What a game for Szczesny to make his debut in premier league!

and look at our subs
Fabianski, Djourou, Denilson, Fabregas, van Persie, Walcott, Bendtner

just watch some highlights of the match, so my opinion might not based on how we played for full 90 mins (didn't manage to watch the full match due to my streamyx screwed up at exactly 4am )

I noticed that Arsenal play very defensively in the first half, but i believed that is a tactic by Arsene as Nasri said

"We wanted to stand off them at the beginning, not to commit ourselves going forward"

Don't really understand this move by the manager as we all know we can't really defend.
However I think we coped quite well until Park's goal. To me it's a fluke goal (MU's fans will disagree and say it's a "superb" header) The cross deflected off Clichy and Park just happened to be there.

2nd half was better, but not good enough. MU defence was rock solid, don't think we really troubled VDS apart from that shot by Nasri, Chamakh could have done better though with the follow up.
And seriously Howard Webb, what's with the penalty? What can clichy do? He fell down and Nani kicked the ball right at his hand . But on a second thought I think Webb didn't see what happened, I think it's the linesman who flagged for that handball and Webb just gave the penalty. Still, it's very very harsh.

Anyway, Arsene's latest reason for our lost, the pitch! This is new from our manager But as usual he won't criticise the team in front of the media. I think he could have find a better reason though.

Some said that we were riled up by Evra's comments, so we keep on kicking them. The highlights didn't show those "kicking" so i don't really know what happened, but obviously they don't know we are not the same team anymore. So what do they want? When we got kicked they blamed us for being too soft, ok so now when we get the tackles in, they said we played dirty. Like Arsene said “No matter what we do, it is wrong”

We'll face Stoke City this Sat, it'll be a hard match and I don't hope to see any injuries, pls put all our fragile player on the bench, RvP in particular. IF we really can kick our opponent as claimed by some people, let's put it to good use this Sat .

This post has been edited by c_calvin: Dec 14 2010, 05:20 PM

Yes we all know Arsene will come out with some excuses. So what'd you expect him to say? Criticise his team right in front of the media? It's not gonna happen! So either you accept it or just ignore his post match comments. To be fair to him, he did say we didn't play well enough and he did give credits to MU's defence. But as usual the media won't make that as headline but instead focusing on what he said about the pitch.

And I think majority of us here know the pitch isn't the reason, so no, we are not following blindly.

This post has been edited by c_calvin: Dec 14 2010, 06:40 PM

AW isn't a good loser. But who wants a good loser, you cannot be a good manager if you're happy when you lost.
Like i said, if you cant accept his comments, just ignore it. Because this is not the first time he'd given such comment and definitely not the last.
And he has the responsibility to protect his player, it'll do more harm than good if he criticise his team in front of the media.

A lot of people misunderstood Arsene's view on bad tackling, no thanks to the media.
What Arsene wants is to stamp out bad tackling in football matches, not just football matches Arsenal involved in, but all the football matches. Of course with that comment he hope to get the referee's attention thus providing more protection for his player.

IMO cards doesn't reflect how a team played really, take our CB Koscielny for example, he got 2 red cards(one is for hand ball and another one for professional foul) this season so far but that doesn't means he's a dirty player.

I always think that Barcelona is the complete version of Arsenal.

-A good CM who can control the midfield with exceptional vision and magical passing ability = Xavi = On form Cesc
-A player who can dribble with the ball and run at defense = Iniesta = Arshavin that plays well, not the Arshavin this morning.
-A good holding midfielder = Busquets = Alex Song that doesn't always wander forward
-A striker with decent finishing = Villa = On form RvP
-Arguably the best player in the world = Messi = ???

So we just need to find a Messi no.2

Anyway the above comparison is my personal opinion and just for fun

This post has been edited by c_calvin: Dec 14 2010, 10:56 PM

I know it's not fair to compare player with player, obviously each of them got different abilities and weaknesses but to be honest Barca's playing style(not the conduct of their club and players on the Cesc's issue ) is what we should learn.

Except from moving the ball faster, their passing are more purposeful, we always pass with no real intention outside the penalty box. And the way they close down their opponent when they don't have the ball is scary. I remember when we play against them we can't even pass the ball out of our half except from kicking it away with longball.

btw anyone here thinks that we'll get Barca for Last 16 of UCL?

This post has been edited by c_calvin: Dec 14 2010, 11:12 PM

Wow, calm down dude. Don't get emotional just because i used "barca" as an example. I don't know how you come out with the idea of I like Barca. What i said is just my opinion on how they played and like i said in previous post, the comparison is just for fun.
And no, i don't think we could have been compared with MU, Chelsea, Real Madrid or even Inter Milan. You might have your own opinion on that but to me our style and Barca's style are more similar.
Yes I know we lost to Barca and their conduct on Cesc's transfer annoyed all of us here. But let's be honest, their playing style is something we should learn, no harm in doing that. And i meant the way they attack, closing down opponent etc. Not the way they fall down easily and ask for a foul when we tackle them

Didn't play and injured? Seems to me it's like the "elbow injury" he had before that
Anyway don't think he's gonna play again, not with Fabianski and Szczesny doing fine at the moment.

This post has been edited by c_calvin: Dec 17 2010, 12:43 AM

err but the 1st leg of last 16 doesn't start until Feb 15
Anyway got a feeling we'll get Barcelona too.

just as planned even Wenger said so

"I know who we will get," Wenger said. "At this level, you need connections." The Frenchman has seen it written. Arsenal will be paired with Barcelona.

Anyway hope we can play with the best first 11 this time, when we lost 4-1 we played with the following players.

1 Manuel Almunia
18 Mikael Silvestre
5 Thomas Vermaelen
22 Gaël Clichy
3 Bacary Sagna
2 Abou Diaby
15 Denilson
52 Nicklas Bendtner
8 Samir Nasri
7 Tomas Rosicky
14 Theo Walcott



This post has been edited by c_calvin: Dec 17 2010, 07:36 PM

I just remembered we won't have Sagna available in the 1st leg

Gonna be a hard hard match for us.
I think Cesc must be celebrating now shouting: "Yes I can play with my old mates again"

Another pic from the Arsenal Christmas Dinner

LMAO!he's better than Cesc and Rooney??

btw classy response from Wilshere

http://twitter.com/henri_lansbury

http://twitter.com/_denilson15

Team to play Chelsea: Fabianski, Sagna, Koscielny, Djourou, Clichy, Wilshere, Song, Fabregas, Nasri, Walcott, Van Persie

Arshavin dropped for Walcott

Henry's Interview before the match



Arsene double facepalm after Nasri missed his chance


A lot more pics, gif, interviews here

This post has been edited by c_calvin: Dec 28 2010, 06:00 PM

Lots of changes but not unexpected. Eboue at LB?

Will the FA fine us for changing too many players?

This post has been edited by c_calvin: Dec 30 2010, 03:30 AM

Arshavin suddenly sprung into life late in the 1st half

He will complain bout the ref for sure
Sigh Arsene, if only you bring on Nasri and Walcott earlier we might have a chance to kill the game

This post has been edited by c_calvin: Dec 30 2010, 06:10 AM