Call me negative, but 4th place EVEN with the FA Cup feels like a massive failure after not even pretending to want to go for the glory of a league title. SMH
Six of one, half a dozen of the other. The reason Ramsey was played so much that he broke was due to the loss of Oxlade-Chamberlain, Walcott, Cazorla, and Arteta to injury (all at various points in time Aug.-Dec.), Flamini to constant suspensions (for yellow card accumulation), or Wenger being weird (I think he had a mild injury, but it seemed like Rosicky was mostly just out of favor for a lot of September and October). Plus, Ramsey was so ridiculously hot throughout the autumn that it was almost impossible to leave him out, even for a single game. You'd be leaving a sure goal or two on the bench the way he was playing for a while. The squad needed to be bigger, no doubt about that. Maybe they should have gotten Kim Kallstrom last summer?...
Your being negative. Chelsea or pool or city will finish above us without silverware.... four teams made a push for the title at least we should get a cup. Think about that... Who cares if you get fourth or 2nd we will have A Trophy after NINe years. Did u really think we would win the league this year? Really??
When you lead for 129 days what else are you supposed to do? lol choke it away? Hmm..let's see Chelsea won the Europa League last year, CL year before, yeah I'd say one yr without silverware out of 3 is not bad. City? Oh they won the League 2 yrs ago and the Carling Cup, no silverware you say? Hmm.. Oh Liverpool? Without silverware you say? Possible but they weren't even supposed to be top 4 so your point is what? We made a push for the title you say? When? Oh last summer when we didn't buy a striker or this window when we did what exactly? Yeah. Now that's a real push. I know I know there wasn't anyone available and who would've thought that the injury bug (which has bitten every yr since 05) would bite again this yr. I'm too negative I know.
If you expect sporting teams to meet your expectations I recommend following the cubs/spurs/PSG/Bayer otherwise enjoy the success .... You act like this club owes us the title for what they did for 100+ games... Guess what they aren't that good for whole season so they don't deserve the title
Anyway, winning the FA Cup feels like a consolation after being teased with the possible glory of a title winning season. Plus the way we just gave up the ghost is abject failure.
The dumbest thing I have read is complaining about winning something finally and saying it's not good enough You sound so entitled
Some (most?) of the ho humness about the fa cup comes down to who we're playing in the final. Forget the fact that we've done well to get there by knocking out Liverpool and Everton
Exactly. How differently would this Cup run be viewed if we'd played Wigan and Hull in the 3rd and 5th rounds and Tottenham and Liverpool in the semi and the Final?
Says the one who was shitting on a half-injured Ozil against Bayern. Just becuase I don't rate your man-crush, doesn't make me the worst poster on the board. If shitting on players and fickleness were legitimate reasons to be the worst poster, you would be miles ahead of everyone.
Look at the past few fa cup winners, its a competition of a mid level tier. I will be glad to win it but it has lost alot of glamour
No one would argue that winning a title or the Champion's League would be the best outcomes, but the FA Cup isn't something to shit on. I think bigman is right in that it's lost a little bit of the glamour the past few years just because some mid-tier teams have won it. If it had been won by City, Chelsea, etc. the past couple of years we'd have a different perspective.
I've done a very basic analysis of conversion rates for Giroud and Podolski, along with a few other players for comparison purposes. The numbers show us a few things that we know (Podolski's finishing is off the chart, for example), but there are a few facts that will surprise many people. The players I've completely randomly chosen for comparison are Aaron Ramsey, Luis Suárez and Daniel Sturridge. Ramsey's finishing is considered exceptional by all and sundry, Suárez is the de facto 'best striker in the league' to whom everyone is compared, and Sturridge is the sort of burst onto the scene surprise performer of the season, so I thought these three would provide decent coverage. I also threw in Sergio Agüero, who in my opinion is the actual best striker in the league. All numbers are from all club competitions in the 2013/14 season (except for Champions League qualifiers; I couldn't find shot data for those games) unless otherwise noted. These are club numbers only and do not include international games. Giroud: 20 goals, 124 shots, 16.1% conversion rate Podolski: 15 goals, 44 shots(!), 44.1% conversion rate(!!) Ramsey: 11 goals, 60 shots, 18.3% conversion rate Suárez: 30 goals, 192 shots, 15.6% conversion rate Sturridge: 23 goals, 104 shots, 22.1% conversion rate Agüero: 30 goals, 109 shots, 27.5% conversion rate A few notes: Podolski's numbers are from a very small sample size and do show a considerable (positive) deviation from his career numbers. Still, he's a ridiculously efficient finisher and always has been. We haven't learned anything new here, as I wrote above. In terms of sheer efficiency, he might be the best finisher in the world. Suárez's conversion rate this year is actually up from last year and way up from his career number. Despite this, he's still the most wasteful in the group. Sturridge's numbers surprised me a little bit. They are really excellent. I'd guess his pace is presenting him with unusually easy chances on average. Ramsey is a great finisher. As I suspected, Agüero's number show him to be the true gold standard. If he had been healthy this year, he may have scored a Messi/Ronaldo like number of goals in the Premiership. Giroud may be slightly below where he should be expected to be based on the number of shots taken, but only slightly. Anyone who concludes that Giroud is as horrible a finisher as I keep reading around here must have no other choice than to conclude that Suárez is even worse.
For the record, that above has no bearing on my opinion of whether Podolski should play center forward. He shouldn't. He works best doing what he's been doing the last few weeks. Nominally on the left, but he's essentially been playing off Giroud as a second striker in the inside left channel.
Good points, but stats do not tell the whole story. We don't know what is actually meant with ''shots''. Shots on target? Shots from outside the box? Shots from inside the box? I'm not sure if you can conclude that Suarez is a worse finisher than Giroud while we don't know how many chances Giroud would have converted if he had taken +190 shots. If Podolski is better on the left than as a cf, he should stay where he is.
Agreed 100%. I'd be willing to bet Giroud has more shots off target (total and percentage) than any of the others named above.
You really are the worst poster on this board. I was able to find his data in about thirty seconds - it's from ESPN, and is total number of shots taken, regardless of where from. There's a separate column for shots actually on target in ESPN's tables. Links: http://espnfc.com/team/squad/_/id/364/league/all/liverpool?cc=5901 http://espnfc.com/team/squad/_/id/359/league/all/arsenal?cc=5901 http://espnfc.com/team/squad/_/id/382/league/all/manchester-city?cc=5901 http://espnfc.com/team/squad/_/id/360/league/all/manchester-united?cc=5901 Numbers that jumped out at me on this list: RVP has 17 goals in 73 shots. Head bangs against wall. Aguero is really efficient, but Negredo has 26 goals on 98 shots. I think Man City's strikers are less a function of their awesomeness and more about their midfield being really freaking good at creating chances when everyone is healthy. Speaking of Man City's midfield, Yaya Toure has 22 goals on 75 shots. Dear god. For someone who's been lazing about, one shot out of three goes in. WTF. Speaking of midfielders, though, Gerrard has scored 15 on 61 shots. Part of this is Brendan Rodgers' coaching, I think, but part of it is that as Gerrard's aged, he can't run around like a headless chicken anymore, and he actually has to think about where he goes. He's become a much better player for it.
Lol. So not drawing conclusions from stats makes you the worst poster on the board, the level of stupidity here must be very high. Again, we don't know what's actually meant with ''shots''. Shots on target? Shots off target? Shots inside box? Shots outside box? Clearance shots?
If winning the FA Cup prevents me from hearing, "It's been X years without silverware, blah blah blah", then it is more than a consolation to me.
It's 1 of the 3 important prizes a team can win in a season. I for one would be quite delighted if we win it. It would give everyone a huge boost and we would be making a statement, that we're fighting for prizes.