Only our staff know the condition of our players. He must have thought Dier was out on his feet to leave him behind (or carrying an injury), Alli was suspended, we have injuries to Vertonghen and Rose and Kane is playing with a broken nose. It was really only Dembele, Walker, Lamela and, arguably, Bentaleb (who is having a poor season) that he could have improved us with.
Kane could have played, proved by the fact he came off the bench after the horse had bolted! Besides, why not play the strongest side available?
You have to judge it on who we were playing. Kane could run himself into a brick wall and not have got many openings against Dortmund. If he is in need of a rest, then it was a good game for him to be left out.
I get the feeling you don't care about the EL. Again, I don't blame you because winning the PL would be a much greater achievement. However, the response I got earlier (albeit from HIAG) was that players were rested to ensure you get top four. It also makes a mockery of resting players in the FA cup to help your EL challenge in the previous round. It just doesn't make sense to me.
I don't much. I would love to see us win a cup, but we have a chance of the PL and that may not come around very often. The finalists of EL have another 6 games to play (5 in the season). Arsenal have to fit in this weekend's cancelled PL game, and will have to fit in another if they beat Watford. To win the PL would make my decade, nothing should stand in the way of that. Not saying we will, but we have a chance.
TBH, I think he set up for a draw or a narrow defeat. And It's blown up in his face. We will see what side he puts out in the return leg, but the tie is lost IMO. 3-1, maybe a chance. 3-0 Nah, can't see it...
HIAG has been trying to play it cool today and pretend he isn't devestated by the spuds complete humiliation in Europe last night, but all it takes it a 'like' to push him over the edge. Worst concealed meltdown ever
Spurs thought they were the next big thing, lol, can't even get it down in Europe's B competition. Just imagine what Barca, Munich, Madrid, Athelitco, are going to do to this team if they get their hands on them. Hehe, tears for spurs,
Poochey had two options, league/CL or Europey, Liverpool and, to a slightly lesser extent, Man U, had to put their eggs in the Europey basket to hope for a chance at CL football. Kane looked jaded against us, and the whole team seemed to run out of steam against ten man Arsenal, they need a rest. He made the right choice imo, though time may tell a different story, sending out a weakened team against Villa has the potential to backfire and end up costing them CL football, it's a no brainer, much like Sam's much maligned FA cup side against Forest.
Although HIAG predicted that Spurs would 'crush' Arsenal at WHL, before backtracking and claiming that they 'bravely earned a draw', they could easily have lost that game in the end. As you mention, they looked like they had run out of ideas and run out of steam when we went down to 10 men. If we'd had 11 on the pitch then I'm confident we would have finished off the job. I didn't see the West Ham game but I read that Spurs were never really in it and West Ham had them exactly where they wanted them. Spurs have been dumped out of two comps recently and unless they smash bottom of the table Villa at the weekend, then we could see them continue their bottling of the league title too.
Spurs are 6 pts clear of fifth with nine games to go. It wasn't about securing fourth, it was about chasing first! If I put it another way, can you see Man Utd, Liverpool or West Ham etc out scoring Spurs by the required margins?
HIAG is only claiming that Pooch was trying to secure 4th because if Spurs bottle the title, he will want to claim that they were never going to win it anyway and their target was a top 4 spot.
That isn't the case though is it ? Every Arsenal fan wants us to do better than simply finish in the top 4. Unless you hadn't noticed the unrest ?
How would that be an excuse? Spurs did not start this season with any expectations of winning the title! We were barely being given any chance of making the top 4 by those ****ers at Sky!
See, I told you Didn't expect him to be rolling out that excuse just yet. Getting it early I suppose.
