1 nil to the football team …..

Some thoughts on the game (some of which I have wantonly culled from comments I posted earlier this morning):

1. Arsenal looked laboured at times, but they held their concentration facing a Stoke side that did virtually nothing with the ball but which held its shape without the ball extremely well. We were too often forced to cross the ball, which only plays into Stoke’s hands, even with Giroud up front and despite the fact that Walcott put in a few very good crosses. It was certainly not a pretty spectacle, but that had everything to do with our opponents. I’m just pleased our players and fans didn’t panic, and stayed focused and patient. The substitutions were made at the perfect time, and being able to introduce a fresh Cazorla and Podolski with 25 minutes to go worked very well. It was good to see some genuine squad rotation, with Cazorla and Podolski starting from the bench.

2. How the linesman even thought there was a possibility of an offside (whether for Theo or the deflection, if it had come off one of our players) is beyond me, it was clearly not offside. Well done to Chris Foy for putting him right. As for the complaints to the officials, both sides were doing it, so Pulis’s whinge about us being out of order is just one more example of his hypocrisy.

3. Begovic would be an excellent signing as a second choice keeper if we did try and rescue him from his purgatory in the summer. And with Butland joining Stoke then, one of Sorenson and Begovic will surely move.

4. Did anyone notice that Shotton (the new Delap) has a special piece of material fitted in his shirt to substitute for the towel he gets to use at throw-ins at the Britannia?

5. You remember that “Same old Arsenal, always cheating” we routinely get treated to by the enlightened souls of clubs like Stoke? It’s funny, when Matthew Etherington (a player I happen to quite like) dived to the floor right in front of the Stoke fans, to earn Stoke one of their very few attacking opportunities, the Stoke fans didn’t complain. And I don’t seem to hear much from Pulis when his rugged, muscular, it’s-a-man’s-game players dive to the ground in the mode of Filippo Inzaghi. Funny, that………

6. The Stoke time-wasting was ridiculous, starting in the 15th minute. Chris Foy’s laid back approach to refereeing is good in many ways, but there are times when you have to get a grip on cynical behaviour like that. A couple of early yellow cards, for example when right in front of the ref, Huth threw the ball away after fouling Wilshere, and the time-wasting would have ended there. And of course, once Stoke were a goal down, they suddenly started doing everything much more quickly. It was funny to see Ryan Shawcross complain in the 91st minute about the speed we were taking a free-kick. Well Sweet Little Ryan, if you hadn’t wasted so much time in the remainder of the game, you might have been able to get more attacks in when you were chasing the game.

7. As the pundit on Arsenal TV said (was it Stephen Hughes?), Stoke deserved nothing from the game and they got nothing. Playing ten men behind the ball the whole game is pathetic from any team, a real admission of weakness, but from a side that has spent tens of millions of pounds and has qualified for European football, it is even more ridiculous. Of course, it’s up to the opponent to deal with it and break it down, which Arsenal did – 1-0 was a pretty measly scoreline given that we carved open numerous good chances yesterday: as well as the goal, Ox, Kos, Giroud and Cazorla all had excellent chances to score. 3-0 would have been about right.

8. Any right thinking person of course hates Stoke and detests Pulis. So it was enjoyable to read that he’s been whining about unfair treatment, and tried to play the “we’re so poor, we can’t expect to win these games” card. It’s been a source of a lot of frustration for me that the journos lap this stuff up, saying in effect that it’s fine for Stoke to play the style they do, even when it verges on the violent, because they’re a poor, itsy bitsy club. The trouble with that theory is that Pulis has spent vast amounts of money. Stoke are about 6th in the list of spenders over the past five or six seasons, yet are allowed to say they are David to our Goliath. It was therefore good to see on newsnow that someone had done some sums and concluded that Pulis has spent £120m more than Wenger. Not a level playfield? On your bike, you prat, you’ve had an incredibly soft ride and, given the resources available compared with the likes of Swansea, Everton and West Brom, Stoke should be doing much better than they are.

9. In recent weeks, the prices sometimes charged for away fans at Arsenal have become a subject of controversy. Here’s a thought: perhaps the prices should be linked to a creativity index, so that the more creative or engaging the opponent, the cheaper the tickets for their fans. So Stoke would still be able to play their desperate version of the game, but their fans would be financially punished for it, while Swansea’s fans would be able to attend for about £3.50. I’m going to start writing to Ivan Gazidis now.

Some rough and ready ratings:

Szczesny: 7 – For staying awake.

Sagna: 6 – Did nothing wrong but didn’t show a lot when going forward either.

Mertesacker: 6 – Did fine.

Koscielny: 7 – Battled well, including pressing in midfield areas, and had a good effort on goal.

Monreal: 7 – It’s impossible to judge from one game but first impressions are good, especially given that he was playing against a side about as far from Spanish football as one can imagine. He was energetic, good with his passing, judicious about his overlapping runs and always seemed to track back. Of course, yesterday was hardly the most testing of attacking opponents, and we’ll have to see how Monreal goes in the coming weeks, but other than one terrible long-range shot he did well.

Arteta: 8 – Great to see him back, he makes such a difference. His tidy passing from deep in midfield is excellent.

Diaby: 6 – Was OK in the first half but tired early in the second.

Wilshere: 8 – Very sharp, often looked dangerous, his thinking was always ahead of his opponent. And lovely to see tomorrow’s England man tell yesterday’s England man, Michael Owen, where to go after the set-to with Arteta.

Walcott: 7 – Pretty dangerous at times, and managed to get behind the defence a few times. But then he was facing the weakest player Stoke have, Andy Wilkinson, so it would have been disappointing if he’d been completely played out of the game. Walcott clearly felt he wasn’t given enough protection by the referee – I’m not sure about that, we’ve seen worse, and it was a Wilkinson foul on Walcott that earned the free kick from which we scored.

Oxlade-Chamberlain: 6 – Had some good moments, especially when he had a shot saved well by Begovic, but overall didn’t manage to make too many inroads on Stoke.

Giroud: 6 – As ever, worked hard, but he didn’t have the same impact in terms of lay-offs etc as he has done. Also made a poor choice to chest the ball for someone else when he had a clear chance to have a header on goal from close range.

Cazorla: 8 – Lifted the pace of the game at the perfect moment and found lots of awkward pockets of space. Should have scored when through on goal.

Podolski: 7 – Typically teutonic energy from Poldi. Got the goal of course, albeit via Cameron’s boot.

Ramsey: N/a

Written by 26may89

A Baptism of Fire?

Last time we played Stoke was early in the season, a 0-0 draw at the Britannia. I remember being disappointed by the draw but  more so by our inability to score. How different it is today …

Note the Nil for Stoke. A Nil. This shows that our defence was not breached; that a team of giants could not score from a cross into our goal area. It is now 6 PL games since our last defensive Nil. In those 6 games we have conceded 11 goals – almost 2 a game.

Yet, our Back 5 looks so solid on paper. Rasp has been saying since season’s start that our defence is the root cause of our inconsistency, a point of view hard to disagree with. My early thoughts were that with Steve Bould to educate and train them our back 5 could become the best for many season. BR  had faith in the skills of Santos and was happy with our LB situation.

How wrong was I?

But no fear …. Nacho to the rescue. Rarely will a player start a game under so much scrutiny. Is he the saviour? We shall see, but let us not judge Monreal on this afternoon’s performance; he will need time to bed in and The Orcs are a baptism of fire.

Nacho Man

Stats: Stoke have only won one away game this season. They have scored 8 goals in 12 away games. They have not won for 5 games. Stoke have never won at THOF. They are Orcs.

Pulis (how I hate typing that word) has created the Volvo 760 of the football world. Big, ugly, efficient and does what other cars do but with far less panache. His brand of football takes the entertainment out of the game. And the supporters …… if they weren’t such a shower of  **** one would feel sorry for them. Not only having to live in a town which under any caring government would be demolished, but having to pay to watch a Volvo 760.

Stoke’s First Team Photo

An Arsenal stat: If the PL was based on halves, Arsenal would be 12th on first halves and 2nd to Man City on second halves. The solution is simple – give the lads some smelling salts prior to kick-off.

Todays team:  Arteta is close to a return but I wouldn’t risk him against The Orcs. Diaby or Ramsey? Ramsey for me – Chief Orc Shawcross is sure to receive his usual warm Emirates welcome.

Thinking about it, the pairing of Shawcross and Huth reminds me of this …

We have been missing Ox for a few games now. It hurt to see him as an unused sub  on Weds night. We had 20 minutes to finish off an on-the-ropes Liverpool but AW chose not to attack; mistakenly in my view. Ox needs game time and I hope he gets at least 20 minutes today.

Runners & Riders:

Todays Explorer: George Mallory (1886-1924). Another great Englishmen who deserves further investigation. Huge doubts arise about who was the first man to ascend Everest but recent theory suggest it was Mallory and not some New Zealander. One of the world’s foremost mountaineers he made a number of explorations of the Himalayas before attempting to climb it’s highest peak. When asked why he wanted to climb Everest he responded with 3 classic words, “Because it’s There”.

Mallory died on the ascent, but perhaps it was during the descent and herein lies the mystery – we will never know. Mallory’s body was found 75 years later.

Such was Mallory’s esteem that King George V,  the Prime Minister Ramsey Macdonald and all his cabinet  attended his memorial at St. Paul’s Cathedral.

May have been one of Britain’s finest but … No Facial Hair, no Knighthood

February is traditionally a good month for The Arsenal. A win today would set up us nicely.

COYRRG

Written by Big Raddy

We All Love Nachos

So the mayhem is over and we bagged a player. That is one more than many thought we would get, but probably 10 too few for some fans on other websites. I can already hear those keyboard warriors punching in We__er O_t quicker than your David Beckham designer boxer shorts would disappear on a Come Dine With Me evening at Evonne’s.

To be fair Arsene had already expressed his distaste for wholesale buys in this window and had suggested 2 should be the limit, so he was hardly going to make himself look hypocritical and get more than this.

So who did we get. Step forward one Ignacio Monreal Eraso or soon to be better known to us as Nacho Monreal. I don’t know much about him but the early reports sound promising. I am sure in the ensuing AA discussion we will be able to collectively get snippets of information that will give us a better idea of what we have acquired. Peaches has already identified a song for him and I am sure if you all ask nicely the next time you see her she will give you her personal rendition of it.

There has been a consistent theme amongst us all on which areas of the squad we needed strengthening in, and this was one of those key areas. What it means to me is that our left flank will now be very strong with good strength in depth. With the addition of Nacho we have even, in a roundabout way, accrued a new attacking left winger who goes by the name of Andre Santos.

So both flanks look strong now to me, but what about the spine of the team. Up top David Villa was mentioned. Did we need another striker? I am not sure as we seem to be gelling and maturing in this department recently. Attacking central midfield I feel we are well covered in, possibly boasting the strongest in the EPL in this department. I had thought about an experienced keeper as back up / competition to Szczeny. We didn’t get one and I don’t feel the need to throw my toys out of the pram on this one, and am happy to see how it pans out this season. Ditto with the CD’s. I have mentioned the possible requirement of a beast of a CD in the Sol Campbell mould, but am happy again to defer judgement till the seasons end.

The one area I would like to examine a little more is the defensive midfield role. Many of us, if not most of us, and I would include myself in this, have called for a powerhouse of a defensive midfielder. A beast of a man, (I do like my beasts), a midfield “destroyer”. So I thought I would look at what we have already got and what it is that we really all want for this role. What is it we are crying out for?

You could form the impression that we are all looking for something akin to a Marvel Comic Book superhero, with superhuman strength and unusual powers, and I must admit I sometimes enter that frame of mind. However, I do try and step back and ask myself what is it I want and why? I would say that in our 3 man midfield you could set up in one of 2 key ways. The first would be with 2 deeper lying defensive midfielders who can work together to provide a defensive screen. This would leave one predominantly attacking midfielder with a more free role. The second is when you want to have 2 attacking or advanced midfielders with one lone defensive midfielder sitting behind them. That obviously places a higher degree of responsibility on the lone defensive midfielder than you have with 2 deeper lying midfielders working together.

Lets look at the current main candidates who for me would be :-

Diaby, Ramsey, Arteta, Coquelin, Frimpong.

Frimpong has gone on loan so I will not dwell on him and we can assess if he can still offer us something at the end of the season.

My opinion of Diaby, Ramsey and Arteta is that they are suited to playing in the 2 man defensive midfield system but don’t quite have the necessary strengths to play the lone defensive midfield role, especially against better opposition. Just my opinion and I would love to hear from other AA’ers on this.

The player that I feel could offer us the best option in the lone defensive midfield role is Coquelin. Not big enough or powerful enough I hear some saying. The question for me would be, is size and power the most important attribute for this role? Does this player have to resemble Frank Bruno on anabolic steroids? They obviously have to not be afraid to tackle, and be willing to get stuck in. If we all go back some 10 years, how many of us would have claimed Claude Makelele as being the best defensive midfielder in the world at that time, as many of his fellow pros seemed to think. That is all 5 foot 7 inches of him, according to Wikipedia.

I have often thought what is the most important natural physical attribute for this role, and I keep coming back to pace. The ability to cover ground quickly at a moments notice, “nippiness” if you like. I feel that the defensive midfielder plays a role that is more reactionary, in other words they respond to situations as they unfold.

Makelele, as well as reading the game well seemed to be able to quickly get from one point to the next to intercept danger or put in a tackle before the opposition could get the attacking move going. Diaby, Ramsey and Arteta, for me, all share the one characteristic of a lack of pace, that would allow them to play that lone defensive role.

You only have to be ½ second slower from point A to point B and then you don’t intercept or don’t have the chance to get the tackle in and break up play.

Coquelin in my opinion has that surge of pace that the other three don’t. His recent games, until injury, have seen many of us give him some high praise. So my question is, injury permitting, do we already have that excellent defensive midfielder, the one we are all crying out for, sitting there right under our noses?

Written by GoonerB