(The not-so-temporary quite-official) Gooner Thread (Part 1)

oh good god!

oh good god alright

sad fact is this one can be squarely pinned on wenger in his 1000th game

the team selection was very optimistic

helsea had  a hugely defensive set-up but pressed so well and so quickly, they were able to create chance after chance. The first two goals felt a little harsh, they were very very good finishes, but the way the game was being played you felt we still had a shot until Ox ended the tie, the last 70 minutes were absolute torture. 

Might've been a different story had we had the likes of ramsey, ozil and wilshere out there to play quick passes and beat the press. This sort of game is where we needed an alternative to Giroud as well, would've suited walcott up top (althought that's a bit moot since we didn't have the skill on the day to beat the press anyway)

nothing to do now except  move on, it's days like this I'm thankful for a a short turnaround

Yes I'd say that's the title gone but all we can do is  to keep trying to win and the fa cup becomes hugely important now

f*ck I hate mourinho with a real passion. Had read those 'specialist in failure' comments when they happened but hadn't actually seen the press conference when he said them until pre-game at this one. Mourinho was very deliberately nasty there, he should have far  more respect than that. Wenger's dig that incited that was hardly a harsh one and didn't deserve such vitriol. 

Saying that they didn't want to admit they were in the title race because he was scared of failure didn't deserve a reaction?? Your kidding me right. Mourinho just turned the failure part around

I didn't say it didn't deserve a reaction, just not that one. But we all know mourinho has a history of that carry-on. 

Watch the two clips for yourself and tell me who was nasty and who wasn't. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TadHEpZALF4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwM4Ip24PyI

For starters the first thing mourinho says is that wenger was right, so that settles it really. Obviously just struck a nerve with mourinho.

And secondly it's interesting that wenger was not asked about mourinho, but about all other managers aside from himself/pellegrini. Obviously he is referring to mourinho and rodgers, who incidentally didn't let it bother him at all. Rodgers was the bigger man by far there and continues to show far more class than mourinho ever has. 

It's comical that mourinho tries to make a comparison between chelsea and arsenal. Wenger has taken on a project of self-sustainability to build a club into a power, and is not far from completing that (although perhaps a little further after this morning!). Mourinho has a bottomless pit of cash with which to win. You can't compare and call wenger a failure on the basis of that, just ridiculous. Mourinho has no track record of doing what wenger is doing and it's the same the other way (although wenger did win plenty when the playing field was far more level). 

Positives: Chamberlain looks to be a good backup to Szczęsny if needed.

Oh well, 4th again it is.

Here ya go Arsene, and I won't even charge you a finders' fee:

https://nz.linkedin.com/pub/gilbert-enoka/17/149/aa6

All I can say is, I woke this morning and thought, "Do I check the scores first or watch the game first?"... I checked the scores first... so glad I didn't watch the game. Meant I spent the day mildly annoyed rather than clinically depressed. If anyone has any idea why Arsenal are so Bi-Polar some times let me know?. May just have to dump a bunch of Lithium in the water supply at London Colney.

Sick of this Jekyll and Hyde stuff.

Faaaaarking hell. My 2 teams concede 11 goals in one weekend...bloody football sucks!

Here's to the FA Cup

From arseblog news;

"Arsenal have cancelled Arsene Wenger’s pre-Swansea press conference that was scheduled for tomorrow morning.

Having avoided the media after yesterday’s defeat against Chelsea it would appear the Frenchman remains in no mood to publicly dissect his side’s abject performance. The club have informed both broadcast and written press that quotes from an in-house interview will be made available instead.

It’s an unusual move from the Frenchman who has always fronted up to journalists throughout his 17 years in charge and a clear sign that behind the scenes there’s a real sharkstorm going down.

As further evidence of the apparent lockdown, the club’s Twitter account hasn’t posted anything in over 24 hours while the entire squad appears to have been instructed to stay off social media.

The silence is deafening right now."

Also Nigel Winterburn quotes;

"Arsene Wenger is protecting his players [in the press] because he knows he’s got a big game coming up in mid-week [against Swansea]," he said on talkSPORT.

"Inside that dressing room I’ve heard of late he’s been furious with them at times. He's angry with the way they haven’t performed when he’s put real trust in them."

Think we might see some changes on Wednesday morn... for starters I haven't been a fan of this cazorla in midfield carry-on of late. I much prefer him on the left and as much as I love poldi, he seems a bit of a flat track bully when it comes down to it. 

The biggest thing though is that wenger must play flamini and arteta in midfield against the bigger sides, particularly away. We just can't handle them without adding a bit of steel and defensive nous. Proven three times over now arsene...

Also from arseblog, Wenger's best bargain eleven;

                 Lehmann

 Sagna-Toure-Campbell-Clichy

Ljungberg-Vieira-Fabregas-Edu

           Anelka-van Persie

Total cost: 18.25 million

Referee Andre Marriner has been ridiculed in today's newspapers for sending off Kieran Gibbs instead of Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain.

The Premier League has responded quickly by suspending Mark Clattenburg and issuing a full apology to Lewis Hamilton.

Does anyone still want Wenger to stay on next season? And if so, why?

The red card was frustrating but we were all at sea before that had happened. Sherwood thinking the yids can still catch us, the only laugh of the weekend.

I'm beginning to think that as the club moves into a new phase financially it may be time for a management change also. 

As much respect and gratitude I have towards AW for steering us through this last phase (moving to Ems, etc) whilst keeping us in Europe and near the top of the league consistently and investing relatively little into the squad (and I have a lot), it seems increasingly apparent that he may be unable to see the wood for the trees... some of his selection and (lack of) transfer decisions over the last 6-12 months are questionable at best... without going over what we've already gone over ad-nauseum, I'm beginning to see some benefit in a change at the end of the season (as unlikely as I think that will be - particularly after we win the cup)... IF the right man is available...

Which begs the question... who could be the right man? And, could he/they be available?

Huge Wenger fan and all but he does it tatically wrong a lot of the time recently, no starting 2 DMF away to chelsea was a massive mistake in my opinion. His subbing of players durings the games isnt great either. Worst thing is that we are only a player or 2 away from being a really really good team. Arteta has done a decent job as a DMF but he's not the destroyer we need in the mids. Not getting another striker in Jan was a huge miss for us in my opinion. IF giroud had finished his chance before Chelsea scored it could have been a completed different game. We shouldnt ever play with a high line i have never seen it work well for us

Transfer list for me in the off season

1. Striker

2. DMF

3. Right Back is Sagna goes

Even thou i'm still pretty filthy about chelsea game. We are still only 7 points off Chelsea with a game in hand......just need to make sure we win the game in hand and we will be 4 points off, that's a lot closer then we have been in March for a while. We have have really strong finishes to the season for the last few years REALLY hoping we can do that again this season.

I wouldn't say 'Arsene out' just yet. I think the gap lies between the quality of players Arsene wants and the money available. That gap is closing as more money becomes available. I think as fans we have a hyped up false sense of reality due to games like FIFA that lead you to think buying a player is simply a business transaction. The reality is you have two clubs negotiating over the sale of an asset with said asset being represented by a 3rd negotiator playing both clubs off against each other. Additionally the asset in question is a human being, likely with a family, that needs to consider what the implications on a move would be for him and his family. North London isn't quite as sunny as say Naples or Madrid. Additionally you throw in the language barriers and it's a big call.

Wenger has stated that Kallstrom was the best he could do in the summer transfer period and I believe him.

Moving forward yes we got spanked, yes Wenger screwed up. Does that mean we should write this season off? Not yet. We're pretty much locked in for a top 4 finish. We still have a mathematical shot at a top 2 finish. We still have the FA Cup to play for. Oh, and lets all look at Moyes ability to take an EPL winning side and turn it into a Europa qualifying disaster as to why we should think very carefully before we demand new blood.

I'll never say Arsene out, ever, he has the job for as long as he wants it in my opinion, despite failures like this one.

There's a reason Barcelona are courting him as we speak - he's one of the best managers in the world. 

In any case he's spent so long keeping our heads above water with very little money that he's earned the right to a more expensive squad like we are now capable of assembling, to see what he can do with it. He has a successful history when the playing field is closer to level like it is becoming again now. An FA Cup this season would be an excellent start for us to push on to higher honours next time round, with the addition of another world class player in the mould of Ozil. 

What I want to see is support for Wenger when it comes to transfers. It's often said that he likes to have control around that so perhaps that's an area where we need him to pull his head in and accept assistance. Maybe that's the sticking point with his new contract, who knows. Or perhaps he is looking seriously at the Barcelona job. 

Just interested to know how close we got to fielding such a quality bargain 11 :-) It's a great side for less than $20m.

SurgeQLD you make a fair point, the right replacement needs to be found but I can't see how Wenger is the right man going forward. He's done nothing the last 9 years, failed to adapt with the times of late, he's terrible at transfer time despite the great success he had previous to that.

Simeone, Klopp, Low are replacements off the top of my head. Why would they want to join us? The league's highest paid manager, transfer $$ to spend and owners that settle for mediocrity and selling the club's soul.

Tough to be optimistic after a loss like that but in all seriousness why shouldn't we be? 

We've only just right now got ourselves into a position where we have more finance than we've ever had in our club's history. Arsenal has not known this kind of buying power since the 1930s. And that is 100% down to Arsene's work since 1997, absolutely 100%. No one deserves to reap the rewards more than he does.

In trophy terms his accountability starts right now in my opinion. If he signs a 2 year contract as is rumoured, then I feel it would be fair to make him accountable for trophies by the end of that, because that would be the first time in his Arsenal career that he'd have had the finances where winning trophies could be fairly expected.

Wigan, Birmingham and Swansea would not be fairly expected to win trophies, there's a difference. Hell even Spurs have won a trophy in the last 9 years. 

Anyhow more importantly, there are rumours floating that Wenger is quitting at the end of the season. Watching this space intently...

bringbacksmeltz can you truly tell me that you can't see a chance to finish top 2 or win the FA Cup? It's still on. I'm not saying it's guaranteed, but there are some big games City, Liverpool and Chelsea all have to play. The FA Cup requires us beating Wigan in the semi and then either Hull or Sheffield. Even after the weekend we're firmly in the box seat here.

Not completely, simply because of the way the last 4 stand

There is an expectation (rightly or wrongly) that Arsenal should win from here. 

I'll be well disappointed if we don't win the FA Cup but it could be argued that I have "more value" on the FA CUP than say the Champions League due to my age. It's what I grew up with. 

71-96 = 3 Cups, 27 years

Wenger = 4 Cups, less than 27 years

anyway I'm wandering off topic, the question was about the future direction. 

The top 4 have been close all year and we're fading with injuries and poor performance in away games against the other top 4 sides. If we don't win I don't think 2nd or 3rd or 4th matters, although avoiding 4th would be nice to get away from that nasty early-season qualifier.  

The learnings for next season should be clear - extra squad depth in a couple of positions, improved squad rotation on arsene's part, and some work around big fixtures against big sides (not sure what that work is, that's where arsene comes in again). 

We should be able to achieve improvement in those areas given we won't be wasting the off-season watching our best players leave like usual (aside from potentially sagna).

Winning the FA Cup would be nice. Often the best sides in recent premier league history have kicked off a period of success with an FA Cup or League Cup win. If they can get a taste it will make them hungry. Silly to underestimate Wigan or Hull/Sheffeld, they'll be well up for it, these will basically be the equivalent of massive derby games. 

What manager going for the title gets hammered at Anfield, Stamford Bridge and Etihad in one season to his title rivals? Our problems have been the same for the last 9 years but have nothing has changed.

Some seem to have been brainwashed that 4th is effectively a success and a trophy. It's not at all. This season has been our best chance in a while to go for the league and we've got Giroud and Sanogo to win it for us up front.

Losing Theo highligthed the fact we never had a capable back up for Giroud. IF we can get ozil rambo and wilshere back soon we can finish the season well. Before we do anything we just need to make sure we put swansea away tomorrow morning.

POL you've lost it mate. Can you honestly say you started the season expecting us to win? I don't think anyone did. We've punched above our weight with the squad we have.

Wenger tried to strengthen up front but couldn't find the players in budget. Do you really think he had another 30-40m in the kitty to spend after Ozil?

We needed a striker more than another midfielder, as we still do. 

I expected us to not get let down so poorly after all the other changes with other clubs. We have the highest paid manager in the league, the highest season tickets in Europe, we have cash in the bank, we have obvious shortcomings in our squad that haven't been addressed, Wenger complains that he can't find players in the last 2 days in the Jan window yet he has a month to look for them.

We get told a bucket of rubbish that next year will be ours and where have we gone in 9 years after becoming the only club to go through a Premier League season unbeaten? Backwards and settling for mediocrity in my opinion.

TBF its been a good season, but the lows of late are casting a shadow. Il take the FA cup with some good investment for next season