Arsene Wenger says he was pleased with the 4-1 win over Hull City yesterday, and more generally his team’s response to losing on the opening day against Liverpool.
The Gunners have drawn one and won three of the four games played since, and now sit third in the table, behind leaders Man City and second placed Everton.
Arsenal did make it a little more difficult than it might have been, allowing Hull back into it yesterday, but the response to their goal was pretty emphatic as Alexis and Granit Xhaka scored to seal the game.
“I think overall we had a convincing performance in two different situations,” he said. “11 against 11, I thought we played well. When you play 11 against 10, it is, of course, not the same mentally and psychologically.
“But we remained serious and in the end we won the game in a convincing way, I would say overall. But we had a very difficult game against Southampton last week, then went away to Paris Saint-Germain.
“It’s an away game, so you are happy with the three points.”
And on the team’s current form since the 4-3 defeat to Liverpool, he said, “Look, we had a big shock in our first game and I said straight away after that first game that we face a mental test to see how well we respond.
“We went away to Leicester and to Watford straight away. So overall I think we responded well. We were not ready physically at the start of the season, we are now much better so let’s hope we can continue our improvement.”
Can’t fault any of that. One thing is for sure. This season will be the most interesting season in a while
Look, I’m absolutely well chuffed we’ve managed to grab some decent results since losing to the mugmashers. That said, and not wanting to be at all churlish, if we weren’t ready physically at the start of the season, shouldn’t the manager take much of the responsibility for that ? – just saying..
No team can be ‘match fit’ when they haven’t played any competitive matches.
That’s what he means.
But they would have been playing against other teams in exactly the same situation….the excuse that they were not fit doesn’t really add up
Exactly, it’s no excuse to say that you weren’t ready for a reasonably routine event that applies to everyone and everyone knows is going to happen. It’s like me saying I wasn’t ready for Monday morning…. which often I’m not,but that’s not the point.
He’s not saying we weren’t ‘as fit’ as the other team.
He’s saying we weren’t sharp enough (Match fit) to play the flowing, fast passing game he wants us to play….
We lost our first game and, by way of an explanation for this the boss offers that the team were not ready physically. You can call it not being sharp enough, or match fit, or anything you like, but if the team was not physically prepared for a game against Liverpool, he knew well was coming, then it’s largely down to him.
Just got to instil that never say die attitude to turn defeats into draws and potential draws into wins. Alexis has it and the Kos-Boss seems to have it this season too.
COYG!
Last three fixtures were all winnable… But still we had to do the job and the guys did just that so happy about that…
But Chelsea will be a true test of our progress..
Chelsea look beatable this season. They have an annoying habit of screwing us though.
Not only Chelsea, teams like man utd, Liverpool, spuds all seems to play game of their life against me.
You can count Southampton and their gk always playing their match of the season against us too..
And Swansea too
United just lost their third game in a row.
Feel sorry for them 🙂
Whooosh….
Feel sorry for them? Keep it up…Long may it continue!
Mourinho doing for United what he did for Chelsea last season.
Sacked by January? With Ibrahimovic taking over as caretaker?
Sounds ridiculous, but you read it here first ?
I’m actually so keen for Koscielny to hammer an over head kick into the net right off Costa’s mug. And maybe a ‘mistaken’ kick in the nuts on a routine clearance outside our box. Which Costa then gets a red card for. What? Seems plausible enough to me.
Not unless he gets excited by the sight of Coq and sticks out his third leg and trips Kos whose flailing back leg goes into his ballbag
The new additions seem to have a different mentality than the previously typical Wenger signings. All of Perez, Mustafi and Xhaka seem more like guys who want to win rather than to be the nice guys. I like it.
If the boss is pleased, am pleased.
COYG. .. IMMER GEWONNEN. ALWAYS WINNING. CONTINUE THIS PLEASE AGAINST ANY TEAM.
Can’t see anything pleasing with a performance lacking intensity. A game played at a pedestrian pace is not what should be pleasing.What happens when you meet City or Liverpool ? You get overrun for sure. The guy must also resolve the ideal midfield combination . To be oppened up by PSG in that manner and exposed by Hull, shows tactical nativity on the part of the Manager. Probably, it shows how the game has left him behind. We have the players to mount a serious challenge this time around but it will depend on the strategies of the manager .… Read more »
Exposed by Hull…when did that happen then?
Watch the chances Hull created on the counter attack and the gap between the defenders and midfielders
I’d rather look on all the positives if you don’t mind.
Does not matter if he minds or not..point is AW should take heed and learn from them when we still have the luxury to apply it.
Otherwise a win like this should not be allowed to eclipse the lessons Liverpool taught us. Hope we learn and apply them when there’s still time.
We can look at the positives in order to maintain our good performances. A critical review of the negatives will improve our performances further.
Or it will just make you a negative team with a losing mentality.
See the game replay…
Happened way too many times if you consider the quality we have..
I’m as anti Wenger as they come, I believe he has gone on 5-10 years too long, but even I think you’re talking bollocks
Always complaining huh? I rather se us play sh** and win or get a good result than dominante the opposition for 88 minuters and the let in a stupid goal which we have seen too much during the years.
If you stop caring you will stop winning eventually.
If you only see negatives you will never see positives.
Do you do this after sex too?
what you have to bear in mind is that Hull play with a packed defence – often 10 men in and around their box. Arsenal attacked for the majority of the game with 8 players, which is actually a positive as it meant we broke them down time and time again (as opposed to 90 mins of sideways passing and being beaten 1-0 like we have seen many times in recent years). the manager has to have the trust in his centre backs to deal with the counter attacking threat, in the same way all Pep teams have done –… Read more »
We have an extremely strong midfield. The “problems” Wenger has in selecting 2 to play behind Ozil makes a nice change to selecting players due to them being available. Cazorla-Coquelin function well, Cazorla-Xhaka looked solid against Watford and I’d personally be more than happy to see Elneny partner any of the above. Call my a Cynic, but its also refreshing to be able to take off a player walking the tightrope on a yellow card, with another talented central midfielder who is chomping at the bit to get on and perform. We still haven’t had to play Giroud or Perez… Read more »
I would be interested to see Alexis and Lucas on the wings due to their high work rate with Giroud in the middle.
Nice result wasnt too pleased with the pace & concentration of the boys… cant believe we gave away that goal the way we did
We win 4-1 and still this negativity?
A couple of “Sunday keyboarders” on here…:-)
We win away at Hull 4 – 1 and Chelshit lose away at Watord 3 – 1.
Hahahahahahahahahaha……Things are good!
I meant Manure!! Maureen hahaha…
And you are typing on ???
Meletios you thumbs rating on this post are currently 3 up and 16 down.
Time to put the spade away mate? 🙂
*your 🙁
Maureen is making a lot of effort to prove that buying is not the solution. Wacked by Watford too. When we played them plenty were complaining here despite the positive result. Looks like no matter what’s the result we still have to complain. Little man syndrome if you ask me. On the Manure front, well looks like they will start missing Van Gaal soon.
Their Team mentality is gone at Man U. Long may it last!
I hope the rotten one tries to solve it by his usual method of getting negative.
But Bayern Munich, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Manchester City and Chelsea are some teams that tell you buying is most definetely a good solution. United is not the only team investing money in the squad. And considering we fans are the sole reason clubs are able to make so much money as they do I really dont understand why any fan would want it all to go towards lining the owner’s pockets rather than being invested back in to the club. Why? We have literally been saving ourselves broke, and when we finally decided to spend some serious cash this window… Read more »
Bloody right mate, everything is shit!!!!
For fuck’s sake, we spend 100 million in the window. What were you expecting??
A bit of a mix bag for me. I think it is easy to be carried away by the final score. Two of the goals came in very late and we were potentially on edge from their goal which was carelessly conceded. We had a good spell when we settled down 10 minutes in which led to the first goal then were a bit static until we got the penalty. Playing against 10 men could be tricky with the opposing players retreating into two banks of four plus a roaming striker ahead to hit and hope. The extra space did… Read more »
What was Xhaka Celebration about?…I liked him a long time..his defiance should be a good thing!