FR: Arsenal vs Internazionale | 29/07/07

[Unkmengani]

Gibbs did well, considering his age and oh yeah, yet another player being asked to play out of position.

Exactly how many CMs do you reckon we have???

I'd say about 15!

I would neither lambast or eulogise on his performance coz basically he's only 17, it was a friendly, he was nervous, big crowd, TV cameras, jumpers for goal posts, etc.

But he looked promising...Fair play to the fella.

 

[Lord Dula]

Well, to be fair on him, I'm appraising his performance without taking his age into consideration - I'm more interested in the quality of our squad at the moment, than the progression of youngsters, and in that context, Gibbs looked way out of contention - if you ask me, he does not look good enough, at this stage, to be part of our first team without seriously decreasing the level of quality we have on the pitch.

But you do take into account age when appraising Senderos, and now you've started to judge players on 70 mins of effectively non-competitive first team football.

Zah?

 

[asajoseph]

You're barking up the wrong tree Dula.

I'm talking about Gibbs' match, which I think was poor, not his career, which I think should be alright.

 

[Jameel46]

i think although not spectacular showed good signs, he did play the safe pass sometimes but when you're nervous it's better to be safe than sorry. if you don't take his experince into consideration than obviously you'd expect more but considering his experience and the pressure he must've felt than you'd say it was a decent enough performance. (notice i said experience instead of Age , there's a difference)

 

[sabret00the]

Having watched the game again it's this simple:

What did Gibbs do == What did Eboue do?

Both ran a lot, both linked up play, both had shots and for how well they looked aesthetically with the wind running through their hair; neither actually done anything.

 

[jay-d]

Having watched the game again it's this simple:

What did Gibbs do == What did Eboue do?

Both ran a lot, both linked up play, both had shots and for how well they looked aesthetically with the wind running through their hair; neither actually done anything.

Not a chance Sabre. Eboue was far more positive in everything he done. He ran at players and provided a genuine attacking threat on the day.

I'm not for one minute saying he's the answer to our right wing problem, but to compare his performance with the performance of Gibbs is laughable.

 

[Unkmengani]

I am not a fan of Eboue playing at RM, but even I gotta say he was good yesterday; direct, no shortness of skill and quality and drew 3 yellow cards in about 5 minutes! We could/should have scored from the free kicks after he was fouled.

 

[Grampus_Eight]

Great amounts of nonsense posted on Sagna, Eboue and now Gibbs here the last few days. Congrats to all involved.

 

[RC8]

Having watched the game again it's this simple:

What did Gibbs do == What did Eboue do?

Both ran a lot, both linked up play, both had shots and for how well they looked aesthetically with the wind running through their hair; neither actually done anything.

Are you serious? Eboué was played a role in both of our goals, was denied a goal by about 30cm, and should have had yet another assist. He won numerous fouls (all of them were actually fouls for a change), and linked up well with Sagna, creating space in the middle of the park for Hleb. I struggle how you can compare Gibbs performance with Eboue's.

I was impressed with Eboue on the wing against Tottenham, where (surprise surprise) Hleb also played in a semi-central role to try and revive the team. Against Salzburg Eboue looked lost on the wing. But yesterday he was very impressive, and actually gave us plenty of width.

A 4-5-1 with Eboue on the wing and Hleb employed behind the striker looks very promising, and I'm looking forward to us using it again in the near future.

 

[sabret00the]

Having watched the game again it's this simple:

What did Gibbs do == What did Eboue do?

Both ran a lot, both linked up play, both had shots and for how well they looked aesthetically with the wind running through their hair; neither actually done anything.

Not a chance Sabre. Eboue was far more positive in everything he done. He ran at players and provided a genuine attacking threat on the day.

I'm not for one minute saying he's the answer to our right wing problem, but to compare his performance with the performance of Gibbs is laughable.

Harsh? yes. Laughable? no. i think it all comes down to end product. yes eboue did run at defenders but what did it amount to? wayward crosses and testing the hands of the crowd. he went for the easy option again and again in terms of his ground passes and nothing else found it's target.

One of the players running at defenders doesn't really debunk the whole comparison.

Eboue is technically a very good player, hence why he can dink the ball over players and then go on a run but that run rarely surmounts to anything. his decision making and end product are still poor. he'll always make a mess of being the furthest man forward too.

As i said, the performances of both were very nice and the same goes for eboue's right wing appearances in general aesthetically speaking but once you look before the outer shell it leaves a lot to be desired.

But then again, please feel free to dismiss me. i'm of the general opinion that i never want to see Toure take another free kick for the club again.

 

[kel varnsen]

I am not a fan of Eboue playing at RM, but even I gotta say he was good yesterday; direct, no shortness of skill and quality and drew 3 yellow cards in about 5 minutes! We could/should have scored from the free kicks after he was fouled.

at least in two of those three did eboue make the wrong choice. instead of passing the ball, he tried to beat the defender on his own. not a bad decision on its own, but on those two occations it was the wrong decision. he should have released the ball, as we had several players running in the 'right' direction. eboue's decision to dribble, slowed down the attack and we lost the fluidness of the move.

 

[Unkmengani]

That probably says a lot about his decision making in general!

 

[Lancelot]

Eboue is technically a very good player, hence why he can dink the ball over players and then go on a run but that run rarely surmounts to anything. his decision making and end product are still poor. he'll always make a mess of being the furthest man forward too.

As i said, the performances of both were very nice and the same goes for eboue's right wing appearances in general aesthetically speaking but once you look before the outer shell it leaves a lot to be desired.

That is quite an interesting situation surrounding the right-side midfield position indeed.

Since the downfall of Freddie Ljungberg, I've never got the impression that we actually have someone who can deliver the proper end product consistently; be it the Hleb on the right, the injured Walcott, the faded version of Ljungberg himself or even Eboue at the moment. To be fair to Eboue though, he should be given with more playing time there just like how we used to be persistent with Hleb.

Eboue's best potential end product used to be his cross after running from a deep position to support Hleb in attack; something which isn't exactly what we need from our very own attacking wide players as we prefer to have some sort of a goal threat and/or a sharp through-ball-like assist.

The most important thing is that we would be needing those crucial attributes consistently throughout the season to make sure that we have a good chance to seriously challenge for the titles.

On one hand, I'd love to see how far we can go with the current options we have in Eboue and Walcott as I'm very very positive that they can be better and improved if given enough chances, however, on the other hand, I'd love to see some sort of a genuine settlement there within this upcoming season by anyone even if that means that we have to recruit more players to try it out.

 

[DC Gunner]

I'll believe that Eduardo can play on the wing when I actually see it. I know Wenger's said he can, but I firmly believe the guy was bought as a goalscorer, a striker, and will spend most, if not all of his time playing through the middle.

which brings back the point that we will get one of the 2, either a new striker or a new winger, but not both.

If we were get a winger then Eduardo will be used mostly used as a striker; if we were to get another striker, then Eduardo might be groomed to be in the Freddie -mold

 

[asajoseph]

Great amounts of nonsense posted on Sagna, Eboue and now Gibbs here the last few days. Congrats to all involved.

Or you could always tell us what it was Gibbs actually did that was so impressive

Nobody's written off his career - but on this occasion, when judged as a first teamer, he didn't look up to scratch.

 

[kamikaze80]

[Van Persie:] "We played some tremendous football. It was quite funny because during the game Cesc [Fabregas] and I were smiling at each other because we liked the fact that we were playing so well.

"Everyone was really happy to play in this game. If we play the same way or even less, we will have a big chance to at least fight for the title."

It was a viewpoint shared by Arsenal's young midfield master Fabregas, who stepped up his pre-season by playing for 83 minutes. "You could see that even today we have a better team than last year," said the Spaniard.

"Some of the Inter players were saying during the game, 'Don't make me run so much, you play so well'. If some players from Inter say that, it means something.

Some more great statements by Cesc & Robin in the fulll article.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/a ... ge_id=1779

great to see the two cornerstones of our club so happy with the way we play. if we eventually win things, cesc just might be having too much fun to even think of leaving.

 

[kamikaze80]

eboue showed promise, but hes not the answer. i just dont think he has the awareness and passing/shooting ability to be a legitimate starting RM on a title-contending team.

hes quick, has great stamina and can dribble. it makes him a dangerous attacking threat as a RB but a less intimidating one from RM.

i could be wrong, his decision-making may improve in time but i dont see him turning into a freddie or bobby-type finisher all of a sudden.

gibbs had a good game considering he is 17. he didnt show me anything to lead me to believe we have a phenomenon on our hands. maybe he'll be a squad player in 2 years.

 

[tactica442]

I'll add my two-cent worth to this thread after watching the game again.

On Eboue, after he got three Inter players booked, he had more room to push defender back into the box and show right channel for either Sagna or Robin to exploit. It's good to see that, but one has to consider that Inter's defense was not very organised in this game.

On Gibbs, I am more impressed after watching his performance on the PC. He moved and linked up like a player that know how the first team play. I feel that Gibbs could have received more balls but maybe it's because other Arsenal players didn't know him well enough. The only player passed more balls to Gibbs was Hoyte. However, Gibbs still managed to move around to link up with others and kept the attacking flow. Gibbs showed good awareness on others' movement and even set up a ball for Flamini to strike. Gibbs also drifted to the center and even more right-ward to give teammates more pass options. He looked comfortable to use his less-dominate right foot to control the ball with a few touches.

Having said these, I found one of his problems is his ball control in tight space. This is often the case when he tried quick turns with the ball under immediate pressuret. Sometime he misjudged the speed of the rolling ball or mistimed his movement initiation. Maybe he found the speed of he game was much faster than that of the games he used to play. But in general Gibbs was not overwhelmed and I think he was doing well given his age. If Gibbs was not up for this game, there wouldn't have seen so many telly shots on him. At least Gibbs was NOT anonymous in this game despite his lack of crucial assistance (while Aliadiere had the anonymous symptom in patches in various games). Inter were far more less organised on Gibbs side. Not many double-up were used on Gibbs but the same could be said to other areas as well.

Sometimes I wonder how some Arsenal fans would think about Gibbs if he were not in Arsenal shirt but still pulled off a performance against a team like Inter in a competitive pre-season tournament. Maybe they would say something like "Arsène should sign him on cheap"? The fact is, Arsène already have Gibbs for free and that should be appreciated.

 

[Mbaki Mutahaba]

I remember eboue coming in against **** in the Carling Cup Semis..and playing midfield right. I like him there and i think he will be very gud there cos he wont play the typcial wingman(walcot). He offers a big threat when cutting in and when goign outside he can actually cross. What he will have to really work on is getting involved in the buildup when the ball is actually coming from the other side. I think Wenger pushing Eboue there and giving hleb freedom showed gud potential. Dont expect a new wing man on the right side.

 

[Clrnc]

nice inter report

'CLOSE my eyes and slip away,' sang The Small Faces over the loudspeakers and the scattered Arsenal fans in the Emirates Stadium got ready to do exactly that.


With Thierry Henry out, can young Gunner Robin van Persie (left) take over his mantle as the club's main source of goals? -- Picture: AFP
Paris St Germain were dull and industrious at best against Arsenal and, even though Valencia weren't exactly backwards in charging forwards on Saturday, it hadn't convinced more than half of Sunday's ticket holders to turn up early enough for their clash.

Perhaps, as The Small Faces sang, it really was to be a lazy Sunday afternoon.

In the press box, journalists joked about the huge gulf in class between these teams.

Valencia, of course, dominated Inter Milan for long periods in their first fixture.

We had a sweepstake on the scoreline and I confidently plumped for a 4-0 victory for the Spanish.

No-one backed PSG for so much as a draw. Boy, did we all get that wrong.

Paris St Germain looked like a different team, but then as the Polish journalist next to me pointed out, with all the personnel changes they actually were a different team.

Their neat, close passing took Valencia, the supporters and the entire press box by complete surprise and 45 minutes of exceptional football gave them a well-deserved 2-0 lead at the break.

Valencia finally woke up for the second half and managed to carve out a few opportunities, but by now the stadium was swelling up for the Arsenal game.

As PSG effortlessly dinked home a third, the aisles filled with distracted replica shirt-clad Gunners, clasping hotdogs and donuts in tidy, red cardboard cartons.

Marco Materrazzi certainly couldn't be accused of having a lazy Sunday afternoon.

After 90 minutes against Valencia on Saturday, he had remained in Inter's starting line-up, much to the delight of the Arsenal fans who jeered him mercilessly from the kick-off.

There is bad blood between these two teams.

In 2003, Inter Milan destroyed Arsenal 3-0 at Highbury in the Champions League before Wenger's team promptly went to the San Siro and returned the favour 5-1.

As well as the continual baiting of poor Materazzi, the home fans jubilantly jeered every Italian move.

The chants of 'Arsenal! Arsenal!' in sharp contrast to the shrill cheer leading of yesterday, were now defiant and loaded with venom.

When Eboue characteristically hurled himself over Materazzi's leg, the stadium exploded.

It was clear to anyone with functioning eyeballs that it was a shameless dive, but the referee took the bait, waved a yellow card and awarded Arsenal a free-kick.

Seconds later, Eboue was at it again, rolling about on the ground clutching his skull as if someone had glued the earphones of his iPod to the side of his head and whacked the volume up.

Again, blind passion strangled objectivity and the ground erupted in fury.

DOMINANCE

For all their dominance, Arsenal simply could find a way through and the fans milled around the stadium during the break, bemoaning their teams' obsession with tentatively passing the ball around the edge of the penalty area and refusing to shoot on sight.

When David Suazo plonked a laser-guided header in off the post early in the second half, it went very quiet.

Only Arsenal, it seemed, could squander so much possession for so little reward. But the Gunners weren't finished yet.

Hleb burst forward and blasted a shot at the Inter goalkeeper before cannoning in the rebound to level the score.

Again and again, the red shirts clustered and failed in the final third.

Such profligacy could not be good for the hearts of these fans, though I suppose that the constant exercise of standing up and then sitting back down again in disgust evened it out somewhat.

Finally, with four minutes to go Robin van Persie put everyone out of their misery by caressing the ball with the tips of his studs across the penalty area and rifling home a thunderous finale to the weekend.

Many fans scampered for the exits early, eschewing the chance to see William Gallas lifting a very oddly sculpted trophy amidst a blaze of pyrotechnics.

Those that remain applauded a Sunday afternoon, not of laziness, but of hope.

Arsenal's players are young, perhaps too young to mount a title challenge this season, but they've got time on their side.

Whether Arsène Wenger will be around to shepherd them into maturity is a question for another day.

On Sunday, however, 59,000 people went home believing that perhaps this coming season won't be so bad after all.

brings some optimist for us