Nice wanyama on the bench. The last time we played he was pretty good. Hope we can score a couple before he comes on.

Lol what a shit first half. And its against a second rate Sotong team with their best striker attacking midfielder and defender out.

What a joke.

We don't look like we want to win the title.

This post has been edited by sigheart: Jan 29 2014, 04:34 AM

Should take out Arteta or Flamini and replace with maybe the Ox. Our attackers looks outnumbered at the moment.

Lol man again in a winning position simply throw away the advantage with stupid defending.

First at Everton now here. That is 4 points we have thrown away. Guess a herculean effort is needed now in Feb and Mar.

To be honest I don't even know what is his role if Flamini plays. If Flamini is not around then yes he is the holding midfielder but with Flamini on? Offers nothing at all in attack and in defence. He was supposed to track the run of Lallana in their equalising goal but there he was jogging back without a care in the world. Huge gap between midfield and defence.

Even bigger LOL at those blaming Wenger. I won't even bother elaborating why.

Probably a bit too harsh also on Arteta since this its his first game back. If Wilshere or Rosicky had been fit Arteta wouldn't even have played. But as it stood we had nobody else.

Tough luck for us I guess with the injuries.

Cazorla can't defend for shits. We will be exposed to the max if you play him in the middle.

And please tell me how Monreal and Sagna was burned countless times due to the lack of cover from both Gnabry and Cazorla? Mind you both their goals started from the wings to the middle.

You go stick Cazorla in there down the middle and we would be cut open like a hot knife through butter with Flamini alone in there most of the time.

This post has been edited by sigheart: Jan 29 2014, 06:07 AM

Yes, since playing players in their proper positions doesn't matter to you my as well play 11 strikers from the start since positions don't matter to you

FFS Arteta just came back from injury.

Then what do you have left? Cazorla who has never played CM before for 99% of his career and the OX who is just as unfit and again has played most of his matches on the wing.

Arteta was a logical choice being a natural CM.

You speaking from hindsight after the match is over is always easier.

Its not that I minat Arteta or what. As far as team selection goes I am not blaming Wenger at all. Any manager would've picked a natural replacement for a position rather than a half-converted one or one that is halfway being nurtured for that posdition in a high stakes game.

First 15 minutes we can see all 11 players out there were crap and useless. Not only Arteta.

This post has been edited by sigheart: Jan 29 2014, 01:20 PM

Agree, that's about the only positive I could draw from this game. One of ozil's best games in the BPL this season and easily our best player last night in the second half. This is one of the first times I've seen him try to beat players on his own so often since he arrived and as shown he certainly has the ability to do that. Hopefully this would prove a launch pad for him to do that more often in future matches.

So who would you have benched, Cazorla or Giroud to make way for Podolski?

The thing is if podolski had played and we were shit people will be slating Arsene instead for not giving Gnabry a chance. Criticizing on hindsight is always easier.

We have won games with a lineup like last night and you cannot argue that gnabry, cazorla and Giroud were off form coming into this game. Giroud and Cazorla are in good goal scoring form and Gnabry has been solid each time he played. It's not that the players fielded ahead of podolski has been shit for an extended amount of time.

The lineup fielded from the start was tried and tested with every player in their best position if not secondary position. Putting in Podolski for Gnabry would mean santi on the right and Poldi on the left. Seriously have you ever seen Santi put on the right in the team sheet before? Next thing we know if we didn't win you will be complaining about Arsene experimenting putting players in unfamiliar positions in BPL matches.

Either way the team which was fielded was still more than capable of winning and it was the individuals on the pitch which were below par and disappointed.

Ozil has never started anywhere else but the middle for us this season since he joined. I know he can play anywhere across midfield with his ability (mind you that piece of play where he cut in and set up Cazorla for our second was from when he was on the right) but putting him on the right primarily for the first time would still represent some sort of a gamble.

Agree that our players do interchange positions from time to time but for most part of the game they would still drift back to their primary positions as per Arsene's teamsheet instructions. At the end of the day team organization is still important.

The main point here is you can't blame Arsene for taking the safest option last night with his team selection in a BPL match. Every player was in their best position bar Santi whom I feel is better behind the striker down the middle. You can say Poldi is in good form, but the same can be said about Giroud, Cazorla and Gnabry.

We saw him experiment a bit in the last game with no holding midfielder at all and Ox in the centre of midfield but that was Coventry and Southampton clearly ain't no Coventry.

Yes, the first goal was a foul on Monreal. Heck they shouldn't even have got a freekick leading up to the goal in the first place. Mertesacker got the ball, it wasn't clean contact but he did touch the ball nonetheless.

Bottomline is, as mentioned earlier the team fielded early this morning was still more than capable of winning but were below par. I believe Arsene made the best choice he could've made at the time. I didn't say the right choice obviously because we didn't win. Its the players that disappointed.

We can blame the injuries all we want but matter of fact Sotong were missing Osvaldo, Lovren and Ramirez also.

Hopefully the players realizes this as well and come back stronger. I believe we are more than capable enough to give the teams we are going to face in Feb and Mar a good run for their money.

COYG

If it's klose i'd rather we stick with Bendtner. Not convinced he can cut it now.

Yeap, all also have glass legs, play one game injured for 2 or 3. You can throw Rosicky into that mix as well.

Its okay with enough bodies we can rotate. Say if we have 6 CMs we can only play 2 per game.

After 1 game 2 injured left with 4. Play another the next game both get injured and we are left with 2. Play those two in the next game and by the time they get injured the 2 who were injured first will be back. Rinse and repeat.

Voila! injury problems solved.

That way each of them gets playing time thats why we always go for injury prone players. If all the midfielders stay fit all the time in no time we have people complaining not enough playing time.

Arsene is a genius.

This post has been edited by sigheart: Jan 31 2014, 11:26 PM

We were rumoured to be interested in him before.

Damn, kudos to Fulham then. Might just be the perfect foil for Berbatov provided he stays.

Fulham have also signed Holtby on loan.

Looks like those b*stards down the lane were hell bent on not giving us any chance in getting Draxler.

Really hope those c*nts crash and burn this year without even getting a UEFA cup spot.

This post has been edited by sigheart: Jan 31 2014, 11:45 PM

Lol you don't know who is Kallstrom? swt..........

He used to be a really good midfielder for Lyon and Sweden. Was one of the cornerstones of Lyon's spell of dominance in Ligue 1 as well some years back.

Now at 31, not so sure though.

I guess most people are just worried on whether he is already past his peak or can he still cut it in the BPL at the age of 31.

If we had signed him 3 years ago people would've called it a fantastic signing.