his vastly greater longevity and experience with his players.

Even when we were 7 points clear a couple of months ago - most pundits and bookies put us 3rd favourites for the league, pointing out that we had had a relatively easy first half to the season. Letters can argue that this is because of Chelsea's and Citeh's resources - but that is not the whole reason. Manure were way out-resourced by the same teams last season but romped the league. The reason why we are not considered proper title rivals by most is that we have a horrible history of crumbling under pressure. In 2008, we were 5 points clear at the top of the league in February, but imploded. For more seasons than I wish to remember, we have been in with a theoretical chance of 3 or 4 trophies, only to crash out of everything in a matter of weeks.

This season, we have lost to Manure during their most inept period; failed to beat a developing Chavs team at home; been spanked by Citeh and dropped points against the likes of Everton at home and now Southampton away. Lets not forget also that we could't secure a draw against Napoli that would have seen us top our CL group - and instead came close to going out of a group that we had led from the outset.

I am afraid that nothing I have seen from us this season suggests that we will not implode again during our upcoming 'crunch' periods. The fact that its so likely to be 'same old' 'same old' Arsenal is what makes results like last night's depressing - not knee-jerkiness.

[Globalgunner]

So we can conclude that Letters and others have written this season off before it even started because we have an inferior squad to 2 teams. Leading the leaugue for so long must be some fluke then, so we should all agree that top 4 is where we expect to be. No doubt things will remain the same for the forseeable future because real;istically the status quo wrt City Chelsea will remain the same and United will eventually get their shit together.

However I dont see what yesterdays result has to do with any other club. We squandered 2 points because we refused to use the assets at our disposal properly.

A great manager can get his team an extra 20 points each season imo, otherwise why are United struggling now with essentially the same squad that blitzed the league last season. I dont understand why some like to be obtuse just to be obtuse. We should all be in agreement that yesterday, Wenger screwed up. He may get it right next time but nothing changes what just happened

[Power n Glory]

Why chose that one game? After 23 games we're top and if City win their game in hand we'll be at worst one point off the top.
If City go top then it'll be because if a run of 12 games where they've won 11, drawn 1. We've done remarkably well to stay top as long as we have.
We're 15 points better off than we were at this stage last season.

We can't blame City and Chelsea for us dropping 2 points but City drew there too, every team drops silly points here and there. We're competing with sides who have infinite resources, it's very difficult. There's been a clear improvement since last season though, last year with a performance as I've heard last night's was we'd have lost. We're going in the right direction, I'm not sure what else you can ask of the manager or club.

Maybe because this is the match reaction thread?

Southampton looked the fresher side even though we had an extra days rest. Saying we can’t ask much more from the team and management is a stretch. It wasn’t a good performance.

[Letters]

Letters chooses to look at the competition to explain why we won't win the league.
Well its that opposition that we have to beat to win things - and compare and contrast them with us.
Both Citeh and the Chavs have had games where they have let themselves down this season, but (the City/Watford FA Cup tie apart) - the trend is that both teams have improved as their new managers have found their right balance of players. Wenger's team has not improved - despite his vastly greater longevity and experience with his players.

We're 15 points better off than we were at this stage last year and we haven't improved?
I'd say our record this year (W16 D4 L3) is significantly better that last year's W10 D7 L6 at this stage.

Last year we scraped into the top 4, I don't see how it's reasonable to expect us to win the league this year.
In order to assess whether we can win the league of course you have to look at how strong the other teams are.
City's squad is frightening, the fact they didn't win the league last year is a combination of poor management, Fergie being Fergie and RvP being brilliant and fit all season. They've looked far poorer this season with Moyes and with Rooney and RvP getting injuries.

This season, we have lost to Manure during their most inept period; failed to beat a developing Chavs team at home; been spanked by Citeh and dropped points against the likes of Everton at home and now Southampton away.

We've also beaten Dortmund away (who I believe had won every home game prior to our visit), won away at Newcastle (who had only lost one home game and beaten both Utd and Chelsea at home at that stage) and beaten Liverpool at home (who would have leapfrogged us to go top had we not done so. I can cherry pick good results just as easily as you can cherry pick bad ones, and I can cherry pick bad results for our rivals (City lost away at Cardiff and Sunderland - the current bottom 2 - and, like us, drew away at Southampton)

I don't think we'll win the league because over a long season I think City and Chelsea both have too much for us.
You can blame Wenger if you like and of course he's not perfect, but we're competing with sides who don't have to cope with fatigue or injuries like we do. We've done well so far but when push comes to shove I think we'll be found wanting. The resources of City and Chelsea are a massive factor.

Do you think, given the last 2 seasons where we've just about limped into the top 4, the title is a reasonable expectation this year?