It is an absolute certainty that the Arsenal players and Unai Emery know of the abject anger from the fans over the capitulation at Watford and there is not much that can be gained by continuing to slam into them.
It is fine to analyse but to call for Emery to be sacked and so on is now counter-productive when we have a big game in less than 48 hours time.
The team now need our support, whoever Emery picks and we can only hope that the support we provide will help lift them out of the abyss they find themselves in.
On Thursday evening the lads face off against Bundesliga outfit Eintracht Frankfurt and it is not going to be an easy game, that much is certain.
Emery is going to have to get his team selection right and that in itself is a balancing act, the Spaniard cannot afford another poor display and if he goes with youth and fringe players he risks just that happening. At the same time, he will be wanting to keep some of his better players fresh for the weekend Premier League clash against Aston Villa.
This is now a critical time for both Emery and the players, they do have a decent set of games coming up and momentum can be built but at the same time, a rut can set in and that must be avoided at all cost.
The fans, as usual, will support the team and it is time for the players and manager to pay the fans back for their unwavering support.
… Nothing new. A few wins and we are back. It’s good for the fans to voice out their frustrations about the Watford game but no one will get sacked for being two points behind 2nd place City. Over the top reactions to me. Just shows how much emotions invested in a sport.
same thing happened under Wenger. The denial of a problem with management just because we string together one or two results after an embarrassing one. All of the criticisms towards Emery still stands and he is not improving the club, just like Wenger was not improving the club during his latter years. If we aren’t in top 4 this season, if we aren’t close to any trophy this season, it is a failure.
For me I just think we only have a change in personnel at the club but we are still run same as before. I was not in anyway excited with our transfer businesses. We didn’t just fail to address our weaknesses but we created a problem of small squad. The management successfully used Pepe deal to blind most of us
The new management tried to fix our issues by getting high profile RW, CAM, LB and CBs. The transfer business was impressive, but the scouting was atrocious as usual
Pepe’s stats and his left-foot made him look like an excellent acquisition, but they couldn’t predict his low adaptability. I still have a high hope in him, but he might need this whole season to adapt
Luiz purchase is a poor decision because we already have four CBs. But maybe this is related to Emery’s tactics
If you check the number of players that left you will understand better.
Spot on its tactics teams look like Barca against us and its not just the wkend its constant across every game.
I predict Emery would revert to a three-CB formation for away games, after two disappointing results with the diamond formation
This is because we have too many CBs and our fullbacks are atrocious in defending
Our current non-injured fullbacks perform better as wingbacks, VS Frankfurt I would like to give SOkratis a chance to play his best and leave the Watford game behind, and play something like this
…….Auba
….Ozil…Pepe
Kola.Ceba.Torr.Nile
..Cham.Luiz.Sokr
…Martinez
Or by any chance we go again with the diamond formation setup like this,
….Auba…Pepe
……..Ozil
…Xhaka….Ceba
……..Torr
Kola.Cham.Sokr.Nile
Maybe Willock gets a chance instead of xhaka.
gotanidea
With regards to pepe.i believe like you he will come good.
Saw a program on robert pires and it took him a whole season to adapt to the prem. Look how he turned out.
Was a big a supporter of UE when he joined..not my first choice but the best of a bad bunch at the time.
I really do question some of his decisions like most supporter here. The hour glass is running down for him so he better get it right or he is gone.
As for the 3 at the back..I agree but that leaves us weak in the middle if we play the fantastic 3 up top, as I am not sure we have the personal to cope in the middle and especially against the big teams
Guess what formation Napoli is using against Liverpool?
442
Isn’t that the same formation Emery used when we played them ?
The truth is that regardless of the formation we would never beat pool that was one off for me.
Well said James.Hopefully Emery,with advice from the likes of Llungberg ,will make suitable changes which will re-energise the team after the lamentable second half performance against Watford..Let’s hope so.
Who saw Leno’s Interview
What did he say?
OT.. how gross is Barcelona’s kit?? Quite similar to our green kit ?
Bernd Leno believes Arsenal must continue to take risks at the back despite that approach contributing to a disappointing collapse at Watford at the weekend.
The Gunners gave up a two-goal lead in an error-strewn second half to draw 2-2 at Vicarage Road on Sunday.
The most egregious gaffe was the misplaced pass from Sokratis Papastathopoulos that gifted Tom Cleverley a goal and the hosts a way back into the game.
Centre-back Sokratis attempted the pass from inside his own penalty area but goalkeeper Leno, signed last year in part for his ball-playing ability, does not think Arsenal should discard their tactics.
“That’s our style to play,” Leno told reporters.
“We try to take the risk because if we beat the press of Watford, then there is a lot of space for our strikers.
“In the first half we did it very well but in the second we didn’t create too many chances from playing out from the back. It is still a process we have to work on. Everybody was angry and disappointed after this game.
“The manager is a very positive guy. He wants to be positive and he said we will analyse this game with time. Now everybody was with emotions, very mad and crazy.
“But that is normal after the game. He said ‘calm down and then on Tuesday we analyse this game and then on Thursday we have another game’.”
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s quickfire brace had given Arsenal a comfortable buffer but David Luiz’s late foul on Roberto Pereyra enabled the Watford winger to seal a share of the points from the spot.
Leno said: “It was very frustrating because we controlled the game but also in the first half, you could see that we made two easy mistakes and then at the end we conceded two goals from these kinds of mistakes and we were lucky we didn’t lose this game.
“I think in the second half we completely lost the control of the game. The distance from the midfield to the strikers and all the distances from the players were too big.
“Watford deserved at least the draw.”
passing out the back is just one of several problems at the club. Can Leno seriously say we have been playing “positively”? Emery has not given us “positive” football yet.
I reckon we bench David Luis and Xhaka,
No use reasoning with the Emery Out Brigade. They are set in their ways it seems
5 matches
2 wins
2 draws (one a derby to a better team)
1 loss to the best team in the Premier League AWAY
These aren’t wonderful results for our first 5 matches but we had worse starts under Wenger and this is far from terrible
Norwich beat the reigning Champs. So all teams have bad results
Now is the time to back the Team including Emery to turn things around. Until January anyway (nothing will be done by Kroenke before that)
It’s not just 5 matches. It goes back to the final 6 game collapse last year. Emery got the setups wrong and selections wrong.
He threw away PL to gamble everything in Europa final. Against a departing coach and a team facing a transfer ban.
We didn’t just lose, we got tossed.
Emery has no style of play, no philosophy, hasn’t fixed poor defense in 16 months, 12 new players for him, and over £200 million on players for him.
You think fans reactionary? Wake up bro, Emery drowning despite £200 million in players, manages worst football I’ve seen played in 20 years.
He’s a spanish Pulis, but hey believe what you want despite the facts in front of you.
Leno can say all that he wants…just watching Dortmund play out from the back and saw that they have worked it out well.
When the goalie is ready for the goal kick, the four defenders are positioned in 4 different angles & distances from him, so there is a lot of space available for them to start their move.
Our guys though stand just a few yards away at similar angles and that makes it disastrous, inviting pressing play from the opponents.
Napoli 1-0 against Liverpool in the 82nd minute and my question is how did they hold down Liverpool while we were like rabbits caught in headlights.
Yet we went to Napoli & won 1-0 ?
Sue, we have to comfort ourselves holding on to such memories. Sigh!
That’s for sure, Viju!!
Napoli 2-0 up, so what excuse do Emery apologists have now?
How does Klopp’s record with Liverpool away to Napoli 0-2, now compare to Emery’s 1-0 win with Arsenal?
Bring back George Graham as defensive coach, Emery hasn’t a clue how to sort this out.
The defensive players are not good.
The board directors should change the transfer policy. We want to see again the unique way of playing like Viera, Henry and pires….
Now, The players do not have fighting spirit.