Morning all.
April the 3rd and the league challenge is over for Arsenal, just as it is for the other eighteen clubs in the Premier League of course but it seems only Arsenal come under constant scrutiny each week. Probably because going into the seventh transfer window since Mikel Arteta became manager, the club has signed just one striker and even he is not what I’d call an out an out striker and of course, we’ve not won anything since the FA Cub at the end of the first season he arrived. Ironically, with a bunch of players he soon moved on.
Last season was close, very close and but for a couple of sloppy performances at The Emirates, those in the media would have been forced to take a very different approach to the way they reported about Arsenal. Instead, they gushed over more Man City success despite knowing it might be proved they reaped their successes by not playing by the rules.
When Liverpool lift the Premier League trophy in May, will any of the media darlings look at how they got there? How many red cards they might have picked up if the officials officiated their fixtures in the same way they did ours? Of course not. They won’t worry about that, after all, decisions level themselves over a season don’t they? Actually, no they don’t!
Arsenal have had a season riddled with injuries and poor officiating. Red cards have been shown to Arsenal players for incidents which in another game have gone unpunished or dealt with differently but I know, we’ve been over that before.
Do you think Liverpool’s goal would have stood last night had it been scored by us? No, never in a million years. Admittedly, James Tarkowski was fortunate to escape a red card for his challenge on Mac Allister but hey, perhaps the officials decided to make up for their error later in the game. I’m guessing of course but there’s also a part of me that wonders if they didn’t want to weaken Everton’s team before we play them on Saturday lunchtime.
Whilst the top four spots in the league are yet to be decided, the relegation places are already pretty much sorted with Leicester City, Southampton and probably Ipswich on the way into the Championship. The only doubt is Wolves who are not quite out of the woods yet. I’m not sure what’s more unlikely, Wolves going on a run of defeats or Ipswich winning all their remaining matches. Not that I care really.
It’s been a bit of a strange old season for Arsenal and Lady Luck had certainly deserted us from day one. As said yesterday, I’ve never known a season like this one for injuries and most of them have been big, usually with the player needing surgery and months of recovery. Merino, Odegaard, Saka, Havertz, Jesus, White, Tomiyasu, Tierney and then we’ve had Calafiori out more often than he’s been available and now, both Timber and Gabriel look set to miss the majority of our run in if not all of it.
Thank goodness we have an 11 point gap between us and Newcastle in 5th place because we need to secure Champions League football next season. Newcastle do have a game in hand though.
I didn’t watch much of the Merseyside derby but Everton did well to restrict Liverpool to just the one goal. An offside goal mind you.
Catch up in the comments.
Definitely offside. Where was VAR for this one?! Perhaps they thought they would turn a blind eye to make up for the mistake of not issuing a red card to Tarkowski!
When they lift the Prem Cup, the other League teams will know that they have been favoured re decisions that should have gone against them more than once and we can all honestly say they haven’t played brilliant football all season. They have just been consistent.
At least us Arsenal fans can say we got further than them in the Champs League with long term major player injuries.
Good to see Berta has wasted no time in getting stuck into the Transfer Market. I have a very good feeling about this and I think us fans will be very surprised/very happy in who he brings into the Arsenal team next year.
Cheers for the post Rico, I didn’t bother watching even the highlights on YouTube, what’s the point?
I’ve been watching Luckypool getting decisions nobody else gets since Bill Shankley was in charge of that BS club, I know that narrative ever so well. It’s why I can’t stand them…
Var allowed it Limey, a joke really.
Ditto Kev, and their fans. Apart from my brother in law and nephew of course. 😜
Afternoon Rico and all.
At the end of the day we can only blaim our self for not winning the league, by slipping up and looseing matches we should have and unfortunitly injuries, with fingers crossed we can hold on to 2nd place,
Afternoon Geoff, to a degree, I agree but we had players wrongly sent off in certain games which not only impacted the game/result, but also had a knock on effect when they were suspended.
There’s little to no excuse for the football and not scoring enough goals, not with the amount of chances the team creates.
Gabriel out until beginning of next season. Hamstring injury needing surgery. Not another one??
Woe is the team and woe is us!
Good luck to
Kivior I really hope he excels himself from until the end of the season. He is after all a very good footballer, just a bit slow😀
Yet we are still the third highest goal scorers in the division. The difference of course being that we have let in less than the rest.
Without a doubt this season has been decimated by injury . I am not sure that we have played the first team twice in succession . We well know that taking our 15 best players and comparing them to any 15 from our rivals we have a squad that stands up against all of them .
The letters of the law uniquely leveled at us and the subsequent red cards seriously affected our campaign and going through some periods with hardly a defence followed by hardly an attack just compounded it .
Whether the players like Jesus , Zinchenko , Havertz are good enough is one thing but when they are all out together along with Saka coupled with the red card 10 men games and suspensions it is a wonder that we are still second.
|However as this season has proved coming second twice to one team is no guarantee that we will be in pole position to get first should they falter.
Next year all the others will have got stronger , the PGMOL will remain , we might get difficult cup draws again . Hopefully we keep pace and strengthen well and go again and I hope see a few more Hale Enders get time on the pitch because if we don’t play them they will get itchy feet .
Unbelievable re Gabriel although it’s probably not. Not really. It’s been the story of our season. At least next season can’t be any worse. Surely?
Agree re The Hale Enders, the two we have in the first team and those not far behind them.
Good evening Rico and all.
I’m doubtful about any organised conspiracy against our club. Certain sections of the press and broadcast media have historically been hard on The Gunners. We did, after all, effectively buy admission to the Football League. Sir Henry Norris “knew people” and was able to cosy up to the relevant members of the Football Association. That was of course a long time ago.
Rather than a vendetta by the POGMOL, I firmly believe that incompetence by the, so called, elite members of that organisation is to blame. Hardly a week goes by without yet another unbelievably bad refereeing decision catching the headlines, the latest being the Tarkowski incident at Anfield last night.
Injuries have hurt us much more than dodgy referees this season and that is to a large extent due to the ever increasing number of games being squeezed into the schedule
It’s worth noting that Gabriel’s hamstring injury occurred within hours of a long flight home from South America. The injury wasn’t brought about by contact with another player, but by a sudden sprint to get back into his defensive position.
I believe that orthopaedic consultants are matching hamstring injuries to the increasing fatigue levels and lack of recovery time between games.
I think it’s time to radically reduce the number of games played, 1) Reduce to eighteen the number of teams in the Premiership. 2) Leave the League Cup to the lower divisions. Restrict International tournaments to just The Euros and The World Cup. Each to be played at four year intervals.
Sad to say I can’t see any of the above measure actually happening. UEFA, and particularly, FIFA are just too money obsessed and too greedy to put the brakes on the gravy train.
Terrible news about Gabriel,not unexpected but even so,if Timber/White are available I’d like to see one at Right Back,one at Centre back. Simple.
Ironically Heaven would probably have got a game.
Evening Cicero. I think Gabriel returned on Thursday, if not earlier after missing Brazils second fixture, so he had a number of clear days before playing but I do think there are far too many internationals throughout the season.
The referees wouldn’t seem so bad against us if they weren’t so obviously biased towards others, Liverpool especially.
I think Kiwior would still be Arteta’s choice over Heaven.
not sure which one was funny Jose Mourinho at his old tactics by grabbing the opposition manager nose and looking like he has done nothing wrong or the other manager rolling on the ground like he just had his nose shot off, Mourino will never change.
That’s been part of our problem this season Arteta has his favourite players and no matter how bad the play he keeps picking them
That’s it then. Gabriel’s season is over. 😕
Sounds like Ange has had enough. Complaining not about VAR as such just how long it takes to make decisions as last night it took 6 minutes to rule out their goal which was obviously a foul on the first play back
He said that referees are just falling back on Stockley Park and no longer stand by their decisions and I have to say I agree with him.
With all the attention on the non-decisions of the officials this week Arsenal had better be on their best behaviour at Goodison Park tomorrow, mind you a belated red card for Tarkowski could be in the works?
Morning all.
New post up.