Arsenal vs QPR 1-0

Positive news: we got a win. Reality: we still played shit. More reality: our goal was from an offside position; Reading had two 100% chances to score with 10 men on the field in the last 5 minutes of the game!!! What does that tell you? We are nowhere close to being a top team right now. And we got away with a very, very lucky win. Let's hope Wenger and his staff will be honest with themselves and get back to work, because if we perform like we did today against Man U next week, i see a painful 90 minutes ahead for any Arsenal supporter.

The best thing that happened to us today was seeing Jack Wilshere back in the starting 11. He was our most impressive player while he was on the pitch. The guy looked like he hasn't missed a beat in the last year and a half without football. He was energetic, hungry to play and was involved in every decent move we had going forward. What i love about him is that, when he gets the ball with his back to the opponent goal, he always looks for an opportunity to turn and advance forward and then look for the pass or his shot. That opens up space for other players and also makes us much more dangerous when we try to attack quickly and more direct. A lot of the other midfielders, when they get the ball with their backs to the opponents goal, they play the ball back or start twisting and turning at the same spot. That's fine, but slows down our attack and our runs are not very penetrating. Not to mention, defenders recover and we have no space to work with. Bottom line, Wilshere was great today and i was really happy to see him playing again! That guy is a true fighter and plays with his heart, let's hope he stays healthy for many years to come!

Another positive today, was the return of Sagna. I really like Jenkinson, but Sagna is very important for us with his quality and the need for rotation. He also had a great game today. Had some good crosses, made a very important stop in the 65th minute when Hoilett was about to be one on one vs Mannone. He looked sharp throughout the whole game and that was great to see. Mertesacker and Vermaelen were steady in the back up until the last 10 minutes of the game where we allowed twice Granero and Mackie to be one on one vs Mannone. I am not saying it was only their fault but the defense (with the exception of Santos whom i will talk about, in the next paragraph) was pretty good for most of the game and then it collapsed the last 10 min.

Now the Santos topic. The guy is a liability at the back against any player with some speed. Not only that, but often he is in the wrong parts of the pitch, thus creating even bigger challenge for himself to get back and keep up with players. To give you some proof i took pictures during the game today of two situations when he was nowhere near where his position requires him to be and that allowed for huge pockets of space on his side and i am amazed QPR didn't do better on those chances. The first sequence is in the 21st minute:

The ball is in the middle of the pitch, Santos pushes way up to attack the guy with the ball who passes to Shaun Wright-Phillips...

..now there is a huge gap on the right side, Santos is no where near the guy with the ball...

...which leaves with a 5 vs 5 situation....

The next situation is in the 53rd minute:

High ball towards Zamora, Vermaelen is right behind him. Santos LEAVES his position to try to win a high ball from Zamora!....

...obviously Santos loses that duel, and now...

...Wright Phillips has the ball again with lots of space to work with...

The point i am trying to make here is that not only Santos is not fast enough to keep up with people, he is also NOT DISCIPLINED enough with his positioning to make up for it! I am going to make a little prediction today: if Santos is our left back for the Man U game, we will get scored on at least twice. Let's hope i am wrong but the way i see it, good teams punish mistakes like this. p.s. If you look at my post from an year ago when we beat Chelsea 5-3 at Stamford Bridge, you will see similar pictures with our boy Santos being the main hero again.

The midfield today was not great. We still didn't create nearly enough chances to win the game and at times in the second half we were dominated by QPR. Wilshere was the bright spot as i mentioned earlier. Ramsey had a decent game but neither him, or Cazorla  created many chances. A lot of times guys were not on the same page for one-two passes; Cazorla did a bit too much of dribbling the ball and turning 360 degrees instead of passing it quicker. He also missed a great chance with an open goal. Podolski was working hard but also didn't create much. We just need to get on the same page as to what we are trying to do offensively. Be more direct with our runs, have more through balls and be decisive in the final third.

Giroud put a good effort today. He wins a lot of high balls but the guys around him almost don't expect him to do it, so they sit around watching, instead of making runs anticipating that he will win the high balls! The good news today was that Gervinho didn't start and even though i am sorry he got injured, i promise i won't miss him a lot. Walcott has to get more playing time if we want our offense to become more dynamic. We will take the points today but let's not kid ourselves, we need to IMPROVE! C'mon You Gunners!!!

Norwich vs Arsenal 1-0, Arsenal vs Schalke 0-2

One of my good friends was getting married this weekend, so i didn't have a chance to either watch the Norwich game or write about it. My initial plan was, when i got back home on Monday, to watch the tape and then write my blog. I obviously checked the score and heard  that we lost; then one of my buddies who saw the game said we played shit; Wenger in his post match interview admitted we played shit; so i decided i am not going to go through the suffering of watching 90 minutes of shit football. I have seen plenty of those games in the last 7 years: lots of possession, no real chances, mistake in the back, lose away from home. I did watch the extended highlights of the game and we maybe had 1 or 2 decent chances for the whole game. What i did watch today, was our Champions League game against Schalke 04, and i will share my thoughts about it, without going into great detail as i normally do.

First and foremost, i have to mention our team selection. The SAME team from this weekend against Norwich, with ONE change: Coquelin for Giroud. I repeat: ONE change! I am not a math scientist but i am pretty sure that if you had a match on Saturday and you played shit, and then you have a match on Wednesday and you play the same exact team, the result is not going to be much different. Obviously with Walcott, Diaby and Gibbs out injured, you don't have a huge choice, but you DO have other options. If i am not mistaken: Arteta, Cazorla, Podolski, Vermaelen, Jenkinson, Mertesacker, Gibbs (before he got hurt) have played in EVERY single Premier League or Champions League match this season. And then you have Ramsey (after Diaby got hurt) and Gervinho who played ALMOST every game.

Wenger said after the Norwich match and i quote "I felt we lacked a bit of sharpness. But we missed what makes the success at the top level - that is complete focus. And they were sharper than us" ; "We had a lot of the ball but did not create much with it. It was an illusionary domination. It was a disappointing performance on our side" Well, no shit Sherlock, if we play the SAME core group of players in EVERY single game of course there will be lack of sharpness. Players get tired both mentally and physically. I am surprised Arteta, Cazorla and the rest, have not gotten injured yet. If Wenger does not start rotating the team more and mix and match the teams for Champions League and the Premier League, i expect more of the same results that we had this Saturday and today. 

Today's game against Schalke just proved that if ANY team, plays very organized and presses well up the pitch against us, we have no answer, except keeping possession and not creating much. It's not "we don't have a good scorer" problem; it's "we don't execute well enough to CREATE chances" problem. Not to mention our current left back, good old Mr. Santos is slower than a turtle and leaves the defense exposed every time he goes forward. Heck, we are exposed even when he stays back, because he can't catch up to anyone. I don't know how many times Mertesacker had to clear the ball from our penalty area because Santos got repeatedly beat down the left and balls/crosses just kept coming in. If you are Wenger and you know your second left back is liability, you manage Gibbs better, and give him breathers on less important games during the season, so you don't get stuck with Santos when Gibbs gets one of his regular injuries. Or maybe you go BUY a left back that can run. I would even put Koscielny in at centre half, and put Vermaelen at left back. But then again, that means the SAME  four defenders would have to play every game.

I have said this many times in previous posts, but i honestly feel that if Wenger doesn't change and adapt his management style, our mediocrity will continue. We will be a top 4, top 6 team, maybe pass the group stage at the Champions League but that's about it. I don't think we should let Wenger go, but HE should stop repeating the same mistakes he always does and then give us the same bulshit excuse: "We were a bit tired today; We lacked sharpness and focus; But our attitude was great and i can't ask for more from my players". Fuck man, i am tired of bulshit. Enough for today.

p.s.I don't support the idea of bringing in a new coach that spends like Chelsea and Man City because we don't have sugar daddies like they do. And i do feel that many players nowadays are unrealistically overpaid. I like the way we run our wage structure and so on, but we must NOT buy and pay decent salaries to awful players like Almunia, Squilaci, Djourou and so on. And we also have to manage and use the good players that we do have, in a smarter/better way.  

West Ham vs Arsenal 1-3

Huge win for us today! Mostly because we have a tough time against physical teams in general and going a goal down today, doesn't make it any easier. Not to mention, despite a lot of possession in the first half, we barely had any clear chances until Giroud's equalizer. So from this view point this was a massive win for us!!! It redeems us a bit for the bad loss/performance vs Chelsea and it will also give this team a lot of confidence going forward.

The performance today was up and down. The possession we had during the game was great (69%). Even if we didn't create a lot in the first half, we still kept the ball very well and controlled the game. West Ham were counting mainly on high balls to Carroll and unfortunately that wasn't a bad tactic for them because we couldn't deal with him all game long. Defensively we were shaky the whole game and we continued to struggle with crosses. Nolan could have single handedly scored 3 goals against us today! At the end of the first half (46m) Carroll won ANOTHER ball from a cross and Nolan had the ball in his feet 1 yard away from Mannone. How he missed that, i have no clue. He then missed 2 more chances in the second half which could have been goals as well. Carroll missed an open goal header when Mannone stupidly tried to come out for a cross but simply got man handled. And for West Ham's goal today, Ramsey allowed to be passed by way too easily and then Mertesacker decided to guess incorrectly what Diame will do, instead of closing the distance to the ball and trying to prevent the shot. So, regardless of the result and the great win, let's not kid ourselves that we played well defensively today.

Individually i don't think the defenders had a bad game. It's the unit as a whole, that allows too many opportunities for teams to score against us. Jenkinson was great again today. Solid performance throughout the whole game. I would say our best defender this game. Gibbs was solid, hopefully his injury is not too bad ( i will speak about this at the end). Mertesacker as i mentioned, made a bad mistake for their goal but then had some very important blocks and tackles, one being the breakaway chance Nolan had in the second half. He also did well in the air, especially in the second half. So, good game for the German. Vermaelen has been a bit disappointing for me lately. Not that he had a bad game today, but he is just not as dominating in games as much as we are used to seeing him.

The midfield today was great with one exception. Yes, you guessed it: Gervinho! To be honest, i can't complain about him doing stupid shit with the ball today, because he was almost unnoticeable the whole game. I wrote after the Man City game, that the chance he missed in that game - on the right side, when he miscontrolled the ball, would have been converted and scored had Theo Wallcott been on the field; and i hope today is a proof of that for people who disagree with me! This doesn't mean that Theo never misses but he has a very high  %  of scoring when he is through on goal with 1 or 2 men to beat. And i do believe his finishing and decision making is better than Gervinho's. I also couldn't believe Wenger made a change in the 60th minute, that by itself made my day. Normally he waits until the 75th, so credit to him. Arteta was solid as usual, the way he has played this season i might as well even stop mentioning him every time, instead you guys can assume he had another great game working hard and being everywhere on the field. Ramsey, i guess got tired of me writing shit about him and had a great game as well. Fucked up big time for their goal, but other than that he was very active and had some great passes, nice to see a good performance by him. Cazorla was by far our best midfielder today. I am glad that he bounced back after the really bad game he had against Chelsea. Especially in the second half today, he was very dangerous. Had 2 shots heading for goal unluckily blocked by teammates; scored a phenomenal goal; gave an unreal pass to Giroud at the end of the game which the Frenchman should have scored. Great game for him! Podolski was great as well. I love how this guy works so hard for the team, today his crossing was off the charts. Gave a great ball for Giroud's goal; constantly was breaking on the left delivering good crosses in the box where Cazorla twice got his shot blocked. He also forced a great save by Jaaskelainen towards the end of the game.

Theo Walcott obviously had a big impact on the game. He didn't change our attacking strategy much, nor did he all of a sudden took over the game, but  he converted the first chance he had with a much needed goal at the time. I am really happy for him and i think he deserves to start more games for us, hopefully this performance will force Wenger to think about it. And finally Giroud. We can say that today was his breakout game performance. I personally think he should have done much better and scored at least one more goal, but the reason i feel this is going to be his breakout game is because he scored a great goal at a very important time for the team, which will give him a lot of confidence. The cross he got from Poldi was a tough one to connect with, making his finish look even more impressive! He showed a lot of hustle and desire today, and a bit of sloppiness missing a great chance to make it four after a great pass from Cazorla. Anyway, i definitely think his size and presence bring a different dimension to the team, so let this game be a starting block for many more goals from him.

Before i write my last thoughts on Wenger, i do have to mention that today's last 3,4 minutes of regular time and the 5 minutes extra time given, was the most comfortable i have seen our team in an away game of some importance in the past 3,4 years. We did a great job keeping the ball and just passing it around, compared to our really bad habit of just kicking the ball away, and then defending for our lives from crosses in the box which often ended up with goals against us, thus raising my blood pressure to immense heights.

As far as my thoughts on Wenger. I firmly believe that despite his undeniable genius of knowing what the fuck he is doing at his job, his rotational policy is absolute shit. I do hope Gibbs is ok and there is nothing wrong with him, but you can't expect to make only 2 changes per game when you play Wednesday-Saturday schedule and not have people get injured eventually. Champions League games are important but we have enough quality players to have a good rotation. The douchebag coach at Man U is super annoying but he is not scared to make rotations to his team, i give him big credit for that. Most recent example: Man U's team vs Tottenham you have Giggs, Carrick, Nani, Scholes and Kagawa. Champions League game vs Cluj you have Anderson, Cleverly, Fletcher, Rooney, Hernandez. That's 5 fucking players and that's how you should make rotations when you have a lot of games. I am sure having Santos, Walcott, Arshavin or Giroud start against Olympiacos wouldn't have hurt our chances of winning the game. Especially when you know Gibbs's track record of not being super durable.

So, we do have a lot to improve on, but today's win was very important for us, let's pray for no injuries during the International break and then it's time to spank Norwich! C'mon You Gunners!!!