Arsenal is sucking the life out of me – I need a break

Do you enjoy watching Arsenal? By Konstantin Mitov

It’s difficult to write a piece about Arsenal with a level head. We fell for Leicester’s trap like an animated character slipping on banana skin lying on the ground, but it’s really not funny if you are an Arsenal fan. They had one game plan. Survive the first half, and then when the pressure mounts on us, hit us with Vardy and it worked. Surely Arteta knows what their main threat is? We are not entitled to win football matches by any means, and I can take a sucker punch if we show a display of passion and desire.

Yet our only “attacking” plan was our centre backs passing diagonal balls to Saka and Tierney on the left. None of the three midfielders we had attempted a forward pass before we conceded. Xhaka should have never put that shirt on again since he flipped the fans off. Yesterday Ceballos was just abysmal. I hardly see how Mo Elneny would’ve done a worse job passing sideways and back, and I feel sorry for him, because he is a 5-million-pound player putting more effort than his overpaid colleagues.

Our right-hand side was non-existent. We should’ve sold Bellerin to PSG if they really wanted him. Ainsley was superb when called upon, why are we benching him for a player who doesn’t run forward and all he does in defence is drop back? He let Foden take him on too easily which cost us at City, yet he’s always a starter, why?

Laca is another player that should’ve been sold to fund a move for Aouar so we can balance our squad a bit. Then there’s Aubameyang, who’s been terrible since signing his new deal. Add Willian on 200k per week at 32 for 3 years and you see the problem.

Back in 2007 we sold Henry to Barcelona and that actually made the team better. It split the responsibility between young players, who produced some of the best football we’ve ever played. We didn’t have enough steel to win the major trophies, but boy were we exciting to watch. We were deemed a mini Barcelona, we would swipe lesser teams by 3,4,5 goals and we were full of players who demanded the ball at their feet and looked forward, asking questions and creating chances.

Point is, we shouldn’t be too attached to players who drove us to 8th pace. But the manager can’t get away with it just like that. It’s all too easy to blame Mustafi for the goal, and it was his fault, but why on earth are we playing him? He’s not played a game for months and we all know he has a mistake in him. Doesn’t Arteta see such things?

We could’ve brought Pepe on in place of Luiz, move to a back 3 and try to be more aggressive, change the game somehow. We could’ve subbed one of three DMs for Pepe again and move Saka in the number 10. I mean, there are options to change the game, but Arteta doesn’t have a plan B. Maybe he doesn’t trust the rest of the team, but it’s not like he knows his best starting 11 either.

What really annoys me though is that I actually thought this was a strong line-up, but quickly the lack of ideas became apparent. It’s looking like the Emery times all over again, but instead of that 22-game run, it’s the FA cup that hides the issue underneath.

The other major disappointment is that we ALWAYS resurrect teams in a slump. City beat only us in 4 league games, Leicester got their first win since 1973 and guess which team we are playing next, that hasn’t recorded a home win? Man United will slap us unless a pure miracle happens.

The real mistake is that I had any expectations at all. I thought that in a difficult time for me personally, Arsenal would lift my spirits, and it’s a shame on me that I actually believed that for a second. Football doesn’t connect people like Nokia, it does anything but. I was shouting, broke the remote by smashing it into the floor then failed to fall asleep till 5 in the morning, thinking how on earth we can’t create a single clear-cut opportunity and we fell for the same trap we’ve done for 5 years straight. All for what? I feel so sorry for the people who were robbed 14.95 Royal British sterling to watch this comedy.

I really need a break from this. Arsenal is depressing and exhausting. I don’t even see how this can change. I don’t see a new owner on the horizon although Kroenke did spend some money. We changed our board like 5 times in 2 years, we have a new manager, but ultimately, it’s the players. For as much I wanted Wenger gone, those players really threw him under the bus, for all the times he ate all the criticism for their mistakes. The same happened to Emery, Freddie failed to inspire them and now Arteta will quickly follow this trend.

The shirt is too heavy for them, but there are really only 3 outcomes. Either we improve drastically in a short period of time, or we spend in January big again, or pressure mounts on Arteta and the negativity will eat him alive in the end. Fans are angry and those Arsenal players are lucky there are no fans in the ground, let me tell you that and you can tell me which outcome you think is most probable?

I will now take a little break, because Arsenal is sucking the life out of me and I don’t want to chew over old topics I’ve covered time and time again just with different names. I want to wish you all good health and well-being in these strange times, and hopefully there will something more positive to talk about next time around.

Konstantin

Tags Arsenal v Leicester City Arteta tactics vardy

32 Comments

  1. How heartrending to read ! The reason I say heartrending is that you seem to have so little else in your life Konstantin to cheer you up! We all need a variety of interests and esp in these dreary and uncertain times.

    I have no idea what your other interests are but surely you have other things in life than just football and Arsenal to interest you? I really hope so and that goes for all who are so cheesed off when their team fails to live up to expectations, often hugely unrealistic expectatons too, as I believe you have for us and far too soon under this new , exciting but determined manager.

    HAVE OR DEVELOP A MORE BALANCED SET OF INTERESTS IS MY ADVICE.

    I also love and worship our club but , thankfully for my “sanity”,(if any human can truly claim to be really sane!) I have a wealth of other passions in life, particularly the health of our fellow humans.
    Just this morning I heard of the sudden death of a close friend only a year or two older than I whom I had known for decades. His widow had been happily married to Len for fifty years and is now distraught , not knowing where to turn.

    I have to say that I feel more sorry for Jean than a mere football club and for any fan who is finding his unrealistic expectations hard to bear, when they don’t happen.

    Good luck anyway Konstantin but some life perspective will show you in good time how little the success of ANY football club really is in the grand scheme of life. Look wider my friend and try to see the full picture. Life is never about just you and your hopes, nor the hopes of any individual. Life just does not happen that way.

    1. Agree Jon, there is more to life than Arsenal and the ups and downs anyway, is just football. Good advice really.

    2. Well said Jon! Well said!

      There are so many posts being published and responses as well that I almost missed your truly worthwhile response.

      It cannot be expressed any better… Your message is not only for Konstantin but for the entire Arsenal fan base in general, many of whom may have choked themselves assuming they saw our players having a nice time after the loss to Leicester!

      At the end, it is just a game! And there are more important dimensions to life than a 90 minute game.

      My condolences to Len 🙏, and may his soul rest in peace. Amen! 🙏

    3. Thank you Jon. This sort of personal comment by Vlad the Impaler is one reason, I left this site. However I couldn’t let this pass.
      My views are similar to Konstantin, although I have many varied interests, both inside and out of my family, other than the ups and downs of a football club.
      I too am going through difficult times with the health of two of my closest friends. Accordingly I wish you, Jean and your families the strength to cope with your loss.
      Bye for now.

  2. I feel sorry for you, but wasn’t that a bit of a biased view of the game and the players? Bellerin moved forward and had our best chance of the game. He also moved forward and received balls from Luiz. And yeah, we were lucky he did not get sent off but he had an average game. Also, Xhaka did attempt forward passes, it was just that Laca couldn’t take advantage of that. And Dani played as makeshift RB when Bellerin moved forward, so maybe that put him off his game. Try to watch the game a little more closely before scapegoating certain players.

  3. Sad that a man lets a football club dominate his world to the extent that he has to publicly declare that it is “sucking the life out of him”. Hopefully he has a family or other interests (music?) that he can now concentrate his focus on and perhaps recover some of the joie de vivre stolen from him by AFC.
    Best of luck Konstantin.

  4. Nobody needs advise on how to live a life on this forum. This is a FOOTBALL forum and we talk about our beloved Arsenal.
    I see passion and hunger gone out of our players. I notice this in headers when there is 50/50 challenge for heading a ball in midfield. All our players duck out of heading and pretend to show to fans they are jumping and doing something. Auba ceballos pepe xhaka in fact all of them never win a 50/50 heading duel. In slow motion you can clearly see this. No commitment at all..

    1. WIGGY I disagree! You need to read between the lines of a post. Konstantin was admitting to being depressed with watching Arsenal. The natural human urge should be to try to help him. When someone asks for help as he was, IMO, our duty is to try to aid!

      Minding ones own business, which you are in effect saying, is unwise, unhelpful and in fact, being remote Do you really think the world is moving in THAT direction? I do not , mercifully!

        1. In the same way that AMN has described how the players are behind helping MO out…it’s the natural way most human beings would act.

          1. Why should they help him out. The mercenary has been “stealing from our club”. He doesn’t deserve any empathy. We fans need to pile more pressure to make him more miserable and depressed.

          2. Thank you both Alex and Ken! The day that we humans are expected to mind our own business – in older times the expression was “I keep myself to myself”(a shameful expression!!) – then that is the day our race ceases to be truly human.

            Thank you for your support in this vitally important subject and if we between us have made Wiggy reconsiderrhis heartless life views then some good has come from our posts. Thanks you both, sincerely!

    2. You noticed that. They they do not head the ball. They would rather it bounces especially at the back then it becomes even harder to defend

    3. Man, you need to put a spurs shirt on and give it a rest. Arteta is and will be the best manager in the world. But even Pep had to learn. Also Klopp needed at least 2 years to make his team. Give over and either support us or change teams. Fans like you expect perfection immediately. Sure he’s mare mistakes but you have to in order to learn. Give it time.

  5. This Guy has let Defensive & Tactical Game took control of the Beautiful Game from Arsenal , We had Defense and Conceding Problem but overall we got couple of players in , We defend more than we attack, you can’t win Without attacking your opponent

  6. Konstantin,take time to walk along the sand and smell the roses.Not my saying, but apt for someone who needs to unwind and relax.Take care.

  7. True, MA is actually losing the plot, he needs to establish a team then build on the squad, he has favoritism, as mentioned and seen Elneny has been more effective than Ceballos and Xhaka, yet! they get the nod more frequently, he’s actually the cog of that team since he came back from loan, Elneny has proved! his worth yet! MA wants to play the squad on rotation without even establishing his strongest! team, tgerefore, prepare for inconsistent results out of various teams fielded, and true Xhaka is an achilles, he can’t play deep role in the modern high press game, his rotational ball play is slow and he’s always! caught or releases the ball late, and was sure as my heartbeat Partey would be synonymous in that game! because he twinned him with Xhaka and Ceballos who is been adopted to a new role he’s never played, yet! we have a player who naturally fits that position but is rotated and actually played in less meaningful games! on the “act” of squad rotation. We will never! achieve, 1st! because of the basics, just like chelsea with debt, thus young managers that have just started their careers like MA want to rotate a squad, without identifying their strongest! teams. The fact that he was under Pep doesn’t mean he can actually operate like him, Pep is in the conversation of the best manager currently in the world, it took him time to be that good, MA needa to know he’s got great! ideas but! you actually have to identify! your strongest! team, before you build on the strengths you have in your squad, and just like you called it out, he should stop favoritism! bellerin is below par and gets the nod! ecery game, that team has talent in it, and players should actually be played on merit, then we can finally fault him after seeing his real implementation fail, but he needs to make necessary changes and even play a potential golden boot regular winner in his actual position, as a striker, that team needs to be played on performance merit! not! on squad rotation

  8. I do feel for you, Konstantin! There was a time if we lost, it would ruin my weekend… I’ve broken things, raged, hell I’ve even cried 😆 But not anymore… yes, if we drop points and are pants, I’m as disappointed as the next person.. but that’s where it ends..
    Just take a breather, have a think, then come back! We all love AFC with a passion and are in it for the long haul!
    Look after yourself 🙂

    1. Can’t argue with anything you’ve said Konstantin. What I notice about the better teams is that once on the pitch the team members all take responsibility and the best teams play as a unit. We play like we are scared and certainly not as unified group. Under Emery the team looked confused and under Arteta we look unsure and scared. Is Arteta pressurising the players too much rather than letting them have more freedom to bond football wise? Is Arteta so controlling that it affects the group creativity. Where is the dominant unit that good teams are? We played well in one 45 mins against Fulham, other than that we have not played like a unified group at all…… in any game.

      1. Konstantin
        I’m sure there is more to you than just the jist of what you write. Your style and content suggest passion, intelligence, and concern. In areas other than Arsenal that would make you a very human, human being. According to the great masters perfume everbody, including yourself, with great compassion and kindness.

        1. Sean, What a wise and a kind post. So true and congrats on having the lack of self inhibition – which is so vital in all those who wish to help others – that enables you to be so open minded and helpful in your comments. What you outline is a marvellous life philosophy and can and so often DOES, transform the lives of others for the better.

    2. Far more important things to get depressed about right now wouldn’t you say Sue? There’s a bloke over on Untold who once said that if we lost he would shut himself away in a dark room for days. I can understand Untold contributors being really sad fcuks, but this was a married male adult family guy in South Africa.

      1. Absolutely, Jax! Bloody hell, a dark room – with some of those bad runs we’d been on, he probably ended up with ‘SAD’ also…
        There’s more to life….

  9. Mate, it’s just football. Don’t let it over reality.
    These are Multi Millionaires and billionaires that don’t even give a monkeys about us but themselves.

    That’s how I always look it whenever I get too emotionally sacked into Arsenal.

    Just live your life and let Arsenal just be a hobby or an interest rather than a serious part of your life.

  10. Well i have other interest in games i left this site for a day playing games because Arsenal’ s peeformance.That is what u should do take a break might listen to music for now and if it is over u come on the site again like i am doing and do the AESENAL thing . Europa at the corner COYG.

  11. Kicking a piece of leather around a pitch is just not that important in the grand scheme of things. All these guys a millionaire ..plus win or lose life goes on…

  12. Everything you wrote is true, I could not find sleep after the match. Arsenal are so depressing and frustrating. The front line guys don’t move, the MF are not just creative and when ball managed to get to the strikers, they don’t utilise it. The strikers are waiting for balls any footballer can score.

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