Throughout my Goonerdom there have been two fixtures which thrill – Spurs and United. There was a time when the arrival of Liverpool or City created a frisson but they are just not the same. United has always been the glamour tie of the season.
Why?
George Best, Duncan Edwards, Bryan Robson, Cantona, Charlton, Ronaldo – the list is very long. Then there were the deeply unpleasant swine who played for them – Ince, Keane, the Nevilles, Hughes, Rooney, Sheringham ++ I have been to many hundreds of Arsenal games and in my highlight reel are many momentous moments playing United …
George Graham and Best being brilliant in a 2-2 draw at Highbury with GG scoring a superb scissor kick. Platty’s header in front of the North Bank, TH14’s brilliant turn and volley at the Clock End. Wiltord at OT. Plus plus plus.
This afternoon will see two clubs in winning form. IMO if we beat United we will finish their tilt at the title (I know it is early). We win and we are just a point off second. Can we?
Much will depend upon our defensive concentration and rigidity. Against a forward line and midfield which cost an insane amount of money (just Lukaku & Pogba cost almost €200m!) we have to be aware. Since the return of Mustafi, we are doing much better at the back. My fear is that we will be as open as we were against Huddersfield – MU will punish those mistakes.
Upfront we will miss Laca, he is perfect to play against MU’s CB’s. I would play Snachez central and Welbeck on the left, as oppposed to Giroud playing as the target frontman.
My Team:
Cech
Koscielny Mustafi Monreal
Bellerin Ramsey Xhaka Kolasinac
Ozil
Sanchez Welbeck
Does anyone know where Walcott is? Is he injured? With Holding, Chambers and BFG as back up CB’s we are good. But, what happens if Bellerin gets injured?
It should be a football festival between two very good sides but there is a Portugese Fly in the ointment, Me-rinho and his PTB tactics. Will Jose give his players permission to play open, attacking football?
I would love it if we win.
COYRRG
Arsenal News 24/7
First
Second
Turd
Thank you Erik
I do think there’s a case to be made that Maureen has the ability to suck any glamour out of any game with his, cough, conservative approach, but you’re right about the historical context.
I agree with your team selection
Chas
I was surprised to read of your late train. I’d imagine these later KO start times would point to a more serious approach to pre-match entertainments
The bugger for me was that the last train out of London on a Saturday is, unbelievably, at 20:05 meaning more that about 10 seconds of Fergie Time would mean leaving early and which is never acceptable
Must win game today.
COYRRG
Couldn’t find the scissor kick, still this 4-0 will do. 🙂
Thanks for the pre-match by the way, BR.
Micky
The earlier trains were more expensive.
£73 total price for us both in first class (i.e. inc return) is not to be sniffed at. 🙂
Ok, fair enough
It bloody amazes me that in a country the size of an egg cup trains don’t run later. Not like the effing pilot is going to get home late
10.40. Proper. And a rare appearance for Marinello
245 images spread over 3 pages.
Cheers Raddy. Not much between the 2 sides on paper. Both sides have yoyo’d this season between decent performances and uninspiring ones.
We can win this. Personally I think much will depend on Arsene sussing out Maureen’s tactics and setting us up to thwart and exploit them. I think an approach of “we only concentrate on ourselves and our qualities” will play into the Portugeezer’s hands. It will be our line up, tactics, and formation that is important today and that comes down to the main man.
I don’t see many chances being forwarded to us so I feel we will have to be disciplined and patient, and will have to have clinical finishers out there today to bury a couple of those rare chances..
I think there is an argument for Coquelin today and possibly even Theo who always seems a more clinical finisher than say Danny.
Are you coming to the FFB Freddie babes or are you still at Drayton Park?
How’s Croydon?
Fred – do you have a distinguishing features?
Ant
What do you reckon Frederick looks like?
My favourite quote from the last few days on the blog
“In December!!!! Have you lost all sense of reality?
Not everyone flits through marriages willy nilly,”
Something like this maybe
Or this
Freddie?
Or this?
Or maybe……..
Love the various pre-match consumables
I’d be on the kebab
Ant ‘n Duck the scratchings and cheesey wotnots
LB the Halibut a la Barigoule
Before our game, we have Brighton home to Pool and Watford home to Them.
Could be some lovely points dropped there
You dine like Kings 🙂
Ahhh, I see you’ve now migrated to the First Class Dining Salon
Right, have fun Lads
Back for KO
Is anyone else meeting the deadly duo in the pub today?
Are you on the Croydon to Drayton Park bus yet Fred?
Get the round in Fred.. 6 pints should do it
What are you having Chas?
Each
44th
Red Arnie! Red Arnie?
Is that Micky’s lead singer dancing and Eddie on harmonies
Lovely blogging A & D.
CAn’t see any of the top clubs dropping points today apart from at the Em’s
Not seen 2,56 before. Excellent.
Looking for the same levels of energy from the Arsenal today
Where are you Freddy?
Freddie
We are in the FFB. I’ve just had a tour of the pub and can’t see you. Then again I don’t know what you look like. 😊
Are you in the pub?
16th ….
Thanks for the PM Raddy, an excellent read as always.
Ant/chas …. you have to put a pic od Fred up now when you meet 🙂
AS fore the game …sofalicious … impossible to predict …. therefore I won’t
A win for us would be massive in terms of our season.
I watched 89 last night … bloody brilliant. I was told that only Jack went to the premier out of the current team … they should all watch it before this gamer … you couldn’t get better motivation.
Still no Frederico. Sorry if we’ve missed you Fred.
Are you stuck at Drayton Park?
Wow. Laca to start. That is a surprise
Erik at 3:32 pm
“Can’t see any of the top clubs dropping points today”
Ohhhh, I see, you don’t regard Spurs as a top club…..ROLF
Sanchez and Laca
The day gets better and better
no Fred? Maybe it is too cold for him, froze to death poor bastard
Raddy – I make no secret I liked Cantona and Keane, Rooney and Gary Neville, George Best is beyond reproach in my books. But Evra is the one that defines ManU for me, horrid little shit. And Fergie, I forgot about that Scottish git, I still hate his guts
Come on, must win game. lets widen the gap on the neighbours 🙂
Wet start
Really Cech?
He got beat between the legs from no angle…grrr
Come on, lets get it together.
3-1 I’ll go for 🙂
That be that….
Good start.
Well I didn’t count on that shit
manure xG 5000
2 shots 2 goals…
That has to be the most stupid 10 minutes we have played at the start of a game for many a season.
Rubbish from our defence. Monreal and Mustafi need a good talking to.
12 mins into the game eh Aaron
Fuck me
Here’s a positive
If you are going to concede two, do it in the first 12 mins
We keep playing like this and we are going to take a pasting.
Mustafi off which means we will go to a back 4.
Came to ffb but didn’t see u chas,will u guys be going there after the game
Mind if I ask were u and ants sitting is it row 12.
Fred
They’re upper tier
bugger, how didn’t we score
need one before half time ideally
Much much better.
Get a goal and Arsenal can crawl back into this.
That’s more like it Aaron 🙂
Xhaka should have buried his chance. Didn’t.
Goals against us aside, it’s brilliant
MU doing their rotational fouling trick.
Look, I despise a timid start- go hard and fast.
Ever since those 2 goals the Arsenal have been kicking their a$$.
That is all I ever ask, let manure and moaninho they are in a game!!
How did we not score in that half? After the dreadful start we we superb.
Terrific game.
Interesting that AW took Mustafi off and not Monreal or Kolasinac when going to a Back 4.
Not a good sign for the German, and his mistake for the second was dreadful over-confidence. TA would have had that ball in Row Z.
GB said earlier that tactics would decide the game, unfortunately he appears to be right.
yessssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
Here we go!
blooooooody helllll
come on you gunnnnnners
Laca. Get in….
This is fantastic entertainment
De Gea is amazing
best news
we still have 30 mins of this to go
bench warmer scores 2 to manure unreal!
Bolleaux
We were all over them. What happened to Koscielny and who is marking Lindgard?
Rubbish defending.
Great stuff. Welbeck for Xhaka. AW giving it the beans
Gorgeous on
Pogba off
only need 2 🙄
Iwobi, Laca, Ozil, Welbz, OG and Sanchez on.
Proper football.
I’ve just read all the stats …. we’ve had 74% possession, 29 shots to their 8 … and we’re losing 1:3 …. the difference? The keepers?
Clear penalty not given. How many is that this season?
Rasp
De Gea is clearly MOTM despite the bloke on the telly thinking otherwise
So I hear Micky …. another site give the shots in goal as 18:3 …. that means they score with all their shots on target. Possession is meaningless … only goals count
Superb game, the only thing wrong with it was the result.
Lapses of defensive concentration, bad bounces and a truly brilliant goalkeeping performance cost us.
Rasp. Watch the game. De Gea was exceptional
Given the loss in the Rugby WC final, the crap first day in the Ashes and the Arse result, it has been a difficult day of sport.
That’s me done. Good night.
Good effort, but like the city game no result. More of the same isn’t it.
Not quite at that level are we.
But the good news is that they’re hiring proper people to run the club to compete again after so many years of not competing. Have to give Gazidis credit after slagging him earlier for doing sfa about wenger. I was wrong.
I know De Gea was exceptional …. can we have an exceptional keeper please! 🙂
Apart from our defence doing the gentlemanly thing of “no, after you sir”, twice, it was a superb game. Bloody ball just wouldn’t go in.
Was hoping to be commenting on happier tones but hey ho that’s football for you. Always likely to kick you in the nuts when you think you are going well.
Can’t really be disappointed in the performance, it was at times exceptional, but you can’t gift two opportunities in the first ten minutes as we did and expect to make up for it later.
And unfortunately they were individual mistakes that was just about the players involved taking the wrong decisions.
All said and done can only take heart from the effort put in by the team and the chances we created. De Gea was on song and they seemed to be able to get block after block in when needed.
Sorry not been around just been very stupidly busy with work and being a dad.
Merry Christmas everyone in case I don’t get back before then.
GB’s comment-
I don’t see many chances being forwarded to us so I feel we will have to be disciplined and patient, and will have to have clinical finishers out there today to bury a couple of those rare chances..
need to edit this to – bucket-loads of chances, lack of discipline at the back, poor finishing on numerous chances.
Arsene got the tactics right but with poor defending like Mustafi’s and even worse finishing upfront from a ridiculous amount of chances means we dont have the right players or the right mindset (which is an Arsene problem). How could it finish 1:3. On paper we are such a better team. Ramsey playing back for Lacazettes goal was superb. Sanchez could have done the same later on but shoots into De geas feet. Some of our shots were just wasteful…..
We need some ruthlessness and dogged determination to put teams to the sword.
Sunday morning here, storms all weekend and I’m boiling on that result. Off to church to calm down
Also first game me and boys have watched together on TV
Nice pic GIE
Think Arsene has taken that one badly, he looked furious in post match about the two early goals, think Kozzer gets allowed the first one as he rarely blots his copybook and Kolasniac and others could have reacted better to the sloppy pass. The Mustafi one is much harder to take as we are already a goal down and he has at least two easy passes to keep possession. Especially as he then lumps off with an injury when the physio is shrugging his shoulders almost to say nothing obvious apart from pride.
Wenger would normally question those two penalty shouts, especially the Welbeck one but I think in doing so he would have let his players off the hook and he didn’t look in the mood to do so.
Whilst he complimented the team about the response and desire I think a few had been read the riot act. You can normally see it in his eyes.
Hi GiE …. have you seen 1989? … GG comes across well. Shame the FA chose to make an example of him
Without realising it GIE I suspect that is the match report.
I’m disappointed bur not disillusioned- other than two stupid give away goals that cost us the game – we totally dominated the game.
Really upset but in the morning I will still love Arsenal.
Rasp when you are caught with your hand in someone else’s biscuit barrel you are a crook. I also liked what GG did for us right up to him stealing our biscuits………….
I have seen the 89 film Rasp, it was bloody marvellous reliving it all.
Thought all the players came across well, don’t think I appreciated at the time just how good Mickey was, and it was interesting to me how all the players said he was the man you wanted in that situation.
GG did come across well as did all the players interviewed, they even made Merse look vaguely intelligent.
One of the things noticeable to me which I probably hadn’t realised at the time was Liverpool’s March up the table, they started slowly, teams like Milwall were shown being up in second around Christmas. You realise how much the game has changed in 30 years, every team that started a season had a chance if they put a run together, because money paid wasn’t vastly different between teams, makes me think that it’s tine for some kind of wage cap but there is just no way the top clubs will back it.
St Pancras looking almost Lowryesque.
Architects of our own downfall (along with De Gea)
This sums up my mood this morning.
The only thing that went right in front of goal yesterday.
Best ever dog vid 🙂
Paddy Considine on twitter does an advent calendar of photos.
Here’s December 1st
December 2nd
December 3rd
two awful goals in the first 10mins, terrific fight to get back into the game, de Gea was on drugs, Pogba is a front bottom, we couldn’t score in a brothel
Bit sad, because fooking Mourinho won, but it was a terrific game, couldn’t take my eyes of the screen
stop chas, they are disgusting”!!!
Yesterday’s train journey back to Notts was like being in a 3rd world country.
There were so many people on the train that a couple of hundred didn’t have seats. There were bodies everywhere. In some of the 2nd class carriages of the train it was virtually impossible to even get to the toilet. Utterly shambolic.
Ant and me had to wait until Leicester to go and fetch our complimentary tea, water and biscuits. I’m thinking of putting in a complaint. 🙂
why, what was the reason for the chaos?
I suspect that had we won you wouldn’t even notice the crowds 🙂
Let me have the details, I like complaining and very often I am successful. You should definitely get a refund
Hi chas do u remember exactly where u and Ants sat yesterday, the guy I was sittings next to resemble Ants a lot
you bloody sat next to a stranger thinking it was ant??? ha ha ha ,all Englishmen look the same fred 🙂
GiE – great video, made me laugh Goooooner :)) you look well with a beard
Chas
It is a 3rd world country
Eddie
It was probably the last train out of town, which is exactly why I didn’t go as mine was 8:05pm!!!!
Freddie baby
We always sit in the same seats row 7 not row 12. ☺
Yea at FFB I walked up for all the guys with glasses asking if they are chas and they all look the same got a bit embarrassing lol
The guy next to Ants lookalike was also wearing glasses , and micky did mention they was in upper tear where I think I sat
3rd world country 🙂
I thought the same when I read this stat: “A record 135 people a week are having to undergo amputations as a result of diabetes”
so nobody really wants to talk about the game??
OK lol chas
Frederico
We are upper tier too.
Sounded from your comment other day about being near a goalpost, you prefer lower tier.
Micky
Not the last train to Notts. Two more after that one we got.
Fred
“and micky did mention they was in upper tear where I think I sat”
What made you think you were sitting upper tier? 🙂
Shame you didn’t meet Ants ‘n Duck, you’d have got on like a house on fire
Morning All,
Still hurting. To lose 3 goals at home to 3 shots on target is crap and to do so to a Merinho side even worse.
But we showed that this team has fight and ability.
I want that dog.
6.16. Lovely pic. Was it taken with a phone?
Good to see GIE in print and photo.
Fredster
Haha, you thought you were sitting in the upper tier.
We were in the garden as I said we would be regardless of the weather. Third tier in the corner.
Yep, on my phone, BR
Don’t have to stadium that well so thought upper tier was the highest seats lol
personally, i dont think Fred is even in the country.
You have a great knack of being able to make me smile after a loss Chas. I love that dog and that is high praise from the cat person that I am.
VP
I get your thinking, but I have two theories.
One. He is RA and RA is He. They are one and the same. Spookily, eerily, unearthlingly phantomesque figures that cannot form into physical entities
The other. If real, then he may have become my favourite blogger
Oh, and if Mustafi is not injured, he should never play for us again.
Back out into a shed
Cheers for the post Raddy.
So gutted yesterday. Went to the game full of expectation of a victory and not meeting Fred, yet after 15 minutes it felt like coming home from work to the sound of laughter eminating from the living room, as my usually staid wife is laughing and flirting with the local Tennis Coach.
Kos pass was terrible. Is Arsene asking to much of him?, or do the words Franz Beckenbauer create a feeling of flying? Have no idea what Mustafi was up to? Except at times he looks like he has an uncontrollable mole like urge to burrow a tunnel.
So we lost either because Arsene is asking the players to overplay? Or because of Franz Beckenbauer and a small yet aggressive mammal? I’m gong to have to think about this?
Thanks you for the lovely curtain raiser, Raddy. 🙂 and before that, LB, for the fantastic hymn to the wizard. 🙂
Gutted? Yes. Proud of our attacking game? Yes. Defence? Shocking. Alleged future captain? oh dear! and IMO, it was not only this game.
De Gea, take a bow! If that is what it takes to stop the fantastic good guys, so be it!
finally, sorry, knot ear.
and finally, finally, lovely snow flakes, Rasp. 🙂
onwards and upwards. Despite everything, I think yesterday we showed progression as a team.
I can assure you am here VP
I just peeped at player ratings in the rugs. Very unfair, all mancs got high scores and our men much lower marks, that’s now how I saw the game, If not for the ridiculous 2 goals we could have won it. if we could score of course
We lost. It’s history. We must focus upon winning at Southampton which will not be easy.
Ah, I didn’t realise we were banned from any more comments.
Sssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
😀 😀
It is my way of easing the pain.
We were poor defensively yesterday especially with the two gifted goals early on – these guys really can’t handle the pressure of big games
We were poor in front of goal as well – Xhaka and Lacazette missed sitters…
Other than that, yes we played well but Man Utd won and easily too…
De Gea is a freak but we knew it beforehand
Your right Raddy, let’s move on.
This reminds me of my first divorce, all our “friends” chose her? Eddie knows what I’m talking about.
This didn’t bother me, on the contrary, I was glad to see the back of the ungrateful bastards. It was always me footing the restaurant bills, introducing people to dentists, scaffolders etc.
After about a year I was driving on the A10 when in front I witnessed a side on collision. Both cars pulled onto the hard shoulder and as a witness so did I. It transpired that the couple who had been knocked into were ex friends who had selected my ex wife that I had once helped by getting there gormless son into a good school, despite him been 14 and still playing with worms.
The other party, who was at fault for the crash, was a Chinese man pretending to be traumatised so couldn’t speak. I know this because I once pretended to be a non english speaking Bolivian after finding that the car I had just gone into was occupied by a man who looked like Boris Karloff. I also made it clear I was not a Doctor and had no interest in unethical experimentation.
Upon approaching the other car I saw the couple with there son in the back. “Terry, thank god, did you see that idiot go into us?”
“Yeah, I saw something” I then peered into the back. “How’s it going worm boy? How are your grades? Or are you still finding out what happens if you shove a worm down your pants?” They looked shocked, but then said “you will be our witness won’t you Terry? It was the other guys fault”
“Errr, no actually. See, I have decided to choose The othe guy. He’s really cut up, reduced to pretending not to speak english, the lot” They started getting upset, begging me to help. “Look, I can’t do it, I’ve chosen him. Turns out he has a 30 year old son who works in a Chinese takeaway that has never got an order wrong, even when the bills over £50 quid or people ask for plain Chow Mein without noodles. The kids probably a maths genius so I’ve promised to help get him into Oxford University”
Let’s choose to move on
Hey I’m not sure but I sat (in the middle tier) next to a Chinese looking man called Fred who said he was from the West indies and had an entourage from the FFB with him, Where exactly are you Fred? “Here” is not much help. I agree with 10.33 and Fred is probably Eddie’s alias as a huge wind up.
Did you get a picture of that bloke who looks like me Fred?
Did you not ask him if he was me?
I hope fred didn’t take photos of strangers at the Ems. This could be dangerous. You go taking photos of strangers Ant, we’ll see how fast you can run 🙂
re 3rd world country – reports show OAP switching off heating during the day and travelling on free local transport to keep warm. This is just disgusting.
Smh
No didn’t Ants
Morning All,
Terry. Superb as always.
I can assure everyone am not that guy called Eddie
The only thing we need in common is our affection for bellerin
Eddie is not a guy, she is a gal
I’m confused now, is Eddie frEddie
if Eddie is not frEddie than is frEddie Eddie?
🙂 🙂 in a nutshell NO.
Does Fred exist?
What is Eddie?
Transplant
All good at AA 🙂
‘I think I’m in the upper tier therefore I am’
Frennie Day cart.
Morning all … it still hurts 😦
Fred … if you want to prove you’re here, post a pic of yourself at The Emirates … everyone who gets to the Ems for the first time takes a selfie!
Afternoon all. I think that we hit a new level at the weekend for battering a team and still losing. There was a lot of our general play that we can be satisfied with if we could maintain that level on a consistent basis this season and going into next.
We could put it down (again) as just one game that we were unlucky in but I do think there are other things that need to be considered if we are analysing that game in the bigger scheme of things as part of the bigger picture.
I obviously got it wrong when stating I didn’t think there would be many chances but I think I got it right when I voiced concern about our tactical approach to this type of game (against the bigger teams). I think the general acceptance is that you will be punished for any silly errors in these games, often no matter what other stats you post in the game. As such keeping things disciplined and tight and not gifting chances to the opposition is as important, if not more so, than any other factors across the 90 minutes.
I would have to say that more than any other team in recent years, Arsene’s Arsenal must lead the way in losing games we have largely dominated. Also I think we lead the way among the traditional title rivals in gifting silly chances. Lapses in concentration, being too casual, not being disciplined and staying switched on and focused. All of these mean roughly the same thing and have been a trait in Arsene’s sides over recent years.
I know many prefer to lay blame at the players feet for this (as oppose to it having anything to do with the manager) but surely a teams mentality is largely a reflection of their managers identity. The kind of sloppiness that you see so frequently with us doesn’t seem to be such a factor under other top managers. It is almost as if they wouldn’t dare switch off and get that sloppy.
There are just too many similar moments historically for it to be coincidence, and it is in these finer details where we let ourselves down. I just don’t see Arsene changing now so I think it is realistic to expect us to always be also rans under him now. It seems to me that he just doesn’t believe in the importance of the finer details like other managers.
I saw Arnie mention that we have showed progress. Arnie I think you are a beautifully optimistic individual, and I love you for it as oppose to my less than optimistic outlook, but I am sorry but I don’t see progress. I see the same Achilles heel problems we always have being left unaddressed.
If you look at our 28 points after 15 games and applied any basic mathematical formula to see where we are trending to at 38 games, you will find it is in the low 70’s (some 15-18 points from title challenging numbers). This is where we have been for years now so the reality is that we haven’t progressed one bit.
p.s…… Sorry
“I think I’m in the upper tier therefore I am’” ha ha ha
GB
Firstly, hello.
Secondly, nonsense 🙂
How was it tacticsbollocks that cause the defeat?
Two pathetic moments from our defenders isn’t tactical. It was down in largest part to that bloody menace DeGea. Let’s face it, even Lukaku couldn’t score against the great oaf despite his best efforts 🙂
Rasp that wasn’t my first time to the Emirates more like my third
So who going Thursday game so we can meet up?
Well looking at Arsenal site upper tier on the east stand is 110 – 115
So guess what Freddie baby was in the upper tier
Maybe the correct term is mental focus rather than tactics Micky. It seems to me that we do seem to habitually lack it at frequent times, more so than other top teams I feel.
DeGea was excellent, and we did play some pretty good football but we always seem to come up against keepers who end up MOTM, and have too often spoken about the decent quality of our football in a game we have lost.
As I say it was more looking at what cost us this game and whether there is a pattern evident in the grander scheme of things, or whether this was just an isolated game of misfortune and errors that aren’t the norm for us. How often have we spoken about pathetic moments from our defenders? It seems to me it is quite a frequent topic of conversation.
Freddinski
Never doubted you for a second.
In fact we’re in block 115, so that geezer you saw with the glasses may well have been Ant.
December 4th
Let me clarify
The guy who looked like Ants had brown hair, just as in the picture (didn’t know a lot of English men has brown hair)
The guy next to him had on glasses
So that why I assumed it was the both u,
Didn’t know
micky is right, 2 goals in first 10 mins were pa.the.tic, primary school errors. As I said before de Gea is on drugs, some hard stuff, meth perhaps
Fredderino
But I don’t wear glasses generally (apart from to read), but Ant does.
Which block were you in out of 110 to 115?
Or guess I miss understood what u was telling me in the message with the picture, I thought Ants was the fella drinking the beer to the right and you was the guy doing a weird thing with his mouth on the left
No wonder I didn’t see u at FFB
Was 110 row 12 seat 530
did you guys see ‘Dumb and Dumber’?
chas – is this correct grammar: “He had kidney problem since several years”. It’s from BBC news page
Good one Eddie I. Totally bottled it lol
Third round of FA Cup
Nottingham Forest v Arsenal.
Eddie
No
NEW POST
Chas first picture was the closest