A fitting “1-0 to the Arsenal” for Arteta’s century!
Has it been 100 games for Mikel Arteta already? Well that surely has flown by what with the rollercoaster of a time we’ve had so far.
Well I guess they say, time flies when you’re having fun, although not too much given how we started the season, but the only way is up and slowly but surely Arsenal are becoming a real TEAM!
But I will admit, given how the first few games went of this season and the up and down times at the club, that I didn’t imagine Arteta would be here for this long.
But he is and slowly but surely he is doing his best to prove the doubters wrong. How long it will take to completely win everyone over remains to be seen, but if Arteta and the team continue in this vein then it will only be a matter of time!
There have been ups and there have been downs but let’s not forget he has won the FA Cup already and when given the funds has clearly made some sort of a change in the dressing room.
Right now things are good, confidence is high and the team seems to really be an actual team. He has the dressing room onside it seems, although he has a long way to go for us to be where we deserve to be and where we should be.
Let’s hope if Arteta is here for another 100 games or more, that they are more comfortable and relaxing to watch then what the first 100 was especially at the beginning of this season.
But there is no doubt that there are bigger tests to come in the shape of Liverpool and if the team gets through that unscathed, then we can only look at what we have in front of us, and surely Arteta and Arsenal will be on the road to the top!
Onwards and upwards hey Gooners!
Shenel Osman
@sh3n3l_
Results wise he’s doing well but the performances regarding the way we are playing is nothing new from what we saw last season where we went on a good run in second half but drab football.
Some fans seemed to enjoy it yesterday ,I didn’t regarding the way we played ,it is what it is ,and like I said to some of the other posters yesterday it’s my opinion .
As for him winning his doubters over ,for me he’s got along way to go before that happens but again that’s my preference ,I might change my mind if I start to actually enjoy watching Arsenal again .
If he puts Leno back in goal and brings back Ozil, he will immediately win you over..so stop pretending that this is about performance..
Good one Mark ,you know me personally do you ?,please enlighten me as you seem to know me so .
I’ve given my views if you cannot except them move on ,I don’t keep barraging other fans for their opposite of opinions..
oh but it is about performance , we have not been great bar 135 minutes this season,maybe a litte more.
eventually performances and results will catch up with each other.
Hopefully, we become consist in performance as season goes on though.
Agreed Dan performances havnt ideal, well not for an entire 90. But its interesting of our games so far we seem woefully inconsistent, even within the same game we can look like 2 different teams. Like against Spurs for example. We blew them away for 30 mins, but the following 60 were all about containment for some reason when they were there for the taking.
Arteta seems to have a desire for functional football. Get a lead and then keep it when we’re probably more suited or better off playing on the front foot. Whether that’s because of the players, maybe he’s not 100% confident in their ability to dominate games to that extent yet, which tbh I agree with.
But this squad is far from the finished Article. We need a more around striker like a Haaland or Vlahovich. Also another midfielder or 2 but I thing finally I think one thing we can all agree on is the squad is looking in good shape and we’re winning games. We may well lose to Liverpool but it would be good to see how far we are along when we play the scousers and the mancs
We were lucky to have the greatest football manager in the history of football with the most brilliant football the world has ever seen.
No one can ever replicate that kind of football. With the current manager good results is all we are going to get (if it stays consistent) for a foreseeable future. At least for now we can go into games without fear of being battered by Watford or Burnley, not that it should have been so in the first place.
stay ever vigilant DK…until this team passes the “eye test” on a consistent basis I, like you, remain unconvinced…unfortunately this site has become so bias in it’s representation of all things Arsenal-related that there’s seemingly no place for common sensical thought or differing opinions…unless you’re chugging the Kool-Aid or one of those all-too-familiar thin-skinned, passive aggressive, and oft-times waffling tw***, you will likely face an Admin-protected onslaught…unfortunately, whenever any organizational environment becomes permeated with “yes” men/women, it rarely ends well, as it lacks the requisite checks and balances required to achieve sustainable long-term success
You, my man, are the one that is short sighted and biased.
Anyone can see that with ten games undefeated the readers on here that were previously unsure are starting to see real signs of progress.
So if you think that suddenly justarsenal.com
(The whole 500 thousand readers) have become brainwashed by me then you are being ridiculous.
The fact is that MOST fans are becoming more positive in face of the facts so ipso facto, there will be less negative people like you
.
Q E D m’lud!
so let me get this straight, the person, myself, who has spoken for years about the systemic problems inherent within our club, which clearly had considerable merit, and who only cares about what’s in the best interests of our club moving forward, is the short-sighted one…whereas you, who has publicly stated on more than one occasion that you care not for the innerworkings of our organization, including who the manager is at any given point, and who encourages the short-sighted reckless banter of those who are trying desperately to anoint MA as the second coming, even though his tenure has produced only about a handful of “real” performances since his arrival, is the one with the proper perspective when it comes to the long-term health and footballing prosperity of our club…that’s rich
I’m not even sure why you found it necessary to intervene in such a manner, as I wasn’t addressing you or anyone else directly, minus DK, unless it was nothing more than another exercise in “big upping”, where you could not so casually mention the readership “numbers”, thus patting yourself on the back in a typically passive aggressive fashion, while likewise rallying the troops by using the oft-times triggering term “brainwashing”, which I NEVER used…just astonishing that this would be offered up by the very individual who should logically be the most neutral of observers
Serious question TRVL. Why do you so enjoy being a constant maverick?
it’s not about being a “maverick”, it’s about having deeply-held convictions and never abandoning them on a whim or simply because it’s not in line with the “flavour of the week” narrative.
you should understand this Jon, in that even though some of the names have changed, very little has fundamentally changed since the time WE were on the same side fighting against the indifference of our owner and the tactical naivety and asset mismanagement of our manager et al
just because we’ve experienced a minor uptick in results, doesn’t mean I should abandon my well-reasoned beliefs, as this club has proved, time and time again, that if left to their own devices they will accept a much lower standard than I would deem as acceptable
Well TRVL, credit to you for explaining in your own maverick style exactly why you still refuse to accept the mounting evidence against your stubborn opinion!
Even mavericks are, in a free democracy, entitled to their view, however left field. That needs to be said, so I HAVE SAID IT!
I admit, I would not have complained, if we had sacked Arteta after the horrible preseason and the first 3 games.
I am more optimistic now both short term and long term. At the moment, I think we are doing great.
But, I don’t think anything is a “done deal”. We could have another long run of bad results, and then what?
Let’s judge at the end of the season. Anything outside top 6 is not good enogh, I think.
Apart from Liverpool, Man City and Chelsea I don’t see why we should not have that 4th spot. I think we have a better squad than West Ham.
And I am very interested to see if Conte will deny us that spot.
It’s too early to be over excited. But we have reasons to be hopeful considering where we are at the moment on the table. However, we can judge the team and the coach after 15-25 games knowing we are approaching end of season. But we can be optimistic on how we are grinding out results without topnotch performances sometimes.
I have been the type of fan who doesnt want to discuss individuals when I want to reflect on the club.
Too much focus on managers means we forget to see other things happening.
The biggest compliment I can give thou is less about the manager and more about where we are right now.
Arteta said, after the win that the boys are enjoying their football and looking forward to game days the day before the games. This is where you want to be as a club.
How can anyone knock arsenal right now?
Performances? We are a use squad and even seeing ANM playing midfield feels new because it is! Other then the top 4, the rest of the team have played little game time together. Performances come with better understanding of one another
You know a lot of people think of playing fluid football comes just like a click, footballers are humans and it takes time to build understanding, if you see the way Arteta sets up now, same players are in the first team every week this is how they build understanding then confidence grows to be more inventive.
People comparing Arteta to Wenger years forgets that it took Wenger years to assemble his team to his style in a less competitive league to the present highly competitive league.
What we are seeing now, especially in terms of results, is what we hoped for.
I was excited when Arteta arrived but my faith in him took a hit against Villareal when I ran out of patience with his team selection and tactics.
Arteta is young and bright, there is no reason he can not learn on the job and develop into a top manager. I would say at the moment we are roughly where we want to be on the PL at this stage. Hopefully, we will only get better as this young team develops. The ACN and the players we will miss because of it, especially Partey, will be a big test. If AMN can play like he did yesterday and fill in for Partey during his absence we might actually be able to cope.
It looks like we actually are only missing a hungry clinical striker. I would consider trying Laca on his own and have Auba sit on the bench for a bit.
I think it’s time to drop both Auba and Laca. They have failed this season. Younf players like Martinelli and Nketya should be given more game times.
Well, we’ve unbeaten in like what, 10 games now which is great. But let’s not forget during those 10 games our opposition has not been.. well top of the food chain (apart from Spurs I guess). And we still managed to lose 4 points to Palace/BHA.
Liverpool away will be the biggest test so far. Games against Chelsea and City were tragicomical.
I’ve seen West Ham how West Ham beat Pool. Brighton also were the better team against Pool at Anfield.
Pool are vulrenable, but it will be down to MA how he sets up the team. I don’t care about Pool dominating possession, Brighton showed us how to be the better team without possession.
A lot of top teams lost points against Palace and BHA. They are not weak teams. Just saying.
I’ve seen West Ham beat Pool**
I’m excited for us to face some of the big boys now and see how we fair….Chelsea/Liverpool/City are challengers I am looking forward to.
If we lose 2 games in a row sometime in the near future it would be very interesting to see if our mentality has really changed or if we are just riding a great wave at the moment….not that i want us to lose any games but it happens and that’s when true character shows up.
OT.. An audience with Arsène Wenger and David Dein Live stream, tonight at 7.30pm (UK time)
Register here: https://arsn.al/UObKJwF
All profits and donations go to
@ProjectTwinning
This one’s for you, Ken 🙂
Just read this Sue and I missed it!!!!!
I got back at 6.00 approximately and didn’t spot your post till NOW!!!
Did you watch the two great men in conversation and, perhaps Pat can put it on JA?
Fret not, Ken, it’s still available to watch for the next month using the link above. Be prepared to donate a small sum though…
I was unable to watch last night, so will catch up with it at some point. It certainly was gooner heaven at the London Palladium! Wrighty and Alex Scott hosted.. some of the Invincibles were there – jeez if only I’d known beforehand!!!
Check out Stuart MacFarlane’s twitter page – great pictures!
To be fair, I have never doubted his Ability, somehow I seems to be confident he has what it takes to succeed at top level as a manager, the signs has been there from the start, FA cup and community shield are not some joke of trophies, and winning those in his first try means he has something special, lots of coaches in his level even with better experience tried same but failed, Ole and Lampard are good examples, and we can’t deny both has better squad with better situations than him, but despite all mitigation he managed to deliver.
First half of last season we were awful, and , that is as a result of inexperience, he learn quickly and almost turn it around, albeit late and the season was unsuccessful, but from January he has shown he is the right man to take us forward, that’s why I was still supporting him at the beginning of the season, despite the 3 losses.
An objective arsenal fans would understand from last year Xmas, arsenal team has been improving and with good summer addition it could only get better, since Xmas we were 3rd on the league based on performance, that is a good achievement and I believe we couldn’t have done too badly this season.
And to those fans, who claimed we had 22games unbeaten under UE, I really don’t know how you compare, but IMO, This time looks so different, in those 22 unbeaten run, we still see our usual defensive howlers, conceding stupid goals and it was clear we rode our luck most times, but atm, we have confidence, the defence has made us difficult to score against, this to me is the basis of good run.
I don’t care how we perform at Anfied, I can be sure it wouldn’t be a 5nil trashing or above because I have confidence in our defence, hopefully no injury 🙏, a loss still keep us in the top 4 race that’s why yesterday win was important, long may we continue to get good results, I don’t care about performance atm, we are not a finished article yet, we don’t have the right to complain about bad performance so far we get 3points
Great👍comment @Adajim
I said to myself after the 1st 3 games that I would give him till the interlul to see if he could turn things around with his players in the squad.
we have witnessed 2 or 3 of our best performances under MA and probably in the last 4 or so years.
I think he has done very well up till now with the turn around in form and performances, yesterdays game was proof of that, in seasons gone by, we would have dropped points, even under Wenger.
So with the team proving they are not so soft anymore, getting results, even ugly ones are whats important for this very young Arsenal side.
! thing i would like from MA is the ability to break down teams like Watford. Against better sides, the high press and counter work great as we wont generally have the ball more. When we have more of the ball, we seem to stumble and dont really know what to do, so yea, this is where i would want to see some improvement.
Overall, i am pretty happy about how we are playing and getting results, hopefully we can keep the run going
He’s achieved the target. Top six in November
Is the target not top 6 by the end of the season? There’s no November top 6 competition
I don’t think there’s any excuse to finish outside of the top 5 now. As most of you have said, MA is capable as is the team and they’ve shown that….so why accept a regression now?
I said he should be replaced if we don’t reach top six in November or December. Of course he’ll get the boot as well if we’re out of top six in the end of the season
We are a building, there is n plaster nor paint on the walls. The roof is not there yet. For all who see no progress and forward marching, I’m sure there’s an optometrist nearby. Let’s look at the way we defend, our players running into spacr(of the ball soccer) our middle to deep passes, our defending set pieces and corners. Our player s committed to tackle, run and holding the ball. If that’s not different from earlier on, then I’m sure I’m watching some other game most of the time. Our boys has become men. Forward forever backwards never. Gunner to assault
.
I agree….defence and attack will take a knock once Xhaka is back though, keep that in mind…..he affects both negatively.
A nice negative comment…just cos right? Xhaka fault always…..not like he was playing at the start of the run with a 3-1 win against the Sh*tspurs
Let’s not look at one game shall we? Overall our consistency has improved with him out of the team…..or is that just my opinion and not proven by the run the teams been on?
PJ-SA
My worry exactly. When Xhaka returns all the thuggish, slow, sideways football may return. Credit where credit is due Tomiyasu, White, Gabriel and Tavarez have defended brilliantly, supported by Laca, ESR and Saka working their socks off. There is a buzz around and I hope the Arteta./Xhaka love affair does not rekindle. It may cost us. Other than that I’ve been enthused.
Sean this mystifying “hold” that statue XHAKA has and had over Wenger , Emery and Arteta is one of lifes unfathomable mysteries to me.
I loathed Xhakas extreme immobility and Mertesacker like slowness at first sight and have never wavered for an instant in my firm opinion that he is useless!
But that leaves three pro managers, PLUS the Swiss natonal manager who think differently.
THAT IS PRECISELY WHY I SAY IT IS ONE OF LIFES MYSTERIES.
Great analogy, Harold. Yes, that’s exactly where we are at.
Still more additions to come……something will happen in January……we should see one or two new faces…..this team will get stronger……………….NO manager knew it all…they all learn and get better with time and experience..and this season teams will drop points cos the world’s talents are in the EPL..almost all the teams are strong and will take points of each other……….Arsenal can make it into Europe………..I’ll give Arteta till the end of the season and I’m sure he can do it….to win the league…another two seasons…………………😀
Arsenal is doing well but I have observed, in three of of their last games, they run out of steam and allowed opposition teams to put them under pressure.
It seems the players unfit and cannot run for 90 minutes. The strikers are always active in the first half but struggle to keep up with the opposition. There is a need for offensive players a defensive midfielder.
I was originally pro-Arteta, but understood that he needed time as the club was in a real mess. After a promising end to last season I was shocked during the opening three games, and was advocating him being sacked because we were as poor as the day he arrived.
From then onwards however, and aided by some fantastic transfers, I began to see a strategy emerging, a team spirit and a sturdyness to this team.
We are nowhere near being we want or need to be. We rarely play truly exciting football, we have a paper thin squad in terms of players with the qualities required, and we are inconsistant.
We have perhaps 13-14 players we can rely on, and urgently need midfield cover and an experienced central striker to cover injuries and the ANC..
But our first 11, whilst young and mostly new to the club, has tremendous potental to improve, both individually and collectively. Throw in our excellent youth prospects and it’s an exciting time.
But we are not there yet. We need further recruitment in key areas to stop the wheels potentially coming off,. We need these young players to master the system, get fitter and more consistant. Once these are second nature then we need them to develop individuals and express themselves. That is when the fun really starts.
A way off, but I’m enjoying winning ugly on that jouney. Liverpool will be a fascinating insite into how far we still have to go.
Arteta? He’s the man behind it all. He’s taken all of the flak, so deserves the credit now. Half-term report: “a promising student, now showing signs of improvement after a very poor start. Needs to improve further to pass the end of year exams but now has all the tools in place to do so.”
Usually when we are on a good run, Arsenal aren’t as good as most of us think they are.
On the flipside, when Arsenal are on a bad run, they are never as bad as most of us think they are.
It feels different this time as even the most optimistic fans dont seem to be getting carried away with our current run.
That for me is a good sign and hopefully when the bumps come (and they will come), there won’t be an tsunami of negativity engulfing this site.
Two steps forward for every one back is all I ask of this year.
Lately, fans from other teams are changing their narrative about Arsenal.
I see how careful they are and their inability to write us off or pass funny comments as they used to not so long ago.
I feel good and much at ease when soccer is being discussed in my circles and it is a clear indication that something good is being cooked at Arsenal. They can see that.
I believed in MA doing a good job with our team and preferred him to Carlo Ancelotti although many fans also preferred otherwise. I was for his youthfulness and the fact that he already knew our team thus, what we needed and he was a Gunner as well.
It was his first time in top management and his inexperience caused doubts in many but his previous job, his direct involvement and importance to the Man. city team for about 3 years, gave me hopes that he had learnt from one of the best and with the needed backing (financially and support), he will succeed with a top-quality team like the Arsenal and yes, he will make some mistakes along the way and who doesn’t?
It is a good job done so far, recruiting the right players to solve most areas where we lacked.
Today, he has built an Arsenal team that can boast of a strong backbone and the team looks meaner and with that, he has been able to erase that “soft touch” aura we Carrieout us some periods back.
We are a work in progress and there are some t’s to cross and i’s to dot but I am glad that most importantly, we have the right man at the helm of affairs in Arteta, to do a successful job.
Better days ahead.
* carried about
Let’s learn to appreciate the good things and take it game by game. We lacked everything, but at least now we see results so hopefully with time the performance will improve
He’s gaining momentum but always good to put things into perspective. It’s our first good run of form since FA cup win. That was a while ago. He needs to build off what we are seeing and finish in a good place at the end of the season before he has my mind changed. I have seen the improvements this season we just need to keep doing exactly that and be consistent. So at the moment it still up in the air. As we are all aware things can quickly go good or bad.
He is improving, learning from his mistakes and believing in himself and his players. That’s why we are getting better and better.
In some games, I felt like we can do better, but let’s face the reality, most of the games our players did not show anything too! sometimes I blame this on MA not being able to bring the best of his players.
Overall, we are improving, we should trust this man as his results are getting better and we are getting closer to where we are supposed to be. Let’s hope he learned from his mistakes and be able to play against any team with the mentality of winning not waiting for them to score and then start attacking. Lastly, I still feel like he is missing something on the field, the lack of the ability to change the player’s positions during the game, this thing can win us a lot of games. I hope the best for MA because his improvement is ARSENAL improvement and we all deserve the best!
Even if we won the Premier league on goal difference or the champions league on penalties there will still be negative comments from the same people . We are a young team with a young manager who are starting out in life we can’t expect perfection life is not like that there is ups and downs in every corner of life,even if it’s 1% improvement that should give us hope.