Laurent has been a real diamond in the rough, considering when Wenger brought him to North London. I thought who in the world is this guy?
Plus Santos on the left, Sagna on the right...consistanly....hmmmm.....mouth watering.... On the side note, Kos got A LOT OF sticks when he first played for us... Not many ppl rated him highly ( myself included - ) but he didnt let it get to him. He quickly adapted to the EPL and became the player he is right now after one season. Great job Kos!!!!!!
i agree he is our best cb and better than vermaelen, even so i would like to see them paired instead of mertesaker who is not touching either of verm/kos' level
Mertesacker brings a controlled, calming presence to the defense. He's good. He's just not your typical centerback so he's easy to misunderstand. He's been a good signing.
i understand him ok, reads the game well but his lack of pace stops him being a really good defender....watch how many times he is beaten for pace and tries to dive in and misses completely not brilliant aerially either
I can not wait to see Kos and TV play together at CB for an extended time. Hopefully Gibbs is back soon though not sure I want his first games back too be vs AC
For me our CB's should be Verm+Koz hands down. As soon as Gibbs is back we can see that again. Mertesacker is too slow and makes one too many mistakes / lapses in judgment to be preferred. Still he inspires a bit more confidence that Djourou, so I'd say Per is solidly in 3rd place amongst our CB's.
Kos made more mistakes than Mert in his first season. One thing I truly hate about this board is how quick people are ready to trash/beatify a player. Mert is slow. That was no unexpected. He will have 5-6 bad games. That is expected too.
um, mert makes a mistake almost every game when he misjudges easy long balls he needs to man the hell up imo, he is awful aerially for his size and not particularly strong
yeah. minor mistakes that just happens regardless of who you are aside, last year, koscielny was generally good for about one cringe-worthy oh-holy-fuck mistake per game. sometimes it did cost us goals, sometimes it didn't. but i always kept an eye out for that one every game. and he was good for it. still, you could totally see he did some really neat and tidy stuff. i think we'll see something similar from mertesacker next year in terms of progression. he'll have had a full year to adjust to the premiership. the only disadvantage is he won't have the summer to prepare like koscielny did this past offseason.
The difference for me is that Kos only spent 1 season in a first division before coming to Arsenal, while Per has been at Bremen for a long time, and while the Premier League is the most physical/fastest league in Europe (according to the likes to Wenger, Fabregas, Pires, and countless others who have played in England and on the continent), I expected him to be stronger. However, my only disappointment in Per was against Norwich. Otherwise he's about what I expected, and I'm satisfied with that as a back-up once Vermaelen pairs up with Kos in the center.
I base a lot of my opinions on gut feeling, after having watched someone awhile. My gut feeling on Koz, even at the beginning has always been positive. And yes he's made some gaffs along the way, but he seems to have more upside potential and those mistakes seem to be getting less. (I have zero facts to back this up... just gut feeling) My gut feeling on Per has not been as good, from the beginning until now. I do see some improvement in him, but some things I don't expect to ever improve too much (his speed, his lack of rough physicality, etc). So I rate him lower than Koz, thus he's our #3 center half at the moment.
He has been what we expected him to be and he will improve. Kos has been a big plus since his arrival.
Great numbers from Kos this season. "Koscielny made the most tackles (85) & interceptions (81) of any centre back in the PL this season" http://www.whoscored.com/Blog/mlcmw...eague-Focus-Premier-League-Team-of-the-Season
another gem uncovered, i don't think anyone had heard of him pre arsenal let alone thought he would be this good!
Beat me to it.... Honest to god (no, it doesn't need to be capitalized; I'm not referring to Bergkamp) it doesn't surprise me, but he just seems like he is incredibly sharp, the way he assesses opposition attacks (which is supported by his excellent tackling rate).
He's good at scrabble! Another reason why my decision to buy a Koscielny jersey two years ago was a good one.
No surprise here either. He is very " cerebral" as his displays on the field can attest. While Blanc will prefer to start Mexes next to Rami, IMO Kos is today a better player than Mexes.
I agree with this. I would rather have Kos starting, but he's gonna need to do more to supplant Mexes. I wonder if they purposely played a "Centerbacks only" game. Interesting.
Kos has become one of my favorite Arsenal players. There are few CB that have impressed me more over the last few years. I'd be willing to say he's our best CB since Campbell.
