As we're unlikely to see terraces again at football, this is the virtual equivalent where you can chat to your hearts content about all football matters and, obviously, Arsenal in particular. This forum encourages all Gooners to visit and contribute so please keep it respectful, clean and topical.
Bring Back Pires wrote:Here's a shot of the vile pigs that is currently scrolling on the BBC Football homepage:
I'm sure you don't need me to point out that Fabregas, four years ago (in 2007), was arguably our best player and had been in the first team for four years already.
Can anyone possibly be so blind??
Good post mate. But whilst these two are typical of the sheep that support our great club now, lets turn this round 180degrees.
*** These two hold up a home-made banner after a match, supporting Wenger and it is shown all over the World.
*** If anyone holds up a home-made banner before, during or after a match criticising Wenger - it will be shown all over the World.
We need to use the modern media as well because surely enough of us now want a major change at Arsenal - whether it's Wenger gone, Kroenke gone, Hill-Wood gone or even a change in transfer policy. Whingeing on here will let off steam but it won't change anything.
I'm off to make an "In Arsene We Rust" banner or maybe a cheeky little "Sack The Board (and Wenger)" banner.
Bring Back Pires wrote:Here's a shot of the vile pigs that is currently scrolling on the BBC Football homepage:
I'm sure you don't need me to point out that Fabregas, four years ago (in 2007), was arguably our best player and had been in the first team for four years already.
Can anyone possibly be so blind??
Good post mate. But whilst these two are typical of the sheep that support our great club now, lets turn this round 180degrees.
*** These two hold up a home-made banner after a match, supporting Wenger and it is shown all over the World.
*** If anyone holds up a home-made banner before, during or after a match criticising Wenger - it will be shown all over the World.
We need to use the modern media as well because surely enough of us now want a major change at Arsenal - whether it's Wenger gone, Kroenke gone, Hill-Wood gone or even a change in transfer policy. Whingeing on here will let off steam but it won't change anything.
I'm off to make an "In Arsene We Rust" banner or maybe a cheeky little "Sack The Board (and Wenger)" banner.
Cockerill's Chin's "we don't trust you anymore" idea would probably work. Especially if you could get it near to the In Arsene We Trust one. And if they tried to take it down & left the the other one up it would just highlight the attempt to silence the fans. The same fans gazidis said would determine Wenger's fate.
Bring Back Pires wrote:Here's a shot of the vile pigs that is currently scrolling on the BBC Football homepage:
I'm sure you don't need me to point out that Fabregas, four years ago (in 2007), was arguably our best player and had been in the first team for four years already.
Can anyone possibly be so blind??
Good post mate. But whilst these two are typical of the sheep that support our great club now, lets turn this round 180degrees.
*** These two hold up a home-made banner after a match, supporting Wenger and it is shown all over the World.
*** If anyone holds up a home-made banner before, during or after a match criticising Wenger - it will be shown all over the World.
We need to use the modern media as well because surely enough of us now want a major change at Arsenal - whether it's Wenger gone, Kroenke gone, Hill-Wood gone or even a change in transfer policy. Whingeing on here will let off steam but it won't change anything.
I'm off to make an "In Arsene We Rust" banner or maybe a cheeky little "Sack The Board (and Wenger)" banner.
Cockerill's Chin's "we don't trust you anymore" idea would probably work. Especially if you could get it near to the In Arsene We Trust one. And if they tried to take it down & left the the other one up it would just highlight the attempt to silence the fans. The same fans gazidis said would determine Wenger's fate.
Exactly mate. Exactly!!
I firmly believe Gazidis said that because if (more like when) we finally turn on Wenger, it will give them the excuse to "relieve him of his duties by mutual consent" cos they don't have the bollocks to do it themselves.
We would be pushing against an open door if we started to protest so FFS lets start doing it
Thank goodness i did not watch the match. In the past i wouldn't have missed watching such matches but nowadays i dun give a rat's ass anymore. All thanks to our glorious leader
Bring Back Pires wrote:Here's a shot of the vile pigs that is currently scrolling on the BBC Football homepage:
I'm sure you don't need me to point out that Fabregas, four years ago (in 2007), was arguably our best player and had been in the first team for four years already.
Can anyone possibly be so blind??
Good post mate. But whilst these two are typical of the sheep that support our great club now, lets turn this round 180degrees.
*** These two hold up a home-made banner after a match, supporting Wenger and it is shown all over the World.
*** If anyone holds up a home-made banner before, during or after a match criticising Wenger - it will be shown all over the World.
We need to use the modern media as well because surely enough of us now want a major change at Arsenal - whether it's Wenger gone, Kroenke gone, Hill-Wood gone or even a change in transfer policy. Whingeing on here will let off steam but it won't change anything.
I'm off to make an "In Arsene We Rust" banner or maybe a cheeky little "Sack The Board (and Wenger)" banner.
Cockerill's Chin's "we don't trust you anymore" idea would probably work. Especially if you could get it near to the In Arsene We Trust one. And if they tried to take it down & left the the other one up it would just highlight the attempt to silence the fans. The same fans gazidis said would determine Wenger's fate.
Then you do the banner for an away game.
I was near these dogs and i can tell you a supervisor steward went over to check the banner before the game...he was happy with it...
so away games is the answer to put your banners up...
Did anyone there watch our board gradully melt off into the distance as the goals went in yesterday? And they were in the free tickets and still left early
Leaving aside all the general abuse etc there was one thing in yesterday's game that typified Wenger, and his complete lack of tactical awareness. At 3-1 we were holding United reasonably well and creating one or two things - 3-1 would have done me as a result after going 3-0 down. So what does he do? He takes off his defensive midfield player (Coquelin - who certainly didn't let anyone down) and brings on a poor lad of just turned 18 to make his debut (Alex Chamberlain must be wondering what he's done to deserve such a thing) and we let in 3 goals in the next 5 minutes. From then on it was just a training exercise for Unites, and not a very difficult one.
You would think that someone on the bench (Pat Rice, I'm talking about you) would have been pleading with Wenger not to make such a substitution. Has Pat Rice no sense of pride in himself? Or is he just a complete yes man?
For Arsenal FC to concede 8 goals is such a shameful thing that the Manager should have been sacked immediately. It's beyond unacceptable.
This was always gonna be a home banker, I went for 4-0 united but this was just surreal, these losers we have in our ranks never had any belief, desire or passion they could dig in and try they're hearts out for the shirt, they simply don't care and are happy to sit back and cop massive wages to trot out inept displays like this, it's absolutely disgraceful! A major shake up is needed now or at this rate we will be VERY lucky to finish mid-table. In Arsene we rust.
An astonishing game ended with a resounding Manchester United victory.
Sir Alex Ferguson kept the side that defeated Tottenham on Monday, with Danny Welbeck continuing upfront.
Arsene Wenger was without Thomas Vermaelen and Bacary Sagna to add to various previous injury and suspension problems, so Carl Jenkinson played at right-back, and Johan Djourou in the centre. Francis Coquelin made his debut in the centre of midfield.
The match was a barely believable stream of United chances in an amazingly dominant display. Arsenal were wretched from start to finish, completely unable to make the most of their numerical midfield advantage, and remarkably disorganised at the back.
Defence
Where to begin? It’s difficult to look at an 8-2 and break it down into specific areas that went wrong. Arsenal were simply poorer in every possible attribute that goes into competing in a football match, and the logical continuation of this stream of thought is that Arsenal’s problems do not lie predominantly in tactical issues – there’s something deeper that must be addressed.
That’s not to say that there weren’t tactical problems, however. For a start, they lacked any kind of cohesiveness without the ball. Some of the side seemed to be pressing, some seemed to be standing off. Coquelin, thrown into such a huge game on his debut, played a relatively deep position and picked up Rooney. Bizarrely, despite Rooney claiming a hat-trick, Coquelin did reasonably well: Rooney’s impact upon the game in open play was relatively little in the first half, and all three of his goals came from set-piece situations. Wenger’s decision to remove Coquelin at 3-1 on 61 minutes (though possibly because of fitness reasons) backfired spectacularly.
That was the only thing that went OK for Arsenal. The problem with pressing meant that Arsenal frequently had no pressure on the ball in midfield – despite the fact that they could afford Coquelin sitting, because Aaron Ramsey and Tomas Rosicky could close down Anderson and Tom Cleverley. Somehow, and again arguably due to fitness reasons, this failed – Anderson and Cleverley got time on the ball and could hit passes over the top.
The secondary issue was with the high defensive line, which is suicidal enough when there is no pressure on the ball – but that almost becomes a pedantic point when the main issue was that the back four was incapable of moving as a unit. Two players would step up, two would drop back. Sometimes it was amazingly easy for United players to waltz through and score – the Nani goal being the best example. On other occasions a lone Arsenal player would become trapped behind the rest of his defence and be forced into a last-ditch tackle – Jenkinson collected both his bookings in this fashion.
United were frequently pleasing on the eye, and the quality of their finishing was consistently superb, but they didn’t even have to play particularly well. They passed the ball much better in the 3-0 win over Tottenham and in the 3-2 win over Manchester City. Some of the goals – the Park Ji-Sung shot, the Welbeck header – simply came as they had too much time and space on the ball. Rooney’s three goals came because Arsenal had conceded fouls by diving in. Young’s strikes were superb – yet if they’d been the only goals in a 2-0 win, we would have been here questioning why a right-footed player was allowed to come inside onto his stronger side so easily. Almost everything went wrong for Arsenal.
Basic errors
The most striking thing from the chalkboards is that even in the basic areas, the most primitive concepts in football, Arsenal were outclassed. United completed 64% of the tackles they attempted, Arsenal just 45%:
Another example – despite the ball spending most of the time on the edge of the Arsenal area, United managed to block six shots compared to Arsenal’s one:
Getting tackles in, getting blocks in – not sophisticated, not the Arsenal way and unlikely to be a deciding factor upon the game, but when your side can’t keep the ball, can’t keep an offside line and is letting the opposition play, these are the things you have to be halfway decent at. If not, you’re liable to concede eight goals.
Conclusion
Part of the issue, in simplistic terms, is that Arsenal didn’t have players who were fit to perform the tasks required. Some of this was because they lacked experience, some because they were simply the wrong players for the situation. Laurent Koscielny finished with a 100% pass completion ratio…yet kept getting caught too high up the pitch when defending. Carl Jenkinson was a force going forward and got an assist…yet didn’t make a single successful tackle. Ramsey and Rosicky are creators, not battlers. To use these type of players in the positions they played in, you must be in control of the game, and Arsenal were never close to that.
United continue their impressive start, though even they must have been surprised at how easy it was. Their 4-4-2 shape (with two strikers coming deep) provides forward runs from a lot of different angles, and with Nani and Ashley Young being able to go down the line or inside for a shot, they are very dangerous going forward.
Bring Back Pires wrote:Here's a shot of the vile pigs that is currently scrolling on the BBC Football homepage:
I'm sure you don't need me to point out that Fabregas, four years ago (in 2007), was arguably our best player and had been in the first team for four years already.
2 stupid fucking ignorant women, a fucking bitch slap would have been my order of the day for those 2 fuckers.
Bring Back Pires wrote:Here's a shot of the vile pigs that is currently scrolling on the BBC Football homepage:
I'm sure you don't need me to point out that Fabregas, four years ago (in 2007), was arguably our best player and had been in the first team for four years already.
2 stupid fucking ignorant women, a fucking bitch slap would have been my order of the day for those 2 fuckers.
Bring Back Pires wrote:Here's a shot of the vile pigs that is currently scrolling on the BBC Football homepage:
I'm sure you don't need me to point out that Fabregas, four years ago (in 2007), was arguably our best player and had been in the first team for four years already.
2 stupid fucking ignorant women, a fucking bitch slap would have been my order of the day for those 2 fuckers then id turn them over and fuck them both up the arse