Unai Emery: In or Out?

Bloke has been there 8 months and you want him out

 

On the one hand, we need to be patient... but on the other hand I was trying to think yesterday evening of any manager who started off poorly and got better.

I think of all the really good managers and when they first started at a club, was their talent hidden away in a poor start? I can't think of any.

Moyes - started poorly, was poor
LVG - started poorly, was poor
Mourinho - started poorly, was poor
Sarri - started well briefly, then lost it
Conte - started great, lost it
Poch - started well, still doing well
Guardiola - started well, still doing well (although hard to compare at a club like that)
Emery (PSG) - started OK, never did a great deal outside the ordinary

The list goes on.

Anyone got any example of a vaguely recent manager at a vaguely big club who looked quite as unspecial as Emery does now, but got better and better as the seasons went on?

When has anyone who started with such mediocrity been anything but that throughout their tenure?

I might be being biased here and only remembering the shockers, but it seems to me it's hard to spot those that might start well but crash and burn later down the line, but it's not hard to spot those that will never get any better.

 

The thing some people are forgetting is a lot of the issues we are seeing right now precede Unai Emery. Shoddy defending, poor away form, a few hammerings etc. These aren't new issues.

It takes time to change mentalities, let alone personnel.

I don't want to be a spin doctor, but when you consider our primary objective is getting back into the Champions League, he is performing better than I expected. Admittedly, that may be because my expectations for this season were extremely low due to how bad we were in 2017-18, but we have only had a higher points tally at this stage of the season on one other occasion in the last 8 years. We're only 1 point behind a rejuvenated United team in 4th, who are now beginning to express their quality.
Our away form and record in big games is better than last season, but we have to remember that these players still have limitations and so we cannot make changes until we can get rid in the Summer.

The injuries we've had to Bellerin, Holding and, even Welbeck as an excellent 3rd choice striker, have derailed us. Especially as the latter two were coming into their own before being ruled out for the season. Emery isn't to blame for this. No-one could have anticipated this.

I wouldn't say Emery's performing miracles with this set of players, but he is doing a reasonable enough job for me to think that both he, and the club, will do better next season.

For instance, Monchi has left Roma and is reported to be joining Arsenal in July as Sporting Director. Monchi oversaw Sevilla's relegation in 2000 and got them back to La Liga, whilst they won 5 UEFA European Cups and two Copa Del Reys in the 16 years he was there.
He subsequently moved to Roma and signed some promising players e.g. Mo Salah, Alisson, Rudiger, Emerson, Under, El-Shaarawy. He actually managed to sign most of those players for cheap and sold them on for huge profits. He did this whilst helping Roma become a more competitive side in Europe. So his proposed appointment looks like it will help us a lot.

Also, we will have several high earners off the wage bill e.g. Lichtsteiner, Cech, Welbeck, Ramsey, Monreal.
Then there is the proposed sales of Mustafi, Ospina and Elneny.
On top of that, the new Adidas Deal will kick in, giving us an additional £60m per season.
We will also have Reiss-Nelson and Emile Smith-Rowe back, who will be challenging for a starting spot.

Gary Neville called this after our loss to Man City on the opening day of the season - Emery's first year was always going to be about him acclimatising to the league and the country, whilst getting to know these players in terms of their psyche, character and ability to adapt to his demands.

The problem is, people see other clubs chopping and changing managers and instantly think that is the solution for us when things aren't going to plan. The fact of the matter is a lot of the underlying issues we have are way bigger than Unai Emery and it will require patience from the fanbase if we want to sort it out.

People might not like what I've said, but he's not going anywhere just yet, so let's just give the bloke a fair crack of the whip.

 

So basically Kroenke doesn’t need to invest as he doesn’t have to, and he hasn’t the financial punch to do a City and get sponsorship from an associated business.
Great ****ing White Knight saviour Kroenke turned out to be, the board royally ****ed up in selling their shares to Mr Safe rather than selling at a higher price to Uzmanov who vowed to spend big - and this was pre FFP so he could have done.

No wonder Uzmanov threw in the towel and sold up, Kroenke owns a great club and doesn’t have to spend any money on it !!!!!

FFS ****ing ****ing board

 

I would argue while not bad, both Klopp and Pep were underwhelming their first season / few seasons. I Still think we need better players in certain areas.

 

Klopp wasn't. You could see exactly the potential he had with some very impressive performances. After he joined game for game he would have been near the top of the league had it not been for the ****e start Brenda had given them. Pep - meh, not really a comparable situation given their unique status as a club.

 

To finish in the top 4, I don't think we need "better players". We need to be better, but we have more than enough talent to win the games we need to win.

I stuck with Wenger a long time, but even so, I don't think you can blame the players when we lose and praise the manager when we win, which is what we do a lot. And a lot of our player hate comes across as subjective to me. Sokratis was every bit as inept against Rennes, as Mustafi has been on occasion, all be it not in exactly the same way.

Wenger and Emery are quite similar in some ways. They are both fairly inflexible about how they want to play. Wenger, I always felt, if he got good enough players he would win. Emery on the other hand doesn't try to dominate matches, and that is what worries me. He plays tactics that suit a scrappy team with defense first, but I'm not sure they are the right tactics to win a league, at least not in England.

I question whether you can find players that are both scrappy enough to play the 11 man aggressive pressing defense Emery wants to play, and have the skill to reliably break down an English defense when they win the ball. I'm just not sure those kind of players exist.

That is what I mean about Wenger and Emery being similar. Wenger demanded an extraordinary level of ball control, passing and skill in all his players and couldn't find any that were able to defend as well. Emery is almost the total opposite. He demands an extraordinary level of defending and pressing in his players to such an extent that he can't find any that have enough skill to attack and dominate a game. I think we overlook that, because we are so used to the extreme the other way, but it will get old fast.

 

Yeah ive been saying that all Season.

We have good enough players to make top four. I still feel though Emerys constant tinkering hasnt helped himself. Had he stuck with the same lineup that beat Tottenham or Chelsea - I think at the very least those winning runs would have been extended.

 

I still think on paper City, Liverpool, United, and probably Spurs have a better overall squad than we do. If you compare strictly on paper, I don’t think we should be making top 4.

Obviously football is not played on paper, but I think we have the 5th best squad in the league.

 

Im not sure about that.

I feel we have a less balanced squad than Spurs but we probably have more quality.

 

Conte started poorly (first 2 months).
Klopp started poorly in his first year at pool (8th)
Pep was underwhelming his first year
Pretty sure poch was underwhelming first season (5th) well average
Fergie although that was a different era

 

We could still finish Top 3-4 and if we get past Rennes tomorrow could also win the UEFA Cup. Would be a pretty decent first Season considering he's barely had any money to spend either.

This Summer hopefully we will get rid of the dead wood and Emery will get to bring in some more players that fit his system. If we are not improved next Season then I would start to worry. Soo far though there's plenty to be optimistic about.

 

We're 12 points better off at this stage than we were last season. Facts speak for themselves, Emery has significantly improved us since last season.

 

Conte did not start poorly. They won the first three games, had an iffy next three games then were top by November and never looked back.

Liverpool finished 8th because of Brenda's useless start and the fact their squad in 2015/16 was a sack of ****e. Klopp improved them.

Pep yes I'll agree.

Fifth for spurs is never underwhelming.

 

When klopp took over they had 3 wins 3 draws 2 losses.

Klopps record was 13 wins 9 draws 8 losses which frankly is piss poor.

Contes bad start was 3 wins 1 draw 2 losses. So you are comparing brendens "horrendous" start where he lost 4 points more to contes not horrendous start?

 

It was piss poor.. But not as piss poor as Brendan and his squad was a joke, nowhere near as good as ours is now. But actually yes I think I have remembered Klopp's start too well, had it in my head he did better than that.

Conte... Come on, he was top by November.

Klopps I'll give you to some extent... Conte no way.

 

Yeah i know conte smashed it first season . I did say his first 2 months (6 games in) was bad.

 

People need to accept that times are different. The competitiveness between the top 6 clubs and the rest of the PL is wider than its ever been.
To win the league, you need to be accumulating a points tally in the early 90s. To get into the top 4, you need to be getting a points tally in the mid-to-high 70s.

For 2017/18, the 3rd placed team got 77 points and 4th placed team got 75 points.

The top 6 sides regularly battle it out for 4 places knowing that one or two dodgy results could be the difference between Champions League and Europa League football.

We are on course to get 76 points this season and even that may not be enough for top 4.

It is harder than its ever been.

That's why, so long as we see some improvements from Emery (which we have done), I don't think we should get rid even if he doesn't get us CL football from the position we're in.

 

Any talk of getting rid of Emery at this stage is ludicrous in my opinion.

 

The consensus amongst the fanbase seems to be that we should give him a second season regardless of how this campaign ends, but there are still quite a few people who aren't convinced by him and think he will turn us into the new Sevilla (i.e. decent in the cups, poor in the league). I just get the feeling he hasn't earned the respect of all Arsenal fans just yet. But he can only get that when he's had a proper transfer window and got another season under his belt to prove what he can do.

I'm quietly optimistic for next season