Back on Track

It was great to see another away victory secured, especially at yet another tough ground. Arsenal have now beaten Man City, Everton, Aston Villa, Blackburn and Wolves and drawn at Liverpool and Sunderland. An excellent record, especially when you consider the emphatic wins at tottenham and Newcastle in the Carling Cup and the win at Partizan in the Champions League.

Andrey Arshavin stood out on Saturday with an excellent goal, an inventive assist that wasn't as easy as it looked and a hard working, creative performance. It's nice to see the hard work and ability together, as he looks an amazing player when he turns it on like he did at Villa Park. I think people have been a bit hard on him saying that he has had a poor season so far, he has played very well in quite a large number of games and scored 6 goals and has created a lot of assists. There's not many players I'd swap him for.

He also played very well when he went into a central attacking midfield position in the second half, getting on the ball more in dangerous positions, running at Villa's defence and drifting wherever his heart desired. This is interesting as it's surprising Wenger chose to do this during the game and I wonder if he plans to use Arshavin in this role more often this season. If he does I'll be glad because he looks at his best in that position.

Another player that stood out for me was Chamakh. This sort of game should suit him down to the ground and it's also the sort of game where he should come in very handy. His physical presence out- did that of Dunne and Collins, he scored a goal, provided the assist for goal no. 4 and always looked dangerous, his header in between the first two goals that was saved comes to mind, especially when you bare in mind he climbed above Collins to head that ball with such power and intent. I would imagine van Persie will play some part against Wigan on Tuesday, but I am curious about how things will pan out up- front this season what with Chamakh's terrific form this season so far and van Persie's quality. Last season at Villa we drew 0-0 with Arshavin up-front on his own and this time we had Chamakh up-front who made a massive difference, check the result for proof.

An excellent performance, one where we looked threatening and dangerous going forward and solid defensively with Koscielny having a very good game. I know we conceded two goals but the first one shouldn't have counted and the second one was from a corner, in open play we looked very solid. It's rather impressive that we are so good going forward even without Fabregas and van Persie, which shows the strength in depth of the squad and the improvements made by players like Nasri and Wilshere this season. Long may it continue.

Player ratings:

Fabianski 7
Sagna 8
Squillaci 7
Koscielny 8
Clichy 7
Rosicky 8
Song 8
Wilshere 9
Nasri 8
Arshavin 9
Chamakh 9

Denilson 7
Gibbs 6
Djourou N/A

Robbed or Rubbish?

You can look at this game in two ways. One is that we were robbed with the non-penalty decision that somehow didn't get given. The other way is that Arsenal were very poor and criticise the manager, his methods and the players.

I'm going to start with the latter. First of all, why on Earth did Wenger pick such a weakened team? I'm fed up of him making the same mistakes over and over again. He decided to "rest" Sagna, Song, Nasri, Chamakh, van Persie and Arshavin leaving the latter two at home and not even on the bench! This is the sort of thing you do when you're already qualified, not when you're nearly there. Arsenal did well in the first three games getting 9 points and running away with the average group we're in, but then Arsene Wenger decided to "rest" several players for the Shakthar Donestk game, resulting in a defeat and the group looking much tighter. He could have played a stronger line-up, at least drawn the game and we'd be qualified by now, then he could "rest" players in the last game of the group. And it's not even like he has been proved right in the longer term, as a few days later they lost against Newcastle. Will his resting players against Braga pay dividends against Aston Villa at the weekend? Time will tell, but I think it would have been much better to go into this game on the back of a win, or at least a draw, against Braga with our strongest available line-up playing and then playing again on Saturday. Instead, they go into the game after two defeats. OK, there will be a lot of changes but the mood in the squad will not be a confident, buzzing one going into the game which it could have been at least a bit if we'd have approached the game properly last night and got a positive result.

I wrote about approaching the game incorrectly after the Shakhtar defeat and hoped I wouldn't be doing so again about three weeks later, but I am because Arsenal, and most of all, Arsene Wenger just don't learn from their mistakes enough.  I personally do not think it makes a difference to the team on Saturday that they were "rested" last night. They don't need resting, they are professional, fit athletes who's jobs are to play football. They want to be playing as much as possible, I know this because I have been playing football for years and I wouldn't like being "rested," I would want to playing week in week out- it's better for the consistency of the player and for the continuity of the team. If you're chopping and changing the team every game then it's bad for the team as the more you consistently play with the same players, the more you get used to them as well as the team's system. And then the one player he should have rested, he gambles with after he specifically said he wouldn't take any gambles with before the game, Fabregas, played! After the game he said "I took a gamble and it back-fired". What is that all about? He said he wouldn't gamble. The bottom line is- I don't buy into "resting."

The team need to stop getting caught out on the counter- attack. We saw an example of this at the weekend when the team allowed tottenham back into the game just after half time by getting caught on the counter attack and again last night where the team pushed so far forward that Braga could just play a ball over the top of the defence to counter on us and score. A draw wouldn't have been a bad result, it would have guarenteed our qualification. What more do you want? It is costing the rest of us as Wenger's and the team's flaws and mistakes just keep getting repeated and this, at the end of the season, results in zero trophies.

However, it's not just Wenger. The players are at fault as well. They need to be a bit more clever and not get caught out as easily as they did at the weekend and last night. They are also the ones who keep making silly mistakes, such as Fabregas' handball, Denilson's sleepy tracking of van der Fart for their first goal, Clichy's terrible back pass at Shakthar and Fabianski's blunder against Newcastle. That's just this month so far.

I do wonder if players such as Denilson and Bendtner are actually good enough for title race/ champions league level. Eboue has been poor this season too, getting caught out too much going too far forward. Denilson doesn't really contribute enough to the team. He generally plays in a sitting midfield role, but doesn't have the intelligence, strength or tackling ability for this role. Nor does he have the creativity, passing range or shooting ability to play further forward.

Bendtner needs to do less talking off the pitch, and make more effort on the pitch. He arrogantly struts around the pitch wandering into silly positions where he is no use, doesn't possess the same aerial threat Chamakh does in the box and doesn't hold the ball up for other players to come into play. His technique and passing haven't improved at the needed or expected rate over recent years and he isn't consistent enough.


On the other hand, we were robbed. Why in the name of Sam Hill are these officials put behind the goal if they can't see simple things and aren't going to contribute extra officiating to the game? The referee should have been able to see that that was a penalty last night, and even if he can't the extra official should be able to, after all that is what he's there for- to spot that kind of thing in the penalty area, especially when it's right under his nose! Eboue got punished for a foul and booked in the first, literally right under the official's nose when it was a perfectly fair tackle where he won the ball. Now either the fifth official is blind or daren't go against the referee's decision. Either way, it's pointless him being there. Another example was when Djourou pulled the ball back and the defender diverted it out for a corner, right next the the official and the ref' gave a goal kick. Stupid and pointless are words that sum them extra officials up.

I sure do hope they bounce back against a depleted Aston Villa team on Saturday as Chelsea and Man Utd have got games that they'll probably win. Even though we'll probably have Fabregas out we should win, I don't think Villa are as good as they used to be and they have got a lot of player's out. Come on you Gunners!

Arsenal of old

Today's travesty reminded me of the Arsenal of 2008. It reminded me particularly of the Man Utd game we won 2-1. We looked great going forward but looked so vulnerable defensively and the score could have been anything that day. Also, I remember we had a few chances to make the score 3-0 in that game, like we had a couple today, and then Man Utd pulled one back for a nervy finish.

I'm not saying we were as good today as were in that game but the Arsenal of today seemed to lack maturity and a bit of know- how, just like the team did that day against Man Utd, and a couple of weeks earlier against tottenham. My first thought going into the second half was "Right, first and foremost, our aim is making sure we don't concede." I didn't want us to go all out defence and get 10 men behind the ball, but I wanted us to attack and play with caution. Don't gamble too many men forward, make sure we don't make any silly mistakes and keep the ball; don't give it away like we did a few times when trying to rush the attack and play a fancy through ball that's never going to work- keep the thing- there's no rush, we're 2-0/ 2-1 up.

Maybe last Sunday's game at Everton affected the attitude today as Arsenal went a bit too defensive in the last 10- 15 minutes of that game and invited Everton on to them, very un- Arsenal like and Wenger mentioned this after the game and will have talked to the players about it, so they probably thought "let's keep attacking and not invite tottenham onto us." Which is fair enough but we end up being like the Arsenal of old on their 1st goal by getting caught on the counter attack when 2-0 up, which is just silly. I thought we'd grown out of this over the last couple of seasons, we've seemed smarter in these situations lately.

I can't understand why Djourou didn't play today. He was very good at Everton last week whereas Koscielny wasn't the last time he played against Newcastle, yet he walked right back into the team. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. I only watched the game until around their 2nd goal, but until I stopped it to get away from it I thought Koscielny did reasonable yet we concede three goals, which leads on to my next point...

I often seem to say after an Arsenal defeat that we were unlucky, as often this is how it seems or is. Today was the same. Another thing I often think is "How on Earth dd we lose this game?" Today was the same. Why is it that most of the time when we lose it seems an unlucky defeat? Are we just unlucky? Like today, in the build up to their second goal it was never a free-kick in a million years, Song's challenge on Modric was a fair one, just one of strength. And then was it actually a penalty? Players put their hands up all the time in this situation, its human instinct to protect your face, I think its harsh to give a penalty there. Also, we didn't actually play bad and didn't look under threat in the game at all while I watched it. So how did we end up letting a two goal lead slip at home? They scored when we fell asleep a bit on a counter attack- which as I've said shouldn't happen when you're 2-0 up, particularly in this sort of game. But apart from that, we didn't look under threat. A long range Modric shot went over and they didn't really threaten apart from that. Van der Vaart, Bale, Lennon, Modric and Pavlyuchenko didn't look troublesome, and most of them were anonymous. Yet after regaining comfort and control of the game after they pulled it back, which i was impressed with a sit showed maturity and sense but then we are wrongly punished on their second goal and are unlucky with refereeing decisions twice in a minute. Unlucky rather than bad? Probably.

I can't comment on the rest of the game as I went to take my dogs out for a walk as I was fed up of puttting myself through the tension and nerves. I hear Koscielny missed an empty net which points to another of our failings, often unable to kill teams off. We were almost guilty of it at Everton last week with a couple of missed chances at 2-0, one of which a sitter. So often we get 1 or 2 goals up and start being fancy or over- elaborate in front of goal, failing to kill teams off. Chamakh could have used his strength on the stroke of half time by continuing his run to have a great chance of putting us 3-0 up. What a position that would have put us in. It would have been game as good as over. We were guilty of this in the 4-4 draw with tottenham and against West Ham last season at Upton Park, just examples off the top of my head. Too often this had happened in recent years. It's holding us back, as well as our lack of maturity, strategy and, at times, ability defensively when Vermaelen isn't there. We need to improve our killer instinct, particularly against teams more likely to punish you.

Overall, it's hard to criticise a player, or the performance but it's also hard to defend them as this defeat hurts more than any other and it's humiliating to lose at home to your local rivals who we never lose at home to, after being 2-0 up at half time and conceding a late winner. It's just so hard to take. If this was Football Manager, I wouldn't save the game, but unfortunately it isn't. Hopefully, our good away form can save our rubbish home form again next week against Aston Villa.

A consolation is that we're still in a good position, table wise, as Chelsea lost so we're only 2 points off 1st and 2nd. I've barely thought of the table since today's game, it's pride that's the bigger issue after this sort of defeat unfortunately.

Life's never dull as a Gooner, that isn't always a good thing.

Gunners Gain after another away win

Premier League weekends don't get much better than that do they? A great away win for Arsenal, Chelsea get stuffed at home by a mid- table team, Man City only draw at home to Birmingham and Man Utd fail to win a game they probably should have. Oh, and Liverpool lost but we don't need to be concerned about their results do we?

That win at Everton showed qualities in the team that are necessary for a team to win the Premier League. Grit, determination, resilience, solidity and good finishing (apart from Chamakh!). I think I could list a load of different words to describe The Arsenal yesterday but the point is they showed improvement and, again, went to a difficult place to win and did so. They generally looked solid, didn't do anything silly and made the most of chances at crucial times. They also saw out the late fightback from the Toffees at the end, which fellow title contenders Man Utd failed to do back in September.

I was worried at the start of the weekend about the possibility of being seven points off Chelsea, or even 8, yet here we on Monday 2 points away from Chelsea who stay top. That's football- last week things seemed easy and turned out terrible yet this week things seemed hard but are now rosy again.

Praise today goes to Fabianski and Nasri. It could go to a lot of the players but these were two that stood out for me in particular. Nasri looks like he's come on a bundle since when he first arrived, and even from last season. He's also looking world class and getting better by the game. The way he breezed past Jagielka for his chance at 2-0 was sensational, not many get past Jagielka. His passing, intelligence and working back are great and his strength has also improved among many other attributes, not to mention his improvement in front of goal.

If Fabianski can keep us this form, not only will he shut up people like Merson who are overly- critical of him, but he'll be a key figure in our season and become a very good goalkeeper for us. OK, he made a mistake in the Newcastle game but look how he's responded. A MOTM display at Wolves followed by another great display at Everton. not to mention his form before the Newcastle game at Man City and other games. Great saves and great in the air from crosses and corners.

And a final note: I don't think our squad ever gets the credit it's deserved as I happen to think it's the strongest squad in the league. But the point is that yesterday we had one of our hardest away games of the season without our first choice centre halves Koscielny and Vermaelen and yet looked solid. Chelsea on the other hand, had Terry and Alex unavailable and got slaughtered by Sunderland at home. That's no coincidence. Chelsea never seem to have multiple injury problems and when, for once, they did yesterday they got beaten badly. In addition, if you look at each team's bench, we had van Persie, Walcott, Denilson, Rosicky, Gibbs and Eboue on ours yet Chelsea had Bruma, van Aanholt, Sala, McEachran and Kakuta alongside Kalou. There's no contest there. OK, they had a couple of key midfielders out but so have we many a time and this again just proves my previous point that Chelsea just didn't cope well when they had more than one or two injured players. Looking elsewhere, I think we have a far better squad than Man City, tottenham and Man Utd too. Just look at what Man Utd's bench was against Villa.

The fact that Arsenal have the best away record in the league got an even stronger one too which is a very mimpressive thing. Not only have we got the best away record, but we've had hard away games against Man City, Everton, Liverpool, Blackburn and Sunderland, and Wolves ain't easy. The one we lost was at Chelsea too so there's plenty of room for pride as far as Arsenal's away record is concerned. We haven't played numptys like Wigan and West Ham yet like Chelsea have either (at the perfect imes I might ad).

So, to sum up, a very good display and a great weekend for Arsenal.

Player Ratings:

Fabianski- 8

Sagna- 8

Squillaci- 7
Djourou- 8
Clichy- 7
Fabregas- 8
Song- 8
Wishere- 7
Nasri- 9
Chamakh- 7
Arshavin- 8

Denilson- 7
Rosicky- 6
Eboue- 6

Away Fans- 10

What the Hell?

What are the FA thinking? They have extended Laurent Koscielny's suspension by an extra game so that now he will miss the Everton game as well as the Wolves game. What a disgrace! How on Earth can they refuse to take action against Tom Huddlestone after he stamped on a Bolton player at the weekend with his studs and yet extend Koscielny's ban? There's just no logic there. Tom Huddlestone's offence was a lot worse than Koscielny's as he endangered another player's well- being yet all Koscielny did was pull somebody to the floor. His red card was debatable and in my opinion, undeserved. He only deserved a yellow as Ranger was quite far out and on the touchline when he was running in on goal and Squillaci would have probably caught up to him therefore there was a man on the cover so Koscielny wasn't the last man therefore shouldn't have been sent off and had his ban extended.

The reason for the extension of his ban was because this is his second red card of the season. That other red card, like this one, was not awarded for dangerous play either, it was just two bookable offences. They should only be able to extend a player's ban on the grounds that he has been sent off before this season, if that other sending off was a straight red card. Just like Arsenal can only appeal straight red cards. It's just bent. Also, if you think back to that dismissal at Anfield, that wasn't a deserved red card either as his second yellow was completely wrongful too.

The FA need to put down their cream- cakes, pull their fingers out of their backsides and actually learn about the game. They also all need to grow a pair because it seems that they daren't go against a referee's decision when called upon, as if they go against a referee's decision they make him look bad- so what?! Do the right thing you jobsworths!

Overall, the point is how can they extend Koscielny's ban and not take action against Huddlestone?

The other point is how can they extend his ban on the grounds that he has already had a red card this season, even when that red card was undeserved? I bet they didn't even look at that red card incident on the opening day in their build- up to this decision. Which just shows how thorough they are in their "jobs" and decisions.

The worst I've ever seen Arsenal play

I have never seen Arsenal play that poorly, home or away since I started supporting them. Even when we lost to Man Utd and Chelsea at home last season we were better than that, albeit still very poor. We didn't create enough chances, have enough domination and didn't put Newcastle under pressure anywhere near as much as we needed and should have done. We didn't put them under enough pressure for long spells of the game including the last 10- 20 minutes or so where you would have expected us to be camped around the edge of their box creating plenty of chances. We also looked dodgy at the back and poor in possession which is a rarity for Arsenal.

Our home form this season has been a bit worrying. We haven't performed well in the league since Bolton on September 10th. We thought that the defeat against West Brom was a one off slip up. Evidently not. Hopefully it doesn't happen again, I would expect they'd learn from this, but I thought the same after the WBA game. We didn't have any excuses today either, we had a strong team out and the best bench I've seen us have in a very long time. OK, Van Persie had just come back but still with the options we had, you wouldn't have expected us to fail to score. Often after defeats, like the Chelsea one, we have perfectly good grounds when saying that injury woes were a factor in our defeat and a legitimate excuse, but not today. We had Vermaelen out but against a team like Newcastle at home, that isn't enough excuse for playing so poorly. We had other players out but I'm not sure if any of those players would have played today had they been fit.

I don't blame Fabianski for the loss either. He was half at fault for the goal as he made a bad choice in coming out to challenge for the ball, but after his recent performances I can forgive him that one mistake- everybody makes them. The other player half at fault, who lost Carroll whilst "marking" him was the striker guilty of putting on an absolutely abysmal showing today. Lethargic, thick, poor technically and not threatening enough- Chamakh. The runs he makes and positions he takes up are often ridiculous and thick. Another abysmal performance came from the man who should have been picking up the other players and driving us forward more than anyone else and leading by example as the captain of Arsenal football club- Cesc Fabregas. I can't remember him playing as badly as that or giving the ball away as often.
Theo Walcott was also very disappointing but its the team performance that was most disappointing today and we can only blame individuals to a certain extent.

It's vital we pick up some points in our upcoming games, including our next game at Wolves which won't be easy and a game at Everton which should be even trickier. Like with Newcastle today, we might be getting Wolves at a bad time after their recent games should give them confidence as they beat Man City and have provided themselves with encouragement after their games against Man Utd. On the other hand, them being gutted after that last minute winner yesterday could work in our favour, they may also be tired after their recent run of tricky games- either way its a game we should win. But after today, I'm not too confident.

Chelsea and tottenham losing are consolations, especially the former as we remain 5 points off the top instead of 8. Let's bounce back against Wolves!

Ratings:

Fabianski 6
Sagna 5- why did he look so uncomfortable on the ball?
Squillaci 6
Koscielny 5
Clichy 6
Fabregas 4- awful
Song 6
Wilshere 7- did alright- best player today (not that that's saying much)
Walcott 5
Chamakh 3- atrocious
Nasri 5- couple of decent moments first half and perhaps should have had ball layed off to him when Walcott hit the bar

Arshavin 6- decent when in possession
Van Persie 6
Bendtner 5

Glad to see those rests in midweek cam in handy.

Notes:

• Our delivery and final ball were awful today- crossing is very poor and where was that different dimension that Chamakh supposedly brings us- he needs to make more effort to get away from his marker as he never seems to create space for himself.
• Weren't strong enough at the back
• The players didn't seem to communicate with each other enough- is this a regular thing that is holding us back slightly?
• We need to stop starting these games so lethargically as it gives the opposition confidence and makes our task of winning harder.
• Do we miss the balance in midfield that Diaby brings?

Bigger fish to fry, but Wenger got this one wrong

This wasn't the most crucial game ever, but getting something would have made life easier. We had a severely under-strength line-up, so what could we have done to get a positive result?

The first thing we could have done was picking a stronger line-up. I don't think Wenger approached this game correctly. It was a bit like "we're in a strong position, so we can afford a defeat". That's what it seemed like to me anyway.

What conveyed this to me was the team selection. OK, if it was a risk playing Fabregas then I agree to leave him out. And, depending on how much of a risk it would have been to play Arshavin and Song, I could agree with that too. But couldn't we put Denilson into the midfield? I'm sure his knock wasn't too bad- I bet if we'd have been playing Chelsea at home in league last night, he'd have been available to play. Plus, I don't think he'll play against Newcastle on Sunday- or at least he shouldn't in my opinion. So unless he was genuinely injured, I disagree with not playing him instead of Eastmond as he would have given us a better passing ability than Eastmond, a better sense of positioning, he's experienced and knows how to play in this sort of game more and would probably have made our midfield more solid and protected the back four more. Some may disagree with me on that, but it would have been an improvement, and I don't believe that he was genuinely injured.

I don't think it would right to go on about that too much as I don't know how injured he may or may not have been so I'll move on. Resting our two most reliable available defenders was a mistake for me. First of all, why did they need "resting"? Koscielny has just returned from injury and only played two games and Sagna could be "rested" if he desperately needs to be against Newcastle on Sunday, I would say that is a better opportunity to "rest" him and play Eboue in  a game that suits Eboue more.

On a more positive note, this wasn't the be all and end all so it shouldn't turn out to be a massive setback. Also, if on the 4th October after the Chelsea game, I had been offered 5 straight wins against Birmingham, Man City away and West Ham in the league as well as a Champions League rout against Shakhtar and a Carling Cup rout at Newcastle followed by a defeat away against Shakhtar, in our most difficult CL group game I would have taken that.

Additionally, we still top the group and have two very winnable games left in the champions league so we are still in a good position.

Thirdly, the players should be nice and fresh for the Newcastle game to continue our fine form in the league. And hopefully, I'll be writing after that game about an Arsenal victory and a Liverpool favour.

Overall, an extremely under-strength line-up so not the most worrying defeat and we're still in a good position in the champions league group, so there's no need to set the panic alarms off.

Here are my player ratings:

Fabianski 7- continued his solid form and couldn't be blamed for the goals
Eboue 5- very poor- as poor as I've seen him play at right back, rubbish going forward, got caught out a few times defensively, especially first half
Squillaci 6- could have been a bit better and lead by example
Djourou 7- pick of the back four, did alright
Clichy 5- second goal puts him down to a five, terrible mistake for an experienced footballer, especially just before half time, away from home
Eastmond 5- showed he's not ready yet for this level
Rosicky 5- poor, should have had more of an influence on the game. had a decent spell in second half with a couple of good passes but overall not good enough- should have lead by example
Wilshere 7- did quite well, always trying to create but didn't get deep into their half enough, however was on his own most of the time in trying to create chances and dictate play
Walcott 7- did excellent for the goal, and had a few decent efforts on goal in the second half
Bendtner 5- not really invloved
Nasri 6- Did well first half but faded and shouldn't have passed to Chamakh (see Chamakh)

Vela 6- not much impact, worryingly average at this level
Chamakh 5- should have made a better impact and his first touch and cross were pathetic late on when Nasri broke towards goal and passed to him
Emmanuel Thomas 6