I suppose you could feel a little bit sorry for those members of the football media and TV pundits that have thrived on their anti-Arsenal comments in recent years, because they have had a pretty thin diet to feed on this season as Arsene Wenger has got the Gunners playing the best football in the division and the squad has shown a much better toughness and togetherness to get over the games where the fluent football is not working.
So the likes of Michael Owen have been left sniffing about for scraps with which to criticise Arsenal for. Just look how people jumped on our poor performance and heavy defeat at Southampton on Boxing Day as ‘proof’ that Arsenal were still weak and did not have what it takes to win the title, completely ignoring the fact that we had won all four previous games in December including the one against everyone’s pre-season favourites Man City and the brilliant away win over Olympiacos to secure a place in the next Champions League round.
Of all these Arsenal bashers, though, the worst offender must surely be Adrian Durham who has finally found a stick to beat Arsenal with this week in his Daily Mail column. What this muppet has written is that by missing the match away to Stoke on Sunday our German midfield star Mesut Ozil has proved that he has no stomach for the title fight.
According to Durham either Ozil or Wenger should be castigated for not forcing him to play with a foot injury and he seems to think the German just didn’t fancy it. And there’s us thinking that all those medical and fitness experts might have had a say. Does this fool really think it would be better to have Ozil limping around the Britannia and risking further injury problems?
I might be wrong but did this same moronic hack have a go at Wenger for playing Alexis Sanchez who then pulled a hamstring? He also ignores the fact that Wenger admitted that Ozil had this foot problem in the Liverpool match, which he played in but was not his usual self.
Is that maybe why the boss rested his star man, to make sure that he would be back to his best for the crucial games to come?
I never to read Andy Duhram. waste of the times, why even read WHY!
To be fair it was pretty obvious Ozil was rested, noone fell for the ‘slight’ foot injury. I’d rather draw against Stoke than have an injured Ozil for our next few fixtures. Stoke are rough and would have been told to stop Ozil, same with Sanchez, I bet he was ready but no point putting him against a team that love taking out players. Wengers a smart man, hopefully pays off and we go on a run now with players coming back.
I don’t get why so may thumbs down ? You’re basically stating the truth, Ozil is the most important player and risking him against a team that likes to break legs is just dumb.
If he missed the game in readiness to whoop Chelsea who cares!!!!!
We need to rip Chelsea apart as we did United and City by taking our chances and keeping it tight.
If Wenger felt it was a risk to play either Ozil or Sanchez at the Britannia well he has a good cause for that. I would rather our star men miss one game than the entire season.
he goes missing against better clubs, allegedly
Not this season.
Whether that’s true or not is a story for another day but we all know what he is capable of, our opponents know it hence they keep an eye on him the entire game.
Ozil’s passes can change a game at any second. In his third year we have seen massive improvement, I can site the game against Man U, Man City, and Bayern, it doesn’t get bigger than that. I would rather have an invincible Ozil the entire game and him providing two assists that leads us to win the game than having certain players on (cough cough Ox) running around the entire game and nothing to show for it.
Mesut ozil is a key player for us, I do hope he is fit in time for the chelsea game on Sunday!
Any latest news on Le coq’s progress?
Anyone know when Alexis is back? What about ozil?
Does anyone know where I put the keys to my car? ? ?
Hahaha, ffs!… You guys obviously have Internet, so stop being lazy and search for the information that you need, instead of waiting to be spoon fed with it, Or maybe you are just looking for brownie points? ?? ?
Anyways, Ozil has a inflammation in his foot, probably caused by his New lace less boots ?
and Wenger hopes that Sanchez and Ozil will be ready for the Chelsea game… But don’t hold your breath!
Yes, @ ButFlaps & 007 have said well. But even then, the Gunners MUST quickly learn on how to create many good goals scoring chances and take them with Ozil on or off the field of play. And also without Sanchez playing too. That is important.
To have the duo against Chelsea should be an enhancement to the quality of the Gunners game. Which shouldn’t be down or missing if those 2 quality are in the game or not.
Beating Chelsea this week is massive. It will be very tough too. Chelsea may be in terrible shape this season, but I expect they’ll still get up for the challenge when we play them, just as they did when we went to Stamford Bridge. We haven’t been able to properly beat Chelsea in years, and it’s really bothering me. The community shield win was a small brightener, but I still don’t see it as a real win.
If we don’t win this game, Man City will go above us in the title race. We may have got the Brittannia and Anfield out of the way, but we still have tough games away at Goodison Park, the Etihad, Old Trafford and White Hart Lane to come. We cannot afford to drop any more points.
Agree completely with the Chelsea sentiment MTG but saying we cannot afford to drop any more points is a bit harsh imo. I might be proved wrong and City may well turn it on – every time they win the media swoons and predicts them steamrollering everyone for the rest of the season but there is nothing this season to date that makes that an inevitability. They haven’t strung 2 successive wins together in 10 games now and won just 4 of their away games – they will drop more points especially as 9 of their last 16 games are away.
gingernut durham talking utter bull as usual lol
i think wenger did right to potentially rest ozil but what i don’t agree with is the persistance with Ox and Theo, Both have been given ample opportunities and time & like claude says on arsenalfan tv says “gone stale” need throwing away.
Really hope once ozil and sanchez are back both are dropped immediately, i think it would be a travesty if poor campbell gets dropped which sadly i think is most likely to happen knowing wengers favoritism.
4 players next season who i think have alot more potential and will definatley cut it in and around the first team squad and only get better & i hope they get more chances are Rene adelaide,Iwobi,Zalalem,akpom, some will say iwobi is already around but i feel he definitely deserves to be ahead of Ox now but its not going to happen.
#outwiththeold#inwiththenew#
@Mo1
Rene and Iwobi most def should get 1st squad play, now. Akpom needs to get his head right and Zelalem is too light in the pants and timid. Neither, I see as being ready to take the step up to 1st squad…
Agreed that they are the two who have stepped up to the plate.
It seems wenger now knows how to manage players well.Without overusing them and getting them all injured or tired.
This season has purely been about ozil and i hope he will be more than enough to win us the premiership and maybe even go as far as winning us the champs league.
He and sanchez will surely set the league alight when they are all well and firing.
I like how his game works.
Find measure and set a pass.
It might not be most eye catching kind of play but its surely a stroke of genius
Not sure I agree. The Norwich game saw him knacker both Santi and Alexis when both were clearly injured either pre match or during the first half.
Does Moyes still believe that “the jury’s still out on Ozil”? 😉