Fulham vs Arsenal - 08/12/2024 - KO: 14:00 GMT

[HCZ_Reborn]

Well Brighton and Brentford play in very different ways but I get the overall point.

Yes we were without Gabriel, but the way Jiminez went past Kiwior was almost as embarassing as how easily Isaak turned Van Dijk.

They play differently but we can’t even rely on shut outs anymore. Arteta has not only neglected the squad in the forward areas, his pointless tinkering has made us more fragile because of fucking about with midfield (Rice at number 8, when he should be being used to stay back and snuff out danger) because he prefers buying players like Merino who plays like he has muscular dystrophy to actually quick and creative players.

[McNamara That Ghost...]

It is an issue that one player out can mean three different positions change.

Can't function as a team if you keep doing that.

Also why can't we see Odegaard and Nwaneri on the pitch at the same time?

[HCZ_Reborn]

It is an issue that one player out can mean three different positions change.

Can't function as a team if you keep doing that.

Also why can't we see Odegaard and Nwaneri on the pitch at the same time?

Hand on the chicken switch.

[Niall_Quinn]

FT 1-1

Liverpool strolling to the title really.

No. They have a poor defence and they have a fatally flawed striker in the halfwit Nunez. They won't last the pace. The gypos will bounce back, measure the challenge against them. And the chavs are a dark horse, don't know much about them but they seem to get the business done by hook or by crook.

[HCZ_Reborn]

No. They have a poor defence and they have a fatally flawed striker in the halfwit Nunez. They won't last the pace. The gypos will bounce back, measure the challenge against them. And the chavs are a dark horse, don't know much about them but they seem to get the business done by hook or by crook.

Dunno about City coming back into it. Some of their best players have seen better days, their current best player is out for the season and that doesn’t seem like a happy environment (things are all rosey when they are going your way).


It’s why I’m furious, because I think what you say about Liverpool is largely accurate. But I don’t think we will be there to take advantage

[IBK]

Yes we were without Gabriel, but the way Jiminez went past Kiwior was almost as embarassing as how easily Isaak turned Van Dijk.

They play differently but we can’t even rely on shut outs anymore. Arteta has not only neglected the squad in the forward areas, his pointless tinkering has made us more fragile because of fucking about with midfield (Rice at number 8, when he should be being used to stay back and snuff out danger) because he prefers buying players like Merino who plays like he has muscular dystrophy to actually quick and creative players.

This.

We are not going to win the title gents. And we are not going to win under Arteta. This is not an over reaction to 2 dropped points, but an observation on who we are now. A team with title aspirations does not fail to put the game to bed against a mid table quality team. A team that needs to up the pressure against league leaders who dropped points in midweek and whose postponed game meant we could have been within 4 points of them does not spurn the opportunity to do so.

Let's face it, apart from our injury-ravaged back 4 we were at full strength today. Yet we can't score from open play? Many Gooners were lauging at the 'Stoke' sobriquet levelled against us. But that is what we are when faced with stubborn opposition where we don't score first.

And how can a team obsessed with signing defenders be in a position where we are so disrupted by injuries at the back? Last year's defensive capability has vanished. How many times this season have we seen an opposition team score with their first attack? we are vulnerable at the back and seem so easily to be rendered toothless in attack when facing a well organised opposition.

We are, unfortunately a team that crumbles unless we have our first 11 unavailable - despite having spent so much on our squad. This is on Arteta. I said recently that our manager may not know how to create an effective/resiliant attack and I stand by this.

[HCZ_Reborn]

We are victims of Arteta’s pathological stubbornness, and his innate conservatism

To be a handful from set pieces should be something we are able to deploy as one of many threats, it should not be our single angle of attack.

I think in many ways this insistence on playing two holding midfielders harms us, because we don’t have natural ball players behind Odegaard, the ball takes longer to get up the pitch which gives the defence time to get into shape and it means because we have to overcommit with bodies it means that teams can catch us out with one long ball or just a good run.


I don’t think you can blame Kiwior too much for Jiminez bursting past him, he was left totally exposed. The thing is we as a team naturally push up anyway, our defence plays a high line but equally Newcastle scored with their first attack where as we dominate the ball but because we lack a threat in the centre of midfield a lot as Odegaard is left by himself, we dither a bit and then get caught out.

Arguably you can see the same thing happen against Man City. Overcommit, careless pass or dispossessed and we are pounced upon, the individual defending hasn’t got worse…it’s just teams know how to get at us and not having control properly in the centre of the park. And that’s even before you get to the wastefulness of our forward players.

I think the following has to end


Timber cannot play left back anymore, Partey cannot play right back anymore, Rice either plays at 6 or not at all….he lacks the technique or dynamism to be a box to box player.

We shouldn’t have two holding midfielders at all unless we are playing teams where we need to be cautious. We are too slow against teams that sit deep, and this is the main reason for that.

I stand by what I said earlier, I don’t think we should sign a striker in January…Arteta’s judgement cannot be trusted.

We shouldn’t give up on the title but we should tell Arteta that either way we are to part ways at the end of the season. Even if by chance he wins the title, it will be because of a spectacular collapse by Liverpool and we need someone who can take us forward not someone who lucks out despite himself.

[21_GOONER_SALUTE]

I don't think this is as complicated as you guys above are making it.

It would be 5 years and all we have to show for his stewardship is one FA cup and a possible superstar in Saka who fell in his lap.

Its really simple, we win the EPL or CL or he goes. Even Klopp, who's aged team is tearing up the league still had the decency to leave when he realised he couldn't stand the daily grind. He has high standards so he didn't need to be nudged. Unfortunately we are serially afflicted with coaches who don't have this kind of dignity.

I expect the excuse this season to be that "Edu leaving really through a spanner in the works" Its funny anyone would come up with that excuse when we are being bested by a double act of rookie championship level managers who got the job 4 months ago!!!

He needs to leave at the end of the season if what we really want hasn't been delivered...or we'll do another 10 years, with Saka, Saliba, Odegaard and Nwaneri effing off with nothing to show for it.

Its AW (without the success) happening all over again and some fans are actually falling for this crap.

[HCZ_Reborn]

The irony is, if Klopp left because he felt that no matter what he did with Liverpool he couldn’t best Man City (I think ultimately it’s more complicated than that, or a manager of his calibre would be back in management again). Is that someone who is a cheap imitation of Klopp (perhaps unfair on Slot, he does have his own style of play…but he’s been smart enough to keep to the Klopp blue print) might achieve something as a result of Man City’s collapse and Arsenal being blinded by the lights when we should have been the beneficiaries of City’s collapse.

I think ultimately a coach should have three seasons to prove himself, barring a dreadful sequence of results (a sequence like that happened for Arteta in the 2020-2021 season and I think the only thing that prevented him from getting the push was because we had sacked Emery only recently). So whilst I don’t think a coach should be kept in perpetuity whilst the goal posts get moved on what constitutes success.

I equally don’t like the hiring and firing policy of clubs like Chelsea which doesn’t give a coach chance to mould the team in their image, erases any effort to create a sense of consistency and ultimately can only ever work (if it works at all) with a club perpetually able to throw money at the problem. A bit like how Nate Silver describes Elon Musk’s gambling style…throw money at it and be prepared to reap huge losses until you eventually win.


I don’t want that strategy for Arsenal, I want the premier league for sure…to the point where everything else is subordinate to that goal. But I don’t want one premier league, I want to win the title, retain the title build a dynasty. The core players we have in Saliba, Gabriel, Odegaard and Saka as well as other key players in the squad such as Rice, Havertz, Trossard, Timber, Calafiori and Raya are good enough to not make that ambition fanciful. But we still have too much dross…whilst Partey and Jorginho are good they are the wrong side of thirty and they’ve had their best days.


We need a top striker for whom Havertz and Trossard can act as backup to


We need someone who will allow Martinelli to meet what in my view is the clear potential to be as good as Saka if not surpass him. The technique and raw pace is there, the confidence? Not so much


Arteta for all his flaws has instilled a much better mentality in this team than has existed under former coaches, we don’t get scared at the idea of going away to big sides….we know we can mix it with them. In fact the problem is we are more likely to suffer at the hands of mid table streetwise teams. I want to keep what has worked well with him at the helm, but move beyond him because it’s clear he can’t move beyond his shortcomings


We need to worry less about control and more about attacking execution. We know we can defend a lead, we need a side built to establish that lead and then tear apart any team that wants to get back into the game.

[KSE Comedy Club]

It is an issue that one player out can mean three different positions change.

Can't function as a team if you keep doing that.

Also why can't we see Odegaard and Nwaneri on the pitch at the same time?

Because Arteta is a coward.

Same reason all his subs are like for like, he never changes the formation or mixes up the play.