Why I am worried about Swansea by DN
Swansea are currently only three points above the relegation zone and it seems a bit strange after their excellent form of the last few seasons, but the fact is that right now they will be looking to put some daylight between themselves and the other contenders so will be expected to put up a fight this evening.
The Swans visited White Hart Lane at the weekend, and scared the Spuds with an early lead, but despite all Arsenal fans cheering them on they couldn’t quite hold on and ended up losing 2-1, and now they arrive at the Emirates with another tough task, but will they be as worried about facing the Gunners?
Let’s start with my list of reasons to worry about tonight.
1 – Arsenal have lost their last two games and look in disarray.
2 – In the last six home games Arsenal have only scored in two of them.
3 – Arsenal have not beaten Swansea at the Emirates for the last three seasons. Bogey team?
4 – Lukasz Fabianski.
5 – Giroud hasn’t scored in nine games, a record.
6 – The pressure is on Arsenal. No win – no title.
7 – Arsenal players have been criticized all week and will be very aware of their failure
8 – Lukasz Fabianski
Swansea may be close to the relegation zone and are rated as long underdogs for tonights game, but they have many easier games coming up and will have little pressure here. Swansea’s first-team coach Alan Curtis (the manager is ill) said: “We’ve got a good record there in recent seasons.
“We’ve beaten them twice and also drawn in the last three years, and we can certainly draw confidence from that.
“We knew how difficult these two away games were going to be but we go to Arsenal with the same mindset and that is to try and win.”
Let’s hope that Arsenal are also trying to win eh? Wenger is expecting a hard game of course. He said on the official site: “Swansea want to secure their position in the Premier League so we expect them to fight very hard, be very committed and well organised defensively. They are a good side who find themselves in a position where they certainly did not expect to be at the start of the season. They lost confidence with a bad start and after that, in the Premier League, it’s difficult.”
And Wenger hit the nail on the head there. Talking about lost confidence! Arsenal last 10 games shows 3 wins, 4 draws and 3 defeats. Which is the team lacking confidence Arsene?
So I will be watching tonight’s game with fear in my heart. We SHOULD be hot favourites, but are we really?
Darren
If we play like we did
v Barcelona we will win.
However if we play like
we did v Man Utd …
it doesn’t matter if we played like vs Barca or not…….if we play Like Arsenal of 2016, we are in for trouble
only a change in pattern and style of play may be our saving grace
9th reason why we should be worried bout swansea’s visit
WE PLAY AT THE EMIRATES!
Lets hope this is not a sign of us making excuses before the game has even started..
Fabianski is good but him being the reason that we dont score is absurd – A weakened Man u team put 3 past Cech. Its about time we start winning and convincingly atleast.
forget about theories play this team and we get 3 points:
4-1-4-1
cech
bellerin kos chambers nacho
lecoq
cambell ozil elneny sanchez
giroud
Swansea are going to pack bus n counter.
2-1 hard fought win
DN
No win no title!
Don’t be so stupid.
There are about 33 points left to go for!
Anything can happen as it did last night.
Depends on many results.
Westham beat Spurs
Arsenal beat Swansea.
Watford draw Leicester.
Arsenal beat Spurs.
Saturday night.
Leicester 58
Arsenal 57
Spurs 55
No team is happy to Lose twice………the Swans Lost once…….don’t think they would afford to Lose cheap tonight……..JUST A PRECAUTION!
Arsenal have already lost twice. Do you think they want the hat-trick?
My 8:
1. Wenger
2. No leaders on the field
3. Flamini
4. Arteta
5. Satan Kroenke
6. The grass is too green
7. Per
8. The Dow jones index
9. Wenger
22 reasons we will win
1-14.
Cech
Bellerin Mertz Koz Monreal
Coqulin Elneny
Wellbeck Ozil Sanchez
Giroud
Subs. Walcott Ramsey Campbell
15 We have to win.
16 We are at home.
17 Swansea are weak.
18 Our home scoring drought will break.
19 The hand break has been released.
20 The experience of Wenger.
21 The positive support from JustArsenal 🙂
22 And because I blarrdy want us to win 🙂 🙂 🙂
20 is not so inspiring?
The rest work though!:)
being hot favourite or cold favourite doesn’t matter any more. We were all favourite before United game,what did it bring.!? Fever.?
Based on how Arsenal have played @ home recently’, a draw is written all over this game. Swansea are a bogey team and we have turned into bottlers. I’m not confidence with this team..I hope they win but won’t be disappointed if they draw or even lose…
“Giroud hasn’t scored in nine games, a record”
A world record? An EPL record? A French record? An Arsenal record? A Giroud record?
A record since he came to Arsenal
I have not seen an Arsenal team lately that makes me confident of the win. Of course we have to win but we had to win against Man U as well. Having to win does not say much to this team, if anything it freezes them.
I have to confess that I can hardly bother to get excited about tonight’s game.
I will watch the Spurs game, if we lose that game I will write us of and only follow us in the press. Can’t afford to take time away every weekend from family and friends for a club that has a manager and owner who don’t respect us. It leaves me in a bad mood and it makes me question why I spend a perfectly good afternoon watching some over paid and under motivated millionaires go though the motions just to collect their pay check which in partially comes out of my pocket and really comes 100% as a result of the total fan base be it gate receipts of TV money.
Now that Cazorla is out and the team is not sure of what it wants i think it is time for Elneny to start playing alongside Coquelin and create a base for the midfield. A win would go a long way but with Spurs in the cage after this only thing we can expect is to play with the strengths and allow Alexis to start scoring because he will want to do anything to win today. Swansea cannot be expecting a slow start again after the previous encounters with them.
Personally I’d like to see us play the following XI tonight:
Cech
Bellerin Mertesacker Koscielny Monreal
Coquelin
Campbell Elneny Ozil Alexis
Giroud
It’s difficult to decide who play alongside Koscielny because Mertesacker is (at times) scary – his pass to Flamini against Barcelona which was responsible for the penalty, his attempted tackle on Costa which resulted in his red card, him falling over in the FA Cup final against Hull, just as we were trying to see out the final few minutes.
But all that being said, the partnership the BFG has with Koscielny is far stronger than Gabriel and Koscielny. I think Koscielny needs Mertesacker alongside him, he looks more calm and in control with BFG talking to him.
In midfield I want to see Elneny start, maybe slightly in front of Coquelin, Elneny has throughout his career liked a long range shot, for Basel he scored a few belters. Given Arsenal’s desire to walk the ball into the net at least one player wanting to shoot might actually help us score?!
Walcott must not start, his *ahem* contribution against Utd was dire, he must be benched and used as an impact sub.
I also feel Ramsey might benefit from a rest, he’s not best suited to play alongside Coquelin and if he has fresher legs for the Spurs game then all the better, likewise Welbeck, who can come on as a sub if needed. Fresher legs for the game on Saturday where his workrate will be essential.