Morning all.
Would I prefer to see a different manager along with a new coaching team at Arsenal? Yes, but even though that’s my opinion, I’d be as happy as Larry if Mikel Arteta proved me and all his other critics wrong. We know what the Arsenal board are like so it’s highly unlikely change will come anytime soon. Ultimately though, performances, results and the fans will decide his future.
Of course I want to us beat Aston Villa because I’m an Arsenal fan not a fan of one particular manager just because he played for the club at some stage in his life. I’d never wish for a cluster of defeats either just because it might force the board to act.
Sambi Lonkonga, a young midfielder who arrived in the summer has been on the end of a bit of criticism which is a tad unfair, after all, it’s not his fault he’s been thrown into the mix at such a young age. After Mikel Arteta’s experiment of playing Martin Odegaard alongside Thomas Partey on Monday night failed dismally, I hope we see something different tomorrow. AMN would be my choice.
Bukayo Saka is reported to be fine so he’s likely to play and I hope that means there’s no place for the often disappointing Pepe. Alex Lacazette has to come back into the team surely? I’m not sure he will though, despite his fantastic attitude on Monday night.
Anyway, back to Sambi and he’s been talking to the official website. Here’s a few snippets:
I don’t know if I’ve got a favourite stadium to play in, but what I really like is to play in the stadiums of our biggest rivals. I love that, when everybody doesn’t like you and they hate your club. It gives you more energy and I think you play better.
I bet he can’t wait for the second NLD then because when it comes to a group of fans hating another club, it doesn’t come bigger than that. The feeling is mutual of course.
Surprisingly though, when asked if there’s a particular game this season that he is looking forward to, it wasn’t Toots:
I think for me the Liverpool and Manchester United away games. They are in big stadiums with a big fanbase, and a lot of fans around the world will be watching.
Someone one has taught him well, Toots aren’t a big team. Perhaps it was Thierry Henry.
Unlike Ben White, Sambi watches football:
I watch a lot of Premier League football now because I like to know a lot more about the teams we are facing. I knew a lot about Belgian football of course, because I watched it all the time, but I need to get to know the Premier League better. It’s a new league for me, everything is new, so I’ve got to watch a lot and keep learning.
That’s just what I meant when I said Ben White is missing out. The best way to find out about what/who you’re up against is to watch them play. Arteta can talk about his teams tactics (cough) in training all he likes but if players don’t know what to expect from the guys their up against, it’ll make their job harder I think. Unai Emery was reported to be a stickler for analysing the opposition during his time at the club and I think Arsene Wenger was the same but even so, the players need to do their homework too I’d have thought, if they want to improve themselves. I bet most goalkeepers research the opposition penalty takers before a game, just in case.
This might sound as if I’m having another dig at Mikel Arteta but it’s not meant that way, but when you, I and other fans are aware of opposition players and their strengths and weaknesses, how come Arsenal don’t seem to exploit them, or nullify them? Even during a game when one side of the pitch is struggling, Mikel Arteta doesn’t seem to do anything about it. Has he ever made a substitution based on game management rather than because of injury or towards the end of a game? When Pepe loses the ball time and time again, why leave him on the pitch, if Tierney or Tomiyasu is getting roasted like the latter was at Brighton, why not change things to help him and the team. When Pepe isn’t really doing a lot, why not replace him? Bringing Martinelli on for Partey on 81 minutes isn’t tactical in my opinion it’s desperation.
Anyway, another waffle on from me over.
See you in the comments.
Miguel Azeez has made just one appearance for Pompey after arriving on a season-long loan from Arsenal in August.
And Pompey’s head coach Danny Cowley insists the 19-year-old be unleashed once his team are in a ‘good moment’.
Azeez has made just one Blues appearance since arriving on a season-long loan at the end of August.
Even in successive heavy defeats to Rotherham and Ipswich, Azeez wasn’t called upon from the bench to inject much-needed inspiration.
Yet Cowley remains wary of exposing the England under-20 international to negative match scenarios which may impact his development.
It’s a desire to identify the right time for his first-team participation which has led to the youngster being used sparingly in a struggling team.
Pompey’s boss told The News: ‘It’s unfortunate for Miguel.
‘We lost Clark (Robertson) who is that left-footed centre-half that can play into the left-half space which Miguel likes to play in and we’re not in a good moment.
‘He’s only 19, we are trying to set a young player up for success and we are not in a good enough moment to bring him into the team.
‘I couldn’t bring him on against Ipswich, not at that time, not in this game. It would have been very, very difficult to come into the team in that moment. Very, very difficult.
‘He’s a young player finding his way in the game, so it’s your job as a manager to set him up to have success.
‘The team are playing with no rhythm and no control – and he’s a player that needs rhythm and control. We didn’t have it on Tuesday night.’
Morning Kev, all, he might not be playing any time soon then….
I can understand what Rowley is on about though, younger players need to be around players who up high in confidence, not a team which is struggling.
As much as Cowley has a good reputation and from his comments seems to have the players good at heart , it seems that Azeez is at the wrong club .
If he went to gain experience then surely he has learned that sitting on the bench is not helping him.
Perhaps he needs a different loan elsewhere.
That’s the problem with loans.
Young ex players that have become managers like Arteta are living on their experience as players and the methods and guidance of their ex managers.
We have a manager that has been influenced more by Wenger and Moyes than he was by Guardiola . Despite looking to find a blend of the three he is showing many of the traits of the former two.
Everton consistently finished between fifth and eighth in the league under Moyes , always unable to make the step up to rival their neighbours.
At Arsenal he is in the shadow of Abrhamovic’s Chelsea more than the seven sisters outfit but the comparison remains.
So to Guardiola’s flair he has the Moyes reticence to go for it holding him back and if you
add to this the Wenger organisation , the preordained substitutions , the adherence to one pattern of play and you have Mikel Arteta.
I don’t think it really matters which players we have at our disposal , if the way we approach games doesn’t change we will stay forever on the treadmill which we currently occupy..
Look at the first half against Wolves last year before Friday’s referee changed the game for sending Luiz off for heavy breathing and recently the first half against Spurs where we certainly blew them away. All was good for 45 minutes and when we had control of the match we fell into the Moyes Everton approach and petered out.
The players we have are more than capable they just have this devil on their shoulder which drags them back when they should be striding forward .
Following on from yesterday’s subject . I can’t see this changing until the mind set in the dug out changes.
Agree re the subs and style of play being rigid. Subs are as you say, very Wenger like. Moyes was pretty negative at Everton but at West Ham I think that’s changed to a degree. Maybe that’s down to having more backing from the board in the transfer window.
I still think he’s trying to emulate the way City play with all the passing etc etc but the different being City know when to play the right pass and when. They move around more, making better passes possible whereas Arsenal player don’t do that.
Good day to you all and thank you Rico for thought provoking post.
I do think we need some changes, the problem is what changes can Arteta make?
Our manager seems to be fixated on the Guardiola system and is going to extreme lengths to force the players into playing that way.
Playing out from the back is needlessly putting undue pressure on our defenders by encouraging our opponents to press high up the pitch. For a few of Ramsdale’s early games he often went long with clearances, but Arteta appears to have put a stop to that, so we are continually pushed deeper into our own defensive third of the pitch. When under intense pressure it would sometimes help if one or two of our defenders knew where Row Z was.
Constantly passing the ball around in midfield only allows the opposition time to form up in their defensive mode. It seems almost as if we are trying to win the stats game i.e. number of passes made, percentage of passes completed unfortunately such stats do not count towards league points and position in the tables.
We were all delighted by Tierney’s pace and crossing of the ball in attack. His ability to get behind the opposing fullback resulted in some very good scoring chances for our strikers and drew a number of fouls that further increased the number of chances. Lately, however, he almost always turns inside or passes the ball backwards from whence it came. Once again, the thought must be that he is playing to the orders of the coaches.
There are two possibilities here, 1) the strikers were not getting in position quickly enough to profit from the crosses, or 2) the strikers were not able to compete in the air for them.
Arteta is content to play with two wide forwards, Aubameyang and Pepe, who turn inside in an attempt to hit balls across the ‘keeper. Playing with Lacazette as a central striker is seen only as a last resort as per the recent Palace game.
A few changes to Arteta’s tactics would help. 1) Allow Ramsdale to go long when required, but make sure there is a player sufficiently far up-field to compete for the clearance. 2) Use either Lacazette or Martinelli as a central striker to get on the end of Tierney’s crosses. 3) Encourage ESR and Pepe to run with the ball at defenders in and around the box which may well panic the defenders into committing fouls thus giving away free-kicks and penalties.
One other thing that might be worth consideration is to play Holding in the back line and move White into the defensive mid-field position where we could profit from his composure on the ball and his range of passing.
I am certain that Arteta won’t completely abandon his preferred tactical system, but a little adaptation wouldn’t come amiss.
Afternoon Cicero.
Playing out from the back does my head in sometimes but I guess it’s here to stay and to be fair, if the movement ahead of the defence was better, it’d probably work better too. I think our problem isn’t playing out from the back but the choice of the second ball. If the defender has no out ball, he has to go square as Tomiyasu did to Partey but by then, Partey has several players around him and as Potter pointed out, very few red shirts to help out.
In principle, playing out from the back is a good tactic I think it’s just that we don’t always execute it well.
The long ball over the top of midfield usually comes right back at us because unless ball lands in front of Aubameyang for him to run with it, who do we have to hold the ball up?
Morning Rico and all.
Well written Rico, Playing out from the back is fine if we have players free but when they are all covered the keeper needs to just kick it long straight down the centre and make our players sprint for it and at the same time having a player sprint down both sides of the wing, then the centre player has 2 option. 1 take on the keeper or 2 pass to either side.
We need to go back to basics because nothing else is working.
So Arteta claims he knows what we need to do to beat Aston Villa but can he implement it is another thing. We have to win this weekend not only for ladder position but for the players confidents to stay up.
Glad to hear Saka is fine but he needs to start on the bench against Villa, he looks tired to me
One thing from last weeks match I forgot to mention was in the dying minute the showed Ramsdale and he looked like he was after guidance as to weather he should stay in goal or run down the other end and know one help him. I know it’s only a small thing but it does show the players don’t know what Arteta wants them to do.
Hi Geoff, thanks.
I’ve not seen Arteta’s press conference yet, I take it he’s upbeat and confident ahead of tomorrow? I think Villa we get at us more than Palace did.
Agree re your point about Ramsdale, little things like that should be ironed out long before a game kicks off.
I can feel the pressure ramping up on Mikel for the Villa game tomorrow. I guess one of his biggest problems is that nobody that I have heard from or read can actually understand what he is trying to do on the pitch.
In some ways it seems an absurd proposition to suggest that any of us know more than a man who had a long and successful professional playing career and then did a managerial apprenticeship under one of the best coaches in the world. From what I have seen, we have played only one good half of football so far this season. Others have pointed this out too, including Thierry. The rest has been somewhere between awful and shambolic. There feels like the ground beneath the team is forever shifting, leaving nothing solid to build on. That we aren’t improving seems irrefutable and Mikel’s problem must partly be that so many fans are unfortunately expecting this to continue. In the stadium the crowd are losing hope and we can feel this apathy and disappointment through the TV coverage.
I think it’s probably later than we think. The ball of negativity is rolling and I think his time is running out. A bad performance and anything less than a win tomorrow and it’s hard to see, barring a miracle, any way toward re-establishing Arsenal where I am sure we all want them to be.
It’s down to hoping for the best but expecting more of the same, but I do wonder who is advising the Kroenkes right now.
That Adam is a great question?
I mean how often are the people from Fenway in and around Liverpool, none of them live on Merseyside as far as I know?
And how many of the AbDhabi ownership live in and around Greater Manchester?
Do any of the Glazier brothers live in Salford?
And Joe Lewis, well he’s a tax exile.
I could go on, but as much as I feel that the Kroenke’s are absent owners and I see that as a problem I have to admit that most of the owners of Premier League clubs are absent. Even Abramovitch isn’t on the scene anymore, they all pop in to see the odd big game and go to Cup finals but in general they’re part time supporters.
So then it comes down to the quality of the people they put in charge?
Therefore as Adam asked, who is advising Stan and are they any good?
I mean nobody seemed to be advising Stan that things were in crisis under Emery or latter day Wenger instead it took a stadium full of empty seats to finally motivate KSE to act.
Or maybe alternatively they were advising KSE but Stan wasn’t listening?
I wonder if it’s down to Josh to make decisions as Stan is all wrapped up in the L.A Rams and big game hunting.
Potter I recon Josh keeps an eye on Arsenal and only reports back to Stan when something is wrong.
Arteta may of been a good player and learned coaching tips from Pep but that’s were it stops. He should have gone and coached at a smaller club to get experience then look at Arsenal
Any half decent owner would have their eye on the ball, as would a strong and ambitious board, who by the Kroenke’s own admission, run the club. We know Arsenal don’t act swiftly enough, or that’s what history tells us with Arsene Wenger and Unai Emery, so I expect them to carry on regardless unless the fans talk with their feet.
I can’t see how anyone enjoys watching this Arsenal play football.
We all know we needed a rebuild, needed to sort a number of contracts out and the new signings needed time but as others have said many times, me included, theirs absolutely no identity out there on the pitch, no fight, nothing.
Morning all.
Morning Rico and all
I know he’s not one of our players but the wax statue of Liverpool’s Salah looks great and the way he joked with it show’s his fun side.
Morning Geoff, I’ve not seen it.
Morning Rico. When I asked the question as to who might be advising Stan I was really thinking about the board and their power at the club. We might all want a scenario where the owner is a hugely ambitious individual with a shed load of money who lives around the corner but that’s fantasy.
We are, traditionally a club that don’t change managers too often and see this as a good thing. Old fashioned club, human values and all that. In fact, those of us who have been around a while like to cling onto that reputation. We scoff at Chelsea and their managerial Merry-go-round. But its their wealth surely that allows them to do that and let’s be honest, they’ve done pretty well. A lot of Chelsea fans I know we’re pissed off when one of their own, Frank Lampard, was sacked. They never mention him now. The Kroenkes we’re probably spoilt with Wenger but these days I bet there’s the thought that, perhaps this Premier League gig, especially with Arsenal and the fans, could be a bottomless pit, especially with the financial clout they’re up against.
At this moment Arteta is failing and his vision for a very young team is looking shaky to me.
Perhaps he will turn it around and when I say ‘he’ I mean the team of him and Edu and their coaches.
If he doesn’t then who is there to say “This isn’t working and can we really afford to throw this season away?”.
Morning Adam, I realised you meant someone on the board but as you say, who is there? I’ve no idea what the board does really but Vinai doesn’t fill me with confidence. My only hope is that Edu soon gets fed up with what he’s watching and starts the ball rolling.
New post up now