The Arsenal v Wigan 6/12/08 (Pre-During-Post) Match Thread [R]

[G dot Ozo]

I honestly don't get why Wenger thinks a midfield of Eboue, Cesc Denilson and Song will ever work. Eboue and Denilson are clearly not suited to play on the wings and the fact Wenger persists with it is shocking. Eboues' role in the team is cover for Sagna, and should be nothing more. I don't blame him for being so poor in midfield; he gets told to do a job, and he's got to do it. In short, the boos were justified, but they were directed at the wrong man. The blame lies with Wenger here.

[juanca]

Credit to Wigan for coming to Town and playing some football, perhaps only the tackle on Nasri was way over the top, but other than that, it was a good open game, any team couldve won, im glad it was Us.

I got no beef with Eboue but when i think about the players we've let go or sold in the past, and yet somehow have come to Rely on This guy as a "senior pro" at the club is just poor judgement.

[Publius]

I honestly don't get why Wenger thinks a midfield of Eboue, Cesc Denilson and Song will ever work. Eboue and Denilson are clearly not suited to play on the wings and the fact Wenger persists with it is shocking. Eboues' role in the team is cover for Sagna, and should be nothing more. I don't blame him for being so poor in midfield; he gets told to do a job, and he's got to do it. In short, the boos were justified, but they were directed at the wrong man. The blame lies with Wenger here.

With Walcott, Nasri and Rosicky (remember him) all out, Wenger either has to go with very inexperienced players, in terms of age or Prem experience, or he puts in Eboue and Denilson.

[antifan]

Well, the announcers did nothing at all in the second half to irritate me. Arsenal, on the other hand . . . .

Up until the 85th minute I thought both teams had played well and Arsenal were just unlucky not to have a comfortable lead. The last bit of that game was an absolute horror show.

To me, the textbook examples of a "You Suck" sub come when a player is taken off in the first half when there's no injury or when a player is subbed off after coming in as a sub. I don't know that I've ever seen Wenger make a "You Suck" sub before. Eboue just mentally came apart in the last 5-10 minutes of that match.
To be fair to Eboue, he was coming back from a long layoff and shouldn't really have played more than 30 minutes. I think he ended up playing more like 60. Wenger should have taken him off sooner, if anything.

[Weymouth Dave]

he lost his confidence... before that he was vital in our attack and put in some good touches that lead to some of those chances that we flubbed...

if you dont want to support players on your own team, go support Chelsea... "tired of this crap" ... shut up!

exactly... I dont understand this at all, and I dont understand how anyone can support their actions...

Eboue had a shocking final ten minutes, not saying otherwise, but to mock him and boo him was horrible...

It's attitudes like yours that have allowed this team to underperform in many games. Eboue had a poor performance and was booed. This team doesn't need kisses blown at them. They need to know there are expectations on them. They're big boys getting many quid to perform consistently.

[ZIAD]

With Walcott, Nasri and Rosicky (remember him) all out, Wenger either has to go with very inexperienced players, in terms of age or Prem experience, or he puts in Eboue and Denilson.

yes, but had he listened to everyone else and replaced Flamini, and Rosicky we would be doing much better. Seriously Eboue is only good for a back up RB that's it, playing him in a mid field position is useless.

[DaPrince84]

It's attitudes like yours that have allowed this team to underperform in many games. Eboue had a poor performance and was booed. This team doesn't need kisses blown at them. They need to know there are expectations on them. They're big boys getting many quid to perform consistently.
and its attitudes like yours that causes our players to panic in vital parts of the game because you all boo over every mistake...

he had a terrible 10 minutes, in his first match back since Halloween... before that he played pretty well... ideally he would have just gotten 15 mins or so but was forced in at the 30 min mark...

Im still in shock at what I saw today... just stunning... those 'fans' who booed are fools who should never be allowed in that stadium

[-apoc-]

Aside from the end it was a fairly decent game for us. Eboue was shocking at the end and I am happy about Wenger making the sub cause it was clearly a matter of getting the 3 points there and not blowing it. Something in this team broke mentally after that Tottenham debacle and they are losing their minds at the end of matches for some reason.

On a side note not trying to slag him off he is good in the middle but since Denilson is kinda rubbish on the wings when Eboue came on why didnt he go to the right and Denilson come to the left. At least that way only 1 of our wing players was being played out of position instead of both.

On the whole booing Eboue thing if it was any player other than him or Bendtner the crowd wouldnt be on their case about it nearly as much I dont think, but Eboue is not well liked do to the crap he used to pull and it takes people a long time to see that for the most part he has cut alot of that rubbish out of his game and actually start supporting him as a player. Not defending the booing but there is a reason for it.

[G dot Ozo]

With Walcott, Nasri and Rosicky (remember him) all out, Wenger either has to go with very inexperienced players, in terms of age or Prem experience, or he puts in Eboue and Denilson.

Blatantly playing square pegs in round holes are far worse proposition compared to inexperience, particularly when in Eboue's case, it has proven to be a failure for a year and a half.



On a side note not trying to slag him off he is good in the middle but since Denilson is kinda rubbish on the wings when Eboue came on why didnt he go to the right and Denilson come to the left. At least that way only 1 of our wing players was being played out of position instead of both.


Both of them were being played out of position no matter how you slice it.

[brianodom]

he lost his confidence... before that he was vital in our attack and put in some good touches that lead to some of those chances that we flubbed...

if you dont want to support players on your own team, go support Chelsea... "tired of this crap" ... shut up!

exactly... I dont understand this at all, and I dont understand how anyone can support their actions...

Eboue had a shocking final ten minutes, not saying otherwise, but to mock him and boo him was horrible...

why is it you guys can be so delusional?

if we would've given up a goal off of that what would you have done?

we didn't we got three points..soooooo... you'll just sweep this under the road until a gaffe like that knocks us out of the CL ..etc

we are playing catch up this year and really don't have time for his antics..bendtner is enough as it is..

Arsene did what any coach with common sense would've did..eboue was tired, lost, and totally out of sync..

and take that chelsea crap somewhere else..it is well documented I'm an arsenal fan..stop getting upset when people tell you the truth..

[TheArgonaut]

Phew...three points. TBH, I think we deserved the 3 points for the amount of chances we created. Wigan played a good game though.

I actually felt bad for Eboue. I'm not a huge fan of his but I recognize that he can be useful...if Wenger plays him the the right way. He can add defensive solidity to the RIGHT side of the pitch and be a pretty good backup to Sagna. Wenger made the right decision in bringing him off but he made the wrong one when he put him on. I have a hard time understanding why he and denilson didn't switch flanks or why, if Wenger really wanted denilson on the right, he didn't bring on Ramsey.

However, even if I agree with subbing Eboue off the fans who cheered as he went off were way out of line. The announcer had that one thing right (the announcer was sh*t the rest of the game though)...the boy has had a very bad day. Making him feel like crap is not going to help the situation. It's embarrasing enough for a player to be subbed off after being subbed on...he knows that he sucked today...the fans didn't need to do that to him.

[brianodom]

To be fair to Eboue, he was coming back from a long layoff and shouldn't really have played more than 30 minutes. I think he ended up playing more like 60. Wenger should have taken him off sooner, if anything.

EXACTLY

he should've played the last 20 mins AT MOST...

[OrangeArsenal]

Well that game could have been 5-0, but I'm just fine with a win and a clean sheet.

I feel a couple of the Eboue's first mistakes were down to him being tired. He has missed 9 games and wasn't really ready to play an hour today but he had to. Once he made those first few mistakes his confidance just went.

edit: opps, guess I got beat to the "tired" post

[G8TR_Gooner]

Re: today's performance. . . its 3 points with some nice spells of play overshadowed by 15-20 minutes of heart in the throat panic.

Re: Eboue

I'll come out and state I am not a big fan of booing players. Yes, supporters have the right to do what they want but it is rarely productive. In England its a lot less acceptable than it is here in NJ/NY or heaven help me. . Philly.

However, if you have NOT been to London, or the stadium this year to catch a match/matches and your complaining about the booing you are talking out of your arse. Between the waterfall of layoffs, property values falling like stones, pound sterling plummeting in value, etc. people are in a foul f@#$!ing mood and having to sit through some of what they've seen on the pitch people are bit fed up w/ paying top dollar to watch a team that like many ArseAm members only show up for big games. The mood at the matches I went to seemed to turn surly pretty quickly and I'll wager anyone a few quid that if AW buys no one useful in the upcoming transfer window and we hit another rough patch. . . it will only get worse.

Before some wise a## lays into me I'm not agreeing w/ all that is going on but if you don't look at things in the proper context you're really just missing the bigger picture. Today was about more than Eboue.

[DaPrince84]

why is it you guys can be so delusional?

if we would've given up a goal off of that what would you have done?

we didn't we got three points..soooooo... you'll just sweep this under the road until a gaffe like that knocks us out of the CL ..etc

we are playing catch up this year and really don't have time for his antics..bendtner is enough as it is..

Arsene did what any coach with common sense would've did..eboue was tired, lost, and totally out of sync..

and take that chelsea crap somewhere else..it is well documented I'm an arsenal fan..stop getting upset when people tell you the truth..
this post makes it sound like you are just on the bandwagon when times are well...

im not defending his play at the end at all, and I would have been very critical if the fans didnt boo him.. but you support your team, not boo them... hence why these guys panic...

[DaPrince84]

its a shame when the loudest response from the crowd the whole match was to mock and boo Eboue

[-apoc-]

Both of them were being played out of position no matter how you slice it.

Eboue is perfectly capable on the right side of midfield. Im not saying he is going to be winning any player of the year awards there but he is better than Denilison was out there and on the left he looked lost. Now whether that is from the extended injury, him not being mentally prepared or physically ready for such a long run out is debatable. But I think all those factors would point to him going out to the right side so that playing an unfamiliar position wasnt added to the list of difficulties that he was facing in his first game back in over a month.

[brianodom]

this post makes it sound like you are just on the bandwagon when times are well...

im not defending his play at the end at all, and I would have been very critical if the fans didnt boo him.. but you support your team, not boo them... hence why these guys panic...

ummm no dude..I've been a fan since the early 90's

I support my team to the fullest but.. Pepole are growing tired of us NOT finishing games..thats why we are somewhat in the situation we are in...if a player on this level doesn't have the mental ability to play through booing he shouldn't even be playing..its mental man..

it all comes down to Arsene shouldn't have had him on for that long..people are frustrated and every point counts we really can't afford another loss or tie and people like myself felt a tie was imminent.

[Henry Porter]

Im still in shock at what I saw today... just stunning... those 'fans' who booed are fools who should never be allowed in that stadium

That's the price paid for having high ticket prices.

[And_ROOS]

Eboue is perfectly capable on the right side of midfield. Im not saying he is going to be winning any player of the year awards there but he is better than Denilison was out there and on the left he looked lost. Now whether that is from the extended injury, him not being mentally prepared or physically ready for such a long run out is debatable. But I think all those factors would point to him going out to the right side so that playing an unfamiliar position wasnt added to the list of difficulties that he was facing in his first game back in over a month.

He will never be the answer to that side of the pitch, and we wont succeed in terms of trophies with him on that side of the pitch. He is adequate cover at RM and RB and that is about it.

Its clear Eboue was rushed back onto the team today and he simply wasnt ready. Alot of his passing was mentally sloppy, some of it was just unlucky.

But then again he needs gametime to get back upto speed, and playing him as a LM when he isnt exactly a godlike RM was always going to be, hmmm, interesting for lack of words.