Did you say the same thing about United after the game on December 2 when Arsenal had 33 shots, 16 on target to United's 8 shots, with just 4 on target and Arsenal enjoyed 75% possession, but United still went out 3-1 winners? Or did you just praise Mourinho's tactics? Mhki scored and Sanchez didn't, given the number of youngsters in the starting lineup and how well some of them played, those two things are good enough for me.
I have no recollection of that game. However, I looked back at it and we performed well enough to have won that game by 3-4 goals. If that's what it takes to make you happy then I can't imagine what actually winning a game would do for you
I hate Manure and Jose but total abject apathy about this match. Didn’t watch. What’s the point? Thursday is the cataclysmic end to the current torture chamber that has been the Arsenal the past decade. Win or lose we must move into a new era. We lose, the new era just begins that much sooner.
Why would you expect a result out of this game? It was completely irrelevant to Arsenal's league position and thus a good opportunity to look at some of the younger players and rest the starters for Thursday. Given that context I was happy with what I saw. I was particularly impressed with Chambers and Mavropanos. They stepped in to win balls, but never overcommitted, something Mustafi and Kos are both prone to. Together with Holding, Arsenal appear to have three decent young central defenders. The odds are that at least one of them will become good enough to play for Arsenal on a regular basis. AMN also had a good game. When Jack leaves I'd give AMN his minutes. Given that Arsenal have to rebuild, it's important that they play the youngsters in competitive games to see if they are good enough,
It was 50/50 at the half, so it was 70/30 in the second half. Don't have the numbers to do the math for the final 30 minutes.
Mavropanos has promise (he did make those 30-plus yards passes look easy), but he's still very inexperienced. He was lucky Rashford's goal was disallowed for offside. That time Fellaini beat him in the air only to be denied by the post. Maybe he was trying to keep the line, to deny the extra yard to the attackers, which to some credit did help put Rashford offside in the end, but it got him on the wrong side of Fellaini. Mavropanos was not goal-side of Fellaini when he need to be and Arsenal almost paid for it. After that moment, I think Arsene instructed Xhaka to help Mavropanos out against Fellaini. Xhaka was no match for what happened on the goal. I think United rehearsed this cross and header many times and knew exactly how to get that half-a-step advantage to get something at the end of that cross. I can't take too much away from Fellaini's header. It did take a bit of luck, but it was mostly class. Maybe a defender of Chiellini's or Kompany's quality and experience would have denied Fellaini that header: it would have taken some real quality to have done it in my view. Xhaka might be the one who cops blame for the goal, but really a more experienced defender in Mavropanos' place probably would have meant Xhaka would never have been called-in to defend so deep against Felliani to begin with. This to me is a fault that lays with Wenger, asking something of Xhaka that he simply couldn't do and asking something from Mavropanos which he isn't yet ready to do. Others may differ in their opinion, but some matches you can afford to lose and I think Wenger approached this game in that sense. He took the risks of playing a young lads and made the best of it. Who knows, maybe Xhaka or Mavropanos could have proven himself beyond their known abilities. All things considered, there wasn't anything riding on this game other than one's pride for one's team. And with that consideration, it was United, not Arsenal that played a team of mostly first team of regulars. They were also playing in front of their own fans. They really had less of an excuse if they failed to show up and win today. Even a draw for Arsenal would have looked like a good result, but that would not have been so for United. And considering how youthful and untested Arsenal's side was today, these lads did relatively well for themselves.
Also, just a quick word for Chambers. He was excellent, and has a future, despite the consensus. Mavropanos was interesting, as well. It’s one game, so I’m not getting excited, but he seems a good athlete, good build, tall and strong, and decent with the ball.
Giggles. "Come over 'ere and join us, son. Me and your stepdad have straightened things out" pic.twitter.com/9fjYPX7NnO— Nooruddean (@BeardedGenius) April 29, 2018
So many people want to believe we played well against a full strength Manu side. I feel JM could have told his players they only need to give about 50% and Arsenal will find a way to cough something up. You don’t have to try against Arsenal, they will find a way to blow it.
I thought Chambers and Mavropanos chemistry together were really good for being the first game. Mustafi better take a hard look at himself seeing youngsters play better than he did all season.
A season is a long time. Lets give them the room to grow so we don't end up with version 2.0 of our swiss pair.
I really don't like the continued dogpiling on Wenger, especially after he's announced his departure, but this might be correct. Or it might not: some managers simply don't play young defenders (e.g. "shut up i'm a champion").
So how do you explain the fact that from 2012 to 2016 statistically Arsenal with the Per Kos pairing in the center of the defense were one of the two or three best defenses in the league. Cumulatively during those 4 premier league seasons Arsenal and City both allowed 150 goals, an average of 37.5 goals per season (about a goal a game), while Chelsea allowed 151 goals and United 158, everyone else was well over 160 goals allowed. The deference between the Per/Kos pairing from 2012 to 2016 and the Mustafi/Kos pairing the last two seasons is that Per and Kos complemented each other, while Kos and Mustafi are for all intents and purposes the same player. In addition Kos has lost half a step. So you can blame Arsene for signing a player that doesn't complement Kos, but the meme that Arsene can't coach a defense is old and tired.
Hmmm, Per had 237 first team club appearances before Arsenal, Koscielny had 143. I wonder what the difference is?
Koscielny had played 35 games of top-flight football before he came to Arsenal. He didn't make his first appearance for France until over a year after he signed with Arsenal. He wasn't exactly established. Also, Mustafi had 135 first-team appearances (and 12 senior international) before he came to Arsenal, so you're cherry picking stats really badly here.
Mertesacker was so good. I wish more people could look past his speed to see what a phenomenal defender he was
In Kos' first year at Arsenal he was paired with a combination of Djourou and Squillaci, both with 20 starts and statistically Arsenal were still fourth in the league in goals allowed, with 43. To accomplish this with a player in his first year at the club, who doesn't have a consistent partner game in and game out, and when the partners he does have are a combination of a very young Djourou and an inadequate Squillaci suggests to me that there was some defensive coaching going on.
Probably harsh: think it's more that Koscielny is hilarity-prone (think CC final, last week), but Mertesacker made sure that everyone was organized such that Koscielny typically didn't get into situations where Koscielny doing something crazy hurt us.
It took me a couple of seconds to realize that "i" is next to "o" and "d" is next to "s" on a keyboard. I'm going to disagree. Per's athletic shortcomings would have been even more apparent without Kos to cover for them. They truly did complement one another. I think you may be basing your evaluation, at least in part, on the last two seasons, when Kos has lost half a step. My first positive memory of Kos, early in his Arsenal career, was of a game against Barcelona when he had Messi in his pocket.