Mikel Arteta, success or failure? - Merged thread.

[Clummo2019]

Like celebidee slag Jordan on a Saturday night I'm sandwiched right in the middle of this.....

I can see some improvement in our set up and in our spirit but nowhere near the turning a corner thing some are implying has been achieved.

We look harder to beat than under Dick's last 6 months but equally look less able to win than under Dick's first 6 months.

Our main problem is the playing squad. Too many are not good enough or past their best. Most top teams can carry one or two lesser players but not 4 or 5 starters that are not good enough.

What's the solution? Can't see the wigged avenger releasing 500million to buy in what we need and can't see 4 or 5 youth players stepping up and being capable of playing at that level.

Arteta (like Dick) has inherited an abattoir of a club 10 years in the building. That will not be rebuilt in a couple of months or even years.

The part highlighted in red is exactly what I have been saying - tiny improvements yes, but nowhere near what some are claiming

The part highlighted in blue is where I feel those that are championing arteta already are muddying the waters - yes only top teams can carry one or two lesser players, but Bournemouth, palace, leeds and Sheffield united are not top teams, and we absolutely should be beating those teams with the players we have available. Setting us up to be harder to beat against the chav and manure c.unts is fair enough, but then we have to be able to step up and take the game to the lesser teams that I mentioned, and he hasn't fixed that at all

But Augie sadly we are not a top team ourselves atm. We are a mid table team roughly at the same level as all but one of those that you mention.

BTW I'm certainly not championing Arteta in any way at all. I didn't want him first time around and didn't want him this time but it is what it is. There are enough small signs of improvement for me not to be so dismissive of him. The old adage in football is when you're trying to rebuild you first make yourselves harder to beat. I think we're heading in the right direction on that in spite of the sub standard personel at his disposal.

We are not within a million miles off the top clubs but lets be honest, on paper our players are streets ahead of the likes of the 4 teams I mentioned - ability is only a part of any player and teams usefulness, but it is every managers job to get the maximum performance of every player under his control, and I cant remember the last time we can say we had that (certainly not in the last decade or so). We are comparing our players to our teams of old, but comparing our players to the teams we are now facing would give a better reflection of where we should be - I think most will acknowledge that we should be doing a lot better than we are (that's why emery was sacked), but doesn't that say that we have players better than those teams around us ?

I'd confidently say that you could count on one hand how many of our players would be coveted by those teams though. Even Leeds! The majority of our squad are mid table level or worse. I'm certainly not comparing our players to those of old. I am comparing them to the squads of the teams around us. We're even being linked to players from Sheff Utd and Bournemouth.

Also would like to play Devil's Advocate with a few comments from people today digging at the fact we've only won one game in seven under Arteta. You can counter that with only LOSING one game in seven. That certainly suggests to me that we appear to be harder to beat?

As I said earlier, Arteta was never my choice but things have been so shite lately that I'm willing to grasp at anything even remotely positive!

[GoonerMuzz]

I've always said before we get better we need defensive stability, and you can see that players are trying harder the problem is still we have the same defensive players who aren't good enough for the roles under Arteta as we had under Emery, christ some of them were this bad under Wenger.

Arteta has an issue in that he can only play those available and right now a number of those who might be regular first choice starters are either injured or working themselves back to full fitness. It's a bit of a cop out on my part but I will not judge Arteta on the basis of choosing between which option is the least bad available.

Emery choose some of the same players Arteta has even when he had nearly a full complement so you just cant use Emery as a yardstick for where we're going under Arteta yet because if Arteta had all the players he might choose differently and end up with different results than he's had, admittedly they could actually have been worse.

Interestingly for me even though we're struggling with results we've actually not fallen particularly far behind since Arteta took over, the one plus he has is that with the exception of the top 3 all the teams above us are performing nearly as poorly as we are.

Blind optimism it may be but it gives me hope that IF Arteta can just get things to click ironically we'll probably end up no worse than 5th under Arteta exactly the same as we ended under Emery last season, probably without a Europa final though

From my viewpoint I'm effectively giving Arteta a free pass currently simply because there is no choice, I can bemoan the fact we ended up with Arteta I can whinge and moan about results, team selection or whatever but in reality there is fuck all I can do about it. So instead I'm trying to take the passion out of it and look at things from a pragmatic stand point, are the team trying harder? Most of the time, are they getting it right? Some of the time. Are we improving? In some areas yes, in other areas no. Are results and on field decisions going our way, are they fuck....but that's nothing new and one of the joys of being a Gooner Is there room for improvement? Most definitely by the players and the coach.

I know some will completely disagree with giving him a pass and that's fair enough but in reality the latter Wenger years and everything that has changed both with the Arsenal and football in general allows me to disengage a lot more than when I was younger, I guess I've lost a but of the passion that drove me when I was younger but I can completely understand those who still have it 'in the blood'.......I have a medical condition is my excuse

[OneBardGooner]

I've always said before we get better we need defensive stability, and you can see that players are trying harder the problem is still we have the same defensive players who aren't good enough for the roles under Arteta as we had under Emery, christ some of them were this bad under Wenger.

Arteta has an issue in that he can only play those available and right now a number of those who might be regular first choice starters are either injured or working themselves back to full fitness. It's a bit of a cop out on my part but I will not judge Arteta on the basis of choosing between which option is the least bad available.

Emery choose some of the same players Arteta has even when he had nearly a full complement so you just cant use Emery as a yardstick for where we're going under Arteta yet because if Arteta had all the players he might choose differently and end up with different results than he's had, admittedly they could actually have been worse.

Interestingly for me even though we're struggling with results we've actually not fallen particularly far behind since Arteta took over, the one plus he has is that with the exception of the top 3 all the teams above us are performing nearly as poorly as we are.

Blind optimism it may be but it gives me hope that IF Arteta can just get things to click ironically we'll probably end up no worse than 5th under Arteta exactly the same as we ended under Emery last season, probably without a Europa final though

From my viewpoint I'm effectively giving Arteta a free pass currently simply because there is no choice, I can bemoan the fact we ended up with Arteta I can whinge and moan about results, team selection or whatever but in reality there is fuck all I can do about it. So instead I'm trying to take the passion out of it and look at things from a pragmatic stand point, are the team trying harder? Most of the time, are they getting it right? Some of the time. Are we improving? In some areas yes, in other areas no. Are results and on field decisions going our way, are they fuck....but that's nothing new and one of the joys of being a Gooner Is there room for improvement? Most definitely by the players and the coach.

I know some will completely disagree with giving him a pass and that's fair enough but in reality the latter Wenger years and everything that has changed both with the Arsenal and football in general allows me to disengage a lot more than when I was younger, I guess I've lost a but of the passion that drove me when I was younger but I can completely understand those who still have it 'in the blood'.......I have a medical condition is my excuse

So it's true you did catch the pox off of Spuddy!?

[GoonerMuzz]

I've always said before we get better we need defensive stability, and you can see that players are trying harder the problem is still we have the same defensive players who aren't good enough for the roles under Arteta as we had under Emery, christ some of them were this bad under Wenger.

Arteta has an issue in that he can only play those available and right now a number of those who might be regular first choice starters are either injured or working themselves back to full fitness. It's a bit of a cop out on my part but I will not judge Arteta on the basis of choosing between which option is the least bad available.

Emery choose some of the same players Arteta has even when he had nearly a full complement so you just cant use Emery as a yardstick for where we're going under Arteta yet because if Arteta had all the players he might choose differently and end up with different results than he's had, admittedly they could actually have been worse.

Interestingly for me even though we're struggling with results we've actually not fallen particularly far behind since Arteta took over, the one plus he has is that with the exception of the top 3 all the teams above us are performing nearly as poorly as we are.

Blind optimism it may be but it gives me hope that IF Arteta can just get things to click ironically we'll probably end up no worse than 5th under Arteta exactly the same as we ended under Emery last season, probably without a Europa final though

From my viewpoint I'm effectively giving Arteta a free pass currently simply because there is no choice, I can bemoan the fact we ended up with Arteta I can whinge and moan about results, team selection or whatever but in reality there is fuck all I can do about it. So instead I'm trying to take the passion out of it and look at things from a pragmatic stand point, are the team trying harder? Most of the time, are they getting it right? Some of the time. Are we improving? In some areas yes, in other areas no. Are results and on field decisions going our way, are they fuck....but that's nothing new and one of the joys of being a Gooner Is there room for improvement? Most definitely by the players and the coach.

I know some will completely disagree with giving him a pass and that's fair enough but in reality the latter Wenger years and everything that has changed both with the Arsenal and football in general allows me to disengage a lot more than when I was younger, I guess I've lost a but of the passion that drove me when I was younger but I can completely understand those who still have it 'in the blood'.......I have a medical condition is my excuse

So it's true you did catch the pox off of Spuddy!?

Wouldn't be the first.....allegedly

[OneBardGooner]

[SydneyGooner]

Think Arteta has had a decent start and I'm satisfied with what he's done so far. Since coming in we've got 3 wins 4 draws and 1 loss. We've still got a long way to go but there's been an improvement especially in the attitude of the squad and he's been a little bit unlucky to have not gotten more wins.

[Nos89]

Keeping Nketiah for the rest of the season could be a brilliant move, considering lacazette's goals have dried up.

He does only have one league win to his name, which is a massive concern to me. The win away at Bournemouth in the cup was a boost. Winning away at a premier league side, Burnley should be a very similar proposition.
It seems injuries and suspensions to our CB's are simplifying the selection process for arteta in our defence and may just hit upon our strongest backline which include holding, who needs a run of games to get up to the level he was playing at last season alongside sokratis.

[clockender1]

Tets comments today :

On his time at Arsenal so far: "There's been a lot of challenges, with injuries and suspensions, but I'm pleased the direction we're taking and very pleased the way the players have accepted the ideas and the way the fans have reacted."

On the break: "We'll use it to do two things. Firstly we'll give the players a few days off so they can rest, because they haven't had that since November. Then we'll spend some time training so we can get our ideas across more."

I think we can add VAR to injuries and suspensions.

But as said above, the improvement in attitude, fitness and work rate is noticeable. I also like tets attitudes - hes not afraid to tell the players its not good enough. He also seems to prefer a quicker more direct game, and more variation in our play.

We seem a bit more solid, and we are better to watch - tikka takka thankfully seems dead

Still a very long way to go, though.

[Zanatos3]

Headline: Mikel Arteta blames the grass after Arsenal’s draw against Burnley

LINK
https://metro.co.uk/2020/02/02/mikel-ar ... -12169613/

Dangote for 2022

[falkirk goon]

El beige..defo a failure.

[SteveO 35]

4 consecutive draws and some absolutely dog shit performances - imagine the abuse Wenger or Emery would be getting today after a snoozefest like that. Passing gone to rat shit, playing Lacazette down the middle instead of our top scorer.

Truly awful. A long way to go before he can be even considered to be doing an acceptable job let alone a successful one.

[augie]

I didn't see any of the game today so am not gonna comment on the quality (or lack thereof), but one win in eight league games tells it's own story - I don't give a fcuk what anyone say's, if emery started last season or this season with a run like that, we wouldn't be listening to shit about what a positive difference the change in manager has made

[SteveO 35]

I didn't see any of the game today so am not gonna comment on the quality (or lack thereof), but one win in eight league games tells it's own story - I don't give a fcuk what anyone say's, if emery started last season or this season with a run like that, we wouldn't be listening to shit about what a positive difference the change in manager has made

Exactly right - I love the way all of those who were giving Dick bundles are now clutching at straws seeing the things they want to see to justify the change. The football we played today matched the first half against Leeds, the whole game against Sheffield United, the second half against Bournemouth Reserves and against a team that Dick and Wenger never dropped points against

Supposedly we are defending better, but if Patrick Bamford or Jay Rodriguez could hit a cow's arse with a banjo that little myth would be scotched too.....not to mention the panic stations from every corner again today.

Loved Arteta the player, not loving Arteta the coach. Hired a novice to do a job that even the most experienced of managers would find tough

If he carries on playing Lacazette down the middle every away game we won't win another away match all season. If ever Aubameyang needed an incentive to piss off in the Summer, it will be spending every game shoved out wide while that lazy, lardarse takes his place down the middle

[Nos89]

He's only been in the job for 6 weeks. Lost one game.

He's working with the muppets Emery bought and the remaining deadwood left by wenger. This break is very much needed at this point of the season.

[Clash]

He's only been in the job for 6 weeks. Lost one game.

He's working with the muppets Emery bought and the remaining deadwood left by wenger. This break is very much needed at this point of the season.

I think us fans need the break more than the players after watching that shit today.

And roll on the summer if Arteta is gonna persist with playing that clown Martinez in goal in the FA Cup and EL as we won’t go the distance in those competitions.

Decisions like that cup keeper policy and playing Abamayeng out wide etc. are not doing much to convince me that Arteta has any fresh ideas or any kind of new approach. So far he’s pretty much just copying what the previous coaches have done.