What Ever Happens At Anfield, Keep Perspective by Dan Smith
I can understand why other supporters want Arsenal to get a harsh reality check on Monday Night. Even as a Gooner myself, I have to admit some of what I have heard and read from our fanbase borders on arrogance.
Yes, winning the FA Cup was fantastic, but beating opposition in a one off knock out competition doesn’t equate to suddenly having the consistency to close a 43 point gap, behind a Liverpool team who have since added Thiago and Jota.
Even if you believe the Champions lose focus and struggle to match 99 points, why do you think a squad who finished in our worst position in 25 years will magically find this new found consistency?
Because we brought Gabriel and Willian?
Be honest if Man United had finished 8th and then net spent approx. 6 million would you be calling them title challengers?
I understand why some want to convince themselves this could be our year, but we have to take little steps, you can’t just make things up.
For example I read how Arteta deserves credit for starting this campaign with a winning start not seen in years. We beat Fulham and West Ham, two fixtures we should be winning.
Guess what, we started the last campaign by beating Newcastle and Burnley. Again that was expected, before in our third match we were comfortably beaten at Anfield.
If that happens again it shouldn’t be a shock. It confirms where we are, capable of getting three points against those outside the top 6 but likely to lose away at the big clubs. Hence why we finished 8th.
Yet some Gunners are talking about our trip to Anfield as crucial in the title race.
Let me stress, if we win, it’s another huge step in the progress Arteta is making, but it wouldn’t make us contenders .
We lose, it’s equally not the end of the world.
It’s a reflection in society that some don’t have the patience to watch the project unfold, people want success now.
We win a trophy and suddenly our manager is being compared to Arsene Wenger.
We win we overreact, we lose, it’s the end of the world.
Like anything the truth is probably somewhere in the middle.
We have someone special in our current coach who has improved individuals and has the man management to get a group to tactically follow his instructions. Yet he can only work with the resources he’s got, and his owner simply doesn’t match his ambition.
So while he can improve a Luiz, Xhaka, etc, I don’t see him turning them into the best in the UK in their positions. That’s the standards.
Many call me negative but by being realistic with my expectations I’m the least likely to be putting pressure on our boss in May if we are outside the top 4.
While everyone is entitled to their opinion, if you’re talking about winning the CL in 3 years (yes that’s a thing) then your just putting pressure on our boss which is unfair.
Whereas if your level headed, you’re not going to think it’s the end of the world if we end up 6th.
Whisper it quietly, if I had a choice I rather us win on Thursday. That will put me in the minority but if you offered me another trophy this year, I would bite your hand off for it. Victory in the Carabao Cup puts us in the Quarter Final, three wins away from silverware.
That’s where we are at… A chance of a top 4 finish and a cup run.
So whatever happens in both games this week at Anfield, think with your head not your heart.
Be Kind In The Comments
Dan Smith
Win or lose won’t matter much but I will still prefer to win today than on Thursday, I detest that caroba cup.
You are not alone in that. Man City wins it every season because their 2nd 11 is better than a third of Premier League 1st 11.
Support the team. Hope for the best. I always feel like only arsrnal fans ever tell eachother to keep perspective and all that jazz. Never hear this nonsense from man utd fan. #COYG
Spot on.
Well said Dan, sums up my
feelings about the club atm.
Plenty to be excited about but
still a long way to go regain our
rightful place in both England
and Europe.
👍👍
Arsenal win or draw today. But if we lose it will not hurt us too much in the next games
Can I please think with my head and my hearty please?
Im obviously elated for the team to have picked themselves up from the floor to finish in a European place and win the FA Cup. That cannot be underestimated
I think it’s too early in the season to get a feel for how teams will fare but a lacklustre ManC got trounced yesterday and WH hammered Wolves, which shows, much to my surprise that our difficult win against them was a better result than I thought. Not much is going as I expected so far. Will Frank Lampard prove his worth or Mourinho have a funny 5 minutes?
Covid may well cause postponements or loss of players to quarantine
My heart wants (and believes) a top 4 place is possible but my head says that overturning the superiority of Liverpool over the season is too much of stretch of the imagination
But a win tonight is not impossible
Well said SueP
You nailed it in your 3rd paragraph.
Spot on! Liverpool away is arguably the toughest game in world football these days. Winning our opening two games, still leaves us in a great position, should we lose this anyway.
I’m not getting carried away but I’m optimistic we’ll get something out of the game tonight and if it doesn’t happen, so be it. Still gonna support the team. And recently as a point of correction, there’s no such thing as teams we should be beating in the modern day epl anymore, anybody now beats anybody, teams are getting stronger and challenging the top 6 teams, no team is a walk over so correct that notion Dan. We saw what West Brom did against 220m transfer budget of Chelsea, we saw what Brighton did against utd. Heck, on paper, u would fancy wolves beating westham, or spurs beating Newcastle. Football is evolving, there are no easy games anymore. Win, lose or draw tonight, the team has my support. Doesn’t mean we’re not improving or getting better. And I will never understand when people discard one-off competitions, as if they’re not played over the same 90mins with the same first team players, or maybe there’s a different rule there we don’t know of?. a win is a win in whatever competition it is played. Please enough of downplaying what we’ve achieved and will continue to achieve, no one is saying we’re a finished product, but we’re well on our way there.
👍
True that.
I think your man u comparison is a bit unfair as we played under 3 managers last season, lot of instability at the club where as man u didnt have this problem to deal with. The reason I’m confident(ish) about top 4 is arteta, he is exactly why we will see more consistency this season, winning the title is out of the question but I definitely think we will do significantly better than last year, especially if we get our targets before the window shuts.
I prefer a draw than lose. Or not more than a one goal difference. Lets give em tough fight. We need to show them we are not easy team anymore.
Definitely mate, I fancy a draw, not the end of the world if we dont win I just want to see urgency and passion and a clear game plan,beating pool in there home soil is asking a lot, hope to god KT is back tonight 🤞🤞
Agreed we are doing better than last year.
43 points gap was last season I don’t see how that gives Liverpool an advantage in anyway. This season we have equal points so far.
Long are the days when Liverpool would have easy wins against us. Even if they manage to win (and I predict they won’t) they will have to sweat for that, and there is no shame in losing away to fellow contenders.
You say we won against Fulham and WesHam because they are games we should win, well we finished 8th last season because we couldn’t win those winnable games.
Absolutely HH
Yes that was the mistake we make Last season
Didn’t we beat West Ham last season ?
Can’t compare Fulham result but if you say there in bottom.3 , we didn’t lose to bottom three
Of the 10 games we lost City twice , Liverpool , Chelsea, Spurs and Leicester , we drew at home to Spurs, Leicester and wolves
So of the top 7 we managed 3 wins 6 defeats and 5 draws
So yeah , it’s fair to say we don’t win these games in the Prem
If the 43 point gap isn’t important then I guess Everton could be champions this season based on your criteria
Leicester were champions a season after they gained promotion..
So whats with the 43points nonsense?
Okay Everton can win title then ?
But won’t you say we have improved a lot since then Dan? I think we have confidence of taking all 3 points when we play the likes of Brightons this season compared to last season.
We improved mate but not enough to be contenders yet
True that.
Arsenal is work in progress just as how pool were 4years ago.The support is the motivation.Whatever result,the love never fades.COYG!!
Spot om6
Spot on
Arteta has my support because with the limited funds,the unwanted players still around he has tried to get results.I hope Aouar & Partey will be part of the squad come oct 6th.I fancy a 4th place finish cos its possible especially with how MA does his job
Well written! Let’s target top4 and a cup trophy this season. COYG 💪
I don’t know why you always bring this issue of finishing in 8th position&43pts below liverpool last season,for me it doesn’t matter what happend last season,let’s see what happens at the end of the current season…only God knows the future so stop predicting that we can’t compete with liverpool just as u didn’t predict correctly that we’ll finish 8th last season.ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN
DAN in your fine and fullof perspective article, what stood out to me was your sentence about ” many call me negative but by being realistic with my expectations, I’m the least likely to be putting pressure on our boss…”.
So very true and pressure goes on ALL THE PLAYERS TOO when they read the constantly hyped and excitable claptrap from the usual daft suspects on here. Some predicting a title challenge. It makes you weep at their nonsense, honestly!
And players are well aware what fans think, write and tweet about them whether or not they personally read ever posts. Pressure harms our club, NOT helps it but too many juvenile, none too bright fans never think of this. Indeed, manyof them never really think at all. Manyof them are just not bright!
I DESPAIR AT READING SOME OF THE CLEARLY NEVER THOUGHT OUT FIRST COMMENTS THAT APPEAR ON HERE, AS I KNOW THEY HEAP UNWANTED PRESSURE ON ALL AT OUR CLUB. Please desist(that means stop it!) you thickos!
Someone once said, “the day Laca finds his scoring boot, it’ll be one hell of goals extravaganza.” Something tells me it’s today. I think I am wrong – I hope not.
I also hope you are not wrong! If Laca is on form tonight, who knows what happens.