The former Arsenal and England star Ray Parlour has been talking up the Gunners after being very impressed byt the way the team have been playing. The ex central midfielder gave special attention to the recent performances of Francis Coquelin, as reported by the Daily Star, and accepted that the young Frenchman has, for now at least, secured his place in Arsene Wenger’s starting line-up.
And Parlour was also optimistic about the Gunners and our chances of challenging for the Premier League title, although he seems to think this season is too soon. But Parlour believes that a few key additions to the squad in the summer will see Arsenal give it a right good go next season.
He said, “The squad they have now is very good, but the signings are important. The age of the squad is very good.
“This summer is going to be so important. They will get back to winning stuff.
“They could overturn Manchester City and Chelsea if they bring in the right players. It is time to kick on from last year’s FA Cup win.
“It is great to see Coquelin play well. A lot of the plaudits go to attacking players, but he’s taken his chance very well.
“Wenger is loyal so, if you play well, he will keep on playing you. He’s become an important player for Arsenal.
“He probably thought it was his last chance and he’s certainly done brilliantly.
“It will be interesting to see what he does in the summer.”
I would go a little bit further than the ex Gunner though, and suggest that Arsenal have already got a squad capable of becoming champions of England. So why are we only in 5th place? Easy, because of the massive amount of injury problems that Wenger has had to cope with.
Missing the likes of Ramsey, Walcott and Ozil in the second half of last season saw us slip from top to 4th. And this season has been even worse, but now that the injury situation is a lot more manageable, you can see just how strong Arsenal are.
Do you think it is a coincidence that Chelsea and Man City have had very few injury problems this season and that Liverpool were in the same situation last year? I do not and hopefully Wenger and the players will have the chance to prove what we can do with a strong and fit squad. What do you think?
Coq has stepped up immensely over the course of filling the def-mid role and has really excelled in it. We were always a strong team and recent results shows that our players are believing that too
cant wait for the NLD… See us securing those three points @ the end of the game
#COYG
– If we can stay off injuries to key players
– Maintain our compactness and our found solidity in defense
– Having a good golie has Oooospina has so far shown
– No complacency in games
– Keep bagging in those goals (goals wins games)
– Get rid of some ageing/underperforming players in the summer
– Recruiting a few more for an even improved squad, and
– Continuous improvement to our academy
well, we can actually be in for major honors. I know we’ve been saying this for a while now, but there is something different this time around, Wenger may actually be looking at winning the UCL and the EPL once more before he hags his long coat.
I don’t think we will lose Saturday. If we play as they play at the Emirates we may even win it. What I want to say is that even if I loathe to lose against the Spuds it should not be seen as a tragedy as they will go only one point above with 14 games to play. The confidence in the squad is at very high level and I am sure we are not underestimating the Spuds. They don’t have powerhouses as Toure/Fernando/Fernandinho/Matic in their squad so Cazorla should not be bothered too much. For the first time in years I am not afraid to watch an away game fearing a disaster. Bring it on!
I believ what we need to focus on is keeping everyone fit and sharp during the next preseason, if we are to have a reasonable title challenge next season it has to be from the onset not the second half of the season but i will not blame anyone for injuries this season, they were just out of our control, the medical team obviuosly did their job with some players coming earlier than expected only to have others go straigt back (debuchy) the staff did their job but other factors had their way and thus the injuries. Now that we have got the form and the talent is now evident lets just hope that our luck favors us
The signing of Ozil signalled the turning point. Decent signings in the interim. Big improvements to be seen in lots of players. After this summer transfer window all gaps in the 1st team squad should be plugged – can be no excuses. We will then be in as good a position as any team can be having regard to the spending levels in the past 10 years.
We should be challenging properly next year. However, we should not kid ourselves though, Chelsea have been spending like crazy for 10 years now, thick end of a billion quid. Man City doing the same for 6 or 7 years and spending the same. The truth is that we would still be underdogs – no sane person could make a coherent argument as to how it would or should be possible to leapfrog Man C and Chelsea after 2 or 3 years of relatively modest spending. And who the f*&k knows what will be happening at OT, LvG will probably blow another £200m in the summer. If we did pull it off only we would know how special an achievement it would be – we won’t get much credit from elsewhere. Win the league and watch Mourinho, Pellegrini and LvG walk or get the sack. Oh, I can but only dream.
I know us fans have a tendency to bounce between extremes – thinking we are the best team in the land, or the worst-
But I agree, with Coqueline’s help, Rosicky, Ozil, Walcott influence and Sanchez amazing form – we are a genuinely good team. But perhaps its our defence that has been the biggest improvement, helped no doubt by Coq, but having our central main partnership has been a BIG advantage-
Right now- we can play ANYONE and know we have a chance of winning – I haven’t felt that for a while if Im honest. We also have a bigger better squad than we’ve had in a decade (maybe longer)
We have more steel, more determination, defending all over the pitch, in short our group mentality has been vastly improved!!!
Right now I think we are a top 3 team. But to win it (prob not this year) I still say we need one true world class striker. Our options are good, but a top top striker can win games when we have no right too – every GREAT team in the world has an amazing striker
We need one too!
PS: Great to hear my old school buddy bigging up the Arsenal again 🙂
The squad deep is there.
The competition is there as well.
One major and underrated factor is the adjustments by wenger, both in selection (base on capability) and tactics (base on games).
As much as I love Coquelin, I think it would be a mistake to not get a Top DM in the summer. To rely on Arteta, Flamini, diaby, Bielik would be dangerous if Coquelin is injured
Arteta deserves another year but his quality has deteriorated slightly
Flamini, honestly, should leave in the Summer
Diaby, who I do feel sorry for, is always injured and releasing him would free up wages.
Bielik, who could be WC in future, is still very young and only has a handful of first team starts under his belt.
Coquelin has been probably the biggest and nicest surprise this season but needs competition to keep him on his toes.
Agree, Chelsea see a big drop off in performance when there is no Matic and they are forced to play Mikel. Why haven’t Chelsea git decent back-up in a critical position? The problem for even the biggest clubs is to have replacements as good as the those they are replacing. The egos and demands of the top players means they will inevitably walk if they don’t get first team experience. Get a top 1st XI CDM in and Coq will want out, let Coq strut his stuff and carry on doing a great job then what big name will want to join on the bench.
Matic is the most passed player in the premiere leuage second is fabrigas. Don’t buy into the media hype he is overrated but he is a good improving player.chelsea defend from the attacking mids with most of there ball retention comming from hazard especially wich just proves how complete he is as a player.
I don’t think I said Matic is “overrated” but apologies if I misunderstood your response.
I actually thought Arteta looked good when he played this season. He looked fitter and faster. It seems the Sanchez effect had rubbed off on him as well.
Agree Twig – MA is a popular villain on here, most just comment on his mobility and see little else that is very good about his game. Most of our best games in the past 2 seasons have been with Arteta in the team. I think there are certain harder games where Coq is a better option but plenty of other games where Arteta will be fine. Happy to see him in the squad for another year and personally think he is the type of player/pro (together with TR) who could help out in the future in other non-playing roles at Arsenal.
Arteta has been poor this season he has kept his passing still quality but he averages the highest amount of fouls at arsenal along with yellows and only second to jack wilshire in tackle success rate.6.5/10
As much as we like to give flamini stick he has been a consistent 7/10 his passing is just as good as arteta 93%accuracy and he is younger and fitter.better tackling,decent arial battles and positioning.
Are you sure about that? Don’t know what stats you are looking at but both MF and JW are miles ahead of MA in terms of YCs, ill-discipline and errors. Flamini has a physical edge on MA in terms of tackles, duels etc but not significantly so. In terms of possession, successful passes, pass completion and errors he is not in the same class. MF is a trier I’ll give him that but little by way of composure and intelligence.
Agreed on all points. My only worry with Coquelin is a cynical one. He’s out of contract and this is his chance for a big payday. Nothing personal against him, I’ve just seen it happen too many times in too many sports. Hopefully the dramatic change is simply do to maturity and opportunity but I would feel better going into next season with another top DM.
BTW Ray was one of our unsung hereos. I remember goals he scored and always appreciate his comments.
I am very glad to see many on this site appreciating our team for a change. This is indeed very good. I have known of our strong squad for sometime now. As a matter of fact I predicted an Arsenal win against Man city recently in soccernet.com when no single pundit gave Arsenal a chance. I revelled in my good prediction after the win. What has perhaps been a problem with many sports writers especially the football ones is lack of in-depth analysis and assessment. Many writers are swayed by money spent on players and the wages paid rather than looking at the quality of players. Some people had taken to bashing Arsenal and its manager so often that it has now become their mission! It is as if to be a good pundit or sports writer you must bash Arsenal and praise Mourinho for whatever he does. Unfortunately many of our fans fell for this cheap ruse including this and other websites. Fortunately some of us refused to be used by our detractors against ourselves. This is the main reason I am happy that at last many of us can appreciate what our team is doing and what it is capable of.
I think Wilshere should be sent out on loan next season.
And then he will have a monster game against Monaco and everyone will scream to field him week in week out.
And again he will miss some sitters like against Chelsea and Man U this season and we will again end up blaming Wenger and scapegoating Giroud.
We’re can we play him?He has been very poor this season he averages one of the highest foul rates in the squad and the lowest tackle succes rate.he has no end product and holds on to the ball two long
Am=sanchez>santi>ozil> Rosicky/wilshire/ramsey
Cm ramsey>santi>wilshire/Rosicky/diaby
Dm coqulan>flamini/arteta>ramsey>wilshire/chambers>beilek
This is based on this season performance so he isn’t good enough this year but he still has a future here.
injuries had us drop from 1rst to 4th last season. this season we had an injury problem with even more magnitude and people wonder why we weren’t doing well? it isn’t rocket science. just look at chelsea falter with o cesc and diego.
add wc hangover and new players trying to fit in a this is what you get.
still AW should have got more defensive cover. wake up guys not his entirely fault. we can still do a lot this season