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

absolutely loving that Simeone is in the directors box standing behind Gazidis...gotta control his temp if he wants the job!

Worries me that we haven't scored yet. We should have a couple by now with the chances we've had. 

we are sooo slow with our movement, Atleti can just sit back and absorb. unless we pick up the tempo, we aint gettting shark out of this game

ospina can pass better than Laca

yeah, we’be taken the foot off the gas, which is letting Athleti play! How good was that soaping bullet to Welbz though?!

right off to work now. hope we dont lose this 0-1, but at the moment, thats all i can see happening.

I thought our movement has been pretty good kwlap, we've created plenty of big chances, the problem is that we haven't been clinical. Change nothing but our finishing and we'd be 3/4 up, without the movement or passing changing whatsoever. 

Worrying that we let the foot off for the last 10 and nearly conceded. 

Need to be patient, carry on, and bring that intensity again in the 2nd half. Clean sheet and 2/3 goals needed here. 

LACA

great work from wilshere

Still a painful watch trying to pass it through a stacked defence into the box. I sometimes wish we were a bit more direct like Liverpool instead of all this backwards and forwards passing which results in nothing. I'm hoping for a Xhaka thunderbolt from 20 yards.

Kill me now. 

and there we have it. Classic Arsenal. How many fouls in that build up did the referee miss?!

that’s as good as a win for Atheltico. What a f*cking disgrace from us.

How unlucky was that equaliser??? Foul to turn it over, Kosc gets a boot to it, luckily falls back into Griezeman's path, Ospina saves, falls back into Griezeman's path, Mustafi there for the block, slips over.

You couldn't make this stuff up. 

Fuming right now. 

Overall we played really well. The finishing just wasn't good enough. Lacazette was in everything and should've had a hat trick. 

Can't see us getting through, so tough to go there and avoid defeat, their crowd will be intense. Although the way we played was encouraging. We'll need to defend our as*ses off to have any chance. 

Had to kill the tie off with that one man advantage and all those chances. Difficult not to see us getting battered in the return leg, which I suppose would be a fitting end for Wenger in European knockout matches..

Arsene's European record rests on 2 moments for me. 

1) Wayne f*cking Bridge, and the multitude of chances we missed over that tie. We battered Chelsea over those 2 legs, was a travesty we went down. Porto in the final would've probably seen Wenger beat Mourinho the first time he played him too, which would've altered history quite significantly. 

2) Thierry Henry's missed chances when 1-0 up against Barca in 2006, the one-on-one in particular. Should've buried that game. 

We've Arsenaled again. FFS... in other news; have a read of this about a potential new gaffer:

https://www.joe.co.uk/football/julian-nagelsmann-exclusive-how-tragedy-helped-mould-the-managerial-phenom-wanted-by-europes-top-clubs-175107

Have to admit I wouldn't be disappointed.

Missed all of that due to work. Disappointing result to say the least. Can't see us getting anything there.

Wow that was rather impressive. 

Everything handed to us on a plate and we bottle it. Again. This team will be the death of me.

Also, Ozil was fudgeing terrible all game. Wilshere stood up though, so there's that. 

I'd be incredibly jealous if you guys do manage to pick up Nainggolan, he's a phenom. 

Did he? Bar the cross he did f*ck all. Didn't offer anything defensively, and was rarely on the ball. Xhaka was the metronome keeping it going, Ramsey and Ozil seemed to come get it, and Jack was an extra man often not used. We'd actually have been better playing Reiss Nelson or someone out wide so Ozil had more space to own in the middle. Still can't believe we didn't poke it home in any other given scenario. Classic for me was the amount of times a back post run on the left hand side where Welbeck was playing would have resulted in a corner - but he wasn't making them. If Auba had been playing I think we'd have had a very different scoreline.

I thought it was one of our best performances all season. 

All players played well. 

Just dodgy finishing and a typical c*ck up to give them their goal. 

Also Lacazette was excellent this morning. He should've scored more, but he was everywhere, and always looked dangerous. 

That's 7 in 7 since he came back from injury. 

So 1-1 in the first leg and everything still to play for in the 2nd.

Tough ask to get that away win but it would be awesome to see Wenger leave with a trophy

Thought today was a day when we could have used Giroud. He'd have been immense in the air & his link up play would have been handy. 

Read a bit more on the game now, and watched some bits and pieces on youtube.

Lots of comments about how this was our best performance of the season. Fair enough but we were against 10 men for nearly the whole match, and also up against a team without their influential manager on the touchline for the same period.

We have to try believe we can go there and get something. Chelsea beat them there 2-1 earlier this season. It can be done, it's just gonna be fudgeing difficult as hell.

Everything is pretty much against us. When you think about having to repeat that performance, against 11 men this time, with Simeone back on the touchline, away from home where we have struggled all season, where our opponents have not conceded since January at home and have the best defensive record at home and overall in the top 5 leagues in Europe this season, it is a huge ask. But it isn't impossible.

I really want to see the players show some bottle next week. They've talked about giving Wenger the perfect send off by winning this competition, now is the time to show it. This is all on the players now imo. 

Simone is not guaranteed to be back on the touchline, but I don't that makes a substantial difference.

We don't need to win; a 2-2 draw would see us through, but I'd rather we do if for the clubs future than wengers ego. A team in the champions league will attract t better talent in terms of coaching and playing personnel, and there is a big rebuild job required here.

Presuming you beat Monaco in the semi finals of course?

Something that still annoys me, we really should have won that tie after going 2-0 up at the bridge (3-3 agg), only to draw 2-2

I hope Arsenal can make the final, but the other two sides in the semis are no mugs either.

I wonder if AW thinks differently now?

http://www.football365.com/news/wenger-always-agai...

Mustafi, Ramsey, Kosc, Laca, Jack and Ozil didnt travel to manchester. Going to have to do this the hard way. 

We're going to get pumped, I just hope it's not too bad.

One thing that may help is their their right back is the one who got red-carded, and their usual backup right back is out injured. In saying that, the Thomas fella filled in very well.

Could not care less about the Man Utd game, but likely lineup imo;

Cech

Holding Chambers Monreal

Bellerin Kolasinac

AMN Xhaka

Mkhi Welbz

Auba

I know the game means nothing in terms of the season and next week's game is the big one, but this is Wenger's final match against United and Mourinho so it's a shame to let then humiliate him one last time.

That's not a bad lineup all things considered

Yep, only really weak at the back.

And as it turned out the lineup was even weaker than that... 

Apart from Auba, Mkhi and Bellerin, it was basically an U23 lineup. Even then Mkhi was just returning from injury. 

Made a good account of themselves, unlucky to lose in the end, and hilarious that it took Moyes' old guard of Young and Fellaini to do it. 

Maitland-Niles and Mavropanos were very impressive. 

AMN actually got man of the match, he really is looking the goods these days. 

I knew they were always going to get a winner but it felt very cruel to come so late after a pretty good performance with that team. 

That was cruel AJC. The guys worked their balls off, and Fellaini bumbling it in off his back was infuriating. That said when I saw our line up I was mentally preparing for another 8-2, thought the guys played really well. I also enjoyed at the end the amount of time Paul Pogba spent chatting with/consoling AMN, nice to see.