Arsenal 2 - 2 Liverpool: So very Arsenal

First Half

Do I need to go over this again?

To save time, I'll just examine the goal we conceded.

Liverpool attempt to thread a ball through to Johnson, but it's easily spotted and Sagna makes a move to intercept... only, he somehow loses his footing. So Johnson is now in behind our defence. That's not good.

Johnson plays a good cross, right across our six yard box. Vermaelen comes steaming in to clear it, but then absolutely misses the ball. The ball reaches Sturridge, who's finish is poor/denied by a decent save from Szczesny.

The ball comes out to Ramsey, who fails to clear it on the edge of the box. Suarez runs onto the ball and has his shot deflected in off Mertesacker.

Sagna's slip you could say was unfortunate, but Vermaelen's failed attempt at a clearance and Ramsey's failed attempt at a clearance was poor.

The rest of the half isn't worth mentioning. Arsenal managed a few decent attempts at goal; Walcott had two attempts - one a very good strike that was curling into the far corner - saved well by Reina, and Giroud managed a powerful header but couldn't direct it either side of Reina. Other than that, Liverpool defended pretty well and looked threatening on the counter with our defence just being a pile of crap.

Second Half

For fifteen or so minutes, it didn't look like Arsenal were going to turn up this half. Liverpool were still defending well, keeping a good shape and countering. They got their second goal after some more terrible defending.

Henderson finds himself in acres of room on the right hand side and drives into the Arsenal penalty area. Mertesacker's attempt at winning the ball back is crap. Santos is easily brushed aside, which was also crap. Ramsey actually wins the ball with a challenge, but the ball happens to hit Santos and roll back into Henderson's pass who has the simple task of finishing past Szczesny.

It's good persistence from Henderson (insert adage about making your own luck here), but it's a goal that any amount of competent defending would have dealt with.

At this point, I didn't think we'd come back, simply because we had not been good enough and Liverpool were playing very well. They were well organised and worked very hard to make sure that Walcott and Podolski didn't get in behind too often and that we couldn't take better advantage of Giroud's layoffs.

The goal changed things, though. It may have just been the shock of us scoring from a set-piece, but we gained a lot of confidence while Liverpool seemed to panic slightly. We were beginning to open up more spaces with quicker passes and better movement, with Giroud at the centre of most of our attacks. He was instrumental in our equaliser, laying the ball off for Walcott, who had ghosted in behind, to smash into the far corner. Walcott and Giroud have combined very all season and it's starting to look like a fruitful partnership.

Arsenal had chances to win the game. Giroud, running onto the ball, headed over from a corner when he really should have scored. He missed a more guilt-edged chance later on, when some more excellent play saw Podolski in behind to play it across goal. Unfortunately, Giroud couldn't get his feet sorted out and missed the chance completely.

At the other end, some more calamitous defending almost gifted Liverpool the winning goal.

2-2 in the end. Probably a fair result.

We are Andrey Arshavin

This is intended as a light-hearted jab at Arshavin as a player.

Dick Advocaat once described Arshavin as a player who will only ever effect games for 20-30 minutes and it's a very apt analysis. During those 20-30 minutes, Arshavin can be exceptional; beating players for fun, playing sublime passes and scoring some outstanding goals.

However, for the rest of the game, his game is littered with wasteful passes, an inability to beat his man, inaccurate shots and some outlandish back passes.

This, I feel, is the best way to describe Arsenal at the moment. For 20-30 minutes, they are exceptional, playing with pace, making some excellent passing moves and scoring high quality goals. However, for the rest of the game, their game is littered with wasteful passes, slow build-up, bad decision making/lack of quality in the final third and some shockingly bad defending.

And just like Arshavin, you never know when this quality is going to appear. Arshavin would be a world class player if he could keep the quality switched on for longer. Likewise, Arsenal would be in the top four if they could play at their best for long.

For some reason, though, neither can. Arsenal have a distinct problem with starting games well. In attack, we can see their is a lot of quality - who isn't enjoying the way Gibbs, Wilshere, Cazorla, Podolski, Walcott and Giroud are linking up right now? - but a lack of consistency, while the defence is just a walking error with a goalkeeping prone to poor decisions, a right back out of form and three centre backs that swing between great and crap too often.

It's a strange situation to be in. If the defence played better, we could probably get away with missing a few chances. But because it's not doing well, we need our attack to score whatever it creates. Again smaller teams, it's worked brilliantly. In the big games, we've missed some great chances.

The problem, then, seems to be our ability to deal with pressure; the pressure of starting well in front of expectant fans, the pressure of coping with opposition pressure, the pressure of scoring the big goals that win the big games.

That's the modern day Arsenal, though. A team of "almosts, ifs and buts".

Should have been 3 points.

Should have narrowed that gap down with Spurs dropping points today.

F*ck off.

its as if we are nervous everytime we start a game

Same old problem. 1st half = shit, 2nd half is just a different team.

We should have won. Giroud missing a tap in but score a more difficult chance was brilliant though lol apart from that silly dive

Walcott's goal was amazing.

Ramsey was excellent in midfield along with Wilshere and Cazorla. Finally showing his pre injury form. Sprayed some gorgeous passes and kept the ball moving. Had the most touches in the game.

Wilshere was his normal self. Kept us going.

Giroud probably the MOTM ? My personal motm would be Ramsey

If only we didn't gift them the goals. Could have had 3 points. but i guess draw against a top team isn't bad.

It was a great game, We deserved a point out of it.

Anyways was pretty disappointed with the diving though. Most of you guys would be slacking Suarez for that every week.

That's the Arsenal I know and love hate.

Spoiler:

Nishank wrote:It was a great game, We deserved a point out of it.

Let's agree to disagree.

You can play as well as you want, But at the end of the day we scored 2 goals in your stadium and earned it. Point deserved.

Eman wrote:That's the Arsenal I know and love hate.

Spoiler:

See this is what I mean.

Opportunities to cut that gap to the top 4 are not easy. Realistically, we are never going to catch Chelsea unless Benitez f*cks it up.

But we should be 1 point behind scum right now. And ahead of Everton. It was there for the taking. And we facked it up.

Oh btw, Vermaelen is not better than Djourou.

Nishank wrote:You can play as well as you want, But at the end of the day we scored 2 goals in your stadium and earned it. Point deserved.

Like I said, I don't have to agree.

If we defended any better, or had been more clinical, we would have got the 3 points.

You want me to say Liverpool deserved a point, when it was a result of poor defending and not some extraordinary Liverpool domination? I don't see why I should.

Like I said, feel free to disagree.

Everton = the only winner of today

srigooner wrote:

Nishank wrote:You can play as well as you want, But at the end of the day we scored 2 goals in your stadium and earned it. Point deserved.

Like I said, I don't have to agree.

If we defended any better, or had been more clinical, we would have got the 3 points.

You want me to say Liverpool deserved a point, when it was a result of poor defending and not some extraordinary Liverpool domination? I don't see why I should.

Like I said, feel free to disagree.

and if I had a vagina instead of a penis, I'd be a woman.

We missed a lot of chances as well (as well as yourself), notably the very very last chance of the game.

Whenever Man U beat you, they barely ever dominate you....do you think they never deserve it

RealGunner wrote:Oh btw, Vermaelen is not better than Djourou.

Just look at it as him finding a way to stop the club from selling our captain this summer .

A draw was about right i think. 'Pools goals were ridiculously jammy, though

6unner wrote:

RealGunner wrote:Oh btw, Vermaelen is not better than Djourou.

Just look at it as him finding a way to stop the club from selling our captain this summer .

Should have sold him to barcelona. His attempt to clear the ball before the first goal was hilarious.

Wenger: Gibbs out for three weeks


Our options for LB

Vermaelen ( best )
Jenkinson
Yennaris
Coquelin
Meade
Oxlade
Arshavin



San.. Ramsey

Santos

Harry Redknapp wrote:

srigooner wrote:

Nishank wrote:You can play as well as you want, But at the end of the day we scored 2 goals in your stadium and earned it. Point deserved.

Like I said, I don't have to agree.

If we defended any better, or had been more clinical, we would have got the 3 points.

You want me to say Liverpool deserved a point, when it was a result of poor defending and not some extraordinary Liverpool domination? I don't see why I should.

Like I said, feel free to disagree.

and if I had a vagina instead of a penis, I'd be a woman.

We missed a lot of chances as well (as well as yourself), notably the very very last chance of the game.

Whenever Man U beat you, they barely ever dominate you....do you think they never deserve it

Won't disagree with the part in red

The very last chance of the game was another gift from that f*cktard Santos

When ManYoo beat us, they score some good goals (in a footballing sense) in addition to the ones we gift them.

Bottomline still remains the same: We. Suck. Donkeyballs.

RealGunner wrote:Wenger: Gibbs out for three weeks


Our options for LB

Vermaelen ( best )
Jenkinson
Yennaris
Coquelin
Meade
Oxlade
Arshavin



San.. Ramsey

Santos

I would rather play without a LB than that retard. *groan*

Arshavin at LB

I always said Ramsey is deeper player and hes proving it.

I think we havent seen 35% of Ramsey yet.

The combination of Wilshere and Ramsey is exciting.

Anyway back to the game.

We cant really blame the lack of signings for this game. Yes Santos is shit but considering our depth, we cannot have a better back up for Gibbs at the moment.

I thought, we played really well but unlucky to concede an early goal.

Pity for both team with just a point.

gibbs injury might be a blessing in disguise, we can move verm to lb and bring in kosi at cb. verm has been too poor at cb latley

Agree about Ramsey, highburied.

In place of injured Gibbs, Vermaelen to LB would be more ideal than Santos, but it would also stretch our only three real CBs pretty thin to play every game. I'd actually like to see at least one or two matches where Sagna, given his experience, moves to the left and Jenks gets a start at RB.

our squad is pathetic

Where is Ignasi Miquel?

Can we recall him from loan?

He has the quality to be CB/LB cover. I like that kid. Can't be worse than...