Untold Arsenal on Twitter @UntoldArsenal
By Phil Gregory
After a controversial opening-day draw with Newcastle, Liverpool travel to the Emirates with a squad laden with fairly pricey recent signings. That stands them apart from Arsenal FC, with our biggest outlay being Gervinho at around £10m.
As Wenger argues however, the question is not money of price, but one of quality. I imagine most readers of this blog could have a good go at finding a better player than Henderson somewhere in the world for less than £20million, whilst the £9m fee paid for Charlie Adam is extortionate for a player with limited top flight experience and crucially, only one year remaining on his contract at the time. That fee implies that Charlie Adam, with a hypothetical four years on his deal is worth around £15-20m, which is clearly nonsense.
Buying clubs seem to be overpaying for players nearing the end of their contracts, with figures of £23-25m being quoted for our own Samir Nasri and United’s Ashley Young coming in at £16.5m. Absolute insanity.
Thanks to this outlay however, Liverpool are a side who many are tipping to overtake Arsenal this season. I disagree with that, and don’t even expect them to break the top four. Whilst they may have strengthened in many areas that they needed it – depth in goal, full back, creativity in the middle and options out wide – I don’t feel they have really bought the quality required to break the top four, even with Arsenal potentially shorn of two of our best players this summer. If they don’t break the top four, Dalglish could have spent all his bullets this summer unless the owners can find some cash somewhere. In the meantime, the losses will mount as Financial Fair Play looms.
Let’s move on to the tactical side of the game. Arsenal will be aware of Carroll’s aerial threat, but this can largely be negated be a high defensive line. Even if Carroll does winner headers, he’ll only be doing fairly far away from our box, and thus his goal threat will be limited to set pieces. During the Sunderland game he was fairly poor when shooting, but dominant in the air. If we can keep him away from goal we can negate the usefulness of his aerial threat, as long as we don’t give away foolish free kicks and corners. That said, the pace of Suarez will be a danger if we play a high line, leading me to suspect Dalglish may go 422, with Suarez looking to get on the ball in behind the defence.
Gervinho and Song are suspended for this game, as we all know. The injury list is growing, with Diaby and Wilshere out, as well as the newly wounded Djourou, Gibbs and Traore. Rosicky is a borderline case: he’s not injured, but touch and go, and with his injury record you can understand why the club don’t want to gamble with one of our few remaining central midfield options.
It could be an interesting bench, with Japanese youngster Miyaichi in the squad. Joel Campbell was also announced officially recently, but I’m unsure of his work permit situation. If anybody can offer any information or sources on that front, please post a comment at the end of the article.
Szcznesy
Sagna Koscielny Vermaelen Jenkinson
Frimpong
Ramsey Nasri
Walcott Van Persie Arshavin
There are a few talking points in the team that I’ve put out there. With neither of our recognised left backs available, I’m expecting Jenkinson to come in there. Ideally, you’d put Vermaelen there and bring Squillaci in at centreback but I’d much rather have Vermaelen in the middle up against Carroll. Moreover, new Liverpool signing Henderson had played wide right for Liverpool in their last Premier League game and he wouldn’t pose too much of a threat to Jenkinson going forward, so we might be able to get away with a youngster on the left.
The rest of the defensive unit then picks itself. Vermaelen and Koscielny continue at centreback, Sagna at right back and Szcznesy between the sticks. With Song suspended, Frimpong will surely come in and anchor the midfield. The next three games are huge for the youngster, with a real opportunity to seize a first eleven berth at hand. I’ve only seen bits and pieces of Emmanuel though my main impression from watching him at the Emirates Cup was that his passing and use of the ball could be better. With a weakened midfield for Arsenal, good use of the ball will be key so hopefully Frimpong can keep it tidy.
Further forward, it’s anybody’s guess who will take up the final midfield berth next to Aaron Ramsey. One option would be Henri Lansbury, who could play a hardworking, box to box role in order to allow Ramsey to go further forward. That however, would leave us with a very, very young midfield but that concern is rightly secondary in Wenger’s mind to whether they have the necessary quality to win the game. Nasri is in the squad, so could take the playmaker’s role with Aaron functioning as the slightly deeper central midfielder. The French international was lambasted by fans –myself included – during the Newcastle game so it will be interesting to see how the fans react if he is selected to start. It would be a grave mistake to boo or catcall a player performing in the Arsenal jersey, so hopefully common sense prevails in this case and we get behind all eleven Gunners on the pitch.
Further forward, Walcott plays wide right, Arshavin takes up his place on the opposite flank and Van Persie comes back in after a European suspension left him on the sidelines of our last game. With a weakened midfield, the Dutchman’s creativity could be crucial in this game.
It’s certainly a slightly makeshift line-up but at home, against a Liverpool side who had a poor pre-season and have got off to a slow start this year, we could have enough to get the win. I think it’ll be a fairly scrappy affair, and I hope we nick it 1-0. Another clean sheet? Why not.
Woolwich Arsenal 2 Liverpool 2, 100 years ago: watch a film of the match!
Fighting against the odds the Arsenal way
Know Thine Enemy – from a long weekend in the Untold Media Trenches
Stevie E
Sorry mate but even Wenger admitted he should signed another CB. Remember Verminator was out.
Cant afford it or wont spend any money R two different things. As always Wenger leaves it to the last minute.
@goonergerry,
i think you know what i mean, if you’d rather join the school of obvious fools then go ahead.
It is really getting on my nerves that some people think that they are really telling the rest of us something we don’t know. We all know we need players, the difference between us is that we believe the manager knows this too and is doing what he can to address the situation.
@Goonergerry
Honda??? Type R times are real bad at the emirates!!!
6 million a year and our manager wants to buy a honda. Then again it gets you from A to B.
Jose Manuel Jurado – watch this space.
jayj
You’re barking up the wrong tree here.
I, like many others on this site, totally support our manager Arsene Wenger, that doesn’t mean we’re in denial or oblivious to any problems regarding the team/club/management. Yes we have problems, along with almost every other club in world football.
You have made many sweeping, mostly critical generalisations about our club,manager and/or players on this post, it doesn’t help your cause(agenda) when you make such derogatory comments as;
“Last season one CB away from a trophy”
“This is bad beyond anything”
“how many dumb players do we have Frimpong another to add to that list”.
“As always Wenger leaves it to the last minute”.
“Last season Wenger could easily of gotten Viera in”
I’m not against anyone expressing their opinion and complaining, I accept certain areas in the squad need addressing but please, try to remain objective with your criticism.
Lets face it,it isn`t if Wenger goes, it`s when he goes. He continues to stumble his way through the daily routine of dragging our wonderful club into a mid table. If his antics yesterday did not confirm that he really has no idea how to turn this around, then there is no hope. How can any manager continue to claim that the likes of Walcott, Ramsey, Rosicky and Arshavin are of the quality we currently need? Arshavin and Walcott were yet again totally ineffective yesterday. Neither of them have an idea how to get past a player and Arshavin might as well have played for Pool, the number of times he gave them the ball. It is clear now that Theo just ain`t good enough, he would not get near the bench in any of our main rivals and it is clear that without Cesc or Jack alongside him, Ramsey is lost and ineffective. WE continue to miss out on quality targets because Wenger will not match the “going price” Worst example, he could have had Mata for £20/£22 million but now looks like he has lost out to Chelsea! He has brought in Gervino and already tried to change him to a wide ineffective player rather than the natural second strikers role he played for his last club. Young Jenkison has come from a first division club who rated him so highly last season, they sent him out on loan to a non league club? And finally Oxo, £12-£15 million for a lad who has only played first division football? But tell me how can Wenger justify spending this obscene amount of money on Oxo and then refuse to meet the asking price of Samba, Jagilka, Cahill, Mata Etc He really beggars belief. What a shame that when we look back at our current manager in years to come, he will only be remembered as the egotistic & dillusional man who brought our team to its knees rather than the superb tactician who gave us so many years of glory and entertainment.
ive been having a go at wenger for a while now,but the sight of him on the bench was totally shocking.for all wengers failings and stubborness over the last few seasons i wouldnt want him to get ill or have a breakdown because of the pressure hes under,afterall the guy has a wife and daughter to care for.as fans we cant do much for him as only arsene can ease the pressure hes under by signing better players thus improving results.arsenal means a lot to me but wengers physical and mental health are also important.someone needs to step and get arsene to take a look at himself and the team before its to late.god bless arsene.
i am feeling gutted and angry at thesame time.see what wenger is turning our beloved team to.see what his quality players were playing today.it was very painful but maybe the positive there is that wenger can’t bore us now with his quality song.he his enriching the board at our expense so they won’t do anything so we the fans must mount pressure until they succumb if not this might just be the begining of our end
Tasos
Fair do but we do have too many players not thinking for the team and look what happened yesterday, therefore I would say my criticism is justified.
Wenger himself admitted should he have known the extent of Verminator injury then he would signed a CB – FACT!
Wenger hasn’t addressed our CM issue and looks like Nasri’s off so who is coming in? Any news, I’m a supporter.
Wenger could of gotten Viera in just to provide some inspiration but its always the cheapest option.
Then our club should set it sights lower and tell the fans the lack of money instead of hicking the price up and failing to invest it.
Wenger will let the transfer clock tick down and then state “no filled the criteria”, “just not good enough”, what you reckon on that.
and where is that idiot anne? who wrote a million words that cesc was staying? You numpity, he’s long gone and like our idiot manager needs to fuck off too. Good they got booes off the pitch
@jayj – these lot have got their head so far up wnegers rear they cant see the reality
Wasn’t this rebuilding a 5 year plan, last year Wenger stated “should it not produce a trophy then the plan is a failure”, now he said “money is not an issue should the right player come 40/50 mil is not an issue”, So what is it?
Should we fail to qualify for the CL I wonder what excuse will fill this site? Its not that bad is it!
Let get it straight Wenger has given us alot but the fans have stood by and invested as much time and even money, and whats our return? Wenger get 6 mil a year and the board members 100s of mil, but we the fans get FUCK ALL.
Mikeyb
I noticed the trend here anyone question Wenger is automatically a HATER, not me I signed the petition number 127. As a fan I have concerns.
@mikeyb
You need to learn some respect. It was AW who put us in the position you’re so afraid of losing. And Anne put a huge amount of time and energy into researching and writing her article, to call her an idiot is incredibly rude and pretty much sums up the level of comment your little pea sized brain can manage. Next I suppose you’ll be pulling up your hoodie and smashing some windows at the Ems cos youre not getting your own way. Carry on bigman, you’re real clever and tough sat in your bedroom while your mummy cooks you your dinner.
Anyone who questions Wenger is a white van man (sun reader), lets get that straight. Fuck the media, too long they’ve spouted the same shit. Yesterday was a wake up call our squad is too weak and even the neutrals looking in shake there heads in disbelief. What has happened? Who did this? Where’s the players?
Stevie E
MikeyB has made some valid points, or have we the fans got this wrong? Everyone seems to have insight except us so tell me please.
Juan Mata to chelsea – not enough world class players on the market, Arsenal so cheap this deal could of been done weeks ago. Wengers plan is to sit this season out make the board some money just like the last 6. Gervinho 10 mil took 4 weeks to complete chelsea took 5 days to get Mata. Not like we was 40 mil or so but hey Wenger knows best.
Jayj
His posts at 8.54 & 8.56 are pure insults. If you and he want to be taken seriously, that sort of speak is just gonna piss people off and invalidate any valid comment you may have made earlier. People automatically think you’re just idiots spouting the usual aaa shit and will just ignore you (as you may have noticed happening to you)
StevieE
Explain how I’ve been abusive or made any insults? Please
Jayj
HIS posts…
StevieE
pasted:-
His posts at 8.54 & 8.56 are pure insults. If you and he want to be taken seriously, that sort of speak is just gonna piss people off and invalidate any valid comment you may have made earlier. People automatically think you’re just idiots spouting the usual aaa shit and will just ignore you (as you may have noticed happening to you)
So your saying I’m just an idiot?
I wasn’t but you’re starting to act like one.
jayj
I don’t claim to know the solutions to Arsenals problems and I’m not privy to the information such as the non buying of players like Vieira, IMO such talk is purely conjecture and does little in the way of moving the debate forwards in a healthy manner. As for Nasri, who knows if he’s leaving? And yet Man City, for all their billions have failed to negotiate the speed of his arrival to their managers liking. Poof if needed that it takes two teams to agree on the sale of one player, no matter how many millions you have to spend.
However, I do agree with you that we require personnel and with the transfer window not yet closed, I’m convinced the club will do business and add the necessary players. If they fail to do so, as you yourself predict, then that situation may well become indefensible but lets not jump the gun and throw around foolish accusations before the deadline day has come and gone.
BTW The club have invested in new players this season, in fact over £20m in talent has been added to the squad so far. Your failure to acknowledge these acquisitions does little in a way of justifying your argument.
If you can remember correctly, Wenger predicted most of the transfer activity will be done at the beginning and end of the current window. Conveniently you failed to quote him on that one jayj?
Finally. Many Arsenal fans, myself included, are feeling the frustration of things at the moment. Certain sections of the media are rejoicing at our current situation, us fans adding fuel to their fire will only intensify the problems. This is a very awkward and difficult period for the club, IMO we need to stay together as supporters and unite the club. My fear is the media have their knife well and truly aimed into the back of our club and manager and will not relent until they have his head. Division amongst our own supporters will only aide their cause and the media certainly know how to make the most of it.
Divide and conquer appears to be their motto.
mickeyb, your first comment was poor and ill-informed, after that you just became abusive.
‘Arshavin and Walcott were yet again totally ineffective yesterday.’
How many days since Walcott scored the winner against Udinese? I personally thought he was our poorest player yesterday but ‘yet again’ seems a somewhat ludicrous choice of words since he had scored 1 in 2 games going into the match.
Besides, the inside forward positions are the ones Arsene has focussed on strengthening so far this summer so questioning the managers claims that Theo and Andrei are ‘of the quality we currently need’ seems pretty redundant.
‘It is clear now that Theo just ain`t good enough’
13 goals and 8 assists in all competitions last year but some random guy on the internet categorically states he ‘ain’t good enough.’ I’m sure he’s receiving his P45 as I type…
‘without Cesc or Jack alongside him, Ramsey is lost and ineffective.’
Aaron made 49/55 successful passes while playing in a midfield zone that Dalglish packed intentionally – to stop he and Nasri from playing freely – and while being virtually man-marked by Henderson.
Also, are you seriously criticising him because he wasn’t as effective as when he played alongside Cesc? Is that a capital offence in your world or something?
‘Wenger will not match the “going price”’
‘he could have had Mata for £20/£22 million’
Either you have some super secret inside sources and I’m very jealous, or you’re treating every transfer rumour you read in the Daily Fail as though it’s gospel, in which case I pity you.
‘He has brought in Gervino and already tried to change him to a wide ineffective player rather than the natural second strikers role he played for his last club.’
Watched a lot of Lille last season did you?
I’ll answer that question for you, no you didn’t. Here:
http://www.holdingmidfield.com/?p=300
In case you’d like to educate yourself.
‘Young Jenkison has come from a first division club who rated him so highly last season, they sent him out on loan to a non league club?’
Was this a question or was it simply a snide insinuation that any young player sent out on loan must be shit?
‘And finally Oxo, £12-£15 million for a lad who has only played first division football?’
More super secret info? or more guesses/assumptions based on guesses/assumptions printed in the tabloids which combine the upfront fee with every performance related add-on in the contract? You even manage to structure it into an implied criticism of the quality of a player who has never even pulled on an Arsenal shirt… good job.
‘But tell me how can Wenger justify spending this obscene amount of money on Oxo and then refuse to meet the asking price of Samba, Jagilka, Cahill, Mata Etc’
You’re the one with all the inside sources mate, surely you would be better placed to ask him that question than any of us.
‘he will only be remembered as the egotistic & dillusional man who brought our team to its knees’
Three games in and we’re already on our knees?
Tell you what, if you go down that easily you might wanna keep your nose clean. I don’t think you’d do very well in prison.
The Press always have an agenda. Always. The first is the belt notching culture where they measure their performance against how many managers get sacked. I’m not sure experienced judges would use such criteria…….
Weblogs have agendas too. The different lines taken by Arsenal blogs over what is going on in the Board Room says so. One scenario says Wenger’s spending wishes are hampered by the Board. Another says the Board wants Wenger to spend but he won’t. They can’t both be right…….
This summer’s transfer theatre is determined by one thing only: the ECL qualifier. The summer would have been very different if Arsenal had finished 3rd. That’s history, but the reality of 4th place is waiting for players until Group Stage qualification is achieved.
I would lay heavy money that the EPL fixture list was devised to maximise the ‘should Wenger be fired?’ media bandwagon….after all, the media are the most influential stakeholders in football now, aren’t they?
I would also lay heavy money that the next 12 months will see a decisive outcome to the power struggle going on inside the club.
You’ll note I’ve expressed no opinions on any of those things.
Because one thing I am learning is that there is a field of distortionists out there who have sought to misinform me and I have reached the conclusion that the only conclusion to be drawn is that they are all scheming liars until proven otherwise.