A couple of bad results and the table swings very easily because it’s so tight at the moment.Originally Posted by Mac76
Our only concern right now should be how the fuck do we get a tune out of the guys who were so good last season but now look like Sunday league players.
Its more than just the striker from what I'm seeing. I mean even if we had Toney, there was absolutely no service, so what magic would he be expected to conjure?
We really messed up this summer, splurging all that money on a failed project like Harvetz, overspending for a decent Rice and putting ourselves in debt for Raya....just plain old stupid.
Cleary, we overestimated our current crop. Martinelli is an inconsistent player and will be so for all his career if you ask me. Odegaard is a show pony. Saka....well I'm not sure he can move on to the next level unless he has competition and sees the need to improve. That won't happen under a manager that thinks the way this manager thinks. In short our front 4 and the future we are so tirelessly building on their shoulders is nothing special. And yes it's deja vous, Wenger team youth all over again.
I'll hold my hands up. I honestly thought the 3 players I mentioned above could be our backbone and take us back to the glory days... but right now I'd sell at least 2 of them in January if I had the chance and probably bin the manager too.
I'm really upset but I expect i'll be re-echoing this sentiment again in a month or two.
Last edited by 21_GOONER_SALUTE; 31-12-2023 at 04:23 PM.
I think I’m definitely guilty of underestimating the work Xhaka and Partey did last season.
And not so long before that they were miles ahead of us.
It’s been a strange season, no one has really been consistent. Which is probably good in a way, makes it interesting and unpredictable.
It's the battle in the box from corners (if they ever get past the first defender) and set-pieces that require a physical striker to wear down the defence. In the last 2 games I watched the West Ham and Fulham defences grow in confidence as they totally bossed the midfielders and wingers who were pressed into service in the striker role. As for Eddie, he needs to hit the gym, big time. He has good feet but he can only ever be a supplement to a Giroud type who will pick up the bumps and bruises and cause real pain for the defence in return. A striker would also open up space for Saka and Martinelli who can be easily neutralised by double-team defending because there's no threat in the box.
weird, isn't it? I miss Giroud. He'd make a massive difference now.
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Is Ivan Toney any good? Is he a proper striker, or another tip-tap merchant?
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Good striker but I don’t think it would change too much given how feeble our construction of play is at the moment.
I think his physical presence in the box would help us immensely but I think that would be a short term fix rather than needing to adapt how we play.
We need to be far more direct, given the absolute pace merchants we have on the wing I don’t get why we are so reticent to use the long ball…it works for Liverpool.
Not the long ball, except on occasion to mix things up, but the high temp, direct ball which we already know these players are capable of delivering. Right now the passes to the wide men seem to be deliberately played short and to feet (or even behind them) so they always have to start from standing when they want to take on a defender. It pretty much eliminates any pace advantage they might have and gives the defence the time it needs to shut down the routes forward. And Jesus, or Eddie, the supposed strikers, end up square to the wide men rather than trying to make space ahead of tme. A lot of this is also down to Odegard thinking he's some sort of orchestral maestro when in fact he's a bung that guarantees every move breaks down unless one of his 1% moments happens and the highlights reel can sing his praises once more. If this team robbed a bank they'd throw away the safe key and try to pick the lock instead - making sure they spent enough time doing it to guarantee being caught.
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I said Martinelli has been the biggest downgrade this season but I don’t think Odegaard is far behind. He has become stale as fuck, needs so many touches to play the ball and loves a party trick for no reason.
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