Arsene Wenger says that a good pre-season can instil confidence in a side, and that he’s targeting an improved season which includes a real title challenge.
Although the Gunners finished only 7 points off the eventual winners, Man City, in 2013/14, that gap grew to 12 points last as Chelsea ran away with the title. And on the back of two successive FA Cup wins, the Frenchman is hopeful his team can carry some pre-season momentum into the new campaign.
“You want a good pre-season,” he said. “It doesn’t give you a guarantee that you start strong in the competition but it’s still better for the confidence and the belief of the group. Then, when it comes down to points, you add that little bit of extra commitment that is demanded in games.”
And on the season ahead, he said, “We want to improve. We know we will be better and we work very hard to better.
“It’s difficult to know how much better our opponents will be. Everybody tries to be better. Let’s not forget that Chelsea won the Premier League with a comfortable distance last year, so we have to make our way up.
“There was still a gap between them and the others but the desire is to improve and to move up there to fight for the championship. We know that many teams will be in that position. Let’s start well and try to give our best.”
He also spoke about Sunday’s encounter with Chelsea, when the two teams meet at Wembley for the Community Shield.
“I think Chelsea have beaten us at Chelsea 2-0 last year, where we felt that we gave the game away a little bit. At home, we played 0-0, so it’s a third opportunity for us to beat them. We have a good opportunity to show that we have improved.
“It’s on neutral ground, where they’ve had success and we’ve had success, so it will be very interesting.”
Mourinho should really shut the **** up. Doesn’t bring up the previous decade of spending when he wins titles – but the year wenger spends he brings it up. The media let him get away with murder, no stones. I’d love it for wenger to win the premier league & FA cup this year and shove it up mourinho.
Lighten up mate. Mourinho’s a fucking cunt don’t get me wrong but his persistence on commenting on Arsenal every time he opens his gob shows he’s actually worried. Plus we know he’s talking a lot of rubbish so giving it more air time will only make the papers publish more shit like that. We’re way better now as a team, let’s just ignore it and focus on other better things.
lol – http://www.espn.co.uk/football/blog/soccer-transfers/3/post/2539130/how-does-arsenals-spending-compare-to-the-top-six
Interesting, thanks punter.
I like both top comments equally. Also go eat a dog turd Jose.
Ignore the bloke. If you see any headline that mentions him, don’t click. No clicks means they’ll slow down with his rubbish.
I’m really surprised anyone still listens to Mourihno honestly. His comments are so nonsensical it’s surreal. His insults don’t even affect me anymore. He’s a troll and should be dealt with as such.
The best example is;
How many players in the Chav$ki squad cost them over £20m to buy?
How many of our players cost over £20m to buy?
Not what they would cost now!
That interview with Maureen was conducted by a Chelsea fan, Steve Brenner, who was obviously brown-nosing all the way through, and all the papers ran with it, without questioning a single word of it, even ‘respected’ papers like the Guardian.
What’s a ‘respected paper’?
I’ve never seen any.
Toilet paper?
Also there is difference between spending your earned money and spending your dad’s money.
To be fair, in the last few years they’re earning well and haven’t had problems with FFP, but that’s because they chucked stupid money at the team every year before FFP.
So it’s more like spending the money you earn working at your dads business.
And getting £50M for Luiz sure helps balance the books.
I would love to see the findings of any thorough investigation of that deal.
The year FFP kicks in, one team sells a half-decent defender for 50m to a another team that has already failed the FFP.
What a Coincidence!
No, they do not have a problem with FFP because they are selling players for inflated amounts. They are selling players they bought when they were making 100m loss year after year and now the same players cost twice as much. And it’s more miss that hit anyway, e.g. cuadrado or f. luis.
and a big difference between parting with earnings accrued from sensible managment (often to the point where I would scream”Buy someone ffs” at AW and spending a Russian oligarch’s ill gotten gains to buy the title. Arsenal and Arsene have something Maureen cannot buy. Integrity. Jose has the same problem with his mouth the Professor used to have with his coat. He ought to learn how to zip the fucker up.
Nicely put Highbury, and succint.
‘succinct’
It will be an absolute delight if we beat moorinho(don’t really care about spelling his name right). The loud mouth fellow just needs a very decent beating to shut him down completely, and am praying that the gunners do just that, beat him silly!!!
Gunning for the fourth trophy in two years 🙂
I believe the correct spelling is c,u,n,t.
I’m thinking, ‘why the fuck bring up Maureen?’ This article is about us improving our league position and the upcoming game. Like someone says below, don’t give him coverage.
Apologies, says above ^^
The only reason Mourinho said those things was because he wants to stop Wenger from spending more. He knows that one more big signing and we are gonna be genuine title contenders. He’s worried about us, the cunt.
And honestly, the biggest difference between this season and seasons gone by is a sense of confidence from me in Arsenal. I don’t fear arsenal heading away to man city, chelsea or man u in anticipation of a spanking. If anything, I think on our best days a lot of teams fear us like murder, and on not so good days we are still capable of pulling out a win.
COYG!!!
I don’t care that it’s an exhibition; let’s destroy Chelsea like we beat Citeh last year. I was on holiday in Scotland watching the game with a few Gunners at the pub…what a great day.
Chelsea are just getting back from North America today so they’ll be a little jet-lagged. Advantage Arsenal. Also, John Terry doesn’t play on our team so advantage to us again!
Will winning the community shield shake off the Chelsea monkey from our backs? Or do we need to do it in the prem?
Why settle for “or” – let’s just beat them on the weekend and twice during the league and we’ll call it good.
I would just like to hear a straight “we are going to give a real fight for 1st place ” from wenger rather than hearing all the other teams have strengthened stuff.Our players know what they are capable of..let le prof also acknowledge it openly that we are in for title
Funny that. I don’t want to hear that, as it just makes the other teams try even harder to beat ((or draw) with us.
Winning the Premiership is not the divine right of any team in England. A good manager will remind and advise his Team on the current and future strength of its main opponents or harsh rivals during the season’s composition. This helps to alert and motivate each player and the team as a whole to challenge aggressively for the ultimate goal (winning the Barclays EPL competition outright).
Let’s give those cunts a real kicking, start as we mean to go on.
I hope the third team on the field is ready for this match, ol’ Anthony Taylor as captain. I’d hate to have them influence it much. I’d like to just be watching: Arsenal v Ch€£kut$k and not have to be moaning about the officials. I guess that’s up to me anyway, innit.
I think we’ll thump Ch€£$kva 2-0.
I still haven’t forgiven Anthony Taylor for the Villa incident. One of the worst refereeing performances I’ve ever seen, never should we have lost that game 3-1.
✓ Barclays Asia Trophy
✓ Emirates Cup
Community Shield
Capital One Cup
Premier League
FA Cup
Champions League
Two down. Only five to go.
Dude you just got me hyped up! COYG!
I’m happy to let the Capital One Cup go if we get the rest.
No, we need our youngsters/reserves to have a real good run in the TinPot Cup.
They need the game-time.
I am happy for us to have the distinctions (win all competitions).
That’s what you call real ambition!
Arsenal has the capability in terms of squad to cover for the season’s competitions.
Mind you, Chelsea and Man City did look like teams that could win all competitions; so I believe Arsenal is up to per in ambition.
Let us aim for the ‘Invisible’ again, this time in form of winning all available competitions.
And then the Club World Cup in December. But of course we’ll have started doubling up on some of these by then.
Let’s think about Club World Cup only next season. Barcelona will be playing in this season’s Club World Cup.
Makes sense!
Don’t forget the Club World Cup after we win the CL!
Damn, Mr. Snuffington beat me to it.
Please, call me Cornelius. Mr Snuffington is my father.
Will do, Cornelius. Wasn’t sure if you were among the “older generation” that was rather more formal.
And I’ll agree with Toms post and consider the Club World Cup among the 6 or 7 trophies for next season.
First 2 are not official trophies.
I still think we need to add two more players to the squad.
Off topic, but anyone seen Benzema’s instagram post…
Me!!!
Yep, but I’d doubt that involves us. I figure it’s ManUre, with all the spending and still needing a striker, but who really knows.
They don’t want a striker, Rooney is their captain so he’ll be ahead of Benzema in the pecking order, and the only reason Benzema would leave Real is for more playing time. So if he’s coming to England, it’s us.
Honestly I don’t really want Benzema to come. I don’t see him as a player that will have the kind of impact Sanchez had for us last season.
I completely agree with you on that; we don’t need Benzema at that ridiculous price/cost. Can’t have Benzema, Giroud and Walcott together in the team this coming season.
Arsenal requires an aggressive striker that causes fear and shivers up the spines of defenders. I don’t see Benzema in that category.
I think our main concentration is on acquiring a very good and experienced DMF person, luckily Arsenal has the ability to score a lot of goals from the attacking midfield positions.
The RIP hash tag along with the instagram pic doesn’t look good!
This is gonna sound like transfer-junkie, overly analytical gobbledeegook BUT this is my theory… If you look at Benzema he appears to be gesturing to the photo-taker to hand him his phone back. He also has a kind of smile like “no come on man give me phone stop being silly”. I reckon his mate took his phone and felt like causing a stir in the football world, just for jokes. so he posts some cryptic message along with picture and low and behold everyone goes bat shit crazy. Well, that’s what I would do if I was mates with… Read more »
Isn’t hos phone latin next to him?
*stupid autocorrect…
Well I guess that’s why you not his mate.
…Dude
My theory is he just watched Frozen on his flight and was really feeling that Let it go scene and wanted to quote some lyrics
I’m pretty sure that #rip is about his relationship with Rihanna.
“The past is in the paaaaaaast”
Sorry about the double post but I mean if you think about it it all fits. Can he adapt to moving away from the nice Spanish weather?
Answer: “The cold never bothered me anyway.”
The left hand sign looks good though.
I don’t think that benzema is going to manure they’re getting pedro apparently.
On reflection i’ve let myself down there
Could be wrong but first thing I thought of when I saw his hand was that symbol Ozil makes after he scores
Moanrinho should be well advised to learn how to use his pocket calculator better.
Since 2004, our net spent is 90m where as Chelsea is way over in excess of 400m ball park.
And the critical thing is we spent our own money which we earned. They are on credit.;)
I think you have to enjoy development to understand Arsenal. We have always had a tradition of development. By contrast City and Chelsea have been buying young (English) players mainly to fulfill quotas. Many of them have their careers rotting on the bench and have seen their value plummet from moving there. This of course has not stopped your next Fabian Delph but I believe the truth is out that joining City or Chelsea could be the poison chalice. Some of the prices paid out for players like Lescott for example simply baffles when you consider what we pay. Meanwhile… Read more »
You forget to mention Jenko on loan and I thinm Emi Martinez is considered home grown?
The last time we won back to back FA cups was 2002 2003 and we all know what happened 2004! Let history repeat itself pleeeeeease
Jose must be the most disliked manager in england…hold on…all of football…always complaining and grumpy (seriously does he even smile at home?)…no class whatsoever…chel$ki already spend millions before his second stint so he started with a stronger team but still outspent us in the last two years and then takes a one year snapshot to make a point…idiot…and press print whatever rubbish he says…
Chelsea have written off close to a billion pounds of debt since Abra-movich arrived but the portuguese prick would have us believe 10 mil ( after some creative accounting ) is significant….and the associated press lap it up like the cretins they are. Prick/s !
Sorry but back to Benzema….he is going somewhere on a private jet on his Jack Jones…I bet none of his team mates are on private planes going places right now?
Something is happening surely?
What do you want mourinho to say exactly?
I spent billions that’s why we win stuff? It’s not very likely. Seems to me football fans have become very fickle over the last few years. Get easily worked up over comments that are obviously made for that reason, think players are the new whoever after watching them play 5 mins in a friendly, think other players are awful after watching them for 5mins.
I’d love to be a football press officer just to wind up fans and watch them kill themselves.
Agree football fans are easy prey for professional trolls who make a living antagonising psychopaths. But heres the catch. Wheres the professional media troll to troll mourinho? Why is he having an easy ride? Whats the deal? In spain and italy they had mourinho in very high regards …aggghmmm….
This Community Shield thing could tick a few heart-warming boxes: 1. Retaining the trophy. 2. Completing the mythical pre-season triple. 3. Getting everyone to see just what a shitbag fuckwit manager Mourinho really is when Chelsea gets beaten just four days after playing Barcelona in America and preparing his side for Wembley with a bout of jet-lag that makes him and his side look like rank amateurs. It’s also worth noting that Chelsea play Fiorentina the following Wednesday night a mere three days before they play Swansea in their PL opener. Not only is Mourinho clueless as to how to… Read more »
The manager who should really be complaining about fixture congestion and travel is Slavan Bilic, whose West Ham side are playing away in Romania on the Thursday night before opening their PL season away to Arsenal at 12:45p on Saturday. But no, he’s kept his trap shut. Moronho could learn a lesson from that. But he probably won’t, the cunt.
i think it’s been moved to sunday?
Superstitious me, but everytime Wenger has said something about this being an opportunity to beat them, we have lost. Just leave it, let’s play the game, why talk about this? and it is not the “third” opportunity to beat them. We’ve had a few with their current manager in charge. And we have beaten them other times, so I don’t know what this whole mealy mouthed response that only jinxes us in the end is for.
Never been so exited about the start of a new season….Couldn’t give a fuck about chelski, my betting slip says we’ll beat West Sham 4-0,,,,,COYG
The more I take stock of our midfield options, the more I think we don’t need another signing there. Some believe we need a “top class” striker to have any chance of winning the title. We have Giroud, Walcott, Alexis and Welbeck. These 4 are capable of getting 55 goals among them. Ox, Ramsey, Ozil, Cazorla, Wilshere and Kos can weigh in with another 30. That means 85 goals in all. That is enough to get us the title without any new signing. These take me to my main point – keeping our players fit is the most vital factor… Read more »
Its all well and good mentioning our options; but compare it with big 6.
Our midfield is the only position I can confidently say is superior to others, Chelsea defence is as strong/better than ours and our strike force is one of the weakest in the top 4.
In other for this team to be as strong as chelsea, we need a striker and a DM.