Not the welcome return from the Interlull that we wanted. Two soft goals conceded, two more injuries, and a missed penalty late on that should have salvaged a point.
Here’s how the players rated.
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it’s plain simple
we buy a good cover for Coq in the next window and we’re good
everything went against us today, i can’t be too mad at our players
One point off our two main contenders for the league in November, three matches against teams in the bottom 5 coming up. We are well placed (objectively), though it was disappointing today.
COYR.
Buy? What is wrong with the internal solution? Of course Arteta played 3 games didn’t finish any of them and got injured three times with the same calf that put him out all year last year. Arsene refused to sign back up holding mid because he extended Arteta contract, and Rosicky contract even if he didn’t play him the second half of last season when he was fit. Why? because his aim this squad even with the injury prone players we will still finish fourth, and that is all he needs to keep the yank happy.
Arsene IS the problem
Why would you be mad at the players, they play without a manager. Anything they achieve is in spite of the manager
Without Coquelin to protect the back four this team will always leak goals.How can the Manager justify this crucial lack of judgment;choosing not to re-inforce this crucial position during the last transfer window.There are no excuses this time!He has put his deluded stubborn belief that the squad didn’t require any outfield re-inforcement before the team’s best chance in a decade to win the Premier League.Arteta and Flamini would struggle to get into the first team squads of virtually any other Premier League team, yet were deemed to be suitable back-up to Coquelin. Yes Arsenal’s first 11 to 15 are capable… Read more »
How on earth can everything go so wrong in a single game? Injuries, o.g, pen miss
I know .
At least city got smashed
i know, …ridiculous, isn’t it?….i couldn’t even get upset over the loss, …how could anyone?, with every possible thing going wrong?….its like the man upstairs is against us today and.the only thing missing imo is mike dean?
It’s not so much a case of ‘everything’ somehow going wrong though is it?
Problems on the pitch are exacerbated when options are limited. We’ve got eight players out right now who would either start, challenge, or support this team. We create problems for ourselves when we fail to keep players fit and maintain a healthy squad depth.
The penalty was just rotten. Very out-of-character and therefore very forgivable.
we make problems for ourselves by not defending properly
Today the moon good luck moon was elsewhere
Nowt we can find about the result
We were pussies …..
Let’s move on with little anger at the opportunity lost
Could be top of the league ….with ManCity losing at the moment
Grrrrrr
Worst performance I’ve seen by Hector Bellerin (apparently English commentators have learned that ‘ll’ => ‘j’, pronunciation-wise). It’s a dread, but had he fitted in his shirt, the game wouldn’t have been lost. I genuinely hope that there are people around that lad to ensure that he gets on, because he’s certainly better than this! How ironic that the near-perfect penalty taker Mikel Arteta wasn’t on the pitch, when needed? (never thought I’d see The Arsenal have a penalty again!). Some attention to SC as well – but he, unlike most others, had no excuse; had a goal for his… Read more »
What ever happened to the long range screamers that we used to see?
Hector was coming back from an injury .
Might explain it a little .
Bad result though . Really thought we’d win
Joel. Campbell.
That is all.
Blogs, why on days like these do you do to yourself? A simple post saying shit would be all I’d do.
It’s my job.
Campbell less than Arteta?
Listen, Arseblog, I know you want to protect Arteta from then excessive attack he’s getting on the internet, but being overly protective of him and even playing down his bad performance isn’t gonna help. In fact, it will just act like sweet honey to internet trolls to attack him more.
Regardless of how poor Joel was, you simply can’t claim he was worse than Arteta, you really can’t.
Hmm…how about, yes you can? I can’t remember another sitter being missed in such a manner.
Imo, we have learned from the first half of this season, that Arteta and flamini arent really up to the standard required for a team to challenge for title. So i make that two MF’s we need to move on and replace with quality, whether promote from within or whatever, and thats without taking into consideration certain squad members persistent injury problems. Injuries are killing us atm…..i know its easy to say it now but we should have pushed more in summer with this situation. Vidal or Carvalho, i dont know who was available, none of us do. Just feel… Read more »
Arseblog should also stop posting articles by 7amkickoff if they wish to maintain a certain credibility.
After the laughable article about Cazorla making more beautiful passes than Özil, now the problem today , guys, was….. ÖZIL ! Yes… and it is called a specialist.
Tell you what, if you don’t like them, don’t read them. Nobody’s forcing you. And if I want your advice on how to run my site, I’ll let you know.
At risk of “sample size!!!!!”, Arteta is no longer reliable depth at CDM, especially with his injury record. That said, this was a bad day at the office. We could have won, even with so many key players out. Just gotta get max points from the easy fixtures from here to the City game.
Easy fixtures?
There are no easy fixtures as today proved.
All the talk about ” an opportunity to rotate” prior to this match on this website…………….
FFS, will people cop on please, I mean, who and where????
Arrogance (meant well) , but naive arrogance all the same.
Which key players? We started with 10 of our first choice 11 and finished with 9.
This was a reply to the post above, not this post
Murphy’s Law folks. Glad City are losing though, 2 points off the summit. Coquelin, get back as quick as you can. We need our injured players back the most, especially Ramsey.
Exactly, as bad as Campbell’s miss was, was it any worse than Ramsey’s against Man U? If anything Ramsey’s was easier as he didn’t have a player slip in front of him to put him off and no one’s talking about the end of his Arsenal career.
Arteta’s performance today was spectacularly bad, there’s no hiding from that and it’s insincere to pretend otherwise.
This was a reply to Stillmatic above
Interesting how Campbell gets a lower rating than Arteta… Just saying. If it were Walcott others would say he was at least getting into the areas and has not had enough game time. And that ball he missed would have been expected to be cleared by the defender, so it really surprised him. Just saying. COYG!! Time to recover.
Our Attacking players should be taking more shots on goals and not just pass and pass looking for assists, but take the bull by the horn and give the opposition other players to worry about.
Exactly. Ramsey missed from similar area against Watford. Hopefully Joel finds shooting form quickly
Probably because he missed an open goal that would have rescued a point for us.
What are the chances of Coquelin coming back to full fitness before January 31st?
My fingers are crossed for backup in the transfer window but my head is keeping my expectations well and truly muted.
He’ll probably be out for “3 weeks”.
No fucking chance at all…
Steaming. Pile. Of. Dogshit.
The only one at the races today was Sanchez and was good for his 6, maybe 7. As for the rest, some very generous (and, quite frankly, clueless) ratings above.
Just like us, Man City are losing to a mid-table side!
Heads up lads. We’re still neck and neck with City and Ramsey, Walcott and the Ox will be back soon.
Only saving grace is that no team seems to want to take their chances to push ahead this season.
This is arsenal. Coq Will be out six weeks which means nine months.
Pathetic that Wenger didn’t get any cover. Negligence
If arteta gets a 4.5 for that I cant sleep imagining what a 3 could be and thinking about a 2 I’ll scream everytime sun beam touchs my skin, but, just, please tell me there is no 1.
I am not too sure about the team demeanor really, very lack lustre. Why did Gibbs start? At least Liverpool won. Fix this Wenger.
I would be very happy if I never saw Joel Campbell wear an Arsenal shirt ever again. I would be delighted if he was handed a free transfer tonight …to another sport! Backgammon or something.
And it would also be great if we started fining players 25 million weeks wages for trying to take penalties down the middle! It’s not smart, it’s actually stupid.
Arteta gets a 4.5!!!!! Take the blinkers off!!!!
He did nothing, blocked nothing, provided nothing, scored a goal.
We are home now.. 4th on the table.. So, that was the plan all along!!! All our injured players will start coming back LANS once our 4th position is in danger.. and ofcourse a couple of them will come back just in time when the january transfer window opens
This may come as news, but the prizes are given out for where you are mid May, not end November. Hold off that trip to the Swiss euthanasia clinic for a bit, just in case.
Oh, come on mate.. just adding a bit of dark sarcastic spin to our situation.. no need to get personal.. you have to admit.. our situation is quite funny.. chance to go to the top and we don’t have players left to beat West Brom.. the sub coming on to replace an injured player gets injured.. we have to start a left back so that we have some semblance of an attacking player on the bench who scuffs his chance to equalize with 20 minutes to go.. one of our best players misses a penalty and incidentally hasn’t scored since… Read more »
Coquelin was awful today, he could not handle the pace and power of McClean. Cazorla was poor once again. Campbell showed why he is sixth or seventh choice for wide right role. Poor defending all round on both WBA goals.
It looks like Coquelin will be out for a while, which will mean either Flamini or the returning Ramsey in CM.
Arteta’s rating is the kindest score you’ll give all year. Hard to understand what merits a 1 or 2 if that was worthy of a 4.5. He did nothing defensively, he had an OG which could have been a penalty had it not gone in amyway and provided absolutely nothing going forward. His leadership isn’t outweighing his poor play at this point.
Now I hate to say I told you so but when I suggested that we’d struggle to win the league because we don’t have a deep enough squad when you consider the inevitable injuries that we get each season I was given the thumbs down treatment on here. It’s all too predictable.
Arteta should have a ,minus….or a tombstone…Never want to see him on the pitch again…Adds absolutely nothing..Become a full time coach and stay around Arsenal because he does add alot of things OFF the pitch.
Joel has great striker play/moves. He just isn’t a winger but he still gives a decent goal threat from the wing. He should probably have started except we have Zagreb. People just have bias (against Bayern i saw a winger sacrifice his play to protect an abandoned wing back position. Everyother person roasts Joel) and will have it until he either has a stupendously good season with us or goes away and becomes lead striker for a Portuguese club scoring for fun which will be when same gunners will start asking for a buy-back clause. Leave Joel the fuck alone,… Read more »
Keep telling yourself that.
A decent goal threat ??
When , exactly ?
chibs I don’t know where you get the idea from that Campbell will ever be a high scoring striker, he has not been one for Costa Rica, Lorient, Real Betis, Olympiacos, or Villareal.
I’m sure he doesn’t have Ozil or even a Ramsey-level creator there. Some one mentioned his getting into positions, also the way he plays with his back to goal etc. He has that initial acceleration that takes him away from defenders and he’s a decent passer and also has good shooying technique. Those loan teams(i stand to be corrected but im sure about Olympiacos) played him on the flanks as well
yes he has been played on the wing by all his clubs and his country, and maybe the reason is he is not a very good striker, he is not a good finisher, he is a scorer of good goals, and is not a good goal scorer. All his managers can not be wrong about his best position.
Here, how about you give him a chance first before you know, nailing him yo the cross? A lot of managers can decide what they want about anybody, Dan Crowley was not really appreciated in a team where all yheir fans think he’s sliced bread so there you have it. Olympiacos had/have Mitroglou and he was banging them in steadily, why would they think of it? Also, Coquelin was played at left wing in Freiburg and yet, he’s one of the best destroyers around but even the boss didn’t trust him until absolutely crunch. Managers ain’t God. They’re human and… Read more »
We were a bit unlucky today,but injuries are starting to bite,and we all know that the coqs injury will be the worst possible.
Wish we had spent some of the 200 million in the bank now, the striker I understand as their was nothing available but not buying a holding mid was poor poor judgement. I remember some John Terry quoting how much it cost to pay the stewards for each game and that had to be taking into consideration, as I said, John Terry!! We are still there but if coq is out for a while the league could be gone as the middle if the park now looks awful. Santi can do it alongside a good strong holding mid. Flamini, Ramsey… Read more »
I rolled off a list of around 20 examples of the hundreds, if not thousands of areas where the club needs to expend finances to be run as a successful business and all you can remember is the stewards? lol
You’re a fucking moron, pal.
Let’s recap on that debate. You said that the club has £200m in the bank to spend on players, I told you that we don’t. You then put forth the hypothesis that we could spend all £200m with no problem, I then had to combat your fickled brain with the realistic fact that £200m in the company bank account does not equal £200m to spend freely. I gave you many examples of costs, one of which included staff, not just players and manager, but also that of sales staff, stewards (which seems to be the only one you can actually… Read more »
And whilst we’re at it, £200m spent on players doesn’t equal wins on the pitch, ask Chelsea.
Best not try then right?
I’m not saying don’t spend, I’m saying that even if we were to spend all of our available transfer funds in January (of which the only players available will be sub par ones), does not mean we will win the league. Yes, we need to buy some players for options, but people are wanting us to blow our load on players that are not available in a mid season transfer. Too many people asking questions and never able to provide answers because they can’t see things with context on here after a loss. The same ones who wanted us to… Read more »
Just to add some context, Stringer Bell was also suggesting that we spent £60m on Benzema. I’m not saying not to try, I’m saying we don’t have £200m in the bank to splash out on transfers. I think we absolutely needed a striker with potential to challenge Giroud and Walcott, but more so, directly challenge Welbeck. I also think we needed an out and out Right Mid/Winger to create a more standard dynamic to Alexis and Ozil up top with the striker as Ramsey drifts around a bit too much for my liking (despite being effective at it, stat wise)… Read more »
Clattenburg didn’t do his job before Santi took the penalty. Two West brom players should have sees the yellow card for bad sportsmanship. But they got away with it. Santi forgot to get the turf out of his shoes, he slipped and missed the penalty. More bad luck and the cheaters get away it unpunished.
why the fuck did even take the pen? hasn’t scored for months in Prem … Giroud anyone? Hopefully Aaron R can do a job in defensive midfielder, or Flam? Seriously short sighted not signing a class DM and world class striker in summer. FFS Arsene, get a grip, and not a Vulcan death grip on our title chances. Fucking Pulis and his fucking fuck fuckers
Because he’s our first choice penalty taker and usually scores.
Arteta would’ve taken it to hopefully redeem himself if he wasn’t off injured ( again )
As the Lego man takes a lovely penno normally
As much as I adore him it seems Wenger’s sentiment gets in the way of good decision making. We missed a trick letting Klopp go to Liverpool so close to retirement and I feel it will come back to bite us in the ass. Sorry.
By the way for all those having a go at artera,remember he’s hardly played any meaningful football for 2 years,I know he’s now very injury prone but that’s a different matter.
So Arteta is rated higher by Arseblog than Campell?. Campell was bad, but c´mon Arseblog, I know you have a thing for Arteta, but he was very, very, very bad today. This rating is a schoolbook example of what being biased is.
It’s just my opinion. You’re quite entitled to disagree!
How do you get 3 thumbs down for stating it as an opinion and that people are free to disagree with it? Jeez, this is Arseblog, a blog written by an Arsenal fan, his musings on a team that he follows and loves like we all do. He isn’t Opta, not everything is fact and you are not being told that you have to follow his opinion. I personally agree with most of what Blog says, but theres been times when I think his opinion is different to mine. Doesn’t make him right and me wrong or vice versa, it’s… Read more »
Jeez…bitter much!!!
More upset than angry. another season going wrong because of injury.. without coquelin our defence will be shit… is it the end of the season for us? food for thought
I’m actually a tad annoyed now that areblog seem keen to make Joel the scapegoat rather than Arteta.
I mean, what’s with the bias?
says a lot about you that you want a scapegoat at all.
Özil our only decent player on the Pitch, today
About as bad a day as we can have given the other results, more injuries and the quality of the opposition we should be putting to the sword if we’re meant to be contenders.
Need to realistic and put the kids in the CL games to ensure we finish bottom the group. Europa league will finish us off.
So disappointing today.
The bias on this blog against players that are not of the linking of Andrew is unbelievable. Last year it was Ospina. Even listening to the podcast he mentions all the players on international duty except Ospina and Campbell…as if they were not Arsenal players, you go figure why! Then he says that Campbell “feels out his depth” a full international that only just got back late Wednesday from playing world cup qualifiers where he played 150 minutes in two games. my question to you is…was Ramsey out of his depth when he missed two sitters one against Watford and… Read more »
It’s not bias. I was delighted for Campbell when he scored at Swansea and said so. But when you miss chances like that at this level, it tells you something about the player and his place in the squad. Having doubts about a player isn’t slagging him off. Calling him names or being abusive is one thing, but analysis of him and his performances is perfectly fine. As you just did with Oxlade-Chamberlain, right?
Also, I have no idea what me being Irish has to do with anything.
You do a tremendous job of putting these people in thier place, blogs.
Well put.
Every Season,injury is our problem..WHY?!!!…
Totally agree, forget the champions league, we don’t have the depth of squad for it!!! In the summer Wenger needs to be ruthless and let the injury crocks go and replace with more robust players!! What is the point of having Walcott or Wilshire if they are out for 50% of the season?
Some pretty embarrassing comments on here slagging off Arteta. He was poor, but so were most of our players.
We lost. It happens.
Must say I was shocked to see all the “bad luck” posts. Sure there are plenty of injuries but come on guys! Arteta is always a joke. I actually laughed out loud when I saw he was the one to come on instead of Flamini. He was atrocious as well as Cazorla, Mert and surprisingly Bellerin (minus the last 15 minutes). Ozil was his usual good self and one of the only positives was Alexis’ play. Despite this disappointing performance, we’re still in fighting distance. COYG
The defence as usual is sloppy. I am talking about the German.Wenger still has time
to get another cd. Why didn’t he play Gabriel?
He would be a boost. I doubt Arsenal can qualify let alone win the cl .Wright has
been quoted as saying the gunners are ill equipped to win the cl. I agree
100% with him.Of course things can change especially if Wenger gets a couple of
quality guys ,not cl tied. But its along shot.
The tall German and Arteta are supposedly the personalities the younger will look upon for inspiration when the going gets tough. I hope our players ignore them and follow sanchez’s example.
Why are our fans so polarised? A few weeks ago, 95% of the comments stated that Campbell should start ahead of The Ox and Ramsey. Now, he’s apparently the worst player to have ever played. Can’t we take these things game by game? I’m just angry that we missed a chance to go up top. But so did City. Being 5 points ahead now doesn’t mean we will win the league, but being 1 behind doesn’t mean that we are going to lose it. Why do our fans turn into such babies after we lose. This is football, teams lose… Read more »
Polarised or not…facts are we took the lead, Arteta is a liability, santi has no excuse for that pittyful miss.
If slipping while taking a penalty isn’t a justified reason for missing, i don’t know what is.
I’m beginning to lose the plot on this site after a loss. I read a comment yesterday that said that any top premiership player has no right to miss a penalty. Seriously, what bollocks are people coming out with, it’s like mass hysteria after a loss and no thought of logic or context whatsoever. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t like this 5 or so years ago, did we start picking up idiots after winning the FA Cup or something?
Don’t understand your surprise. Arteta cost us and santi shouldnt miss like that. What do you mean he slipped? He was offered an opportunity to win something out of the match and messed it up. Was he nervous? Psyched out by Garner? Both inexcusable. A champion takes these opportunities. Look at Wenger’s face. He can’t explain it. He is disgusted. What is he watching? Seriously? Do they want it or not? Come here Mr Arteta, you’re my of one most trusted and I need you in a game and this is what you give to us? Come here Mr Mertesaker… Read more »
Yesterday was unlucky, but we look to have lost the most important player in the squad – in the sense of the gap between him and his replacement – in Coq. We might get away with Flamini for a couple of games given the fixtures. But shouldn’t be like this. Got to hope that we’re willing to shell out for Carvalho or similar in Jan.
I should be called Mystic May, I wanted Flam on instead of Arteta and when Cazorla was stepping up for the pen I just thought “wish Giroud was taking this” Damn I wish i.d been wrong ?
you jinxed us mate.. lol
At least our duracell bunny ran and did good all game long, considering the amount of games he’s played.
Something positive, don’t you think?
I thought ratings on Alexis and Ozil were a tad low. They looked good. Everyone else was lackadaisical.
Look fella’s….shit happens, have a look on the Man City blog, don’t you think they want their manager sacked this morning…football fans always over react, it’s what we do. If we win our next three (league) games we’ll be world beaters again. Do I think we’ll win the league? No not with Wenger at the helm, because I think the way football has evolved, to finish above the other “big four” you have to make a couple of £40 million pound plus signings every year, including in January if need be, and I don’t think Wenger will do that year… Read more »
I agreed with what you’ve said up till Wenger.
May I enquire what do you mean by he will not spend 40m worth signing per year? Is that based on the dreaded 9 years (trophy drought years)?
Because he has shown as that once the debt has been cleared, he will make the right purchases with transfer bids relevant to modern day prices, see Ozil and Sanchez. He will make the necessary bid on the right players when necessary. What he will not is to spend big for the sake of spending.