Well it's actually two reasons:Originally Posted by IBK
1. The summer transfer window was terrible, the recruitment was below the required standard and no where near enough. We have a 22 man squad this season instead of 25.
2. The style of our play, the team selections, tactics & substitutions have all been regressive, poor & downright baffling for most of this season so far.
Yeh, fair point.
It just seems like we will never change, just when we need that little bit of sprinkles on top to finish the desert, we refuse to spend the extra 50p to finish it off.
We always 'make do' or scrabble around the bargain bin instead of doing the right thing.
True but also it’s clearly not as easy as we make it out to be. Whilst it’s an excuse in some respects to justify parsimony it’s also true that we do have to be careful not to fall afoul of either FSR or FFP. The thing is you will hear the complaint about not spending in areas where we need to from the fanbase of all clubs. Even Liverpool fans seem to be going ape shit that they aren’t active in the transfer window. The problem is rather than create an even field, these regulations have stratified the spending imbalance.
Last summer was a gamble that didn’t pay off. Ultimately I don’t think anything we do in January will change anything this season. So it’s about making sure that the summer isn’t a write off like last one. I suspect that this Sesko individual will be announced as a summer signing like with Zubimendi before the season ends.
Hmmm...Re 1 I'd say that at the time - ie before the season started, the fan base was reasonably happy with our Summer transfers. There might have been misgivings about a striker, but there was hope that Jesus was fit again and able to contribute, and even the Sterling loan was greeted with a certain amount of relief that we had a player who might shake off his Chelsea form.
Re 2 - if we were top of the league and looking strong, I think there would be little criticism amongst Gooners regarding our style of play, tactics etc.
The misery and criticism has come because we look so inconsistent - and it is because we are not performing to expectations while allowing another team that we feel we should be at least equal to, to run away with the title.
As HCZ correctly observes, this season we are 'doing a Liverpool' in the season after they won the league. I think actually that the more telling comparable was Liverpool finishing 2nd in 2021/22 then 5th in 2022/23. Criticisms of our team aside, the pressure of trying to keep pace with City - as we have done for the past 2 seasons - should not be under estimated.
Putting the laughter back into manslaughter
I think 2020/2021 is more of an apt comparison because Liverpool weren’t losing games until about January/February time. I think this is what will happen with us. The amount of injuries we have just make everything unsustainable. I think we will start losing games like City, Forest etc.
Things are probably going to get quite grim this season and if we make top 4 it will be at the last.
Well KSE's point is surely that it's partly because of style, tactics etc that we aren't nearer the top of the league (I'd say with injuries/refs etc being top is nigh on impossible)
We all believe (I think) in winning ugly when necessary but if we're not playing in a way that maximises our players and their strengths then that's a real handicap, right?
It is certainly a point of view...but there is an equally valid counter argument that says that if we had been on the other side of a few key decisions, and had had more luck with injuries we may well be top of the league now. It is even possible to argue that Aretaball has maximised the talents of the players we have or the circumstances in which we have found ourselves. Personally, I feel that Arteta has been too obsessed with not losing/retaining possession, and that we have left ourselves too light in attack, but that's just an opinion, not a certainty...
Putting the laughter back into manslaughter
I think we both agree the build up play is far too slow. The problem is I remain unconvinced that we have the players capable of hugely changing that. We can bemoan the defensive mistakes that brought Villa back to parity but we’d also have to concede that their defensive fuck ups are what helped us make the breakthrough rather than our attacking brilliance.
It’s a bit of a, a bit of b. Arteta frustrates the fuck out of me with substitutions, Everton is largely what stands out where he simply made like for like swaps against a team that showed no attacking ambition whatsoever, when Nwaneri was brought on to replace Odegaard rather than play with him as an additional attacking option.
But equally if I recall we brought him on as an additional attacking option against Newcastle in the league (albeit Odegaard was still unavailable) and it made not a sod of difference, our attacking build up was still too laboured and it was all about waiting until the heat death of the universe to find an opening in the Newcastle defence rather than go for the unorthodox. How much of that is Arteta’s over coaching how much of that is the natural limitation of the players themselves. Not a question I feel I have a decisive answer to
On point 1 - yes you are correct, most of the fanbase thought the summer window was good - I however did not & voiced my displeasure at the time. I knew we were short and I knew that Sterling was not the answer, I also knew that we still needed at least 1 or 2 more players after him that we didn't get.
They don't. But what they do show is that this season hasn't quite been the calamity so far which some are claiming.
It does feel like it's constantly wobbling on the brink of it though.
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