Arsene Wenger says he’s sure that he can win the league with Arsenal before his current deal is up, but also issued a warning over Laurent Koscielny’s fitness.
The Gunners defensive issues have seen the France international return to the squad sooner than expected, and the Arsenal manager has admitted the former Lorient man is not quite 100% yet.
“Koscielny could be a problem because his inflammation of the Achilles is not completely gone,” he said.
“He had two tendons which were bad. The left has gone completely and the right is still a little bit there so, if he has no reaction, he can cope with it. If he has a reaction, you have to be cautious.”
It’s not uncommon for players to play through pain and with various aches and strains, so it’s not the end of the world, but the lack of defensive cover means that Wenger can’t afford to take any risks either.
As for the possibility of lifting the Premier League crown again before the end of his three year contract, the Frenchman said, “Of course. We have not started very well but we never had the squad together since the start of the season.
“It was a post-World Cup start. I think we have what is requested to do it. We have fought many times for the title. People always remember who won it but the fight has been very tight for long periods in the last eight or nine years.
“We have a big competition in England, we have to accept that. The Premier League level goes always up and this season, Chelsea has started very well. They will be difficult to catch but everybody will fight to come back on them.”
And the Arsenal cycle of banter goes on…
My first reaction to those comments about us challenging for the title was along the lines of “Oh god he’s delusional”. But actually though, thinking about it for a little longer, it makes me really happy that Wenger has such high aspirations for the team. Sure, I may personally be pessimistic about our chances, but I’d rather the man calling the shots be aiming for the top rather than being resigned to fourth at best.
We had a similar lead over second place at this point last season. It’s too early to call. Besides Mourinho being the cunt that he is, will surely make someone in heaven will send him some malaise sooner or later.
we also had a fixture list that resembles the one Southhampton got this season, the table does lie -but it is more accurate on January 1 when everyone has played everyone else.
But isn’t that our frustration with Wenger? Who on earth would have looked at this squad, knowing it needed a DM and a CB, and think it could challenge for the title? Even best case scenario would have been predicated on the prayer that we don’t suffer injuries. Guess what? We are an injury magnet. Injuries seduce us, then give us a good rogering. It’s one thing to think you can win the title. It’s another to do the things necessary to actually challenge. Last year was the year. This year isn’t. It’s a shame because I actually like the… Read more »
Lets not kid ourselves by two good wins, with the results tonight we need to put a good run together to stay around thetop 4.
In Wenger I trust
For now
Unfortunately tough words don’t win league titles, actions do. Piecing together a team, a balanced and adequate squad does. And this is what his letting him and us down. For many years we have been a couple of players away from being able to challenge for the lot.
I think this is what had frustrated me the most in this season and past. We have a decent team, but we never buy the players that are needed to complete this team and make us into a real title challenger, always missing that last piece of the puzzle!
Last Jan was a perfect example – had we bought wisely we would have won the league.
Let’s run Chelsea down then! I for one, don’t think chelsea will win the league this year. Only 13 games into the season. Long way to go yet
Not saying it can’t be done, but it would have to be some run.. I think we’re just too short on numbers/quality due to injuries making us too inconsistent this season.
Lets face it, I think 99% of us would take 4th place if it was offered to us right now. Even Wenger..
What is 2/17? Not 99% I assure you
No way! This team will definitely finish higher than fourth. No need to short change ourselves that much. All we need is the players to put in their all till the injuries clear up (oh God please), Arsene gets the promised signing(s) in January and then watch this team take teams apart. 3rd is the lowest we will finish this season
Hope and optimism, never take those away from a man. BUT, that’s all Arsenal has for the title this season. Reality is a different kettle of fish.
Chelsea looked distinctly average against Sunderland last weekend. Can see all the bottom-half teams copying Gus Poyet’s strategy of nicking a 0-0 when they play them. It is totally conceivable Chelsea drop points in 3 or 4 fixtures in succession this season. Most neutrals would agree that Mourinho is a better tactician than Wenger (a few might disagree) but the biggest difference between the two is that Wenger exclusively applies ‘positivity’ to motivate his players, whereas when the going gets tough Mourinho will typically utilise the dark side i.e. ‘negativity’. The latter half of Mourinho’s Real Madrid stint was highlighted… Read more »
1997/98 season, arsenal overcame a 11 point deficit to win the league. It’s been done before, so it’s possible
Not really a “warning” as such to Koscielny. Deceptive headline…
Who is he warning? The world and its mother who knew it was ludicrous to go into the season without strengthening the defence? Or someone else…?
May be he is warning himself….
He’s warning his tendons.
Because Arsenal are the only team with multiple players recovering after a long World Cup. Ridiculous comment.
Chelsea is the only big team who hasn’t had a rocky start. So could be something to it.
Because they don’t have any players who played in the world cup
Laughable. One of the reasons we won’t win the title with Arsene in control is there in the way he’s handled kos.
We sell a central defender knowing one of the two we have left has a Achiles problem and yet he still decides not to sign another one. Laughable.
Yeah, that defender we sold sure is doing well from the medical room. Him and Kos could’ve hung out together, I guess.
And you clearly knew that he was going to get injured.
It makes no difference the situation is the same. We needed and still do another center half. Like we need a defensive midfielder.only Arsene cannot see it. And that’s just one of the many many reasons we won’t win the league.
Wasn’t he injured when we sold him and continued to be injured?
No, the fact is he did see the shortages we had at the back, he promised a defensive signing but didn’t follow through because there are no defenders left in the world…
Pretty sure we were trying, plus selling Vermaelen was a nobrainer looking at the amount he’s played for Barca.
His decision to not settle on a defender for cover but to find a top quality one has left us far too light at the back though, on that we agree.
Trying to sign another centre back is not good enough, a club like Arsenal don’t start a season with 2 senior CB’s its laughable.
3.
But with Wenger unwilling to play Bellerin (another thing I don’t really understand) then Chambers isn’t enough cover for both positions.
And said central defender, Vermaelen, hasn’t played this season for Barca and won’t play again until next season. So you’re right it is laughable but in a different sense – laughing all the way to bank!
And what about Chambers? We’re no worse off than last season numbers wise, injuries have just hit us hard!
Plus I’m sure he didn’t “decide” not to sign another central defender. If all Barca could find was Vermaelen then there probably wasn’t a lot available. We’ll get one in January..
With Chambers providing the cover for RB and with Wenger unwilling to play Bellerin, we are down in terms of numbers from last season, although given Vermaelen wasn’t really available I guess it’s effectively the same!
I hope we get one in January, but I was pretty sure we’d get another one in the Summer and that didn’t happen, so I’m a little uncertain.
Money makes the unavailable available.
Roma got Manolas and Yanga Mbiwa, one on a loan and the other for 10 million, which looks a major piece of business. Snatched right from under Arsenal’s nose, incidentally, as we were apparently interested in him.
We knew all summer that Kos had the achilles problem and really did nothing about it. It was inexcusable.
Last season we had 3CBs and 2 specialist RBs. This season we have 3CBs and 1 specialist RB (until Wenger actually uses Bellerin in a PL game, he doesn’t count). So we are indeed short in numbers, even worse considering we were already short a CB before, plus Kos’s tendonitis was already known and spoken about since last year. As for the whole “no CBs because Barca couldn’t find one” such bollocks. Should we say there’s no top CMs because United couldn’t find one? Guys like Ezekiel Garay went without a challenge, and to say because no top team went… Read more »
For me, there are three players that we need to replace, either internally or otherwise within the next year: Mertersacker, Arteta and Cazorla. This is not a criticism of them, nor is it me saying their time at Arsenal is over, but they are all the wrong side of 30, and as good old Stevie G is showing week in week out, you can’t expect players to perform to a high standard every saturday and wednesday once they’re into their 30s. Other than that, we’ve got a young, talented squad which has no reason not to develop and become a… Read more »
Poor Mertesacker, he only turned 30 in September and he’s already the wrong side of it.
Mert retired from Germany, and CB’s on average get a few more years in than strikers, wingers, wingbacks, etc. So hopefully in the next year is a bit over cautious. I mean, look at the Cunt. We’re still not rid of him.
Key difference between our title winning sides and the current one in terms of the number of defenders and power in defence and midfield. Such a vital part of Wenger’s three league titles here are the main things missing from the current squad, foolish to think that without this we stand a chance. Failure to address the issue of steel will see us caught out in big games time and time again, failure to address the issue of numbers will see us dropping points in a lot of games where having an extra backup defender or two could have won… Read more »
It does say a lot that I’d rather have Cygan at CB than Monreal, maybe not Stepanovs, probably rather have Grimandi too if I’m honest.
Pretty sure we have the power though, Welbeck/Giroud/Sanogo are all big and strong, the Ox and Alexis pretty much embody the term ‘bullish’ and Ramsey/Wilshere have enough about them too.
I tend to think that none of the things people regualrly cite as our problems is the issue, we have a psychological problem as when we play well we can beat anybody we just…don’t.
You need to have that power all the way through the squad not a random player here and there. We simply don’t have it. We never will again under Wenger. It’s time to move on.
I named 4 strikers and 3 midfielders, if you want I could complete the set by mentionong that Chambers is pretty strong and Gibbs/Debuchy are as powerful pair of full-backs as you’ll find, let alone what Kos can do against people much larger than he is.
If we want to go deeper into the squad, Hayden’s powerful and Gnarby and Campbell are again ‘bullish’.
At one point we suffered due to lack of power, I don’t buy that with this squad.
If Wenger really loved Arsenal, which I believe he does after what he has done for the club in all these years, he would have definitely bought a central defender in the last transfer window, if the right player was available. I think that the targets we had did not join the club, fearing that they may not get first team chance – mainly becoz of Mertesacker-Koscielny Partnership of last year. Wenger would have been honest to any of the prospective CD in saying that they will get a chance only when one of them would get injured. Unfortunately for… Read more »
Arsenal will win the league this season
Chelsea have one decent striker and only 2 central defenders
Plus Mourinhou will implode as soon as chelsea have a bad spell just like Arsenal, city and Utd have suffered so far
M
Well.. If they having 2 central defenders is an argument for us winning the title I find that a little strange, because if you look at the roster we only have 2 central defenders as well. :p They have Cahill, Terry and Ivanovich who can all play on the position. They don’t really have a record of injuries. As much as I hate Chelsea as a club, you cannot argue that their squad is more than capable of keeping their current form up. They are a very very strong team. I think a 3rd place is what we will get… Read more »
Zouma is their 3rd central defender, he’d probably play instead of switching Ivanovic to CB because then you need to switch Azpilicueta to RB and bring in Luis. The only difference between us and Chelsea in terms of numbers is that Ivanovic can play CB and none of our full-backs can (Chambers is equivalent to Zouma in my head, despite his lack of Prem experience).
The way Chelsea play means their defence is much better protected though, probably meaning less stress on the joints and certainly more leeway in terms of playing weaker players.
I really hope you’re being sarcastic??
Why? Do you want us to lose?
No but i won’t delude myself into believing we’ll win the league.
We need reinforcements in the back line being it that he is fit or not.
We are not likely to win the premiership any time soon. I hope to be proven wrong, I just genuinely think that we need a few more players in the defensive apartment(s) and also 1 or 2 additions upfront. The DM issue is what costs us time after time in the big games against top opponents. We need to beat them, you will not win the league unless you beat your competitors. Manchester City and Chelsea got very accomplished squads, it will be hard to challenge them, Man Utd will be right up there after another summer of £200m spending… Read more »
Not to mention our injury problems which is the main problem.. Injuries to our beest players are costly, to say the least..
I hate it when the beests get hurt.
I have to agree with this one, more or less. Hate to say, but Chelsea did exactly what they had to regarding recruitment: they needed a world-class striker, which they got; a replacement for Lampard, here they even got an upgrade plus squad players (which they also got in Remy, Felipe Luis and Drogba) – in addition to recruiting a midfield enforcer in Matic back in January. They got very complete squad and no matter how it pains me, it looks to be nearly impossible to catch them this year. I don’t think we have a bad squad, but we… Read more »
I said one ago until the board comes up with £200 million in one season we will be contenders for EPL title.£100 ml to replace all the star quality players we sold and £100 ml to actually strengthen the squad. Until this happens don’t expect Wenger to perform miracles. The Arsenal board is the problem we are not in the race. Simple as that. No manager can compete if quality players are sold and not replaced ask Mourinho he can confirm that , even with the squad that he has he still wants to buy new players what does that… Read more »
you expecting him to buy Messi and Ronaldo or something? wake up
Got to admire the optism Mr Wenger, unfortunately this seems to be a recurring theme… Hopefully you’re right and I’m wrong and im not disappointed come May.
Seriously Pradeep?
Good on you, but we just don’t have the killer instinct. We don’t have the “forget the money” approach sadly needed. We don’t have an assistant manager allowed to assist. We don’t have the courage to substitute or rotate properly. We don’t have an inside man able to challenge Mr Wenger (and find his successor). We dont have alternative tactics. We don’t have enough former players able to influence and inspire (they go to city).
We have a lot of class and skill and intelligence, but we lack a lot too. Sorry 🙁
Wenger will never win the league again with Arsenal. He lives in his own idealistic world while the likes of Mourinho lives in reality and will win the title at least twice in the next three years.
We’d have a much better chance if he’d just do the obvious….
He’s created this divide, no one else.
We’re quite simply stinking of cash with more guaranteed surplus revenue to come…. and yet transfer window after transfer window passes us by without us doing what’s nessacary to really compete over the course of the season.
His loyalty to certain players is also baffling.but for some reason I still love him….
Wenger is playing mind games,he will be of different opinion should he fail to beat Southampton and stoke. And how come world cup only affected arsenal?
Wenger has always said that it’s dangerous bringing in too many new players at once. I reckon he thought that this summer he would bring in some high quality attackers, and would roll the dice on the defence. Liverpool managed to simply outscore the opposition last year, and on paper, our squad should have been able to do that until January, when we could get a top, top, quality defender or defensive midfielder. Unfortunately, the injuries have been a nightmare, and the tactics haven’t clicked (even though a lot of us got really excited after the Community Shield). Therefore, confidence… Read more »
Yeah but Liverpool play a very different football tactic which worked better for them than what Arsene Wenger’s ‘Wengerball’ does.. Long balls, football with pace. The way it is meant to be played imho.
Why would you wait until January to try to buy a “top, top” defender? It makes no sense. Wenger himself constantly says how much harder it is to buy top players in January. We could have had Manolas if we hadn’t dithered around doing nothing as is our wont. Olympiakos had to sell him to pay the debts. If we had bid a little higher than Roma – or offered Olympiakos Campbell for another season as a a sweetener, which looks like it would have been good for all parties anyway – we would have got him. He may not… Read more »
It will be interesting to see how this team reacts to a run of consistency; that run will hopefully include form and health. We have the ingredients for a potent attack, but the boys need to find the ruthlessness in their efforts.
this is not the optimism of a resolute manager but the ramblings of a senile old man – and for those people saying defenders were not available, when you have 175 million in the bank EVERY defender on the planet is available – roma signed that greek defender manolas from olympiakos for under 10 mill, we could have signed defenders from in and around us like jagielka from everton, williams from swansea, there were plenty available, wenger just tried to do it on the cheap like he always does and this time it bit him in the backside
Every defender on the planet would for sure be available on FIFA, not in reality. The biggest names does not leave in January. The players you mention “Jagielka”, “Williams”. They’ve both been rather rubbish so far this season. Jagielka is 30+ and Williams around his 30 as well and neither is “amazing”. I am not defending Arsene Wengers decision not to sign anyone, but as he said.. it is not as simple as going in to a super market.
They would have been viable options though, until he’s willing to trust Bellerin and Chambers/Hayden have some more experience it might not have been a bad idea to get another older head to cover, Jagielka has looked pretty much as good as ever, to me.
Damn straight
Y’see, you seem to think its a lack of ambition but strangely I see it as a surfeit of ambition.
AW isn’t willing to settle on stopgaps any more, so is looking for the ‘right’ guy but that’s blinding him to making short term risks that we can now afford to make, in as much as any self-sustainable club can afford to chuck 10m away anyway.
Delusional. Plug the holes in the squad and get your big game tactics right and then we stand a chance next season, maybe.
Till we solve this freaky injury issues we have every season and wenger improves his big match tactics and doesn’t make stupid mistakes like going into a season withb six defenders…we’ll never catch up with city, talk of winning the league.
“Koscielny could be a problem because his inflammation of the achilles is not completely gone”
““Of course. We have not started very well but we never had the squad together since the start of the season.”
Maybe just maybe you shouldn’t use semi-injured players then.
Pretty much every player carries injuries most of the time, as you’d know even if you’d only played in a ‘sunday morning’ league. You get used to it and I’m pretty certain Kozzer wanted to play, but I agree there are levels of injury that professionals shouldn’t be allowed to play with, and this is one of them.
I personally don’t think we can win the League this year, but who knows what will happen in the next two years? We all laughed and thought Wenger was delusional when he said Arsenal can go the whole season unbeaten. I think he’d want to leave on a high note like Sir Alex. Let’s see who he signs in January.
Have to buy a Cback. Regardless whether Koscielny is fit, it is simply crucial to have someone who can rotate through Meterscielny (both around 30 yrs now) Someone preferably 23-25 and 6’3+, sufficient big game experience. Chambers may be an eventual candidate for the middle but he may also end at RB or at DM. I don’t get why people say Chambers should be played in his natural position of CBack. His main experience playing for Southampton is at RB. so whilst he offers versatility in cover, we need better assurance centrally if we want to fully challenge. Chambers has… Read more »
It’s true, he mostly p[ayed at RB for Southampton but he DOES look much more natural at CB, and much of his problem seemed to be about his positioning and getting isolated by a lack of cover when he was at full back. That’s why I prefer him in the middle, and why I’m pretty sure that’s where he’ll end up whether in midfield or defence.
Regardless of Chambers, we need another CB though.
Hummels could be another possibility albeit he will be cup tied and won’t come cheap.
I’m not sure if he has inked an extension but on current Bundesliga form, possibly not.
Ticks plenty of boxes for me.
You won’t find Borussia Dortmund sell their Captain and main man in defence in january. Their bündesliga performance is absolute shite, they are obviously not gonna make things worse by selling Hummels in january.
I hear they have financial problems at the moment and may prefer to get some money for him in Jan rather than get nothing for him in the summer. I’m not saying they will or won’t, but it’s not an impossibility.
Because footballers are always willing to stick with a sinking ship rather than move somewhere they can make more money and perceive they have a better chance of winning something.
Title hungry? Very deluded?
Maybe from Wenger’s comments he has taken note of the comments of others. Maybe we won’t start next season with a herd of injury prone midgets.
I hope that he does sign a defender a monstrous seven foot brute whose name starts with four consonants or even a bunch of vowels like “Toure” but please buy some monsters (That is what Wenger did then and this is what Mourinho does now)
Up The Arsenal!
Take your pick: http://nerdrepository.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/monsters-inc-3d.jpg
Are you saying that Arteta and Debuchy are too small at 5’8-5’10 ish or that Ramsey, Kozzer and HFB are too small at 6ft, 6’1 and 6’3? We have had tall players before that have been rather poor. We had 2 big Swiss CBs that weren’t too swift on the turn so the home crowd got on their back, broke their spirit and we had to get rid of them, even though they we’re much better than most when their confidence was high. There are very very few big players that are quick enough for the top level, especially in… Read more »
It is a post-World Cup start for every single rival as well.
City and ManU had comparatively rough starts too.
Lets beat a top team first
I want us to win everything
But still #WengerOut
every year injuries cripple us never just your average knock always months out rather than a few weeks, and here we have wenger stating basically after having spent 30 million on a state of the art training centre playing kos who is not fully fit, because we have too, wenger never strengthened the squad its totally obvious we needed a cb cover. every year we are always 2 or 3 players short of seriously competing until he changes he’s view on that winning the league will always be a dream.
Yawn! Wenger cant really have any excuses. He has complete control at Arsenal from players diets to player salaries and transfers. For him to blame the world cup or the high competitiveness in the EPL is really poor.
and another thing no ones listening or caring.
Classic case of foot and mouth from le fraud, if he had twenty years he still wouldn’t win the PL.going into the season short of defence and no DM proves the clown can’t do it, no defensive tactics, no plan b, same old excuses from Wenger, time to go and as the banner stated thanks for the memories but it is time for you to go, should have gone in 2005 after failing to win the CL, one nil up, thirteen minutes to go and you still fail to defend, GG would have won the game, one nil and shut… Read more »
Did you hear the guy? he said title by 2017? looks like he’s just trying to extend his time and have more excuses…yes we’ll have patience for another 3 years…until we become the new liverfool
I am really not a wenger fanboy, I was devastated when he signed a new contract. But we are entering an important phase of the season and it is important to get behind the team and the club that we support. Everyone knows what arsene wenger has done for the club and everyone also know of his problems to adapt to modern football. His optimism is unbelievably stupid becacuse there is gaps in his squad and have been for several years. I doubt he will sort the issue with the DM role anytime soon. Which is what we really lack,… Read more »
“People always remember who won it” did he really say that?
That’s the difference between a “nearly man” aka very good manager, and a great one who was born to win!
Love wenger but he’s not internally driven to win at all costs vs somebody like Fergie etc
Wenger likes to use stats to hide his flaws.He said MU had only one shot.Yes Arsenal may have had a thousand shots,but if you can’t score you don’t win.Unless he can string a 3/4/5 game winning run.Arsenal could be out of the running for cl qualification.