However in the cups with Martinez, we did much less of this, I assume because that's just not a natural strength of his, compared to Leno who has basically mastered it. Emi would very often just punt it up field. And whether it's just a coincidence or actually an effect of this different style of starting from the back, we played arguably our best football in the cups, and had our most convincing victories. In Laca's post-match interview they really put him on the spot about what's going on at Arsenal these days, and the one tangible thing he said was that they were lacking confidence. I suppose he was speaking for himself, because he sure looked that way. Or in his case, I've been willing to chalk it up to being just plain rusty.
Leicester sometimes had both strikers in or near the six yard box. It's just common sense to try and go over the top sometimes to make yourself unpredictable.
One of the last few Arseblogs talked about how cup teams are probably playing Arsenal more in a "small team v big team" kind of way and respecting what they can potentially do. Instead of teams in the league who have figured out that arsenal are going to keep making the same mistakes and to press and force more mistakes.Perhaps that has had some impact on this.
I think the EL teams are just shittier and the talent gap is making the difference. IIRC we're not really blowing teams off the field but some good finishes made the difference.
EmeryOut and all that, but I don't know how we went from creating consistent high quality chances from pullbacks this time last season to basically nothing this season. I never thought I'd see an Arsenal team down tools like this. Man dem on work to rule. All of our midfielders are under 23? It was immensely frustrating to see none of our midfielders had the confidence to turn in the midfield. Relying on Wilock, and Guen to play like a vet Carzola seems daft. I don't think playing Ozil and Lacazette was wise, but it's noty career on the line. Chambers had an excellent game Tbh the back three we played had a decent game against a high movement attacking 4. One small bright spot actually. Getting Holding back into pre injury form seems critical to any chance Emery has.
Yeah this. Basically for that reason I'm more hesitant to give Freddie a chance than I would have been a month or two ago. I don't think the abysmal level of our recent performances is his fault, but he's been too closely connected with them to think that he's a clean break from Emery. I think our best option for now might be Arteta, if he's willing to come and City is willing to let him go. Not so much that he's a tactical mastermind (I don't think that anyone can pronounce definitively on that one way or the other), but clearly he has a lot of experience as to what good football _culture_ looks like, and that's what we're lacking right now above all else.
Disastrous result, and then the club essentially admits we can't compete away at Leicester because they are much better than us. Seriously.
If that Ornstein piece is accurate and they (Raul and Edu) really thought we were dominating the match prior to Leicester's goal, they're idiots. We were moving the ball around a bit better than we did against Wolves or Sheffield, but that's a low fecking bar.
To get really old school, the shot dominance stat, which is now a trend across a significant number of games, is a basic indicator that Arsenal are getting outplayed not just by Leicester, but also by mediocre sides. If teams outshoot us, game after game, including relegation level teams, it is a sure sign we are the weaker side. Add to that our data is down in virtually every other dimension, I can't imagine what Raul and Edu are looking at.
I suspect that Raul and Edu's "positive" outlook towards Emery might be forced because Kroenke made it clear he is not going to spend millions firing him if he could be rid of him in the summer for free, and the end result of no CL revenue is the same either way. Raul swept away the EL blues by pulling a rabbit out of a hat and giving the club one of its best transfer windows in recent memory, and for things to be worse than ever despite all of the work he put in over the summer, has to be infuriating. Our management didn't shatter the club's transfer record to finish 10th. The area where the club are making a mistake is thinking that the fans are just getting a little heated in the moment and will cool off. The problem is that there are no segments of the fanbase trying to calm things down. Everyone, even the more level headed figures of the fanbase (arseblog/gunnerblog) is pissed off, so things are only going to get uglier.
Completely SOTR was basically an early proxy for chance quality (XG). A team that created more on-target shots than it conceded was likely to win games. XG is just a better stat - but in simple terms Arsenal is getting comprehensively outshot in games, which means we give up more chances than we create. That is the hallmark of a weak team.
Seems like a false saving given all the damage to the brand and lost CL revenue. If we do finish 10th, we will basically have lost the ££ we could have paid him off with
Agree. Losing out on EL will cost more than paying him to leave. We may have no chance of top 4 either way but we still have a shot at top 6 and winning EL but don't think either happens under Emery.
The board will realize that too late. If we maintain our current performance level over the last 19 league games, we will end up with a point total that would have us 13th last year, so even with some improvement, finishing outside the EL is a distinct possibility.
Don't know if you listen to the Arsecast and, if so, you have already today, but one of the things Andrew and James opined is that the "leaked statement" to Ornstein smacks of this insinuation that the vast majority of Arsenal supporters are like the wankers on AFCTV, and thus can be dismissed. But to the contrary, as Andrew and James argue, the majority of fans are NOT like that, are not stupid, and yet are still getting really upset, or worse apathetic, about this. There is almost no case to be made for keeping Emery, not the data, not the table, not what we see with our own eyes. But the club nevertheless chooses to gaslight us and treat us like we're all either idiots or raving lunatics like some of the AFCTV regulars. It's insulting. And now they have a big PR mess on their hands, as well as a mediocre club.
There is way too much pressure on Douzy at his age. I mean to break out at age 19 is amazing, and now he is essentially our top midfielder at age 20? Ceballos is at least a bit older, but hardly a guy who has led a top flight midfield. Joe Willock also 20. With Xhaka being trash, that basically means LT has to lead the midfield at age 23
This is a ten minute read, but it's absolutely fantastic and a scathing indictment of Emery. https://thirdmanruns.wordpress.com/...-failures-of-emerys-latest-throw-of-the-dice/ Key quotes:
This is really one of the most frustrating things actually. Anyone of his 50 tactical plans could work, if he gave the players more than 30 minutes to figure them out. Despite being a generally toothless tactical set up, given some actual familiarity with the system and some confidence it would probably be a pretty effective way to get out best assets on the pitch at the same time.