Villa Post Match

When we went 2-0 down I would have bitten your face off for a replay. I thought back to the game at Highbury about 10 years ago when we were 2-0 down to Villa and won 3-2 in injury time and talking to some guy at half time, we both agreed that this Arsenal team didn't have that in them and how we're crap.

So I'm glad the team proved us wrong. Ok our defending in the first half for the goals was not good enough but we're into the next round and that's all that matters etc cliché.

Sagna's return is huge, we've missed him so much. Arteta's composure at the end has also been a big miss in recent weeks, glad to have him back. Now, no one else get injured for the love of god.

Bolton and Blackburn coming up. Not many better teams to play when you're looking to get your league campaign back on track. Don't mess this up, Arsenal.

Durrell wrote:

2) Song's positioning for the second goal is awful. He presses the ball for a few seconds, then just stands there. Completely loses Bent (and is not even looking to make sure Bent is anywhere near him) and is only aware where he is when Bent is being played in behind the left back.

I think that is harsh.

It was Vermaelen, Song and Ox there marking Bent. Where are the centre backs?

I think Ox being there confused things more than helped, as he was not committed to getting goal side.

Someone had to go and press the pass. Song did the right thing. Once he stepped forward, there was no way for him to get back and goal side of Bent.

Fans were morons. Booing Arshavin's name as it was called out. Booing the manager and players before and at half time.
And then singing 'You're not singing anymore' to the Villa fans when we were 3-2 up. Well you only sing when we are winning.

Mugs.

On the plus side the players fought hard and asserted themselves well in the opening 20 minutes of the 2nd half. Why not do that at Kick-off though and save our nerves? Great to see Sagna back and of course Arteta. Oh how we missed Lego head.

Walcott looked hungry enough and more determined. Chamberlain is starting to look the real deal. Still early for him though. He did look to start to drop off and tire in the end. Kos was immense. His burst forward to win the penalty was the kind of drive and determination I wish more players in our squad had.
Coquelin was good again today. Good to have him back.
Van Persie composed as always. Rosicky starting to show great form recently. Right in time for contract negotiations too. (Maybe that's a bit too harshly cynical)

Negative side of things, we were shit. We were just lucky that Villa were shitter.We were defensively naive again. Our brand of passing football I'm afraid needs to be re-assessed in the absence of any real creative spark in midfield. If Sir Chesney get's injured we are fucked. Fabianski is so unsure of himself it's not funny. Maybe he needs a run of games to get some form but if he's not ready to slot in convincingly when called upon, I'd rather not have him there. I don't want to think of the alternative though...

All in all, hopefully this result makes the players realise they need to fight for the cannon and for each other. Sick of seeing them coast around and not look bothered. Bolton will be a tricky game as they are gaining some good home form and will always be up for it against us. But with players returning to full fitness, hopefully we can get 3 points there and finish this horrible month on some kind of a high..

Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but after Walcott he scored, he went and did that silly ping pong celebration with either the bench or the fans, and ignored Wenger. Thought it was a bit strange.

Zaid Derweesh wrote:Maybe I'm reading too much into this

You're reading too much into this.

on whether he will sign anyone…
"Certainly not. But you never know!"

Mindfuck.

Watching the replay right now. Great win but it seems there are deeper issues to be addressed for the squad. I'm still not convinced that this squad can make top 4 with injury blows. If everyone was fit I am sure we could catch chelsea as they aren't having the best run of form. Tottenham have tough fixtures coming up, but what if another key player goes down for a spell? not sure we have the quality to cover and it will cost us as we have already seen this season. very worried at the moment without any signings, so seems about right for an arsenal fan come january

Siddharth Mehra wrote:Fox Soccer managed to get Ivan Gazidis on the phone after the match. Here's what he had to say -

1. Wenger has money to spend, its up to him how he spends it.
2. Chamberlain, Koscielny and Vermaelen have been "big money signings" for us
3. We cannot compete with "oil money" and "some Russian billionaires with lots of money" in the transfer market.
4. "We are challenging on three fronts, am sure that Man City would like to be challenging on three fronts but they're not"
5. Next 48 hours could be interesting but don't expect any signings.

most important thing that Ivan said was that arsenal have 50 to 70 million to spend on one player but that is not how arsenal is run. arsenal will continue to focus on youth development.

Gazidis also mentioned that it's very difficult to buy good talent during the January window because no one wants to let go of their star players. I'm not expecting much, maybe some unknown youth player at best.

Mohamed Samir wrote:on whether he will sign anyone…
"Certainly not. But you never know!"

Mindfuck.

lol

MCLeish the ginger scrotum face is calling for an investigation into the Van Persie elbow incident. The media is really running with this story this morning. So I'm sure there will be something said from the FA. If Van Persie gets a 3 or 4 game ban over this, we are fucked. Just as well Chamakh is coming back :p

Ugh. MacLeish.
I really hate the old Scottish Fanta pants.

(Here's a link to the BBC story http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/16784620.stm)

Steve Claridge commentating dismissed it out of hand, saying it was nothing, im not stating he meant it in any way but what wont help Van Persie's case is that he does look at the defender before the arm comes up. But if they didnt act on Lescott they shouldnt act on this.

Henry will start if he gets banned.

Wenger get's demonised by (other clubs') fans and the media for being a whinger, moaner or whatever else.

Has he ever called for a ban in this way to a player? I don't think calling for a long ban for a broken leg tackle counts.

Jenks1981 wrote:Steve Claridge commentating dismissed it out of hand, saying it was nothing, im not stating he meant it in any way but what wont help Van Persie's case is that he does look at the defender before the arm comes up. But if they didnt act on Lescott they shouldnt act on this.

Henry will start if he gets banned.

Barring the midweek game, I'm pretty sure Chamakh would start the remainder of any ban. From what we've seen so far, I'm not confident Henry would be up to leading the line in a PL game.

How did we get to this point, having only 1 half-decent striker?

Ramsey had a great game, feel happy for the lad. Wenger probably read the transcripts of the board to him and now he's sitting here like...

Stephen Mitchell wrote:

Barring the midweek game, I'm pretty sure Chamakh would start the remainder of any ban. From what we've seen so far, I'm not confident Henry would be up to leading the line in a PL game.

How did we get to this point, having only 1 half-decent striker?

We hoped for Vela to replace Adebayor.

We have neglected the centre forward position to some extent hoping on youth and gambles to pay off. When you pay little, quite often you get little. Chamakh and Park, for example. Bendtner hasn't become the best striker in the world at the club and will also leave. Maybe Wenger thought a year or two ago that Walcott would have reached the stage by now to lead the line but that hasn't happened, either.

We are so reliant on Van Persie it's scary.

Bacary Sagna had plenty of reasons to celebrate on Sunday after making his long-awaited comeback from injury against Aston Villa.

The right back returned from a four-month lay-off in the battling FA Cup win over Alex McLeish’s side, after recovering from a broken ankle suffered at White Hart Lane in October.

Sagna admits his spell on the sidelines has been testing and the French international is determined to rediscover his best form as soon as possible.

“I am absolutely delighted,” he told Arsenal Player. “It's been quite difficult all these months - four is a long time.

“I just needed to get back as quick as possible and now I finally am. Now I just need to work even harder to get back because I have only had two training sessions and it is not easy. But I will do it.

“I will still work with the fitness coach but I will only get fit by playing games. I am just biding my time to start a game now but I am not rushing. I just want to give the maximum to get myself into the best position.

“It was nice to have support from my wife, kids and my friends. The fans have also supported me a lot during my recovery and it was quite helpful when I was working.”

http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/sagna-i-m-so-happy-to-be-back-in-action?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+arsenal-news+%28News+Feed%29

Mario Leontiou wrote:

Stephen Mitchell wrote:

Barring the midweek game, I'm pretty sure Chamakh would start the remainder of any ban. From what we've seen so far, I'm not confident Henry would be up to leading the line in a PL game.

How did we get to this point, having only 1 half-decent striker?

We hoped for Vela to replace Adebayor.

We have neglected the centre forward position to some extent hoping on youth and gambles to pay off. When you pay little, quite often you get little. Chamakh and Park, for example. Bendtner hasn't become the best striker in the world at the club and will also leave. Maybe Wenger thought a year or two ago that Walcott would have reached the stage by now to lead the line but that hasn't happened, either.

We are so reliant on Van Persie it's scary.

Agreed. Not wanting to do the standard comparison with our teams of 02' and 04' (which you can't expect to recreate over and over), but even in 2006 we had 3 or 4 good options up front. If we are pretty sure that Park won't make it, and that Bendtner will leave, why hasn't Wenger gone all out to buy a striker now? We're one RVP injury away from catastrophe.

I realise this is rehashing old arguments, but it's the one area that we are short in even when everyone is fit.

Stephen Mitchell wrote:

Mario Leontiou wrote:

Stephen Mitchell wrote:

Barring the midweek game, I'm pretty sure Chamakh would start the remainder of any ban. From what we've seen so far, I'm not confident Henry would be up to leading the line in a PL game.

How did we get to this point, having only 1 half-decent striker?

We hoped for Vela to replace Adebayor.

We have neglected the centre forward position to some extent hoping on youth and gambles to pay off. When you pay little, quite often you get little. Chamakh and Park, for example. Bendtner hasn't become the best striker in the world at the club and will also leave. Maybe Wenger thought a year or two ago that Walcott would have reached the stage by now to lead the line but that hasn't happened, either.

We are so reliant on Van Persie it's scary.

Agreed. Not wanting to do the standard comparison with our teams of 02' and 04' (which you can't expect to recreate over and over), but even in 2006 we had 3 or 4 good options up front. If we are pretty sure that Park won't make it, and that Bendtner will leave, why hasn't Wenger gone all out to buy a striker now? We're one RVP injury away from catastrophe.

I realise this is rehashing old arguments, but it's the one area that we are short in even when everyone is fit.

In 2006 we had Henry, Van Persie, Adebayor, Bergkamp, Bendtner, Reyes, Walcott and Ljungberg at the club who could be selected to play up front.

A tad different to now.

Stephen Mitchell wrote:

Mario Leontiou wrote:

Stephen Mitchell wrote:

Barring the midweek game, I'm pretty sure Chamakh would start the remainder of any ban. From what we've seen so far, I'm not confident Henry would be up to leading the line in a PL game.

How did we get to this point, having only 1 half-decent striker?

We hoped for Vela to replace Adebayor.

We have neglected the centre forward position to some extent hoping on youth and gambles to pay off. When you pay little, quite often you get little. Chamakh and Park, for example. Bendtner hasn't become the best striker in the world at the club and will also leave. Maybe Wenger thought a year or two ago that Walcott would have reached the stage by now to lead the line but that hasn't happened, either.

We are so reliant on Van Persie it's scary.

Agreed. Not wanting to do the standard comparison with our teams of 02' and 04' (which you can't expect to recreate over and over), but even in 2006 we had 3 or 4 good options up front. If we are pretty sure that Park won't make it, and that Bendtner will leave, why hasn't Wenger gone all out to buy a striker now? We're one RVP injury away from catastrophe.

I realise this is rehashing old arguments, but it's the one area that we are short in even when everyone is fit.

It could be that he is. I'm quite sure we made serious efforts to sign Podolski and Gotze, I'm pretty sure they just didn't work out - neither player wanted to move/clubs wouldnt allow it, Gotze picked up an injury in any case. It sounds like Hazard has also been on the radar, but maybe Lille didn't want to sell midseason when they are still in the title race. So maybe Wenger is forced to settle for a summer signing.

Maybe Wenger is banking on Benik Afobe. It would be repeating the mistakes of the last 3 years to do so, of course, but maybe that's it.

Or maybe be he really thinks Chamakh and Park have what it takes. Or that Gervinho and Walcott could do a job there. Maybe he's waiting for the summer to do his substantive business. Or maybe he's fighting the board for a signing. Who knows.

WENGER KNOWS

No retrospective action being taken by the FA against Van Persie for alleged elbow as the referee said in his report that he saw it and didn't feel it necessary to act upon.

Stuff it MacLeish.

Yer just seen that the FA just tweeted it no ban all good in the eyes of the ref.....


Alex....

You cunt....

I love how nobody in the media mentioned that Walcott's goal shouldn't stand because it was a handball. Very selective, assholes.