Before we talk about what Michail Antonio has said about Arsenal, who’s feeding him false information?
This season, Arsenal’s mantra shifted from trusting the process to focusing on what they can control. Focusing on what they can control appears to have succeeded; Arsenal has been accumulating points and is justifiably at the top of the league standings. They appeared to be in charge of the Premier League title race until they squandered points against Liverpool and West Ham in their last two outings.
The difficult scenario Arsenal is in, where they are four points clear of Manchester City but having played one extra game, began with the Liverpool game; the belief was that if Arsenal won against Liverpool, they would have almost certainly won the league. But now, City can easily win the league if Arsenal doesn’t change the dynamics of the title race.
Anyway, speaking of the title race, the West Ham striker Michael Antonio has made a claim that appears to suggest Arsenal players are concerned about their bad form, and how City are capitalising on it. Given Arsenal’s mantra of controlling what they can, I find it difficult to trust Antonio’s claims that Arsenal players have stopped thinking about what they can control and are now concerned about how excellent City are.
“I heard this from someone that works at Arsenal. All season, they’ve been concentrating on themselves just playing how they play. They’ve been playing so well,” he told The Footballer’s Football Podcast.
“But last week, when they drew with Liverpool and City got that bit closer, it was the first time all season that this person — I’m not going to say who the person is — heard players start talking about City and how well City’s been playing. So they are definitely feeling the pressure from City chasing them.”
I’m not sure how true Antonio’s comments are, given that Granit Xhaka just revealed that he and his teammates still believe they can “finish the job.”
I believe Antonio is getting information from the wrong source, which may even be distracting him from concentrating on what’s going on at West Ham. I don’t think this Arsenal team’s mentality allows them to worry about things they can’t control, and for the time being, they can control the Premier League title race by beating Southampton, then going to the Etihad and doing what they need to do, beating City, who, if given a chance, won’t think twice about beating them.
Daniel O
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Regardless of sidewalks about Antonio’s view, controlling what we can remains the answer: we win the 7 remaining games, the trophy is ours.
Actually just winning the next 6 will be enough heh
You can see the players are starting to feel the pressure that’s why I think they will fall apart when the city game comes and will get destroyed can’t see our defence as it is now being able to cope with there forward line and this will be the knockout blow that wins city the tittle!
I worry the same thing, city battering us 6-1 or worse and putting an emphatic end to our season.
In my opinion, where we are right now has nothing to do with City. We practically put ourselves in this precarious situation.
Against Liverpool we got jittery and weren’t helped by the substitutions and the timing of those substitutions.
At WestHam, after going two goals up we felt the job is done and stopped playing. Well, the rest is history now.
Honestly, I feel we probably have lost the title to City, except for some kind of miracle.
Hoping for some decent finish at end of the season in anycase.
Unfortunately this Arsenal side is not ready go all the way this season. The Westham game was confirmation for me that we not going to be champions this season, well done to the boys but they need a little more maturing. We can go again next season Liverpool was on top of the log almost most of the season in 2018 but couldnt make all the way the same with this Arsenal side, i think next season we can give it a better run
It’s hardly surprising if the squad is feeling the pressure of a close finish to an exciting season that has the media & fans posting their often unrealistic expectations, just to round on them at any perceived setback.
Who really cares what Antonio thinks or from where he gets his info.!!
Jax, some anxiety would be a perfectly normal for any normal person; the Arsenal players are relatively young and inexperienced. They have to fully concentrate on what they can control and put in their best efforts in every game starting with Southampton.