No one said Freddie is the next Sacchi. There is no reason to call him a fraud. This is an impossible situation.
So is it official? When is the announcement? When can he get his team of assistants in there? How much control over the squad and transfers does he get? What is his coaching philosophy? Having never managed any side before what makes him believe he can manage just a big name club in our darkest hours? So many questions...
Think Barca youth, Wenger & Pep influence and below is an interview from 2015 to give a little more insight...
In addition to Arteta, I am seeing some rumors that we are looking at revamping our youth setup. Supposedly in advanced negotiations with ManC's Sam Fagbemi (In charge of City's youth recruitment strategy) and Wolves Phil Antwi (Sr Academy Scout).
Thanks for those interview quotes. Those are very insightful and he says a bunch of "the right things". But they are from 4 years ago, just before he became an assistant coach to Pep. It would be even more interesting to see what his answers would be in 2019. Anyway, if this is where we're heading, and I'm more than willing to give him my full support, can we please. get. on. with. it?
Seeing rumor that Arsenal and Arteta have agreed a 3.5 yr deal and he will be on the pitch as manager for the Everton match this Saturday.
+1 And cue NBC to rearrange their TV schedule to get this soap opera on live TV. I believe we were supposed to be relegated to Gold this weekend, no? Edit: No, I'm off the mark again. Looks like we're in the Saturday 7:30am ET slot, which would always have been on NBCSN. Not sure what's up with me and my posts tonight.
The only nickname I see for Freddie if he doesn't win another game before we bring in someone else, would be calling him Oneberg.
Handbrake Off podcast: According to Ornstein, Arteta is definitely the front runner, but Vieira is strongly in contention Freddie was a bought into the first team setup with the idea that he could hold the fort if things went wrong with Emery - sort of like an insurance policy Freddie has now failed but still held in very high regard because of the way he has conducted himself What will happen to Freddie if Arteta comes in? Maybe out of a job? Will he go elsewhere? Freddie was supposed to be building an interim team after norwich but then club didn't provide him with any staff. He has now called them out on it.
This from arseblog is what i find incomprehensible on Freddie I agree the guy is a good communicator and lots of the issues are not his fault. But he was given the shot of a lifetime with the lowest possible bar and couldn't shift the needle at all. Surely there exists the possibility that one reason Arsenal are rubbish is that our management team beyond Emery consisted of people like Freddie who are not very good? This is why it also baffles me that so many people want Vieria The process feels like jobs for the boys
All of that seems quite intuitive to me. EXCEPT that I don't quite see why Viera is "strongly in contention". Arteta is a gamble with quite a bit of upside potential. Because he's never really done it before Viera is a gamble with very questionable upside potential. Because he's had several years as a head coach and has been pretty mediocre, especially his last 2 years in France. Totally agree. It almost seems like fan-boy Josh is hell-bent on bringing back a legendary player/captain to be our HC. Thankfully he seems to have given up (for now anyway) on considering TH14 whose first HC job at a major club ended in quick failure. I've never been a huge proponent of MA8 because of the inherent risk, but if the choice is a binary one between him and PV4, I would choose Mikel.
I don't agree with the expectations for Freddie in the least. Freddie imo was put forth by the club to hold the paddles on this lifeboat until they made a decision and nothing more. Hence all the clarity from Freddie on the situation and his resources. This team was/is in a terrible way due to poor coaching/direction from a competent manager without a functional style. You cannot judge him on the basis that other managers are weighed on because he had no resources to make any changes. Freddie did what he could in arguably the hardest position of all top football atm with a club that can't make the most simple administrative decisions. With some of the most demanding fans in the world. Dude is class and if anything has shown me more why one day he will get his chance and will do well if properly supported somewhere. I hope he is allowed to stay on and help Arteta in some capacity.
Just listening to ArsenalVision podcast and they referred to Mikel as "Panini Pep". Immediately a new nickname popped into my head... "Pepini" For me that encapsulates how we see Arteta and without being particularly derogatory. Edit: Subsequently I did some googling and found no hits for "pepini". Only a few for "pepito". Hmm...
One year and a half later, we got our Captain Black! He's who I wanted when we went through this process in 2018, but I'm glad he got another year of experience with Pep because he's gonna need it to deal with this club's bullshit. Anyways this calls for an avi change.
Honestly, it’s probably better for him now than 18 months ago. 18 months ago he would have been expected to resurrect a side thatS cratering and not in his image. Now he can create a new team in his identity.
Still not a done deal. The latest news reports says they're in final stages of negotiations, and hope to announce within 48hrs. Not enough time to take the reigns for this weekend, but enough time to sit in the stands and watch Ljungberg struggle to get a result... likely.
I don't understand why there were any expectations of Freddie right now. The team is composed of an excellent striker, an excellent goalkeeper, and unreliable mishmash inbetween. There's a reason that nobody wants to buy any of our other players - they're not Champions League caliber talents. I think our midfield sucks. Each of the options we have is the third piece of a three man midfield. There's nobody that can attack and defend, read the game, or control tempo. Nobody can both dribble forward and pass forward. It's a bunch of one-dimensional guys. LT is solid, Xhaka is a mess, and Guendouzi is an incomplete player right now.
The narrative is so funny to me. When we were bad under Emery, no one blamed emery’s coaches. It was his tactics and lineup. Now that Emery is gone and we still are bad (although I think we are better), it’s because Freddie doesn’t have any coaches!? These are professionals that have been playing footy since they were toddlers. They surely can go a few games without someone to kick a ball to them and tell them to Sprint harder or whatever. The central defenders are bad, we have no fullbacks to play a formation which complements our attack, our highest paid and most senior midfielders have pretty much checked out leaving 19-21 year olds to go against MEN in the middle. For those who are in doubt, the season is a total write off (we ain’t winning the EL either) so let’s not worry too much about the few games in between permanent coaches. Let’s take the time and think long term here. Speaking of. To those who think arteta is low risk since we have nothing to lose—let’s do the math on that. Say we have to pay city 7m to get him. And then he’s on a 3.5 year contract. If he does the same as Emery, we will be on the hook for another 2 years to pay him off. That’s probably another 8-10m and a couple more for his staff I’d guess. So potential risk of 15-20m, plus whatever damage he does in his tenure. Putting that kind of £ at risk for a guy with no experience seems like a pretty heavy bet to me. I’d just assume give Freddy a two year deal to do the best he can. Let Edu and Raul work on the personnel situation—getting rid of ozil, mustafi, chambers, Lola, xhaka; getting in some quality defenders, and dealing with the Auba and laca contracts. If Freddy shows promise, then extend him. If not, move for a dynamic young coach with some experience.
I'm hearing that City's management is pissed off, not only because we may poach Pep's chief and trusted assistant, but because Arsenal mgmt have supposedly not even reached out to them yet. Although that's probably not the first time a buying club would act this way, but is it smart? Could it come back to haunt us? If they start playing hardball from an angry point of view?