The 20/21 Season

Myesyats wrote:Bednarek red card overturned but Luiz stands. What the fuck

they sure do hate Arsenal

On what basis does it stand? Is there an official explanation?

Also, why isn't Arsenal going at the necks of the PL?

Guys, what's going on. Something needs to happen, and quick.

Nothing can be done. The tactics and play was at times boring. You only have to look how Villa moved the ball from the high press compared to us. Laca and Pepe want to do backheels which lead to nothing, Bellerin passing was so poor, its hilarious how the absence of one player and we are struggling to play consistently.

Also, someone help me understand this. Laca and Auba aren't strikers known for their aerial ability, they lose the ball time and time and time again when it is punted forward to them, so when we know that doesn't work, why the hell are we doing that? Don't they have a technical team that helps reviews games and notices these things?

Sigh. There are so many things wrong and honestly, Arsenal are not fun to watch anymore.

From what I saw Pepe actually looked really good in the leftish position

A deflected goal off our own mistake inside two minutes. What can you do?

Villa's defenders had amazing games. Every last ditch tackle and block came off. Arsenal's forwards were a fraction off their games so they didn't take advantage of the good positions they worked the ball into. The quality on the final pass wasn't there from anybody. Refs missed a blatant pull by Martinez on Lacazette in the box (and then Peter Walton, so-called "expert", defended it by saying Lacazette used the pull to commit a foul. Like, what the actual fuck?) Just one of those games.

The Wolves defeat was out of our hands. Played really well until the red card and pen which I guess were technically correct decisions, although to this day I still can't see contact. Then they scored from a 30-yard screamer. Again, what can you do? Coming back with 10-men is really difficult.

So tempting as it is to pick apart every facet of Arsenal's performances... honestly, I feel this the team has been plain unlucky this week.

Sadly, after the terrible run earlier in the season, the margin for error is very small now. Arsenal had to win about 14 of their remaining 19 games to even have a chance of top four. For Europa League (which is only 5th and 6th this season; 7th is for Europa Conference League), they were looking at 11 wins from 19. Still doable but it means picking up wins in these tricky away fixtures and that's going very poorly at the moment.

Some stats:

Arsenal's xG puts them at 11th, which is a marked improved over the start of the season, when they were down the bottom. Their xG is actually better than Spurs and Everton, but still a ways short of the top. Currently, Arsenal are under-performing their xG by three goals, which isn't a massive difference but maybe enough to swing one or two games their way.

9th for XGA. Actually not too far from United (6th) and Liverpool (3rd).

Expected points puts Arsenal at 9th. Current position is... 10th. So Arsenal are performing close to expectation this season which is kinda depressing. Though it has to be said this accounts for the god-awful run of form earlier in the season and the team did improve briefly through December and January, which shows the team is obviously capable of doing more.

The Premier League is bloody weird at the moment. Arsenal are actually performing better than Spurs and Everton in these metrics, but they're being out-performed by West Ham, Brighton (the league's unluckiest team because they could actually be 6th at the moment!) and Aston Villa, all of which were tipped for a relegation battle.

I maintain Arsenal's defending is decent now, bar the odd brain fart from the usual suspects. Offensively though they suck, relative to the money invested in their frontline. Certain individuals (Willian, Aubameyang) aren't performing, some are so wildly inconsistent you don't know what you'll get from them (Lacazette, Pepe) and the rest are kids who will have good and bad streaks because they're kids. Saka, Smith Rowe and Martinelli are good talents, but they're not world beaters who can drag the team's level up on their own. They look great because the senior players are playing like shit. Not their fault and they're doing their best but such is the situation. We're relying on a 19-year-old and 20-year-old to produce consistently every game because the £72m winger, the £300k p/w centre forward and the freebie who's won a bunch of trophies can't string more than two good performances together.

Why is this happening? Who the fuck knows, honestly. Maybe Arteta is incompetent, maybe the players aren't doing enough, maybe it's both (it usually is). Aubameyang has lost his confidence having gone the whole season feeding off scraps on top of his family issues. Pepe... I try to to be patient with him but for every one good thing he does, there are 10 bad things. Willian is just a zombie. Awful signing who should never see the pitch. Lacazette is a grafter but a striker taking fewer than two shots per game without the creativity to really compensate isn't going to elevate an attack on his own.

I had us down for a 5th placed finish this season but it's looking like 7th is the best we can hope for now. At which point it's all in for the Europa League.

El Gunner wrote:Benfica doesnt sound like a good tie though, how have they been doing in the Portuguese league recently?

4th in the league, haven’t beaten any team worth mentioning since the start of the year.

Hapless_Hans wrote:From what I saw Pepe actually looked really good in the leftish position

I would agree with Pepe, I thought he looking the best up until Saka was pushed over when Soares was taken off. Then he was nullified more moving him to the other side of the pitch. ESR seemed to ghost this game Saka had a high number of turn overs. Trying to figure out why when Ødegaard came on he took up the position that Belerin had been playing in and forcing him to the center of the pitch.

As for our CFs none of them are ever going to get us anything until that point when we can get them the ball in the center of the pitch with enough room to do something. Since it seems that tactically the only plan we have is to take the ball up the wing, and slow up play until the box is overloaded I just don't see them getting much.

If we were going to cross the ball this many times, why did we bother selling Giroud...

Does any of you guys have ever thought that Arteta prefers experienced players over young players all the time?

Saliba, Martinelli, Nelson, Willock, Nketiah, Balogun all of them can stand up and say that they were not given enough chances in the first team this season (except Nketiah may be) specially when the experienced ones have already lost 10 times in the league.

Saka was introduced by Emery and boy he has planted his foot in the team amazingly and ESR selection was literally thrusted on Arteta as he did not give him a chance until the second half of the season and that too after a lot of pressure from media and fans.

Martinelli had a serious and lengthy injury, din't he? So maybe the reason is that he's just not fully back to his best, not some agenda?

When I saw Willian come on instead of Martinelli, I knew the game was done for. Willian ended doing exactly 0, other than falling to the floor and losing the ball on the wings alot

AnJl wrote:When I saw Willian come on instead of Martinelli, I knew the game was done for. Willian ended doing exactly 0, other than falling to the floor and losing the ball on the wings alot

That is how I go into every game with the current regime. That way if we can actually pull out a draw it is still not a horrible day. Then if for some reason we mess up and win it brings exuberance as if we actually achieved something incredible or qualified for something important.

Feels like he has barely been involved with us.

Xhaka-Ceballos it is i guess.

AFC: Leno, Bellerin, Luiz, Gabriel, Cedric, Ceballos, Xhaka, Saka, Odegaard, Smit-Rowe, Aubameyang

#LUFC: Meslier, Ayling, Cooper, Struijk, Alioski, Harrison, Shackleton, Klich, Dallas, Raphinha, Bamford

Odegaard from the start

Did Saka just dive?

Nah definitely push

AUBAAAAAAAAAA

Off to a good start

4 of our best technicians behind Auba. We were bound to be good.

Saka what a Gem,may as well be bigger talent than Sancho
Great 1st half,more of the same please