Southampton Away

[LDB]

Great fighting spirit lads

[BournemouthRED]

It's arsenal fault for doing another shitty away screening

[goonersid]

Have to be honest and say I think that's it, lads. We will just drift off the top now and by March we'll be back scrapping for 3rd or 4th - which is a very slight improvement on scrapping for 4th or 5th...

Chesney made some decent saves, Giroud finished well.

But we pissed away a lead we probably weren't entitled to and that is the real difference between champions and also rans. Champions take advantage of a bit of good fortune or luck.

I have been saying for months that Flamoney will get sent off and cost us big by lunging into a stupid reckless pointless challenge. But I also don't think last night's act of stupidity was the big one. I just have this awful feeling he'll do it in a cup final or when the 3 points are absolutely vital. This is a guy that knocked himself out diving into a head to head challenge out near the halfway line - hey, I'm all for commitment and guts but I'm also in favour of basic intelligence and cop-on! I agree he has done well in games but he is a constant risk.

It's been a nice run but ultimately this squad is not good enough to win the PL and Arsene is not a good enough manager to win it either.

Thing is we probably have been doing just that(winning without playing well) away from home in a lot of games this season, but you can't expect to keep getting away with it, at some point you have to start winning comfortably, otherwise you are going to get found out and that's where I feel we are now.

[kiwomya]

Have to be honest and say I think that's it, lads. We will just drift off the top now and by March we'll be back scrapping for 3rd or 4th - which is a very slight improvement on scrapping for 4th or 5th...

Chesney made some decent saves, Giroud finished well.

But we pissed away a lead we probably weren't entitled to and that is the real difference between champions and also rans. Champions take advantage of a bit of good fortune or luck.

I have been saying for months that Flamoney will get sent off and cost us big by lunging into a stupid reckless pointless challenge. But I also don't think last night's act of stupidity was the big one. I just have this awful feeling he'll do it in a cup final or when the 3 points are absolutely vital. This is a guy that knocked himself out diving into a head to head challenge out near the halfway line - hey, I'm all for commitment and guts but I'm also in favour of basic intelligence and cop-on! I agree he has done well in games but he is a constant risk.

It's been a nice run but ultimately this squad is not good enough to win the PL and Arsene is not a good enough manager to win it either.

Thing is we probably have been doing just that(winning without playing well) away from home in a lot of games this season, but you can't expect to keep getting away with it, at some point you have to start winning comfortably, otherwise you are going to get found out and that's where I feel we are now.

I don't think there's a team in football that haven't "been found out" - it's not a big secret and you change how you play every game to avoid it. It's how you perform against those sides that matters. Southampton turned up and kept at their game. It's no conincidence that they've got results against City, United and Liverpool.

[Dan_85]

Have to be honest and say I think that's it, lads. We will just drift off the top now and by March we'll be back scrapping for 3rd or 4th - which is a very slight improvement on scrapping for 4th or 5th...

Chesney made some decent saves, Giroud finished well.

But we pissed away a lead we probably weren't entitled to and that is the real difference between champions and also rans. Champions take advantage of a bit of good fortune or luck.

I have been saying for months that Flamoney will get sent off and cost us big by lunging into a stupid reckless pointless challenge. But I also don't think last night's act of stupidity was the big one. I just have this awful feeling he'll do it in a cup final or when the 3 points are absolutely vital. This is a guy that knocked himself out diving into a head to head challenge out near the halfway line - hey, I'm all for commitment and guts but I'm also in favour of basic intelligence and cop-on! I agree he has done well in games but he is a constant risk.

It's been a nice run but ultimately this squad is not good enough to win the PL and Arsene is not a good enough manager to win it either.

Thing is we probably have been doing just that(winning without playing well) away from home in a lot of games this season, but you can't expect to keep getting away with it, at some point you have to start winning comfortably, otherwise you are going to get found out and that's where I feel we are now.

I don't think there's a team in football that haven't "been found out" - it's not a big secret and you change how you play every game to avoid it. It's how you perform against those sides that matters. Southampton turned up and kept at their game. It's no conincidence that they've got results against City, United and Liverpool.

[arseofacrow]

Lucky to be 1-0 at half time and then criminal to have them on the ropes and then throw away a goal.

Tactically wrong, no surprises. A few players were poor but Monreal just looks like a rabbit in the headlights to me, just not up to it. You're not going to have two quality players in every position but your back-ups at least have to be solid and confident.

Flamini was just an utter cock. Utter utter utter utter cock. If he'd got sent off for a stupid second yellow or a misjudged professional foul that'd be one thing but he's been threatening to let us down like this all season. It was a dreadful tackle, glad he didn't really catch the bloke.

2 points dropped without doubt but given our first half performance, the way we threw away 2 goals and the way in which that clown let us down we could easily have lost on another day.

And you're shocked ? He has always had that "not enough brains to fill an m & m" mentality and a few of us predicted this earlier in the season

I'm not shocked - as I said he's been threatening to do it all season and he took all of about 10 minutes in his return in an Arsenal shirt to put in a two-footed lunge against Spurs. It's been on the cards all season so I'm not surprised it's happened, although I am a bit surprised at the circumstances - more of a 5 minutes in vs United than an 80 mins in vs Southampton tackle.

I don't remember him being so reckless in the tackle before he left?

He hasn't really been threatening to do it all season mate. What he's actually done is contributed signififcantly to us winning points this season. Probably a tad more than some others.

If we're really looking for fault last night, it lies elsewhere in midfield.

[Theoperator]

To be fair it was great to see Ozil in the second half, some totally quality -noticable passes as well as runs.

He remains an enigma, but I do seem to remember DB10 being a bit like that fairly often

[Dan_85]

To be fair it was great to see Ozil in the second half, some totally quality -noticable passes as well as runs.

He remains an enigma, but I do seem to remember DB10 being a bit like that fairly often

Had one of his best games in a while last night, second half especially. One of the few who actually seemed interested in driving things forward...

[northbank123]

Lucky to be 1-0 at half time and then criminal to have them on the ropes and then throw away a goal.

Tactically wrong, no surprises. A few players were poor but Monreal just looks like a rabbit in the headlights to me, just not up to it. You're not going to have two quality players in every position but your back-ups at least have to be solid and confident.

Flamini was just an utter cock. Utter utter utter utter cock. If he'd got sent off for a stupid second yellow or a misjudged professional foul that'd be one thing but he's been threatening to let us down like this all season. It was a dreadful tackle, glad he didn't really catch the bloke.

2 points dropped without doubt but given our first half performance, the way we threw away 2 goals and the way in which that clown let us down we could easily have lost on another day.

And you're shocked ? He has always had that "not enough brains to fill an m & m" mentality and a few of us predicted this earlier in the season

I'm not shocked - as I said he's been threatening to do it all season and he took all of about 10 minutes in his return in an Arsenal shirt to put in a two-footed lunge against Spurs. It's been on the cards all season so I'm not surprised it's happened, although I am a bit surprised at the circumstances - more of a 5 minutes in vs United than an 80 mins in vs Southampton tackle.

I don't remember him being so reckless in the tackle before he left?

He hasn't really been threatening to do it all season mate. What he's actually done is contributed signififcantly to us winning points this season. Probably a tad more than some others.

If we're really looking for fault last night, it lies elsewhere in midfield.

I'm not saying he hasn't helped win us points this season - although I think some of his admirers exaggerate his importance he has done a lot better than I thought and really helped pull us through a couple of games.

But this lunge was hardly out of character and as I said a lot of us has been saying all season that he was going to do this and I wouldn't be surprised if his discipline seriously let's him down between now and the end of the season.

[augie]

Flamoney's importance has been greatly exaggerated and to me we look a better and more fluid team with arteta in the team as opposed to flamoney or flamoney and arteta

[goonersid]

Flamoney's importance has been greatly exaggerated and to me we look a better and more fluid team with arteta in the team as opposed to flamoney or flamoney and arteta

I couldn't give a fuck how important or how well he does or doesn't play. He should never have been allowed back through the door. He pissed off for the money to bench warm at Milan. which he is perfectly entitled, but ffs the club should have had the self respect to tell him to fuck off!! when he was clubless and needed somewhere to train, never mind re-sign the
I honestly wouldn't be surprised to see Wenger accomodate cashley and van judas bastard should they retire to the MLS and need somewhere to stay fit during the winter months.

[QuartzGooner]

Sid

I disagree about Flamini coming back, because he (as you do point out) left for the money, and so do most players, and he never badmouthed the club after he left.

But how does Flamini differ from Henry returning?

He also left to a fat contract, he was only a year into a contract extension with us, and he had a fat £5M front loaded re-signing fee too in the summer of 2006.
Did he repay that when he left, was he contractually obliged to repay it or not?
No blame to him if he was not obliged, as the club gave it to him!

Henry of course was a better player, but I still maintain that whilst he is a nice guy, with a genuine passion for Arsenal and football itself, and I think was probably the best to ever play for us, a model athlete and clean living in the sense he avoided booze and the nightclubs etc, he is also a very canny self-publicist.

[goonersid]

Sid

I disagree about Flamini coming back, because he (as you do point out) left for the money, and so do most players, and he never badmouthed the club after he left.

But how does Flamini differ from Henry returning?

He also left to a fat contract, he was only a year into a contract extension with us, and he had a fat £5M front loaded re-signing fee too in the summer of 2006.
Did he repay that when he left, was he contractually obliged to repay it or not?
No blame to him if he was not obliged, as the club gave it to him!

Henry of course was a better player, but I still maintain that whilst he is a nice guy, with a genuine passion for Arsenal and football itself, and I think was probably the best to ever play for us, a model athlete and clean living in the sense he avoided booze and the nightclubs etc, he is also a very canny self-publicist.

First of all Henry gave us the best years of his career, his move was not cash orientated and he did not come back to train with Arsenal because he had nowhere else to go, ie he was in gainful employment.
Flamoney' gave us one decent season at most, then when his career seemed on the up and an international career looking likely he became a greedy little shit, who was quite happy to sacrifice (perhaps unwittingly) his international prospects, to sit on the bench and earn more money at Milan. The sole reason he came back was because he was out of work ie unemployed.
That's why I feel the two are very different.

[afcforever]

It's been a nice run but ultimately this squad is not good enough to win the PL and Arsene is not a good enough manager to win it either.

This

Arsenes already won it a few times
I don't think well win it, because the squads City and Chels have, we simply can't compete money wise with them.

[SteveO 35]

According to john cross flamini will be banned for 4 games,did he get a red card earlier in the season.

Isn't this the wonderful and responsible midfielder we've heard so much about. Well, thanks to him we lost the opportunity to go for the win at the end of a tight game and now he'll miss some key matches against the likes of the Mickeys and the Mancs

I'm just hopeful that old has been Arteta can live up to the expectations of cutting his sleeves off at the elbows and charging around shouting at everyone playing 'mock hardman'