Match Reaction - Reading 1-2 Arsenal. 18th April. FA Cup Semi-Final

[fakeyank]

Really dont see why AW is being criticized tbh.. it was a cup semi-final and we won.. I could care less how we did it. The biggest game for me is next week when we play the cunts from West London. Beat those bitches and that'll be a display of 'bigger change' in the club than this win.

Let's go out and win this cup and hope Villa kill those cunts from Liverpool. You damn well know that if Stevie G is in the final, the refs will do whatever it takes to give the 'son of the soil' his dream farewell.

[Kano]

Szczesny has managed to master all the posturing and bravado of a top keeper but not the actual ability needed for this level. Decent but not good enough for us.

Wenger took a huge risk playing Debuchy for the whole 120 minutes after so long out, although at least his match fitness will be up. Kos was as solid as ever whilst Gibbs looked like a guy who hadn't played in a while.

Le Coq was solid, Caz worked hard and Ozil was off his game. Becks gave his all as always but badly needs to develop his centre forward play, which is hard when he'll struggle to get a run in this team. Out wide he's reasonably effective, a goto squad player.

And Sanchez is something else. Can be relied on to run his legs off upfront, chase back, retain the ball under pressure, bring others into an attack and consistently shoot on target. This sort of calibre of player won't stick around if we don't seriously challenge for the PL or CL.

Winning 9 (or 10?) in a row means we won't always be at the top of our game and we just done enough, forcing our luck today. We have a defeat looming sometime soon because I don't think anyone has ever won more than 12 on the spin over here. How we play against Chelsea - win, lose or draw - and how we pick ourselves up after our next defeat will hopefully prove something to a lot of us unconvinced fans.

[Herbert_Chapman's_Zombie]

Actually no I think this is worrying, I wouldn't mind if its a year ago and we don't really have any natural width or pace then I could understand but it was abundantly clear that a physically strong and hard working Reading side struggled against pace and yet we haul Welbeck off when bringing Giroud on and wait until extra time to bring Walcott on.
Not only that there is the lunacy of starting Debuchy despite being out for three months, and this totally arbitrary notion of having the second choice goalkeeper play the cup games no matter how horrendously out of form they clearly are.

Winning despite playing badly allows you to ignore the glaring deficiencies in performance and tactics, and to get anything against Chelsea we will need to be at our best (Man City at the Etihad best).

[Letters]

Really dont see why AW is being criticized tbh.. it was a cup semi-final and we won...

Are you all right? You're scaring me!
Playing Chesney was a mistake IMO. I'm ok with having a 'Cup Keeper' to an extent but Chesney has become a liability. There was a bit of bad luck with the goal, it did deflect, but a better 'keeper would have kept it out IMO. And on a few other occasions he punched the ball rather than catching it and looked far from convincing, I fear for us if he plays in the final.
I don't have a problem with the rest of the team, we had more than enough quality to beat Reading and while we made hard work of it it's often like that in a semi-final when the underdogs are playing the game of their lives. These sorts of games are rarely thumpings.

End of the day, we're in the final. That's all that matters.

I put less weight on the Chelsea result than you, it would be nice to beat them but the title is gone. It's out of our hands and they won't slip up, or not badly enough. We need them to lose 3 games and they've only lost 2 all season. One of those is against us or course but you know Mourinho will park the bus, he'll come for a draw and probably get one. I'd rather win the Cup final than the Chelsea game. Both would be nice, of course.

[Letters]

we haul Welbeck off when bringing Giroud on and wait until extra time to bring Walcott on.

To be fair, Giroud made an immediate impact. Ramsey should have wrapped it up in normal time. And he's in far better form than Walcott. Also, playing badly and winning is what sides who win trophies do. No team plays well every game. It wasn't a terrible performance yesterday, nor an outstanding one. We did enough though, that's all that matters in a cup.

[Herbert_Chapman's_Zombie]

To be fair, Giroud made an immediate impact. Ramsey should have wrapped it up in normal time. And he's in far better form than Walcott. Also, playing badly and winning is what sides who win trophies do. No team plays well every game. It wasn't a terrible performance yesterday, nor an outstanding one. We did enough though, that's all that matters in a cup.

It's not bringing Giroud on that was the problem (I agree he did provide a positive impact when he came on) it was leaving one of many central midfielders on and making the midfield more congested and giving them time to get back when we attempted to break.
Ozil, Ramsey and Cazorla could have taken one of them off, and I disagree I think Walcott actually gave us a good attacking outlet when running against tired legs and could have been deployed earlier to just as good effect.
Talking Coquelin off was also suspect as we were finding it hard to clear our lines and got ourselves penned in for large periods of the second half of extra time.
I agree that you can win games without playing well, but I think most managers will still address why the side isn't playing well my worry with Wenger is that it doesn't matter to him whether his tactics and personnel worked if he wins despite this it doesn't matter.
Yesterday we were let off the hook in a big way, and to say we don't need to learn from this would be a fatal error, we didnt look that great against Burnley either and if we think a more talented and capable side like Chelsea won't work just as hard as Burnley and Reading than we have a big surprise coming to us.

[Niall_Quinn]

This is what a lot of fans and certainly the media just don't get. Each game is important not just for the result but also in terms of the team performance and the performance of each individual. You build a settled team, nurture the squad so you can slot one or two players in to cover injuries and suspensions. You keep winding the performance levels up a notch each game until you have a machine, like the chavs or barca or marketing.

There's a huge difference between consistency peppered with the odd loss, that can happen to any team, and randomly picking up wins and points bouncing from fixture to fixture constantly on the edge of defeat but somehow scraping through before falling off a cliff.

Top players can help you paper the cracks and disguise managerial incompetence, players like Alexis. A poor tactician and man manager like Wenger relies on these individuals to bury his own inadequacies. You see when we lose he blames the players, not his lack of tactics, cohesion or his failure to build genuine rather than random momentum and understanding between the players. He'll say we lack sharpness, or we play with a handbrake, or our energy levels dropped. He never admits his crazy team selections and subs and inappropriate tactics are the root cause.

Wenger loses silly games, he promotes under-performance in straightforward games, he takes stupid risks when they aren't necessary, he goes conservative when there's no threat. Basically he's a handicap we have to overcome every match and he showed that again yesterday.

A decent tactician could get so much more out of this squad and team, could take us up that step that is unreachable for Wenger.

What we needed against Burnley and Reading were two confident, efficient and progressive performances with the intent of peaking for the chav game. Instead we get shit performance #1, but it was a win so ignore it, and embarrassing and shit performance #2, ignore it again because now we are in the "Can't Win a Big Prize" Cup final. Hopefully the players can pull it together all by themselves next week, but a lot of that will depend on what team is put out.

Indeed, the title is all but gone. So there is absolutely ZERO reason not to go for after the chavs big time next week. If their goal is to park the bus we need a smart manager who can overcome that. We need to surprise them, shock them, shake them out of their comfort zone. We need Maureen and his chavs to leave that pitch thinking fuck, okay we won the title this year but we're going to have a real fight on our hands next season.

Wenger won't be thinking like that. He'll be thinking shit like a 1-0 will do no matter how we play or what message we send. He'll be thinking we're in the cup final and that's all that matters. He'll be thinking the title is gone but second isn't bad.

LOSER stuff, like that. Only losers think like that.

Yesterday there should have been continuity in the team, regardless of it being the cup, a fast tempo, respect for the opponent but homework done to find their obvious weaknesses (they are a lower league team after all) and ruthlessly exploit them. Now if the opponent battles you to a standstill, good for them. But when they are in the game because you can't be bothered to be in it, fuck that. The result can't hide that basic lack of competitiveness and drive. The manager instils none of that. Alexis embarrasses him. Alexis would manage this team much better. He knows what it takes to win. He's a winner.

Too many excuses for Wenger floating around after a decade. Fans can console themselves with the FA Cup if they like but don't expect anything more than consolation while this guy is in charge.

His substitution of Coquelin yesterday was astonishing. Absolutely stunning. No other manager would even contemplate lunacy on that scale.

[Ollie the Optimist]

One thing i found odd yesterday was the reaction by the media to the keepers mistake. It was painted as a tragedy and the worst thing that could have happened etc etc. You have to feel sorry for him and all that bollocks.


Just like they felt sorry for Szcesney when he did it v birmingham.

[Niall_Quinn]

One thing i found odd yesterday was the reaction by the media to the keepers mistake. It was painted as a tragedy and the worst thing that could have happened etc etc. You have to feel sorry for him and all that bollocks.


Just like they felt sorry for Szcesney when he did it v birmingham.

FA Cup syndrome. Little guys against the giants. I don't think it was aimed at us, they do that for any underdog.

That said, their keeper was awful. He was very lucky not to concede minutes before the second goal when he again made a howler but got away with it.

[Ollie the Optimist]

FA Cup syndrome. Little guys against the giants. I don't think it was aimed at us, they do that for any underdog.

That said, their keeper was awful. He was very lucky not to concede minutes before the second goal when he again made a howler but got away with it.

he was also lucky not to be sent off for tripping alexis early on in the game.