I went to a pub quiz last night and a mate asked me why I thought that, but if you think about how little margin you have for error in these group games, it kind of makes sense. You play three matches and normally if you pick up four points to six points you stand a chance of going through. Mexico, Poland and the Saudi’s probably all thought that Argentina would get nine and it would be a fight for that second place spot to get out of the group. Poland and Mexico probably thought that a win over the Saudi’s was basically a necessity because of the fact three teams were fighting for one spot. By beating Argentina yesterday, the Saudi’s have blown up the permutation rule book and as a result both Mexico and Poland probably knew that a draw for both isn’t the worst result in the world. That’s because if they draw with each other, both beat Saudi Arabia, then it comes down to picking up a point against the Argies to most likely qualify. If both teams get a draw against Argentina and beat the Saudi’s then both teams go through.

I’m not saying there was anything dodgy going on from a match fixing perspective, far from it, but tournament football feels like psychology as much as anything some times and this was a game in which both teams knew they didn’t want to lose, so a snoozefest was always going to be a possibility in that match.

And for those thinking “well, the Saudi’s could just go and do another upset”, I think that’s probably highly unlikely. They basically scored their two goals with their only two shots on target and had three in total in the entire game. If they get the same numbers against Poland and Mexico, they’d have to have the world’s luckiest charm stashed somewhere to pick up points based on performances like that and get through. But hey, let them have their moment, there will be celebrations in Saudi Arabia today and probably until they play next.

As for Argentina, there will be an inquest no doubt, but I heard that Emi Martinez has already found out why they lost that game yesterday. Apparently it was Arsenal’s fault, for letting him go and not giving him the number one jersey in September 2020, so that’s that mystery solved and the Argentinians can all move on with their lives. For them the path and aim is now abundantly clear; to win the World Cup they need to basically win every single match between now and the final. It can be done of course, as Spain showed in 2010 having lost to Switzerland in the opening game. So it can be done and part of me wonders whether this is the shock they Argentinians need to kick start their World Cup bid. Time will tell.

Elsewhere in the competition that is Arsenal-related, sort of, is the French game, in which Olivier Giroud has equalled Thierry Henry’s World Cup goal scoring record by notching two goals against Australia. I didn’t believe that and then I looked it up; Thierry got 51 in 123 appearances for France, but Ollie G has now notched 51 goals in 115. He’s done it in less than Henry did! That is some record and you have to give praise to him, but he’s an interesting case as a player because he feels a little like Welbeck to me, in that Danny Welbeck for a time had a phenomenal international goal scoring record, but  for The Arsenal and for United he never really translated those ratios to the Premier League or domestically. There’s also something in the fact that Giroud has never been a player reliant on any kind of pace whatsoever, so his longevity in terms of his playing days was always going to be more than some of his other compatriots. This season for AC Milan he’s on nine goals in 19 games so fair play to the man, he’s still doing it both domestically and internationally.

The real disappointment though will be with Wiliam Saliba, who didn’t play a single minute and I can only think that Deschamps hasn’t watched a single minute of The Arsenal play this season, because he’s arguably the best defender in the best team in the best league in the world right now, so how that shouldn’t translate to some minutes on the pitch, I don’t know. Hopefully Deschamps sees the error of his ways soon enough.

Today’s footballing instalment see’s Arsenal involvement down to just Takehiro Tomiyasu today, with Morocco vs Croatia, Germany vs Japan, Spain vs Costa Rica and Belgium up against Canada. I wonder if Japan can cause an upset against the Germans, but I’m expecting little else from the other games other than the favourite teams to win. It’d be funny to see the Spanish lose but I don’t see it happening to be honest.

The only other thing we need to watch out for is the next controversy that unfolds in this World Cup. Perhaps the Qatari’s will ban fizzy sports drinks being held in the right hand of spectators, although that’s ok if you have a ticket supplied by FIFA as a VIP. Or maybe they will force everybody to stand on one leg for one whole minute at halftime? Who knows. What I do know is that we’re now deep in to the football side of it and at least that is one positive to come out of this infernal competition.

Right, I’m done for the day, so I’m going to call a halt to proceeding’s and catch you all in the morrow.

Laters potatoes.

So of course today I’m going to be forensically analysing the fact that the world and wife have been talking about how Lacazette will be joining Lyon upon to ceasing of his Arsenal contract.

It’s not exactly sensational, left of field, out of the blue news in reality. But it does feel like a fairly standard move and given that Aulas the Lyon Chairman mentioned something along the lines of “we’re trying to sign him” a couple of months back, it seems like a deal that is pretty obviously going to happen.

And good luck to him. He’s come to The Arsenal, he’s seen out his five year deal and he’ll return to a club that he made his name at in France and will probably see his time out as he reaches the end of his career. Hopefully that happens and hopefully he is happy.

When I personally look back on his time at the club, it’ll feel like we went for the wrong guy, at the wrong time, if I’m being honest. Lacazette was a man who it felt like Wenger signed because we couldn’t get other players high on the list. He cost us over £50million and at that time and on the wages he joined on, you really are expecting a guy to bang a few 20+ goals a season during your spell at the club. His best season at The Arsenal came in 2018/19 and he scored 19 goals in 49 games in all competitions, 13 or which came in the Premier League.

So when I reflect on his time I don’t think it will be one I will say was overly successful. Let’s not forget we brought him to replace Olivier Giroud, who was more of a target man, link up play, but had no pace. Giroud has just bagged 14 goals for Milan this season in 38 games. In his best season he got 24 goals in 53 games for The Arsenal.

With Lacazette we got a smaller guy, but we thought – or at least I did – we were going to get a guy who could play as a playmaker and a finisher. At Lyon he wore the number 10 I think and he bagged a shedload of goals. I thought we were going to see a pacey goal scorer that could take us to the level that having a target man in Giroud could not. Yet as we draw to the end of Laca’s contract, those who appreciate the Frenchman say it has been his link up play and the fact he’s been so good for the other young players around, that have been some of his best attributes. I’m sorry, but that’s what we all said we needed an upgrade on Giroud for, so the fact that he exits us with people spinning that narrative only adds to my perception that overall this hasn’t really been a great deal for Arsenal.

Did I ever really know the real Lacazette though? What type of striker was he? Did Arsenal and Arsène ever really know either?

I’m not so sure, for the fact that we went out in the January after signing Lacazette and brought Auba in shows that actually I think Arsenal knew that he probably wasn’t ‘the guy’ and that’s why they brought Auba in. Aubameyang delivered exactly what we needed and as a result Lacazette’s time to me will essentially be remembered as him coming in on big wages, playing second fiddle to a better player (who scored 14 more goals than him in 32 matches less!), then departing back to France where he began his career and made his name.

The Lacazette deal also shows a cautionary tale, because if we get it wrong this summer in the striking position, we could be lumbered with an expensive asset that sets us back years. When we signed Lacazette we had cash in the bank to go out and get Auba within months. If we sign another non-scoring dud, I don’t think we’re dropping more big cash next January to correct it. So Edu and Arteta will be thinking very hard about who they bring in and if that is Gabriel Jesus, we all better hope and pray that he bangs at the club, because we need our striker to hit the ground running.

I guess that’s why all the talk is of players who know the Premier League inside and out and I for one am happy with that. Don’t get me wrong, if we go and get Osimhen from Napoli I’ll be thrilled, but his adaptation period needs to essentially be negligible, because if we fail to score goals in that position from the off in August, I don’t think we’re getting close to challenging for top four.

So whilst we all want juicy news about incomings you happen and happen soon, I am torn between wanting us to get somebody in straight away so they have the summer to acclimatise to The Arsenal, and getting in an oven-ready striker who will drop in to that cent reds l striking position and bang goals like he’s been at the club for a couple of years already. We have the foundations around any striker to give them the service they need; Ødegaard’s chance creation is high, Saka, Smith Rowe and Martinelli can all chip in with goals and assists, plus we have a stable base behind the attacking and creative players. We just need that jigsaw puzzle piece up top to hit form straight away and if that happens, we could be looking at exciting times ahead for The Arsenal.

I shall leave it there for today. It’s going to be a nice day and it’s my old man’s birthday, so I’ll celebrate it with him in the sun.

Have a good one.

I’ve woken up this morning feeling a little less pissed off than I was on Thursday night, then Friday, but that poor home draw is still frustrating me, so when I listened to Mikel’s press conference this morning and heard some of the usual dross for questions being trotted out, it hardly helped. For example being asked about a reaction from the players and saying he got it on Thursday night kind of triggered me at first, but then I think back to the game itself. We had the chances – Saka through on goal, Laca through on goal, Willian free kick off the post, etc – we just didn’t convert those attempts that the xG crowd would have been creaming themselves over given the positions on the pitch. So whilst I still think the reaction of the players wasn’t good enough – let’s not forget the first half seemingly played at walking pace by those Arsenal players – we did do more than enough to win the game.

But that’s the problem with this Arsenal team at the moment, isn’t it? Doing enough to win a game, not taking chances, then being idiots at the back, which gives the opposition a lifeline. Then I start to think about the enigma that is this Arsenal team. We have been poor for large chunk s of the seaosn, but from a goals conceded point of view we haven’t been as poor as I seem to feel like we have in my mind. We went through a period of games where we didn’t even concede a goal. Yet here we find ourselves having not kept a clean sheet in 15 matches! It’s both bizarre, frustrating, entirely predictable and yet so unpredictable.

I guess it is the embodiment of mid-table mediocrity though. From sublime to ridiculous game-by-game and sometimes, like the West Ham game, half-by-half.

A lot of the other questions he was asked in yesterday’s video conference call don’t really even warrant being discussed today though. Being asked about the importance of confidence in the players and what he can do to change that, or how Nicolas Pepe has been good coming off the bench, almost feel like “yep/nope” answers he could give. He did talk about converting chances and said that we aren’t going to get 15 in every game, more like four or five, so with that in mind I really hope he takes a good look at those that played up top on Thursday and realizes the folly of his decision making. I said it last night on the Same Old Arsenal podcast; I am not a fan of Alexandre Lacazette and lately I’ve been thinking about whether we’d have been better not picking him up for £52million, instead signing Auba either that summer or in the following January window, then we might have been much better off in terms of attacking balance.

In the discussion we had we talked about whether Lacazette was actually in fact an upgrade on Giroud and whilst I had certainly thought so when we signed and when in his first season he bagged 18 goals for us I thought that yes, he probably was. But the decline in his overall performances since that first season have been there for us all to see and when I then compared the two strikers’ goal and assist ratio’s, it did shock me actually. Did you know that Olivier Giroud has a better goals scored average than Lacazette? Giroud played 253 games for The Arsenal and got himself 105 goals. That’s an average of 0.42 goals per game. Lacazette? 61 goals in 163 games. That’s 0.37 goals per game. So in buying what we thought was a more natural finisher, but perhaps somebody who was better in the box and who would bag more goals as a better striker than Giroud who was slower and more of a target man, what we actually have is a guy who looks like he runs through treacle at the moment, who rarely seems fit enough to start 90 minutes, and who has under-performed his fellow Frenchman in the key metric where we thought he would better than him in.

That has really surprised me if I’m honest. We all knew Ollie G was slow, he missed chances, we needed an upgrade. But that upgrade – and I’m obviously talking with my Captain Hindsight glass one here – has simply not happened. Even if you wonder whether Giroud has stat-padded with penalties more than Lacazette, it turns out that they both have scored the same number of penalties as each other: seven.

What a bout assists though, because Lacazette is supposedly a guy who brings others in to play, right? Well, only just, because Lacazette has 28 in 163 games (0.17 assists per game) and Giroud had 41 in 253 (0.16 assists per game). If you multiply it out with Lacazette’s numbers to the number of games Giroud played for us, you get 43 assists in 253 games as a ratio.

That’s it. This striker we paid £52million for, who was supposed to be a better and elite upgrade, in fact has statistically provided us with an average ratio of just two assists more if you do the maths.

That simply isn’t good enough for the wages, the transfer fee, his time at the club. Olivier Giroud was bought for £12million, sold for £18million, was on less wages, produced a better goal ratio, was only just behind on his assist ratio, plus he provided a better target man than Lacazette. He was also – if you remember – half decent on defending corners.

The signing of Lacazette has, in my opinion, been a massive mistake and I think it shows another example of just how poor our recruitment has been in the last five years. That is a massive problem at our football club and this summer essentially needs to be flawless both incoming and outgoing if we are going to get anywhere near the objectives that Arsenal Football Club should have.

Some thoughts for you to ponder on a Saturday. Have a good one.

Anyone else have some slight regrets over the departure of Olivier Giroud?

After he exited in that January window we signed Aubameyang. I don’t think there was a single Arsenal fan who thought we now didn’t have an upgraded attack with Aubameyang joining and Lacazette with him. But as time has worn on, as Giroud has shown that he is a valuable and apparently evergreen option for Chelski, I can’t help but pine for him a little bit.

Not in the space of Aubameyang, mind, but certainly in the space of Lacazette. The club made the moves in the wrong order, in my opinion, that’s for sure. In that summer we signed Lacazette there were rumours that Aubameyang was available for around £75million. We ended paying £52.6million for Lacazette and then in the January we paid £56million for Aubameyang. We sold Giroud for £18million which makes a net spend of £90.6million. So in effect we’d have saved ourselves £15.6million and maybe that could have been reinvested in the team elsewhere.

Given what we’ve all seen from Lacazette and Giroud respectively, would it not have just have been better to cough up more for Auba in that summer and keep Giroud as a rotation option? He would certainly have got more game time, I’m sure would have been happy with his place and given that Auba and Laca have played a lot together in the same side, he too probably would have played even more football than at Chelski.

At his age we would also be able to justifiably been winding him down and we know that he would have got less games as Nketiah and maybe even Balogun get more time to shine.

Why am I bringing this all up though? Why am I playing the ‘hindsight’ card when all it serves to do is wind us all up? Well, it’s not just to highlight that he scored a great goal last night and has continued to be a very good asset for Chelski way into his mid-30s, but also that he’s such a different option that I think could have thrived better than Lacazette in the central position he is occupying, as well as the fact that we made some really shocking transfer decisions in the last five years. Terrible even.

The squad building of this Arsenal team has been nothing short of appalling in recent years and that is why – with Leeds winning last night – we slipped to 11th. It could get worse because on Saturday Wolves go to Newcastle who are in a dreadful run of form, Crystal Palace are at home to Fulham, who you’d expect them to beat, whilst we play Leicester. By Sunday night we could be in 13th and despite the fact that we’ve seen some better performances from this Arsenal team this side of Christmas, it is hard to look at the season so far and feel like progress has been made domestically in any way, shape or form.

I am not turning on Arteta. I want him to succeed and I hope he can. I have a belief that he is the right man, but in the cold light of day if we get to the 38 game part and we are 10th -14th in the league, it will be hard to look in isolation in that and say that he has had anything other than a failure of a season domestically.

It is why the Europa League is brought in to such sharp contrast and it is why tomorrow night’s game feels like it is season defining. In fact, every Europa League game we play before now and the end of the season will be season defining, because we have been nowhere good enough in the league and made a pretty average attempt at defending our domestic cup ambitions. Football can turn on a knife edged in terms of the context of a season and if Arteta wins the Europa League all will be forgotten. But that is a massive ask. That’s because teams who are still in the competition that I genuinely fear could beat us as they are potentially better than us include (in no particular order):

• Tottenham (you may laugh but they are still a good team and let’s not forget we haven’t beaten them in our last six matches)
• Ajax (not long ago finalists in this competition and in the semi final of the Champions League)
• Napoli (currently patchy form but are a big team and will be a very tough opponent)
• Hoffenheim (have become a bit of a mid table team this season, but currently sit in 11th just like us)
• Leicester (we play them on Sunday and have already lost to them this season. They are a better team than us right now)
• Villarreal (managed by Emery, who you just know will find his Europa League mojo when we play them)
• AC Milan (second in the Serie A table and with Zlatan still doing the business, this is a team I fear a lot more than most)
• Man United (again, like Leicester, they are above us in the table for a reason and whilst we have beaten them at Old Trafford, you don’t really want to go up against them again)
• Roma (fourth in Serie A and will again prove a really tough opponent to crack)
• Bayer Leverkusen (fifth in the Bundesliga and a side I would be wary about playing – feels like they are better than they are)
• Olympiakos (knocked us out last season, currently 4-2 up on PSV on aggregate).

So in the round of 16, if we were able to progress, there are 11 teams I would not ideally want to face. The odds are probably stacked in favour of another English team and with that we may not have to travel, but i’d have the feeling that we will be the underdogs to progress. Even if we did progress, you’d say the round of eight would probably have five or six of those teams above who have got there, so it looks like our route to the final will essentially be really tough opponents after really tough opponents.

That’s why I wonder how long it will be before all of the eggs get chucked in the Europa League basket and if Mikel will start a more widespread rotation in the League. If we win tomorrow night then I think it becomes a very real possibility.

Catch you all tomorrow.

Our confidence is on the floor. We have players missing like Partey and players like Willian and Xhaka who will probably play tonight and utterly stink the place out. The manager doesn’t seem willing to mix things up a bit and the result is that we get turgid performances after turgid performances as this creeping death of a season drags on.

Chelski will be – and should be – favourites for this game because they have the attacking talents on display to cause us real damage. They’ll have more of the ball, they’ll knock it around with confidence like Southampton did, just waiting for our mentally brittle players to collapse.

We will play a deep block and look to frustrate them. That’s all we’ve got as a game plan these days and the problem with it is that it means a team that has such a low conversion rate of chances will have hardly any chances they’ll create and it’ll most definitely be pain for us to watch.

If I was in Mikel’s shoes though, I’d make some bold decisions. I’d have Gabriel, Luiz and Holding in defence with Tierney and Bellerin as the wing backs. In the middle of the park I’d have Maitland-Niles for his energy and athleticism and partnering him I’d even think about Chambers. He did a good job in central midfield for Fulham and he could do the same sat in front of our back three for protection.

Then you’ve got three in front and if Aubameyang is fit then it should be him centre with Saka and Emile Smith-Rowe out wide and given a chance. I’d be surprised if Martinelli is fit enough to start, otherwise I’d have had him in there, but certainly I’d want him on from the bench at some stage.

Like I say, that line up would be a shift from what is expected and it also ensures those senior pros who are so painfully out of form do not get near the first XI. Let’s have some consequences for playing badly.

I can’t really make much of a case for us beating them, or even getting a point today, if I’m completely honest. They’re just better than us in most aspects of the park and coupled with our utterly wretched form and broken confidence, it just feels like this is going to be a long afternoon. We lost to them last Christmas at The Emirates but that result was one that we didn’t deserve and I weirdly came out of that game with lots of confidence and believe that we were going in the right direction with Mikel in charge. But defeat tonight will nowhere near fill me with the same hope and expectation. It’ll just be what feels like another nail in the coffin for Mikel Arteta’s managerial tenure at the club.

I hope that isn’t the case. I hope there can be some kind of a Christmas miracle. But it’s hope rather than expectation at this moment in time.

Chelski will hit us with pace, energy and movement and despite the fact that Chilwell and James are both injured, it is with the likes of Mount, Pulisic and Werner that we will have to be worried. Lampard could be tempted to give Giroud a start given that he loves a goal against us, but I think he opts for pace of Werner or Abraham rather than Giroud as the target man.

But I guess it depends on terms of game state. For example a game in which Arsenal deploy three central defenders and a low block might call for less pace and more aerial threat. If we contest the space in our defensive third then perhaps Chelski will need to get the ball out wide and get crossed into our box? That’s when Giroud comes into his own. So whilst Lampard has options that can flex his tactical muscle, we seem to have little else in choice other than to adopt this back three low block and hope it frustrates.

It’s a sad and sorry state of affairs that we’re approaching a game at home against a team who we should class as a rival, with a small team mentality of “I’d bite your hand off for a point” but that is where we are right now. We kind of just have to accept it.

It would be nice, though, if we could avoid anything stupid, so none of the following:

• Conceding a penalty
• Having a man sent off
• An injury to one of our key okayers
• A stupid own goal
• A gaping hole in our midfield for the entire game.

I think I’ll call it a day on that note. Let’s hope for some sort of Arsenal Christmas miracle later.

Catch you all tomorrow.

It was FA Cup final day.

2017 was the final of the FA Cup and we were there for the third time in three years. We were the joint most successful team in the competition having won the trophy in 2014 against Hull, then smashed Villa in 2015, only for Man United to draw level with us on FA Cup wins in 2016 with their 2-1 win over Pardew’s Crystal Palace. So what was to unfold on 27th May 2017 could either see us stuck with them on 12 wins each, or separate us by one.

I remember getting ready and thinking about all of the historic days I’d witnessed as an Arsenal fan and this was potentially going to be another one. But if you know me and follow my writing/social mediaring, you’ll know that I’m a bit of a pessimist when it comes to The Arsenal. That’s because it’s my defence mechanism. I can’t help it. It is me protecting myself from the disappointment because if that happens, if I’ve mentally prepared myself for it, then it doesn’t feel as much of a hammer blow.

That’s why – as I was cooking my breakfast bacon sarnie in the morning – remember texting some of the lads and asking them about their thoughts, whilst at the same time admitting I’m not confident but am hopeful. I remember messaging Dave Seager and telling him that I’d be arriving at JJ Moons near Kingsbury station – one stop up from Wembley Park tube – about 11.30am. I was so excited I just wanted to get there and start to soak up the atmosphere as soon as possible. Dave was going to get to me as soon as possible but he had a longer journey. Then as the day would start to unfold more and more friends would be filtering in to the pub.

And the drinking and the excitement began to build. Chelski were the opponents and they’d just been crowned champions. I wasn’t exactly optimistic. They’d got a very good, very efficient team under Antonio Conte and as we ticked closer to kick off I remember saying that for us it’s just an outside chance. After all, we were missing Gabriel, Koscielny was suspended due to his silly red card on the last game of the season against Everton, but even Mustafi wasn’t fit to play. Arsene had switched to three at the back to try to arrest our slump and the absolute carnage that was our leaking defence. We had to call on Mertesacker who’d barely played all season, Monreal who was a left back, then Rob Holding, who was our young and unproven centre half up against the threat that was Diego Costa. Costa had regularly been a thorn in our side and had also regularly had an ability to ‘get to’ our players, so not only was I worried that he’d be doing some Class A Sh*thousery today, but I also thought he’d probably have a goal or two in him against us.

So as I said I wasn’t exactly confident but I was hopeful and as we made our way to the famous ground that hope grew and grew as my alcohol intake had expanded too. I even went as far as to get myself a little online bet going, which I don’t always feel like I have the stomach for. But I found something with some sign up bonuses and thought I’d go for it.

And then it kicked off at 5.30pm. And all of my worries about our injuries, about how Chelski would dominate us, about how we’d be watching the game from behind our fingers, all disappeared.

I’ve seen us beat Southampton in the Cup final at Cardiff, I’ve seen us beat Hull in extra time, I’ve seen us smash Villa, but of all of the finals I’ve been in, this was the one game that I think we’d played the best football. We dominated from start to finish it felt like and in that balmy Wembley sunshine I saw an Arsenal team who stood up and delivered. Mertesacker was imperious in defence and alongside him Rob Holding had Costa in his pocket. Rob Holding! The kid! He’d stood up, decided this was his Gandalf ‘YOU SHALL NOT PASS’ moment and we were privileged enough that it was in that big game. And we’d gone ahead so early through Alexis Sanchez in the fourth minute, that it felt like we had a touch of destiny about us that day.

Of course Chelski being the team they were they wrestled back a goal despite being down to ten men as Moses had dived. Playing against ten men we were dominant, but that goal felt cruel because I thought we’d been the better team for most of the match and should have taken advantage of our numerical player advantage on the pitch. But we’re The Arsenal and we don’t do things the easy way.

It was a sucker punch in the 76th minute but the goal that Ramsey scored from that Giroud cross – right in front of us in the ground – probably meant that it felt all the sweeter. Our end erupted and as we saw out the game I just remember looking up to the sky and thanking the footballing gods for such a performance.

It was an amazing day. I stumbled home to The Management inebriated, but very happy with what had transpired. A memory that I will always cherish and even now, three years on, I sit here at my desk at home and tap away at my keyboard with a smile on my face.

Catch you people tomorrow.

I’ve seen one in my lifetime, witnessed three heartbreaking ones, so I’m very aware of our record in Europe and very aware that this game could end up being a painful night for us Gooners.

But this is what we live for. Cup finals, trophies, it’s what we all want to see every season and The Arsenal have certainly given us plenty of opportunities by getting to cup finals. Even if they lead to heartbreak like last seasons League Cup.

Chelski have won this competition and the European Cup in recent years and that was painful to watch, but if they win it tonight, it will be a double blow given it compounds our own misery. Which is why we really really need Unai Emery to sprinkle some of his magic Europa League dust on the game tonight. He’s the guy who won it three times in a row with Sevilla and did it against a Klopp flavoured Liverpool team. That can give us some cause for optimism because it should suggest he knows what it takes to at least get his side prepared in the best possible fashion.

But whilst preparation is key, execution is more vital, so all Arsenal fans have to hope that the players go out there and execute his game plan tonight.

It won’t be easy. Ramsey feels like a massive loss today and I hope that injury picked up in Naples doesn’t come back to bite us, because having him in the team sitting on Jorginho at the base of the Chelski midfield was a key component of the victory at home a few months back.

In that game we scored first, relatively early, and it feels like the same needs to happen today. Arsenal chasing a game is a very different psychological side to Arsenal in control of one by getting the early goal. In that game at The Emirates we let Chelski have the ball as soon as they were ahead. We let them pass themselves to death and the fact that we were two up meant we had a cushion. To win tonight it feels like we are going to need to have some form of replication in which we go ahead and ask them to break us down.

That in itself is also a worrying prospect because our defence is often an accident waiting to happen. In the game at The Emirates Emery went with a back four and a diamond formation. Yesterday as the journalists watched the players train on the pitch they said they saw Cech playing the ball out from the back in what was a back four. I’m not so sure Emery is going to go down that route tonight however. If we had Ramsey fit then I think certainly he would, but without him I’m just not sure who can be given detail on Jorginho. So I think Emery might go with a back three and wing backs again. I suspect that means Koscielny, Sokratis and Monreal, with Kolasinac and Maitland-Niles either side of them.

Midfield would then be Xhaka and Torreira and that leaves Özil, Aubameyang and Lacazette as the attacking players. And I really want Özil to step up and show us the player he is, not the player we’ve seen this season. I want precision passing, defence-splitting passing, passing the likes of which no other player can provide. We haven’t seen enough of that from Özil this season but we know he’s capable. It’s time he stepped up and showed that he can do it. And do it on the big stage in a cup final.

Chelski appear to have their own problems and with Hudson-Odoi, Loftus-Cheek, as well as Ruidiger injured for the final, they have to shuffle a bit I suspect. Lots of people are saying that Kante’s ‘injury’ is just mind games and we’ll see tonight if he starts, but David Ornstein isn’t one prone to hyperbole and he said that Kante was hobbling in the training session. If he’s missing that will be a blow for Chelski but let’s not forget what happened a few years ago in the cup final. We were missing a host of defenders and had to opt for youngster Holding and Mertesacker given the injury of Mustafi and suspension of Koscielny. Nobody gave us a hope but we pulled out one of the best performances of recent years and Chelski are capable of that. Of that I am in no doubt.

They also have the best player on the pitch in terms of Hazard, surely playing his last game for the club, in which we have rarely been able to deal with over the years. And I suspect he’ll have an impact tonight, probably scoring, or diving to get an Arsenal player sent off. It’s what he does.

If he does score then it means we need at least two, probably three, to get the result tonight. Chelski may not be as defensively sound as they were just a few years back under Conte when they won the league, but amongst the big teams you rarely see sides score three or more goals. It’s usually decided by one and usually these matches have a couple of goals in them, max. So the emphasis on a better defensive performance cannot be understated today.

Does our back line have it in them? Can they focus and not have brain fart moments? I’m not so sure. I hope so, but I’m not convinced, so hopefully I can be proved wrong.

This game has so many narratives behind it that I don’t even know what to think. Cech’s last game, Hazard’s last game, Arsenal’s last chance of Champions League football for next season, a summer of woe and transfer paucity if we lose, another European Cup Final heartbreak, heck, we could even have a horrible situation of Giroud coming on and scoring the winner against us. That would be a horrible thing.

I guess what it will come down to is which team is the most desperate to win.

Well Arsenal? How desperate are you?

Looks like Mesut got 90 minutes so the hope must be that he’ll be rested in midweek so he’s got plenty of recovery time. To be fair to Low he is usually sensible with Ozil, it’s normally idiots like whoever is in charge of England who play players when they’re clearly not fit. Although even Southgate is being cautious with Jack and he wasn’t in the squad yesterday. The whole England team has very little of interest to me now and with a quick search telling me that Welbeck got 22 minutes and Lingard inspired a 1-0 victory over the Netherlands last night, it tells me all I nee to know: it probably wasn’t a very entertaining evening in the slightest.

So I feel smug that I haven’t really missed that much.

Ospina played against Ollie G and Iwobi got to get away from the groans of the Emirates to play for Nigeria in Poland. Looks like very little happened for anyone so that'[s good I suppose.

I besmirch international football but in a way it’s been useful at times this season. Gives me a chance to get away from the woes of The Arsenal and let’s face it, this season there have been a few of those, but as usual by the time it gets to Sunday afternoon I feel like something is missing from the weekend. I guess that’s what happens with an addiction/obsession. You find yourself with a bit of a void. Ifs you’re clever enough you can fill it with other things in your life. For me that’s chores, probably a movie or two, maybe even a bit of dinner and chilling with The Management. It’ll be fun and a little different and if there’s any advice I can give to anyone it’s to make sure you fill your life with other interests. It’ll benefit you in the long run.

I do think people get too angry with football and as an Arsenal fan I’m as guilty as the rest. But what I’ve been trying to do in the last 18 months or so is to try not to get as angry. Or at least condense my rage into two to three hour periods in between the football actually being on. Of course when I wake up in the morning and relive it through the medium of a blog it’s a little more difficult to compartmentalise it, but certainly i’ve been finding it easier this season, mainly because of the apathy that the current management regime brings. The ‘sameness’ of Arsenal these days has probably come at a good time in that regard. I’m in my mid thirties and have been ‘in to’ The Arsenal for long enough that I’ll be hooked for life, but I’m also at an age where I’m realising there are other things in life that can make you happy. And that can’t be a bad thing.

Blimey, what a sanctimonious pr*ck I come across as today, eh? Oh well, I guess that’s what happens when there’s no Arsenal news of any note to speak of. I saw some stuff about Bellerin from his agent but really, is “footballer’s agent says everything’s ok” count for news these days? Not for me. I do think he might be off at some stage either this summer or next summer, but that’s not really something to worry us too much at the moment I don’t think.

Right, I’m off to buy some Panini World Cup stickers, which let’s face it is the best thing about the World Cup.

Peace out folks.

Last season his desperate lunge to recapture some form took the form of a formation shift but, having now seen almost a year of that, the players aren’t responding.

This season he’s turned to transfers – both in and out – and done what looks on the outside is throw a lot of cards with players names on and see who lands face up.

Yesterday was crazy. This whole January has been crazy.

• Coquelin gone.
• Walcott gone.
• Giroud gone.
• Alexis gone.
• Debuchy gone.
• Bielik gone – on loan.
• Pleguezuelo gone – on loan.
• Akpom gone – on loan.
• Jeff Reine-Adelaide gone – on loan.

It’s been such a culling I am trying to work out if we’ve ever had anything even half as busy as that in January. I certainly can’t remember.

Admittedly half the players on there will be out for experience but still, that’s some work done by the admin team. It almost feels like Operation Deadwood 2.0. We all thought the season in which Arshavin, Denilson and Bendtner were shunted our would mean an end to the ‘Deadwood’ series, but clearly somebody commissioned a second.

But the good news? Plenty of cash from the wage bill has been stripped, meaning Arsenal could do what I honestly think was possible and get Mesut to sign a new deal. At 29 and clearly the leading light in this Arsenal team, Mesut has signed on for three and a half years and I have to say that was the bit of news that pleased me the most yesterday. Genuinely.

That’s not to say I’m not delighted with the signing of Aubameyang – he’s an elite player who will improve us no end – but the confirmation from all sources except Arsenal yesterday had me grinning from ear-to-ear because right now he’s the only man who is offering any semblance of quality in this Arsenal team.

On Tuesday he was the only player in that stupid blue kit worth watching. By committing to Arsenal he’s putting his faith in the club that we will do what’s needed to develop a properly assembled team around his talents.

Yes the figures are eye watering, yes there have been questions in the past about his consistency (which is tosh if you ask me) and yes, there will be the cynics who will say he’s chosen a comfy life at Arsenal with a fat pay packet. But right now who cares? He’s our shining star and should be paid accordingly.

His team have played this saga majestically though you have to admit, because with Alexis out the door and overtures from United supposedly on the table, they have leveraged that to make Arsenal blink and give him what he wants. And actually in this market, with what players of his quality are paid and with him having to endure being in a team with our defence and attack, it is worth the money in my opinion.

Now what is needed is the team needs quality around him. Defensively there needs to be action in the summer. We won’t get near the Premier League top four so the rest of this season has to be creating an identity, style and putting the wheels in motion for some movement in the summer at the back and also to sort out a quite frankly embarrassing midfield set up.

With Mkhi and Aubameyang we should have the makings of an attacking outlet that helps Özil. So it’s about righting the clear wrongs behind him now. New ‘keeper, new centre half, new ball-winning, engine-purring, ground-covering midfielder and Jack/Rambo alongside that person.

Then maybe, just maybe, we can also get a new coach – not manager – to develop a new football philosophy that works at the club. Because I’ve long said – and most of you tell me too in the comments – that it is needed.

The best we can get out of this season is to get players bedded in, perhaps win a cup (although I doubt we’ll get near City in the League Cup but you never know), then look at 2018/19 as one in which we can look up rather than down.

Another quick one on Aubameyang. I’ve kind of talked about it all week so don’t feel like going into War and Peace again on him, but he’s an elite player, who will vastly improve our attacking threat. Two years ago this was a dream to have somebody like this at Arsenal but it looked like an impossible one. Now we have an exciting player who has taking Thierry’s number. I don’t know why, because numbers mean little in the grand scheme of things, but that has added a little bit more excitement to proceedings for me too. You can clearly tell the confidence of the guy; his shirt number choice says to us “I’ll be your new Thierry. Leave this with me” and I love that.

Fingers crossed we get the first glimpse of that on Saturday.

A final word on Ollie G, who left yesterday and said nice words about Arsenal, which is nice. I don’t think we should have sold him but clearly this is the new Arsenal regime moving pieces around so there’s little we could do. Obviously I hope he doesn’t have too much success at Chelski but the way he has behaved, the effort he’s always put in and the time he’s had at Arsenal needs to be remembered more for the Scorpion Kicks and less for the Monaco horror shows. I will miss him and I think he’ll miss us. I have never seen a good player receive so much frustration just because he wasn’t an elite player. But such is life I guess. All the best Ollie G.

Laters peeps. Have a good one.

So tonight we get to forget about all of the “what ifs” and permutations on players and look at how we could potentially get our season back on track against a Swansea team who have struggled all season.

Or we’ll lament yet another away day in which the players simply haven’t cut it.

It’s safe to say we are one of the Premier League’s biggest ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ teams that exist this season. At home we are one of the top teams in the league and yet away from home all of that confidence drains away and we look like a rabble of schoolyard kids, unable to string passes together, devoid of creativity in the final third, with teams understanding exactly how to counter our approach.

The better teams just move the ball quicker than us when we’re away from home and in doing that they isolate our players in certain parts of the pitch. They also work the ball well and rely on our complete lack of a midfield at times to overload our defenders.

The worse teams just sit. They remain dogged in defence and ask an Arsenal team who struggle without Özil to break us down. They then play to their own strengths by being good at set pieces, or by countering quickly, or in some instances just rely on mistakes from referees (see Watford and West Brom ‘penalties’ this season as an example).

Swansea will do the latter tonight. They have their blueprint by the way they suffocated the life out of the Liverpool game on their own patch and I’m expecting Arsenal to have the same resistance put before them. Which is why these types of games require quick responses. At home this season we’ve been good at getting goals early and I think that has helped the home matches from being frustrating for us. We’ve caught teams cold like we did against Palace the weekend before last and that has meant that teams have been forced to be drawn out. At least a little anyway.

So tonight if Swansea are leading or level without conceding at the break, I worry for us, because they will get confident and build on that, which means I’m hoping that the rest from the weekend ensures a vibrant and quick-passing Arsenal take to the pitch to move Swansea around this evening.

Swansea played at the weekend and it looked like a lot of their first teamers played too, so the hope is that we’ll be fresher, which I also hope means we can stretch them.

I suspect we’ll see Mkhitaryan and I hope it’s from the start. I’d be surprised though. Our last game saw us beat Chelski and I think Arsène will have seen how much better we looked in the second half and will go with the same starting XI but with Elneny making way for Monreal. I’m hoping that Kolasinac makes it back into the team because I think we’re going to see more of the ball going forward and there’s no doubting his ability when in the opponent’s’ half of the pitch. If we play with three at the back he has cover though.

Midfield will most likely see Granit but then we have a question because both Jack and Rambo are fit and Wenger loves them both. My money would be on Jack as Rambo is still recovering from injury, although I wouldn’t rule out the Welshman being deployed further forward with Özil and Lacazette. I’m no Ramsey fan in that position but hey, compared to Iwobi there is a massive gulf in class, so I do wonder if that might be an option. As better as Iwobi was against Chelski in the second half he still looks short on confidence and form and should have been taking out of the limelight months ago, but perhaps it tells more of our lack of options in those positions, than anything else.

So it’s three at the back I’d like to see, with more from our final third attacking options, but thankfully the arrival of Özil back into the starting XI should help us. He was once again brilliant against Chelski and had looked very good for some time now. Perhaps he’s playing for a big move somewhere else but for now we can just appreciate what we’ve got and how we’re going to use him. We need to see the best from him tonight I’d wager. He’s the type of man who can thread the eye of that needle and if Swansea sit deep and compact then we’ll need that special player to play that pass.

Hopefully we see enough minutes with Mkhi and Özil because I’m fascinated to see what those two together could accomplish. But I suspect we might only get a little glimpse tonight.

Right, that’s me done, so off for another day of work whilst waiting patiently for the football to arrive.

Catch you all tomorrow.

So in what is this winters latest plot we saw the development late last night that most of us must have expected following Dortmund’s public statement about Aubameyang on Saturday: an agreement on price finally being met, communicated through the clubs’ unofficial sources. For Dortmund it was Kicker but for us it’s the BBC’s very own David Ornstein, who said that a deal is there to be done if Dortmund can source a replacement.

So actually there is clearly no deal that is close to being done. There won’t be any Giroud-shaped loan deal offered to Dortmund and by the sounds of it he doesn’t want to leave London. So that means Dortmund have until Wednesday to find somebody suitable and if they don’t then they’ll hang on to their prize asset.

So now we wait. Having made Dortmund wait all this time for Arsenal to put in what they consider an appropriate bid for their best player, we now have to wait, hoping that they don’t dither over who they want to bring in. But frankly if they did could Arsenal real blame them? After all it has been clear for some time that we’ve been in for him and it’s clear Dortmund and Arsenal have been talking for longer than the week and a bit since Ivan was spotted in Germany. So if for whatever reason this deal doesn’t get done due to time restraints, once again we will all need to seriously question whether Ivan can run a football club effectively from a player acquisition perspective.

The CEO has put a lot of eggs in this elite player signing, so if we come out of this window empty handed then it’ll be him that bares the brunt of the ire from fans, media, etc.

There’s plenty of people out there who have said that the £60million figure is too high and that we shouldn’t be going that high to get him but I actually think it’s not that bad. Let’s not forget how much Barca paid for Dembele, or Coutinho, or how Liverpool shelled out for a central defender. The prices are inflated everywhere except Arsenal, where we offload players for a song because we just want to get any old rope in for them, so we suddenly think £60million seems expensive. But we’d be getting an elite striker in here folks. In January, which is always a window that everybody knows usually has no value, so I think we should all be happy with that. Six months ago we probably would have had to go to £70million or £80million for him. So to me £60million seems like a fair price.

It does sound like there’s a deal to be done. Dortmund would probably not want a player who has one foot out the door and come the summer they’re also less likely to get as much cash for the player I’d suspect. So I think they’ll probably work just as hard to get this transfer sorted and get the squad unity back too. Having spent so long telling us that the Alexis situation doesn’t affect the players Arsène is now admitting that it did in fact have an impact, which is what Dortmund are going through at the moment, so it’s in their interests to find themselves another striking option as much as it’s in Arsenal’s.

What I don’t want to countenance is a move to strengthen Chelski’s Champions League attempts by sanctioning any move by them to bring Giroud in. Lest we forget how they dangled Demba Ba in front of us on deadline day one year before suddenly whipping him away and leaving us with nobody up front as an option. I for one would be more than satisfied for Arsenal to return the favour this window. Especially if it pisses Chelski off even more.

I’ve already stated my case on how we would use Giroud as a ‘Plan B’ anyway so I won’t reiterate that now, but the important thing for me is that we have different options, not that we give other rivals different options.

Quite what else is happening today I’m not sure. Arsène’s already done his press conference and so there’s nothing new to add there. I suspect the team will be travelling tomorrow to Swansea so it’s probably another training session on the cards and another opportunity to bed in Mkhitaryan with his new teammates. Then the only question will be whether he starts in Wales tomorrow evening.

So we play the waiting game. We wait for any updates on a shiny new signing. We wait for tomorrow’s game. We wait to hear from Kicker and The Ornacle. Waiting, waiting and a little more waiting. But soon, thankfully, this is all going to be over – transfer window wise I mean – and we can get back to cursing our atrocious away form.

Catch you all tomorrow.

At the stories (unsubstantiated of course, after all, it is The Sun) that Alex Iwobi decided to see if he could improve his form by partying until the early hours of the morning before the FA Cup game against Forest this weekend?

At the noises that City are now knocking on Arsenal’s doors to take Alexis away from us for a paltry £20million-odd?

At the rumours that we’re selling Coquelin for an equally paltry £10million abroad. I’m no fan of him but that money for a player with a three and a half years left on his contract is tuppence in this market. Renato Sanches went for £8.5million in a frigging loan fee for Christ’s sake!

But it’s ok, because we’re going after Johnny Evans for a probably ridiculous high fee, to solve our defensive woes.

I haven’t even touched on the fact that we could be a month away from exit in the League Cup and staring at a Europa League run as the only thing to keep this season alive.

Arsenal are a car crash right now. Nothing makes sense, we don’t appear to have any planning or vision, the players are doing what they want, the manager doesn’t seem to have the answers any more and the fans are having to suck this all up and deal with it.

Now, I’ll admit that things change quickly in Football and in one months time we could be looking at a cup final, still in European competition, picking up a few points in the league and who knows maybe even a decent signing or two. But as an outsider looking in on Arsenal right now, it’s hard to see the positives if I’m honest.

This feels very bleak at the moment. Normally I write my headline after I’ve written my blog because I don’t always know what I’m going to say, but today it seemed quite easy, because we look like a total mess.

We turned down the chance to go after Evans in the summer because he was possibly over priced. But desperation could see us going for him now. We turned down £60million for Alexis but desperation could see us get less than half of that less than six months after rebuffing City. We wanted to offload Chambers in the summer but then changed our minds because presumably Arsène was given a nudge as to the sheer volume of work that could be needed the following summer if we went full-on fire sale.

Yet here we are, a pretty poor halfway point in the season, and it’s all transpiring exactly as some of us feared. And the real Arsenal fans aren’t happy about this. We’re all pretty depressed in fact.

Arsène was quoted in the papers yesterday that there would be business this January. Well no sh*t Sherlock; because we didn’t do enough last summer and didn’t get important decisions answered, we’re staring down the bottom of a pretty scary barrel.

Riddle me this, friends: given Arsène’s regime have found it difficult to get players over the line each summer for the last few years, how on earth will they cope if/when:

• Özil leaves on a free
• Alexis leaves
• Coquelin is shipped out
• Theo is gone
• Ramsey has one year left on his contract
• Big Per retires
• Ospina is gone
• Koscielny can’t play more than half of a season due to his Achilles
• Bellerin fancies his Barcelona move
• Kolasinac isn’t in the managers long term plans
• Welbeck rejects a deal and so the club start to negotiate
• Giroud wants out due to lack of playing time
• Ainsley and his Mum want bumper deals for a contract renewal

Some of these are speculative, I know, but they are all stories we’ve heard and they could all feasibly be happening on the next six months. So yes, Arsène, we know damn well you’ll be active in January because you’ve suddenly realised that there aren’t enough hours and days in the summer – a summer of a World Cup no less – in which to give this squad the reboot it needs through new blood.

But the new blood will only do so much when given the same coaching staff and management to work with. So we could overhaul this entire team and with Arsène still in charge we still get the same results. So maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe we should just throw this season, bank the cash, wait for a new man and give him a real life actual war chest?

The thing is, I don’t really want that to happen. I don’t give a monkeys about the people in charge as long as Arsenal are winning. But we’re not. And we’re not even looking like we’re progressing. We’re regressing and it’s patently clear for all to see.

The wheels aren’t coming off, they’ve been kicked off, look like they’re rolling down the hill, on fire, with a manic-looking Wenger chasing after them shouting “everything’s ok! I’ve got this all under control!”

Football fans love to laugh at others misfortune. We’ve been there and done it too. But when you’re on the receiving end it isn’t fun. And we’ve been on the receiving end for a while now.

But hey, on the plus side, I’m starting to appreciate other things outside of the football world that I used to immerse myself in. I’d recommend it and if you don’t have it take up another hobby. I’d recommend collecting thimbles. The Management has a lovely collection from across the globe that she’s amassed in the last 25 years.

Catch you all tomorrow for a match preview.

So It’s Crystal Palace today and if ever there was a performance that stands out as the real arse-end of 2017 for Arsenal it was the abomination that was the 3-0 defeat at Selhurst Park in April last season. We were out fought, outthought, outnumbered across the pitch – or so it felt – and it came across as the archetypal match which demonstrated that Arsene simply didn’t have the players that were playing for him any more. There was no fight and no real drive from the team and if ever there was a game in which you’d want the players to watch and tell them “do the opposite of this” then it would be tonight.

It’s a very different Palace team to the one that was in free fall earlier in the season though. I’d have fancied our chances against that Palace team, but this particular incarnation under Hodgson has hit some form, dragged themselves out of the relegation zone and quite frankly, given how we played against Liverpool and most of this season away from home, you wouldn’t put it past this Arsenal team to serve up another dogs dinner. Arsene has been busting out the excuse of the Man United defeat as a psychological blow for the last few weeks and if he keeps giving these players excuses like that then they’ll only be too happy to continue to oblige.

So for tonight’s game I’d be trying my best to give them all a massive dose of tough love. They need to be told that it’s not acceptable. That the away form is not what a top side should be delivering. That certain players are on the ropes and playing for their immediate futures. That this January is a chance for him to look at other players if the current squad continue to fail to deliver.

He won’t though. He’ll set up the team as he’s always done with the mentality that they’ve always had. We just need to hope that it’s enough to turn over Palace on their own patch.

Let’s face it; our players are better than them, so it shouldn’t really be something that we worry about, were we not a football team with an amazing ability to think up new and inventive ways to shoot ourselves in the foot. The hope I do have though is that – Southampton aside a couple of seasons ago – our Christmas form hasn’t been the worst in recent years. Granted, we’ve usually been at home for at least one of the two games and there has rarely been a big game wedged in between Christmas and the new year, but we’ve tended to pick up points. Last season was the reversal of these two fixtures with West Brom and Crystal Palace both at home, but with Arsenal scorpion kick-less in the absence of Ollie Giroud, we’ll want to see a different kind of spectacular tonight.

I’m just hoping we get a better performance than the Liverpool debacle. That performance had five minutes of splendour punctuating what was a pathetic display and if the team serves up the same tripe come 8pm tonight, it’ll hardly make for a lot of festive cheer in  my family household.

To how do we beat a Palace side unbeaten in their last six Premier League games then?

Start with Zaha and work back from there. Palace like to get balls into the box from wide positions, they like to take advantage of set pieces, they have a settled XI that they use and they all know their positions. Roy has brought discipline to the team and as a result they will be a difficult opponent tonight. Haha is clearly the jewel in the crown and he’ll be running at our back line with glee tonight I suspect, especially having seen how fragile we look against Liverpool. But he’s not going to be able to beat everyone and do it alone, so I think we just need to isolate him. I also think that three at the back would be a good move too. If we had that with Kolasinac playing as a left wing back, when we have the ball – and Palace will concede possession to us tonight – his forward runs could be used to pin back Zaha. So despite Molnreal’s injury, I’m hoping for a back three in which Koscielny, Mustafi, Chambers, Bellerin and Kolasinac are given the nod. I think that gives us more stability defensively. I have nothing against Maitland-Niles but he’s not a frigging left back and against someone like Zaha he might find it delightful if Arsenal line up in a four and give him the opportunity to isolate against the young player who’s playing out of position.

If that is the back line then the midfield will surely be Jack and Granit and if i’m honest with you, given that we basically play with no midfield anyway, it’s the best we can hope for. Grant had a particularly horribly performance against Palace last season and so I hope that’s in his mind tonight to give us a better display, whilst we know that Jack will give us energy and pop the ball around well. The question is whether he’ll be able to last the full 90, because it’s become more evident that he tires in the second half, as has been quite visible against West Ham and Liverpool.

In front of those two we’ll need movement between Ozil and Lacazette and given that he’s undroppable no matter how many times he loses the ball, throws his arms in the air, runs around a lot, Alexis too I suppose.  Palace have shown that they can be susceptible at the back and so we need to see an Arsenal team with more drive than we’ve shown away from home for most of the season. At times we’ve felt lethargic and so I don’t want to see any of the leggy performances that we’ve been subjected to by some of the players. JUST MOVE THE FRIGGING FOOTBALL QUICKER. If players move the ball quicker from an early stage in the game it will tire the players out from Palace and then our players can take advantage.

Whether or not we get that or not is another matter. I guess the opening exchanges will tell us if these Arsenal players are feeling up for it or not. I really hope they are.

Catch you all tomorrow.

Which is pretty much what happened yesterday evening, as Arsenal rather just sauntered their way into the semis, as opposed to bulldoze.

In truth, West Ham looked like they could be even less arsed than the Arsenal players and never really challenged our defensive line of Debuchy, Chambers, Holding and the man on the naughty step, Sead Kolasinac. Instead they were content to contain and little else, which you’d have to say worked, other than a period just before halftime.

Kolasinac gave Theo a peach and he headed wide from about eight yards, there were some decent balls into the box that we didn’t manage to get on the end of, before Danny Welbeck went ‘full Danny Welbeck’ and once again used parts of his body to scramble the ball home off his knee after a good header back across goal from Debuchy.

If Steve, Mark, Andrew and I thought that this might be the start of a glut of goals in the second half, we were to be left as unsatisfied as much as the plastic and over-priced beer we drank at halftime.

West Ham and Arsenal delivered more of the same and sadly, the only real notable part of the second half was the injury to Olivier Giroud, at a time in the year when he’d most certainly be getting more games as the matches hit us thivk and fast.

The signs look ominous. Ramsey, Giroud, who’s next? The usual Arsenal injury crisis has been abated because of the large-scale rotation, but it looks like it’s catching us up. We can ill-afford more players going down with injuries and I just hope this is the last of them, but ‘Tis the season’ for that sort of stuff so I’m not 100% convinced all of the current squad will make it through the next couple of weeks with no knocks or injuries that keep them out.

If you’re wondering why I’m not really talking much about the match last night, well, it’s because there isn’t really much to talk about. It was a drab affair from a team perspective but there were one or two individual performances.

Francis Coquelin did ok. He ran around a lot. Didn’t misplace pass after pass and I believe played the ball into the box which allowed Debuchy to nod into Welbeck’s kneecap.

Debuchy too looked good and whilst I know we can’t exactly compare a very leggy looking West Ham to some of the better teams in the Premier League, his performances give me heart at a time in which Bellerin is struggling for form and is the only right back we’ve got in the squad. An injury to him means that at least we’ve got a Debuchy playing himself back in to a bit of form.

I thought Chambers and Holding also did themselves justice, although in reality they weren’t really troubled, but when they were put to the test they stepped forward and were aggressive enough in the tackle to give me heart.

And then on the other side Kolasinac, who is clearly in Arsène’s bad books for some reason, played well when going forward. Steve and I speculated beforehand why he was playing but the more I think about it, the more I think he’s right; I wonder if we’ll see Monreal at left back on Friday night? One to ponder for the upcoming days I suppose.

Willock had a good game too. For such a gangly-looking lad his balance was surprisingly good and he got stuck into tackles, was able to beat his man a few times, as well as retain possession well I thought. There’s a good player in there and I can’t help but think that a stint at a Championship club will do him the world of good in the new year. Let’s just wait and see what happens with the league cup and Europa League first though, as I’m sure Arsène would rather give him a bit more time in a red and white shirt before he farms him out somewhere.

Theo was Theo and Giroud put himself about a bit, and we’re into the semi finals which will no doubt see us play City or United I’m sure. We’ll find out by tomorrow but it doesn’t matter too much for now. The job is done and we can “look forward to” Liverpool at home on Friday.

Catch you all tomorrow.

Well, the first fifteen minutes, for starters. Which is why we need to start tonight’s match well come hell or high water. Actually, scrap that, let’s just grow into the game and not concede an effin’ early goal thanks to a defensive lapse, ok?

Who plays in that defence is a really good question though. Mustafi is our. Big Per looked ropey. Koscielny has exploding achilles. It’s hardly the most comforting news is it?

I suspect he’ll gamble on Koscielny though and I think he’ll stick with a back three, but although I’ve always said Wenger loves his hierarchies in the squad, Big Per’s mistake will probably have him thinking about Holding and Chambers. My gut tells me he sticks with the same team though so I reckon Big Per gets another shot at redemption.

Heck, I’ve been wrong many times before and I’ll be wrong many more times in future, so don’t be surprised to see a back four with Koscielny and Monreal this evening.

The manager seems to be toying with that idea of the back four more and more these days, which is why I think we’ll slowly see it creeping more and more into our game, but for some reason I just have a feeling that he won’t do it just yet.

He probably should though. Not least because we have players more suited to a 4-2-3-1 and with the couple of injuries we have it feels like he’s got a perfect excuse to do it. Cech, Bellerin, Koscielny, Monreal, Kolasinac, Xhaka, Elneny, Alexis, Özil, Wilshere, with possibly Ollie G up front, would probably be my stab at a winning side this evening. I’ve already talked about the questions in defence, but midfield also causes Wenger a dilemma. A base of Xhaka spraying the ball around and Elneny covering ground that the Swiss can’t get to in front of the defence, would mean we see less vast patches of green grass in our defensive third of the pitch.

You also have Jack dropping deeper when we don’t have the ball and when we do have possession – which you’d expect us to have for most of the evening – we can have an attacking four that have enough ability in confined spaces to take advantage of the tight spaces we’ll probably have to operate in when West Ham have to defend.

Giroud loves playing with Jack and he’ll be a handful for the West Ham back line, whilst Özil can do his level best to help Alexis in being half the footballer we know he can be.

West Ham will look to use the trickery of Arnautovic and Lanzini to support Antonio and I suspect we’ll see plenty of balls put in from wide positions to worry us, so we’ll need the best aerial defenders we’ve got on it this evening. Their line up is similar to ours with a back three, wing backs and two in midfield, so if we suddenly did switch it to a 4-2-3-1 I think they’d have to do something to counter the extra bodies we’d have in midfield. That could mean that we are pulling their central defensive unit about. I certainly hope that is the case this evening.

It’s a tough one to call and it feels like whatever Arsenal team show up will dictate whether we’re all as frustrated as we were at the weekend, or we’re happy that we’re back in winning ways. I feel like I need to see the opening exchanges of the game before being able to determine if it’ll be a finger chewing night or not.

I’m off to the Olympic Stadium (I refuse to call it that other name) tonight so hopefully I can bring some good luck. Don’t wholly count on me though!

Catch you all tomorrow.

Giroud’s late flick in on 88 minutes may have taken some of the stink of the performance away, but by and large it just masked the odour rather than remove it, because Arsenal were terrible at times yesterday.

Particularly at the start and particularly in defence. Arsène named the same XI that started against United bar the injured Mustafi who was replaced by Big Per and whilst pre game I was happy with that selection, after about 15 minutes I was scratching my head as to how these defenders could be so bad.

It was like some of them had never played together, never trained together, didn’t even speak the same language. And yet again we shot ourselves in the foot early on, just like the game against United, only this time it was a couple of mistakes and Big Per falling over that will have him having nightmares I suspect.

But we could – and should – have been two or three down after that and whilst Arsène blamed the mental scarring from last weekend, I’m not as forgiving in my analysis, because these are professionals who should be able to compartmentalise weeks of football like last weekend.

I think Arsène is covering for his teams away ineptitude though and we have to admit that we have a problem away from home. Southampton had chances to score more goals and after the interval they settled in to a very decent defensive shape that we simply couldn’t break down. Last weekend De Gea made save after save but this weekend Forster was left relatively quiet.

For all of the talk of our ‘elite’ front line, the lack of chances created in away games really is quite atrocious and it seems to stem from the fact that we have a midfield that is completely barren save for the forlorn Granit Xhaka who is left to roam alone at times as Ramsey goes hunting in the final third.

There’s no real build up in our pattern of play. Southampton has a game plan to sit in and be difficult to break down, so our game plan should have been to move the ball quicker, perhaps draw them out by asking them to collectively press us higher up the pitch before hitting them with our pace. But as I’ve heard on the Arsenal Vision podcast and started to see myself and realise yesterday; this Arsenal team are not very good passers of the football. And if you’re not very good and composed in moving the ball quickly then you aren’t going to be able to move teams around because you’ll keep turning over possession.

Which is exactly what happened and the chief protagonist was Alexis. Now I don’t know about you and I don’t know if I’m psychologically preparing myself for his exit, but I’m getting more and more annoyed by his individuality, by his constant lack of ability to release the ball, by his inability to sometimes just do the simple thing, and I’d love to know why he isn’t being dropped. People are talking about the ‘X-Factor’ he brings but how do we know that his absence won’t just liberate the team into looking like a more cohesive unit?

I kind of want to give it a go if I’m honest because I’d love to see us perform more of a team and less with nine outfield players and one maverick.

Alexis was poor but we were poor in general all over the pitch. Koscielny looks a shadow of his usual self, both full backs were atrocious, Ramsey went back into frustrating mode and to make yesterday all the more sh*tty, looks to have done his hamstring with one of the last kicks of the game. Lacazette didn’t get much of a sniff and only Özil looked like he was trying things.

There’s definitely something wrong with this team and it’s not fitness because they’re only playing one game a week.

We play a buoyant West Ham who will be bang up for it after beating Chelski and it’s not a prospect I’m looking forward to on Wednesday night I’m afraid to say. If we want to get out of this festive period looking like we can challenge for a top four spot then we have to win our next three league matches and I’m just not convinced we will at all right now.

I suppose the saving grace is that Liverpool, United, Chelski, all dropped points this weekend like we did. But that’s one point from a possible six that we’ve got and anything other than a win on Wednesday night will have us feeling like we haven’t got rid of the November curse at all; we just shifted it to December.

Catch you all tomorrow.

Giroud’s late flick in on 88 minutes may have taken some of the stink of the performance away, but by and large it just masked the odour rather than remove it, because Arsenal were terrible at times yesterday.

Particularly at the start and particularly in defence. Arsène named the same XI that started against United bar the injured Mustafi who was replaced by Big Per and whilst pre game I was happy with that selection, after about 15 minutes I was scratching my head as to how these defenders could be so bad.

It was like some of them had never played together, never trained together, didn’t even speak the same language. And yet again we shot ourselves in the foot early on, just like the game against United, only this time it was a couple of mistakes and Big Per falling over that will have him having nightmares I suspect.

But we could – and should – have been two or three down after that and whilst Arsène blamed the mental scarring from last weekend, I’m not as forgiving in my analysis, because these are professionals who should be able to compartmentalise weeks of football like last weekend.

I think Arsène is covering for his teams away ineptitude though and we have to admit that we have a problem away from home. Southampton had chances to score more goals and after the interval they settled in to a very decent defensive shape that we simply couldn’t break down. Last weekend De Gea made save after save but this weekend Forster was left relatively quiet.

For all of the talk of our ‘elite’ front line, the lack of chances created in away games really is quite atrocious and it seems to stem from the fact that we have a midfield that is completely barren save for the forlorn Granit Xhaka who is left to roam alone at times as Ramsey goes hunting in the final third.

There’s no real build up in our pattern of play. Southampton has a game plan to sit in and be difficult to break down, so our game plan should have been to move the ball quicker, perhaps draw them out by asking them to collectively press us higher up the pitch before hitting them with our pace. But as I’ve heard on the Arsenal Vision podcast and started to see myself and realise yesterday; this Arsenal team are not very good passers of the football. And if you’re not very good and composed in moving the ball quickly then you aren’t going to be able to move teams around because you’ll keep turning over possession.

Which is exactly what happened and the chief protagonist was Alexis. Now I don’t know about you and I don’t know if I’m psychologically preparing myself for his exit, but I’m getting more and more annoyed by his individuality, by his constant lack of ability to release the ball, by his inability to sometimes just do the simple thing, and I’d love to know why he isn’t being dropped. People are talking about the ‘X-Factor’ he brings but how do we know that his absence won’t just liberate the team into looking like a more cohesive unit?

I kind of want to give it a go if I’m honest because I’d love to see us perform more of a team and less with nine outfield players and one maverick.

Alexis was poor but we were poor in general all over the pitch. Koscielny looks a shadow of his usual self, both full backs were atrocious, Ramsey went back into frustrating mode and to make yesterday all the more sh*tty, looks to have done his hamstring with one of the last kicks of the game. Lacazette didn’t get much of a sniff and only Özil looked like he was trying things.

There’s definitely something wrong with this team and it’s not fitness because they’re only playing one game a week.

We play a buoyant West Ham who will be bang up for it after beating Chelski and it’s not a prospect I’m looking forward to on Wednesday night I’m afraid to say. If we want to get out of this festive period looking like we can challenge for a top four spot then we have to win our next three league matches and I’m just not convinced we will at all right now.

I suppose the saving grace is that Liverpool, United, Chelski, all dropped points this weekend like we did. But that’s one point from a possible six that we’ve got and anything other than a win on Wednesday night will have us feeling like we haven’t got rid of the November curse at all; we just shifted it to December.

Catch you all tomorrow.

The stadium was probably even less than half full and whilst that will no doubt be the media’s favourite topic this morning, the real story cane from the squad players who finally stepped up and said “bugger this, we’re going to have some fun”, and they certainly did. In spades.

The team selection was a little more experienced than expected but I guess Arsène had given fair warning about that in his presser on Thursday. Only Maitland-Niles managed a start from the academy and it feels like even he’s getting to the stage where he’s a squad player and so should be considered as such rather than an academy prospect.

So little change in the normal midweek personnel, but plenty of change in the set up and for the first time this season we started in a 4-2-1-3 formation, or variant of depending on how you think the set up went. And it worked.

From the first few minutes we dominated the ball, controlled possession and with Elneny dropping deep to collect from the back four, it even felt like we had three at the back at times. He was all over the park and I’d definitely say it was one of the Egyptian’s best performances since joining, capped off by a very smart finish in the second half from a Wilshere ball which Mo rather enjoyed himself it’s fair to say.

But they all did I’d imagine, except for Ospina, who had little to do bar keeping warm throughout. BATE are no real force in Europe and they looked like a team with little confidence that they were going to get anything from the game. So when Debuchy of all people fired home another smart finish, it did feel at the time like it could be the first of many.

And so it proved. Theo getting another goal whilst doing little else in the game, Wilshere notching his first in years, Ollie G from the spot, the aforementioned Elneny finish and a strikers hammering by one of their unpronounceable centre halves to deny Welbeck a tap in, sealed another hammering just a week after the Huddersfield tonking.

I’m getting used to this. And I like it.

The players seemed to enjoy themselves too and it’s hard to pick anyone as an underperformer on a night like last night. It’s true that the opposition helped, but I thought the two centre halves played well in Chambers and Holding, Maryland-Niles had a couple of nice interplay’s going forward, whilst Debuchy also added another fine performance to his tally this season. We were rarely troubled but some of that must also be the composure of the back line.

The midfield base of Coquelin and Elneny worked against this opposition too, mopping up wherever needed, but it was the man in front of them that dictated the show. Jacky Wilshere stepped up and put in a performance that said “pick me! Pick me! I’m here!” to Arsène and the boss essentially admitted it at the end of the game in his post match interview. Jack was pivotal in our build up, exchanging passes with the midfield base, forward play and getting into the kinds of positions that are a nightmare for defenders when you’re so close to your own goal and you’ve got a guy who is so good in confined spaces.

His goal was a classic example of that. A ball pinged in to him on the penalty spot, one touch with his right foot, a second and third with his left – all very close to his body – then a hammer drive past the ‘keeper.

We’ve got games coming thick and fast and I really do believe that Wilshere should start at least one of the next three Premier League games, probably the West Ham one in midweek, which is away but a game I’d fancy he’d be up for.

Welbeck will be a little unhappy that he didn’t manage to get on the scoresheet but for him this was all about fitness. Olivier Giroud did ok and he’ll be happy that he got a goal and he also created a few chances for Theo too. Giroud and Wilshere seem to work well together and their combinations in the final third looked very impressive; almost as if they have never not been playing together. Whether they both get to rekindle that relationship on the Premier League remains to be seen, but I am just pleased that it clicked.

There will be many to dismiss this game, to question whether celebration is needed, but to those people I would simply say:

We had to play this game – would you rather a gritty one-nil or a total shellacking?

That’s all anyone needs to say.

Yesterday evening was fun. I hope for more of the same in midweek in the near future.

Ciao.

The stadium was probably even less than half full and whilst that will no doubt be the media’s favourite topic this morning, the real story cane from the squad players who finally stepped up and said “bugger this, we’re going to have some fun”, and they certainly did. In spades.

The team selection was a little more experienced than expected but I guess Arsène had given fair warning about that in his presser on Thursday. Only Maitland-Niles managed a start from the academy and it feels like even he’s getting to the stage where he’s a squad player and so should be considered as such rather than an academy prospect.

So little change in the normal midweek personnel, but plenty of change in the set up and for the first time this season we started in a 4-2-1-3 formation, or variant of depending on how you think the set up went. And it worked.

From the first few minutes we dominated the ball, controlled possession and with Elneny dropping deep to collect from the back four, it even felt like we had three at the back at times. He was all over the park and I’d definitely say it was one of the Egyptian’s best performances since joining, capped off by a very smart finish in the second half from a Wilshere ball which Mo rather enjoyed himself it’s fair to say.

But they all did I’d imagine, except for Ospina, who had little to do bar keeping warm throughout. BATE are no real force in Europe and they looked like a team with little confidence that they were going to get anything from the game. So when Debuchy of all people fired home another smart finish, it did feel at the time like it could be the first of many.

And so it proved. Theo getting another goal whilst doing little else in the game, Wilshere notching his first in years, Ollie G from the spot, the aforementioned Elneny finish and a strikers hammering by one of their unpronounceable centre halves to deny Welbeck a tap in, sealed another hammering just a week after the Huddersfield tonking.

I’m getting used to this. And I like it.

The players seemed to enjoy themselves too and it’s hard to pick anyone as an underperformer on a night like last night. It’s true that the opposition helped, but I thought the two centre halves played well in Chambers and Holding, Maryland-Niles had a couple of nice interplay’s going forward, whilst Debuchy also added another fine performance to his tally this season. We were rarely troubled but some of that must also be the composure of the back line.

The midfield base of Coquelin and Elneny worked against this opposition too, mopping up wherever needed, but it was the man in front of them that dictated the show. Jacky Wilshere stepped up and put in a performance that said “pick me! Pick me! I’m here!” to Arsène and the boss essentially admitted it at the end of the game in his post match interview. Jack was pivotal in our build up, exchanging passes with the midfield base, forward play and getting into the kinds of positions that are a nightmare for defenders when you’re so close to your own goal and you’ve got a guy who is so good in confined spaces.

His goal was a classic example of that. A ball pinged in to him on the penalty spot, one touch with his right foot, a second and third with his left – all very close to his body – then a hammer drive past the ‘keeper.

We’ve got games coming thick and fast and I really do believe that Wilshere should start at least one of the next three Premier League games, probably the West Ham one in midweek, which is away but a game I’d fancy he’d be up for.

Welbeck will be a little unhappy that he didn’t manage to get on the scoresheet but for him this was all about fitness. Olivier Giroud did ok and he’ll be happy that he got a goal and he also created a few chances for Theo too. Giroud and Wilshere seem to work well together and their combinations in the final third looked very impressive; almost as if they have never not been playing together. Whether they both get to rekindle that relationship on the Premier League remains to be seen, but I am just pleased that it clicked.

There will be many to dismiss this game, to question whether celebration is needed, but to those people I would simply say:

We had to play this game – would you rather a gritty one-nil or a total shellacking?

That’s all anyone needs to say.

Yesterday evening was fun. I hope for more of the same in midweek in the near future.

Ciao.

Of course this is Arsenal and I’m not counting my chickens just yet. Remember Watford at home last season? This is the type of game we could face tonight so I’ll save any schadenfreude until probably Sunday if we’ve picked up two wins.

Tonight is the first instalment of two home games in which it feels like the season could start to have more of a positive turning point though. Win the next two and we’re in a much better position than two months ago. Sounds simple, right?

Well, this is Arsenal and ‘simple’ is rarely something we do, so I suspect we’re in for a bit of a rough ride tonight. Huddersfield are an aggressive team, a boisterous team, a team that like to ‘get stuck in’ as the saying goes, so I’m expecting a match in which we’ll need to have our players on their toes and moving the ball quickly. Nobody wants to see any dangling feet when there’s a high chance a Huddersfield man will go for it.

The Terriers come into today’s game as a ‘freebie’ too; they know they’re not expected to get anything from the game so they have nothing to fear. They’ll be missing van La Parra through suspension, which will take away a little bit of their pace an attacking intent, but you only have to look at the way they’ve set up this season to know that they won’t expect a lot of the ball in the Arsenal half. They concede possession a fair bit but that won’t worry Wagner, as long as the team shape and discipline remains in act defensively. We always struggle to break teams down who remain compact and if the manager has an eye on rotation tonight I’d be thinking about players who are good in tight spaces.

That’s why I do wonder if we’ll see Jack and Giroud this evening. Yesterday we got confirmation that Iwobi will be out, which puts Jack another step closer to the first team XI, and the Englishman is very adept in some spaces wriggling through teams. It’s something I’d certainly be considering if I was in Arsène’s shoes though.

I think he’ll have to do some form of rotation. Despite what he says about only thinking about the next game, the thought of having one of our back three unavailable through injury on Saturday isn’t really something I’d like to countenance, but if all three play this evening you just know one will break down. That’s why I’d be resting up Koscielny’s Achilles and be giving Big Per the nod. Mustafi will still be fresh having missed a few weeks through injuries and Monreal seems like a chap who is robust enough, so I’d certainly be considering that as a threesome.

I’d like to say that we should be rotating our fullbacks, but with no real understudy for any of the positions I think we’ll see a similar line up to Sunday, which I also think we’ll see in our midfield. I just have a feeling that Arsène won’t roll the dice on the whole team tonight and that is why I figure he’ll give the front three a bit of a shuffle and that’s it.

Of course I’ve been pretty wrong before and I’ll most likely be wrong tonight!

United won, the Totts lost, which means we’re playing both catch up and run away with this game, but it should be a game we’re capable of winning though. We do need to be at it quickly though. As I recalled above this sort of game could quickly turn into a Watfordesque debacle if the players aren’t putting a shift in because much like Burnley at the weekend, you know that Huddersfield will put a battling performance in this evening.

Arsène has some tricky decisions to make today but here’s hoping he makes the right one, gets the teams mind set in the right place, picks up three points and sends us all home happy.

************

As an aside to tonight’s game, it’s good to see that there are clear indications for life after Arsène, with the appointment of Raul Sanllehi as Head of Football Relations from February. It’s an interesting appointment because despite Arsène’s clear disdain for a Director of Football, this seems very much like a similar sort of position and it’s very telling that it’s Ivan talking about the appointment rather than Arsène. The message has clearly been read and understood that one man can’t have all the power in the modern game and the club are beginning to put the pieces together for life after Arsène. Who’d have thunk it: some succession planning at last!

Catch you all tomorrow folks. Hopefully with a positive blog talking of three point godliness.

It was weird because we lost, yet ultimately there was relief, because we still topped the group to ensure that the game against BATE in a couple of weeks is as meaningless as it would have been had we won or drawn yesterday. So yeah, weird, because I didn’t really feel that much other than happy for the people of Köln that they got a win and a big night out when their team is struggling at the foot of the Bundesliga.

I also have family from Köln too, so it was nice to be able to have wishes for them and their City on a night where it ended up meaning so little to us in the end anyway, which is why it also felt weird because I was still happy at the end of an Arsenal defeat.

As promised Arsène rotated the shizzle out of the team and so as we’ve come to expect in these midweek fixtures, we had a completely different XI from the one that faced them in the North London Derby. Ospina, Chambers, Debuchy, Mertesacker, Holding, Maitland-Niles, Elneny, Coquelin, Wilshere, Welbeck and Giroud all came in and with a line up like that you can see why Arsène says we have a big squad. Just a couple of those at best (Holding & Maitland-Niles) you’d describe as ‘youth’ players and the rest are those that should be fighting for a first team place.

I watched the game through a skipping feed on my phone on the tube back home in the first half and it was clear from the broken John Hartson commentary that it wasn’t a game that will go down as a classic. Köln wanted to not concede, Arsenal retained possession but a Coquelin post and a Welbeck fizzer wide seemed pretty much the sum total of our efforts in that first half.

The second half offered little of the same save for a pretty obvious dive/fall over from the Köln centre forward. It was one that you’d expect the red to laugh off but I have my suspicions about the Russian, namely that he was as bored as the rest of us, so probably just wanted some sort of action/controversy to ensure that the game had at least something to talk about.

The Arsenal response was…well…there wasn’t really one. The rotated players hardly did themselves any favours when it comes to vying for a place in the Saturday team and if I’m honest, aside from the first game against last night’s hosts, all of the performances in Europe have been a bit disjointed. Upon reflection we’ve seen this sort of game a lot in Europe so far with just the odd punctuation of class like the Giroud overhead kick. You’d think to yourself that you wouldn’t want any of these players playing like this in the first team but I have a theory though; when squad player is asked to step up through injury or suspension, they’re inevitably playing with better players, so they naturally up their game. That’s what I think is happening in reverse in games in midweek; the senior squad players aren’t able to up their game as much because they’re not playing with other better players and so we’re seeing these types of ‘bitty’ performances.

Think about is realistically; if an injury or suspension happens in the first team, it’s only going to be one or two players that come in and they’d naturally up there game but also, Arsenal aren’t going to put in that kind of performance (you’d hope!) because of one or two squad players coming in.

So I’m not too worried about the overall performance of the team in this respect. Individuals however, there are some cause for concern, like Jack Wilshere. He wasn’t great, was he? He is master of ball control in small spaces and those intricate moves on the edge of an opponents box. That wasn’t coming off last night. Neither was the ability to get past a defender with that burst of pace he has. And so he endured a frustrating night and at a time when so many are crying for him to get more game time, this felt like a match in which it showed that he’s not playing on a Saturday/Sunday for a reason. It’s sad to say because we all really want Jack to be our saviour, especially with the two contract rebels gone by the end of the season, but I’m realising that it’s unlikely to happen at this stage. I just hope I’m wrong.

It wasn’t just Jack whose night was hardly covered in glory though. I thought Giroud was poor and nothing really came off for him, as well as Coquelin, who seemed intent on racking up world records for either running the ball out of play or passing it out too.

Iwobi came on and offered little, whilst the decision to play Chambers at full back and Debuchy at centre half was, well, in keeping with the general feel of the game, weird. I get that some might think Debuchy hasn’t got the legs for full back but come on, he’s played there most of his career, and we all know that Chambers is a central defender. It just didn’t make sense to me.

But there’s been a lot of that from Arsène this season so I guess we shouldn’t be surprised.

One of the bright sparks of the nights was Maitland-Niles though. I thought he did a good job at left wing back and look bright all evening. He’ll hopefully be buoyed by the game time and performances he’s getting and hopefully this will give him the confidence to get into the first team over the course of the season. One for the future perhaps.

Likewise, Reiss Nelson came on and had a bit of an impact and its hard not to get excited about this guy given his age. He’s great with the ball at his feet and I just hope he’s developed properly because he looks a bit special. We need to make sure he’s nurture properly and if so, in three years time we could have a first teamer on our hands.

And that’s about it from me. A successful night in the end because we’ve qualified as group winners. It should mean a more palatable draw and it will certainly mean some youth team players get a chance with the home crowd in a couple of weeks.

Catch you all tomorrow.

It’s a curious one, is today’s game, because we’re up against a German side who are on their own turf. It’s also a team who gave us a little scare in the reverse fixture at The Emirates. So you’d expect this to be a tough game. Yet Koln find themselves bottom of the Bundesliga. They’re yet to win a game domestically. It’s fair to say they’re not having a ‘lovely old time’ in Germany.

So you’d hope that Arsenal, fresh off the back of victory in the North London Derby, will be in a better state confidence-wise. Of course none of the Arsenal players who played on Saturday will probably line up today, but they all gain together, they’ll all have felt that buzz at the club, so I’d expect they’d all be able to profit from the goodwill and feeling surrounding the club at the moment.

So who will be starting for The Arsenal in this most irritating of kick off times?

I suspect we’ll see the return of Ospina in goal and hopefully Calum Chambers too. I’d like to see Big Per and Holding to complete the trio in the heart of the defence, because that might give Debuchy the chance to play as a right back and maybe, just maybe, we’d get to see Reiss Nelson further forward in an attacking position?

The youngster has looked good going forward and playing him in one of the front three in the absence of Walcott due to injury provides Wenger with a nice opportunity to experiment without damaging any senior pros egos.

On the left I suspect it’ll be square peg in round hole time in the shape of Maitland-Niles, whilst the centre of midfield will surely continue with Joe Willock and one of Elneny and Coquelin. My personal preference will be Elneny because I feel like he offers a greater degree of ball control when we’re in possession. Having somebody who can retain it rather than spray it out of play like Coquelin would do, is much more preferable, especially if we get plenty of possession of the ball.

In front of those two you have to have Jack, then assuming Giroud is fit (and I’ve seen little to suggest he’s not) I think he gets the nod, but I’d also expect Welbeck to play a part at some stage.

You could argue for a few players starting tonight though, so I suppose the positive is that we seem to have squad depth options, with Coquelin, Iwobi and Welbeck all feasibly as options from the bench if Arsène picks the team I’ve suggest above. But there seem to be a lot of variations on the team line up today, so I reckon the chances of getting the starting XI right aren’t exactly obvious, which does indeed show that we have depth. Whether it’s the right kind of depth can be argued vociferously, but not right now, not on a game day.

I didn’t even mention Nketiah, who Arsène referenced in his press conference, so expect him to get some minutes if things are going right.

As for Koln, Córdoba was the guy I remember getting in behind a couple of times on the night at home a couple of months back, so he’ll be the one that we’ll need to keep our eyes on. If Arsène goes for that experienced back three then it isn’t exactly blessed with pace, so my hope would be that the midfield are cutting off the frequency with which balls into the channels and round the corner of the back three are made. The Koln forward missed a couple of chances on the night in North London but we shouldn’t expect that to go on forever.

A point sees us top the group and means Arsène can rotate even more heavily against BATE in a couple of weeks time, so I’d hope that the team has enough to see this through, leaving us with top spot and a group that – assuming we win – has been relatively routine for our first time in the competition since the 90s.

Sadly due to the ridiculous nature of the kick off time I will miss the first half because of work commitments, but hopefully I’ll pick up a decent signal on the tube home.

Catch you all tomorrow.

I mention this only because I work with a few Italians, so there will be a few grumpy people in my office this morning, although I will point to the fact that they have seen their country win the World Cup and also they haven’t gone through nearly as much heartache and irritation as you do as an Arsenal fan.

Arsenal-supporting Italians however, well, probably just best to steer clear of them today.

As expected with Arsenal still not really on the agenda due to the continuing round of internationals, the official website is going with various articles about the handsome bearded Frenchman. There’s something about him wanting to emulate Jean-Pierre Papin, who was one of the first striker I remember pretending to be as a kid in the playground, so I kind of get why Giroud has named him as one of his idols. 

He’s also won the goal of the month competition for that Red Star bicycle kick that turned up the excitement levels about 12 points on the game in Belgrade. At this point I’m wondering if the club shouldn’t just retire the award because Ollie G seems to have a real monopoly on wonder goals. When his time comes to hanging up his boots I suspect history will be very kind to him, not least because of his ability to turn in a stellar YouTube compilation performance. In this age of reduced attention span the ability to be elevated beyond your actual level is rife and so I expect that 20 years from now the talk will be on whether he was one of Arsenal’s best five strikers of all time. 

He’s clearly not, because Bergkamp, Henry, Wright and van Persie all have been better in my time alone, which is not even counting the likes of Charlie George or Cliff Bastin. So whilst I’ll certainly recount some good performances and some great goals, I’ll be the fifty something bloke that won’t be moved on arguments about Ollie in that top five.

There’s also some stuff on the official site about the Anfield 89 side following the documentary that is soon to be released. It’s a great one to watch but I won’t labour the point too much, having already done something of a write up last week. Suffice to say there are some stories about a proper back four that pretty much put our current defensive shambles in to stark context. 

If only some of them were in the current set up to actually be allowed to coach defence by the current manager eh? Sigh…

Anyway, that’s enough from me today, because I’m in danger of getting even more rambly and ranty if I carry on. And I’m sure that there’ll be plenty of time for that in the aftermath of the north London Derby on Saturday when Harry Kane makes a miraculous recovery to start and score a hat trick in front of my very own eyes.

Laters y’all.

I tune out the transfer tittle-tattle when there’s still six weeks to go until the January window opens, and when it’s a window that doesn’t usually see big clubs part with cash anyway, it doesn’t really feel like wasting my words on it would be relevant. I certainly wouldn’t waste my hard earned cash to watch it, although you can get some good deals at www.footballticketpad.com if you were so inclined. Although I’d be using that for domestic games only myself, because I work hard for my moolah and the last thing I want is for a drab international to make me feel like it’s being frittered away.

So instead I wait patiently for the news of the surviving players who haven’t been brutally maimed by some clobbermeister who currently plays in the Latvian fourth tier for FC Miqhurdlanin or some such equivalent. The news so far seems to be that we’re all ok as it is. There are a round of meaningless fixtures tomorrow night though, so I do expect we’ll have a little more need for the biting of nails then, particularly with players like Ramsey. He always feels like prime target number one for an injury to me. Mostly due to his playing style and his all-action approach to games and if anyone is going to go hammy tweaking ahead of an important run of fixtures it’s Aaron. Let’s just hope he’s managed well enough by Coleman when they play Germany tomorrow.

I think what’s also made this Interlull particularly ‘lully’ has also been the type of fixtures wedged in between. City away followed by a home game against the Totts has meant that this particular interlude feels to me like it’s stretched out a bit. Probably because of the impending fear that will soon engulf me as I try frantically to work out how this current Arsenal side get anything against a high energy, high press, fast counter-attacking Tottenham.

Given that impending sense of doom though, surely I should be relishing the fact that there is no football to really get myself worried, right?

Well, yes, I suppose that could be one way of looking at it. Except I’m a football fan and as every football fan knows it’s better to at least have that sense of anticipation than have to deal with the numbing boredom of not having any proper football to concern yourself about. 

There’s a great line in one of the Pierce Bronsnan Bond Movies where the villain (played by Robert Carlyle) says “what’s the point in living if you cannot feel alive?” and I guess that’s the reason I’d rather be locked in fear and pessimism ahead of the North London Derby, than having to sit through much more of the nothingness that international football gives me.

So yes, give me the fear of what might happen on Saturday, rather than the emptiness of what will happen at Wembley tomorrow night.

Oh bloody hell. I’ve just seen that Ollie G picked up a thigh strain injury for France at the weekend and won’t play tomorrow for France. That will most likely completely rule him out of next weekend’s game and although he hasn’t been a regular starter, he is still a very good asset in a game like this, having scored a few goals down the years against that lot too.

So there you go. Even more reason to hate the international breaks.

Catch you all tomorrow.

Having a good Saturday?

well, as good as you can have it without The Arsenal, although these days with all the flipping Thursday night football we endure it’s not normally a game day anyway, so I wonder if i’ll get the usual withdrawal symptoms that I get when there is an Interlull.

I’ll tell you what I don’t do: I don’t try to compensate by watching international football. So I certainly felt smug that I didn’t have to sit through over an hour and a half of England drawing 0-0 with Germany. Phew.

First I saw of it was when Fiona Bruce gave me a heads up on BBC1’s News at Ten and quite frankly, i was happy enough to keep it that way.

I don’t even know what Arsenal players did or didn’t play, except Ollie G who bagged another goal and must surely be wondering what he has to do to get a start in the Prem. He’s certainly got the match fitness and when he’s playing with better players what do you know, he looks better himself. Perhaps it’s because I like a bit of old skool, but I’d love to see wenger say “off it” and go to a 4-4-2 with Ollie and Lacazette doing a little and large combo. They are both players whose future wouldn’t be up in the air because of contract wrangling, plus it would certainly surprise a few to see us go back to a couple of banks and those two up top. You could have Monreal on the left and Kolasinac in front of him nd give him licence to roam, whilst on the right you could try Ozil (probably wouldn’t work), or Alexis, or even Iwobi.

I know, I know, it’s fashionable to fire out a few xG stats, about talking about things like counter-press, about thirds of the pitch and about the styles of specific players to fit a system, but I’m pretty sure in the 90s nobody talked about this kind of stuff. That’s probably why the football was a bit pants but whatever.

And who knows? The reversion back to an old system might be such a surprise that it throws opponents into a confused state of bewilderment, rendering them unable to deal with our vintage tactical masterclass.

Just a thought. And when you have the boredom of an international weekend then you start having these kind of irrational thoughts. Or you think too much. Or you don’t think at all. Which I quite like sometimes. It’s amazing how sometimes the coming around of an international break can be a good thing and if we weren’t seeing the Totts on the horizon i’d probably be glad of the little interlude in the Premier League we’d have. But as it is I find myself in a limbo of disappointment from a folding at the Etihad, to a fear of what lies ahead at the Emirates next Saturday.

This is why I drink, by the way, because it does give you a warmer, numbing feeling.

So yeah, Ollie scored, other Arsenal players probably played, but I’m not interested enough to care and i’m probably going to even have to resort to Rugger watching this afternoon, which is unpalatable at the best of times. But I need some sort of sports fix, so I guess that’ll have to be it.

At least I have plenty of Red Leg and cola to keep me company.

Just need some lime.

And that’s pretty much the sum of my blogging parts today folks. There is little going on, all’s quiet on the Western front, and I have a day of dentist, haircut and beverages in the afternoon. Only one of those three things will fill me with any joy, I can assure you.

So I shall say my goodbyes and hope that you have a splendid one today. It’s raining here. Boo.

Laters.

Perhaps it’s because I am a child of the Championship Manager and latterly Football Manager era that I like to rotate as much as possible. People talk about how the modern game is awash with stats but it’s that  mid-90s era of football that first brought to us the concept of a player’s fitness being within a percentage range that has remained with me. So when I see wholesale changes in midweek so we can have a fully fit first XI for the following weekend I am a happy bunny indeed.

So it’ll be a completely new front three who will play this evening at home to Norwich and that was more or less confirmed by Arsène yesterday on the official site, when talking up the strength of our attacking options. He’s right though; when you think about how this competition was about youth six or seven years ago, it’s now about fitness for squad players and that is vital for this team. Vital because if one of the first team players picks up a knock, then having somebody who is at least match fit – if not technically better – will be important.

Ollie G – fresh from his Puskas award – will be buoyant and I suspect we’ll see Theo and Jack again. There may be a temptation to play Iwobi in the attacking three and drop Jack back in to a central role, but I think his rehab serves him better in a more advanced role, so I think that means he’ll get the nod and we’ll probably see Willock and one of Coquelin and Elneny partnering him. I think Arsène really wants to find as much game time for Willock, AMN and Nelson at the moment and so that’s what makes me think he’s starting tonight. 

That would mean Nelson and Maitland-Niles as full backs with probably the same three as those that played against Red Star. Debuchy, Holding and then it wouldn’t surprise me if Elneny and Coquelin do get on the field together, but with the Egyptian at centre half. It’s not ideal but to be honest with you, with Chambers and Mustafi not fit, it doesn’t really leave us with many options. It’s a shame because I think Chambers getting as much game time as some of the other players have been getting would have been a good thing for him. But I guess that’s just the way the footballing cookie crumbles.

Norwich are in good form at the moment and they’ll be a tough opponent for some of these players to face because the Norwich players will have the wind in their sails. So I’m expecting them to be quite up for this game. However we do have the advantage of a lack of fatigue because Norwich played their first XI on Sunday and so the manager will have a decision to make on whether rotation is in order for the Canaries. If he does then the Arsenal players will also have the advantage of having played more regularly than the Norwich squad players. 

So however we and they line up today, you’d hope we have enough to counter them, to ensure safe passage to the next round and another opportunity for these players to play.

Of course this is The Arsenal and if there’s a way to make life difficult then we could perfect it. 

Catch you all tomorrow when hopefully we’re all talking about another Arsenal victory.

A win is a win is a win.

And we won. So ultimately it’s a good Friday to you and it’s a happier one than had we drawn or lost. 

There’s also the positive of seeing Jacky Wilshere once again pulling the strings in midfield and whilst some will protest of the clear lack of quality in the opponents, I prefer to look at this being another big step in his rehab back in to the first team and making an influence for Arsenal this season.

His touches were good, I saw at least three instances where he was able to wriggle us out of pressure or drive us forward, but his role in the only goal of the game is what really caught the eye and watching him spin away from three players, exchange a pass with Theo before flicking it back to him to head for Giroud, was the Jack we all remember and I’m just praying that his body is holding together well after each game because it’s clear he is a class act on the pitch.

He was clearly the most promising player yesterday and performances like that must surely have Arsène Wenger pondering whether to just throw him in to the Premier League soon. I suspect we might start seeing some cameo roles for him in games. That feels the most logical next step.

He was influential in the goal but we should also give props to Ollie G for his goal and as my companion for the evening Mark noted “he can move for a big fella”. Indeed. In fact he’s quite graceful and when you see him put in a volley like that you wonder why he wasn’t gifted more composure in front of goal on a more regular basis. 

The goal was a moment of beauty in an otherwise turgid game of football. It was rarely brimming with quality and having now watched Red Star Belgrade for the first time you have to say that you can see why from their side. They had a couple of chances and Cech made a couple of decent saves but you could tell that any half decent side would have battered this makeshift Arsenal team. 

When you’re starting your back five with four players out of position it is always going to look a little disjointed at times and whilst there wasn’t any major problems caused, there were a few half chances where players got spun or turned out wide and we could have been vulnerable in transition. You could just tell that a better side would have carved more clear cut chances.

But Red Star didn’t and the result means that basically Arsène can run a competition to let fans play in the final two games if we beat Red Star in a couple of weeks time.

The hotch-potch of a team last night also means that the players who will play on Sunday will be fresher and hopefully that gives us a better chance against a beleaguered Everton who are sure to play like Barcelona come Sunday afternoon. I caught a bit of their game and they looked terrible so we all know how that story plays out for us in Liverpool on Sunday lunchtime.

A few words for the youngsters who played yesterday and I thought Willock was tidy enough and Nelson continued his good run. He’ll still be learning the game in three years time but he seems to be going in the right directions so we can all be happy about that.

Other than that there’s not really a lot more that can be said about the game because it was a drab old affair. So I think I’ll call it a day. 

See you tomorrow.

It’s the Europa League for us tonight and it’s another away trip, this time to Red Star Belgrade, who feel like the sort of side you’d always have to play in computer games of the 80s and 90s in European competition. A former very decorated club, that name has drifted from the top table from some time tonight, but I’ve got to be honest with you, I don’t care because I’m oddly looking forward to the game. 

It offers some respite from the turgid away form domestically and with Arsène sure to ring the changes this evening it even feels like we’re going to be watching a different team. Which I guess we are; especially seeing as Matthieu Debuchy is getting in on the action.

I almost didn’t believe my eyes when I read that yesterday. We’re going to be playing Debuchy and, providing he stays fit, you’d expect him to get more game time in this competition as we see how his body reacts to top flight Football again.

I must admit to you though, I’ve never been as quick to dismiss the guy as some Arsenal players have, because I think there’s still a good player in there. Ok probably not good enough to play regularly for Arsenal, but as a midweek stand-in for Hector in European competition I think it could work.

What certainly does seem to have worked so far is the rotation that Arsène applies to midweek games and I’m all for it at this stage. So tonight there’ll be Ospina, Debuchy, Big Per, Monreal and Holding at the back I suspect, with Ainsley possibly filling in at left back. For Per that’s probably a good thing; with Mustafi our Mertesacker needs games to get up to his full flow and so I’d expect him to play most of the game today and then on Sunday too. Holding will continue to get minutes and so the only one that I suspect might play but we’d all rather he didn’t is Monreal. But given injuries to Chambers and Mustafi and Koscielny’s dodgy legs, we don’t really have many options.

In midfield I think we’ll see Wilshere given that he was wheeled out in the press and because I’m not sure Arsène risks Ramsey, but I wonder if he also starts with Coquelin. It could be an option and would certainly be more preferable than Elneny and Coquelin because those two together will have any Arsenal fan waking up with cold sweats, but Arsène does like his hierarchies so it wouldn’t surprise me becaude those two are next in line after Xhaka and Ramsey, so I think they start. 

Nah, come on Chris, you know he’s starting Wilshere because Wenger loves him. 

And we love him too and all any of us are hoping for is that he comes through another 90 minutes because he has something that nobody else in our team has. He has the vision but his ability to travel with the ball and exchange those quick passes to drive us forward through the phases is something we don’t see very much any more. Another good 90 for Jack tonight and I think we see him from the bench on Sunday. It all comes down to that.

In the attacking three I have a weird feeling we’ll see Alexis with Theo and Giroud. I certainly think the latter two – given what I mention above with the hierarchies – will play and despite the fact it doesn’t seem to actually work with Alexis and Giroud, the Frenchman and Theo have been scoring in Europe so providing they deliver again tonight I think Arsène will be reasonably satisfied.

The other question is around the younger players. Who’s getting game time tonight? Is it Willock? AMN? Does Nelson get 20 minutes at the end in an attacking position to see how he gets on? 

I suspect we’ll see some at some stage this evening, because even though we want to win the game there are still two more home matches whereby wins will see us top the group anyway, so I think Arsène can still experiment. He is probably less mindful to do that straight away though because the sooner he can get to 12 points in the group the sooner he can make even more changes and play younger players.

So let’s hope for another three points tonight. 

I’ll sign off now, but not before I say that away games in the Europa can f*ck off. I finish work at 6 which means I have no chance of watching the away games from the start. And that pisses me off. It’s the only thing I’ve hated about this competition so far which, given that I wanted us to throw it five months ago, is not so bad after all, I’d say.

Catch you all tomorrow. 

I hadn’t felt worried about the game beforehand because, if I’m honest, I was half expecting a performance like this. Away from home this season we have been sluggish, devoid of creativity and at times ponderous. So to see this Arsenal team put in an almost identically insipid performance against an industrious but not special Watford as they did against Stoke, it felt like yet another Groundhog Day performance, from a team who really don’t look very good any more.

It’s boring. Watching Arsenal isn’t very much fun any more. I’m not getting very much pleasure from it and the fact that we don’t seem to have any real kind of style any more just makes it all the more tedious. We have no drive. We have no cutting edge. We just lurch from one passage of play to the next.

What’s also obvious is that this team has very few ‘special’ players in it. Cech used to be, but I feel like he’s showing his age and on a day where you saw Lloris and De Gea make world class saves to keep their team from conceding, it is obvious that we don’t have the same advantage. He’s not rubbish, he just doesn’t do what he used to do, which is regularly make saves that make you say out loud “how has he saved that??”

In defence we have a rapidly deteriorating Koscielny, a converted full back in Monreal, a Mertesacker who’s ‘okay’ but nothing more and a Mustafi who frightens us all every time he goes to ground. In Bellerin we have a right back who has stagnated and on the other side Kolasinac has been great but it shows how desperate this team are, that we’re all over the moon at a proper player playing in his natural position. 

Midfield is boring and it certainly was yesterday. Elneny just gives and releases. He’s a pass completion master but does little else and it feels like he’s in the team to literally just put a body in the starting XI. Beside him Xhaka can spot a pass but he wasn’t at his best yesterday. 

But the bigger worry for me is the attacking options, because it’s clear that Özil and Alexis are miles ahead in terms of ability in comparison to the other players in that position. Iwobi did what Iwobi does yesterday, travel with the ball, beat a few men but the second he hit the final third, he was toothless. On the other side of him Welbeck looked rusty but we also know his limitations. He’s a decent player but not exactly the type that gets you off your seat. Lacazette is a finisher and you could see he made some great runs yesterday, but with no creativity coming from further back on the pitch, he just made run after run without people spotting him.

The options on the bench were Walcott, Giroud and Wilshere and if Jack was fit you feel like this team is crying out for his creativity. But he isn’t fit and so we stumbled towards the finish line and ended up with nothing. 

Of course you can complain about the clear dive for the penalty to give Watford the equaliser, but you can’t complain about the rest of the match. The Arsenal players just didn’t look as hungry as the Watford ones and whilst our home form has been decent enough, away from home we have been tripe. There just doesn’t seem to be any kind of backbone in this Arsenal team and even Troy Denney said on TV afterwards that it was easy to get at Arsenal. 

It felt like Arsène was preparing for life after the two superstars yesterday, experimenting away to Watford by leaving Özil on the bench when in fact, it just made his decision look bizarre. We’ve now already lost three games this season and still have Spurs to play twice, United to play twice, City twice, as well as Everton twice, including next weekend. The way we’re playing I can’t see us getting anything in Liverpool again and if we do lose that, what are our expectations for the season? Because mine will be another one of scrapping around about sixth or seventh. 

We are declining. We have been declining for some time and the FA Cup win was a sticking plaster. With Arsène at the helm we look more and more like we’re a team out of ideas in these types of games. We don’t have an identity because Arsène doesn’t really have any idea how his team should play any more. He’s asleep at the wheel and we’re all helpless back seat passengers having to watch this car crash unfold.

Arsenal don’t excite many people any more. We’re just there. We exist but we’ve got players who don’t want to be there, a manager looking out of ideas, a fanbase massively divided and an owner who just wants his money pile growing thanks to the cash flooding in to the Premier League.

We are no longer an elite team. We haven’t been for a while but I think we pretended that we were amongst ourselves. We’re one of the better ‘also rans’ and the decline of Arsène’s once great empire he built is rather sad. As well as tedious. 

I’ll still go to games though. If only to meet mates for pre match drinks. The football is of little interest but the social element is great. A bit of gallows humour and a beer is all I really take from Arsenal these days.

Catch you all tomorrow.

We wish him none of the best.

As for Arsenal related news, it’s happiness and joy for Giroud, Ospina, whilst commiserations exist for Alexis and Kolasinac. For the latter we can feel genuinely sad for, although a nice summers rest for him will certainly be welcome from an Arsenal perspective. For the former it just feels bloody typical that the Chilean’s one summer of recuperation will be the one in which he’ll exit Arsenal. 

The real winner from that Brazil win last night? Pep Guardiola. Arsenal have had to deal with a half for Alexis at the start of every season but of course with all of their riches and all of the amazing players that City have, why wouldn’t they have absolutely nothing standing in their way for a fully fit Alexis come August next year.

If ever the case for shipping him abroad in January were there, it has surely been strengthened now, because none of us want to see what a fully fit Alexis can do when starting from August. Especially as you just know that the football fates will cackle at us by seeing him return to the Emirates with his new club come the first Premier League game of next season with his new club. It feels almost inevitable at this stage.

So I hope Arsène sells the Chilean in January to PSG or some other team we’ll probably only encounter once every five years and I hope we can just replace with another star who we can pin all of our hopes on until he eventually runs down his contract into 2021. That’d be grand, thanks.

But let’s not dwell on any negativity because last night Ollie G bagged himself another goal and just to confound the modern day Premier League tacticians, wouldn’t it be super awesome if Arsène went 4-4-2 this weekend, with Laca and Ollie up front? It’d have old Marcos Silva scratching his head on how to set up, having spent the last few weeks peering over the fence at London Colney watching Arsène and his ‘tactical drills’ of 3-5-2. 

I would Kevin ‘Keggie’ Keegan luv it if we did that. 

Seriously though, it does feel a little harsh that Ollie G isn’t getting any game time, although you do wonder if this will be one of those situations whereby as soon as Lacazette hits a wall in terms of games, goals or injuries, that’s when Ollie will have his chance and I’m convinced that he’ll take it. The reason being is that whenever he’s been in danger of losing his position he always seems to up his game. That happened at times last season when Alexis was preferred up top and I can see that happening again this season. He’s already got two goals with two starts (and seven sub appearances) and I think if he gets more time on the pitch he will rise to the occasion.

And that’s all any of us have wanted with him. The only frustration about him is that he hasn’t had that competition before and if he steps up and delivers for us over the course of this season then we can only be happy for him. But for us too because both he and Lacazette getting goals will vastly increase our likelihood of breaking back in to that top four. 

But only the season’s unfolding will tell us if that prediction comes true.

And with that I’ll say good day for another one. Enjoy your Wednesday.