PL: West Ham United vs Arsenal | 26/10/08

[raidersoftheark]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

A few points:

- I dont know how the f*ck they worked but Wengers substutions were absolutely brilliant. Not bad for a guy that has no clue about tactics, eh guys?

I think they worked in spite of them, to be honest. Theo was our biggest attacking threat and taking him off while leaving RvP on (who did very little but congest the final third) was really wonky. Credit to Robin for coming back later in the game with that shot and that free kick (gah, those were horrible moments), in any case.

 

[raidersoftheark]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

I'd also like to add that this was our most impressive victory of the season so far. We've pummeled a couple of teams already, but this is the first time in a good while that we've managed to really fight our way to victory when Green and the ref were trying their utmost to not let that happen.

 

[McIntyre]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

Too many times in recent seasons we've completely dominated teams only for their keeper to perform heroics for 90 minutes. I thought today was gonna be another of those days. Thank goodness for the attacking instincts of Julien Faubert.

 

[j'nuh]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

A few points:

- I dont know how the f*ck they worked but Wengers substutions were absolutely brilliant. Not bad for a guy that has no clue about tactics, eh guys?

I think they worked in spite of them, to be honest. Theo was our biggest attacking threat and taking him off while leaving RvP on (who did very little but congest the final third) was really wonky. Credit to Robin for coming back later in the game with that shot and that free kick (gah, those were horrible moments), in any case.

Yeah credit to Robin, did brilliantly to convince the Arsenal team to allow him to move to the left wing. Nothing to do with Arsène that.

 

[j'nuh]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

Too many times in recent seasons we've completely dominated teams only for their keeper to perform heroics for 90 minutes. I thought today was gonna be another of those days. Thank goodness for the attacking instincts of Julien Faubert/Emmanuel Adebayor

Fixed.

 

[McIntyre]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

Too many times in recent seasons we've completely dominated teams only for their keeper to perform heroics for 90 minutes. I thought today was gonna be another of those days. Thank goodness for the attacking instincts of Julien Faubert/Emmanuel Adebayor

Fixed.

Indeed.

 

[sabret00the]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

our midfield was lame today. our full back didn't really contribute to the big picture and there was a lack of edge to our attacks really. quite a subdued wing pairing that failed to deliver and not enough penetration from bendtner. van persie was poor but he was our only goal threat and with little to no support throughout the entire first half. we must improve. no doubt everyone's **** is out for song because he got a yellow for obstruction. he deserves more games to try and prove himself, but if that was him playing out of his skin to take that spot next to cesc, then his best isn't half good enough. good luck to all the players, i wish them all the success in realising their aspirations to improve by wednesday, it'll be a huge match for us now.

 

[banduan]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

Why does Green have to play so well against us?

Also, what was up with that ref/linesman? The ball caught outside box incident, our players climbing on top of hammers unpunished, yellow cards for standing still and getting run over, yellow cards for teeny tiny fouls, play ons not played... he was dire.

 

[M+D]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

I didn't see the game and had to listen to the radio in the car instead. And to make things worse I only got second half commentary, with Mark "I'm a complete *****" Bright who is beyond being annoying. In fact, if I had heard the first half as well I think I would have had to turn it off. As it was I found myself shouting at the radio "It's BENDTNER!" Bednar plays for West Brom you idiot.

Anyway, I was watching the MOTD highlights last night and I think the BBC's football coverage can now sink no lower - for who was analysing alongside Hansen if it wasn' Mark Bright.....!
What was incredible about last nights program is that Hansen was delirious with happiness at Liverpool's win and unbelievably went on to say that two of Gerrard's passes were the best you will ever see this season or something along those lines. They were two decent long range passes to players in space but nothing special when you looked at Bendtner's sublime through-ball or (I think it was) Barry's pass to Agbonlahor for Villa or even Sturridges pass to Robinho for his hat trick. The bias on MOTD is incredible and very unfair to the other teams that aren't Manchester United and in particular Liverpool.

Anyway, rant over.

What I saw from the highlights is that Walcott had a couple of great moments early on, Green had another superb game against us and Almunia made a couple of very good stops once again. 2-0 will do very nicely anyway ahead of the crunch game on Wednesday.

 

[hackajack]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

...with Mark "I'm a complete *****" Bright who is beyond being annoying..... Hansen was delirious with happiness at Liverpool's win and unbelievably went on to say that two of Gerrard's passes were the best you will ever see this season or something along those lines.

I always thought it was one life's little jokes that someone so dim should be called Bright. Hansen just lost the plot at the prospect of Liverpool winning the league 'bestest passes of all time' my arse, usual Hollywood stuff fron Gerrard that he often as not overhits.

 

[law]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

- I dont know how the f*ck they worked but Wengers substutions were absolutely brilliant. Not bad for a guy that has no clue about tactics, eh guys?

There's no way you can give Wenger any credit for those substitutions, they were way too late and we were very lucky that they didn't fail miserably. Also we never would have brought Adebayor on if we'd already scored a goal, Wenger was forced into it and would once again have revealed his complete tactical ineptness if he hadn't been so lucky.

 

[TomasCR]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

And that´s exactly what we call good substutions no? Changing a bad player for the good one that can make an impact and eventually score a goal when needed and that´s exactly what Wenger did and what he did well.

Sometimes I wonder when people take the confidence that in tactics they are better than Wenger himself. He propably couldn´t have done it better yesterday but you can still see some of us compaling about how he should have done it better, sooner, or what. You just have to stop playing these Managers when you can stop the game, think 10 minutes about what should you do and who should you change. Wenger has to do it during the game and that´s pretty incomparable.

 

[patrick42uk]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

Myles Palmer in the latest installment on his website argues that this team isnt motivated for run of the mill domestic games. I'm inclined to agree. Against West Ham, it was almost as if we were waiting to concede. I didnt see the Everton game but he felt we adpoted the smae attitude in that game too. Its a dangerous attitude because we wont always be able to recover from a goal down.

 

[sabret00the]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

I've said that for a while, for some reason, this team only performs when we're either on the verge of a loss or against the big teams.

 

[TomasCR]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

Has anyone read todays papers? I don´t know if we won against West Ham or the whole league. I really don´t like when somebody talks about how we are back in title race after win against a team from the first half of table, it´s beyond me.

 

[patrick42uk]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

I've said that for a while, for some reason, this team only performs when we're either on the verge of a loss or against the big teams.

Too many young players

 

[kamikaze80]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

its funny, i thought we played well against west ham, even in the first half. i felt the tightness of the match was due more to west ham elevating their game to meet our quality than to any complacency on our part. the match was played at a very high pace and they did a good job congesting the middle of the pitch and in such tight spaces, our flicks were not coming off and there were numerous misunderstandings on and off the ball. sure, not our sharpest first half, but i didnt think it was a disaster like most here seem to imply. lets give credit where it's due, the hammers played well.

i think the biggest reason for our lack of sharpness in the first half was the bendtner-van persie pairing up top. not enough dynamism, van persie rarely makes runs (though when he did, he got the ball in good positions two or three times) and bendtner was trying to force things wide cos we were trying to pass through the parked bus.

 

[Rohit]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

I too thought it was a good professional away performance. West Ham did bring out a few saves from Almunia but apart from one clear cut opportunity the rest were long range strikes.

I think the team is motivated. It is just our brand of football which makes it seem so, atleast in my opinion. We seem to start slowly not because we are not motivated but because these players seem to fear conceeding first than wanting to score first. It might be because of their age or because we really have not had defensive stability for a long time.

If we conceed first or if it is deadlocked obviously the urgency kicks in.

Tony Adams in 2003 accused that Arsenal team of being too cavalier. I'd love to see this bunch turn into the same. West Ham for example only created anything when we were cautious in our attacking play ourselves. Once we started launching attack after attack with pace they simply had no answer. We rarely conceed from counters.

I'd actually like to see some of the cavalier attitude in this team.

 

[law]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

And that´s exactly what we call good substutions no? Changing a bad player for the good one that can make an impact and eventually score a goal when needed and that´s exactly what Wenger did and what he did well.

And why did he have to change a bad player for a good player? Because he set the team up wrong. If he'd stuck to his original line-up we would have lost and as it was we were very lucky to win. How many times have we seen Wenger make a substitution with 20 minutes or less to go and it's been too late to rectify his earlier mistake?

 

[sabret00the]

Re: EPL: West Ham v Arsenal| 26 Oct. 2008 16:00

its funny, i thought we played well against west ham, even in the first half. i felt the tightness of the match was due more to west ham elevating their game to meet our quality than to any complacency on our part. the match was played at a very high pace and they did a good job congesting the middle of the pitch and in such tight spaces, our flicks were not coming off and there were numerous misunderstandings on and off the ball. sure, not our sharpest first half, but i didnt think it was a disaster like most here seem to imply. lets give credit where it's due, the hammers played well.

i think the biggest reason for our lack of sharpness in the first half was the bendtner-van persie pairing up top. not enough dynamism, van persie rarely makes runs (though when he did, he got the ball in good positions two or three times) and bendtner was trying to force things wide cause we were trying to pass through the parked bus.

we were passing the ball so slowly that i went and made some chicken (seasoned and fried and the grill pan, ten minute job) as i sat down the take my first bite, the ball was only just reaching it's destination. what you describe as west ham raising their game to match ours, was them getting over the fact that a ball could move so slowly.