PremierLeague

6th February 2016: Premier League Preview – Arsenal to face familiar A-foe-be

Posted on by TremendArse

Good evening. Arsenal face south-coast opposition for the second time inside a week when we travel to Bournemouth tomorrow afternoon, looking to secure our first Premier League win in five fixtures.

With Leicester City’s dream season continuing unabated as they beat Manchester City 3-1 at Etihad stadium earlier today to remain clear at the top of the table, we’re now eight points behind the Foxes, so the pressure on us to get back to winning ways in the Premier League has obviously been amplified.

But beat Bournemouth tomorrow and we have an opportunity to close that gap to just two points as early as next weekend, when we host Claudio Ranieri’s league leaders on Valentine’s Day and attempt to take some of the romance out of their surreal success story so far this season, along with the three points.

Standing in our way first though are the Cherries, who themselves have exceeded most people’s pre-season expectations and currently sit relatively comfortably in 15th place in the standings, five points above the relegation zone and with a game in hand over the teams below them.

One of their most in-form players at the moment is striker Benik Afobe, who of course came through the Arsenal youth ranks having joined our academy at just six years of age, before we eventually let him leave for Wolverhampton Wanderers in a reported £2 million transfer in January last year.

I remember Arsene Wenger describing Afobe as a ‘deadly finisher’, or something along those lines when he was still an Arsenal player, and after struggling for goals in several loan spells earlier in his career, he managed 19 from 30 appearances in a temporary spell at then League One side MK Dons in the first half of last season, leading to his switch to Wolves, where he continued his prolific form a division higher scoring 23 times in 48 appearances.

So it was unsurprising to see him back at a Premier League club so soon and he’s already managed three goals from his first four top-flight games for his new side since arriving last month, to suggest he’s more than capable of finding the net consistently at the highest level of the English game.

Some have recently criticized Arsene, saying he boobed big-time in letting Afobe leave without giving him a chance in the Arsenal first-team but I think that’s harsh and probably stems from being a little under-informed, given Afobe’s progress at the club was severely hampered by injury.

Also, as has been shown countless times in the past, timing, in terms of competition for places, often plays a big role in whether a young player gets a prolonged first-team chance at Arsenal or has to leave in search of regular football elsewhere. That’s something Arsene touched on when discussing his former player at yesterday’s press conference, when he said:

He (Afobe) was very young, he had big competition in front of him with Robin van Persie, and players like that, so I gave him authorisation to go somewhere and play, which he did. You educate people to influence their lives and give them success, that is what we do. When they do not manage to play for us, if they do it somewhere else we are of course very happy for them. Benik has done extremely well, even beyond the expectations of many people and that’s great, that’s down to him and congratulations to him. I think the best way to stop (him) being dangerous is for us to have the ball and dominate the game and being aware that Benik is quick, strong and has good movement in the box. We are used to facing these kind of strikers in the Premier League because in every single club there are top-quality strikers. That’s the same with Bournemouth.

I must admit I haven’t seen Afobe play much other than the odd highlight clip so can’t really comment on his best attributes with too much authority, but his goalscoring record speaks for itself and we’ll obviously need to keep him on a tight leash given his form. Especially when you throw the ‘ex factor’ into the equation, which will no doubt spur him on to try that little bit harder against the club that let him leave.

As far as our line-up  is concerned, I do wonder if Arsene might make a change or two seeing as we’ve failed to score in our last three league games. It may be a match to give Theo Walcott a return to the striker’s role for instance, with Olivier Giroud dropping to the bench. I mean, Theo’s clearly been out of form playing on the flanks in recent weeks but then Giroud’s hardly been banging them in for fun. A rest for the big Frenchman, and at the same time, a show of faith with a return to his favoured position for Walcott, could prove beneficial for both players in the long-run.

At the back I think we’ll see Per Mertesacker return at the expense of Gabriel to partner Laurent Koscielny after the German missed the FA Cup clash with Burnley through suspension and watched the Southampton game from the bench. Francis Coquelin starting alongside Aaron Ramsey in central midfield in place of Mathieu Flamini, is another very likely change in my opinion providing the former is now deemed completely match-fit.

The rest of the line-up should be largely unchanged from the Southampton game though, with Petr Cech in goal, our two Spanish fullbacks, Mesut Ozil and Alexis Sanchez all starting. But a bit like up front, I’ve a feeling Arsene might want to freshen up the right hand side of the attack, where we could see Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain come in for Joel Campbell for instance.

I wrote earlier this week that I don’t really like Ramsey in central midfield because of his unreliable distribution but given he’s hardly ever played in a two with Coquelin, the boss may want to give that combination a chance to prove it can work before trying something else, such as bringing in Mohamed Elneny or even handing Alex Iwobi a Premier League starting berth as a central midfielder.

By my recollection, Coquelin and Ramsey have only ever played as a partnership for 45 minutes this season – the first half of our opening-day defeat by West Ham – so even if many, myself included, aren’t convinced it can be effective, hopefully the doubters can be shown up as not knowing nearly as much as we think we do, and that duo will gel to form the midfield platform on which we go on to win things this season.

How I’d love to be proven wrong as Coquelin stealthily covers Ramsey’s goal-getting forward raids, Mesut picks up the Cazorla-less circulation slack and we function fluently as a team all the way to the Treble …

Whichever line-up Arsene opts for however, the objective is very simple: we need to win because a manageable gap could very quickly morph into an insurmountable one if we’re not careful.

Back post-match.

COYG!

5th February 2016: Wenger on Rosicky and Welbeck

Posted on by TremendArse

Hello and welcome back. Arsene Wenger held his pre-match press conference this morning and has revealed the latest team news ahead of Sunday’s trip to Bournemouth.

There was no update on Jack Wilshere or Santi Cazorla, who we already know won’t be back until March, but sadly, the boss did confirm Tomas Rosicky will be side-lined for another sustained period after suffering ‘a bad muscular injury’ against Burnley last weekend. He said:

It’s too early. The only thing we know is that it’s a bad muscular injury that will keep him (Rosicky) out for a long time. The good news is that he will apparently not need surgery as it is a partial rupture of his tendon but how long it takes, [whether] it is two months or three months, we don’t know. We are all shocked and he is the most shocked and we have to patient and hope that it is not his last game.

While an understandably emotional Rosicky himself spoke with Arsenal Player to express his shock at his latest injury set-back, praise the Arsenal fans for their support and defiantly vow that he won’t give up and will work hard to regain full fitness:

It (the reception from Arsenal fans) was unbelievable, something I didn’t expect. Since the moment I started to warm up on the sidelines it was exceptional. Honestly, I had tears in my eyes after such a long time being out. I started to warm up and the reception was unbelievable and I will never forget it. Obviously it is the worse thing (getting injured again) and the feeling I cannot give the fans anything back at the moment is frustrating. I was out for a long time so obviously the relationship with the fans after 10 years was always great and they always knew I played my heart out and they always appreciated me and I appreciated them. As I said it is heartbreaking I can’t give them anything back after the reception they prepared for me, but in life things will be thrown at you and you have to deal with it. You are defined by how you deal with these things and I will deal with it again and I will be back again.

It really is depressing and considering the the frequency and severity of the injuries he’s sustained over his Arsenal career, he joins Abou Diaby as somebody who had all the talent in the world but whose body simply would not let him showcase it to the world for any decent period of time.

I remember being very excited when Arsenal announced his signing back in 2006 as Robert Pires’ replacement after the Frenchman moved to Villarreal, because I’d seen him score a superb solo goal against us for Sparta Prague some years earlier at Highbury and had followed his progress closely as he moved to Germany with Borussia Dortmund and proved himself one of the Bundesliga’s best performers.

Then not long after he arrived at Arsenal, he produced that long-range stunner away to Hamburg, I think, in the Champions League and playing from the left of a midfield four also including Cesc Fabregas, Mathieu Flamini and Alexander Hleb, formed one of the best ‘footballing’ midfields I’ve ever seen at the club, which peaked during the 2007-2008 season when by my reckoning, we were the Premier League’s best team and would have won it but for, you guessed it, injuries.

With his contract up this coming summer, I think it’s safe to say we’ve seen the last of Tomas in an Arsenal shirt and a parting of the ways between club and player seems inevitable, just as with Diaby last summer. Hopefully he can get himself fit and enjoy at least a season or two at another club, perhaps back at Sparta, somewhere I think he’s spoken of wanting to return to in the past.

On a more positive note on the injury front, Danny Welbeck played for the under 21s earlier today as they beat Brighton, and speaking this morning before that game, Arsene revealed the striker ‘looks promising in training’:

He is playing today with the under-21s, for one half at least. I believe that he needs to play two or three games before thinking about coming back into the first team. We can organise games internally without being official games and I think in the next three weeks he should be available. He has not played for 10 months so we need to be patient with him. He has good basic fitness but after it is competitive decision-making and he needs to get used to that again. We are a bit relieved because with such an injury, you never know how a player will come back. But he looks promising in training.

With Theo Walcott struggling for form and the team struggling for goals at the moment, Welbeck’s return obviously cannot come soon enough. With a bit of luck – and a couple more behind-closed-doors matches – the former Man United man will be back in time to give us a boost for what will hopefully still be a chase for both the the Premier League and Champions League crowns, rather than simply securing a top four finish.

For now though, we go with who we have available and that means either Theo or Olivier Giroud up front. Speaking of selection dilemmas, I’ll be back playing Arsenal Manager and trying to predict Sunday’s team in my Bournemouth preview post tomorrow.

Until then.

3rd February 2016: Covering the absence of ‘Clockwork Cazorla’ needs urgent re-thinking

Posted on by TremendArse

Arsenal have a big, little problem. Santi Cazorla is injured, isn’t due back until late March and there isn’t a single player in our squad equipped to come anywhere near replacing the passing, vision and above all, intelligence, the diminutive Spaniard brings to the centre of our midfield.

After drawing 0-0 at home to Southampton last night, many will point to ‘chances created’ and ‘saves made by Fraser Forster’ stats, to suggest our main issues were poor finishing and fine opposition goalkeeping, but I think that would be highlighting temporary symptoms and failing to acknowledge the underlying cause of our recent malaise – we’re Santi-less.

Here’s what I wrote about Cazorla back in July, following a pre-season win over Everton in the Barclays Premier League Trophy in Asia:

As for Cazorla’s chipped assist from inside the centre circle, well, the vision and execution using his ‘weaker’ left foot was as majestic as his all-round display. We’ll have a real problem replacing Santi’s outstanding skillset when he does eventually depart, because for me there isn’t another player in our squad right now who can replicate his talents in the middle of the park – a velcroed virtuosity that has become vital to our performance and overall pattern of play this past year or so.

Before adding:

… Ozil fed Cazorla on the right following a short corner and having weighed up his options, the Spaniard decided to go it alone, twisting and turning to bamboozle the defending James McCarthy on the edge of the area before drilling home at the near post leaving the ‘keeper motionless. And Cazorla was at it again just four minutes later, exchanging passes with Mesut Ozil to allow the German to sidefoot emphatically into the net for three nil, making it two assists and a goal for Arsenal’s captain on the day. I would tie him to as long a deal as possible as he shows no sign of being debilitated by age.

If Petr Cech permeates a sense of calm from between the sticks that has a positive effect on our defenders in front of him, then Cazorla’ s coolness under pressure, quick-thinking and precise circulation of the ball gives the team fluency, helps us to maintain better shape and regulates the team’s rhythm, more so than any other player, in any other position in the side. More so than Mesut, even.

That cock-sure conviction of Cazorla’s spreads throughout the team in my opinion, and crucially, to our forwards when presented with a goal-scoring chance, because the build-up play often sets the tone and temperament of the move’s finale.

Our finishing last night, exactly like the rest of our play from the back four to up front, was erratic and rushed, rather than cold and calculated like clockwork, as it has been ever since Santi was re-stationed to the middle just over a year ago and he produced that phenomenal individual performance at Etihad stadium as we beat Manchester City 2-0 in January 2015.

Theo Walcott seems to be the go-to-guy to vent frustration at for the stalemate with Southampton and on the one hand hand, I understand completely why. His contribution from the bench after replacing Joel Campbell was far too peripheral and he fluffed probably our best chance of the game in all-too-typical Feo-style.

On the other hand though, he provided a decent cross from which Alexis Sanchez headed goal-wards, and also found Ozil with a low pass across the edge of Saints’ penalty area before the German’s one-two with Sanchez nearly led to a goal. Overall though, I agree whole-heartedly with those that say Theo’s all-round game just isn’t good enough for him to function to the requisite standard on the flanks, so he either plays as the striker or not at all.

But the player whose display makes me want to scream in frustration and bewilderment isn’t Walcott, or even the past-it Mathieu Flamini, who kind of tempers his dreadful on-the-ball ability by making one or two important tackles, interceptions or clearances a game.

No, it’s Aaron Ramsey, who in my opinion, cannot pass the ball anywhere near well enough to be playing centrally for us if we want to be a team that controls possession. If we decide to sit back and adopt a contain and counter stlye-of-play, it might suit the Welshman more, but not in the current set-up.

I much prefer him playing from the right when he isn’t tasked with dictating our play and can instead provide energy going both ways on the flank and drift infield to provide a goal-threat. That way, he’s much less a passer and gets afforded the time he needs to bring the ball under control and decide what to do with it because he too, like Walcott, needs longer than quicker-witted and more naturally gifted footballers, like Cazorla.

So what do we do moving forward? Your guess is as good as mine but it’s Arsene Wenger’s job to find a solution. As far as I’m concerned, we either reconfigure our style or try something new like playing Ozil alongside Coquelin in the deeper midfield role or even throwing Alex Iwobi into Premier League action because I’m struggling to find more reliable passers in our squad, in the continued absences of Cazorla and Jack Wilshere. Maybe Mohamed Elneny is the best available man for the job, but judging by his debut, he needs time to acclimatize to the pace of the English game and build confidence.

All that said however, we can of course still get good results without Cazorla, as we showed with four straight wins in all competitions following his injury at Norwich at the end of November, it’s just that we’re not as consistent in our play and that’s reflected in our more recent run of form. Also, the up-coming Barcelona double-header really worries me without Santi playing, because of just how important the rare phases of possession against the Catalans can be if we’re to have a chance against them.

As it stands domestically though, we’re down to fourth in the table but as I’ve said all season, just two shy of my tip for the crown in Man City, which means we remain firmly in contention. Leicester are a further three ahead and that makes our situation look worse obviously, as they continue to play well and win their games. But surely the most most surprising story in Premier League history, in terms of a title challenge, will find a more expected conclusion and they’ll drop away from the top a little. Won’t they?

If the Foxes win their next two at City and against us at Emirates stadium, I might change my tune but I think Leicester’s is a bubble long-overdue a bursting. As for that lot down the Seven Sisters Road, they might be flying high and getting giddy at edging us on goal difference right now, but let’s see how they fare when Europa League football returns and it’s ‘spiral’ time. Their new Jermaine Jenas – Dele Alli – may be on fire but always remember one thing: Tottenham are sh*t.

Until tomorrow.

2nd February 2016: Premier League Preview – Southampton at home

Posted on by TremendArse

Evening all. So we resume our chase for the Premier League title when we welcome Southampton to Emirates stadium in a couple of hours’ time and after a poor January points-wise, a win tonight has become all the more important.

We secured just five points from four league games last month; losing to Chelsea, drawing at Liverpool and Stoke, and managing only to take all three points from our home game against Newcastle.

And after playing the Saints, we travel to Bournemouth before hosting league-leaders Leicester City in our other two Premier League games in February – far from an easing-looking fixture-list, but one Arsene Wenger says he feels confident in tackling:

The [coming weeks] can be pivotal but not decisive. They will give a clear indication of the strength of the teams and who can cope with the importance of the games. At the end of the day somebody will win and the team who will win has to go through the important games with strong performances. It’s a big month for us. I am quite confident, having everybody available, that we can do very well. What is important now is for us to be capable of focusing and coping with that kind of expectation level. I don’t feel that we have really struggled recently because we had two difficult away games with Stoke and Liverpool and we didn’t lose. We had a bad result against Chelsea and of course, if you put the three results together, it looks like we’ve struggled but overall the Chelsea result is under special circumstances. If you take the history of our season, we started with a defeat against West Ham and the way we responded and where we are today shows that this team has the capability of responding under pressure. I’m sure that we will show that in February.

Hopefully starting tonight. We owe Southampton a beating after they won 4-0 the last time the two sides met on Boxing Day, but if I remember correctly, this fixture last season was a very close contest and it took us 88 minutes or so to score the only goal of the game through Alexis Sanchez.

To be honest, I’d be happy to win by a similarly slender score-line tonight and Arsene says his team are eager to put right that big loss at St Mary’s in December by producing a ‘strong performance’:

They gave us a tough game last time and we have to put that right. It is a very important time in the season as we go into big, big games and have 13 matches to go. They were dominant in the challenges and the duels. We just came out of a very tough game at Man City, and maybe didn’t have the urgency to cope with that. We were a bit unlucky with three goals on the decisions of the referee as well. The message [this time] is that we play at home and we want to put things right and put a strong performance in because the strength we show at home now in the remaining games can be decisive. The defeat against Chelsea was very unlucky, because our performance was right – it was not a Southampton performance. Our performance, our energy level, our commitment and the quality of what we did was very good. It is an encouragement. Sometimes you have to raise a little bit above the result and keep the positives. In that game there were a lot of positives.

Which is right. In the loss to Southampton we simply weren’t at the races and were soundly beaten by the better team on the day, whereas against Chelsea, the early dismissal of Per Mertesacker and our subsequent display with a man less shouldn’t have affected us confidence-wise.

In terms of the team tonight, I’m guessing Mertesacker will return in place of Gabriel having served his one-match ban for that red card against Chelsea, but at the same time wouldn’t be surprised to see Laurent Koscielny given a breather with the Brazilian starting alongside Per instead.

Further forward, Aaron Ramsey should partner Francis Coquelin in midfield, Mesut Ozil will surely start ahead of them, as will Sanchez on the left, but the right flank and up front remain a little more uncertain now that we have increased personnel options.

Personally I’d go with Joel Campbell on the right and Olivier Giroud up top but the boss could conceivably select Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Theo Walcott in those positions respectively. We’ll see.

Right, not long until kick-off now and the line-ups should be announced soon so I’ll leave it there.

Back on Wednesday.

COYG!

27th January 2016: Bellerin on Barca + Iwobi on working hard to wow Wenger

Posted on by TremendArse

Evening all. A very quick post today because Arsenal-related news is as scarce out there at the moment as goals at Old Trafford this season.

Luckily then, Hector Bellerin, our brilliant Cockney Catalan right-back, has been discussing a variety of subjects with Amuse, including how he feels about Arsenal’s upcoming Champions League encounters with his former club Barcelona. He said:

Excited. My family as well! I played for Barcelona for eight years, so it’s a massive thing for me and my family, who have been watching me since I was young. The day the draw was announced I started getting texts and calls from everyone. It’s crazy how a game moves so many people. We’re very excited – it’s going to be a hard game, but if we did it against Bayern, then we can do it against Barcelona. We have a great team mentality and our confidence is very high, so we fancy anyone at the moment.

This interview was conducted after we’d just drawn away at Stoke in the the league but there’s no reason why the team’s mentality or confidence should be much different now, despite our loss to Chelsea since then. Because a) Diego Costa cheated again and b) losing by a single goal having had to play most of the match with a numerical disadvantage shouldn’t knock anybody’s confidence – the opposite ought to be true.

All of which is to say I agree with Hector – we should approach the Barcelona games with confidence and belief that we can emerge victors. In my opinion, they remain the best team in Europe with everyone one fit, but we’re capable of beating the best, as we’ve proved a number of times in the recent past by grabbing wins over the likes of Barca themselves, and as Bellerin points out, Bayern Munich, who unlike the Catalans, we’ve now managed to defeat both at Emirates stadium and in Germany.

That tie is still about a month away though so moving on and another young Arsenal star, Alex Iwobi, has been speaking about his fledgling career, this time with Arsenal Player, saying:

I grew up in a footballing environment. My dad, my uncle and my whole family loves football. I played with a local team with Chuba Akpom so I grew up with a footballing life. I see it helps me [to be related to Jay-Jay Okocha] and it gives me guidance, [it shows] what I need to work on and what I need advice on so it has helped me over the years. I don’t see it as pressure [to be related to him] but he is someone I look up to as motivation as I try to be better than him. I had a few doubts when I was younger, especially when I was 13 to 14 years old. I was questioning whether I was good enough at that age as I… had to work on a few things. I didn’t let it get to me but I stayed focused and try to prove to them why I should get another contract. It is very hard. You need to train well every day and you have to be in the boss’ eye and his mind all the time so that is what I’m trying to do all the time. I was just hoping to go out and learn but to play for Arsenal’s first team means so much [to me] because when I play I think about all I have done to get to where I am and I feel so happy to do it. I had a few chances like against Swansea where I came on and against Bayern Munich. I got to play 90 minutes against Sheffield Wednesday. I got a few chances and now I’m hoping to get some more. I don’t know what to expect nowadays but playing at the Allianz Arena with the world’s best players was just crazy. I’m taking it as it comes. You have to always be prepared as you never know when that chance will come.

Despite playing out wide for our academy teams and in the Emirates Cup last summer, the club have been experimenting with Iwobi as a central midfielder, culminating in him making his first competitive start in an Arsenal shirt in that position in the FA Cup against Sunderland recently.

The fact he played so well against he Black Cats bodes well for the future and with so much competition at the club, his versatility might prove crucial if he’s to carve out a long-term career at the club. Good luck to him and I’ve really liked what I’ve see from him the few times I’ve seen him play so far.

Right, I think I’ll leave it there for today.

Back tomorrow.

26th January 2016: Koscielny on Giroud, Giroud on Giroud + my opinion of Wellington Silva

Posted on by TremendArse

Man it’s windy where I am today. The snow-storm that caused so much damage to the east coast of the United States has arrived in London, minus the snow, but bringing blustery conditions that seem to to have set off every car alarm within a 10-mile radius of me. Soooooooo annoying.

Not as annoying as Diego Costa’s face, and constant cheating, mind, but then who or what is? Certainly not Olivier Giroud, as far as his compatriot Laurent Koscielny’s concerned anyway – quite the opposite in fact. Laurent has been raving about the striker’s qualities, saying Giroud is ‘the best’ when he keeps his game simple. He told Arsenal Player:

When he plays simple, he’s the best. He’s tall, he’s big and when you try to find him, he keeps the ball. No defender can pass him. He’s so massive and that’s one of the best qualities for a striker. When he can play like this, with one or two touches and staying in the box – which is where we want him – we can score in the air. I think Olivier has a work rate for the team which is very high. He’s not just a forward, he’s always there [when we have] free-kicks or corners against us. He’s the first guy who tries to head the ball. It’s important that he can give assists too. You can see now that he smells the situations well – when he needs to shoot quickly, or control the ball, like he did against Liverpool with his second goal. I think he’s in good form this season and I hope he will stay in that form until the end of the season.

High praise indeed and given his contribution to Arsenal’s cause not just this season, but since he arrived at the club from Montpellier in 2012, Giroud deserves it. He’ll never be quick, a nifty dribbler, or, flicks aside, be able to combine at speed with team-mates in tight spaces, but he does possess pretty much every other attribute you’d want in a forward.

He’s a big, strong, scores goals for us at a rate of just under 1 every 2 appearances, is great in the air in both boxes, helps to release pressure on our defence by holding the ball up, works his socks off and, at times, has a great first touch. All that said, I’d still like a more mobile forward if not to replace Giroud, at least share the sole-striker’s role with him, because there are games where Giroud’s ineffective and a a different style of player at the tip of our attack is needed.

And Giroud himself has also been speaking with Arsenal Player, explaining that having to work his way up through the lower leagues in French football has been the making of him as a top-level professional footballer. He said:

It is harder to get noticed when you come from a small club but it’s all about playing and when you don’t get your chance, you need to go to another club to get enough playing time. I succeeded in doing that on loan and I always used to score goals. Afterwards I succeeded step by step to play better and better and reach my level today. I definitely feel tougher because the beginning of my career was different to than if I played for Marseille, PSG or Lyon. When you have to face difficulties it always helps you in the future when you have to be strong and have to face your responsibilities. It definitely helped me in my career and that’s why I can say that I am tougher today. I thought I could play at this level when I played for Montpellier and won the league. I wanted to reach this level then and today I am proud of that. I don’t want to stop here and I always want more because when all this stops I don’t want to regret anything. I really want to give everything to my limit.

As I mentioned earlier, if there’s one thing Giroud doesn’t lack it’s a world class work ethic, and that has to be the foundation for any player, whether they’re as naturally gifted as Wellington Silva, or more modestly talented with a ball at their feet like say, Mathieu Flamini.

Speaking of our Brazilian winger, having just turned 23 and returned from a two-month injury layoff with a torn hamstring, he’s wowing Bolton fans with his ability and work-rate in equal measure. The alleged past problems with professionalism that appear to taint his reputation in the minds of so many simply don’t exist anymore, if they ever even did to any alarming extent.

As far as I’m concerned, he’s an outrageously skillful footballer who luckily for us, is also a team player like compatriot Neymar, knowing when to pass and when to go it alone, rather than an over-the-top and largely ineffective show pony like Adel Taarabt or Yannick Bolasie, who perform step-overs for fun but rarely tap into their team’s pattern-of-play with any meaningful consistency.

A friend of mine recently asked why Bolton were doing so badly in the Championship at the moment if Wellington was as good as I believe he is, and my answer was simple: he’s amazing but his team-mates aren’t and he’s a footballer – not Superman. Put him alongside better team-mates on a similar wave-length, playing on better surfaces, and I’m confident he’ll confirm his class with goals, assists and overall performances.

It’s a bold prediction but I’ll make it anyway: I think Wellington will prove himself a better winger than any player we currently have who can play wide with the exception of Alexis Sanchez. He may even be suitable more centrally, either in the number 10 role or up front, given a chance.

If you haven’t guessed, I can’t wait to see him pull on the red and white and if we end up selling him before he’s given a chance like so many expect us to, I’d be amazed and devastated, because I think he has the sort of potential that is very rare, even for a Brazilian. Thankfully then, it seems Arsene Wenger rates him as highly as I do, so it’s likely he’ll get his chance at some stage fairly soon – hopefully next season.

See you tomorrow.

 

25th January 2016: Last-man rule + reaction to Chelsea loss

Posted on by TremendArse

Welcome back. I’ll start by pointing out that I don’t really feel like discussing yesterday’s game against Chelsea because it was highly annoying, hugely frustrating and f*cking boring to be honest, after the contest was cruelly corroded by the dismissal of Per Mertesacker after just 18 minutes.

I’d been looking forward to this fixture for quite some time too, but the game was ruined by that early red card and it got me thinking about the rule that ensures a player is sent off if he’s the last defender and commits a foul. People have suggested that when such an incident takes place in the box, the combined punishment of a red card and the concession of a penalty is too severe on the offending player and team.

So (and I’ll admit I wouldn’t be talking about this if the shoe was on the other foot yesterday), rather than dismissing a player, would a more suitable punishment not be a yellow card and a penalty conceded, even if the foul takes place outside of the box? I mean, Per denied Diego Costa a goal-scoring opportunity (if you pretend he actually made contact with the cheating striker) right? A penalty would give him that opportunity back and karmic balance would be restored.

And crucially, the match wouldn’t be ruined for the watching world. Anyway, just a thought, but it’s something that’s bugged me about the rules ever-since Jens Lehmann in Paris against Barcelona in what what the biggest game in our history, even if that particular incident was slightly different, with the ‘keeper committing the offence.

Seeing as I’ve ended up talking about our latest defeat to that despicable lot though, I may as well take a look at some of the reaction from Arsene Wenger and a couple of the players. First up it’s the boss who expressed his frustration at how the game turned out when he spoke to Arsenal Player:

It was disappointing as we couldn’t really play with our real team for 90 minutes. I was very disappointed because in recent games we have lost we have had really harsh decisions against us [like] at Southampton and today. We had such high expectations today. To lose the game the way we did is really frustrating today and difficult to accept. The difficulty was that we went straight away down at 1-0 and we had to attack without being at 0-0 which means you expose yourself at 10 men, but what can you do? I think we had a good attitude and fantastic spirit despite the negative result today, I think we should come out [of this] with even more belief.

Meanwhile, Hector Bellerin gave his take on the game, stressed the squad will not dwell on the defeat and instead look to get straight back to winning ways in our next game:

It is difficult because [even though we were] playing with 10 men we thought in the second half that we wouldn’t give up, and we had some chances to get a better score. It couldn’t be done and it was a bit unlucky on our part. We need to keep our heads up and move onto the next game. We can’t just be thinking about the result today. We need to focus on the next game and it does not matter about the trend, we are not thinking about that. We are just thinking about winning and getting ahead. We always think of it. We take it game by game and when it comes to May we will see where we are.

And finally, the thoughts of Petr Cech, who feels despite the obvious disadvantage of having had to play with a man less for most of the match, we played well and could easily have snatched an unlikely point. He said:

We are disappointed because we lost a game at home. We wanted to compete, we wanted to take advantage of playing at home, but unfortunately the decisive moment came quite early on in the game. Unfortunately Chelsea took advantage of that and scored. From there, they tried to control the game and playing 11 against 10 for 70 minutes is always an advantage [for Chelsea]. I thought that, even with 10 men, we came back very strongly in the second half. We could have actually scored the equaliser but we were missing a little bit of the last touch inside the box and around the box. There were always moments where we almost got there, but we didn’t find a real opportunity to put the ball in the net.

Right, I really, really don’t want to talk about or discuss that game anymore. It’s done, dusted and we need to move on.

Danny Welbeck should resume full training tomorrow, Francis Coquelin is already back in full training and we’re just three points off the top of the table. We’ve given ourselves a great platform from which we can make this a season to remember for the right reasons, rather than yet another that promised much but delivered little. It’s in our hands.

Back on Tuesday.

24th January 2016: Ten-man Arsenal beaten by Chelsea

Posted on by TremendArse

So our Chelsea hoodoo continued this afternoon after Per Mertesacker was sent off just 18 minutes into the contest and Diego Costa scored the only goal of the game five minutes later to secure all three points for the Blues at Emirates stadium.

If I’m honest, after conceding the goal having just been reduced to ten men, I was seriously concerned about us potentially getting a battering. So considering how the rest of the match played out, I was pretty pleased with the overall team effort, if not the performance of individuals.

Theo Walcott has taken a lot of flak online from what I’ve seen, and rightly so in my opinion, but he was far from alone in playing badly. I thought Aaron Ramsey, for example, was very, very poor in the middle of the park and his display again underlined just how much we miss Santi Cazorla’s distribution and game-running capabilities in that position.

Mathieu Flamini was just, well, Mathieu Flamini, and I don’t expect much more from him, but I do expect Ramsey to be able to find a team-mate with a pass every now and again and to not get caught in possession every time he receives the ball, as he seemed to today.

At the back, Laurent Koscielny had a poor start to the game but I think that can be put down to nerves and I thought he got better as the game wore on. Meanwhile, his partner Per reminded us why opponents like assigning even remotely mobile attackers to play off of his shoulder, by reacting to a through ball played past him in what seemed like slow-mo speed.

Unsurprisingly, the German defender only succeeded in getting himself sent off after sliding for a ball he was never going to reach – especially after he disorientated himself at the last second by looking to see if he’d be saved by an offside flag – and Costa took full advantage, hitting the deck and rolling around like the big feigning f*cktard he is.

As for the fullbacks, Nacho Monreal could have done more to close down the cross that led to their goal and Hector Bellerin was steady and tried hard but with our team looking disjointed and lacking any kind of fluency, he wasn’t as effective raiding forward as he usually is.

In truth, when you’re reduced to ten men so early in a game, especially against quality opposition like today, it’s an almost impossible task to take anything from the game and if you avoid doing serious damage to your goal difference, it’s a big plus. And that’s what we can cling to today if nothing else. As I said earlier, we might have been beaten by three or four goals and that would also have been a much bigger blow to our confidence than the narrow defeat we ended up with.

As it is, I think the squad should be able to compartmentalize this game for what it was; another defeat to Chelsea yes, but also the second one this season against them where we’ve had at least one man less for a large portion of the game.

On the bright side, we’re still level on points with Manchester City, we’re getting players back fit and with the FA Cup next weekend, we now have nine days to get our team balance right before we resume our title chase by entertaining Southampton a week on Tuesday.

One final point on today’s game before I go though, and it’s about the apparently widespread disillusionment over Olivier Giroud being the man to make way for Gabriel after Mertesacker was sent off. Personally, I called that switch and still think it was the right one.

Arsene decided we’d need pace out wide to best implement the counter-attacking game-plan we’d be forced to adopt with a man less, and although he could have taken off Walcott or Campbell and moved Ozil wide, taking Giroud off allowed us to keep Ozil in a free-ish role in the middle of the park, which I think was hugely responsible for us enjoying as much possession as we did in the end, and keeping ourselves firmly in reach of a draw right until the end.

Until tomorrow.

23rd January 2016: Premier League Preview – Can we record a rare win over Chelsea?

Posted on by TremendArse

Evening all. We welcome Chelsea to Emirates stadium tomorrow aiming to secure our first league win over the Blues since October 2011, as well as reclaim top spot in the table after Leicester beat Stoke this afternoon to leapfrog above us.

On that occasion at Stamford Bridge, some Dutch striker bagged a hat-trick for us, John Terry reproduced his Moscow special by slipping on his a*se, and even our fattest ever player – Andre Santos – got in on the act by helping himself to a goal.

But our last league win over Chelsea on home soil was in December 2010, when goals by Alex Song, some Spanish midfielder and Theo Walcott helped us to a 3-1 success over the then Double holders. Chelsea go into tomorrow’s game as kind of double holders again, having won the Premier League and League Cup last season, so perhaps that’ll prove a good omen for us. It’s been too long since we turned them over in the Premier League, so hopefully tomorrows’s the day we set that wretched record right.

Speaking of which, Arsene Wenger says that much like our wins over other rivals such as as the two Manchester clubs this season, taking three points from Chelsea would suggest his team are progressing nicely in terms of performing in the ‘bigger’ games:

It is another one where we can show we have moved forward. It is another game where people look at us and see how we behave because, even if Chelsea are not in the best position, you look at their squad. It is a big game because of the quality of players on the pitch and it has a big importance to us because we play at Emirates Stadium and we know it will be important to win these types of games. We have certainly proved our battling potential [this season] through big solidarity, through great togetherness and as well because we are ambitious and we have more experience than in the past. One of the advantages of having experienced players is that they know that sometimes it’s just about battling and not always only about playing well.

As for how we’ll line-up tomorrow afternoon, Mesut Ozil will no doubt replace Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain from last weekend’s starting selection at Stoke, but then it gets a little more uncertain, depending on the availability of Alexis Sanchez. If the Chilean is deemed fit to start, any one of Theo Walcott, Joel Campbell or Olivier Giroud could conceivably make way for him. Sanchez for Walcott would be a straight swap, Sanchez for Campbell would mean Theo switching flanks to the right and Sanchez for Giroud would mean Walcott upfront.

Personally, I’m not sure what I’d go with if I was picking the team. I think if it’s a choice between Walcott and Campbell based on recent form it has to the Costa Rican who gets the nod. On the other hand, Theo has a good goal-scoring record against Chelsea. Dropping Giroud to play Walcott would be more than a little harsh on the Frenchman, who’s been in fine form recently, but Walcott running off of Terry’s shoulder is also a very exciting prospect.

Elsewhere though, you’d imagine we’ll be unchanged, unless Mohamed Elneny’s showed in training that he’s ready to replace Mathieu Flamini, or Arsene Wenger wants Gabriel on the pitch to counteract Diego Costa’s nastiness with some Brazilian aggression of his own, and gives Per Mertesacker a little rest. I doubt it though.

On a personal level, and against my better judgement, I’ll be watching the game with two Chelsea-supporting ‘friends’, who decided to get the ‘banter’ going a day early by texting me pics like Wayne Bridge celebrating his winner at Highbury in the Champions League quarters in 2004, Cashley Cole lifting the European Cup and also one of Arsene when he tripped and fell at a train station on the way home from an away game.

Now, I could have reminded them about the fact we’ve been English champions on 13 occasions compared to their pitiful five triumphs and such like, but I found the following, which I think, although slightly out-of-date, sums our opponents up more succinctly in the closing paragraph than I ever could:

Back post-match.

COME ON ARSENAL !

22nd January 2016: Elneny endears and promises endeavour

Posted on by TremendArse

Happy Friday folks. I’ll start today with our new signing Mohamed Elneny, who has been speaking with Arsenal Player about his move to the Gunners and the Premier League.

Encouragingly, the Egyptian midfielder sounds like he’s got his feet firmly on the ground, is eager to improve and impress, and endeared himself to Gooners everywhere by labeling his new club ‘the best team in the Premier League’. He said:

I expect it to be a massive shift in my career and a big starting point. I would like to achieve a lot and prove to myself and everyone that I am capable of playing in the Premier League and any league around the world. Hopefully I can develop my skills more and more. I always work hard to develop all aspects of my skills to benefit the club I play for. As I mentioned before, Arsenal is a big club and I have to live up to this responsibility. That’s why I work hard to develop myself continuously. I can see that Arsenal are having one of their best seasons, that makes me very enthusiastic to play with the best team in the Premier League, both now and in the past. That is why I am very keen to accept this responsibility. I am very aware of this and I am well prepared for this task.

Having been an unused substitute for our game at Stoke last weekend, Elneny is of course yet to make his debut for Arsenal and it would have been nice to hear what Arsene thinks of his new recruit’s physical readiness for Premier League football. I mean, because of the winter break in Switzerland, Elneny hasn’t played a competitive game since early December.

Perhaps that might have been a better question for reporters to have put to Arsene at his press conference yesterday, rather than ‘are Chelsea specialists in failure?’. But of course, an update on Elneny’s match-fitness isn’t nearly as important to some sections of the press (Sky) as trying to instigate bad blood between Arsenal and Chelsea before they meet on Sunday.

Even if Elneny is ready to compete for a starting place though, my guess would be that the FA Cup game against Burnley next weekend might be deemed a better time to hand him his full debut by the boss, rather than in a high-pressure London derby. Then again, who knows? If he’s ready, he’s ready, and he could be our secret weapon to catch Chelsea’s midfield off-guard and run rings around the likes of John Obi Mikel and Nemanja Matic. We’ll see.

Moving on and as we prepare to play the first of three home games in our next four Premier League fixtures, Laurent Koscielny has been discussing the importance for taking maximum points at Emirates stadium if Arsenal are to be crowned champions. The defender told Arsenal Player:

If you want to win the Premier League, you need to win all your home games. Our seven away games will be very difficult because we play against Man City, Man United, Tottenham, West Ham, Everton, so we need to do the job well at home so we have the points. We take each game and we will see. We want to play and win all games. We are in a period where we play many different competitions, we play the Champions League, the FA Cup, Premier League. This weekend is an important game and next weekend too, because it is the FA Cup and we won it twice and we want to continue like this. In February March, we will have Champions League so we need to take it game by game and that’s it.

You obviously don’t have to win all your home games to win the title but you know what Koscielny means. We have difficult tests ahead away from home so winning all our games at Emirates stadium from now until the end of the season would obviously help our cause no end.

Back tomorrow with a preview.

Laters.