Realwood pretty much said it perfectly for me as well. I admit i didnt think the squad could win the Prem this year. I thought perhaps we could challenge but might come up short, maybe win the FA cup or CC and hopefully have a solid run in the CL. Last i did check though its Sep 20th, not May 20th. We havent won s*it yet so in that case this thread is a bit premature. As well i dont really think it is appropriate to take a stab at people for having differing opinions.
I understand what Realwood is saying, and I understand what flyerhawk is saying. Everyone is intitled to their own opinion but some posters do take the negativity a bit too far. I don't think realwood is one of them. The club is playing some excellent ball, and the confidence that stems from that just leads to more excellent play. The team is in a good spot right now.
"Did you say over? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?" arsenal fans unite!!!! ps..see rick, us americans are good at many things other than geography...
For the record I don't doubt the sincerity of any fan who spends time on a message board. This thread wasn't intended as an indictment. It was intended as some light hearted jabbing at fellow Arsenal fans who perhaps see the black could in every silver lining.
So it isn't appropriate to poke fun at unnamed pessimists? Tough crowd here. I guess I'll just take my red and white colored glasses and move along.
Martymarts wandered off? Man, that sucks. I just fell off the face of the planet. Our injury problems had nothing to do with it. I'd still like Edu back.
Wow, a post from Coach!! Hope you are doing ok and everything is good. Would be good to see you over here one day before I bugger off to Africa for good!!
Really? I actually feel quite vindicated. Whereas say, 18 months ago, there were probably twenty or thirty issues I would criticize club management for, now there might be three or four. The rest of them have more or less been resolved as I would have wished. This is especially pertinent wrt the things you and I have tangled over. Having said that we shouldn't get ahead of ourselves too far. You can't win a golf tournament on Thursday, but you can lose it. The best that can be said for us at the moment is that we're a month or so into the season and we haven't lost anything.
No its alright to call people out when i feel they need to be called out, obviously people take stuff a bit far on here sometimes. Just surprised me a bit to see so many people glorify themselves in the light of others. Based upon our form so far certain people know they are already proved wrong, no need for us to call them out on it.
Gooner, You are missing the point of this thread. I am NOT trying to call people out. If I was I would have brought up quotes from the past. I am trying to get the pessimists on board. It's really no big deal that people were negative about the team's prospects. What's important is we all band together NOW! We all know that the potential is there. Let's support that faith rather than fight it.
I'm with you. Too bad supporting your team and believing in your players should be such a problem for some. We still have a lot to prove, but the talent of our squad is undeniable. It's shameful that so many people thought they couldn't improve. It's really nonsensical.
I'm not sure that was the issue so much as who was expecting both Manchester and Chelsea to both dramatically digress over the first month of the season? How much we improved, I thought, would be secondary to how much they fell off. To overcome a gap in results as big as existed last year, you need to do more than just improve yourself.
We lost 2 points the whole season .. Our performances have been good .. I credit the team fully and not our rivals messing it up .. This, well, we can't find out until we're a decent way through the season .. If we continue our good performances, I'm sure it will be independent on how ManU or LPool or Chelsea perform, don't u think so ?! We win all the games, we remain at the top irrespective of how ManU or LPool play ..
Well IMO you can't gamble on teams losing points. We did that last year. We've now got the mentality that if we're going to win this thing, we need to not lose a game all season. We probably will lose along the way, but if you set the benchmark high your performance is high.
The point of this post, however, was the rationale of people before the season started. Antifan implied that by not expecting better of the season, people were somehow not expecting the roster to improve - which couldn't be further from the case. The issue is that I expected everyone to improve, thus our improvement would be relative to that - and making up such a huge difference in performance would be difficult. For the first month at least, only Liverpool and Arsenal have improved. The other two, both due to injury and poor play have fallen off the pace they had last year. Seeing it right now, I don't see any reason Manchester United can't get back up and running at full speed within a few weeks and then a full on three-legged race can get going. Chelsea, who knows? They could completely collapse - and who wouldn't love that?
Terp, Why do you keep talking about how poorly other teams are playing? The WORST we could be right now is 2 points off the lead. At this point last year we were 6 points off the lead. It won't kill you to actually praise Arsenal.
I have praised the team - in this very thread. But if you honestly think Chelsea and Manchester United are playing at potential, I don't know what to tell you. I have actually seen them play recently, and they are vastly reduced from last year's form. I don't really care how many points we would or wouldn't be off. We've played a month. We've done well. They haven't. There's still what? 8 months left? It's good to celebrate the team, but let's not turn this into a potential treasurechest of comedy for other teams in May.
I don't care if ManU or Chelsea are playing to potential. It has no bearing on this thread, except as an attempt by you to rationalize your position. How does their play matter relative to our play?
I just love how people who one minute are overly critical on the team and complain for no reason all of a sudden show up on this thread to say they haven't been critical or complaining. Get behind the team or shut the ******** up!
She makes a good point here. While I've lodged my issues with Flyerhawk's post already, if we're looking at the here/now, the reality is that we're top of the table and ManU/Chelsea have been spotty in terms of form. As of today, we are doing well and look poised for a strong season, rationalizing that by saying we're only here because the other teams haven't played to potential takes far too much away from how the team has performed to date.
Splar, I'm most definitely not a female. Although that would be cool if I was. I could just stay home all day and molest myself. My handle comes from a couple of other sports teams I follow.