Thursday, March 28, 2024

Leno: Freddie has made us feel free to play

Bernd Leno has been one of Arsenal’s best players this season – in part because our defensive issues mean he’s far more involved than we might like.

Clean sheets are a rarity, and up until last night so were wins in the Premier League. However, the Gunners ran out 3-1 winners over West Ham at the London Stadium, and the German keeper spoke afterwards about the impact Freddie Ljungberg is having.

He admitted things went badly under Unai Emery, but not for the want of trying – and it seems there’s a more upbeat mood in the camp under the former Invincible.

“From the first day he said he wanted to see laughing faces, to see a good atmosphere,” he said.

“We had a bad time, we are all human and it is not easy. It was not like we did not try, but it just did not work.

“Freddie is doing a very good job. The team know about his quality and the way they want to play.

“We want to play with possession, keep the ball and also press very high, and also with transitions.”

West Ham 1-3 Arsenal – player ratings

The 27 year old expanded a bit on what had gone wrong under the previous coach and how Ljungberg has helped.

“It was not like everyone was not trying, but you could feel that we did not play in a free way and he made us more free to play,” he continued.

“You could see this more in the second half. After the second and the third goal you could see how we can play with more confidence.

“This is the real Arsenal.”

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Russ

Sadly, I think we got it completely wrong hiring Emery.

SB Still

Letting go of Emery was the easiest decision the club had to make. It was so obvious that it wasn’t working for whatever reasons. Plus, the passive possession, the regular self destruction were alien!

Ofcourse its happened with Wenger too but far less frequently. For most parts we played easy on the eye, 1 touch football.

Given time, maybe atleast till end of the season, Freddie can bring back the style of football he played in Arsenal, with more solidity at the back – wonder if the board will help him even a little in the winter transfer window.

Futsboller

Hiring Emery felt good at first, if only because it ended a period of negativity associated with Wenger. But it became clear by midseason to a lot of people that his talk of protagonist football was just talk. Following the Europa loss, he should have been let go, and a new manager brought in and the summer transfer business geared toward that fresh approach. But alas, we’re late bloomers at Arsenal, and the damage is likely too severe to manage the top four this year. We can only hope that Arsenal’s next permanent coach is dedicated to the attacking philosophy… Read more »

Magic City Gooner

Removing the fear and shackles from this side will go a long way towards making our way back up the table. Overthinking and playing with fear cost us so much the last few months. Hopefully Leno is right and we’ll start seeing what the real Arsenal can do going forward.

gooner

You could say we were stuck in the moment.

Reality Cech

Maybe playing a little bit with the handbrake on

C.B.

Leno, our best buy recently, he’s saved us many times.

And, on a positive note, we are now over half the way to 40 points and avoiding relegation.

AfroGooner

I desperately hope that this is the start of the Gunners regaining their form and rescuing the season. We need them happy and playing their best.

Tim

“This is the real Arsenal.”

What a powerful statement, I hope we build on it.

jon

Having experienced success under Wenger, it would be no surprise if Ljungberg takes a wengerish approach: Let the players form their own roles on the pitch. Of course, this requires both the right mix of players and time to let them adapt to each other.

Wenger failed in his later years. The slowness in build-up was too easy to defend against. Why should it succeed under Ljungberg? More suited players, maybe, and a little higher risk going forward.

Francesc

Not long before Bayern come in with their bag of dirty tricks to take him

Takeshita

Not today lad with this negativity. I am gonna bask in the 3-1 sunshine with a smile. My missus asked me today morning, “how long do you think this is gonna last”. I said, “As long as it can!!! “.

Amusa

Sokratis’s face as he hugged Freddie nearly made me cry, so much emotion on his face.
The players must be hurting as well, no one wants to suck at their jobs (The accusation that to them it’s just a job).
I hope they can channel the anger and disappointment and beat City, destroy Chelsea and annihilate the spuds and United.

Gbenga

I too hope they can beat city but we have to be frank with ourselves, city is also a wounded Lion looking for who to pour their anger on and it is just the wrong time to face their wrath. I don’t see us surviving it. I will be more than happy to eat my verdict if something good comes out of it. As for Chelsea and Man u, I strongly believe we have a chance due to their own recent form but way way better than ours. For Chelsea last 4 matches L(Westham), W(Villa), L(Everton), W(Lille) while Man u… Read more »

Gbenga

I too hope they can beat city but we have to be frank with ourselves, city is also a wounded Lion looking for who to pour their anger on and it is just the wrong time to face their wrath. I don’t see us surviving it. I will be more than happy to eat my verdict if something good comes out of it. As for Chelsea and Man u, I strongly believe we have a chance due to their own recent form but way way better than ours. For Chelsea last 4 matches L(Westham), W(Villa), L(Everton), W(Lille) while Man u… Read more »

onenil

Can you imagine what it was like, running out at the Emirates. The stadium full, millions of people watching you round the world. Emery has just explained to you in great detail what he wants you to do…

…and you have no idea what he was talking about.

Amusa

But they knew it was a Good Ebening 🙂

Tommy Gunner

How about we stop taking the piss out of a guy doing his best to speak a foreign language, now eh?

Amusa

Yeah you’re right. English for me is also a second language. Shouldn’t make fun of anyone trying their best.

The Peter Simpsons

Without a doubt one of our most impressive performers this season and I think we have ourselves a proper goalkeeper.

Rich

Arteta

Saadman

Merson

backsakacrack

Cabbage

Rich

Leno is class, and I love him just a little bit more, because I know how much Martin hates him….

Santori

I don’t know about that Leno. I don’t see any freedom to our play bar 9 minutes which isn’t anywhere near an entire game. We were ponderous, took way too many touches, lack urgency and dynamism, sharpness and even off ball effort (by Pepe, Granit and AMN) left much to be desired. Had this been a better team with their tails up, we would have been punished…again. We were lucky. A swallow does not a summer make. And we have A LOT of work to do. Positives is in that 9 minute spell which they dropped and we managed to… Read more »

Santori

At the moment I’d keep as stable a selection at Cback as possible. If Chambers is seemingly doing well, I’d keep him paired with Sokratis until one of them cocks up. We need an understanding at the back. Fullbacks, hopefully Bellerin is recovered. AMN was OK but he really needs to focus, still that slackness his major undoing. He has a lifeline at the moment but if he blanks out again, he would have worked his way out of squad. Still needs to work harder. On other flank, unlucky on Tierney. BUT I don’t see the ‘masterclass’ some people prefer… Read more »

myrtle

Granit and Guendouzi has never worked.

Dave M

Granit xhaka has never worked

db10s

Yup. They don’t work. One has very bad defensive awareness and the other is too slow to get back if we lose the ball. Overall I feel like it’s a coaching issue between the backline and midfield. It doesn’t help that the players we have in the midfield are have very specific strong points and a lot of liabilities that makes it hard to find the right balance. I feel like the gap between the backline and the midfield is always too huge. With the ball, the back line sits back and midfield goes forward so we always have trouble… Read more »

Pakgooner

So much copy paste good God, Santori

Deno Garbby

Yeah I believe this is the kinda manager The Gooneers can thrive under one who promotes a free atmosphere and understands his resources well let’s look at how to bring down City so that we look at a champions league slot and I believe in Freddie we can get the invincible team at Emirates again

Deno Garbby

If there be a plan to hire a manager then Ancelotis record would be outstanding winning Epl for Chelsea ,champions league league series A copaderey etc it’s a better CV but can he performed that again ??? Foot ball has evolved of late

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