On a slightly lighter note.....I thought Sokratis dealt with Carrol pretty well when he came on. I thought without a player like him, Carroll would have probably come on and put the game out of reach.
On a slightly lighter note.....I thought Sokratis dealt with Carrol pretty well when he came on. I thought without a player like him, Carroll would have probably come on and put the game out of reach.
We made Nasri look as good as the day we sold him to City.
He is the player we have the world considers world class.
I hate to bring up other teams so frequently but just a month ago most of the press and so-called football pundits in the country were siding with Jose and saying Man U's players weren't good enough in quality, in particular a recent World cup winner (forgetting Jose had performed this same trick on Chelsea players including Hazard, then they won the title the very next season!!)
https://www.dailystar.co.uk/sport/fo...ier-League/amp
https://amp.sportsmole.co.uk/footbal...gh_321181.html
https://talksport.com/football/46161...liverpool/amp/
https://amp.sportsmole.co.uk/footbal...ed_315416.html
Now look at them purring.
I'm not saying Ozil is the answer or his abscence is the cause of our recent decline.... but Emery's inabilty to work with him or get anything out of him, despite having no close/adequate substitute for him, cannot be something we the Arsenal should overlook- it speaks volumes about the ability/limitations of our current manager.
Last edited by 21_GOONER_SALUTE; 13-01-2019 at 10:15 PM.
I agree with this, some have however said the recruitment was down to Mislintat (I don't necessarily entirely agree) and if that's the case he needs to take the blame as well as the money we did have, which granted wasn't a lot hasn't been spent too well, Leno has been a bit suspect (not that unpexpected as he was prone to errors in Germany as well) but we still paid 20 odd million for him, Lichsteiner came on a free but again as suspected he's rubbish, Sokratis is a bit hit and miss, he's good at time and poor at other times but his age is a concern as he will need replacing before long so spending what money we did have on older players seemed odd.
Guendouzi might turn out decent though after a good start to the season has faded somewhat, Torreira is the only real great signing.
But Emery also needs to be questioned on his tactics, choice of lineups and playing players in the wrong positions again (Maitland Niles). If he knew anything about English football and Arsenal in the 1st place players like Xhaka, Mustafi etc would have already been out, I believe in giving players a chance but not utter rubbish like them.
I also think his handling of the Ramsey and Ozil situations has been poor, he should have decided if he wanted to keep Ramsey last summer, then we could have sold him, instead again we have a player walking away on a free, as for Ozil, other than Ramsey he's our only creative player, to freeze him out as he has bearing in mind he's earning 350k is nonsense, he's happy to use a player (and make make him captain) who is leaving in a few months but won't play our highest earner who will be around next summer.
Emery needs a chance, but he needs to changes some of his ways and learn a bit more quickly, some of his decisions are baffling (he needs to prove he's up to the job despite thed difficult situation). I wanted him over a guy who had no managerial record in the summer (Arteta) but he wasn't anyones first choice in reality, most wanted an elite manager (which seems to be what Man U will look for in the summer unless Solkjaer carries on) but it became clear we weren't in the least bit interested in one and Gazidis made this appointment (despite choosing to leave a few months later - yet another odd thing to happen).
For me Emery needs to start playing Ozil, play AMN in his natural position, ditch Mustafi completely and replace him with Mavropanos when he's fit (he can't be any worse let's face it) and also play Torreira as often as he can, I'd also relegate Mhiki to the bench as the guy really has flopped so far.
In the summer we then need to flog, Xhaka, Mustafi, Mikhi, Cech, Elneny (possibly Kolasinac if we need more money) then we should probably ditch the like of Koscielny who is finished, Welbeck (who is out of contract), Jenkinson and start rebuilding this awful squad with some young players and a few quality buys (mid 20s), because right now if we stick with this bunch we're only going one way and it's not up.
Isn’t that the point of Mislintat, to recruit players? I’m sure Emery is invoked on some level but I’ve no idea how all of that works.
As far as I know AMN has been used as our defence was ruined by injuries. We’ve few options in defence for most of the season really with Kos/Monreal/Mav/Holding being out.
It seems he wanted to keep Ramsey and started him at the beginning of the season but then the contract mess happened and that came from above. Not sure what else he can do except use him as he has - which as mostly been from the bench.
Ozil, well I’ve said enough about him. With or without him we perform the same, as our position this season shows. And given his flakiness (his WC strop being another example) I’d genuinely question some of his ‘injuries’ too.
Torreira looked completely spent in his last 2/3 games and was not the same player. Whether that’s down to the amount of work he has to do to cover others, World Cup fatigue, or because he’s adjusting to having no winter break, I don’t know - but letting him rest a bit made sense. For some reason his performance levels have noticeably dropped recently. The loss of Bellerin has also been huge.
People were calling for Guendouzi to be a regular starter early in the season - but we are seeing you can’t rely on a 19 year old to do that job every week. But our options in that position are extremely limited - hence why Xhaka has to be a starter. Either that or it’s Ramsey (a proven disaster there), Elneny (average) or AMN (unproven and covering full backs) It also shows that the idea of throwing in kids right now will probably only make the situation worse.
At the start of the season, most fans did not expect us to finish top four, which I didn’t either. We have almost the same points/goals as this point last season and are a similar distance away from the top four. We are where we should be with this team. Chelsea are as flaky as us, but they have a stronger midfield and defence. No one expected Man U to fall off a cliff and they’re getting back to their old performance levels. Every team in the top 6 is better than us and we didn’t spend enough in the summer to strengthen the squad.
Selling some of our dead wood won’t raise much funds. If we aren’t going to get much to spend in terms of budget then money has to be raised in other ways to reshape this team, which means selling one or two of our most valuable assets and reinvesting smartly. And that means Lacazette, Bellerin or Ozil need to be sacrificed to inject us with us decent cash.
See this is the problem.
Emery certainly has questions hanging over him, but basing any questions on him when it comes to Ozil is just plain wrong.
The world needs to realise that Ozil is done, no one can get anything out of him because he cant cut it at the top level consistently anymore. It’s his own limitations, injuries, mentality that is the problem not any managers.
Also as you point out, everyone was backing Jose and the players weren’t good enough, now it’s the opposite. Same goes for Ozil. He was useless and shit and now his absence is the reason we are doing so shit.
They are all clueless and look for any excuse rather than the real facts.
The sooner we can offload him the better.
Last edited by KSE Comedy Club; 14-01-2019 at 08:43 AM.
NOTE: The location of this post has been moved and the thread title (which was previously Wenger is Leaving) has been manipulated by a notorious pro-Wenger moderator. What was previously a message that contained no profanity and made a comment on a real life event has now been manipulated by a deliberately provocative title. An old and crude propaganda and censorship technique.
I agree mate. Emery has made some very dubious decisions recently in terms of picking the starting line-ups and I am finding myself questioning him more and more with our formation, this 5 at the back malarkey isn't working at all, we don't look solid and we seem to be suffering offensively.
We are actually going backwards....for a while throughout our unbeaten run we did actually look half decent at times...not now though...it's been a real struggle recently.