Fartboxing at Forest Weds Feb 26th KO 1930

[Limerick Gooner]

My post was about sticking with players not emery so you are wrong thinking I was suggesting that

Unless I am mistaken you have posted consistently that we could have kept several of Emery’s squad. You have also consistently posted about how Emery is light years better than Arteta. So can you please talk me through in detail how he had us in mid-table the year after blowing 4th and getting tonked in the Europa League Final.

I’d also like you to talk me through how he has Villa in 10th having spent a boatload of cash.

[OneBardGooner]

[General]

@Augie, how could we stick with the same players who got Emery sacked? Let’s not forget most of them had at least a season and a half with Arteta before they were gradually moved on. Arteta didn’t exactly drive a grave digger through the squad at the first opportunity did he. Apart from Kolasinac, none of them have gone on to win anything worthy of note

[IW8Goalmachine]

My post was about sticking with players not emery so you are wrong thinking I was suggesting that

Unless I am mistaken you have posted consistently that we could have kept several of Emery’s squad. You have also consistently posted about how Emery is light years better than Arteta. So can you please talk me through in detail how he had us in mid-table the year after blowing 4th and getting tonked in the Europa League Final.

I’d also like you to talk me through how he has Villa in 10th having spent a boatload of cash.

I'm not defending Emery here because he had many faults but four Europa League titles is an eon ahead of Arteta

[augie]

My post was about sticking with players not emery so you are wrong thinking I was suggesting that

Unless I am mistaken you have posted consistently that we could have kept several of Emery’s squad. You have also consistently posted about how Emery is light years better than Arteta. So can you please talk me through in detail how he had us in mid-table the year after blowing 4th and getting tonked in the Europa League Final.

I’d also like you to talk me through how he has Villa in 10th having spent a boatload of cash.

And this is where the hypocrisy sticks out like a sore thumb - no doubt emery spent a boatload of cash but he took over a team fighting relegation and got them into champions league quicker than the cone boy got us into it. How is the money relevent with emery but dismissed as insignificant with legohead ? How are we supposed to go along with the bullshit argument that the cone boy took over a shit team, but yet totally ignore the fact that emery took over a team fighting relegation and got them into a 7th place finish that season and into top 4 the following season ??

@General - we had some very bad eggs that neither emery nor the cone boy could handle, and no doubt they had to be moved on, but I would argue that just like we didnt move saka or martinelli on, we also should have kept torreira and guendouzi. In my opinion both were young players who could have been moulded once they were seperated from the senior players who were a bad influence at the time - both had energy and a drive to win, and that was what we needed to build a new team around imo. I dont go by what the player done elsewhere after leaving AFC, but prefer to judge based on what strength the player has and what needs the team has, and I think both would have been mainstays for us, and miles ahead of xhaka, partey, merino, ceballos and jorginho imo

Also as IW8Goalmachine has pointed out, emery had faults and played a big part in bottling top 4 that first season, but he is light years ahead of the cone boy and his trophy record is exceptional when you consider the calibre of clubs he won them at, and without spending £800m too

[Limerick Gooner]

My post was about sticking with players not emery so you are wrong thinking I was suggesting that

Unless I am mistaken you have posted consistently that we could have kept several of Emery’s squad. You have also consistently posted about how Emery is light years better than Arteta. So can you please talk me through in detail how he had us in mid-table the year after blowing 4th and getting tonked in the Europa League Final.

I’d also like you to talk me through how he has Villa in 10th having spent a boatload of cash.

And this is where the hypocrisy sticks out like a sore thumb - no doubt emery spent a boatload of cash but he took over a team fighting relegation and got them into champions league quicker than the cone boy got us into it. How is the money relevent with emery but dismissed as insignificant with legohead ? How are we supposed to go along with the bullshit argument that the cone boy took over a shit team, but yet totally ignore the fact that emery took over a team fighting relegation and got them into a 7th place finish that season and into top 4 the following season ??

@General - we had some very bad eggs that neither emery nor the cone boy could handle, and no doubt they had to be moved on, but I would argue that just like we didnt move saka or martinelli on, we also should have kept torreira and guendouzi. In my opinion both were young players who could have been moulded once they were seperated from the senior players who were a bad influence at the time - both had energy and a drive to win, and that was what we needed to build a new team around imo. I dont go by what the player done elsewhere after leaving AFC, but prefer to judge based on what strength the player has and what needs the team has, and I think both would have been mainstays for us, and miles ahead of xhaka, partey, merino, ceballos and jorginho imo

Also as IW8Goalmachine has pointed out, emery had faults and played a big part in bottling top 4 that first season, but he is light years ahead of the cone boy and his trophy record is exceptional when you consider the calibre of clubs he won them at, and without spending £800m too

I’ll happily pick your post apart. Emery squeaked into 4th 21 points behind Arsenal. Yes. 21 points…..
Their run in to 4th was a complete bottle job disgrace. Spurs however bottled it harder, including surrendering against City. Getting 4th was a nothing achievement. They got 68 points. They lost 10 times. They had no Europe to deal with either. What are they up to this season when they are in Europe? Answers on a postcard.

[General]

@General - we had some very bad eggs that neither emery nor the cone boy could handle, and no doubt they had to be moved on, but I would argue that just like we didnt move saka or martinelli on, we also should have kept torreira and guendouzi. In my opinion both were young players who could have been moulded once they were seperated from the senior players who were a bad influence at the time - both had energy and a drive to win, and that was what we needed to build a new team around imo. I dont go by what the player done elsewhere after leaving AFC, but prefer to judge based on what strength the player has and what needs the team has, and I think both would have been mainstays for us, and miles ahead of xhaka, partey, merino, ceballos and jorginho imo

Also as IW8Goalmachine has pointed out, emery had faults and played a big part in bottling top 4 that first season, but he is light years ahead of the cone boy and his trophy record is exceptional when you consider the calibre of clubs he won them at, and without spending £800m too

So you think Guendouzi and Torreira would've won us the PL title or were you willing to sacrifice a season or 2 and wait for them to come good? Where would you have played them and where does that leave Odegaard and Rice, given we can only field 3 max in midfield. In other posts, you've also argued that we should've kept Smith Row another midfielder, so that's 5players you'll need to squeeze into 3 positions, unless you think we shouldn't have acquired Rice and Odegaard.
The problem with your argument is you have high expectations but yet you are lamenting the loss of players who are good to decent at best. It doesn't matter whether they are better than what we currently have, they were not good enough to make us competitive let alone win a major trophy, as Emery found out to his own peril.

[augie]

@General - we had some very bad eggs that neither emery nor the cone boy could handle, and no doubt they had to be moved on, but I would argue that just like we didnt move saka or martinelli on, we also should have kept torreira and guendouzi. In my opinion both were young players who could have been moulded once they were seperated from the senior players who were a bad influence at the time - both had energy and a drive to win, and that was what we needed to build a new team around imo. I dont go by what the player done elsewhere after leaving AFC, but prefer to judge based on what strength the player has and what needs the team has, and I think both would have been mainstays for us, and miles ahead of xhaka, partey, merino, ceballos and jorginho imo

Also as IW8Goalmachine has pointed out, emery had faults and played a big part in bottling top 4 that first season, but he is light years ahead of the cone boy and his trophy record is exceptional when you consider the calibre of clubs he won them at, and without spending £800m too

So you think Guendouzi and Torreira would've won us the PL title or were you willing to sacrifice a season or 2 and wait for them to come good? Where would you have played them and where does that leave Odegaard and Rice, given we can only field 3 max in midfield. In other posts, you've also argued that we should've kept Smith Row another midfielder, so that's 5players you'll need to squeeze into 3 positions, unless you think we shouldn't have acquired Rice and Odegaard.
The problem with your argument is you have high expectations but yet you are lamenting the loss of players who are good to decent at best. It doesn't matter whether they are better than what we currently have, they were not good enough to make us competitive let alone win a major trophy, as Emery found out to his own peril.

I have a few responses to your post and after that I will be ducking out of this debate cos it is dragging out too long now -

1. I dont know if we would have won the league with torreira and guendouzi as starters, but I am saying again that we will never win it with partey, merino and jorginho either, and imo torreira and guendouzi are upgrades on the current 3

2. I was crystal clear at the time and remain so to this day, but I would never have spent anywhere close to £100m for rice cos he simply is not worth that type of money - I get the whole argument that there is a premium cost when it comes to buying english players, but the harsh reality is that if rice did not do an international u turn and he was just being judged on his talents/abilities then we would be talking about a £60m at most. The over-valuation isnt on him, and I'm not having a pop at him here either cos he doesnt set the price, but we got our pants pulled down on that deal and he will never be the player to drives us to win a title imo

3. Your question "where does that leave odeargod" gives me an opening for a very simple answer .......... out the door if I had my way. It isnt that he isnt good enough (but he isnt), but its the fact that his slow release of the ball is killing our wingers, and the cone boy loves him so he plays all the team so the hurt he is causing is constant. Again I am nothing if not consistant cos I made those same arguments against hleb when he was here so this is nothing personal against the invisible captain, and nor is it just because I am a smith-rowe fan. When a manager starts to rebuild a team then there are certain positions that will always be a priority, but the position that supercedes all others is that of captain - you will never see a successful team led by a captain as flaky as ours, and I dont see the captaincy being taken off him either, so the best solution all around would be to move him on

I really am staggered that you or anyone would make a statement saying that "it doesnt matter whether the players we sold are better than we currently have" - surely the main aim when buying and selling players is to improve your team and squad, and how will that happen if you are bringing in worse players than the one's you just got rid of ? I would absolutely have been willing to wait for 2 or 3 seasons to allow young players to develop to the required level, and that is something I have continually said with our young players - we do not have the wealth of the chavs or citeeh so cannot buy a ready made team, therefore when we spend money we need to do our homework properly and spend wisely, plus we need to be patient with the young players as they learn their trade. Under the cone boy we have been anything but diligent with our spending, and he has consistantly shown a hesitation to playing the young players until injuries forced his hand

[DB10GOONER]

@General - we had some very bad eggs that neither emery nor the cone boy could handle, and no doubt they had to be moved on, but I would argue that just like we didnt move saka or martinelli on, we also should have kept torreira and guendouzi. In my opinion both were young players who could have been moulded once they were seperated from the senior players who were a bad influence at the time - both had energy and a drive to win, and that was what we needed to build a new team around imo. I dont go by what the player done elsewhere after leaving AFC, but prefer to judge based on what strength the player has and what needs the team has, and I think both would have been mainstays for us, and miles ahead of xhaka, partey, merino, ceballos and jorginho imo

Also as IW8Goalmachine has pointed out, emery had faults and played a big part in bottling top 4 that first season, but he is light years ahead of the cone boy and his trophy record is exceptional when you consider the calibre of clubs he won them at, and without spending £800m too

So you think Guendouzi and Torreira would've won us the PL title or were you willing to sacrifice a season or 2 and wait for them to come good? Where would you have played them and where does that leave Odegaard and Rice, given we can only field 3 max in midfield. In other posts, you've also argued that we should've kept Smith Row another midfielder, so that's 5players you'll need to squeeze into 3 positions, unless you think we shouldn't have acquired Rice and Odegaard.
The problem with your argument is you have high expectations but yet you are lamenting the loss of players who are good to decent at best. It doesn't matter whether they are better than what we currently have, they were not good enough to make us competitive let alone win a major trophy, as Emery found out to his own peril.

I have a few responses to your post and after that I will be ducking out of this debate cos it is dragging out too long now -

1. I dont know if we would have won the league with torreira and guendouzi as starters, but I am saying again that we will never win it with partey, merino and jorginho either, and imo torreira and guendouzi are upgrades on the current 3

2. I was crystal clear at the time and remain so to this day, but I would never have spent anywhere close to £100m for rice cos he simply is not worth that type of money - I get the whole argument that there is a premium cost when it comes to buying english players, but the harsh reality is that if rice did not do an international u turn and he was just being judged on his talents/abilities then we would be talking about a £60m at most. The over-valuation isnt on him, and I'm not having a pop at him here either cos he doesnt set the price, but we got our pants pulled down on that deal and he will never be the player to drives us to win a title imo

3. Your question "where does that leave odeargod" gives me an opening for a very simple answer .......... out the door if I had my way. It isnt that he isnt good enough (but he isnt), but its the fact that his slow release of the ball is killing our wingers, and the cone boy loves him so he plays all the team so the hurt he is causing is constant. Again I am nothing if not consistant cos I made those same arguments against hleb when he was here so this is nothing personal against the invisible captain, and nor is it just because I am a smith-rowe fan. When a manager starts to rebuild a team then there are certain positions that will always be a priority, but the position that supercedes all others is that of captain - you will never see a successful team led by a captain as flaky as ours, and I dont see the captaincy being taken off him either, so the best solution all around would be to move him on

I really am staggered that you or anyone would make a statement saying that "it doesnt matter whether the players we sold are better than we currently have" - surely the main aim when buying and selling players is to improve your team and squad, and how will that happen if you are bringing in worse players than the one's you just got rid of ? I would absolutely have been willing to wait for 2 or 3 seasons to allow young players to develop to the required level, and that is something I have continually said with our young players - we do not have the wealth of the chavs or citeeh so cannot buy a ready made team, therefore when we spend money we need to do our homework properly and spend wisely, plus we need to be patient with the young players as they learn their trade. Under the cone boy we have been anything but diligent with our spending, and he has consistantly shown a hesitation to playing the young players until injuries forced his hand

Great Post. Absolutely slapped down a fucking stupid argument too - "It doesn't matter whether they are better than what we currently have".

Jesus Christ of course it matters. If we don't have the billions to spend every year like cheateh then we should look to improve each position in increments, not worsen the fucking positions in increments.

Some people will post the most absurd arguments because someone has criticised (or in their world "insulted") their Lord and messiah the Spanish David Brent lol.

[OneBardGooner]

And that as they say is a Wrap.

[Limerick Gooner]

I think we need Wenger back to mentor Arteta.

[General]

It's a bit of a copout to say you would've kept a player but don't know if we could've won the league with them starting. I'm not getting bogged down in a subjective merry go round debate about whether discarded player A is better than incumbent player B. If neither player is good enough for the level we need i.e. win titles, then it's a pointless debate imo. At this rate, I'm sure you'd have Lord Bendtner over Merino, but is he going to win you the PL or CL? Fact of the matter is Torreira and Guendouzi were simply not good enough. Torreira in particular was shocking in the Europa Cup final and he never recovered after this.
Martinez is the only player you could argue could've got us over the line in the last 2 seasons and Arteta should've made every effort to keep him.

And are we supposed to believe that the malcontents who stir the pot at every opportunity would happily wait 2-3 seasons for young players to develop to the required level
One of the most heavily criticised players on this forum is Martinelli who joined us at 18 and is still only 23. I've also seen you criticise Saka Augie who is also still only 23 carrying the expectations of the club on his shoulders. What do you say to this

[Limerick Gooner]

It's a bit of a copout to say you would've kept a player but don't know if we could've won the league with them starting. I'm not getting bogged down in a subjective merry go round debate about whether discarded player A is better than incumbent player B. If neither player is good enough for the level we need i.e. win titles, then it's a pointless debate imo. At this rate, I'm sure you'd have Lord Bendtner over Merino, but is he going to win you the PL or CL? Fact of the matter is Torreira and Guendouzi were simply not good enough. Torreira in particular was shocking in the Europa Cup final and he never recovered after this.
Martinez is the only player you could argue could've got us over the line in the last 2 seasons and Arteta should've made every effort to keep him.

And are we supposed to believe that the malcontents who stir the pot at every opportunity would happily wait 2-3 seasons for young players to develop to the required level
One of the most heavily criticised players on this forum is Martinelli who joined us at 18 and is still only 23. I've also seen you criticise Saka Augie who is also still only 23 carrying the expectations of the club on his shoulders. What do you say to this

[augie]

It's a bit of a copout to say you would've kept a player but don't know if we could've won the league with them starting. I'm not getting bogged down in a subjective merry go round debate about whether discarded player A is better than incumbent player B. If neither player is good enough for the level we need i.e. win titles, then it's a pointless debate imo. At this rate, I'm sure you'd have Lord Bendtner over Merino, but is he going to win you the PL or CL? Fact of the matter is Torreira and Guendouzi were simply not good enough. Torreira in particular was shocking in the Europa Cup final and he never recovered after this.
Martinez is the only player you could argue could've got us over the line in the last 2 seasons and Arteta should've made every effort to keep him.

And are we supposed to believe that the malcontents who stir the pot at every opportunity would happily wait 2-3 seasons for young players to develop to the required level
One of the most heavily criticised players on this forum is Martinelli who joined us at 18 and is still only 23. I've also seen you criticise Saka Augie who is also still only 23 carrying the expectations of the club on his shoulders. What do you say to this

Send rodders a private message and he'll set you straight on martinelli - I have defended martinelli on here FAR MORE than anyone else has, to the point that rodders was getting narked at me for blindly defending him. Saka I admit I have criticised at times - undoubted ability and no longer a rookie learning his trade, so even though he is only 23 he is measured by a different yardstick imo, even though there have been times when I was overly critical

[Limerick Gooner]

Nothing is ever black and white.

Emery is a good manager but was out of his depth at Arsenal.

Arteta is inexperienced as a manager but has improved us immeasurably. He has latterly over emphasised the defence as it is what cost us in 2023/23 when Saliba got injured and we had to bring Holding in. However he was neglected the forward line.

I am sceptical that we will go out and sign a striker and a winger good enough to win a title but in the absence of any serious failure I think he is here to stay. The Kroenke’s muddy the waters as I think they are ultimately just spending the club’s own money. Not convinced they are really doing anything to help us sign proper players.

Finally, City were a juggernaut we did well to compete with. Liverpool have had a fairytale season and they have the Premier League’s only world class player in Salah. Basically a modern day Henry. Even if we were fully fit and with a proper striker I think it would be tight.