What I am referring to is Gibbs tackle in the dieing embers of the match...I like santos but doubt he would have produced such a magnificent tackle. So thank you Kieran Gibbs. Touch wood he has an injury free season next year he's been pretty under rated of late.
Gibbs is fast, skillful and can tackle. His positional sense is off, but hoping he can learn quickly. You are right about this seaosn though - it came down to just a handful of moments that if they had gone the other way we'd have come up short. Not too disimilar to most seasons, but just a little more acute this year.
Have followed his progress ever since he was here on loan at Norwich. Level-headed and a terrific prospect. Should definitely be in Roy Hodgson's squad IMO.
my heart stopped at that moment when i saw the player clear on goal, i thought oh no, this is it, the dreaded moment, we've lost it, :-(, and then Gibbs went in with the tackle and we celebrated like we scored. BUT not too be too negative here, the reason why he had to make such a last ditch tackle was because his positioning (again) was too inside and leaving way too much space on the outside for such a run to be made in the first place, it's been happening too many times as of late with Gibbs in the LB position, the covering has just not been good enough, so we have to keep that in mind. Against Norwich we were getting slaughtered from the full back positions.
Noooo...call me selfish but I want him fully fit and rested for next season. He's on a good run and I don't want him to spoil it. Great potential though and if you've seen him for the reserves he's got great dribbling ability and a rocket left foot.
BTW folks, erm, let's not forget DoSantos scored the highly important equalising goal in the first half? Let's give the guy credit.
I was never sure about Gibbs. Particularly back when he used to play for our reserves in midfield. But I've been really impressed with him as of late. if he can stay fit he'll be a top class left back. its important that injuries dont hinder his development though (like they have with Diaby)
So that would be fine margins. As I've been telling you all season. We've also had a number of moments that didn't go our way and had they of, we'd have won some more games. We were not far off from winning some, but for the width of the post or the cross bar, or the ref not giving a blatant pen against Norwich. Had Gibbs not made that tackle and Spurs pipped us to 3rd, then we would have been not far off, but for a fine margin.
He's not called DoSantos, but yes he deserves a lot of credit. I think he's a very good attacking LB, with a lot of confidence to take people on and shoot.
The question we need to ask is why in the dying minutes being 1 goal ahead we allowed so much space on the left - there was no one! Gibbs was out of position and needed these heroics to save the season. We could have avoided it being just more disciplined in defense. I do not want heroes in our defence. All I want is players who are able to be in the right place at the right time.
Yes, and a similar comment could be made about Morison's goal for Norwich. Just as a matter of interest, do you guys see improvement ahead defensively speaking, given Steve Bould's stepping up to first team duties?
Well tbh the U18s are a mirror image of the first team from what I've seen. They play great football...even better than the first team at times...but are vulnerable defensively. However you must take into account both the fact that our u18s have great attacking talents like gnabry, toral, Olsson, jebb just to name a few but the likes of monteiro and boatneg arent exactly talented really theyre more athletic than anything else. However bould does know who to promote to the first team and knows when to use them.
Cb. I struggle to get my head round the idea of Steve Bould being comfortable with the wide open spaces so often to be seen in the Arsenal defensive third! Also with the idea that you can still finish third despite the frailties, the injuries, and the last-minute departures which got things off to such a bad start. Good signing though, Podolski.
Thanks robieBB. Good luck next year. Our clubs may have had bit of a tiff recently but I actually quite like Norwich and their commitment.
actually, it wasn't gibbs job to mark the man who was through on goal. that guy (jones i think) is a full back, therefore it should have been santos, but he failed to track him. gibbs did a good job of covering his mistake
I've been talking about this issue of fine margins and not being far off all season. Even when we were right in the doldrums, the games we were drawing and losing were only done so by fine margins. We were never far off from winning those games. There was never a full blown crisis of the proportions some of the doom mongers were claiming. Whilst I can understand their frustrations, some of the 'solutions' that were offered, would have plunged us into the crisis they were talking about. Mikel Arteta summed it up perfectly in his mid season speach about 'getting the small details right'. Which we then did and went on a couple of long unbeaten runs. It was never about sacking the manager, it was about making minor adjustments that ensured that we didn't lose games. I'm pretty sure that had Gibbs not made that tackle on saturday and we'd been pipped to third by Spurs, the doom mongers would be out in force, telling us that they were right all along, that Wenger should walk, the board should resign etc. But for that fine margin, they are not. We were never far off and in the end we proved that by finishing third
You're right Piskie. We were the same, if we'd scored from just one of our 19 corners against Villa and/or we'd kept Fulop on our books, then the whole outcome would look different. The table doesn't lie, but in reality there is almost nothing between our clubs currently.
