EPL - Bolton vs Arsenal - Sunday 24th April 16:00pm - SS1

[Anzac]

Nasri is another example. We essentially prolonged his ineffective form by sticking with him through thick and thin. There was no pressure placed on him to pull himself out of the rut. He suffered no punishment whatsoever for strolling through games.

Not just Nasri either, although I think the players are given extra leeway/time because they are constantly adapting to new positions & roles.

Nasri was an AMC when we signed him, then we used him as LW in a 442 until we signed AA. Since then he's been played as RWF, AMC & LWF & all before he's fully matured/developed as a player. He looked like he was finally settling into a position/role & had a run of form that had the pundits referring to him as the best player in the PL this season. Then AW decided to drop AA & moved Nasri to accomodate Theo, & Nasri has never been the same since.

Song is another at the same age who's position & role has changed in each of the last 3 seasons & the same holds for Cesc. Add to this that the midfield is the guts of the team & play & we've seen changes in shape, roles & players = no stability.

AW talks of this as player flexibility towards Total Football interchange, but the reality is that it dumbs down players towards a generic type of jack-of-all-trades as they never get the chance to learn a position/role well enough to excell at anything.

IMO AW moving our best player at the time smacks of playing favourites, as does his obsession with Cesc as AMC in a single striker formation. It also suggests he is willing to compromise the team capability in favour of individual 'requirements'.

 

[Anzac]

"Bolton played a Cup game today, they were 1 week late"

Arsène on Bolton...don't know whether to laugh or cry.

All that means is we'd have lost the CCup to Bolton as well then....

 

[viper_001]

Lol. He's a witty character, I'll grant him that.

I dunno, the comments sounded more embarrassing and petulant than witty. Bolton fought like warriors just days after having their FA Cup hopes shattered, and deserved recognition for it. They had us penned in our own half at times, and passed the ball about with the intent to score rather than shutting up shop.

Imagine if Pep had said the same thing after we won 2-1, or any other manager after we lost the CC final. Those same words out of anyone else's mouth and nobody here would be calling it witty. The press are starting to pick up on the way he throws his toys out of the pram now, and will dive in like starving piranha soon enough.

 

[ibby]

Imagine if Pep had said the same thing after we won 2-1, or any other manager after we lost the CC final. Those same words out of anyone else's mouth and nobody here would be calling it witty. The press are starting to pick up on the way he throws his toys out of the pram now, and will dive in like starving piranha soon enough.

That much is true. I remember when Arsenal fans got their knickers in a twist after comments Pep made about Wilshere.

It's a ****ish comment to make by Arsène.

 

[redwhiteAustrian]

I'm pretty sure we will, and at the same time offload one or two. Although Djorou has delivered decently in many games, he's untidy and seems prone to lose confidence. Koscielny annoys me so much. He's given away some absolutely imbecile penalties this season, and could easily have given away more.

And are you actually surprised?
The moment Arsène bought Kos, I knew we're in for a difficult season defensive-wise, because Kos had at that time even less experience on top level, than Verms had when he arrived.
It was a foregone conclusion that we might suffer a bit, so I'm/was not surprised.

We've had good spells during this season with Kos/DJ or Squib/DJ at the back, where no one can complain.
I've written DJ off at the start of the season where he looked shaky as hell, but he turned it around and has been one of our most consistant performers until the horrific CC/CL/FA Cup -out week, where he got injured. It seems to me he has lost his form massively due to that injury, as we could see against Spuds and yesterday, where Kos was obviously by far our best defender.

Squib did well alongside DJ this season, but not alongside Kos which isn't a surprise either, knowing that both of them are playing for the very first time in the PL in their careers. Yes he's more experienced, but not at that level, and experience alone doesn't help you to adapt more quickly.
Squib is a good 4th choice CB, and the fact we've had to play him that often was down to having our two established CBs more or less out for big parts of the season.


I fully agree with Mo, that we'd need top class CBs to challenge for the title, but honestly, how often has our backline let us down this season, compared to our attack?

It's always easy to blame those who're supposed to defend, but those who should create and score haven't done too well either this season. We've scored 9 goals less this season than last, that's a rather poor return if you ask me.

Could Cahill be the solution?
Not at all, unless he ensures that our attack is up for it in 95% of the matches.

 

[Kroket]

We might have scored less goals than we have last year but scoring goals doesn't necessarily win you titles. I agree we should have scored against Sunderland and Blackburn but look at the bigger picture. We have given away a two-goal lead seven times this season. We even went 4-0 up one game but failed to win. We conceded three goals in a home game to a newly promoted side, and we conceded six goals against Sp**s. We opened the scoring in the 97th (!) minute against Liverpool yet still couldn't hang on. Against Bolton Szczesny saved a penalty but our defence managed to concede twice from only three corners.

 

[Bossa]

We also had more points last season and we reached the quarter finals instead of the semis in the CL

Overall we had a better season last year. We havent really improved at all.

 

[redwhiteAustrian]

Yep, we gave many leads away during this season, but against Sp**s at home and away for example, we've still had plenty of time left to turn things around when we're with our backs at the wall, but we couldn't.
You always suffer from the odd mistake at the back, that can happen in each game, but these are the moments where you have to show some strength and fight your way back into it, but we often couldn't.

Newcastle away was obviously the fault of our defending yes, but there're many other occassions when our attacking play let us down massively.
Sunderland (home and away), Blackburn, Pool (home and away), Newcastle (home), WBA (home and away), Chelsea (away), ManUre (away twice),.......

I struggle to recall a season, where we've looked so dire and flat in attack that often in just a single campaign.

 

[Emma Lusa]

We also had more points last season and we reached the quarter finals instead of the semis in the CL

Overall we had a better season last year. We havent really improved at all.

It's worse than that are main rivals Utd and Chelski are having very poor seasons, Utd if they win all there remaining four games (that would include a win at our place and beating Chelski) will match there 2010 points, Chelski will (assuming they lose to Utd) be at least 12 points worse off.

Will we match our 83 - 41 goals for and against? ... well we're currently 67 - 36 so barring four goal feasts we will be worse on goals scored and conceivably worse on goals conceded. This is the season we were supposed to 'reach our potential' well if that's the case we're truly buggered.

 

[Kroket]

08/09 was a terrible season attacking-wise, remember that four game 0-0 streak we had in February? That season we only scored goals thanks to individual brilliance from Van Persie and, later on, Arshavin. Then there was the same period last season, where we were largely dependant on a few late goals from Bendtner to keep us in the title race.

Having said that, I do agree our attack has looked terribly blunt on more than one occasion, not only this season but stretching way back to the first game of 08/09. But even the Invincibles had to rely on a very strong defensive unit to maintain their dominance. We probably should have done better up front but I think it already should have been good enough to win a trophy or two this year.

 

[redwhiteAustrian]

Never doubted that we've to improve our defending either, but that's not the only problem and to single it out as our main problem is just too simple.

For all the attacking strength, movement and power we're supposed to have, I haven't seen enough brilliant attacking performances this season tbh.

The goals you don't score, you concede, simple as that.
And that has been as huge a problem, as our defending in recent seasons.

 

[Yousif Arsenal]

Never doubted that we've to improve our defending either, but that's not the only problem and to single it out as our main problem is just too simple.

For all the attacking strength, movement and power we're supposed to have, I haven't seen enough brilliant attacking performances this season tbh.

The goals you don't score, you concede, simple as that.
And that has been as huge a problem, as our defending in recent seasons.

This is 10000% true like yesterday or many match before how many chances we need to score one goal 10 or 15 chances to score and the other team like bolton yesterday they had just 3 corners and they score 2 goals and we had 10 corners and all was waste

 

[brady_style]

I've just read that over 50 per cent of the goals we've conceded this season have come from set pieces.

Apparently ( according to the Sun ) this was put to Wenger at the post match press conference and he agreed it was a shocking figure.

Over 50 per cent !

For God's sake can we please rectify this in the Summer.

For example against WBA we had both of our CB's standing just outside the penalty spot marking their men. These opposition players split one attacked the near post the other the back post. Of course Squillaci and Kos were left chasing after them and were nowhere near them when the scorer headed the ball into the goal.

It's common sense even at park level football to not have your main defensive header standing outside of the penalty spot.

Because we're so bad at set pieces you can rest assured that every team in the week leading up to our game practices routines over and over. And their strikers are told to look for frees anywhere within 15 yards of our box.

Ridiculous scenario.

Our attack has been poor but then so has United's.

Our defense has cost us.

 

[Bossa]

1. We dont really have the personel to defend set pieces properly, our only tall guy is Djourou and the rest are small.

2. We dont defend properly on set pieces. There's no good marking and positioning. Its like our defenders invite opposition players to head the ball

3. I believe that Cesc said that we do not practise on defence and set pieces.

Its really not that hard to fix this. Sign a tall CB 1.90+ who can jump and head the ball, and get a goddamn defensive coach like Keown or Dixon.

 

[redwhiteAustrian]

We should go to cover the player, rather than the room when defending set pieces.
There'll always be spaces you can't defend in your box, so it'd be more efficient if we covered the opposition and not the space.

That'd mean each defender and midfielder has to get instructions before the game, as to who he should cover when the opposition gets a set piece.

That shouldn't be too difficult.

 

[brady_style]

We should go to cover the player, rather than the room when defending set pieces.
There'll always be spaces you can't defend in your box, so it'd be more efficient if we covered the opposition and not the space.

That'd mean each defender and midfielder has to get instructions before the game, as to who he should cover when the opposition gets a set piece.

That shouldn't be too difficult.

But covering a man doesn't mean you stand right beside all the time.

If your man stands outside the penalty box for example and then charges towards the front post you'll never get to the ball before him.

This is one reason you never saw Tony Adams or Martin Keown standing looking up at players as they headed the ball into our net.

If your man stands far out and makes a run the best way to defend is to stand halfway between the penalty box and the 6 yard box in a line with your man.

In a way this is a kind of zonal play but then the best defenses combine man marking and zonal marking.

 

[redwhiteAustrian]

True, haven't thought about players who might run into the box when the corner is being taken.

Yeah, a combination of both types of defending might be the answer. It can't get worse than now.

 

[Bossa]

Wenger should have signed Cahill instead of Koscielny in the summer. Its not like Koscielny was that of a bargain. 10m for an unproven CB with only 1 year in ligue 1.

 

[mo50]

Signing a CB with the physique of a twig was always asking for trouble in the PL. Its like Wenger fancies handicapping himself before the season starts.

 

[Emma Lusa]

Defending set pieces is about team defending, you only have two CB's so if the attacking side puts six players in the box who marks the other four? We lose out at set pieces because we don't have midfield players or strikers who can do a decent defensive job why? Well according to Cesc they don't practice ... I don't believe that but clearly they don't practice enough.
It's the same at attacking set pieces without Verm we don't have anyone that can come up and be a real threat, we should have four or five players we don't.
Exactly the same as last year, year before blah blah blah blah ... fix it or get someone in who can.