The Big F**king German

[Rosie_titters]

full backs are the issue at the mo, Sagna and Gibbs have both been woeful lately, and don't really bust a gut to get back when we lose possession.

Gibbs awareness around him is shocking

[SteveO 35]

full backs are the issue at the mo, Sagna and Gibbs have both been woeful lately, and don't really bust a gut to get back when we lose possession.

Gibbs awareness around him is shocking

Christ alive - Gibbs has been one of our best players recently. The fella works like a fucking trojan and gets bugger all help. He made a shitey challenge to gift City a goal but that apart he has been really good. His crossing has been excellent for the most part too and he can't help the fact that Montpellier's answer to Carl Leaburn is playing at centre forward with his octagonal head.

Sagna has been shit, that much is true.

I'm not sure how you can say the centre backs aren't the issue. Mertesacker has been absolutely fucking awful - watch Michu's goal at the Liberty again and Koscielny cost us the fucking game against City before it had even got going.

[augie]

full backs are the issue at the mo, Sagna and Gibbs have both been woeful lately, and don't really bust a gut to get back when we lose possession.

Gibbs awareness around him is shocking

Christ alive - Gibbs has been one of our best players recently. The fella works like a fucking trojan and gets bugger all help. He made a shitey challenge to gift City a goal but that apart he has been really good. His crossing has been excellent for the most part too and he can't help the fact that Montpellier's answer to Carl Leaburn is playing at centre forward with his octagonal head.

Sagna has been shit, that much is true.

I'm not sure how you can say the centre backs aren't the issue. Mertesacker has been absolutely fucking awful - watch Michu's goal at the Liberty again and Koscielny cost us the fucking game against City before it had even got going.

Tbf Steve o, Ramsey and Klingon run around and work like Trojans and you have never used that as a defence from criticism. I know it may seemed otherwise but most of the chavs attacks in the first half yesterday were down our left and that wasn't by accident - rafa is a lot of things but tactically stupid isn't one of them and he knew that defensively Gibbs is weak.

I don't want to turn this into a slate the full backs gig though cos everybody knows that playing full back in a team set up as we are must be one of the most thankless jobs in football

[donaldo]

full backs are the issue at the mo, Sagna and Gibbs have both been woeful lately, and don't really bust a gut to get back when we lose possession.

Gibbs awareness around him is shocking

Christ alive - Gibbs has been one of our best players recently. The fella works like a fucking trojan and gets bugger all help. He made a shitey challenge to gift City a goal but that apart he has been really good. His crossing has been excellent for the most part too and he can't help the fact that Montpellier's answer to Carl Leaburn is playing at centre forward with his octagonal head.

Sagna has been shit, that much is true.

I'm not sure how you can say the centre backs aren't the issue. Mertesacker has been absolutely fucking awful - watch Michu's goal at the Liberty again and Koscielny cost us the fucking game against City before it had even got going.

Whenever fans talk about Gibbs they say he's good going forward .He's a fucking defender his job is to defend.As has been said his awareness as to what is going on around him is awful.Its no coincidence that other manager target him as our weak link
The truth is none of are defenders has played well this season.

[littlefire]

Big nasty Merty in Enforcer scandal.

[LeftfootlegendGooner]

Mert is shit, sagna has turned shit, tv is nearly shit, kos is proper shit, gibbs has potential but could, given time, end up shit

[spendsum4uckingmoney]

I think the midfield is largely to blame. We dont keep the ball at all which is shocking considering that was our idea of a trophy.

[TeeCee]

Vermaelen has been utter shit for two years now! He has a very occasional decent game but he has regressed so far I wouldn't care if he was sold tomorrow. The big problem is now Sagna doesn't give a feck we don't have one single consistent defender. The whole back 5 needs an overhaul, new personnel and new training. Can't see either of those things happening though!!

[begeegs]

I think that he is a decent defender, but not physical enough with his 6'6" frame for me. Samba would have been the better buy for us because he had some pace about him.

I'd agree that our system doesn't suit him much like Giroud also doesn't fit our system.

We play a high line to occasionally press the play up the pitch (when we are up to it), but to buy a slow player who isn't great in the air is mass stupidity.

It is similar to buying a slow striker who is good in the air, but not providing him with crosses and playing in a system which needs a pacier, mobile striker.

[SteveO 35]

I don't want to turn this into a slate the full backs gig though cos everybody knows that playing full back in a team set up as we are must be one of the most thankless jobs in football

That's the truth of the matter. I guarantee that if Cole or Baines were playing left back for us they would be getting exposed to two players pushing on down the flank and people would be saying how shit they were defensively. Its been levelled at every Arsenal full back since Lord Wenger adopted this pathetic system.

Clichy would often get slated on here for being a shit defender, a criticism that mysteriously seems to have fallen away since he joined City. Nothing to do with being set up properly defensively of course.

[northbank123]

I don't want to turn this into a slate the full backs gig though cos everybody knows that playing full back in a team set up as we are must be one of the most thankless jobs in football

That's the truth of the matter. I guarantee that if Cole or Baines were playing left back for us they would be getting exposed to two players pushing on down the flank and people would be saying how shit they were defensively. Its been levelled at every Arsenal full back since Lord Wenger adopted this pathetic system.

Clichy would often get slated on here for being a shit defender, a criticism that mysteriously seems to have fallen away since he joined City. Nothing to do with being set up properly defensively of course.

Agree with you generally but whenever I've watched City Clichy has still been turd by and large.

[LDB]

How long is it going to be before gooners finally give up on slating our defenders and clamouring for us to sign whatever flavour-of-the-season defender?

Even at our pomp under Wenger we weren't impossible to score against but we maintained some of the defensive standards of the Graham era with a team packed with winners. Since the invincibles we've seen numerous combinations of back 5 and not a single one has been good enough.

Good defending is a culture that runs through the club and we just dont have it and wont have it again under Wenger. You can sign as many 80 cap German internationals as you like but Wenger will make them look clowns. There is no pressing ahead of them and no determination throughout the team not to concede goals. Oh well, we'll just have to score 2 more seems to be the attitude of the club and thats not what championship winnings team are built on I'm afraid.

Mertesacker is the paper over the massive crack that is our defending.

[SteveO 35]

Kos is not first choice centre back and is a back up only

For the record I agree that he isn't as dominant in the air as I thought and hoped he would be but he has been our best defender this season and that is an absolute certainty. His reading of the game is way better than the other centre backs as he reads danger whilst the other fools are running around like headless chickens

Tbh right now I would like to play sagna at centre back for a few games - he is good in the air and very good in the tackle plus he is having a'mare at right full so I would play jenkinson there

It might be a certainty in your head but I'm equally certain that he isn't. Had to laugh at Steven Howard's description:

"Germany has produced so many outstanding defenders that it's scarcely believable Arsenal have got hold of one of the few with the positional sense of someone playing in a blindfold and the pace and turning ability of a supertanker on the Panama Canal"

Couldn't have put it better myself. Far far worse than anything Vermaelen's dished up AGAIN. At fault for both goals.

The bloke is absolutely sodding useless - another of Wenger's duds

And please can we try a bit harder than blaming zonal marking or the system. The bloke has no pace, can't jump and at set plays is about as much use as a handbrake on a canoe......woeful

[mcdowell42]

For their 2nd goal yesterday he tried to head the ball when it was easier to kick it it was only Bout 2feet off the ground

[SteveO 35]

For their 2nd goal yesterday he tried to head the ball when it was easier to kick it it was only Bout 2feet off the ground

I suppose he thought it was the only time he might connect with a header because it certainly won't be any time when the ball is more than six feet off the ground