Forget all the media talk, Arsenal fans, that wants to suggest that the reason the Gunners beat Aston Villa yesterday was some mystery virus. Apparently that meant Paul Lambert had to without six of his Villa players. Boo hoo and all that, but Arsene Wenger had no less than seven of the Arsenal squad unavailable due to injury.
So please, pundits, give the Gunners some credit for once, as much as it hurts you. The suggestion is that this virus also affected the Villa players on the pitch, leading to them becoming tired and without enough energy to mount a proper charge in the second half. Yeah, yeah.
But the game was actually over by halftime, as Arsenal blew them away with three goals in less than four minutes. We were not going to let them come back from that. In fact, the platform for the victory was laid in the first 15 minutes, as the Arsenal players showed the fight and grit that was missing in Dortmund, to hold off a fast and furious start by the home team, and I think I may have discovered where that came from.
Imagine my surprise when I was watching the George Groves fight and saw Mesut Ozil enjoying himself in the crowd. It turns out that Lukas Podolski was there as well, as this pic taken at the end shows. But with his languid and laid back personality and style of play, it was Ozil’s presence that surprised me. I wonder if Arsene Wenger has been trying to toughen the German star up and perhaps put him in touch with the London boxer. He certainly seemed to be more up for the fight yesterday.
Maybe the boss could arrange to hook him up with Mike Tyson before we face the spuds next weekend….
Well then. The ultimate confidence booster. How about we see him going at it fist to fist with the likes of Diego Costa or Balotelli. Maybe that will skyrocket our confidence in his abilities.
Anyways, he seemed motivated and happy playing yesterday. I think he wanted to prove something yesterday.
The thing about playing footballers out of their most natural positions is that they often under-perform. Ozil is no more a versatile player than say, C. Ronaldo or Iniesta. However if you play a C. Ronaldo in the CF position you will most likely not get his best output (whether he puts in effort nonetheless). Iniesta, the season he was played on the left wing for the major part, his output dropped significantly. Iniesta could not always do what Iniesta does in CM nor did he do what a David Villa or Ronaldinho or Pedro did for Barcelona when they played that LW position.
Plus this things can have an effect on a players style or attitude. Take for example Zlatan Ibrahimovich. I think he is a Black belt holder in kung-fu or something like that. When Zlatan plays, you literally see the confidence in him (evidently gotten from his days as a fighter). And some of those acrobatic goals?!! The way he intimidates defenders without necessarily being an idiotic urchin like D. Costa or a nutcase like Balotelli.
what?… seems irrelevant haha
i hope tuesday we give some youngsters a chance
like chuba
Well league cup is traditionally a youth cup for us so its likely they’ll get there shot
gamer
September 21, 2014 at 8:07 pm
we look soo much better and fluid without giroud in the team its like a wall has been removed lool
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There! He said it, not me!
i still maintain our poor performance v dort was bc we had played a huge game against manc on sat. i dont blame ozil/ramsey etc bec they gave everything v manc.
its wenger’s fault: he shouldve played 1 b2b (wilshire) v manc and kept the other one (ramsey) for dort. and so on for wingers (sanchez v manc, campbell v dort), maybe ox for one, cazorla for the other one etc.
we all saw caz/ox do so well v AV bc they were fresh.
pod/roz couldve played 60min+ v dortmund and done well.
i liked that v AstonVilla he gave at least a bit of time (15min) for pod & roz.
i wish he’d sub in at 60th min so the subs could get 30min.
bring on Roberto Mano de Piedra Duran to the Emirates!
Doubt that had anything to do with it! The gunners know they had to respond after the dorthmund defeat, and that they did! Coyg!
Maybe he just went to see a boxing match with his pal Poldi…
Please don’t give credit to George for arsenals win I know the guy through association he’s a Chelsea supporter he’ll never let it go
The never let it go bit was a joke. He’s actually a really nice guy
you sound scared 🙂
Yep he might see it lol
Yes Groves supplied Arsenal
with steroids thats why they
were all fired up.
Ozil did so well in the 10 spot but i think it goes much deeper as to why he shined against villa. arsenals midfield movement was plentiful causing a much more fluid gameplay. this gave ozil much more space for him to find and work with which looked really good. all this plus the fact that we have a much more versatile 9 means that ozil has the extra option of slipping our forward thru on the run rather than just playing the ball to our 9’s feet to hold up (giroud).
with this dynamic midfield and our pacey new welbeck, ozil has much more options which pays off for everyone. especially us watching 🙂
Wasn’t this just the perfect weekend. United lost, Liverpool lost, spuds lost, Everton lost, city and Chelski dropped points. And we won comfortably.
wait till we play Chelsea, Fool and Utd…
and there will be more articles on Patience, bad day at the office….play Ozil at central role and etc…..
Everyone talking about Ozil… but Welbeck was awesome on Saturday. One thing I really liked about his game was how he kept possession and his link up play (from hold up play to link up play 😛 ) with the midfielders. He had 97% pass accuracy and was highest ranked player on whoscored. At Arsenal, with Wakcott, Ozil and Cazorla, he has all the tools to be a 20+ goal striker. Let’s see how it goes…
*Walcott
Whats will happen to Sanchez, Pod and Campbell?
I strongly doubt we will have much youth players playing tuesday, because there is a lot of disgruntled senior players on the bench and in the squad who have not have a go at a competitive game yet/
So i expect to see Arsenal B senior squad with about 2-3 juniors included and i think this will be taken seriously to get there name as part of the first 11 and a good run of games