When will Arteta be sacked by

[HCZ_Reborn]

@MO - agree, Trossard needs a start and Saka needs a rest

@HCZ - I think Jorginho on a normal day is better than Partey on a bad day so was the right move

as for ESR, i really have my doubts about whether he's going to make it here, i don't see how he fits in, he seems too much of a drift-in-and-out type

I'm much more concerned about making sure Nelson gets enough game time and that we keep him, i still think Arteta underestimates waht he can do, he is one of our very few potential game-changers

I wasn’t saying it was the wrong move, I just don’t necessarily think it made the difference we were hoping for and to that end I’m suggesting that even if Arteta had made the substitutions we think he should have made it possibly wouldn’t have changed all that much.

I’m torn on Smith Rowe I tend to think we are better off selling him, but I also do think he’s a player that whilst not a starter clearly has enough ability to be an impact substitute

I’m less convinced about Reiss Nelson than you are, I just think he isn’t physically strong enough for the premier league. But again I’m open minded enough to think I could be wrong about that

[HCZ_Reborn]

Agree with your post. The part in bold is particularly true. I suspect that even Citeh fans have felt the same about the best manager in the world at times this season. A manager who can never be criticised for a decision in a key moment does not exist, and it is astonishing to see the post above claiming its good news for us that there is talk of Arteta being chased by PSG is crazy.

We bottled it yesterday. Simple as. I agree that the subs were inconsequential yesterday. The manager was not responsible for Partey having his worst game this season, nor for the majority of our players being below par and far too casual once we went 0-2 up. It's not down to Arteta that we had injuries to 3 key players - nor even that if you take Saliba and Zinchenko out of our team the Arsenal machine misfires. We are not on financial steroids like the team who will win the league, and perhaps it was always going to be the case that we needed luck with injuries for the run in to finish top - that has deserted us when it counted.

Where the real disappointment comes for me is that similar to the sharp end of last season, our players cannot play the occasion. We have seen this twice in a row now. The quality of our team has improved, and our league position does not lie. But we remain brittle, and we lack the composure and self-belief to be champions. I feel that our last 2 games will be the analogy for our season. Excellent at times but thrown away when it counted. Its easy at the moment to feel that we will never reach the level that Citeh display season after season - consistency when it really matters. We have exceeded expectations, but it doesn't feel like that when we keep returning to type. I would have loved to prove all the sceptics wrong, but I don't think we will do so.

Agree

It’s interesting because the players themselves seemed to recognise it, Odegaard was very open about what went wrong and now the passing which was second nature just wasn’t coming off.

Then again recognising it is one thing, being able to do anything about it is quite another

[selassie]

I agree, people can go on about City's relentlessness but, just as our success has been partly down to Arteta, so are our failures - today and last week were self-inflicted by a manager who has favourites and no plan B, when things go wrong he often makes the wrong decisions on who to bring on, who to take off and when

Man City's relentlessness is factual stuff, they go on deep winning runs at the business end of every season hence why they have won 4 of the past 5 titles, we can ignore it if we want but it is what happens every season. It's not even like we have collapsed either, yeah we have dropped points in crucial games that we were seemingly in control of, that's really on the players, the fact it has happened in consecutive weeks is a major concern though.

Arteta is still learning on the job and has his faults, I've not really gone too much into his substitutions as I still don't think we have enough match winners or difference makers off the bench yet. The squad is still evolving and we will need to improve it quite a bit in the summer if we want to navigate CL and a proper Title challenge next season.

I do agree Arteta makes some very questionable decisions, up at Liverpool was ridiculous bringing on Kiwor. Even yesterday I would have kept on Odegaard, the Jesus substitution could well be because they are still easing him back in, I don't know.

[selassie]

I looked back over the last 5 seasons. City's points average over the last 5 years is 91.6. Their average is more than The Invincibles got. It's mental.
Liverpool got 92 points in one season and 97 in another and didn't win the title either time.
The only time City have failed to win it is when Liverpool went absolutely mental and blitzed everyone.
Yesterday was unacceptable. Liverpool wasn't great but more forgivable given their home record and the saves Ramsdale made to keep us level at the end.
But we are up against the Usain Bolt of football. They were always likely to mow us down. I just hope we keep going and at least make them work for it, a collapse now would be unforgiveable.

Yep, this is the point I have been banging on about.

[21_GOONER_SALUTE]

Agree with your post. The part in bold is particularly true. I suspect that even Citeh fans have felt the same about the best manager in the world at times this season. A manager who can never be criticised for a decision in a key moment does not exist, and it is astonishing to see the post above claiming its good news for us that there is talk of Arteta being chased by PSG is crazy.

We bottled it yesterday. Simple as. I agree that the subs were inconsequential yesterday. The manager was not responsible for Partey having his worst game this season, nor for the majority of our players being below par and far too casual once we went 0-2 up. It's not down to Arteta that we had injuries to 3 key players - nor even that if you take Saliba and Zinchenko out of our team the Arsenal machine misfires. We are not on financial steroids like the team who will win the league, and perhaps it was always going to be the case that we needed luck with injuries for the run in to finish top - that has deserted us when it counted.

Where the real disappointment comes for me is that similar to the sharp end of last season, our players cannot play the occasion. We have seen this twice in a row now. The quality of our team has improved, and our league position does not lie. But we remain brittle, and we lack the composure and self-belief to be champions. I feel that our last 2 games will be the analogy for our season. Excellent at times but thrown away when it counted. Its easy at the moment to feel that we will never reach the level that Citeh display season after season - consistency when it really matters. We have exceeded expectations, but it doesn't feel like that when we keep returning to type. I would have loved to prove all the sceptics wrong, but I don't think we will do so.

Excuses, excuses, excuses.... throwing 2-0 leads twice in a row in 7 days to sides struggling (and fatigued) isn't the Managers fault or down to his decisions, but when we were beating teams black and blue it was all about his greatness and how he sets up his team.

Come on give me a break.

For ages their has been a consensus on here that if theirs a weak or naive part of the Rookies game, its the way he uses his bench and subs; we are either complaining that he is running players into the ground (Saka), or ignoring his favourites messing up and being ineffectual (Xhaka, Zin etc.)...saying nothing would have changed if we'd made subs at the right time is a bloody cop out! Pep and Klopp have always shocked us with subs before the half hour limit once they see something isn't quite right...our more experienced former manager who is doing a great job at Villa use to do the same thing too... always believing a team of inexperienced kids will "figure it out" is a bit fanboyish and immature if you ask me. But if I am being honest, I can see how it could build character, the same way I can see how dropping points and repeatedly falling over hurdles kills any character that was suppose to have been built!!

I really don't get why we as fans would prefer not to analyse our team and coach but instead stay firmly fixated on another teams record, lionising every effing thing about them ...its just too pathetic.

It wasn't Citeh who knocked us out of The Europa league, they didn't knock us out of the League cup...they are not responsible for the fact that he has only reached one final in 4 years .....and TBH, even if they end up beating us this month, that loss will not be the loss that meant we could not win the title this year ( we dropped 4 points in 7 days while being 2 nil up, who effing does that while chasing a title!!)...lets actually look at what we can control and scream about our weaknesses until they are adequately addressed....thats if some of us want to move forward or want to keep on bitching for another 20 years.

[selassie]

Agree with your post. The part in bold is particularly true. I suspect that even Citeh fans have felt the same about the best manager in the world at times this season. A manager who can never be criticised for a decision in a key moment does not exist, and it is astonishing to see the post above claiming its good news for us that there is talk of Arteta being chased by PSG is crazy.

We bottled it yesterday. Simple as. I agree that the subs were inconsequential yesterday. The manager was not responsible for Partey having his worst game this season, nor for the majority of our players being below par and far too casual once we went 0-2 up. It's not down to Arteta that we had injuries to 3 key players - nor even that if you take Saliba and Zinchenko out of our team the Arsenal machine misfires. We are not on financial steroids like the team who will win the league, and perhaps it was always going to be the case that we needed luck with injuries for the run in to finish top - that has deserted us when it counted.

Where the real disappointment comes for me is that similar to the sharp end of last season, our players cannot play the occasion. We have seen this twice in a row now. The quality of our team has improved, and our league position does not lie. But we remain brittle, and we lack the composure and self-belief to be champions. I feel that our last 2 games will be the analogy for our season. Excellent at times but thrown away when it counted. Its easy at the moment to feel that we will never reach the level that Citeh display season after season - consistency when it really matters. We have exceeded expectations, but it doesn't feel like that when we keep returning to type. I would have loved to prove all the sceptics wrong, but I don't think we will do so.

Or it could be a mixture of bottle and lack of quality. Maybe we don't have the squad yet to compete and this is all hypothetical as technically it is still in our hands. This season was always going to be about keeping our key players fit for most of the season which we have done pretty much up until now. We have seen the drop in quality when Saliba is out, we have seen it when Partey was out even though he was awful yesterday and not great up at Anfield either.

If for example Saliba would have missed large parts of this season I don't even think we would be in this position. I am not saying we haven't started to bottle it and I do question the mentality of this team at times but you could argue we also don't have the squad quality yet.

One thing we need to do is improve it in the summer for CL & PL next season, Holding at 3rd choice CB is not good enough, neither are our centre midfield (not Ode) options outside of Xhaka, Partey and Jorginho who are all getting on.

[HCZ_Reborn]

Excuses, excuses, excuses.... throwing 2-0 leads twice in a row in 7 days to sides struggling (and fatigued) isn't the Managers fault or down to his decisions, but when we were beating teams black and blue it was all about his greatness and how he sets up his team.

Come on give me a break.

For ages their has been a consensus on here that if theirs a weak or naive part of the Rookies game, its the way he uses his bench and subs; we are either complaining that he is running players into the ground (Saka), or ignoring his favourites messing up and being ineffectual (Xhaka, Zin etc.)...saying nothing would have changed if we'd made subs at the right time is a bloody cop out! Pep and Klopp have always shocked us with subs before the half hour limit once they see something isn't quite right...our more experienced former manager who is doing a great job at Villa use to do the same thing too... always believing a team of inexperienced kids will "figure it out" is a bit fanboyish and immature if you ask me. But if I am being honest, I can see how it could build character, the same way I can see how dropping points and repeatedly falling over hurdles kills any character that was suppose to have been built!!

I really don't get why we as fans would prefer not to analyse our team and coach but instead stay firmly fixated on another teams record, lionising every effing thing about them ...its just too pathetic.

It wasn't Citeh who knocked us out of The Europa league, they didn't knock us out of the League cup...they are not responsible for the fact that he has only reached one final in 4 years .....and TBH, even if they end up beating us this month, that loss will not be the loss that meant we could not win the title this year ( we dropped 4 points in 7 days while being 2 nil up, who effing does that while chasing a title!!)...lets actually look at what we can control and scream about our weaknesses until they are adequately addressed....thats if some of us want to move forward or want to keep on bitching for another 20 years.

Or we can get real and accept that we are armchair critics and our opinions don’t matter for shit

The fact of the matter is everyone was playing fine yesterday until they weren’t. And the point is if you have the brittle mentality in the squad it doesn’t necessarily matter who you bring on given we are dealing with human beings and not a vast collection of data on football manager.

I think Arteta has been poor with his substitutions and doesn’t rotate enough but that’s my opinion that happens to be widely shared, it’s not conclusive fact anymore than it’s conclusive fact that the substitutions would have made the impact in a game where it just looked like everyone was rabbits in the headlights and suffering from Anfield PTSD.

Also IBK has also said that he felt that Arteta made substitutions like Nelson too late in the day so it’s almost like you can keep more than one thought in your head.

So kindly knock off this “you either agree with me or you lack ambition as a fan” bollocks you like to go to town with.

[21_GOONER_SALUTE]

Or we can get real and accept that we are armchair critics and our opinions don’t matter for shit

The fact of the matter is everyone was playing fine yesterday until they weren’t. And the point is if you have the brittle mentality in the squad it doesn’t necessarily matter who you bring on given we are dealing with human beings and not a vast collection of data on football manager.

I think Arteta has been poor with his substitutions and doesn’t rotate enough but that’s my opinion that happens to be widely shared, it’s not conclusive fact anymore than it’s conclusive fact that the substitutions would have made the impact in a game where it just looked like everyone was rabbits in the headlights and suffering from Anfield PTSD.

Also IBK has also said that he felt that Arteta made substitutions like Nelson too late in the day so it’s almost like you can keep more than one thought in your head.

So kindly knock off this “you either agree with me or you lack ambition as a fan” bollocks you like to go to town with.

Oh STFU if you can't come up with a proper reply you bullshitter.

You've always believed we couldn't win the league even when everyone else was saying we had a great chance to because you've always been one of those feckless cowardly fans who's opinions I can't really rate.

You rightly got it, that you are the kind of fan I can't stand, so I'm shocked you'd reply to me when I wasn't replying to your usual pessimistic holier than thou bullshit.

Everyone wasn't playing well when we ran up to 2 nil, Saka, who I (and Mandela) pointed out in the last game for having a mare, continued being poor and strangely subdued and I see no reason why Trossard shouldn't have started over him. Partey was strangely poor (but I wouldn't have dropped him, instead I would have maybe given him some help because an argument could be made that he missed Zin). I am sure others would point out those who were poor if you would give them the chance

Unlike you, who is too cowardly to stick to an opinion, I stated on the match thread at half time that we were slowly imploding again...I'm not always right, but caring about something should mean you should give your honest opinion whether you get egg on your face or not.

You've turned yourself into some sort of Rottweiler on this board jumping at posters because you think you know them... dude STFU and debate...if you can't do the latter, just STFU.

[Letters]

Guys, come on. This place is barely moderated these days but let's not get personal.
Keep it civil.

[mandela8]

Saka doesn't need "rested" he needs dropped. The boy is a disgrace. His effort is utterly abject. His attitude stinks and why shouldn't it? The point I've been making for months is that this immunity from scrutiny that everyone affords him doesn't do him any good. In fact, it's detrimental to his development. He now struts around like someone who has made it when he has achieved fuck all. But when he's never criticized or dropped why the fuck shouldn't he? Where's his motivation? You all robbed him off it with your fanboyism.

People now seeing he is a liability and dressing it up as "he needs a rest" is fucking embarrassing. He's a wee primadonna of your own making.