Offical match day thread

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bobo_97 said:
Perfect game for Ozil today.

And pepe - to stop being so dependent on the left hand side.
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Ozil is past it.

I cant see him working in Arteta's sides at all - Arteta give clear instructions that he wants from each position - that include closing down, where to pass, how to move etc.. that doesnt fit with Mesut.
I dont think Arteta is being told not to pick Ozil - but I do think they have kept him completely out of squads in recent weeks in an attempt to get him to leave.
 
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Nervier than it needed to be in the end - typical that Sheffield United, who hadn't scored a goal yet this season, score an absolute belter in the 83rd minute. <doh>
A drab first half, followed by a more confident, clinical display in the second. Happy for Pepe to score an important goal, and it was great individual skill too.
We played some good stuff when we went 2-0 up and were cruising, but perhaps it would have been better to try and kill the game off.

Nonetheless, it's a good win. 9 points from 12 in the league, whilst getting wins in the cups against Leicester and Liverpool away. We've had a very solid start to the season in terms of results. We needed to considering our run of games after the international break.

However, our lack of chance creation and ability to sustain pressure in attack is a big concern. We need to retain the ball better. Our strikers are feeding off scraps here. Aubameyang/Nketiah are barely getting any service.

I hope Edu and Vinai have something up their sleeve in terms of signings...
 
OK.

Nketiah is **** and should never play for us. Not his fault but I just don't get it. Has he got some dirty blackmail stuff on Arteta? He looks like an arsenal fan won the lottery to play for the team he supports. Adds nothing.

Elneny is also ****. Oh for the days of someone like Cazorla who was just so good on the ball he could turn on a sixpence and just make space.

Pepe and Saka have great feet and can make things happen at pace. Those two need to play wide with Auba up top. Then Willian can dictate from the middle. Or he can switch with Saka who looked quite tidy when he went central briefly today.

We need to play with four at the back the whole time. Tierney as a left back who can get forward is epic. Magalhaes and someone else centre half. Not Luiz as he's **** in a centre back pair. So maybe Holding until Mari is fit again?
 
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Sigh.

Real shame we lost this one.

Felt we should have had a penalty in the first half. Also overall felt the sides were very even - defintely did'nt deserve to loose.
 
The top 6 away record does need to improve - no wins since 2015 is poor.

I just don’t think we are at the point yet where we can go to a big 6 away and win; I think we need to focus on the home games more. (Although in these empty stadiums is there really a difference?)

One small concern that does seem to be more and more apparent is we struggle more in an attacking sense under arteta; we don’t create enough and it looks like it’s a midfield issue IMO.
 
white_gunner said:
The top 6 away record does need to improve - no wins since 2015 is poor.

I just don’t think we are at the point yet where we can go to a big 6 away and win; I think we need to focus on the home games more. (Although in these empty stadiums is there really a difference?)

One small concern that does seem to be more and more apparent is we struggle more in an attacking sense under arteta; we don’t create enough and it looks like it’s a midfield issue IMO.
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Read somewhere the other day that we are the third lowest at creating chances in the Premier League.
 
TheBear said:
Sigh.

Real shame we lost this one.

Felt we should have had a penalty in the first half. Also overall felt the sides were very even - defintely did'nt deserve to loose.
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I know Arteta set out with a game plan, and for the most part it worked. We kept City at bay other than a couple of chances (obvs the goal)

But I felt we were too conservative in the 2nd half. I know you run the risk of being opened up if you go for it. But I would have liked us to have been a bit more direct in the last 20 mins.

Other than that, a decent enough performance. But it's a loss so we are still very much a work in progress.
 
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As expected Mesut Ozil misses out on our Premierleague Squad. (along with Sokratis) - He has already been omitted for the Europa league squad therefore the highest earning player in the side wont even be registered to play football for us at all this term. Madness.<yikes>

Arsenal's Premier League squad: Cedric Soares, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Hector Bellerin*, Willian, Dani Ceballos, Calum Chambers*, Gabriel, Mohamed Elneny, Rob Holding*, Sead Kolasinac, Alexandre Lacazette, Bernd Leno, Matt Macey*, Ainsley Maitland-Niles*, Pablo Mari, David Luiz, Shkodran Mustafi, Thomas Partey, Nicolas Pepe, Alex Runarsson, Kieran Tierney, Granit Xhaka

Meanwhile, first-team players such as Gabriel Martinelli, Bukayo Saka, William Saliba, Reiss Nelson, Joe Willock and Emile Smith Rowe have been named among the under-21 players.
 
white_gunner said:
however - my concern still stands. Im not comfortable with Arteta's 'less is more' approach.

Im sure our conversion rate is sky high, but we cannot rely on finishing just 1 or 2 chances per game.
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I think think they intend to. I think we will go 433 soon enough
 
Surely we can't stick to 3 centre halves for much longer. Brought in to steady the ship, but it's not viable longterm. Pepe for a start would be a lot more effective with more support higher up the pitch from central midfield. Too much reliance on very few attackers being able to pull stuff off. We need more players higher up the pitch.
 
cini65 said:
Surely we can't stick to 3 centre halves for much longer. Brought in to steady the ship, but it's not viable longterm. Pepe for a start would be a lot more effective with more support higher up the pitch from central midfield. Too much reliance on very few attackers being able to pull stuff off. We need more players higher up the pitch.
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Yeah I really want to see us go 4-3-3. Gabriel and Luiz look solid enough at CB and Bellerin and Tierney offer us so much going forward on the flanks. I'd be much happier with Partey in the middle of a 3 in the centre too, he looked nice and composed tonight. As you mention, that would give Pepe and Aubameyang more support up top and allow Lacazette to play higher up the pitch, rather than picking the ball up on the half way line as he seems to drop so deep to have to get the ball
 
PISKIE said:
Yeah I really want to see us go 4-3-3. Gabriel and Luiz look solid enough at CB and Bellerin and Tierney offer us so much going forward on the flanks. I'd be much happier with Partey in the middle of a 3 in the centre too, he looked nice and composed tonight. As you mention, that would give Pepe and Aubameyang more support up top and allow Lacazette to play higher up the pitch, rather than picking the ball up on the half way line as he seems to drop so deep to have to get the ball
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David Luiz in a back 2 is a walking **** up. He's a goner. Gabriel and Mari hopefully. Or Gabriel and ANYONE.
 
I thought Luiz played well tonight, but the two standout players for me were Partey and Gabriel. It's obviously very early days, and the calibre of opposition at times hasn't been spectacular, but both of them look absolutely elite. Partey today looked a class above.

The less said about Leno, the better. By far his worst ever Arsenal performance and possibly his worst ever performance as a professional.

Like others, I am concerned at how we struggle to break teams down and how laboured our passing is between the lines. Saka or Pepe didn't really do enough to take players on, and create space for others. We had to bring the 'big guns' on to rescue the game, and it's a good thing we did, otherwise we'd be staring down at a very poor result.

That being said, Rapid Vienna away is our toughest fixture of the group and, even if the performance wasn't dazzling, the result was very important, so I am glad we got the 3 points. That's Rapid Vienna's first loss all season, too. I think it's harder than many thought, but that's probably because we didn't know much about the opposition we were facing tonight.

Leicester at home next....difficult game that is absolutely a must win.
 
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