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

Would love to see this line up, but i cant see Wenger changing much. I did read somewhere that Ox was in the frame to start, but i cant remember for who. I would love to see more of poldi but i think his time is up, and unless we have another injury crisis i cant see him getting much time.

Ah, I completely forgot Ox. Yes he is probably due a start, perhaps in place of Podolski in my lineup above.

What a half! Absolutely nuts.

So Ozil in the no.10 role? any good? maybe he could play there more often?

You beauty! Ozil and welbeck stood up this morning.

I also thought Big Phil had a great game, looks like he has finally forgotten about Drogba, shame he has to play vs him next weekend.

Interesting that sanchez was rested and ox played instead. I hope he was just rested rather than it being a smokescreen for something else, like an injury...

Yes Ozil centrally dominated, he definitley likes freedom but clear evidence not to fuck with what works.

Enjoyed seeing the confidence rise after the first goal and then mental couple of minutes, that could have been the game where patience is shown throughout and then score no goals ala 2 seasons ago.

Arsenal draw or lose - "Ozil looks languid! He's not trying! What a let down!"

Arsenal win. "Ozil looks languid! What a player! Amazing skills!"

If i coulda picked two players to score this morn it would've been welbeck and ozil.

Excellent result for us, just what we needed.

Especially impressive that our 2 most effective attackers this season were both rested. Our strength in depth came to the fore, with us able to bring in Ox and Cazorla in and put out a display like that. 

Ozil really attacked from a lot of similar areas as to his recent games - his heat maps would make interesting reading. The changes I did notice to his play this morning were him dropping deep and attempting to dictate the game from the halfway line quite a lot, but then suddenly bursting into the central striker role when welbeck dropped out to the right - obviously the first goal came that way but there were other times when Ozil was seen running off their centre backs for through balls. The second goal came with him making a run down the left flank too. He was sublime this morning. And after that goal burst you saw his confidence returning, he was trying tricks and they were coming off.

Ramsey was not quite up there again, although he did play some good balls and his pass immediately prior to the assist for the second goal was excellent.

Chambers ran a tight-walk on the cards but aside from that he looked very good at RB. He has great ability on the ball, did he misplace a pass at all? That's even better considering a lot of his passes go forwards compared to Sagna and Debuchy. He seems very adept at picking out our mids/forwards accurately through narrow channels rather than going default back to Mertesacker a lot. I like that a lot.

Szczesny has to be mentioned - his 2 saves at 0-0 were crucial, our heads may have dropped badly had we conceded given the recent pressure on us. The first one was his own fault for a poor clearance but the second was excellent positioning to deflect that point-blank header away.

Excellent, excellent, excellent. 

I didn't watch the game - how were we other than the 3 goal blast?

Fairly  controlled performance

TBF Villa could of scored first

I like what the OX brings to the team. Chambers was big money but looks very good already 

Great result. About time we thrashed someone and how strange was it to have such a comfortable second half where we could just pass it around for 45 minutes with the game won. What an extraordinary period with three goals in three minutes.

Beautiful goals, especially the second. As Paul said, two players who really needed a goal. Great ball from Welbeck through to Ozil and nice finish for the first. Great link up between Ramsey and Ozil and a great ball across to Welbeck for the 2nd. In the right spot and even he couldn't put that one wide. Loved that the ex Liverpool player scored the own goal too, but he had to go for it or Ox was getting a tap in at the back post.

Welbeck and Ozil linked up really well and Ozil was good throughout. Isn't it funny how players tend to play their best football in their best positions? Thought Ox was excellent too and really like what he brings to the side. He has to play in one of the wide positions really. Ramsey still wasn't at his best was did some nice things and was heavily involved in all the goals. Was good to be able to give Sanchez a rest as he's played almost every minute so far and was the one who ran himself into the ground in midweek. Was pleased personally that he wasn't one of the three late subs as I realised I'd put Welbeck on the bench this week in my Fantasy team and also have Sanchez so I needed someone to not play to get Welbeck's assist and goal points!

Great saves from Szczesny at 0-0, especially the header. Felt he could have come and claimed that ball but made himself big in the right place to anticipate the header. The first also came from his error with a poor kick out (which is becoming a big of an annoying habit from him).

Contrary to popular belief Ozil was not playing through the centre today. He moved a lot out to the right flank and popped up in the centre at key times, as he always does, but he was playing predominantly on the left like he has all of this season.

F365's analysis;

http://www.football365.com/faves/9481025/365-Says

And the heatmap...

In my opinion Ozil's starting position doesn't really matter. For me he plays the same kind of game no matter where he starts when he's playing for us - for Germany it's a little more disciplined with him staying out left a lot, but for us Wenger gives him free licence. I'd be interested to see some other heatmaps from this season - I swear in a couple of our games he's spent more time on the right than anywhere else, despite starting from the left. His lateral movement is one of his huge strengths. When he's on form he just seems to know when to be left or right, and when to pop up in the middle. This morning was a great illustration of that. 

For such a lazy, tired, no bottle foreigner he runs a bit .... Just 11kms today, clearly the most on the pitch.

I'll be fuming if Ozil goes the same way as Arshavin ... Run out of town by brainless no necks who expect every player to survive on grit and energy. We can afford to play an artist. I suspect that is what the 42000000 went on.

great result. ozil obviously read my posts on fabregas and showed me what he can bring. love it

Only just occurred to me that we had no defenders on the bench. Bollocks knows what we would have done if Koscielny or Mertesacker had got injured or sent off. Chambers looks good but it does feel a bit uncomfortable to have all our CBs playing at the same time with no cover.

Arshavin was my favourite player for a time. Will never forget that Anfield game. I was home sick all week that week and ran down the house screaming so loud at the 4th goal that I completely lost my voice for days. I won a magazine signed by him from a competition in the official Arsenal magazine too and on my first visit to the Emirates (2009 Emirates Cup) he scored 2 injury time goals to win the game. Another one Wenger never really played in his best position and eventually he just gave up trying. Such a shame how it all worked out.

Haha nice story there! My last trip to Emirate was Arsenal vs Liverpool and Diaby scored the winning and only goal!

Paulm, you are right to a point about Oezil not necessarily starting in a specific position but it does matter where others are postioned in relation to him, playing centrally allows him to drift and create overloads in wide areas of the pitch or pull players from central to wide areas and create space for others.

Agree with that. Starting central and being able to pull defenders wide is different to starting out wide with others already crowding the middle. Ozil doing this was probably one of the key reasons for Ramsey's form last season too.

I love this comment from Wenger's post match presser:

Perhaps you could buy some who want to play in defence or out wide then!

Missed the game but sounds like top work all round. Very happy to see Özil and Welbeck showing what they're capable of!

great weekend result wise

Cocks, both flavour of Scouse, Chq Book Chumps all losing, Blue Budget Blowers in draw

Historically we seem to never take advantage of good fortune like this.

Now that's a sentence!

4 points off Chelsea going in to the game this weekend. No surprises with Mourinho playing a bus against City, surely Wenger and the boys see that coming this weekend and play accordingly. Defend and counter is all they do, but gets us every time. 

A draw at minimum would be the one! :)

My bad, Sp*rs this weekend. Two huge games then. They're looking pretty average too.

COYG 

Fucking hell just seen the United result! I really need to start watching more games than just Arsenal and the highlights. Great weekend of results with all our rivals dropping points. Particularly Liverpool getting battered and United conceding 5 to Leicester.

Great set of results for us eh! Can't remember the last time we benefited to such an extent in one round of the EPL.

Yeah, it certainly is normally the other way around. 3 points over spurs, everton and liverpool, 2 points over city and chelsea is an excellent deal. 3 more points this weekend and a positive result against Chelsea would be excellent. Hopefully Villa do not roll over for them this weekend.

Bloody hell that was mental, I lost it in my apartment in the Gold Coast during those 3 minutes. 

Enough's been said about the game, looking forward to SOTON I'd love to see:

                            Ospina

Bellerin       Chambers     Kosc     Monreal

                          Coquellin

 Rosicky    Wilshere    Diaby  Podolski

                         Welbeck

Looks about right although I'd prefer to start Campbell and rest Welbeck ahead of Spurs. Would be nice to be able to rest Kos and Chambers too but that's the reality only having 3 CBs - we can't. Who would be captain assuming Arteta and Mertesacker are both rested? Rosicky I guess.

Yes! I'd forgotten Campbell, poor bugger.

Captain for me would go to Rosicky OR I'd seriously consider throwing it to one of Poldi/Kosc/Wilshere.

I'd like to see

Ospina

Bellerin
Chambers
Hayden
Monreal*

Flamini
Diaby

Chamberlain
Rosicky
Podolski

Campbell

With Coquelin possibly for Flamini or off the bench, as well as Zelalem getting a run, and either Akpom or Sanogo. Few bigger names on the bench just in case

Martinez, Coquelin, Alexis, Zelalem, Wilshere, Akpom, Sanogo*

* Not sure if they're actually available? If not, Gibbs and Welbeck in for me.

I'd go for a full change-up including resting both Chambers and Koscielny. With our CB situation I feel we need to preserve them at all costs. Considering how short we are at the back we just can't risk them going down in this game, even if that ends up meaning we go out. The FA Cup win last season has taken the trophy pressure off enough for us to focus on the bigger 3 cups and not really care about this. I know this is a mental backline but if I was Wenger I'd go;

                    Ospina

Bellerin-Hayden-Monreal-Flamini

              Coquelin-Diaby

      Rosicky-Zelalem-Podolski

                  Campbell

Hadn't thought of doing that to the backline there Paul. Probably a good option, one I think Wenger would certainly refuse to do! Haha. But agreed, I'd do the same assuming that Monreal is available.

Debuchey has surgery, not back before Xmas

They showed his accident on Arse TV yesterday... I do not mean to make light of his situation but it all looked so innocuous

So did Girouds at the time...

Surely this means we must be considering recalling Jenkinson? He can come back to cover RB while Chambers rotates through CB with Per & Kosc.

I need to google before I post:
http://www.claretandhugh.info/wenger-cannot-recall...

According to PL rules a player on a year long loan can only be recalled during a transfer window...feck.

Monreal is not available for Soton game.

20 year old centre back Semi Ajeyji trained with the first team today so he could potentially start.

Or we could see Bellerin - Chambers - Hayden - Gibbs.