Quote Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn View Post
I'm not talking about one-off games, I'm talking about Merts as a glaring liability over the course of a season. Our entire defence was shit against Burnley. Not surprising considering Wenger sabotaged it before kick off? What was wrong with the team? Wenger. He doesn't do rotation, he does vandalism. You put a jumbled up defence in with a jumbled up midfield including a player making his first appearance and then you say to them just play any way you want to. It's a unique style of management, that's for sure.

All fan discussion is fun but ultimately pointless when it comes to Wenger. I think one post yesterday summed it up. We'll be rid of him when the owners get sick of making money hand over fist.
If Merts was playing with that team would you excuse that same mistake and blame the team around him?

Coquelin was back in the squad, Gibbs and Chambers are hardly strangers at wing back. It's no excuse really. You'd have a stronger case if Gabriel has a solid record for us but he doesn't. It's patchy so it's very hard to assume he'd be miles better than Merts.