Arsenal Vs Portsmouth - Player Rating

[DOUBLE-YOU]

What is it with people policing ratings in this thread? Not last season’s nonsense all over again and no surprise it’s the usual culprits at it. Obviously ratings can be very subjective and are usually down to personal interpretation. Post your own or find something better to do.

Diaby scored 2 and had a good game and only gets 7????!!!

I’m a big Diaby fan. I thought 7 was fair and defensively he can play better. He also did disappear a few times. I would love to see you come out and defend when the hate campaign against him is in full flow.

I am big supporter of diaby too and more often than not back him despite what the negative members of this forum say. I never questioned your feelings of him, i just thought 7 was relatively low. It is totally up to you what you post, as you say everything is down to interpretation, but i just felt 7 was low considering his contribution. I think without the goals his performance meritted a 7, so the fact he scored 2 -then for me - he should get at least 7.1

 

[outlaw_member]

To be fair, mate, he totally dominated the game against Holland, in the Euro's, like I hadn't seen anyone do on the international stage for a long time. You can't dominate a game when Cesc is in the same team as you, it's impossible, Fabregas is the heart beat of this side. Arshavin will become more involved and more clinical though - definitely.
Give him a chance, Henry was a really slow starter, as was Pires. At United, Ronaldo would usually explode into life around late Spetember, even October. Arshavin will explode soon enough, I suppose it's something for everyone to moan about in the mean time (not you Outlaw).

His Euro and Uefa Cup performances is exactly why I expected him to be a more dominant player. Although, as I alluded to later, it might not entirely be his own fault, and he is also playing in a team where he isn't the main man. Ultimately, I've fallen in the trap of expecting him to play as a midfielder like Pires, Hleb, Rosicky and co., when he is actually a forward.

 

[AnthonyG]

There is nothing wrong with 'policing' the ratings, whether one posts their own or not.

If you can't defend your ratings or don't want them questioned then maybe there is something wrong with them? It's all a little bit of post-match fun with some healthy debate thrown in.

 

[ricky1985]

Like yesterday when each and every one of my individual ratings was criticised by half the forum. I realised quite quickly that I wasn't exactly clear-headed when I wrote them. You live and learn.

 

[General]

There's everything wrong with policing when you haven't bothered to make one. That's the whole point and no wonder these threads grow very little. I have no problems discussing the contents of a rating not the meaningless numbers which are subject to interpretation.

 

[thegame24]

I only just saw their goal, alumina is really not good enough.

 

[banduan]

Diaby does indeed deserve 7 although he does deserve the MotM as well. Nobody did an 8 that day.

Diaby's problem was that he disappeared a little too often, especially 2nd half, and was still prone to over-dribbling. But this time the things he tried more often than not worked.

The most promising thing about Diaby now is that he is far far more willing to release the ball quickly. I like that he's doing that now, I never thought he'd change that aspect of his game.

 

[raphael_as]

Almunia (4) - Not going to make judgements on him as a keeper, but that goal was 110% his fault: No way someone should be beating him on a ball in the air, he gets 3ft extra just from being able to use his arms FFS.

Gallas (6.5) - Pretty solid and very encouraging to see both him and TV getting lose in the opposition box to score (even if it is with random parts of their body).

Only blemish for me was the Utaca incident - not so much the trip itself (which could have gone either way) but that he (and the rest of the defence) were so out of position.

(Quick note: I was watching the ATVO full-game stream (absolutely excellent value for someone like me who travels and can't always be sure of catching a match live) and they didn't show any replays of the Utaca incident at all, so the only angle I saw was the centre-field camera, not any of the behind the goal ones which would have probably been a lot more conclusive. From what I could see it looked like they got their feet tangled so it would have been harsh to have him sent off, but as I said absolutely no way to tell for sure).

Vermaelen (6.5) - Much like Gallas, very encouraging to see that they also seem to have a solid understanding at the back, with TV taking on players/balls higher up the pitch and Gallas covering. Two slight quibbles - firstly although I can't recall him losing a header, sometimes he was heading it straight back to Pompey players. Secondly Pompey did manage to get behind our lines a number of times, which concerns me. Having said that, I think a fair amount of that had to do with Eboue/Gibbs not being completely in sync when Gallas/TV came out to play a high line.

Eboue (5) - Pretty solid defensively, but was disappointed to see him coming inside pretty much every time he had the ball. Made our play quite narrow and also isolated Arshavin on the right flank.

Gibbs (4.5) - Not too impressed, and more so since he proved last season he can play a lot better. Made one very impressive stop on Piquoune (sp?) but he was the one who played him onside in the first place when the rest of the defence had moved up the pitch. Also didn't offer too much going forward, although there were some decent runs.

Denilson (6) - I'm not really a fan at all, but since I didn't actually see him do anything hideously wrong, noted a couple of good bits of play and Pompey didn't score (except from Almunia's blatant error) I think he was pretty effective in this match, especially since he didn't have Song to cover him and Diaby is far more attack minded.

Cesc (7.5) - Excellent during long stretches of the first half would probably have been a serious candidate for MOTM had he stayed on. Let's hope his hamstring does not turn out to be too serious.

Diaby (7.5) MOTM - Two very well taken goals and quite a bit of endeavour in the first half, thought he disappeared for long stretches in the second, which is why he isn't higher. I'd really like to see how a Song-Cesc-Diaby mid-field works, but am a little bit concerned that our midfield in the 4-3-3 plays quite narrow.

Front-line (6) - Honestly, I thought they were all excellent in patches (Eduardo's little nutmeg for the 1st goal, RvP's pass for the 4th, Arshavin dancing in past 3-4 Pompey defenders from the sideline (although the shot was very tame)) and it's hard to complain too much when we score 4 goals, but sooner or later these boys are going to have to get their shooting boots on.

Ramsey (7) - Very good performance from the lad, obviously the distribution and directing our play that Cesc gives us wasn't there, but apart from that he put in a very solid half of work, was looking to make himself available and did his job on the defensive side as well. Topped off by a very well taken goal.

Bendtner/Merida - Don't think either of them really got long enough on the pitch for a proper rating, especially since the rest of the team were obviously conserving their energy being 4-1 up.