Legend14
Established Member
Yep. He’ll play 50% of matches in my opinion. Not his fault. Arteta needs to sign an equal level striker to help shoulder the load.
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Arsenal Pre-Season 2023
- Thread starter A_G
- Start date
- Replies 4,760
- Views 177,727
TakeChillPill
Established Member
Havertz is looking as bad as expected
HomeSteak
Established Member
So we had a **** pre season
Country: South Africa
Player:Nketiah
Missed the game entirely as I was out for the evening.
Seen some initial analysis on our struggles against Monaco, and it’s worrying to see, I can’t lie. But it also gives us clear, common areas where we will see the opposition target.
FMS makes a clear video on the game here…
Seen some initial analysis on our struggles against Monaco, and it’s worrying to see, I can’t lie. But it also gives us clear, common areas where we will see the opposition target.
FMS makes a clear video on the game here…
Riou
In The Winchester, Waiting For This To Blow Over
Country: Northern Ireland
Player:Gabriel
Balogun "I think I deserve some starts boss, my form on loan last year was really good!"
Arteta "You know what son, because you had the courage to say that to me...I am gonna make Eddie captain now!!!"
Arteta "You know what son, because you had the courage to say that to me...I am gonna make Eddie captain now!!!"
Riou
In The Winchester, Waiting For This To Blow Over
Country: Northern Ireland
Player:Gabriel
Also if you search Arsenal on Google today, it has fireworks celebrating us winning the ****ing Emirates Cup
Country: England
Ngl I’m actually very concerned about the whole balance of our midfield. I know it’s very early to jump to any concrete conclusions but the way our team was setup very early in preseason last season by suffocating the opposition in their half and our shape being compact when we didn’t have the ball was why we won 5 games on the bounce in the PL straight away last season.
The only hope is that the other teams around us have similar issue as they’ve changed a few things too.
When it comes down to the first game of the season there will be more continuity than people think. Arteta will still try things in the community shield.
Martinelli-----Trossard------Saka
------------Havertz--------Ødegaard
-----------------------Partey
--Timber----Gabriel-Saliba---White
--------------------Ramsdale
Two changes. Everyone else knows the game model back to front.
Country: England
That’s what I thought initially and it look good on paper but still not convinced Havertz does enough compared to what Xhaka was providing us.
I think we’ll be fine for Forest at home but Palace away after that will be frustrating imo.
GoonerBoy19
Well-Known Member
He was alright, some neat passing, good work rate and also won few headers. Vieira,ESR,Saliba,Tomiyasu were very poor.
Playing Xhaka role won't be easy, even rice is nowhere near the levels Granit performed last year.
Buhry
Established Member
Country: Norway
I agree with this, the right side was terrible.
Think Havertz looked a bit more useful than Rice when he came on as well. Rice had 2 good moments but overall I thought he was pretty poor. If Xhaka played like that people would certainly not be praising it.
Gunner D
Coronavirus Truther; ex. Gunner boy dd
Do you support Arsenal because of Kai Havertz? Just asking because you joined around the same time we were linked to him , and most your posts seems to be about him.
Not having a dig or anything, just curious.
HomeSteak
Established Member
My opinion changed after watching us in pre-season. We are not ready at all, and the team is full of red flags. We cannot defend, we have about 20 defenders at the club, but still, it's been more then 7 months since we last defended well. Our transition is crap, we got done by everyone, Monaco, a **** team, lets be honest, created non stop chances, just walked in our box while we had a good back 4 and Rice - Partey in front. We were opened like a bottom tier team. I'm not very happy with Ramsdale either, and then we get the links ... and it's someone worse.
I think we got most of our transfers wrong. And we also ignored major issues in the squad. Saka still has no back-up(I don't even want to type this ****, but if he gets a injury like say Jesus got now, we are ****ed). And of course we have no back-up striker, hell I would say our main striker, our star...is not what we really need either. We can and should improve on Jesus as well.
We have a huge squad, and if Arteta stays the same, and never rotates...people will not be happy. Yeah, you can keep them happy for a period but only if you win...if we start loosing, you will start seeing people talking to the press about playing time.
The pressure will also be huge this season, and up until now, we have seen that this team and Arteta do not handle pressure well at all. So thats another thing that must change...and I'm not confident it will.
All that said, we are still a good team and Top 4 should be easy for them. But title? No, not this year. Shame, as I think with how many players left City (and a few still wanting to leave) + the fact they won it all last year will **** with the motivation in that team...it would have been a good season to go for it. But I don't think we have enough. It will be more of Arsenal past world cup, not pre world cup.
I'm optimistic, that even if Arteta has been trash in europe all his life, in the CL, the enthusiasm of the young boys (playing for the first time, after this long) and the public...we will a have decent ride. We won't win it or get close to the final...but we will get to the quarters probably, and have some good games along the way.
And with this huge squad, we are well positioned to do well in the FA Cup and League Cup as well.
I think we got most of our transfers wrong. And we also ignored major issues in the squad. Saka still has no back-up(I don't even want to type this ****, but if he gets a injury like say Jesus got now, we are ****ed). And of course we have no back-up striker, hell I would say our main striker, our star...is not what we really need either. We can and should improve on Jesus as well.
We have a huge squad, and if Arteta stays the same, and never rotates...people will not be happy. Yeah, you can keep them happy for a period but only if you win...if we start loosing, you will start seeing people talking to the press about playing time.
The pressure will also be huge this season, and up until now, we have seen that this team and Arteta do not handle pressure well at all. So thats another thing that must change...and I'm not confident it will.
All that said, we are still a good team and Top 4 should be easy for them. But title? No, not this year. Shame, as I think with how many players left City (and a few still wanting to leave) + the fact they won it all last year will **** with the motivation in that team...it would have been a good season to go for it. But I don't think we have enough. It will be more of Arsenal past world cup, not pre world cup.
I'm optimistic, that even if Arteta has been trash in europe all his life, in the CL, the enthusiasm of the young boys (playing for the first time, after this long) and the public...we will a have decent ride. We won't win it or get close to the final...but we will get to the quarters probably, and have some good games along the way.
And with this huge squad, we are well positioned to do well in the FA Cup and League Cup as well.
blrgooner
Established Member
Made sense IMO. I thought we were fine in the attack except that players were often not in sync in the final moments. Rice got into good situations and should have looked for cut backs rather than crosses considering our team. Trossard should have made a simple pass to Nkethiah when he was through on goal etc.
WE were very poor from the defensive POV though. As mentioned here, it was very easy for them to find free attackers using defense splitting passes, and then I thought individually too, the defenders were not as calm and composed as they usually are. Also Don`t understand how the offside trap even worked, Looked like there was one opposition player ahead of our defensive line at every point of time. For me, the fact that the entire team had to pull back so often because of the ease with which Monaco were starting off moves affected our attacking performance which was otherwise quite fine( Though I assume in AM Havertz would be blamed for everything). I really don`t share the general bleak view based on this game actually. I think its a matter of time we improve defensively.
BigPoppaPump
Reeling from Laca & Kos nightmares
Was @BigPoppaPump right to be worried about Arsenal's midfield? Like everyone was so happy to get rid of Partey and Xhaka not that long ago.
Country: England
It’s preseason and Mikel has mixed up the teams quite a bit so I’m not drawing serious conclusions yet.
I was extremely pro Xhaka though, Partey I only want to leave for non footballing reasons. Football wise he’s comfortably our best centre mid as it stands.
BigPoppaPump
Reeling from Laca & Kos nightmares
I agree pre season doesn't mean much but it's just funny to me how people were so certain about how amazing Rice was a few weeks ago to having more realistic expectations now. You were reading all the same bullsh*t I was lol.
blrgooner
Established Member
I thought the issue defensively had nothing to do with Partey or Rice. In fact with both of them, we were still easily bypassed in the midfield. FMS made some good points reg why that happened in the video @SA Gunner shared.
In fact, our midfield was bypassed more often when Partey and Rice were playing then when Jorginho came on so I don`t agree with this idea that we were struggling when Partey was not there.
Country: England
I really liked the Rice signing, but the hype and expectations the forum put on the signing kinda dampened it for me a bit.
Without Partey, I think the season ambitions are capped at a 4th placed finish at best anyways.
Rice needs to learn the ropes and him being blown away by the training was quite telling to me.
