The Famous Back 4

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K

King Nasri

New Member
Jun 1, 2011
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Hey guys, this is my first article on here since joining from BBC606 which has finally closed down yesterday! <cry><cry> But not606 is a good alternative

I'd like to focus my first article on the defensive side of our team.

After about a year in the Arsenal job in 1997 Wenger said: ''When I first came to Arsenal, I realised the back four were all university graduates in the art of defending. As for Tony Adams, I consider him to be a doctor of defence. He is simply outstanding.''

My question is: Where has this strong defence gone?

When the likes of Adams and Koewn were near the end of their football careers, Wenger went out and bought the rock that is Campbell and Toure who looked a really good prospect. You could also argue that cygan was not that bad a defender but it signalled the beginning of Wenger signing defenders that weren't top quality.

For example, Senderos came in 03/04 along with clichy, both were young and inexperienced but Arsenal had high hopes for them. Senderos left for Fulham at the beginning of this season after failing to make an impact at Arsenal and clichy hasn't reached the potential everyone thought he would. In 04/05 Eboue was signed and as much as we love him and after being a good player at first we all know that he's not the best defender! In 05/06 we signed traore, another inexperienced and young player who had high expectations but hasn't made an impact yet. 06/07 saw the swap deal with gallas and cole. We lost a top quality left back, meaning an inexperienced clichy stepped in but we gained a better CB although one with a bad attitude! In 07/08 we signed sagna which was an improvement at right back. In 08/09 we bought silvestre from man u which was an awful buy and in the next season we lost toure and gained vermaelen. At the beginning of this season Koscielny came in along with squillaci, the former showing potential but the latter showing why we were wrong to buy him!

So i think it's clear to see that the problem was that after the retirement of the famous back 4 we failed to replace them with defenders of the same quality apart from campbell. And then when campbell left we didn't replace him with a CB with the same quality. This is clearly a fault on Wenger's part. In the team now, we have a really good CB in Vermaelen but i think we just need another to play along side him. Someone like campbell who will win every header and bully stikers! Maybe Samba? And we also need a better LB as clichy makes too many mistakes.

I think that would go someway to sort out our defence problems!

What do you think?
 
The problem is Wenger is favoring small technical ballplaying Centrebacks over tall old fashioned ballwinners.

Our teams tend to lack balance.

Toure and Campbell were our last truely balanced pairing.(and we won the league!)
Gallas and Toure
Vermaelen and Gallas
Vermaelen and Koscielney
Squillaci and Koscielney
.. are all examples of extremely unbalanced undersized defensive pairings we have fielded.

Even Djourou (tall as he is) is not a physical defender.

Look at Dortmund they have just won the The German league playing extremely attacking football (they scored over 80 league goals) but with a solid defensive base.(and conceded a mere 22)
Subotic is 6'4 and a ballwinner
Hummels is 6'3 quick and technically skilled.

In many ways Dortmund have achieved what Wenger has been trying to do. They have assembled a title winning side with plenty of youth team graduates that plays expansive attacking football.
 
squillaci is a waste of space, i would rather see Bartley promoted to the first team, Djourou scares the **** out of me everytime the opposing keeper takes a goalkick, koscielny is good and will get better, and Vermaelen is a top defender, add samba, Huth, Cahill or hangaland (if possible 2 of these) and we sorted
 
add samba, Huth, Cahill or hangaland (if possible 2 of these) and we sorted
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No no no no no, we do not need any new defenders, especially not average ones like those names mentioned. Djourou and Vermaelen are fine as 1st choice, Koscielny is an excellent 3rd choice defender and Squillaci is alright I guess for a 4th choice.
 
robin_van_ fiberglass said:
No no no no no, we do not need any new defenders, especially not average ones like those names mentioned. Djourou and Vermaelen are fine as 1st choice, Koscielny is an excellent 3rd choice defender and Squillaci is alright I guess for a 4th choice.
Click to expand...

Squillaci isn't really good enough as a 4th choice coz we'll have to call on him at some point in the season due to all the injuries we get and carling/f.a cup games we want to rest first teamers for
 
Well I doubt Samba , Huth etc would want to move just to be 4th place. Besides I think the money used to buy them would be better off spent elsewhere
 
if samba comes in, he'll want to be 1st choice. so the question is, is he better than djourou? if yes, then he could be a good buy.

defensive coaching for the WHOLE TEAM is a must. set pieces aren't just about your defenders. yes they should clear the majority of balls in, but the whole team must defend as a unit.
 
yeah i agree, defending starts from the front! It's the closing down carried out by the attackers and wingers which is one of the most important sides of the defensive game. Barcelona is the perfect example with the amount of closing down they do they win the ball back so quickly! Nasri and Walcott are fairly good at closing down but arshavin is slack. The Home game against man u was the first time he really put an effort in to close down throughout the whole time he was on the pitch! The game against chelsea was the most closing down the attackers have done all season and it worked with walcott snatching the ball of cole and scoring in that move etc. More of this closing down needs to be done.
 
defense is a whole team thing. there needs to be quick pressure with the nearest man going to the ball as soon as it's lost. too many times goals have come from players backing off. even if a player goes round you, you've delayed him by a couple of seconds and that can be the difference between a good and poor defensive position.

tracking back is vital too. yes walcott & nasri are good, wilshere puts in a decent shift, but it has to be the whole team.

it's set pieces that they really struggle on. they need to be schooled in defense - and i mean EVERY player - so that set pieces don't make me panic every time the ball goes out for a corner!
 
PNEawf said:
We last won the league because we could concede as many goals as we liked and still outscore anyone. Our defence was not much better then than now. We just had a better keeper who could dominate the box, organise and who had the respect of the defence. It has been obvious for years that our defensive coaches have no clue and the personnel at the back are irrelevent to whether we have certain problems.
In training, who do we have to simulate the problems we will face against the likes of Bolton, Stoke, etc? We coped better against Barcelona than we ever do against the physical sides in the PL. We need a new approach to how we defend and how our midfield operates.
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Actually when you won the league in 2004 you only scored one more goal than you did this season, and less than you had done in 2002 and 2003. But you conceded 17 fewer goals than you did last season, which was what really made the difference.
 
IMO the back defense were not as bad as many say. Sagna was at times immense Djouro improved as he got more games and was reasonablty dominant in the air. Koscielny had a good season considering he was thrown in at the deep end, looks composed on the ball, just needs to toughen up a little maybe. Squillaci was poor, looked like a rabbit blinded by car headlights when he got the ball sometimes and poor distribution. Clichy was disappointing, but maybe distaracted by thoughts of moving abroad ? So assuming Vermaelen is fully fit and can manage a full season in 11-12 I would replace Squillaci and Clichy if he goes. The midfield have to put in the work to shield the back four more, Song was too prone to go wandering, Nasri and Theo tracked back when it suited leaving Wilshere as the only one who could be relied on to put in a tackle. We need a midfield destroyer who is content to sit front of the back 4 and stay there. Maybe Wenger has finally seen the light ????
 
there was a point where arsenal got into contention for the league in which djourou & koscielny were awesome. sagna was a constant through the season. the backup let them down badly.

i rate Vermaelen, Djourou, Koscielny, and Bartley (though he's most likely too inexperienced still to be challenging). I struggle to rate Squillaci. Djourou needs another tall ball-winner to compete with. Vermaelen is competing with Koscielny as the more technical one. That's why I believe Samba would be good - the littleman, bigman combo.
 
robin_van_ fiberglass said:
No no no no no, we do not need any new defenders, especially not average ones like those names mentioned. Djourou and Vermaelen are fine as 1st choice, Koscielny is an excellent 3rd choice defender and Squillaci is alright I guess for a 4th choice.
Click to expand...

A touch harsh! Whilst I agree that Huth and Samba aren't world beaters, they're both accomplished players at this level. Strong, inelegant players but used to what this league has to offer. Cahill is a quality young player but one I don't think we need. As has been stated by others I'd rather a more physical centre-half. That said, I'd be happy to have him in the squad at the expense of some of the players we have.

I'd bite your arm off for Hangeland though. He's proven to be a top player in this league for the past 3 (?) seasons and I think he'd be great with Vermaelen. It's not just his ability though, it's his leadership skills and calming influence I admire. I saw a number of Fulham games over the last few seasons (don't judge me please) and he was really impressive. For myself, I'd just like to watch an Arsenal game where the players don't look like they all need to go to the toilet at the same time just because the other team has pulled a goal back. Tarts.

I definitely think we need a new CB as I'm tired of our surprise year in, year out when we pick up another long term injury and come up short.

Oh, and Squirrel can do one if we get a good new comer in. He's average at best and we're better than that.
 
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