Although not all Arsenal fans were happy with our performance in last night’s draw at Man United, we must have all surely been impressed with Bukayo Saka, who became the Gunners youngest ever player in a match against United.
He was given Man of the Match by Dan in last night’s ratings, and even Unai Emery gave him a special mention in his after-match press conference. The coach said: “I think he’s working and improving, being mature and also playing matches in front each player and each team as tonight, young, as tonight, Manchester United. But his work is natural and he is improving. He is helping us now as an important player. We are going to work with him with him with calm, with patience, but if he deserves to take minutes and to take confidence for helping us with his performance, that is fantastic for us.”
When you think that last year we were crying out for wingers we now seem to have an abundance of them, which will surely help with Emery’s normal game plans. Saka is certainly more impressive than our 72m new signing Pepe at the moment.
One thing that caught my eye was that he was singled out for praise from our ex-captain Cesc Fabregas, who knows a thing or two about being young and talented. He tweeted during last night’s game….
Saka is a player. 18 years old showing great maturity 👏🏻
— Cesc Fàbregas Soler (@cesc4official) September 30, 2019
What did you think about his game last night?
Admin
Saka should play every match. If they are good enough age doesnt matter (i.e Rooney)
Paddywhack you got it in one 👍👍👍
Emery always wants to prove a point even when he knows he’s wrong. If the 72m man and those mediocre are not ready, give the young and hungry game time. Secondly, he kept playing 3 DM in important games, spelling his intention of looking for a draw and not a win, which is not tradition as gunners. I hope they wouldn’t extended his contract, he’s not the man for the job
Please bruv lets not place too much weight my Nigerian brother’s shoulders. Let him have his time to develop and get mature enough. Thanks.
Yes
I hope Martinelli can continue to impress too and compete with Saka
Last year I thought it would be Reiss-Nelson but Sake has been excellent so far
Same here too. The more the competition, the better
Saka was excellent. No wonder he ran out of steam. he worked so hard also defensively, and that is what we need from our wingers, if we are to succeed in modern football.
Am a bit worried that Pepe doesn’t like to work in the same manner, and that could be huge problem.
Have to agree the young lad gas no fear he can tackle, pass, dribble & score. Let him at it,
What a beast!! Take a bow, Bukayo! (And please keep it up!)
totally agree he is an immense talent how many more is there Freddie?
Pepe has to improve immensely as he hasn’t lit the fire yet.
Cesc also gave a shout out to Guendouzi.
We were calling for these kids to be given the chance last season when our snr players got mentally phucked up, but it all fell on deaf ears.
We could’ve put up a real fight for the top three towards the end of last season of only they got their chances on time.
I’m just feeling disappointed already for him because once Lacazette returns, he’ll have to sit.
I think he deserves to keep his spot so far, no such thing as he’s too young.
Mbappe took the world by storm at a very young age.
Plus playing alongside PEA is doing him good, PEA already showed he loves playing with him, Frankfurt, n yesterday when the goal was given, PEA pointed straight to him before he jumped on PEA to celebrate. I can imagine playing alongside Lacazette and PEA will do him more good.
Pepe needs to sit the next game out, let Martinelli get his own chance also.
Saka is a gem, a calm boy, with tricky feet.
I remember saying on here last week that I was ready to bet a thousand buck that whoever Saka catches one on one will suffer for it, the professional that ended up looking useless while marking him turns out to be Ashley Young.
Anyone would be dumb to say Nelson is more talented than the boy.
Ornstein admitted right before the season started what I knew already when he said, everyone at the club sees Saka as the most talented youngster right now given his age.
I wish him all the beat really.
Nelson, I hope becomes better, he used to be tricky and technical with the ball, I don’t know what happened to that boy. I hope he finds himself, he should go play in LA Liga, because that’s the only league that’s more focused on the technical aspects of the game. Maybe he might get back his form and matures.
But for now? PEA, Saka and Guendouzi should always be the first names on the list.
Eddie, all this will come to nought with Emery at the helm.
Viju I won’t even say my observations regarding Emery’s influence on players.
If I do, some folks on would start saying I’m always against the man
I agree with you
Sorry you can’t give UE credit for putting his faith in him (and several other youngsters).
UE and the whole team are showing a forward pointing strategy with the transfers and the way he/they play the youngsters.
I wish Emery will be humble enough to play Laca, PEA, and Salad as front three then play Joe, Guendouzi and seballous or Lucas in the middle and a back 4 of Chambers, Luiz with our 2 FB. Let those older players that only care about the wages sit out to learn from them. And I think our negotiations henceforth should be conditional and performance based.
For Saka’s own sake he doesn’t get coached by the Tinkerman too much, for I’m sure Emery will mess his head like he has done with all the other players. Unless of course he is made of sterner stuff like Auba & Laca.
To be fair to UE he is giving him a chance to shine.As for the coaching; he is yet to understand his rambling in english anyway…lol
It was Wenger’s policy to bring in and groom the academy players, which now is happening due to Freddie. I just hope Saka doesn’t become another AMN in Emery’s hands, because it looks like even Emery doesn’t know what Emery is doing😁
@Pires, I think Freddie is the basic reason why saka is playing at the moment. UE on his own would not dare. He’s too scared to take such actions on his own.
Before the end of october, Pepe will come thru as d highest goal scorer
Saka was impressive last night….Alongside Nkethia Willock Guendouzi Martenlli and Neilson the futur looks bright…
Admin Martin, is there any way you can include an EDIT option for the comments please? This autocorrect is messing up what I write and if I’m not careful what I post looks quite ridiculous. Thanks in advance.
An EDIT button could be misused by trolls after getting an innocuous comment approved, so that’s a no-no.
There is a solution though – be a little more careful lol…
I meant as in me being able to edit my own comments, not others.
Another gem from our pot of youngsters so studiously assembled over the past few years by the club and it’s management.
We are always quick to criticise when we let a player go who turns out to be better than we thought, but they are outweighed by what has come through recently.
I can only assume that Freddie has much more influence than Bouldy ever had as UE’s number two because we could actually field a 4-3-3 of players under the age of twenty three that would compete in most games and this has happened since the switch over.
O.T. Xhaka, in my opinion, was not to blame for the goal last night (and actually had a decent 90 minutes) admins video proves that.
Hi Ken,
I won’t blame Xhaka for ducking, but I think he was slow to react. In the build-up to the goal he clearly fouled, and if that happened, his yellow would have been second and automatic red.
I carefully observed Xhaka’s game and I found him too slow and played too safe. He got caught out of position by a poor ManU team quite a few times, which is saying a lot. Playing alongside him put a lot of pressure on Torreira and Guendozi yesterday, and his sideways and backward passing only makes his stats look good, not his impact on the game.
Viju, glad you mentioned Wenger’s influence, if I had said that I would have been accussed of bias once again (I took the cowards way out and merely hinted!!!).
On Xhaka, I try to make judgements on what I see in each game and, while not arguing against your overall assesment of him, playing safe is not a bad attribute to have when defending a situation.
I also don’t think passing sideways or backwards is a negative, if the result is keeping possesion of the ball.
Guendozi and Torreria also got caught in possesion, it happens to all players.
One of his better games for me, but that doesn’t make him captain material or a shoe-horned certainty for every game…as is the case as UE sees it.
Much was said about our second half display, which actually started from the 55th minute substitution, which I felt should have been Xhaka & not Torreira, who would have gone to his natural DM position.
I have mentioned a few times about Torreira and Guendozi who give away possession quite a lot, but them running and retrieving the ball is seen as positive by many, which is say is poor football but good fighting spirit. They play high risk, but Xhaka’s passing is lame and slow, in comparison and his famed thunderous left foot has gone missing. Him being on the pitch takes away the sharpness which this team can otherwise achieve
Admin, there seems tobe a lot of posts being deleted lately for no apparent reason.
If they are deleted, could a reason be give for this happening?
Really good posters seem to have been ostracized, despite bringing excellent thoughts and reasoned arguments, such as Jon Fox.
Why is this?
Hi Ken, Let’s say Jon lost his head one night last week and was suspended to cool down a bit. I believe he has been reinstated now. We all know how he likes to make a point, which is why we all love him…
😁 he was sin-binned eh?!
FREE JON FOX-NOW
Yes free Jon now!!!
John Fox is innocent OK
Saka is a kind of talent i have been waiting for, i missed that kind of tricky winger . I am curious to see martinelli playing as many matches as possible
saka is good just like our other young stars in the team but our problem is the coach EU.arsenal history,philosophy,traditions,etc are bigger than this man and so i dnt see as the right for the job.we have quality players in the team but wrong selection and continous playing of players out of position plus playing without creativity is his problem else Auba should hav been on ten plus goals by now.we need creativity in our mdf and carpentertivity in our mdf emery.
saka is good just like our other young stars in the team but our problem is the coach EU.arsenal history,philosophy,traditions,etc are bigger than this man and so i dnt see as the right for the job.we have quality players in the team but wrong selection and continous playing of players out of position plus playing without creativity is his problem else Auba should hav been on ten plus goals by now.we need creativity in our mdf and carpentertivity in our mdf emery.
If Pepe doesn’t improve Saka and Martinelli will take his place on the wings
They are both left wingers though. They can both play on right but are best on the left.
Also, after spending over £70 million on Pepe, I can’t see Emery dropping him
The lad was very good in certain parts of his game, his defending on the front-foot, his ball control was good, some nice movement and his passing was decent. All game he looked a talent. One area that he needs to improve on, and so do some of the others, is with that final shot, they aren’t catching it right and Iwobi had trouble with that too. They aren’t clean enough strikes giving it some better power to go with the accuracy. They’ll need to improve on this because when big chance’s come in these type of games, someone like Auba is usually being man marked. You’d have to be happy with his improvements, he looks more polished than Pepe, Iwobi, Nelson, and most youngsters in his age bracket. I like how he tries difficult moves but his ball control ..his touch ..make it look easier than it was. Just needs to pay attention to Auba and Laca so to pick up some shooting tips, watch them and ask them stuff, Laca strikes a ball beautifully and Auba’s when and where is top bracket stuff.
Saka should start every game. I think Pepe needs some time. Martinelli should be a second choice to Pepe, not Nelson imo. Martinelli seems to have more fight in him and more willing. Nelson’s confidence is not good atm, also Pepe.