‘Weak Arsenal side need a miracle to win Premier League’

Harry Redknapp has moved to completely write off Arsenal’s claims of mental strength, whilst claiming they need to beat Chelsea, and come across a miracle, in order to win this season’s Premier League title.

The Gunners gave away a huge chance to close the gap on leaders Chelsea this week when losing to Watford at the Emirates, and now have a nine-point gap to overcome the Blues in the hunt for league glory.

Our players as well as Arsene Wenger has previously described our mentality as being strong, but following our failure to hold focus and win the vital midweek match, Harry Redknapp is questioning that.

He said: ‘I couldn’t put that message out there with their record. They said it after coming back from 3-0 down at Bournemouth to earn a draw at the beginning of last month but for 70 minutes that night, Arsenal were a disgrace.

‘I’d be saying, “Okay, we got out of jail by having a go for 20 minutes but that performance wasn’t good enough.”

‘I wouldn’t be talking about mental strength. I’d be talking about the lack of it.’

Harry then moved to praise the attitude of Alexis Sanchez, describing him as a winner, and claims the rest of the players should be following his lead, but dont.

He added: ‘Alexis Sanchez plays as if his life depends on it all the time but not enough of them follow his lead. He might be a bit disillusioned by the last few weeks as they’ve fallen nine points behind Chelsea at the top of the table.

‘He is a winner — he came off the bench when Arsenal were 3-0 up at Southampton in the FA Cup last weekend because he wants to play every minute.

‘If Arsenal had 11 like him, there wouldn’t be a problem.

‘They’ve got too many who keep hearing the message that “we’ve got great mental strength” without actually showing it or hear they are tired or need rotating and use it as an excuse.’

Are our players showing their mental frailties in recent weeks? Is Alexis the only player fighting for his life?

Pat J

Tags alexis sanchez Arsenal Harry Redknapp

10 Comments

  1. We are not weak. We are certainly stronger than the Leicester team that won the league last season. Wenger just needs to get our selections/combinations right. We also need that mental strength and commitment that Leicester showed and Chelsea is showing currently. We are certainly not weak.

  2. We are mid way through the season now and if wenger doesn’t know his best team lord help us. Well I do believe he hasn’t a clue as he has been arrogant and blinkered for the last 8 years. Living in the past is what he does best.

  3. ‘arry needs to shut up and do what other granddads are doing… help with the grand-kids!
    His love for the media and his unwillingness to accept his managerial career is over is sad. After QPR, no one in a relegation battle will employ him and no club with long term plans will employ him either.
    He should be watching Spuds and owning up by saying poch is doing what I couldn’t dream of.

    If you put up another quote by him or Ray Wilkins, I swear…

  4. I think we are not weak. The question I have is why do we change the system or game plan we were using when we started the league. We had Sanchez in the middle and we were attacking nicely until we decided to throw Giroud in. It is true he was scoring goals from the bench and we should have continue doing that and in that way we had plan B. That question is always in my mind. Can someone here help me understand.

    1. Hi Sandizo, just my thought here maybe it might help.

      Players hit form at different stages in a season, some early, some late, and others have short spells in and out (like Theo). At the begging of the season Alexis was on fire and started at ST most games, OG came off the bench and won us good points and had a good spell at ST when he started so his selection for those games was justified.

      HOWEVER, having said all this Wenger has always had this weakness among many others of not knowing how to select a team based on the opponents in front of us. I swear the man just flips a coin when selecting our team (if Ramsey, OG, and Monreal are fit do or die they have to start the game). Poor game management has been a key feature for our shortcomings in years now.

      Wenger needs to learn that there certain games suited for Alexis to play at ST and some games are suited for OG taking into account form, opponents, etc. But who am I kidding, you cant teach an old dog new tricks.

  5. Harry is right… the team is mentally weak. Even they don’t seem to really believe they can win the title. The inability to begin matches with the required intensity and determination points to lack of belief and motivation to win the title. The team switches off and on during the 90mins…same as the coach.Wenger seems almost comatose during a match and suddenly he can become hyperactive. This attitude from the players and coach will not win any titles. The problem seems to be lack of desire and motivation…both signs of mental weakness n he’s right about Alexis. If the other players and even the coach could emulate Alexis’ intensity, drive and desire…a winning mentality, our results would be better cos this group of players is good enough to win the title if matches are approached with the right attitude

  6. To make things worse the Chelsea game is an early kick off ?
    I’m getting a déjà vu of Wenger’s 1000th anniversary present the chavs handed out ( And that’s putting it politely) ?

  7. The only problem is with the manager. We are halfway in the league and the manager is yet to decide the best pair in midfield and attack. Look at Chelski this year how they quickly identified and resolved the problem. Look at L City last year.

  8. Its like a deja vu… last year L City were prompted to make changes in squad after losing to us and they became champions.. This year its Chelski…. But still still not giving up on title

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