Arsenal fans wanted fight and Francis Coquelin gave us fight, the problem was that his fight was a bit out of control and saw him receive a well justified second yellow card. And that left us with a man down away in a north london derby which arguably we would have gone on to win.
Arsene Wenger certainly seemed to think so as his post match comments on the Arsenal website suggest. Wenger does not like to criticise his players but you could almost feel the frustration from the prof as he spoke abut it.
Wenger said, “I didn’t have to say a lot to him after that tackle. He made a mistake and he knows he made a big mistake. At half time we warned him as well and it was a mistake. He wanted to do well and mistimed his tackle and got sent off. You cannot complain about it. I can complain that Dier was not sent off. I couldn’t understand that.
“Let down is a big word. He made a mistake and he has to quickly learn from that because at a top level it is full commitment and 100 per cent in all the duels in a controlled way. He got a yellow card because he made a mistake to go down on the tackle.
It was a big moment in a massive game, to be sure, but I really hope that Arsenal fans and the boss go a bit easy on our young midfielder. As Wenger said, his opposite number number Eric Dier could well have seen red as well and in local derbys with so much riding on them these things are likely to happen.
I think that we should forgive Coquelin for this rash moment and maybe even see it as proof that he is a Gunner who is desperate for the club to do well. Lord knows we need a few more like that. What do you think Gooners?
Coquelin isn’t to blame, we have a record of getting red cards in high pressure games and it’s he manager’s job to not let that happen. And if we replaced Flamini with a better midfield option we wouldn’t have to worry either. Fans should learn to stop using players as scapegoats and realize who is responsible for building the team and making sure we have adequate back up plans for every scenario. Big teams don’t rely on friendly refs, fair play from the opposition or title rivals dropping points.
Come on now, has Wenger got so much control at Arsenal that he can time players tackles. Or are we saying Coq should have come off seeing as he was on yellow. The boss spoke to him, Mert spoke to him, he was tutored to do exactly the opposite. T
Yes, Coquelin is 100% the one to blame. In fact he us the sole responsible for the draw.
Its harsh and unreasonable to blame Wenger for the red card for a players actions and the ref in some cases ( remember Chelsea away).
I think Wenger always takes more blame than the players. He protects them, fans protect them. Example, the recent man Utd loss. The arsenal line up was more than capable of beating man Utd but the players didn’t show up, they hardly tried. Wenger cannot take the blame alone there, there is only so much motivation a manager can give to the players. The players also need to be self motivated, they are not babies, actually babies have more will and motivation than the players showed in the man Utd game.
Arsene Wenger has absolutely no excuse for not winning this title this season. What a shame this Arsenal team has become, I couldn’t bare being bullied by Tottenham all game, you could see the difference between Arsenal players and the spud’s.
I agree completely
No excuse whatsoever. It was ours for the taking
We were better than City, Chelsea, United, Liverpool
But we did not sign ANY outfielders in the summer let alone a Top CF and DM
We got a £5 million CM in January. So just one outfielder the whole season
We relied on £140,000 Walcott, Ox, Giroud who were all very average, for goals
Wenger has a lot of explaining to do
I didn’t see that bullying you are talking about. There was no shame about Arsenals performance yesterday. Wenger’s tactics and team selection were great, even when down to 10 man we looked like we could win. Most expected spurs to over run us, I didn’t see that.
Just watched chelski v stoke game and was awestruck by running of Imbula. stoke found a gem of a midfielder, I don’t know how wenger missed signing him. El neny not even 10% of imbula. Please watch highlights chelsea v stoke and see imbula playing. He ran the chelski team ragged. Dribbled easily around one of the best defender azipicuelta.
Wenger goes and signs an unknown Egyptian who will take a lot of time settling down in the EPL. Why could not he have signed imbula, why? what a miss!!
I actually think El Neny played well yesterday against an in form Spurs . He exceeded my expectation. He can only get better. So I’m happy to have him in the arsenal team.
I think now all we can do is focus on pipping spu to second, that has to be the only thing on our minds beside the FA cup. As long as we do that well then we know spu won’t win title. It looks like it’s lei for sure but we have to claw ahead of spu just in case.
elneny looks better at the center than ramsey.
given that theo has issues, ramsey on RW sounds good with elneny/coq in the center.
what do ppl think of putting welbeck at LW and sanchez at CF? we need someone at the pointy end who is very fast.
On paper we have the easiest run in between Spurs, Leicester and ourselves. Leicester could easily drop 9 points in their last 3 games alone (Man U (a), Everton (h), Chelsea (a))
Spurs also have a difficult run of games with Liverpool, Man U and Stoke the first 3 games in April.
Until we can beat the likes of West Ham and Everton and show some determination and urgency this all feels like idle dreaming.
this is my team to play the rest of games
Ospina/Chech
Bellerin BFG/Cos/Gab Mon
Coq Ozil El
Cambel Sanchez Welb
obviously it was really stupid and frustrating what coquelin did which changed the game drastically, I didn’t really ever believe they were gonna score Mert and Gabriel were very good but i don’t want coquelin to change a thing about his game. He willl learn from this mistake and be a better player
Recklace
Injuries to Coquelin and Sanchez has really impacted the club in a bad way. There is just nothing a club can do about the situation. Their player Dier really is lucky to be on the pitch. A clear foul is what it is by the spurs player. No wonder teams run at Arsenal defence due to the constant change in the back 4. Arsenal need tall players in the middle of the park who can force issues.
Coq is an important player to the squad. He would be 4th on my team sheet after Cech, Sanchez and Ozil. And there is little reason to carry a grudge against him for his moronic red card against Spurs.
Having said that, this is were the managers should come in. I have blamed Wenger for much of our failings and not in the least because he is at the root of most of them. But at 25 (nearly?) Coq can no longer be said to be a young player and I believe Wenger when he says Coq was warned. He should not even have to be warned to not pick up a second yellow, especially in a non dangerous situation.
Coq proved to be unmanageable in this instance. What is important for the team and the fans to see is how the manager deals with this. Will Coq get his place back after serving his ban? Will he get any form of punishment to discourage this type of stupid behavior. Or will it be tolerated and he will be back in the starting 11 immediately?
If the manager wants to teach his players to listen and respect them and to stop making the same mistakes over and over again, he needs to be feared a little bit.
I have a feeling the players don’t fear Wenger or the repercussions of not listening to him.
You can’t blame Coq, for his red card. The DM role is a combative position, requiring the use of dark arts and menacing moments to protect our sacred parts. Sometimes, they get it wrong. No doubt someone wipl be able to correct me, but I believe ever DM has a collection of reds to their name.