The non-jumping German - hit or miss

[Number 5]

Why are you talking about the players who today played front left and front right of our top 3 when I am talking about organizing our defence?

Because you put the the problems of our defence down to two things, tactics and training, and i showed you that these do not necessarily make as big a difference as you seem to think, hence the walcott and ox example.

There's only so much that tactics and training can do for a player and then it's down to the individual's talent. The same applies to our defensive players. You can try and train djorou into becoming a better defender every day of the week but he still wouldn't have the natural positional awareness of Vermaelen or his determination in winning headers, or Koscielny's technical ability in successfully carrying out tackles.

And I showed you that they do, with the whole best back four English football has ever seen bit.

You got that right?

Walcott doesn't work as an example. You are not correct when comparing the potential of a player to become a great if he is a defender or an attacker.

I'm currently training 10 year olds and I see first hand each week that the defensive players are improving in matches in how well they defend. They are not improving in their attacking play even though every boy takes part in exactly the same training sessions each week. Natural ability to control the ball and use skills to have success up the field aren't the same as defence. Those guys need good hand/eye ball/eye co-ordination. The rest can be worked on.

Our defence is an extreme example as it is a complete fucking joke. Djourou will never be a good defender at Arsenal. I guarantee he would have been solid but probably not excellent had he come through at say Everton.

[MM99]

Why are you talking about the players who today played front left and front right of our top 3 when I am talking about organizing our defence?

Because you put the the problems of our defence down to two things, tactics and training, and i showed you that these do not necessarily make as big a difference as you seem to think, hence the walcott and ox example.

There's only so much that tactics and training can do for a player and then it's down to the individual's talent. The same applies to our defensive players. You can try and train djorou into becoming a better defender every day of the week but he still wouldn't have the natural positional awareness of Vermaelen or his determination in winning headers, or Koscielny's technical ability in successfully carrying out tackles.

And I showed you that they do, with the whole best back four English football has ever seen bit.

You got that right?

Walcott doesn't work as an example. You are not correct when comparing the potential of a player to become a great if he is a defender or an attacker.

I'm currently training 10 year olds and I see first hand each week that the defensive players are improving in matches in how well they defend. They are not improving in their attacking play even though every boy takes part in exactly the same training sessions each week. Natural ability to control the ball and use skills to have success up the field aren't the same as defence. Those guys need good hand/eye ball/eye co-ordination. The rest can be worked on.

Our defence is an extreme example as it is a complete fucking joke. Djourou will never be a good defender at Arsenal. I guarantee he would have been solid but probably not excellent had he come through at say Everton.

Good job on your work with the ten year olds but we're talking about professional players who are over the age of twenty with vast numbers of competative matches under their belts.

You say that the tactics and training at Arsenal are laregely responsible for the bad defending and yet the same management and backroom staff have been responsible for the defence that was in the Invincibles, break defensive records during the 2006 CL run, the rise of great defenders such as Cole, and even current defenders such as Sagna who is arguably the best right back in the league.
So what's changed all of a sudden? Are you telling me that Wenger and his coaches have changed the training that led to all of the above? That somehow they have reverted to inferior tactics and training that enabled one defence to go a season unbeaten to one that shipped in 8 at Old Trafford? Or is it actually a case of less talented defenders in the current squad? It is no coincidence that we went on a run of winning 9 out of 10 games(or whatever the figure was) when we had an established team that was relatively injury free and have suddenly gone back to losing matches when the squad has been reshuffled.

To have a gripe with the quality of players available for selection would be a valid criticism of the management, but to suggest that the tactics and training of the defender's is mainly responsible for the poor defending is far fetched. Give Wenger the ability to pick any 4 defenders in the world and I have no doubt that they'd do a much better job than the likes of djorou, squilachi etc... would do even if they were exposed to the best training regiment known to football management.

[QuartzGooner]

Will decide next season, can take foreign players a while to adjust to Premiership.

[Number 5]

Gonna have to take this bit by bit as there is a lot of questions.

Good job on your work with the ten year olds but we're talking about professional players who are over the age of twenty with vast numbers of competative matches under their belts.

All players I would imagine who showed decent enough potential to be scouted and recruited into professional teams. So they must have been doing something right at some point in their early football life. Shits going wrong now though, why?

You say that the tactics and training at Arsenal are laregely responsible for the bad defending and yet the same management and backroom staff have been responsible for the defence that was in the Invincibles, break defensive records during the 2006 CL run, the rise of great defenders such as Cole, and even current defenders such as Sagna who is arguably the best right back in the league.

I'll just take the 2006 CL run. We had a defensive coach at that time. His name was Martin Keown and he worked with the defence to have them better organised. This is what I want now. Clearly it works, no?

We have good individual defenders, Cole previously, Sagna now, Vermaelen now, Gallas before, Toure before. They cannot defend as a unit I believe because in training they do not work together as a unit. The training is focused on other things

So what's changed all of a sudden? Are you telling me that Wenger and his coaches have changed the training that led to all of the above? That somehow they have reverted to inferior tactics and training that enabled one defence to go a season unbeaten to one that shipped in 8 at Old Trafford?

Who is saying all of a sudden or has our defending been getting more and more comical over the last 3-4 seasons.

43 against last year
42 the year before
37 before that
33 already this

And yes the training has hasn't it? Keown was not retained. The last impressions of the Invincibles, with Campbell, Keown and Toure is well removed. Now it is officially all Wengers defence and it fucking blows.

Or is it actually a case of less talented defenders in the current squad? It is no coincidence that we went on a run of winning 9 out of 10 games(or whatever the figure was) when we had an established team that was relatively injury free and have suddenly gone back to losing matches when the squad has been reshuffled.

Kinda true. It's also more the less talented other players that exacerbate the problem in defence. But also this season isn't a one off is it. It is a trend over the last few years. We have been defensively shit.

To have a gripe with the quality of players available for selection would be a valid criticism of the management, but to suggest that the tactics and training of the defender's is mainly responsible for the poor defending is far fetched. Give Wenger the ability to pick any 4 defenders in the world and I have no doubt that they'd do a much better job than the likes of djorou, squilachi etc... would do even if they were exposed to the best training regiment known to football management.

No it's not. Only 2 or 3 years ago Birmingham yes Birmingham City were the proud owners of one of the meanest defences in the league. They either led in clean sheets or goals conceeded. They probably put that back four together for less than we spent on Mertersacker.

What I would say about Wenger picking the best 4 defenders in the world is that after 6 months of playing with him and training with him they would be collectively worse as a unit.

Djourou, Squilachi and whoever else with a regimented defensive coach would be exponentially better than they are now. Probably not as good as Wengers four but where is the success in that scenario?

Four great players who got a little worse or four average players who got lots better?

[Barriecuda]

Look at the build and playing styles of the defenders at Arsenal. They're not meant to be mean spirited, clean sheet warriors. They're meant to be defensively stable, offensively gifted, two-way players. The problem with that is it's extremely hard to find players like that - especially at the prices Arsenal are willing to pay.

If you want Puyol's and Abidals etc, you have to pay $$$. We don't.

Vermaelen is a great buy, so is Koscielny. They're pretty good at the two-way game, but we're still always going to be vulnerable at the back - that's just the system we play. The defensive coach can be exceptional, but our style of pouring forward will always leave us exposed. Put simply, no matter how good at defending the individual's qualities are, our playing style doesn't allow for it to shine.

As for Mertesacker? He gets far too much stick for his slower speed. He worked really hard today - you could clearly see he was tryign to make up for the Swansea game - and that I respect, because I'm sick of half our team who don't have that heart.

However, he doesn't have a mean streak (hence his low red-card record as a CB) and that isn't always a good thing in the EPL. You have to be vicious and hungry for headers, no matter how tall you are - he needs to realize that and get nastier. The old saying bodes well: "It's not the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog".

[SteveO 35]

Number 5, there are a lot of points you make about coaching a defensive unit that I agree with you on. When USMarty refused to accept anything other than 'the Board' as the reasons behind our demise I urged him to read Kenny Sansom's book which followed GG's early days in charge, culminating with the 1987 League Cup win.

If you haven't read it then in a nutshell, Sansom talks at length about how they spent hours and hours having 6 vs 4 drills (attackers v defenders), practising the defensive line etc, until it became automatic. The players would joke with GG and the coaches about "how about we work on the defence for a change today" and they did, day in and day out.

However, I would also argue that some players are better suited physically and technically to the PL than others. Nemanja Vidic and Vincent Kompany are examples of this. If they played at Arsenal would they be less effective than they are today? Almost certainly yes, but they have a natural level of ability and physical attributes that would still always make them better PL centre halves than Per Tree.

Dixon, Winterburn, Adams, Bould, Keown - all had tenacity, enough pace to cope with the league they played in, were amongst the best tacklers I've ever seen and fearless. They had the raw ingredients and were then coached and moulded into a sum of the parts that was even better.

I just don't see The Tree ever having enough about him to be coached into an effective PL centre half. He reminds me of a poor man's Willie Young

[goonersid]

Sorry Augie but it's a big fat NO from me

[MM99]

All players I would imagine who showed decent enough potential to be scouted and recruited into professional teams. So they must have been doing something right at some point in their early football life. Shits going wrong now though, why?

Why? Could be down to many reasons. Sometimes player's don't live up to their potential and talent (Bentley + Pennant), sometimes they get found out when they come up to first team football, they may not be suited for English football etc....

I'll just take the 2006 CL run. We had a defensive coach at that time. His name was Martin Keown and he worked with the defence to have them better organised. This is what I want now. Clearly it works, no?

Keown may have had a positive impact upon the team but i think you are exaggerating his role on the side. This is the same Keown that was recieving training from the same Wenger and the same coaches for several years. It's hard to imagine that suddenly he would have brought revolutionary ideas to the table that none of the other coaches had. I'm not downplaying the contributions of a seasoned defender such as Keown, but being realistic in that he would not have changed the training routing radically and more likely it was essentially the same ideas that Wenger and his coaches have had throughout the years.

We have good individual defenders, Cole previously, Sagna now, Vermaelen now, Gallas before, Toure before. They cannot defend as a unit I believe because in training they do not work together as a unit. The training is focused on other things

Quite an assumption and until we have solid facts we can't say for sure whether they work as a unit or not. They may be working on defensive duties day in day out but people like squilachi, djorou, clichy etc... will always be making the same mistakes as that's how they are as players and their technical + mental abilities are limited in comparison to other better defenders.

And yes the training has hasn't it? Keown was not retained. The last impressions of the Invincibles, with Campbell, Keown and Toure is well removed. Now it is officially all Wengers defence and it fucking blows.

For Keown i've explaied above. Furthermore, who is it that put the defence of Campbell, Keown, Toure etc... together? Wenger and his coaches. That defence was as much Wenger's as the current one. So even if those player's had left and removed their 'impressions', the ideas and training that they recieved were from the same management team as now.

Kinda true. It's also more the less talented other players that exacerbate the problem in defence. But also this season isn't a one off is it. It is a trend over the last few years. We have been defensively shit.

We have been defensively shit but the reason why I question the extent to which tactics and training is responsible is because I have seen games where the defence has looked fairly solid and comfortable only for one of the less talented defenders to make a stupid mistake (enter clichy, senderos, squilachi etc..) and cost us the game. And then there have been outstanding performances by the same defence in other games. Yes training contributes greatly to the performance of a defence, but training can only take a team so far and that's when the talent of the players is required to push you over the finish line.

[Arsenal Till I Die]

A 6''7 defender who's not got a clue when it comes to set pieces.

[_James_]

Koscileny has had better left backs to help, Mertesacker has to cover the whole right side of defence with little help. If Sagna was there to help he would look alot better.

[Rosie_titters]

Mertersacker is a quality CB, but needs stability around him and he hasn't had that yet - get a settled back four and he will shine, playing alongside Djourou, Miquel, and Squillidy diddily, even TA6 would look crap

although it will be interesting when we get a LB, because Kos and Vermaelen at the moment would be my preferred Centre backs

[augie]

Steve o in your opening post you admitted that kos was absolute muck last season but has since turned it around big time so why so quick to write off the bfg ?

As I have said numerous times lately, the big german is being asked to play in a shambles back 4 that has no full backs and also play behind a defensive midfielder who cant defend Put a quality DM like de jong in front of him and I have no doubt that you would see a big improvement in not just bert's performances but also the back 4 as a whole.

On the plus side I feel his reading of the game is excellent and he is the only organiser in our whole team - it cant have escaped anybodys attention that we seem to be playing the offside trap more lately than we have in a long time and it is bert who organises them. Unlike some who shall remain nameless ( ) I quite like the fact that when he gets the ball he just lays off a simple 10 yard pass to those more equipped to do something with it

On the negative side I have to say that I am absolutely baffled by his performance in the air - it isnt just that he is getting beaten in the air but also he doesnt seem to be committed to winning the challenges either Of course this could be an aspect that might improve when he gets used to the physicality of our league but I cant say that I am certain of that though.

One last question.......how many of you can remember the absolute slating of kos after the 8-2 debacle in old shatford earlier this season ? The guy was written off as a dud and nowhere near good enough to be in our squad but all that has changed now - is it possible that his form has picked up because he is playing alongside someone like bert who organises and talks him through the games ? I am not saying for certain that this is the reason but it seems to be a big coincidence that his form has improved so much since the german came into the team

I will hold off judging the guy until next season

[Number 5]

This is the same Keown that was recieving training from the same Wenger and the same coaches for several years.

I will just use this one line to show once and for all that I am right and you are wrong.

Adams is on record as saying that when Wenger came into the club he looked at the back four and came out with something along the lines of "Well, you guys know how to defend so we don't need to work on that"

As SteveO has pointed out (I'll have to look out for the book by the way) they were only that good because of the work they put in.

So what then did Wenger teach Keown if he felt that he already had it down?

I can only put our shambles now down to him not working on defence as much in training. It really really shows when they can't even pick up a man each at set pieces.

[augie]

This is the same Keown that was recieving training from the same Wenger and the same coaches for several years.

I will just use this one line to show once and for all that I am right and you are wrong.

Adams is on record as saying that when Wenger came into the club he looked at the back four and came out with something along the lines of "Well, you guys know how to defend so we don't need to work on that"

As SteveO has pointed out (I'll have to look out for the book by the way) they were only that good because of the work they put in.

So what then did Wenger teach Keown if he felt that he already had it down?

I can only put our shambles now down to him not working on defence as much in training. It really really shows when they can't even pick up a man each at set pieces.

Anybody see the piece about the divide between moaninho and his spanish players getting bigger ? Apparently at the next training old jose was having a go at ramos who was meant to be marking puyol for the barca corner's and asked him why he wasnt marking him to which ramos told him that he had swapped to mark pique cos barca were using puyol as a decoy to leave space free for pique. Moaninho then sneered at ramos asking him if he felt he was good enough to coach the team now to which ramos told him that in games changes sometimes need to be made on the pitch but jose wouldnt know that seeing as he was never good enough to be a pro footballer

Not strictly Arsenal related I know but your comment about set piece marking reminded me about the story plus of course wenger never played footie at any kind of high level either

[_James_]

Mertersacker is a quality CB, but needs stability around him and he hasn't had that yet - get a settled back four and he will shine, playing alongside Djourou, Miquel, and Squillidy diddily, even TA6 would look crap

although it will be interesting when we get a LB, because Kos and Vermaelen at the moment would be my preferred Centre backs

It would be nice to have too many players for a change, but if we get a LB back I think Kos will go to RB until Sagna is back.