Mustafi with yet another unforced error. What's that his 5th today? Very eager to see him replaced ASAP. Meanwhile we give Huddersfield their first goal in 10hrs! Not a pretty game but if we get out with 3pts it's job done. Ugly, but done. And we do our level best to keep our streak alive... no away clean sheets in the whole season.
Time wasting, defensive lineup, parking the bus the 2nd half....still concede against last place. I blame Ozil
Coming off getting throttled against City, that was a pretty discouraging performance against the very bottom team. Iwobi is like a lawn mower with no blade.
Well, at least Unai Emery didn't guarantee a clean sheet, because he didn't get one (thanx a lot Kola......NOT!!!), even though we took all 3 points, maybe Petr Cech should show all of us one last time how to run what was once the best laundromat in the League, and one WITH guaranteed clean sheets at that too!!! I can't believe a club as great as Arsenal are can't keep a clean sheet on the road, especially against THE bottom feeders, in which Huddersfield currently are. It seems like we can easily beat the top clubs (Chel$ki, ManUtd, Scums, etc.) at home pretty easily but can't slam the door on even the worst clubs while away. What's it gonna take to shut out a club on the road (in the EPL, I do believe, tell me if I'm wrong, as I don't watch, that we've done it this year in the EL)
Meh. Arsenal played without PEA and with AMN deputising, and with Elneny seeing notable PT. Given that plus the usual defensive frailties and this being a road game I'm not going to dump on the performance too much. Let's face it, until we get the back 3-5 sorted out and healthy the team is always going to be below our aspirations. 3 pts Our Armenian looked good Onward and upward
We got outshot 15-9 by a team averaging a touch over half a goal per game. Outposessed too. There aren't really any silver linings to take from this one, except that we managed to grind out a win against the worst Premier League team since 2007/08 Derby.
I've professed my devotion to team form as much as anyone here and I'm not handing out trophies for today. I'm simply acknowledging the team still got 3 pts, and that I've seen worse.
Word. I'm actually shocked we are still winning with our current injury list. Holding, Bellerin, Sokratis, Xhaka, Ramsey, Ozil (sick), Auba, Welbeck, is that all? That's arguably the majority of our best starting 11. I'm not pleased with our play style of our defense, but at least we are still getting points. NBCSN had a graphic that said we are 7 points better off this season. I'm still firmly in the camp that says Emery needs another year to show us if he can actually do this. Remember, he only signed a 2 year contract. Ornstein on the Arsecast said that the 45 million dollar transfer budget being thrown around is ridiculous. He's been told that the actual transfer budget will be somewhere around 100 million + departures. He also said that he's heard from one source that Monchi has already agreed to become TD, but he doesn't want to report it yet because he hasn't verified that fact. I think we have a plan, and I'm willing to bare out these awful performances to get us to where we need to be this season.
I'd agree that it's a majority of Arsenal's best starting 11, but I'm not sure Emery does. Only 4 of the players listed were consistent starters when healthy, though Holding was starting to push his way into that group.
Jesus. This forum is even more depressing than it was in the late winters of the Wenger era. We have five more points than last season and if Chelsea drop points at city we will only be 1 point off 4th. Last season we were done in the league already. Reading these posts you’d swear we were in 10th or something. We have the six best squad in the league and we are in sixth. A little more luck with the injuries and we’d be in 4th for sure I’m convinced. Just have a little patience for Christ sake.
Yeah. Plus our second-half strategy was near-bunkering. I really didn't like that strategy, but no surprise if it led to lower shot production.
Can’t say I enjoy it either. But I’m not convinced it’s the worst strategy. How many games the last few years did we drop points from winning positions. This season we are pretty good at that I think. I think we have dropped 7 points from winning positions—that’s United (2), pool (3) and palace (2), there may be one more but I can’t remember. Last season it was 13 in the first half of the season alone iirc.
I don't see a Torreira thread, so this may be the next best place to put this. Torreira seems to get fouled on a regular basis, so I checked the stats. Only Zaha, Hazard, and Richarison have been fouled more often per game than Torreira. I was also surprised to see that Guendouzi is the 7th most fouled player and Xhaka is 15th. The only other center mids to make the top 15 are Pogba and Hojbjerg at Southampton. The rest are attacking mids or forwards, plus Danny Rose.
We sure do get fouled a lot. We have the 4th, 7th and 15th most foul-attracting players? I guess it says something about our style of play, but I personally worry about these stats. That players like this might have a higher injury rate. (Has anyone every done a correlation analysis of this?) Wilshere used to really bug me in this regard... I always wanted him to release the ball before getting fouled, but he so often didn't. p.s. If there's no Torreira thread, there damn well should be. You wanna start one??
I worry a little about Torriera because of his size; constant fouling has to wear him down, but he was also fouled at about the same rate when he played for Sampdoria. The fact that Arsenal's defensive mids are fouled so often suggests that virtually every other team thinks Arsenal are vulnerable to pressure. The difference between our defensive mids and Wilshere is that Wilshere was a dribbler, they aren't.
The rotational fouling is ruining the game in my opinion. As soon as spurs or city turn the ball over they are straight into the back of the player to break up play. It’s a smart tactic, but the refs have to put an end to it. Every club is starting to do it and every match is turning into el Classico with the stoppages. Not sure how to handle it, but something please.