Mikel Arteta says Arsenal have to get back to winning ways following a frustrating start to 2022 which has seen his side slip down the Premier League and exit both domestic cups in the space of four games.
While the Gunners are only two points adrift of fourth place and have at least one game in hand on four of the five sides above them in the table, the boss is under no illusions of the importance of getting back on track following last night’s disheartening Carabao Cup defeat to Liverpool.
Asked what he’s expecting of next opponent Burnley, who haven’t played any football since 2 January, the Spaniard said: “A competitive team, a difficult game. For us, it’s a massive game because after that defeat and that disappointment [v Liverpool], we’ve got to get back on track winning.”
While few people expected Arsenal’s new-look squad to mount a serious challenge for the top four this season, the fact we’re within touching distance just past the halfway stage means expectations have grown. Arteta admits that brings pressure.
“We are here to win football matches and that’s the pressure,” he said.
“We know the amount of matches that we’re going to have to win if we want to be there, but you can’t look too far ahead.
“There’s a lot that happened in recent weeks, and it’s been extremely hard to manage the squad and the team because we’ve lost a lot players.
“We have to reunite, we have to win on Sunday and move from there because then we have a window, and hopefully we can get some players back.”
18 games left to play, each one a cup final in terms of importance
Let’s hope they don’t treat them like semifinals instead.
We need reinforcements, we knew we’d loose players to Afcon. Ainsley and them lot probably informed the club a few months ago of their willingness to leave come January. I am sure a lot has gone on behind the scenes. What I am driving at is how difficult is it really to get some players? How do other Clubs get players in so fast and we seem unable to do that?
I hope we dont break Tomi, Saka and a few other players. They cannot start every match between now and end of the season.
I feel like they kind of can. We’ve got 18 games to go. All in the Prem. None in Europe or the cup. We will get week long rest periods when our rivals have games to play. Yes, if injuries conspire against us, we are in trouble. But the same applies to our rivals. If Sp*rs lost either Kane or Son for extended periods, they are done. And everyone knows Kane’s got the ankles of an 85 year old Irish dancer. We also have a very robust team. I can’t think of any, bar maybe Tierney and Partey, of our… Read more »
Spurs looked really bad against Chelsea in both legs of the league cup, really outmatched; although their results improved, I don’t see them much better since Conte arrived. Leicester have been crippled by injuries, probably worse than anyone. Man United still look at least semi-dysfunctional (the “semi” is the new-manager bounce), and West Ham have a thin squad and are really out-performing their talents (I wish we had Declan Rice, though). Which means we have a serious chance at top four.
Liverpool have had a champions league campaign on top of what we have had and they looked far fitter than our players. I don’t think the lack of European football has been of any benefit to Arsenal. Its not physical fitness that is the problem at Arsenal – its attitude and discipline which they have struggled with and it stems from Arteta’s management. Fourteen red cards during the 116 games Arteta has managed Arsenal. In comparison, Liverpool under Klopp have had 8 in 343 games. Its a terrible record and its crippling such a small squad of players. And their… Read more »
I don’t know how you can watch this team and say they have a bad attitude or that Arteta can’t motivate them. Liverpool’s squad are the finished article and have been for a while. Arsenal have the youngest team in the permier league and are still a work in progress.
There is a lack of motivation in that team or confidence. What I saw last night was as soon as Jota scored we disappeared from the game.
The young players are very promising and we have played well against the teams there to make the numbers up but there has to come a time when you say the bedding period is over for Arteta – what exactly has he delivered?
In business if you don’t deliver you are moved on. When you have someone spending the money he has spent and achieving nothing…
Well, you know what happens…
I hear the criticism of Arteta. But I really don’t like the finality of it from some of the supporters.
I’ll be honest, this is the most fun I’ve had as an Arsenal fan for about 12 years. And I’m very grateful to Mikel for that.
Which other clubs? None of our rivals have added to their squads either yet.
We have 18 games left in 17 calendar weeks so the schedule isn’t too punishing from here on in – though there are a couple of international breaks.
Covid permitting, I think we can put out close to our best 11 every match from now on.
Realistically we’re looking at a match a week, which shouldn’t be too draining, and Feb looks like a quiet month (assuming none of the postponed matches are rescheduled for Feb). If we make it out of Jan relatively unscathed & maybe get some reinforcements, I think we’ve got enough to make a decent push for top 4.
Anything can happen though, so I’m hoping for some luck re covid/injuries/overzealous refereeing.
“Covid permitting” is quite the qualifier.
The FA have started re-scheduling matches for other teams (like Burnley) in Feb, so I’d expect a few for us similarly- though obviously depends on Wolves and Spurs’ availability. They’re the only two in the league right..?
All our eggs are now in the top 4 basket. That singleness of purpose should help; but a striker and another midfielder is a must at this point.
At the start of the season, top 6 would have been progress. The target has now moved to top 4 as we have exceeded expectations, especially after the first three games.
We do need to keep a reality check I think. We have a really young squad, so let’s not go all Piers Morgan if we don’t make top 4 – even though I think we have a great chance of making it……..💥👊
agreed but it’s our best chance to get back into top 4 as we don’t have european nights, if we get into European nights football, we will need 2 more strikers, 2 more midfielders and 1 more defender to cope with the schedule of thursday + sunday football
I agree, and I’d also expect that Spurs will be better next season after a couple of transfer windows and time with Conte, and eventually United have to stop fucking things up quite so hilariously.. Right? This is such a good opportunity; given where we are now, I’ll be devastated about missing it, regardless of what I thought five months ago. If we miss fourth we could feasibly be in this same cycle in two-three years time. If we squeeze in, we go and sign a few top players in the summer and with our lads a year older and… Read more »
Agree that we need a spend or get some loan players in, disagree about spurs. I think there’s more chance that the Kroenke’s spend than Levy giving Conte enough money to keep him in the job for long. I will be surprised if he’s there for the start of next season.
You measure progress at the end of the season not half way through it
Suspend all judgement until the end of the season. That sounds like fun…
no one has ever qualified for european football half way through their domestic season…
We do need reinforcements, but I don’t think we should make any moves out of fear. As UzesGooner says, top 6 and visible progress on and off the pitch were the key goals this year, and being in the mix for top 4; we’ve achieved that midway through the season and hopefully can stay in there till the end (despite other teams cheating and not being investigated, despite the footballing media being resolutely against us in their obscene biases, and despite the incompetence and laughable double-standard in PL officiating that sees us punished ruthlessly for fouls that other teams commit… Read more »
It’s not just getting in players it’s getting in the right players and doing that in January is extremely difficult.
It feels a bit it worse than it is, I personally think. We lost an FA Cup tie, drew and lost a League Cup tie and lost against Man City. As regards the league, we’ve taken 12 points from the last 15. That’s really good form and easily enough for top 4. We just need to put these cup games to bed and get on with the Prem. I know I sound like an Arteta apologist but that’s how we have to view it. How many people at the start of the season wouldn’t have given two shits about the… Read more »
Chaos…adapt and overcome. That letter from Partey should not need to be written but it was. It shows character and desire to fight for his club, fellow players and manager. It shows the type of players and attitude Arteta requires. This team has character now, things are looking up.
To come on and get sent off after a couple of minutes is not fighting for the club or showing character. It is being an idiot. It is stretching our very limited resources once again. Arsenal are ill discliplined and it costs us every f***ing time – its predictable. It is utterly predictable that when the game turns against us one of those morons will get themselves sent off. We had lost the tie last night – it was done and dusted. There was absolutely no point to do anything rash but that cretin did exactly that. This is not… Read more »
Partey hasn’t been quite what we wanted him to be. Hopefully that is still to come. But he’s shown plenty of desire and character in past games. And he could have easily cried off and not turned up at all. So that’s to his credit. But I agree with the discipline is killing us and the red cards have to stop.
Cretin?? Bit harsh…
Agreed. Particularly when you look at the context of some of the recent results…
Better officiating against MC would have meant we take 3 points.
Liverpool a draw and a loss, playing with a side that wasn’t not match fit nor 100% healthy. The bonus here is that it strongly reinforced the need for further squad additions.
Chins up, we’ll get there.
The thing about positive spin is that it’s still spin.
Life is all about spin.
Do we sit around in desperate melancholy because everyone we know is going to die?
Or do we show gratitude for the time we have with the people we love?
The spin we put on life dictates the joy we get from it. And football is no different.
Agree completely. If we’re all being honest this season’s been about progresion in the league. We’re seeing that progression & we’ve got a chance to exceed expectations.
Here’s hoping Utd suffer a confidence sapping loss in the Champs League that derails the rest of their season, West Ham gets distracted with playing Thurs night football & sp*rs do a sp*rs.
A cup run always does wonders.
And its not the the fact that we were knocked out it was how we were knocked out and the fact that both of those performances mirrored our performances in big games in general since god knows how far back.
Still there is the league so fingers crossed..
12 out of 15 is actually great, superb, fantastic … keep your heads up guys and keeping roaring for our team … our support can help make the difference between the top 4 or top 6 …. C’mon gunners
We just need players to support the ones we have already. We are threadbare at the moment. We need urgent additions in the midfield at the barest minimum. The chase of Vlahovic can continue in the summer.
If Vlahović wanted to come, he would already be here.
Im happy to be corrected on this, but it seems that we missed a midfield link between defence and attack last night.
Did we miss Xhaka?
Why was Xhaka unavailable?
Partey tried his best Xhaka impersonation
Thought he brought more urgency in progressing the ball for the short amount of time he was on the pitch. Not sure if that’s just cause we were chasing the game or not but I could tell the diference when he came on.
Yeah, that was pretty clear. Don’t think we specifically missed Xhaka but we definitely missed a senior player at the base of midfield that had the confidence to either receive & run with the ball or pick out forward passes on a more consistent basis.
Not criticising Sambi as it’s a big ask for someone with his level of experience to do that against L’pool essentially all on his own but he definitely needed someone used to playing that role next to him.
Seriously, we need someone to play the Xhaka-role. I look at other teams and I see some who would fit exactly, not that they are available Think of a midfield of Partey and Declan Rice with Odegaard ahead of them.
I really want us to make top 4 but currently I believe we have two problems in achieving this. Firstly, we don’t score enough goals. Possible solutions (and potentially controversial), 1. move Martinelli up top and stick ESR on left wing and Pepe on the right when back from AFCON…2. bring Auba back into the fold (but not as Captain) Laca is not a natrual goalscorer… Secondly, we’re too inconsistent play well one match, shite the next. With the run of decent fixtures coming up we need to play well, win and breed confidence… Either let’s get behind the lads… Read more »
Saka thanks you for this suggestion
So you’re suggesting we drop Saka..?
Apart from the gaping flaw of dropping our most effective attacker you make a few good points. I’d much rather see Martinelli up front than the pile of shite that is Nketiah but sadly I think gabi’s touch and build arent up to it. He’ll just pushed over way too often. Delighted if he proved me wrong but I don’t think he’d be any better there than auba who to be clear doesn’t suit the single striker role at all.
Have to say I expected a serious challenge for top 4. Why wouldn’t you? We were about 9 points off last year wben we sabotaged our first 4 months. It was a false position in the league 2020/21 – should have challenged then too
Desperately hitting the refresh button to find out if we are getting Arthur. I really do think he will solve so many issues for this team. He’ll hold the ball in midfield, he’ll set a good tempo, he’s zippy around the park, he’ll stick his foot in (in a non-Xhaka way). Him and Odergaard will absolutely boss any midfield with their ball security and awareness. They both know exactly when to shift the ball around and when to push the button. I’ve been watching some Bianconeri Zone videos on youtube in the last few days. It is obvious that the… Read more »
We can’t make top 4…this team lacks the quality to make it. Arteta isn’t good enough, he is just average. Man Utd has picked up nicely…same with Tots, if you think the manager doesn’t matter look how both teams have bounced back.