Arsene Wenger made 10 changes to his team for tonight’s game, and it showed with a pretty lacklustre performance, going down 2-0 to Southampton.
Here’s how the players rated.
News
Monday, December 23, 2024
Arsene Wenger made 10 changes to his team for tonight’s game, and it showed with a pretty lacklustre performance, going down 2-0 to Southampton.
Here’s how the players rated.
Elneny is sick but he starts him, Ramsey is uttershite. People were talking about him being poor because he was on the wing, what excuse do you guys have this time? Jenkinson has to go, time we became a real club. Supporters don’t pay to watch someone because he loves Arsenal, they want performance
Ramsey is shit cus he got to play in his position this one time and didn’t perform?
If he wasn’t to perform in his favoured position in our actually first XI over a few games then fair enough. Shove him in there with a few kids against a full strength premier league team, he’s not going to be spectacular is he?
He’s been amazing for us tbh. Done a decent job in every position he’s been asked to play in. Dont understand the hate people have towards him considering he gives 100% every game.
Southampton actually made 7 changes coming into this game. It’s Ramsey’s effort that was disappointing last night. Looked like he didn’t care at all. Where’s the guy that hurried opponents on the ball not too long ago? Wish he’d do the basics first. There’s a gem of a complete midfielder in there.
Are you for real? Arsenal have given Ramsey EVERY damn opportunity since he got here. Wenger has had complete trust in him and he has only given us ONE good season in his entire career. Tell me honestly, how many good games have he given us since his breakout season two years go? Wenger has played him in three different positions and he has been utter sh** in all of them. And how has he re-payed us? Flirting with Barcelona and complaining. Pure bollocks I say. A great player plays well anywhere. It’s not coincidence that every time he gets… Read more »
A great player plays well anywhere? You must be joking! Let’s play Messi or Neymar in CDM and see how well they flourish? In Ramsey’s break out season he played in central midfield with freedom to roam. Has he had that since? No. Has to play in the CDM axis and fulfil his defensive responsibilities, or plays on either wing having to cover the fullbacks when they overlap. Does he have the freedom? No cus he knows he’ll be scapegoated for any goals we concede so he has to position himself in such a way that he can get back… Read more »
Oh come on! Do I really have to explain this? We’re posting in a footy blog after all aren’t we? When I say that a great player plays well in any position, I don’t mean Pirlo would be a great goalkeeper… What I mean is that a world class footballer spends his time developing his skills and adapting to what the team needs, and not whining every weekend like a Sunday league amateur. Messi and Neymar have played in a myriad of different positions for club and country, (10, 9, wings, and even 8) and they’re great at everything the… Read more »
Ramsey only been a feature of the first team for the past 5 years so I dunno where the decade fact comes from. Further to that, he suffered a potential career ending injury that many don’t bounce back from (Diaby, Eduardo etc). And in his ‘one good season’, he played a pivotal role in delivering our first trophy in a decade! Since then, Mesut has been moved to the middle (rightly so) and Ramsey has been gap filling ever since. He’s not a defensive minded player, and yet the CDM role is what he’s usually tasked with. He might even… Read more »
Some people say that Ramsey was not given chances. What do they have to say about Campbell or Gnabry?
Cmon enough. Wenger has got rid off some gem players to keep pushing and developing the likes of Ramsey. Vela is now world class single handedly carrying Sociedad to top 4 in Spain. MOM against Barcelona on the weekend, but he couldnt get a sniff in because Wenger kept pushing average British players. You say Ramsey performed because he had no good players around him. That’s more reason to stand out. Iwobi stood out because he is class. He looked like he stepped down into the B team. But come weekend, he will hit the bench and Ramsey will take… Read more »
I think Vela has only developed BECAUSE he left Arsenal. We just have a poor record of making promising young players into true world class players. Fabregas and RVP are the only ones I can really say reached their potential at our club.
The best of the rest are Theo, Clichy, Wilshere, Ramsey, Iwobi, all of whom are still hovering around that ‘almost there’ stage still. AW seems to find the rough diamonds but struggles to get them to truly shine, and then keep them!
Ramsey is a player who divides opinion because of two things: 1. His ability to be a the right place 2. His inability to choose the right option.
Unfortunately for him the second part is getting him all the negative reviews but when we consider that he was in great position to make things happen with the right decision in key moments of the match the frustration grows.
Stop it! He’s not that good!
Quadruple is over – but means no horrendous fixture pile-up in the New Year at least! The selection was strong enough to have won, but urgency and cohesion lacking.
Deep down I’m secretly happy we don’t have to play Liverpool twice during the hectic winter period. I feel so ashamed.
Well, we were due a defeat going by the way we had played in the last few games. I would’ve preferred to suffer a loss in this competition rather than in the PL. Hopefully this will serve as a wake up call for the players to raise the standard of their performances.
I’m sorry but there is no way we were going to beat a full strength Southampton team with that line up. And honestly, I’m not even that bothered. We’re finally in a position to be aiming for bigger targets, so using this competition to see how well the youth do is perfectly fine.
A lot of people wrote off the FA Cups we won as trash and then the same kind of people moan when we get knocked out an actual meaningless cup.. bizarre!
First of all, the Southampton team wasn’t a full strength team, it was just as encumbered as we were. Second of all we were playing at home. Third of all, we have lost only 2 games this season and both have been at home. Fourth, I dont understand this mentality about the EFL cup being a cup we dont want. Wenger has never won it and I’m sure he would have wanted to considering this is probably his final year with us. Why is it that everyone on this forum is content with this loss. How can we look at… Read more »
The Southampton team had changes, sure, but they were still a full first team XI. We had Martinez, Holding, Maitland-Niles and the Jeff playing. They’re hardly even close to our first team squad. It was always going to be tough with the team we put out, but tough tests is how you find out which players are ready for more. I’m not happy we got knocked out, neither did I even care about having less games over the coming month, but the EFL cup is hardly worth getting upset over. Tickets are a tenner, the top 6 clubs usually put… Read more »
I don’t agree with you at all. Your argument is extremely complacent and a tribute to mediocrity. And ARSENAL is NOT a complacent and mediocre club. Big clubs have to win or at least try to win everything that’s on the table. This title was just a couple of games away and we let it slip carelessly. Do you think it’s easier to win the CL? Come on! We were at home, and our B squad is man for man much better than almost every other B squad in the PL. We had expensive guys with lots of experience like… Read more »
So aiming for bigger targets is a tribute to mediocrity and complacency? On what planet? Surely it’s all about prioritising your targets? Would you rather win the EFL Cup or the League? The FA Cup or the Champions League? There is no way that we have a squad with enough depth or quality to compete on 4 fronts. We have enough for the PL & a cup this season, so would you prioritise the EFL Cup over the other two? No chance. We put out our B team mixed with some inexperienced youths to see if they could do the… Read more »
Yep the quadruple is over, thank goodness that cup is out of the way, what we need to do now is to drop out of the Champs league, miss the FA cup narrowly and then we can fully concentrate on scraping 3rd place.
As is usually the case.
Clearly threw the game away in 1st 45, but second half was great stuff! We showed endeavour, creativity and spark. Finishing wasn’t there, but how many shots and chances did we make? I think we were a bit unlucky. Can’t judge the guys too hard, great 2nd half but sometimes the ball just doesn’t go in..
I didn’t watch the game, but I heard Gabriel is starting at Right Back against West Ham?
How did we do overall? Unlucky? Was it worth ending the unbeaten run?
For lack of a better term, we were shit. I have never seen so many passes back to the defence in my life. The whole team seemed languid up to around the time when Ox came on and injected a bit of life into the team. Our passing was slow and without purpose, our players were slow to get to the ball and we did not create a single clear cut chance in the first half, while the only one I can remember in the second half was the miss from Ox. Overall a 2/10 performance.
Aahh November……….fuck off and take your miserable, sorry ass with you.
Hey! watch it! it’s my birth month you’re attacking.
Chu-Young Park is to the Arseblog rating system what the Joker is to a deck of cards.
Find it funny that players like Theo aren’t constantly criticised on this website for wanting to play in a certain position.
Yet when Ramsey doesn’t perform cause he’s not in his ” favourite position” . It’s all good and well.
Clearly not good enough to play instead of Santi when fit or Ozil in number 10 so he’s lucky he even gets into this team at all. Wing or not
Before everyone starts defending him, not blaming him for the loss. All the players were horrible
I have had enough of him, to be honest. It would be worth cashing in. Also, Jenkinson is a Championship quality player.
Are you saying no one criticised Theo?? Everyone (including myself) were criticising him when he was playing poorly. Blogs was also often critical of him.
Not going to say anything negative, already broke my Iphone this evening because of Ramsey. Thought Iwobi bounced back and played well individually even if he did not produce anything spectacular..Missed movement up top and a competent player at no 10 to link with. Even though we lost 2-0 and they had a host of chances mostly near the end..I thought Gabriel was very good and Holding was excellent..Been really impressed with him..Even in the 4-3 game we lost to Liverpool.. Niles came on and did well. Xhaxa improved us immensely, but he does give it away carelessly sometimes (in… Read more »
Surprised to see so many 5s and 6s for what was a truly, truly awful performance. No steel, no class.
I’m watching Real Madrid B/youth team right now and they are just on a whole different class level.
First goal by Enzo Zidane btw. Fml I’m so old.
In fairness, there’s a bit of a gulf in class between Europa league Southampton and Madrid’s Segunda Division B opponents but yeah they do have some incredible talent
It was Southampton B
Pffft, Iwobi & Holding represented tonight. Everyone else (Granit, Ainsley & Ox excluded) big question marks. Maybe a little harsh on Gibbo and Gabriel. But c’mon, seize the opportunity. Or have you already acquiesced to making it at the Arsenal?
Agree with the general sentiment, but gee whiz you are wildly off with the use of ‘acquiesced’.
catachresis
Jenkinson and Ramsey were both shocking today … Perez as well, but he’s just coming back from injury … I hope Wenger starts Gabriel against the Hammers … I can’t imagine what Payet would do to Jenkinson … Terrible performance all around but it’s been coming …
Do we have anyone other than Ozil or Santi capable of playing a through-ball?
Alexis, giroud, bellerin and xhaka? Iwobi maybe. But yeah a lack of creativity in that midfield tonight. Xhaka has to start from here on imo.
Joel Campbell! Oh wait he too is on loan.
Gedion Zelalem! Must be getting ready to be sent on loan.
Nope that is about it there.
Surprised that Zelalem and Willock, two of our most promising young players, who also featured in the earlier EFL games, were not on the bench tonight (not that they would have made much of a difference). Were they injured?
I think the Jeff has a ton of potential, but I have a suspicion he’s been promoted to the first team squad a bit too early. Certainly doesn’t look anything close to as polished as Iwobi did last year.
Sending Campbell on loan was a big mistake. He was one of our best players last season and would’ve improved us this season.
Given our horrendous injury record every year, just once I would love for Wenger to purposely keep a bloated squad, so that we truly have enough cover in every area to challenge on four fronts. If we had Wilshere, Campbell, and Gnabry right now (I know he refused to sign, but we only got like 5m for him, so why sell?), we’d be much stronger in the creativity department and on the wings, but the squad is suffering from letting them go.
Can we get wilshere back and send ramsey to bournemouth
Wilshere is just as overrated, and full of himself, as Ramsey
Ramsey really is in a funny position, behind both Santi and Ozil for sure and probably Xhaka and Elneny. He’s definitely best further up the pitch but not to shoehorn him in, usually needs games to find rhythm too, so not really an impact player..what to do?
He seems to be a sentimental addition to the team. Can someone tell me what he is actually exceptional at? He doesn’t have pace, he barely gets a decent pass off, and he just seems to try crazy skills which don’t come off 99 times out of 100. He needs to be discarded, sold, whatever, and a class creative midfielder needs to be brought in in his place.
Ramsey needs to stop fucken focussing so much on his hair, and earn his wage and return something to our great club.
But when he is in form (admittedly not for a long time), everything comes off. He was the best player in the League at that time who could shoot, pass, dribble, tackle, time runs perfectly, pull off crazy skills and impact every game he played in. Wenger probably is overly sentimental and believes that that player is still in there and is determined to not give up on getting him back.
1. Give him a chance to forge a partnership with Xhaka in the middle of the park, in his best position (“box-to-box”), but only until Santi returns, and not at the complete expense of Elneny (i.e. if the latter is fit and keeps playing well alongside Xhaka, then Ramsey must wait his turn on the bench until injury/rotation happens). I think this should more or less be “last chance saloon” for Ramsey as a starter in his best position at Arsenal. 2. If that fails, because he doesn’t produce, then use him as an impact sub for the rest of… Read more »
I’m sorry but the solutions you’ve just stated are what Wenger has been doing for years with him. How many chances must we give him at the expense of the club? With his poor performances and inconsistency Ramsey wouldn’t last a single season at any big club and yet we hang on to him as if he was the chosen one. I think it’s time we put some pressure to sell him, and to sell him now when he’s worth something. He’s a disgrace of a player.
Bright spot today was Holding. Thought he took up great positions, read the play well, and distributed as well as anyone out of the back, even if thats where the quality ended tonight
Sorry but wasn’t it Holding who completely bottled the tackle to let in the incredibly soft second goal?
We were shite 🙂
Our style of play depends on constant movement and quick passing – two things we did not do at all tonight. Ramsey and Gibbs especially guilty tonight.
Ramsey had another one of his second striker games today. I think I saw him in the midfield maybe twice.
Ramsey often dropped deep to get the ball which is not exactly where you want the No 10. And in the first half the real problem of the team was the midfield pairing. Better in the second half with Xhaka but just not good enough.
I felt sorry for Ramsey tonight. Perez is not a big man to play off, and no support from the utter shite in CM of the tried/tested/failed Elneny and Coquelin pairing. Give the guy a chance.. first time playing number 10 in years and all anyone can do is arrange his funeral. He’s definitely not the key culprit for the poor performance and the bottom line is we never had a chance with that starting lineup.
I wonder if Arsene is doing to Ramsey this year what he did to Walcott last year, allowing him to see how much rubbish he is then giving an ultimatum.
uh uh
Being there at the game we again lacked that killer instinct. Iwobi got stuck in, Ramsey was hardly to be seen, and every chance we had a chance to play a ball to Perez we didn’t. It was like watching a game of rugby, constantly passing the ball back, no one really wanted to go for it.
0/10 for the East Stand… No atmosphere whatsoever, trying to chant and everyone was quiet…
Holding played well, showed a lot of promise. Jenkinson will never make it as a full back at Arsenal, I get that he’s Aresenal through and through but so what, that doesn’t mean he’s good enough to be in the side, granted he didn’t get much help, but half the time he gets caught out of position and he just can’t turn quick enough.. And as for Ramsey, I’ve always backed him, but have come to realise he just doesn’t fit in, he doesn’t seem to gel with the players around him, always looks as if he’s playing on his… Read more »
I was expecting better from Jenkinson, he’s not played too badly filling in for Bellerín the last few weeks, buit he really had a poor game tonight. Maitland-Niles was a big improvement when he replaced him. Ramsey, on the other hand, has been consistently poor, and tonight was perhaps his worst just when, as one of the senior members of a makeshift team, you might have expected him to be determined to take a lead. Sometimes he seems to be trying to play by instinct, when it’s clear he’s lost his instinctive flair; other times he just doesn’t concentrate, and… Read more »
He references the intensity! that’s your fucking job. Make sure they go out with the correct intensity and if they don’t display it fucking make sure they know it from the touchline
Yep, buck stops with him.
Tbh I’d take AMN over jenks/gabriel at right back for saturday. That cheeky little over the head flick with the so’ton player coming from behind near the end was madjjical. He brings a bit of what we rely so hard for bellerin to bring to our offense. Love Jenks but he really can’t play football (sorry carl, since you’re probably reading arseblog).
Why didn’t Ox start? Was at the game, Holding did well I thought. The rest were pretty rubbish
Well…we had to lose one game in November…
A very expensive loss. Should cost at least an extra 10,000 a week to re-sign Sanchez and Ozil.
Playing Jenkinson and Jeff on the right side was always going to go wrong against a decent side
Was good to see Perez back out there, but he had little service and tried to do too many little flicks instead of trying to hold and carry the ball to create a shot (as he did one time in the second half). I think he’s trying fit in a bit too much still, just needs to get some consistent playing time which is going to be tough at this point. Was nice to see that Iwobi wants to show Wenger that he deserves to continue to start in the league and CL matches, great work rate and the only… Read more »
I missed the first 2/3 of the match but based on what I saw (which sounds like it was the best part shockingly) and the replay of the 2nd goal, Ramsey gets a 2. I don’t like to single out but he watched two Soton players saunter on by as he Ball watched aimlessly, and one of those players put the ball in the net. Then what I did see was him wasting multiple attacks with shit shots from ridiculous areas. He needs to be the wild card in a team where he’s surrounded by players with conservative positional discipline.… Read more »
Twitter, these comments, everywhere I see Coquelin getting a pass. What does he do for us? We were as open as we were against Bournemouth with him off the pitch. And then he adds nothing to attack. Honestly he was a blessing two years ago and a curse since last season. We were immediately better when Xhaka came on for El Neny, but I bet if Coq would’ve come off for say Ox, switching Iwobi to #10 and Ramsey beside Xhaka (considering Coq made those late runs Ramsey makes much better), that would’ve made for a better performance from us.… Read more »
Jenkinson is a limited player. In all honesty, we should have retained Chambers who did brilliantly at Rback for Soton.
I suppose Wenger felt he had Debuchy as well in the mix. The Frenchman is night and day to the limits of Jenkinson, unfortunately commitment and now injury being an issue.
In absence of viable alternatives, Gabriel to me looks the most composed next best option to the knackered Debuchy.
He looked alright again tonight playing with HOlding.
My pick would be Gabriel at Rback for the weekend. Although young Maitland Niles didn’t do too badly either.
As an optimist, I feel that an exit at this point in the tournament and a defeat will serve as a wake up call to the team. We could do without two extra high intensity games in February, which can derail whatever semblance of a title challenge we might be putting up then. Besides, we have our upcoming CL exit to look forward to.
In midfield, remember all those people having a moan at Flamini last season who had to play alongside Ramsey when we were bereft of many of our best players from NOv till Feb. They did well against City, Olympiakos and maintaining the challenge. It was ironically when the returning front players came back in when our goals started to dry up. Ramsey tried to be more adventurous and isolated the aging legs of old Flamini leading to a couple of lob sided results against us. However the return of Coquelin paired next to Ramsey was worse. We shipped 13 goals… Read more »
Any loss is painful. The problem with Wenger is some teams know his styl e of plau.
Regardless of whether he wins the epl,I hope the German touted shd take over.
He could provide something refreshing instead of the usual pass until death.
You get a down vote from me for suggesting a flavour of the month manager that nobody had heard of 5 minutes ago. His greatest achievement being getting the footballing arm of the marketing department of a disgusting energy drink manufacturer, backed by millions of non-football-related money to the top of the Bundesliga. (As you might be able to tell, I’m not a fan of Dietrich Mateschitz or any of his ‘sporting teams’).
Loved the positivity from iwobi in the second half, and holding has a bright future.. Some of those passes were so good.. Plus his ability to dribble a bit.. Let’s hit the hammers hard this weekend! Couldn’t get over how the commentator kept moaning about us making all those changes Haha, does he know anything about arsenal.. I always enjoy seeing the reserves and youths get a run.. To bad its over for now.
No real surprise I guess. Wenger’s never taken this competition seriously and he never will. I can’t really blame him.
Having said that, a good chance wasted for some fringe players to impress.
EFL Cup = Who cares! Fun to see the young ones out, wish they would have performeda bit better. Glad Alexis, Ozil and the others got a needed rest.
Jenkinson defends fine but his ability to pass at the time when opponent is putting pressure is horrible. He also lacks confidence in his display although Jeff highly contributed to our defensive woes last night as he made silly mistake in deep and often left Jenkinson to deal alone with the problem. Jenkinson will surely play against West Ham i think and he will have to deal with Payet who is currently the best dribbler in the League and i wonder if Jenkinson does not play that day we are definitely doomed. Hope Wenger takes care of Confidence problem and… Read more »
Frankly, I don’t give a shit about this competition.
But…. I still expected more from us.
Since 2006 when Wenger decided to play a tikka takka passy passy style of play we have won 2 cups,never competed in a title run in and become utterly laughable in the champions league.when will the penny drop that maybe this way of playing we are going fucking nowhere. This style of play can only work with exceptional players,e.g Messi,xavi,iniesta, it won’t work with fucking Ramsey and Gibbs etc. The simple fact is for us to be successful playing this style we need to be at 95% plus every day because anytime we drop below that we are slow,boring,predictable and… Read more »
As a man that has spoken about the importance of looking impeccable on match-days and indicating to fans that you are taking it seriously and expect to have a good day, I think it’s strange that Wenger dresses down for EFL cup matches. It seems like such a deliberate way of saying ‘I don’t care that much about this game.’ It’s one thing to pick a developing side and we understand the reasons for doing that. None of us are pretending that the League Cup is as highly regarded as the League or the FA Cup but for Wenger to… Read more »
I think Maitland-Niles’ brief cameo was the bright spot of the night. Quick, seems strong for a kid and looks versatile. Also puts in a good cross. Hope he gets a run out in the FA Cup or a Premier League loan in Jan
How come when other teams put a random team together with kids, newbies and some leftovers they always perform the game of their lives. But when we put a random team together like yesterday, no one seem to know what they are supposed to do. There was no team on the pitch yesterday, there was just 11 random players who worked individually. OK, that is a bit harsh, but the feeling is that they don’t get instructions suited for that group of players, but that it is just a copy paste from the first team tactics. Seems unrealistic that it… Read more »
Is Perez the next PArk Chu YOung? I hope not