Friday, March 29, 2024

Ozil: We’re happy to be ahead of Sp*rs, but there’s still work to do

Mesut Ozil couldn’t help but smile when he was reminded that the 2-0 win over Newcastle put us ahead of old rivals Sp*rs in the Premier League table, but last night’s Man of the Match is aware there’s still work to do to secure a top four finish.

The German was starting his fourth consecutive game – his best run of appearances so far this season – and despite what’s come before he’s finding form at the right time.

He played his part in a good Arsenal performance, and was keen to focus on the collective rather than his own individual display.

“My work is to give everything on the pitch, like today,” he told Sky Sports.

“I only want to help my team-mates to win the game. I think we played very well as a team, not just me. It was a team effort.

“As I said, congratulations. I think we are now third. It was a long time that we had to wait for a game, so now we can go and relax at home now.”

As for moving up into third and ahead of that lot, he continued, “Our aim is to get into the top four. Of course we’re happy that we’re in front of Tottenham.

“It’s always a big competition with them. If we play like today, we have a few more games in front of us and we want to win them.

“We want to take all the points to get into the top four at the end of the season.”

Check out today’s Arseblog for reaction to the 2-0 win over Newcastle

Arsenal 2-0 Newcastle: Ramsey and Lacazette send Gunners into third

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goonero

As Dr.Dre so eloquently put it “remember, anybody can get it, the hard part is keeping it, motherfucker”.

Parisian Weetabix

hahaha glad you kept the motherfucker on the end there, really adds to the meaning of the quote

OneBeatOff

Another cool quote, and I don’t mind paraphrasing here, Mike Tyson said something like: “Plan? Everybody has plan until they get punched in the mouth.”

Rebeldispatch

To me away from his actual performance he looks well,l,ess gaunt, stronger maybe even happier or of course it’s just playing and winning makes it that way

Rostock Gooner

I agree. I remember a scene from yesterday where he was actually using his body to tackle and recapture the ball from a newcastle player.

For now, he seems to react positively from the problem during the middle of the season.

HulahoopsBaptista

Just a quick reminder:

It’s 1-1 at Newcastle.

gus

we are a different team with both him and ramsey in there, quality and experience, the ability to open up teams at will and create chances for our lethal forwards, just need torreira and xhaka behind them for protection, gueundouzi whilst a great prospect is dangerous in play and prone to losing it

Santori

I agree. Guendouzi is a tremendous prospect but people get carried away with him.

He lost the ball way more than Mustafi.

Granit keeps ball better and misplaces far fewer passes. What you get from Guendouzi is energy and positivity. He is always playing it forward and his off ball energy is excellent.

BUT the strong suit in midfield at the moment maybe Granit with Ramsey (or Torreira) and Ozil ahead.

Thierry Bergkamp

Looking back at the season, quite a few silly points have been dropped. The 2 pens vs Palace. Spurs penalty from an offside position and the last min penalty miss. The 2 soft goals conceded at Old Trafford and Martials dive. Dodgy defending in the draw with Brighton. 3rd place could and should have been almost be wrapped up. The main thing is there’s been progress this season and we’ve only been battered once.

Gooner Reg

Agree with what you’ve noted, but all teams will say the same about missed opportunities and squandered points, that’s just how it goes over a season.
I think realistically when the season began we’d all have taken being third with just 7 games to go and a top 4 place being in our own hands.
I’m genuinely excited for the next 6 weeks or so with both the Premier League and Europa League – I won’t be sorry to see the back of the Europa League next season though if/when we secure Champions League football. COYG!!

btw

There is also a few games that we could or should have dropped points but rode our luck. That said, we have looked much more solid lately and I hope it continues until the end of the season and into the next. We are going to miss Ramsey when he’s gone.

Goonereality

True. It’s all down to consistency. The top teams grind out results, sometimes when playing poorly. We’ve dropped silly points particularly in the first half of the season but we’ve been inconsistent away from home all season. What worries me is the inability to close down games when leading away from home. It’s mainly down to poor defending. As a unit the defense has certainly improved, but is now only average in my opinion. That may be good enough in the run-in, but I don’t think we should be over-confident.

Santori

Dropped points to BHA, Soton away and West Ham in poor patch around Xmas was a massive blow. We shipped 8 winnable points then.

No need to remind you (but I will anyway) that in that spell, Torreira gave away or was robbed off the ball 5 times 3 of which led directly to goals against us.

And they say Mustafi cost us the season.

Caligunner

Also if we had mahrez on the pitch those mistakes would never have happened

viennagunner

reading this i had to think of lehmann, who dodn’t know we had won the league at whl after they scored that equaliser. hard to imagine

GraeB

His stupid fault for giving the penalty away.

Goonereality

Mind you, if Ozil had got his act together earlier in the season perhaps we wouldn’t have had to play catch up with the Spuds for so long over 2019. Anyway, I’m sure that we want to see something from Ozil that we haven’t seen for quite a while: a consistently high level of performance over a long run of games. Fingers crossed…

Santori

What about Torreira…same can be said for him. He gave away or was robbed the ball 5 times or more against BHA, Soton away and West Ham (not to mention poor clearance against liverpool.

3 of which led to goals against us.

That was 8 winnable points at very least we shipped in that spell.

BUT some people prefer to wank over him bc he can do no wrong.

A Different George

The NBC studio crew in the U.S. pointed out this was the first post-match interview that Ozil has done in a year and a half. They suggested that sending him out was part of Emery’s good man-management. Don’t know about that, but he certainly seems happier and more relaxed. I have a feeling that everyone underestimated the effect on him of what happened with Germany and the DFB last summer.

Santori

Unai seems to have got the message across. His work rate off the ball has been MUCH better. I mentioned start of season if he could put in just 10% improvement in his off ball work and commit to tackles with better belief, he would be an infinitely better player. He can get better even at this late stage bc his game isn’t based on pace. Some of his feints and dummies are superb. Another with propensity to get even better is Lacazette. I think we’re far from seeing the best of him. His body work and twist and turns,… Read more »

Santori

Some people are wanking off to Ramsey and Guendouzi but truth be told we misplaced way too many passes in midfield. The pair misplaced more passes individually than Mustafi. We will need Granit back in. Also the attack (minus disadvantage in form of Anthony Taylor) needs to be sharper still with chances. Lacazette needs to tailor (no pun) his run slightly at an angle toward the crosses from out wide. He needs to learn from Giroud and attack the ball near post. Several crosses yesterday one from Kolasinac and one from AMN could have been turned in had he angled… Read more »

Santori

Spurts reign above us in once media derided “Top 4″ trophy” certainly didn’t last too long. Always in our shadows, haven’t won the league since black and white TV like their kit. Even their spanking new ground looks like the Emirates except a bit gaudy. Two seasons in top four without winning anything but the media applaud them as the second coming. Hope we (and United) kick them back into europa. We should win the europa as well just to rub salt in. I said in December we could claw back to top 3 (forget top 4).Most people back then… Read more »

Santori

Conveniently there is no Garth Crook’s team of the week this week on BBC. 😀

How many of the Spurts squad can get into this Arsenal side?

BrevIT

No page long report from Santi today – just 7 separate ones!

Teryima Adi

He’s coming into his elements at the right time, and long may it continue.

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