Arsenal v Fulham : 28/02/09 : 15:00

[General]

Tony, not just mental fatigue. Emotional fatigue as well. There were times in the second half when our team didn't look like it cared. I think the weight of the hurly burly of this season is weighing heavily on the boys.

Our entire defensive set-up, from midfield back was a shambles. We have not necessarily been keeping clean sheets because we are playing great defense. A large part of it is the teams we are playing have been as toothless as us if not more so.

Not at all. These guys do care. Half of them simply haven't the needed ability to make a difference. Wenger's repetitive use of the 'we weren't sharp enough' phrase is often mocked but I hazard more often than not, he is alluding at a physical issue within the subtleties. The physical demands of the PL is often underestimated and our players were visibly tired. The Roma game clearly took a lot out of them and we were dead after 80 minutes. Some had no legs to run on and Denilson for one has played far too many games this season.

 

[AnthonyG]

My point was that superior fitness is something always associated with Wenger's teams over the years. Statistically, we always scored more goals than any other team in the dying minutes. Wenger's teams were always capable going the full 90mins, irrespective of the circumstances, without the alarming drop in intensity we saw against Fulham.

This is, or rather maybe was, the case this year too. We were leading the league for scoring in the last 15 minutes; I suspect the recent drought may have chipped away at that statistic though.

 

[ThaSaltCracka]

Not at all. These guys do care. Half of them simply haven't the needed ability to make a difference. Wenger's repetitive use of the 'we weren't sharp enough' phrase is often mocked but I hazard more often than not, he is alluding at a physical issue within the subtleties. The physical demands of the PL is often underestimated and our players were visibly tired. The Roma game clearly took a lot out of them and we were dead after 80 minutes. Some had no legs to run on and Denilson for one has played far too many games this season.

You may be on to something, that these guys might be tired. We have had a lot of injuries. But at the same time, EVERYONE knew this team lacked depth going into the season. We have all these promising young players, but a lot of these guys really aren't ready to play PL football. Wenger should have added to the squad, and he didn't. He is to blame for the lack of tired players, if that is the case.

 

[Mbaki Mutahaba]

How do you measure "if someone cares". That phrase is always thrown around like a red flag pops on their shoulder to inform us of that effect. These are professionals and I certainly believe they do care. They have more reasons to care then not to care, even if its purely selfish ones.

They were tired even the amateur players in this A-M should know how that goes..when your legs just wont listen to your mind.

Fulham played well, just give them that. We still should have won this game..we have played worse and won. It didnt happen so, get over it..lets move on. Maybe we should all pay a visit to the chelski/lpool forums for a better percpective. Most teams especially this year have not been beaten easily. Look at the number of 1-0 games, last minute winners and the total goals scored by the top teams. It would give you a reflection of how this season has been, not just for us.

 

[progman07]

How do you measure "if someone cares". That phrase is always thrown around like a red flag pops on their shoulder to inform us of that effect. These are professionals and I certainly believe they do care. They have more reasons to care then not to care, even if its purely selfish ones.

They were tired even the amateur players in this A-M should know how that goes..when your legs just wont listen to your mind.

Fulham played well, just give them that. We still should have won this game..we have played worse and won. It didnt happen so, get over it..lets move on. Maybe we should all pay a visit to the chelski/lpool forums for a better percpective. Most teams especially this year have not been beaten easily. Look at the number of 1-0 games, last minute winners and the total goals scored by the top teams. It would give you a reflection of how this season has been, not just for us.

This part caught my eye. Being tired is a bad excuse for anything, because if a player is tired, why not rest him? But Wenger didn't even use 3 subs. Also, after every game we can find excuses, today we were tired, against Sunderland we were unlucky, etc. etc. but the end is, we won't reach the 4th place if we don't win.
In a game like this you MUST win, regardless whether you are tired, or how Fulham plays.


Oh and this mentality I always find strange. Today we compare us to Liverpool, and come to the conclusion that we didn't do that bad at all. Last week we compared us to Aston Villa, then we could have thought, we didn't do that bad... Always comparing us to a different loser, it just doesn't work., because if we want comparing, we must do it consistently. While we won a point on Liverpool, on Aston Villa we probably will lose 2, and this is what matters, not whether we got closer to the 2nd placed team. Hope you get what I mean.

 

[tbbosa]

My quick thoughts on the whole situation:
This has not been a good season for us at Arsenal that's sure, but personally believe its not that bad as people would make you believe, to the point of wanting AW out.
We have been very unlucky with injuries in the past two years or so, hopefully next season things will improve. But also every team among the so called top four has had to adjust and have found it a little bit harder this season, given that most teams have actually improved a lot, that's why we have not had so many big teams doing big scores so more often this season, like it has been in previous years. This is due to the fact that all teams either have improved greatly or have money to attract decent players. This makes the EPL clearly to be the best and most competitive league in Europe. This used to be the case in Spain where smaller teams were harder to beat, and now it’s the case in the EPL.
This therefore, calls for change of tactics (only issue I have with AW) and expectations from the fans, we need to start grinding out results, instead of expecting to completely destroy these teams, like Manure has realised, and can do 1-0 scores. Unfortunately this period found us in a time of transition when our team was still maturing unable to grind out 1-0 results. Manu of a few years back would have had the exact same problems we have right now as they were in a transition of their own, but they had just gone past that maturing stage when this revolution in the EPL started, slightly after the two years of Chelsea domination, every team improved, teams like West Ham , Aston Villa , Hull, Wigan, Everton etc..either got new owners or more money and were able to attract good players. Several other traditional teams like Sp**s, Newcastel, Blackburn etc…that have always been competitive, were also caught unware by this revolution in the EPL, and therefore have had to struggle. And am afraid that just buying players and changing managers for the sake of it, cant cut it naymore, case to mention again is Sp**s who have been outsmarted by more hard working teams.
As for Arsenal, we were caught in that transition, with injuries to key players. This led to players like Flamini and Helb, who did not believe in the project to jump ship (into fire if I may add). All these factors have not helped our cause. But am sure we shall get there, only the myopic fans who want success today and now cant see that.
Clearly we have some of the most technically gifted players in Europe right now, I mean look at Nasir, Ramsey, Wilshere, Walcott, Gibbs; Merida, Vela, Djourou etc..these are great talents, problem is they are young and learning and need support. But also with Cesc and Eduardo back, Arshavin, Ade, Rosicky and Van parsie can help us achieve great things, as these are mature enough to provide the momentum.
I agree with AW, in 2 years time we shall be able to out smart these funny defensive teams, only we need to be patient. I would love to be here when that happens.!!
As for the myopic fans, adios amigos!!!

 

[jay-d]

Oh give this 2 years thing a rest now. Wenger and the players have been bleeting this 2 years **** for, well over 2 years now. And how do you get off saying we have some of the most trchnical players in Europe? Don't fool yourself, the continent is awash with players of similar or better technicality. Wenger believed the hype when everyone said that ' any player would love to play under Wenger ' so he planned long term thinking that no one would leave etc. He didn't cont in any variables like better wages, want of immediate success etc. So when this happens his whole plan is thrown back years and this is the cycle we have seen for years now and one which will continue to happen if Wenger treads the same path, players leave - replaced by a younger 'Talent' who needs to 2 years to become a world beater - we struggle - Almost get there then repeat stage 1 and so on and on.

 

[ricky1985]

What a frustrating end to the football week!

What went wrong yesterday? The same thing that has been going wrong all season - the midfield aren't capable of controlling possession, and the strain that is putting on our defense is crippling our team.

When we 'squeezed' the game yesterday Fulham were in big, big trouble. We had them stuck in their own third of the pitch, and we hit them with attack after attack. Unfortunately these periods only last for a few minutes at a time.

It's so obvious what is happening. The defense looks to push up, which in turn forces the opposition to retreat, and we begin to control the game. It's Wenger's mantra and always has been. Minute by minute the midfield gives up more possession, and the defense find themselves exposed, so they begin to drop deeper, and deeper. Allowing the opposition to come at us, and one thing is for sure the midfield doesn't have the experience or defensive know-how to play defensively.

It's been happening all season, and is a terminal failure in the functioning of this team. Basically, if we can't push up and 'squeeze' the game and as a result control the opposition, we become a very average team.

I thought we actually played some very good football at times yesterday. Some of the one and two-touch stuff Nasri, Vela, Van Persie and Arshavin produced was promising. Somewhere in our team there is a breakdown occuring, a consistent failure in the our transistion from back to front.
It's not neccessarily even giving the ball away to the opposition, but persistently not playing the right pass at the right time, which would move us further up the pitch. I suppose the two obvious suspects are Diaby and Denilson, and maybe their only real failings are that they aren't Cesc Fabregas? They have other strengths and are good players in their own rights, but they simply can't give the team what Fabregas does, and it's what it desperately needs.

 

[General]

This team doesn’t need Cesc Fabregas, a DM or Jesus Christ of Nazareth. It doesn’t need a saviour and Cesc certainly isn’t one judging by his half hearted performances this season. The same fickle argument was put forward for Robin last season after we went into sleep mode towards the end of last season and threw away the title.

You have to take your chances at this level when you create them and the so called small teams are no pushovers anymore. Simply have a look at the number of 1-0 games this season, with United the biggest beneficiaries and no one is overwhelming the opposition. Liverpool lost 2-0 to Boro despite the game being one-way traffic for the most part. They could’ve been 5-0 up at half time yet lost miserably. These are the margins deciding the games.

We created clear cut chances against Fulham. It is very convenient to sidestep the issue and look for blame elsewhere but it was the same scenario against Sunderland with wastefulness in front of goal. A DM or Cesc matter very little if we are not putting the ball in the back of the net. People love reviving the political debate on this board after every failure but as much as it’s stating the obvious; football inevitably comes down to who takes their chances and we didn’t take ours.

The main concern for me is the fact that we seem to have hit a fitness issue exacerbated by the fact that we rely heavily on a 21 year old player who’s played far too many games this season. Whereas in the past we would’ve laid siege on the opposition’s box in the dying minutes, we’ve looked dead and buried after 80mins the past few games.

 

[Galahad]

Well...I think we should start by not blaming certain players for our current season and situation. Its not down to some absentees (although they might have turned a couple of games around) nor about a couple of poor performances from a couple of players that change weekly (in names). I think we should get away from blaming Ade for some missed chances, then blame van Persie for some missed chances, then blame Denilson for a lack of creativity and then someone else. What we should realize quite cleary is that it is a team problem. At the moment there is not one single player we have (leave aside Arshavin, he just joined) who delivered frequently this season. Everyone had a couple of decent games and a couple of poor games. Thers no exception to this. Eboue certainly had decent games too, Fabregas was **** in several games, dont tell me RVP is a class act and world class player and even Adebayor had a couple of good games.

Now we shouldnt blame players for missing some chances, because on the other side other teams also missed chances and in football you simply dont score from every opportunity. We had a couple of good chances but there was no 100% chance. The keeper of Fulham saved well and their defence was quite solid. I think you have to admit that a draw was the result everybody deserved and as long as this holds true we cant really complain over missed chances. And as long as a draw is the result we deserve, and that HAS been the case for a long time now, we are likely to get draws.

So what more leads us to believe this is a team problem? Our style of play, or rather the absence of a style of play. We are headless, each of our players. Nobody knows wether we should eep it low, wether to cross all the time, wether to hoof balls up. We just play a mix of all of that and wonder why it never works. Toure hoofs them up all the time, Sagna and Clichy cross into the sideline or the touchline frequently, rarely if ever hitting an arsenal player and our midfielders help themselfs with backward passes. Our strikerws dont get into action too often anymore as the service they get is tiny at best.
To sum it all up, we dont look like a team, we look more of a crop of players that havent played together too often. When I play with my friends this is about what we get, headless action and no plan behind it. This is exactly what Arsenal have looked like this season.

Now we ahve been criticised for not having a plan B the past seasons, always trying to pass the ball into space, play quick 1-2s etc. Now we dont even have a plan A anymore and you cant argue, this isnt beneficial. Id like us to return to our old style, our old plan A. It certainly wasnt perfect but at least we were genuine title contenders with it. We maybe tried to include a plan B and it certainly hasnt worked.

On the other hand the players as a whole arent too satisfieing. All of them are too inconsistent (as mentoned above) and we dont have a single world class player. Dont tell me Fabregas is one, Fabregas is as guilty as anyone else (and so is Robin) about inconsistency and great players are fairly conistent. We cant judge Eduardo and Arshavin yet, one has been out for too long, the other has only been with us for so long.
The point Im trying to make is we dont have anyone who excels, who stands out who carries us forward and who can carry players that arent playing well at the moment. If ManU plays **** they still have Ronaldo who can open up any defense with his magic. This doesnt work all the time ofcourse, but at least they have an option to try it. We dont even have that option. Chelsea have Lampard with his long range shots, so do Liverpool with their Steven Gerrard. Whom do we have?

Another problem that some dont even realize: we are getting older and older but not better at all. It was more then 2 seasons ago when Wenger told us how young our team is and how much experience they will get from this disappointing result. Well they went on for 2 years and nothing has changed. We had a side with an average age of 24 or so against Roma I think (commentator mentioned that and he said OUTFIELD players!). This isnt exactly old, but this certainly isnt extraordinary young either. This would be an age where you expect players to perform and show consistency. And most of them are at an age where you think they wont improve much further if they havent learned more in the recent past. Some just cant learn any more and it seems that some of our players fit to that.

I remember reading an article about just that, that this Arsenal idea of young players isnt new, that Man City tried this some 30 years back or so. And what I will always remember is the authors final statement "And you have to ask the question: Where are they now?". I would like to ask all of you, do you REALLY think that our current crop of players will become superstars? I dont think Denilson will get much better, certainly not Diaby (hes not that young anymore...) and pretty certainly not Song. Wilshere, I dont know, I have hopes for him. Bendtner...well I have no clue. Walcott was stagnating for a long time, now he has injury woes that wont help him...Frankly, Im not too sure we will be any different then the Man City from then...

 

[DOUBLE-YOU]

Well...I think we should start by not blaming certain players for our current season and situation. Its not down to some absentees (although they might have turned a couple of games around) nor about a couple of poor performances from a couple of players that change weekly (in names). I think we should get away from blaming Ade for some missed chances, then blame van Persie for some missed chances, then blame Denilson for a lack of creativity and then someone else. What we should realize quite cleary is that it is a team problem. At the moment there is not one single player we have (leave aside Arshavin, he just joined) who delivered frequently this season. Everyone had a couple of decent games and a couple of poor games. Thers no exception to this. Eboue certainly had decent games too, Fabregas was s**t in several games, dont tell me RVP is a class act and world class player and even Adebayor had a couple of good games.

Now we shouldnt blame players for missing some chances, because on the other side other teams also missed chances and in football you simply dont score from every opportunity. We had a couple of good chances but there was no 100% chance. The keeper of Fulham saved well and their defence was quite solid. I think you have to admit that a draw was the result everybody deserved and as long as this holds true we cant really complain over missed chances. And as long as a draw is the result we deserve, and that HAS been the case for a long time now, we are likely to get draws.

So what more leads us to believe this is a team problem? Our style of play, or rather the absence of a style of play. We are headless, each of our players. Nobody knows wether we should eep it low, wether to cross all the time, wether to hoof balls up. We just play a mix of all of that and wonder why it never works. Touré hoofs them up all the time, Sagna and Clichy cross into the sideline or the touchline frequently, rarely if ever hitting an arsenal player and our midfielders help themselfs with backward passes. Our strikerws dont get into action too often anymore as the service they get is tiny at best.
To sum it all up, we dont look like a team, we look more of a crop of players that havent played together too often. When I play with my friends this is about what we get, headless action and no plan behind it. This is exactly what Arsenal have looked like this season.

Now we ahve been criticised for not having a plan B the past seasons, always trying to pass the ball into space, play quick 1-2s etc. Now we dont even have a plan A anymore and you cant argue, this isnt beneficial. Id like us to return to our old style, our old plan A. It certainly wasnt perfect but at least we were genuine title contenders with it. We maybe tried to include a plan B and it certainly hasnt worked.

On the other hand the players as a whole arent too satisfieing. All of them are too inconsistent (as mentoned above) and we dont have a single world class player. Dont tell me Fabregas is one, Fabregas is as guilty as anyone else (and so is Robin) about inconsistency and great players are fairly conistent. We cant judge Eduardo and Arshavin yet, one has been out for too long, the other has only been with us for so long.
The point Im trying to make is we dont have anyone who excels, who stands out who carries us forward and who can carry players that arent playing well at the moment. If ManU plays s**t they still have Ronaldo who can open up any defense with his magic. This doesnt work all the time ofcourse, but at least they have an option to try it. We dont even have that option. Chelsea have Lampard with his long range shots, so do Liverpool with their Steven Gerrard. Whom do we have?

Another problem that some dont even realize: we are getting older and older but not better at all. It was more then 2 seasons ago when Wenger told us how young our team is and how much experience they will get from this disappointing result. Well they went on for 2 years and nothing has changed. We had a side with an average age of 24 or so against Roma I think (commentator mentioned that and he said OUTFIELD players!). This isnt exactly old, but this certainly isnt extraordinary young either. This would be an age where you expect players to perform and show consistency. And most of them are at an age where you think they wont improve much further if they havent learned more in the recent past. Some just cant learn any more and it seems that some of our players fit to that.

I remember reading an article about just that, that this Arsenal idea of young players isnt new, that Man City tried this some 30 years back or so. And what I will always remember is the authors final statement "And you have to ask the question: Where are they now?". I would like to ask all of you, do you REALLY think that our current crop of players will become superstars? I dont think Denilson will get much better, certainly not Diaby (hes not that young anymore...) and pretty certainly not Song. Wilshere, I dont know, I have hopes for him. Bendtner...well I have no clue. Walcott was stagnating for a long time, now he has injury woes that wont help him...Frankly, Im not too sure we will be any different then the Man City from then...

good post. i think this is one of the most sensible analysis' of arsenal i have seen for a long time. There is one aspect that i think everyone has overlooked though, and that is confidence. i watched the fulham game twice and it's clear to see that the team has no confidence. it's not the opposition but the arsenal players who are scared to play at the emirates. players are scared to play one-two's and passes are under hit. everyone thinks twice before a pass or shot is made.

Personally i don't think the squad is poor, what i do feel is wenger made a mistake getting rid of too many experienced players too quickly. i look at man utd and see how giggs, scholes and neville have passed on certain ethics to younger players. now rio, rooney have the united way instilled in them and pass that on to new players. I feel a player like diaby would be a sensation if he had vieira next to him and bergkamp ahead of him.

we can still make something of this season. i won't judge till may.

 

[ricky1985]

good post. i think this is one of the most sensible analysis' of arsenal i have seen for a long time. There is one aspect that i think everyone has overlooked though, and that is confidence. i watched the fulham game twice and it's clear to see that the team has no confidence. it's not the opposition but the arsenal players who are scared to play at the emirates. players are scared to play one-two's and passes are under hit. everyone thinks twice before a pass or shot is made.

Personally i don't think the squad is poor, what i do feel is wenger made a mistake getting rid of too many experienced players too quickly. i look at man utd and see how giggs, scholes and neville have passed on certain ethics to younger players. now rio, rooney have the united way instilled in them and pass that on to new players. I feel a player like diaby would be a sensation if he had vieira next to him and bergkamp ahead of him.

we can still make something of this season. i won't judge till may.

I agree, it would be great if we still had half of the 'invincibles' here to offer advice, and fulfil crucial squad roles, but it simply wasn't and still isn't feasible.

Man united pay Giggs, Scholes and Neville somewhere in the region of £80,000 a week each. Campbell, Vieira, Pires, Bergkamp and Henry would have wanted that and some, to stay at Arsenal. We simply weren't/aren't in a financial position to do something like that. Ferguson is very fortunate in this repsect.

 

[progman07]

good post. i think this is one of the most sensible analysis' of arsenal i have seen for a long time. There is one aspect that i think everyone has overlooked though, and that is confidence. i watched the fulham game twice and it's clear to see that the team has no confidence. it's not the opposition but the arsenal players who are scared to play at the emirates. players are scared to play one-two's and passes are under hit. everyone thinks twice before a pass or shot is made.

Personally i don't think the squad is poor, what i do feel is wenger made a mistake getting rid of too many experienced players too quickly. i look at man utd and see how giggs, scholes and neville have passed on certain ethics to younger players. now rio, rooney have the united way instilled in them and pass that on to new players. I feel a player like diaby would be a sensation if he had vieira next to him and bergkamp ahead of him.

we can still make something of this season. i won't judge till may.

I agree, it would be great if we still had half of the 'invincibles' here to offer advice, and fulfil crucial squad roles, but it simply wasn't and still isn't feasible.

Man united pay Giggs, Scholes and Neville somewhere in the region of £80,000 a week each. Campbell, Vieira, Pires, Bergkamp and Henry would have wanted that and some, to stay at Arsenal. We simply weren't/aren't in a financial position to do something like that. Ferguson is very fortunate in this repsect.

Well, I'd rather pay Pires than Eboue and Diaby together, so that's solved... But to be honest, our old players maybe wouldn't like to play a backup role, who knows.

 

[stiiphunn]

There's one big difference between this 0-0 result and the three others we've conceded... For once we created chances throughout the game. And Arshavin was the reason behind this.

This is the only thing that keeps me hoping.

Also great posts DOUBLE-YOU and Galahad.

 

[Anzac]

Also great posts DOUBLE-YOU and Galahad.

Agreed.

 

[stiiphunn]

good post. i think this is one of the most sensible analysis' of arsenal i have seen for a long time. There is one aspect that i think everyone has overlooked though, and that is confidence. i watched the fulham game twice and it's clear to see that the team has no confidence. it's not the opposition but the arsenal players who are scared to play at the emirates. players are scared to play one-two's and passes are under hit. everyone thinks twice before a pass or shot is made.

Personally i don't think the squad is poor, what i do feel is wenger made a mistake getting rid of too many experienced players too quickly. i look at man utd and see how giggs, scholes and neville have passed on certain ethics to younger players. now rio, rooney have the united way instilled in them and pass that on to new players. I feel a player like diaby would be a sensation if he had vieira next to him and bergkamp ahead of him.

we can still make something of this season. i won't judge till may.

I agree, it would be great if we still had half of the 'invincibles' here to offer advice, and fulfil crucial squad roles, but it simply wasn't and still isn't feasible.

Man united pay Giggs, Scholes and Neville somewhere in the region of £80,000 a week each. Campbell, Vieira, Pires, Bergkamp and Henry would have wanted that and some, to stay at Arsenal. We simply weren't/aren't in a financial position to do something like that. Ferguson is very fortunate in this repsect.

That's true Ricky.

But just to comment on DOUBLE-YOU's initial point, I'd say that right now, confidence is exactly what we lack. I watched the Inter-Roma game tonight, and frankly I thought to myself "wow when was the last time i saw some quick one touch passing?". Roma played some lovely stuff tonight, and I can't even remember the last time we did this. As Double-you said you don't see any one-two, any creative pass that opens up a defence. Arshavin's pass to Nasri on saturday is exactly what we've been lacking. The rest of our players always choose the safe option because they're short on confidence - and for some it's because they're just not good enough.

 

[outlaw_member]

Yeah, they were class today against Inter. Vucinic and Pizarro will be key, if Roma stage a resurgance against us.

 

[General]

I watched the Inter-Roma game tonight, and frankly I thought to myself "wow when was the last time i saw some quick one touch passing?". Roma played some lovely stuff tonight, and I can't even remember the last time we did this. As Double-you said you don't see any one-two, any creative pass that opens up a defence. Arshavin's pass to Nasri on saturday is exactly what we've been lacking. The rest of our players always choose the safe option because they're short on confidence - and for some it's because they're just not good enough.

These cross-league comparisons hold very little significance. I saw the Inter-Roma game and you’d be lucky to come across that amount of space and slow pace in the PL. It was ridiculous and United could’ve easily cricket scored them last week in the CL. The defending from both sides was also comical to say the least and even West Brom would’ve looked good against Inter. You saw how good we looked against Roma when they gave us all the time and space in the world. The physical, high tempo nature and technical improvements in the PL are the main reasons behind the recent resurgence of English teams in Europe and the continental teams are struggling to cope.

 

[Galahad]

Well to the confidence part: I am not overly surprised by that...the players get booed out of their own stadium every week now, our fans are letting the players know everytime they make a msitake and you cant expect players to ignore all that. Im not blaming the fans here, I understand everyone of you who is frustrated and I would possibly do the same. But the general problem with this is that players arent exactly happy to be at home...getting booed by your own supporters should knack almost any players confidence. Add to that the disappointments we suffered this season and you get the result we see on the pitch every week. Now if I knew one way to change all that Id possibly be the man to take over a coaching role at Arsenal, but as Im only a normal human I dont even have a clue on how to fix that. Its kind of a downwards spiral, the players dont perform -> fans get angry -> fans let the players know -> players lose confidence and play worse -> fans get even more angry -> atmosphere in the stadium is hostile towards our own players -> players confidence is shattered -> players get even more erratic...

 

[progman07]

Well to the confidence part: I am not overly surprised by that...the players get booed out of their own stadium every week now, our fans are letting the players know everytime they make a msitake and you cant expect players to ignore all that. Im not blaming the fans here, I understand everyone of you who is frustrated and I would possibly do the same. But the general problem with this is that players arent exactly happy to be at home...getting booed by your own supporters should knack almost any players confidence. Add to that the disappointments we suffered this season and you get the result we see on the pitch every week. Now if I knew one way to change all that Id possibly be the man to take over a coaching role at Arsenal, but as Im only a normal human I dont even have a clue on how to fix that. Its kind of a downwards spiral, the players dont perform -> fans get angry -> fans let the players know -> players lose confidence and play worse -> fans get even more angry -> atmosphere in the stadium is hostile towards our own players -> players confidence is shattered -> players get even more erratic...

Perfect assessment.

My solution would be very hard (probably impossible) to manage but a very effective one: all the Emirates fans should forgive the team for two consecutive games, totally forgive them (maybe temporarily, maybe permanently). Sing their names, cheer them, don't boo at mistakes. The players will have two full games to regain confidence and prove themselves in less hostile surroundings. If we win, we can get back on winning roads. It would be worth a try, but of course it needs 60k people to be done and it's not exactly easy to communicate...