FT 4-0?! OMG! We.Won.A.Goddamn.Game. In. A. Rout. And. Kept. A. Clean. Sheet. Big ole monkey off Mikel's back? Onward to Greece
Celebrating like we just won the biggest game of our lives. Shows you how much strain and pressure they've all been under. So many things to be happy about today. But maybe putting the negative GD in our rearview mirror is one of the sweetest.
Glad the fans and team are saluting each other. Need to build.more of that rapport to help the spirit around the ground.
Great match! Second half felt like a lot of things finally came together. Felt like everyone contributed in good ways.
I generally like Robbie Mustoe, but just before the match I recall him saying Arsenal's poor performance was mainly on the players. Now after a truly dominant 2nd half he said it's all because of the manager. Really? How about just admit that things aren't quite so black and white mister pundit... there are often many key factors, and both of these factors (players & coach) were true here. e.g. The decisive 2nd goal was pretty much all player excellence, especially Saka.
Much better 2h Ceballos played higher up and was unleashed to control and move us forward. Auba came more centrally as well. Ozil just oiled the machine. Saka was outstanding. Our left side has a very bright future.
Good post. And Auba on post-match interview just confirmed that coach told him to play more centrally.
Horrible first half, should t have to get arteta to bollock them at half time for a performance I love how we moved the ball in transition and on counters but vs a low block it was overly methodical and too short saka has been a revelation, I thought he was our best prospect in the pre season but didn’t think he would be this capable Pepe grew into the game, he has to play less like sanchez did and more like salah, higher up not involved from deep as much as the space between him and the forward is too big and he often stops his dribble and comes back ceballos looks good deep too. We have up some good chances, thank fox they can’t finish
I'm going to believe City will be banned from CL for one season, after appeal. So 5th place is up for grabs! 6 pts away from Spurs, completely possible still. Come on boys!
Pepe with a goal, 2 assists, and should have had a 3rd assist if Eddie hits his sitter in front of goal. After the first 25-30 mins, we were finally able to break them down. Having creative, attacking players on both wings, coupled with Ozil and Ceballos creating chances from center really stretched them out, imo. We've really struggled to break teams like this down, but we definitely did so today. Happy for the clean sheet, but Arteta clearly must continue to improve our defense. Props to Leno, who cleaned up a lot of the mess in defense as well.
Finally watching the game. My thoughts... 1. Really hoping the Saka gets a run playing on the wing rather than LB next season 2. Thought Dani played really well. Saw some criticism of his numerous short passes to Xhaka but as I see it he made the passes Newcastle gave him and took shots up the field when they opened up. 3. Pepe was really good. Hoping he can keep this form. 4. Eddie did well considering his lack of minutes this season. Worked hard and got into good position. Just unfortunate that he missed his sitter. 5. D still needs work. We may have lost in a shootout against a stronger offensive side. They didn't look foolish like some games in the past but still managed to leave guys completely unmarked. 6. Said before and will say it again, PEA just doesn't look right playing on the wing. 7. Saint-Maximin looks deadly as hell. Would love to see him playing for us. Ozil would have a field day picking out runs from a forward line of PEA, St-M and Pepe.
Yeah, you inspired me to just do likewise. That was the play where I kept saying to myself "the crowd should be Ole-ing, why aren't they?" Then after like 20-25 passes they started to do just that. And at that same moment Ozil just completely changed our gears from patient keepaway/buildup to a sprinting incisive diagonal run across midfield... and a few seconds later he ended up getting the ball back about 8 yards from goal with a pretty easy tap-in. Classic stuff that would make an coach proud* *Edit: I just listened to Mikel's post-match presser (see next post) and when asked about the 35-passes, he said basically "yeah it's nice, but if we can score in 2 passes maybe that's better" (with a wry smile). I'd like to say that I'd be TOTALLY down with that too.
One thing that is a definitively, objectively HUGE improvement over Emery is Arteta's pressers. I liked every bit of how he conducted today's, right up to the last sentence where he said Laca came on as a late sub and then worked his balls off...