This Weekend's Fixtures & Midweek Fixtures (20/21/23/24/25 Apr)

[HCZ_Reborn]

You said you wanted us to be in with a chance by May. If we lose tomorrow then obviously it's pretty unlikely we'll win the title. Although City also have to go to Spurs who have a good record against City. But we are at worst very close to achieving your requirement,


It's a reasonable ambition but yes it's an unreasonable expectation.
The latter makes you sound like the irritated customer in a fancy restaurant again.


You did say that and I did look in to that a bit. In a fair number of seasons there's been one outstanding side who blew everyone away, a tight 3 horse title race hasn't happened for a while. A few years ago City won it with 86 points but the second team, Utd, only got 74. Point being you could argue you only really needed 75 to win it. 89 would be an outstanding outcome for us, but given the games we have left to play and our run this calendar year to get us in contention, I think over-criticism of a lower final points tally would be unwarranted.


We have done our part.

The reason it's an unreasonable expectation is we have 2 tough fixtures coming up. Utd have been pretty patchy this season but they'll raise it against us. Spurs is a local derby - even at our best under Wenger when Spurs were a very mid-table side we never lost there but draws were pretty common.
Liverpool lost away at Spurs (thanks in part to that VAR farce, but that was early enough they could still have won it), and they drew away at Man Utd
City beat Utd home and away, but they drew at home to Spurs.
Why would you expect us to win both of those games? They're certainly games we could win, but "expect"?

Yes expect

That’s what happens when you want to compete for the top prizes

[HCZ_Reborn]

Damn and blast. I wrote most of a reply to this and then my browser restarted
Anyway...


It being in your hands doesn't necessarily make you favourites. Anfield '89 was in our hands and of course we prevailed but we certainly weren't favourites.
Obviously a factor is your remaining fixtures and the gap you have over the rest. That's why at no point were we considered favourites because our run in was objectively more difficult than the other two and we've never had any significant gap over them.
I don't see how it's a mentality issue and the difficulty of the run in is not irrelevant. Two of your last 4 games being Spurs and Utd away is objectively more difficult than, say, those fixtures being Sheffield Utd and Luton at home. Obviously we are capable of winning all our remaining fixtures, but those two away games are not the nailed on certainties that the alternatives should be.


There's something in that, but I can't really fault our efforts so far.


Not good enough to win the league. It's an exercise for the reader to determine whether they think it's good enough overall.
For me there's been pretty clear progression this year. We've stood up in the big games this season. We've been near perfect in the the run in, just one slip and that wasn't to some cloggers who we should be sweeping aside.



Agree with most of this. I mean, City only lost to Real on pens, they weren't swept aside by them. But we've stood up to City this season. Maybe we showed them a bit too much respect at their place, but after previous experiences I can understand that. They haven't lost a league home game all season so a draw was a creditable result, and we stopped them scoring which is more than anyone else has done for about 3 years. Next step is to go there and beat them.

If we fall short again this year then so be it. We sign a proper striker in the summer and build on the progress we've made. At times HCZ seems to be saying we should sack Arteta, rip it all up and start again. I think that would be a step backwards.

Why does sacking Arteta involve ripping it all up and starting again?

[Mac76]

Yes expect

That’s what happens when you want to compete for the top prizes

I would expect us to beat Fulham at home (which we failed to do thanks to Zin) but not Man U and Spuds away

[HCZ_Reborn]

I would expect us to beat Fulham at home (which we failed to do thanks to Zin) but not Man U and Spuds away

If you’re trying to win the league and you’re at the business end, you would expect to win every game apart from city and Liverpool away

[Letters]

If you’re trying to win the league and you’re at the business end, you would expect to win every game apart from city and Liverpool away

When is the last time we beat Spurs and Utd away in the same season?
I don’t know the answer to that, but it must be a while. Certainly can’t have happened often over the last 20 years. So “expecting” us to do that, even in the context of a title challenge, seems a bit weird

[Letters]

Why does sacking Arteta involve ripping it all up and starting again?

Maybe overstating things a little but this is very much Arteta’s team now. Sacking him would surely be a disruptive thing. It’s possible it could push us on but we’ve clearly made progress this season, therefore I feel Arteta should stay. If that progress doesn’t continue next year then ok, we need to consider this more seriously, but not yet in my view.

I would remind you that you were sceptical early season of us being able to challenge at all. And when we had a wobble I think you were one of the people worrying whether we could stay top 4. We’ve exceeded or at least met most people’s expectations this season. Sacking the manager in that context seems like a pretty big overreaction

[Mac76]

When is the last time we beat Spurs and Utd away in the same season?
I don’t know the answer to that, but it must be a while. Certainly can’t have happened often over the last 20 years. So “expecting” us to do that, even in the context of a title challenge, seems a bit weird

Agreed, I was saying to someone the other day that before Citeh came along, even that Villa result wouldn't have been seen as such a disaster, it's all down to what teams are faced with when competing with Citeh, but to say we should expect to win two very tricky and baggage-laden away games is daft

[HCZ_Reborn]

Maybe overstating things a little but this is very much Arteta’s team now. Sacking him would surely be a disruptive thing. It’s possible it could push us on but we’ve clearly made progress this season, therefore I feel Arteta should stay. If that progress doesn’t continue next year then ok, we need to consider this more seriously, but not yet in my view.

I would remind you that you were sceptical early season of us being able to challenge at all. And when we had a wobble I think you were one of the people worrying whether we could stay top 4. We’ve exceeded or at least met most people’s expectations this season. Sacking the manager in that context seems like a pretty big overreaction

I’m of the opinion that if this so-called process is worth seeing through it will survive a managerial change or should I say more specifically a change of coach. Never forget that is what Arteta was appointed as head coach, in a power grab he made himself manager.
In my view the head coach is a transient figure or should be, and if success is not forthcoming should be moved on. Frankly for that reason I’m not keen on keeping Arteta on whatever happens between now and May, I think he has too much power at the club and we learnt the folly of that with Wenger.

But either way, for Arteta to meet my minimum expectations we have to win tomorrow simple as that. That was the situation we put ourselves in by losing to Villa unnecessarily

[Letters]

Just checked the three title winning years under Wenger. Didn't win at WHL in any of them. And we were a much better side relative to them than we are now.
1998 they finished 14th ( ), 2002 they finished 9th, 14th again in 2004. Now they're on the verge of Top 4 although look likely to miss out with their run in.

[Letters]

But either way, for Arteta to meet my minimum expectations we have to win tomorrow simple as that. That was the situation we put ourselves in by losing to Villa unnecessarily

Unnecessarily

Dude, this is football. It's a competitive sport. You know the other team are trying to win too, right? Sometimes you're just not going to win a game. We really weren't that bad against Villa. Arteta clearly set us up to blitz them early and win it by half time. We had our chances but it didn't quite happen. There are very fine lines in football. Second half we were poor, but Villa aren't some cloggers we should be thumping. After the top 3 they're probably next best.

Your "minimum expectations" are virtual perfection. And, again. Early season you were saying we wouldn't be in a title race. The first wobble we had I'm pretty sure you were saying Top 4 wasn't assured. You massively overreact to the slightest setback. I arguably underreact, but my main thing this year is I've seen progress. That is surely not in dispute. We've passed plenty of tests this season which we failed last year. If that progress isn't enough to win the title then I can live with that, but changing manager while we are heading in the right direction under them is a crazy thing to do.