Guardiola and Emery – a Fair Comparison?

September 7, 2018

Two wins out of four is clearly not the best start but not the worst either. The last two wins have given Emery a bit of stability; his own way of doing things is coming into focus and as such he is now starting to be able to stand on his own two feet. But this obviously was not the case after the first two games; headlines declaring that Arsenal are in crisis were appearing as frequently as daffodils in spring.

What surprised me at the time was that there were people outside of Arsenal who attempted to come to Emery’s aid. Supporters from Man City and even Gary Neville on Sky were not slow in coming forward to defend our man in charge, all insisting that he should stand by his principles and be given time to implement them.

Among the majority of Arsenal faithful Unai Emery seems to have been already given a pass this season for many reasons but standing close to the top is the reason that it took Guardiola a season before he was really able to make an impact.

Like drowning sailors scrambling for life boats I can only assume that the Arsenal supporters who grabbed onto this comparison after our first two games did so in the hope that similar things would happen to us in Unai Emery’s second season.

Guardiola has been elevated to demigod status for the way he got his team to play last season. Arsenal supporters who really should know better have sung his praises pointing to how he resisted buying marquee names such as Ronaldo, Neymar or Messi and yet somehow managed to put together a strong team with an amazing work ethic capable of winning the league all of which demonstrated what a great coach he really is.

Utter Tosh

“Manchester City have taken their summer spending to more than £200m with the signing of Benjamin Mendy from Monaco and increased their total outlay in the transfer market since Pep Guardiola took charge 13 months ago to £385m.” (The Guardian 24/7/17)

The man spent 200 million at the beginning of last season. Two Hundred Million!

“City confirmed over the weekend the £26.5m switch from Real Madrid of Danilo, who is expected to provide cover for the first-choice full-backs Mendy and the £45m signing from Tottenham Hotspur, Kyle Walker. They will line up alongside other expensive arrivals including the centre-back John Stones, signed last season for £47m, and the £34.9m goalkeeper Ederson from Benfica.” (Guardian 24/7/17)

Pep says City hasn’t the cash for a quadruple – January 2018

Money talks, ok there was the Leicester league win but surely that is now understood that it was a one off; yes, I would take one of those one offs at any point of Unai’s tenure but I am not holding my breath.

I certainly intend to stand by Emery regardless of almost any outcome this season but the comparison with Guardiola and the spending power he can call upon is laughable; the only thing that I see that they have in common is that they are both from the Iberian Peninsula and neither of them is Spanish.

A special thank you to GB for giving me something to bounce off of.

Written by LB

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Playing the ball out from the back – Progress Report

September 6, 2018

What on earth is going on with Emery?

We are a Harry Arter miss away from being the laughing stock of the Premier League. If the Cardiff player had scored from the gift that Cech presented him early in the weekend’s game, the Arsenal Blogsphere would have gone into melt down. The number of visits to this site and every other would have gone through the roof because that is what happens when we lose – every single Arsenal moaner comes out of the woodwork. As it happens, Arter missed and we won so as very close as we came to being the laughing stock, we are not and traffic in Blogsphere is very light; that’s to say, it is just me writing this and you reading it.

So what is Emery trying to achieve giving seemingly suicidal instructions to play it out from the back in the way he is? I have ventured the idea that the purpose is to draw the opposition forward with the aim of being able to pass the ball past them in the hope of releasing our forwards with more space to work in and therefore a greater chance of scoring?

It can hardly be said that the tactic is working smoothly as it often resembles something from a Keystone Kop movie but ironically one of the by-products is that the opposition are drawn even further forward in the hope of exploiting our errors and this in turn frees up even more space for our strikers.

This understandably drew humorous comments suggesting that if things continue like this the whole of the opposition will be camped just outside our eighteen yard line and all Cech will have to do is to chip the ball over them to give one of our attackers a free run on goal.

Chas raised the more serious question of: weren’t we playing out from the back last season? The answer to which in my view is, err, yes but I would add importantly: not in the same way. Notice how extreme Unai Emery has taken it: Cech is playing the ball out to Mustafi and Sokratis who are almost standing next to their respective corner flags. They are so far back, the opposition, who are also trying to do their own version of the high press, are drawn to the ball. Both our defenders then play the ball back to Cech. This is repeated during which the opposition have moved even further down the pitch which is the cue for Cech to play the ball past the advanced opponents and start the basis of an attack. The flaw in this, as we know, is that Cech keeps on fluffing his lines and giving the ball away, creating heart stopping viewing.

Hmmmmmm

It was very different last year. If we got a goal kick, Cech would either hoof it long or if he played it short to say Bellerin, he in turn would try and move it down the field as quick as he could. By this time, and in either case, the opposition would have formed two lines of five with their goal keeper behind them otherwise known as — The Bus. We all remember what would happen then; we would pass the ball backwards and forwards across the pitch just outside the opponents eighteen yard line trying to find a way past before losing possession and then having to chase back like demons trying to stop a breakaway goal.

Anything, anything but a return to the monotony of that model has got to be the reason why Arsenal supporters are remaining so calm and tolerant of such comedic incidents. If those kinds of errors had happened last season, uh I don’t want to think about the size and scale of the melt down.

Emery has more room to manoeuvre among the Arsenal faithful than he probably realises, the divisions among the support are still fresh in the mind and the idea of returning to them is, I am sure, something that should delayed for as long as possible.

Emery does have the choice, of course, he could play Leno. Many have pointed to Guardiola’s first season and the ruthless way that he dealt with Joe Hart. It was thought that England’s ex could not play the ball with his feet the way Pep wanted and because of that he was shipped out. Guardiola then went on to sign Claudio Bravo and we all know how that worked out.

Back to Emery, yes he could have followed the Guardiola route or, as the Basque has done, give the old guard a chance to try and carry out his new way of doing things. Will Cech be able to adapt? It’s not looking good and we are going to see exactly what we have in reserve when we get to see Leno in the Caribou and the Europa. I like the choice that Emery has made of being slower in making radical change; big decisions on Ozil, Ramsey and Cech do not need to be rushed.

Guardiola took over a better squad and far greater spending power; he would have almost certainly been given the brief of your job is to the win the CL. Fanciful things like that might have swirled around the heads of our incoming Spanish contingent but there is a Gulf between the two clubs. In our case drastic change too quickly could have caused drastic problems, not something that would have been missed by the Arsenal hierarchy and as such I feel confident that an equally serious but far more down to earth message was made loud and clear to our incoming manager: no matter what you do always remember one thing – Arsenal do not do relegation.

Written by LB

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Give the new guys a try, Unai!

September 5, 2018

Hopefully most AAers are prepared to give Dick a real chance to get things right before they decry too much his tactics or methods.

I for one am looking for, amongst many other things, a change in attacking style. For many of the last five to ten years of the Wenger era we heard regularly from pundits and other “experts” the phrases……..

“typical Arsenal trying to walk the ball into the net”

or

“Arsenal – always trying to score the perfect goal”.

And as we know occasionally we managed to do just that!! Witness Jack W. against Norwich. But, for me, in the last two seasons we often seemed to do away with the “ball into the net” bit entirely!

Passing for passing sake drives me mad! If you receive the ball over a short distance as, say a midfielder, from a defender or fellow midfielder, it’s not compulsory to play it back to him, once, twice, three times. You are not playing that one touch game in a circle where you try to make twenty passes, or nutmeg one of the players in the middle, so you can then make a high pitched stupid noise in unison to ridicule him.

Instead you have a choice. Receive the ball on the half turn, sense where the nearest opponent is and sometimes “turn”, then get your head up and look for a pass forward with a sense of urgency. This is one of the reasons I loved Santi so much, and felt of all the players missed most in those two seasons, his was by far the most serious loss.

I nearly left the conversation on the site post Sunday’s game to the regulars, as I didn’t feel I could add much to the debate. But then, like some kind of soft drug addict, I was suckered in by two things.

Firstly, LB’s question to himself,  which player “is decisive and moves the ball forward quicker than most any other player?” (like Manshitty and to some extent, Totteringham, I thought)

………the answer he said, was Guendouzi.

Added to this I have my own question. Who does the same, and is also more accurate than both Ramsey or Xhaka?

……….and the answer for me, is Torreira.

Play them both and alongside each other.

The second trigger for me was the degree of praise offered by a number of respected regulars to both Xhaka and Ramsey for their Sunday performances. I have a follow up question to any and all, but especially the statisticians. Of the 162 total passes made by Ramsey and Xhaka on Sunday, how many had no influence whatsoever on the game whether successful or not?

Play the new generation Dick, as part of the new chapter for our Club, and see how it goes.

Written by LBG

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Time to sort the Flaky Defence

September 4, 2018

Perhaps the main factor in Arsenal dropping out of the Champions League top 4 places in the last two seasons of Arsene Wenger’s reign was the number of goals we were shipping. We conceded 44 goals in 2016/17 and a monstrous 51 big ones in 2017/18.

At the other end, there hasn’t been too much of a change in terms of goals scored in recent years, so if your defence becomes more porous, it seems likely you’ll win less games and accumulate less points.

New manager, new methods. Unai Emery arrives in North London and what does he see?

Firstly, two fairly recently signed, exciting, shiny new goal-scoring strikers in Auba and Laca (no offence, Danny).

He also looks at his attacking midfield options. Mkhitaryan still cementing his place but looking class, Mesut signed on for another stretch at the best club in the world and Aaron Ramsey itching to find out where his future lies. Alex Iwobi also lies in waiting as he moves towards his peak years. No shortage of talent up front, then.

Defensive midfield has lacked (well according to blog wisdom, anyway) a proper DM for years. Granit Xhaka passes the ball beautifully (for the most part) but lacks pace and mobility defensively. Mo Elneny has a great engine but hasn’t really plugged that gap in front of the back four. Attempts to use Ramsey as part of the central midfield have often left us short as he goes walkabout in search of a goal. Jack never quite cut it either for one reason or another and was finally deemed surplus to requirements. On the bright side, two new recruits Torreira and Guendouzi look very promising and, in addition, Ainsley Maitland-Niles has really started to look like a fixture in the first team set-up.

At the back, Emery would have immediately wished that Laurent Koscielny hadn’t torn his ankle tendon apart, as he oozes class when fit. (Maybe Kos can come back from injury with his Achilles problems finally behind him for the first time in years – fingers crossed). New signing  Sokratis from Dortmund, along with the much-maligned Mustafi, are the obvious experienced partners in central defence. Mavropanos and Holding are yet to force their way into serious contention and Calum Chambers was presumably granted his loan move because of wanting regular first team football.

Monreal and Kolasinac on the left plus Bellerin and new recruit, Lichtsteiner have the full back positions covered, if not spectacularly.

So, back to Unai’s main focus in taking over the Arsenal playing side, sort the defence and the rest will follow, surely. Now we all know that football is a team game and therefore a team which defends well does so as a whole. The new manager likes a high pressing game and a high defensive line. He also prefers the goalkeeper to play the ball out from the back.

The latter tactic has already produced some heart-stopping moments for us Gooners. LB has suggested, with tongue firmly in cheek, that Petr Cech’s comical efforts so far have been deliberate to draw the parked bus out of position. Wouldn’t it be great if that were true!

So, our first four games (admittedly with two against top 6 teams) we have let in 8 goals, an average of two per game. At that rate we are on course to concede 76 goals! The back four virtually pick themselves what with injuries and a seeming reluctance to field Stephan Lichsteiner early in the season. In addition, Lucas Torreira has not been used, except from the bench, to plug the many holes at the back. Maybe he’ll get his first full start after the god awful interlull.

The manager has to be given time for his new ideas to sink in, which will hopefully lead to us defending better as a collective unit,  but I’m really looking forward to our first clean sheet. 🙂

chas

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Sticky Taffy Pudding – Cardiff ratings

September 3, 2018

Well, the world feels a whole lot better having beaten Cardiff than had we drawn. We got there in the end but not after more stressful defending nightmares. The image that came to mind was of a group of eleven men dressed in red and white Father Christmas outfits arriving in Cardiff bearing gifts (or should that be goals) for all the poor local children who had gone without for so long. The only thing missing from the cartoon was big white bushy beards.

Mustafi’s bullet header opened the scoring

I am really tempted to say that everything new that Emery has introduced is causing downright panic and everything that was already there is working really well. The attack was already there and it is getting closer to firing on all cylinders. First rate goals from Aubameyang and Lacazette back this up. Was the defence any better last season? Mah, maybe not. Was the midfield cover of the defence better last season, mah also maybe not? Perhaps, I should have said that I was tempted to say that ‘almost’ everything that Emery has introduced has caused downright panic.

The obvious example is the insistence of Emery to have Cech play the ball out to players waiting near the corner flags only to have it passed back to the keeper who continually deals with it like a hot potato and on more than one occasion passed it out badly creating a goal scoring opportunity for the opposition.

You might expect that I am going to rip into Emery at this point but you would be wrong. Let’s ask: if all this manoeuvre went well and Cech had the foot skills to carry this off what is Emery trying to achieve? I obviously can’t be certain but what I can see happening is that the opposition are being drawn forward and are staying there in the hope of exploiting an error; this in turn, creates space beyond these advanced opposition players which gives our attackers incredibly valuable and extremely important extra space to operate in up front.

Not convinced? Did West Ham and Cardiff park the bus, surely we would have expected them to do so, it certainly would have happened last season, so why didn’t it – because they were cleverly manoeuvred away from it.

If this turns out to be right then Unai Emery deserves a lot of praise but in the mean time watching Arsenal has become a viewing past time that should be avoided by the faint-hearted.

Laca celebrating Auba’s goal – Photo by Geoff CADDICK / AFP

This obviously is a work in progress but I would bet a barrel of Danish herrings that that is exactly what Leno has been brought in to do. The new keeper will be slowly introduced through the Europa and the Caribou and by the end of the season or, if not, by Christmas he will be our number one keeper. Why not start with him now? Woooo, hold your horses, too much change too quickly can be very risky. Cech is still a fine keeper and after the ten minutes at the start of the game and ten minutes after the restart he reverts back into an absolute first class keeper.

Two wins in two games and apart from some Keystone moments there are some real signs of progress being made. Perhaps I should have been tempted to have said that quite a few things that Emery is doing are working. Lol.

Do you want me to describe the game? Is there a need? Mah, we all saw it.

Mesut looks left out of the bromance

Cech: notice that after the first ten minutes of cartoon football he changed back to clearing the ball however he saw fit, this is not a player defying his manager; it is a player carrying out instructions. 8 for his keeping but for his footwork, hmmm, not so much.

Bellerin: I really wanted to say that his crosses into the box continued to improve but they didn’t. The message has finally been received that he needs to be covered when he is advanced and play breaks down; this was done by Guendouzi and then better by Torriera. 5

TAWTH: Good goal; still continues to be a headline star in Arsenal’s defensive comedy show. 6

GB: starting to get his feet under the table, maybe a bit better this week. 5

Monreal: nothing spectacular today, not sure he fully understands what the plan is. 5

Guendouzi: still a bright spot, obviously the player that is not tainted by previous seasons and also seems to be the player that Emery feels he can most easily mould to the way he wants the team to play. 5

Xhaka: someone whisper to him that the food in Italy is very good. 4

Ramsey: no lack of trying, he knows he is getting prime real estate on the pitch; the much sort after terrain where Mesut’s mansion usually sits is not often vacated. He is aware that he is being given a chance and he is doing his best to take it. A bit slow in his manoeuvrings at times which slowed our counter attacks down but on another day he will score a hat trick so all is well really. 7

Ozil: you have to bear in mind that when writing about Mesut I start from a point of thinking that the man can do no wrong. It made me laugh watching Ozil today, shunted out to the right obviously on Emery’s orders he decided that rather than spend another weekend in the sick bay he would tow the line; he stayed out there for 50 minutes and was completely ineffective. Clearly bored of such nonsense, he then reverted back to what Mesut does best – playing where ever he likes and he was magnificent; watch his involvement in the Aubameyang and the Lacazette goals and the play in general around that time. Emery had his opportunity to reassert his control by hooking him off later on. 7

Lacazette: Man of the Match; Emery has man managed him well, the Butcher’s dog was let off the lead from minute one today and he was just dying to get stuck in. 8

Aubameyang: great goal, should do his confidence the world of good. 7

Oh, I have just seen the spud result, there clearly is a god.

Written by LB

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Arsenal F.C. – Our record against The Bluebirds

September 1, 2018

Arsenal results v Cardiff City

Our first game against Cardiff City was a Division 1 game that took place at Highbury on December 26, 1921 it ended in a 0-0 stalemate.

Our unhappiest defeat against Cardiff City came on St George’s Day, 23 April 1927, at Wembley Stadium in London. Cardiff became the only non-English side to win the FA Cup by defeating Arsenal 1–0 in the FA Cup Final. Hughie Ferguson scored the only goal of the game. In the 74th minute, he received the ball from Ernie Curtis and tamely shot toward the Arsenal goal. Dan Lewis, the Arsenal goalkeeper, seemed to have the ball in his grasp but, under pressure from Len Davies he clumsily allowed the ball to roll through his hands. In a further attempt to retrieve the ball he only succeeded in knocking the ball into his own net. King George V presented the trophy to Cardiff – only seven years after they had entered the Football League.

Here are our League records.

Cardiff City  – 57,893 record attendance at Ninian Park (v Arsenal) – First Division (April 22, 1953)- “you’ve only come to see The Arsenal”

written by GunnerN5

 

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4-3-3 …. Who plays in the front three?

August 31, 2018

Having sorted out our right flank issues on Tuesday plus deciding who should partner Lucas Torreira on Wednesday, it’s time to shift our attention to the business end of the team and the front three.

When you’re taking half chances and scoring at crucial moments in a game, victories look easy. If the boys at the sharp end are misfiring, as against the chavs 2 weeks ago, it doesn’t matter how many golden opportunities are created, you’ll always struggle.

Unai Emery is still moulding the Arsenal players into new shapes but he does seem to favour 4-3-3 (or 4-2-1-3). The front three are a little undefined as yet. Let’s take a look at the runners and riders.

Pierre Emerick Aubameyang – yet to break his duck early on this season after scoring for fun during Arsenal’s tepid second half of last season. Has a career average of about a goal every other game and was prolific for Dortmund. Our most versatile out and out striker which is probably why he gets pushed out to the left flank to accommodate Alexandre Lacazette.

courtesy GK Edits

Alexandre Lacazette – only slightly lower strike rate across his career than Auba, scoring at just under a goal in every two. Perhaps our most natural finisher. He doesn’t seem to score many tap-ins for Arsenal which either says something about the type of chances created by his teammates or about his natural positioning as a striker. Seems to enjoy bouncing off Auba, though maybe the pair are better suited to playing together in a 4-4-2?

Danny Welbeck – Danny appears to be 3rd in the pecking order of strikers, though his physicality could make him an enticing prospect as a powerful left sided attacker. Gets into great scoring positions but often seems to lack that killer instinct in front of the posts. It would appear that when everyone else is fit, he is destined to be our best hope of a goal from the bench, Lord Bendtner style.

Alex Iwobi – a starter against the chavs and hammers, Alex is the go-to player for left side wing duties when Auba is chosen at centre forward. This is probably due to his natural ability to take players on. Bit of a marmite player with some choosing to dismiss him outright.

Henrikh Mkhitaryan – His high work rate and creativity up front seem to have made him one of the first names on Emery’s teamsheet. Expecting him to be constantly helping wingfender Bellerin with defensive duties is too much of an ask. I keep expecting his goals and assists figures to explode once the manager settles on a final plan of attack. Could he play as the tip of a midfield triangle?

Mesut Özil – Mesut doesn’t appear to have found a conclusive position in Unai’s team structure as yet. He seems the man most likely to create a goal-scoring chance with just one pass that we possess. Does he play left side in a front three or the furthest forward of the middle three? Answers on a postcard. I’d imagine he’s hankering for Arsene to appear and to tell him, ‘just play where you like while you dismantle the opposition’.

Aaron Ramsey – the Welsh Messi would also love the free role in any set up. He’s been used as part of a double pivot, as a box-to-boxer, as a number 10 and a right flanker up front. Like Mesut he’s another who doesn’t naturally fit into any particular slot in Unai Emery’s team structure wall chart. Reading LB’s Cardiff match report from November 2013 yesterday reminded us that Aaron has goals in him. Wouldn’t it be great if he could hit double figures again?

https://twitter.com/fumbucker/status/1035133596477079552

Of the other three who had fine pre-seasons, Reiss Nelson would appear to be off to Hoffenheim this week (hopefully just on loan) and Emile Smith Rowe and Eddie Nketiah haven’t made the bench in our first three games.

Similarly to choosing a midfield partner for Lucas Torriera, there will always be an element of mix and match when selecting a front 3 depending on the opposition and if we’re home or away.

On paper an Auba, Laca and Micki combination looks to have the most goals in it. Alexandre hasn’t been chosen to start a 90 minutes up to now and if he was chosen, would it mean Auba moving out to the left wing? Choosing a front three might be based on other factors in addition to goals such as team balance, the fabled high press and workrate. It’ll be interesting to see if Mesut can find a natural slot in the new manager’s plans, perhaps starting on that left side but then dropping into more of a number 10 role at times.

It was only a few weeks ago in pre-season that we were talking about an embarrassment of riches up front but we know it will take time for the new boss to find the right blend.

I’m really looking forward to everything clicking into place soon and for the goals to start raining in – as, I’m sure, are we all.

Thoughts? Who  would you have in our front three?

chas

 

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Cardiff Away Remembered

August 30, 2018

Last time we played Cardiff away was at the end of November 2013 and we cruised down the River Taff to take a 7 point lead over Liverpool and Chelsea at the top of the Premier League (both were playing a day later). The BBC published the following stat alongside their match report…… “Arsenal have now won 10 of their last 12 Premier League games and continue to hold the division’s best away record.”  Here’s the AA post from the day after – take it away, LB.

How good was that? It is getting more and more difficult to find sufficient superlatives to describe the Arsenal performances these days. As the first half rolled on and the Good Guys were spraying the ball around with consummate ease the term “thoroughly professional performance” came to mind. But we have used this a few times recently and somehow it didn’t seem enough to describe what I was watching, intensifying the search was the first goal and the brilliance of its simplicity: a tidy pass to Özil who sent over an inch perfect cross for Ramsey to head home and put us in the lead. As he walked away avoiding celebration out of respect for his fellow countrymen, I thought to myself I am going to need something far more complimentary to describe this.

Racking my brains, playing cards came to mind and the hierarchy that exists: a pair is beaten by three of a kind which is beaten by a straight which, I believe, is beaten by flush and then it came to me: the next up from a “thoroughly professional performance” has got to be “A performance worthy of winning the league” and that is what is was, a full house of a performance, not to be confused with a “Winning the league at White Hart Lane performance” that is obviously a Royal Flush and although rare, it does seem to happen with more regularity than many might imagine.

Wenger foxed us all again with his team selection, it made sense to all who considered it to play Flamini alongside Arteta but no, Le Boss had plans for the Frenchman and opted to start with Wilshere and within one and a half minutes we all understood why: an arrow of a shot released from the edge of the box had all the makings of goal number five for our non-attacking midfielder lol but alas at the last moment it swerved away and hit the bar.

As it turned out, as far as Arsenal taking the game to Cardiff was concerned, this was only the start, the Good Guys were brimming with confidence, chances weren’t coming as often as London buses do when you don’t need them but they were coming; the next fell to Giroud who, clean through one on one with the goal keeper, decided to “walk” before the umpire had given him out, it might be the honourable thing to do as Özil clearly touched the ball but in this day and age — really?

We had to suffer five uncomfortable minutes when Mertasacker hit the deck with the force of a felled giant redwood having clashed heads with Sagna; I defy anyone not to have worried about the possible downside of this potential calamity but luckily all was well with our Big Friendly Giant.

Still goalless, but in today’s script only one person was going to be first on the score sheet and our humble Welshman rose to the occasion and headed us into the lead that took us into the break.

Cardiff started the second half well and created a couple of chances that were a bit closer than I for one would have liked, notably a header from Campbell that brought a brilliant save from Szczesny. TPIG was looking as commanding as ever, we could have and should have made more of the breaks that were frequently arising but our interplay was not quite as good as it should have been, it seemed like Theo time but Jack was tiring and they were coming onto us with a tad more purpose than was good for the blood pressure so Wenger opted to shore things up and bring on Monreal and then Flamini.

As the Frenchman took off his track suit all eyes were on the sleeves – tradition won out and rightly so; someone had clearly whispered into his ear that he had, perhaps without realising, upset a few fundamentalists and today was not the right time to go desecrating sacred objects – best solution: roll your sleeves up and go and score a thumping second goal — and that is exactly what he did, yet another sublime assist from Özil who rolled the ball into the Frenchman’s path to powerfully hit home and put us all at ease.

Was this going to be Flamini’s day, no it wasn’t, this was Aaron Ramsey’s day; a second goal for him and with it he rightly picks up pretty much everyone’s Man of the Match award.

Somebody remind me, where are we in the League?

Enjoy your Sunday.

Written by LB

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Who partners Torreira? – Poll

August 29, 2018

Having sorted out Arsenal’s right side rearguard and assisting flank provider yesterday, today we turn our attention to the midfield pivot.

Everyone is clamouring for Lucas Torreira to start just in front of the back four. Surely the only reason for this not happening so far is due to fitness and/or acclimatisation. So Torreira is a given.

The question then arises, ‘who partners him?’ or, in fact, ‘can he handle the job on his Jack Jones?’.

Let’s take a look at the candidates………………..

Granit Xhaka – building up some decent experience of Premiership skirmishes, Granit possesses a fine left foot. His passing range is good though eye of the needle passes are rare. He’s more of a spread it wide to the wingfenders kind of midfielder.

Mo Elneny – economical, functional and effective, Mo does his job with a minimum of fuss, shifting the ball to others in better positions to deliver a telling pass. Has a great engine and is very mobile.

Matteo Guendouzi – his storming pre-season earned him a place in the team for our opening fixtures. Has a keen eye for a pass and really does like to play the ball forwards into dangerous positions which makes him stand out. Let’s hope the occasional misplaced pass so far, doesn’t knock his confidence too much and he continues to shine.

Ainsley Maitland-Niles – it has been mooted that A M-N could be an effective element of a double pivot. Fast, confident and excellent in the tackle, he does seem to possess the necessary attributes. Has become a bit of a utility player with Arsenal’s need for an auxiliary left back and others suggest his natural position is further up the line providing ammo for the strikers.

Aaron Ramsey – could Aaron find the discipline required to remain in that central area of the midfield? Or maybe Lucas requires a partner with more of a box-to-box feel.  Perhaps Aaron might partner Torreira against particular types of opposition? Though maybe Rambo’s creativity and eye for goal are wasted playing in a deeper role.

Mesut Ozil – perhaps Unai has asked Mesut if he fancies becoming more of a Pirlo-style midfielder, conducting the whole orchestra from a deeper podium and that has caused some consternation. Apparently Mesut has had the highest number of turnovers so far of anyone playing in Emery’s new Arsenal high press.

What do you think? Perhaps you don’t think Lucas Torriera will be the first name on the team sheet even when he has got used to London and the English Premier League?

Maybe Unai Emery already has a good idea of his ideal team members and all with be revealed in the fullness of time.

chas 

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Posted by D.I. Bongo

Is Lichtsteiner the solution to the Bellerin conundrum?

August 28, 2018

Following we have two respected AAers coming to very similar conclusions re: Hector and Stephan. Could this work?

First up, your Copenhagen correspondent……..

Torn apart down the right flank by a very average team. Bellerin struggling. Mustafi and GB too far apart and outpaced.

It is becoming a familiar pattern.

To be fair to Bellerin, he was playing against a very good winger in Antonio and Arnautovic’s movement can cause problems for most defences. Also, as we can see from the graphic below (thank you FGG) UE set up the team so that Bellerin spent most of the game in WHU’s half.

I find this graphic very interesting. Look at the midfield and how compact we are.  Douzi and Xhaka occupy the same area giving Hector no assistance.

I know that Emery is averse to playing a back 3 and prefers the 4-3-2-1 but unless the midfield shield Bellerin we will continue to struggle.

My question is this … If Emery wants Bellerin to play as an attacking right sided MF and almost as a right winger, then why not bring Lichtsteiner in to play at RB? Drop a MF – we do not need Mhiki, Iwobi, Ramsey, Douzi and Xhaka all occupying a narrow space and keep Hector forward, allowing him to protect the Swiss chap, I seem to recall AW doing that by bringing Eboue into midfield.

Unknown.jpeg

Or do we just rely on scoring more than the opposition?

N.B. I know very little about tactics, formations and all that stuff, so the above could be total cobblers. Also, I quite enjoy shouting at the television when a simple lofted ball allows an attacker to go one on one with Cech. 😀

written by Big Raddy

================================================================

Followed swiftly by our Devonian dissector…….

I believe it was LB who once posted this:

……………LACA

AUBA…….MESUT……???

My guess was that the question marks highlighted the lack of a naturally fast right sided attacker.

Ok, the next bit, and this pains me somewhat.

I now have to give credit to a grown up gentleman who I know sits high in East Upper and spends the majority of the ninety minutes putting two Cheesy Wotsits up either nostril, one in each ear, then carefully arranging one Smokey Bacon flavoured Hula Hoop onto the tip of each finger before slowly consuming each salty snack, but here’s the rub, only someone in attendance could have made this comment:

Ants says:
August 26, 2018 at 6:28pm

In the warm up, Bellerin was being passed balls on the right hand side of the box to control and then use to find a runner in the middle. It was exactly as happened for the 1st and 3rd goals.

So there we have it. Goals win games. Bell set up two, while probably being responsible for conceding the one at the wrong end. How about leaving the fashionista up top with the good players and sticking Licht (who can defend) at the back where he belongs?

written by mickydidit89

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Posted by Erik the Red

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