Arsenal v Tottenham: The teams, and the need to kill off under performing players

Posted on by Tony Attwood

By Bulldog Drummond

It is interesting that with the first team seemingly fixed on three at the back, with two full backs helping them, the under 18 side is playing with a back four in a 4-2-3-1 formation – or at least that is how it seemed as they were beating Norwich 3-0.

However there is no sign of any change in the first team, and the latest news is Mustafi and Welbeck have been fully engaged in training and looking fit and ready.  Also there has been a lot of talking up of Iwobi who played for Nigeria this past week and scored twice, including “a stunning solo effort which saw him nutmeg Barcelona’s Javier Mascherano in the process,” according to the Metro.

Our four injured players (Giroud, Mustafi, Holding, Ospina), are all listed as being down for a “late fitness test” or having a “slight doubt”.  However some of the papers are saying Giroud will not make the beach and Holding will be saved for further outings in the League Cup and Europa.

Mr Wenger of course has been doing his best to try and find something interesting to say to a load of inane questions, answering, “Tottenham are a good side but we have the quality to win this game. We have no fear; we are focused on nullifying their strong points and expressing our strong points.

“People always take one situation and the judgement is definite, permanent and forever. But life is movement. It’s down to us to change the opinions of people with our performances.”

As for last season and slipping behind Tottenham for the first time in 243 seasons [I think the maths is slightly out there – Tony] Mr W said, “It was a big disappointment to finish outside the top four. It was the first time in the history of the Premier League that a team with 75 points finished outside of top four. I still feel it was very harsh on us. People forget we won the FA Cup in a very stylish way against City in the semi and Chelsea in the final. The overall achievement was quite positive.”

As for the wide range of interviews Lee Dixon has been doing to promote his new movie, and his throwing out a lot of comments about the current team, in order to ensure he got the coverage, Mr Wenger said, “Lee Dixon is a passionate guy so in his response he is passionate as well.  I think if that was the only way to feel football games, you would say to people, ‘If you don’t win the game you are killed after it. You are executed’. Putting people up against the wall is not the only way. It’s a mixture between urgency and confidence, relaxed and tense. That is different for every individual and every team. You have to adapt your speech to the mental state of the team and the individual.”

Now I must say this approach of killing off players who lose matches might have something going for it.  Indeed I think in parts of South America they already do it.  But maybe we should start with using the firing squad only after two defeats – just to give everyone a chance.

Lacazette takes fewer shots but is far more accurate when he does.  I find that rather interesting.

And the team?

Well…  since you ask, I am going for the fairly obvious

Cech

Koscielny Mustafi Monreal

Bellerin                                 Kolasinac

Ramsey         Xhaka

Ozil        Lacazette        Alexis

 

On the beach: Macey or Ospina, Debuchy, Coquelin or Elneny, Wilshere, Walcott, Iwobi, Mertesacker

I don’t think I’ll enjoy it; I just want us to win.

PS: I am sorry to say we won’t have much of a coverage for the rest of the day.  Walter has a family event which will keep him from the usual post-match write up, Blacksheep’s on holiday, and the rest of us are going to be in London, and thus a long way from home in the East Midlands.  Tony says he might get something published before going dancing, but don’t bank on it.

Arsenal v Tottenham

 

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112 Replies to “Arsenal v Tottenham: The teams, and the need to kill off under performing players”

  1. I’d have though killing underperforming players off is a bit extreem when a quiet transfer out is all that is required.
    I think the Dixon film is the one about the (very close to my heart) ’89 season & should be well worth watching. There’s also an upcoming documentary on Sky re The Invincible’s season based on the book by Amy Lawrence, so we’re well covered in this respect.
    Unfortunately I have a match clash today and won’t be able to follow the live feed as I’ll be travelling.

  3. Debuchy played last night for the U23s so unlikely to be involved, Nketiah was involved in first team training yesterday so may well be on the bench. For starters I think you are probably about right.

  4. Need a win this afternoon to complete the set this week. Two wins from the Women (3-0 & 6-0), U18 s won 3-0 yesterday afternoon and the U23s beat a good Porto side 1-0 last night. Good week so far.

  5. Against the “odds”, come on Arsenal, we have our weaknesses but this is the “enemy” so lets get it on.
    Release that handbrake.

  12. The SFR Channel is aknowledging that Mike Dean has some problem with Mike Dean, that he is a known Spurs supporter, talking about his joy in the win the Spurs had against Aston Villa…maybe they will lose thrie braodcasting rights ?!?!

  29. Dean the cheat in full view! No card for the spuds but immediate card for Alexis! What a corrupt PGMOL select bunch of bastards.

  32. Hahahhahahahhahahah

    Come ooooooonnnnn

    Yyyyyyyyyyyyeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrhhhhhhhhhhhh

  34. I’m quoting the SFR commentators here :

    “in 5 minutes, Arsenal are giving themselves the illusion of winning the NLD…”

    what else do I need to say ?!?

  36. In India on Star Sports Select HD1
    Commentators are trying to manufacture an offside for second goal

  39. good half…great energy levels…shutting down the Spurs midfield. Ericksen hasn’t really done much at all and the closing down of their forwards has been spot on…the forwards have stopped their attackers from holding the ball up by tracking back quickly…

  40. Commentators showing Lacazets arm as offside……

    Hahhahahaha

    Last week they turned a blind eye when whole body was offside

  42. Now that’s a performance!!! Keep it up boys…dont back off in the 2nd 1/2. Keane has a goal in him, so….don’t have them,a,sniff.

  45. Walter, is hand considered in calling an offside.

    Btw, they were deliberatly stopping the ball after it was kicked to show it was an offside, both goals were not offside when first replay frame stopped (if hand is not considered), but theb in the next stopped frame, they were, the ball was just off the player foot.

  46. first goal was marginally offside…second was fine. I will be curious to see how this is reported after the match.

  47. Townsend the ugly thinks his brain is better than the Laws. They are looking for a hair to be off side so that the goals feel like brinks mat! Chew the truth you thick pundits & realise that Arsenal are winning despite the cheating sloping pitch created by PGMOL & their officials. Claiming that physical obstruction is only a foul when Xhaka does it.

  48. Now the pundits are saying that Tottenham came back from 2-0 at half time in 2010, so they are upbeat that Arsenal will lose….

  49. I think AW’s tactics are spot on…the things to watch will be whether he sends off Xhaka or our energy levels drop precipitously as we are totally denying them time and space to hit their long balls. Short of these two things, I think we shall be OK.

  51. Yassine,

    That is exactly what I thought, the ball is already moving when the frame is stopped and Mustafi’s arm is offside. Andy Grey on Bien Sports said it’s offside but liam Brady (smiling from ear to ear) said you cannot score from that part of the body so it’s not offside.

  52. Wow! Really???
    Foul for a non-infringement, followed by an offside goal. 2nd goal probably offside too and you guys still crying that the ref is against you??? Jeeesus!

  67. Trippier takes a run at Kolasinac…fouls him…and finds out what the side of a brick sh*thouse feels like.

  73. Do dean can referee an okayish match, like he can see fouls he used not to see previously!

    Somerset Gooner,
    Now look at the media reaction after the game.

    Amos,
    Non-infringement? Really?

  76. Plus Pochitineo is a genius? When Wenger took away our only striker, he made teo subs, keeping the same formatio , when he should have added a striker to kane….terribly overrated

  79. Spurs 16 fouls, 1 yellow. Arsenal 11 fouls, 4 yellows. That means 1 in just under 3 of our fouls got a yellow card. 1 in 16 spuds fouls was deemed worthy of a caution.

    2 weeks ago v City both teams committed 15 fouls apiece. City had 1 yellow, while Arsenal had 6.

    Let that sink in.

  80. Yassine, really if that had been called against arsenal tell me you won’t be ranting on untold all day long

  82. Amos, no I wouldnt, he pulled him when he turned and ran after the ball…yes it was not that strong of a pull, but it was enough to cause Sanchez not to follow the ball.

  84. Five Arsenalgames this week. Arsenal 15 others 0. Clean sweep. Well done Arsenal!

    Spurs – up yours!

  85. Well Lacazette at Stoke with a little foot and it’s offside and it’s AW fault, City player fully offside and it’s AW fault, now Arsenal win and it’s not because of AW but Ref mistakes. Kane went down it’s suppose to be a penalty straight away, if an Arsenal went down its soft and no penalty. Ok got it.

  86. Congratulations boys for making us grin from ear to ear today. Meanwhile the sore sports should continue to moan about fingers and hairs on offsides before we spanked their darling team. As if it will reverse the results!!!!

  88. Q: Knock, knock.
    Q: Who’s there?
    A: Amos.
    Q: Amos who?
    A: A mosquito bit me.

    Q: Knock, knock.
    Q: Who’s there?
    A: Andy.
    Q: Andy who?
    A: And he bit me again.

  89. The narrative on Sky is that both our goals were offside. I believe the first was probably offside but not the second. Any part of the body that can legally play the body can contribute to an offside call…arms can’t legally play the ball and from any angle it was only Lacazette’s one arm that seemed past the defender.

  90. Where’s the negativity? I’m just glad to see a lil cojones, and happier to be able to tell whingers like you that all things are possible with a little cojones

  91. Q: knock knock
    A: who’s there
    Q: Gord
    A: Gord who?
    Q: gord I’m a prick.
    …see what I did there? Anybody can do it

  92. I slept in, and the ghame was already well in hand.

    The statistics when I tuned in was:
    Shots on target 2:2
    _ off target 2:4
    Corners 6:1
    Offsides 6:1
    Fouls 8:13
    Yellow 3:1
    Goal Kicks 3:3

    Immediately you look at the fouls to cards ratios, Arsenal is at 8:3 and the Tottenspud are at 13:1. Sure looks like referee bias to me.

    With the fouls/cards showing a high liklihood of bias, you would think that offside may not be accurate either.

    %Arsenal Possession
    _5 49
    10 47
    15 45
    20 45
    25 47
    30 49
    35 51
    40 50
    45 48
    45+3 49
    50 48
    55 48
    60 47
    65 45
    70 44
    75 44
    80 44
    85 42
    90 42
    90+5 42
    90+5 42

    A yellow card for obstruction?

    Guardian calling Lacazette a coward. Saying there is a feud between Alexis and Aaron. Multiple times Guardian say that Tottenham have …, when in fact it is Arsenal that have the …. They are just completely set up to commentate for the Tottenspud and against the Arsenal. The only reason Arsenal are leading 2-0, is that the Tottenspud are terrible.

    > Mauricio Pochettino’s assistant Jesus Perez, who is a genuinely lovely fellow, was not at his friendliest as the teams went off for half-time. He waited at the mouth of the tunnel to give refewree Mike Dean both barrels as the ref walked off for half-time.

    Hmm, I wonder if that ends up in the game report?

    Guardian was fishing for offside in the goals, and declare that if osside is present, it is only millimeters.

    Someone emails Guardian to tell them, that Sky Sports is being pro-Arsenal????

    53 – No penalty for the Gunners?

    69 – Tottenspud Trippier should have been given a yellow, but today yellow is the colour for Arsenal.

    A poor cross from Ozil still manages to find the recipient?

    Final statistics:
    Shots on target 5:4
    _ off target 5:8
    Corners 7:4
    Offsides 8:1
    Fouls 11:16
    Yellow 4:1
    Goal Kicks 7:6

    And Mike Dean blows!

    Come on Swansea, Leicester, Southampton, WBA, Newcastle!

    > If there has been one criticism of Arsenal in big games, it is that they can lack aggression, passion and intensity

    I’m sorry, where did you learn how to count? That is three things.
    _ And then they go on to rag on Ozil. Dorks!

    Distances run against the Tottenspud: Aaron (12.4km), Granit (12.2), Hector (11.3), Sead (11.1), Mesut (10.35).

    Metro is reporting that Dean made a mistake in our favour, in giving us a free kick which led to the first goal. Reportedly a ficticious shirt pull. I wonder if there is a picture showing the shirt pull somewhere? Finish the article by saying that most/all of Mike Deans errors favoured Arsenal. I really doubt that.

    ESPN (world leader in being ESPN) also claiming Dean making mistakes to favour Arsenal.

    Express reports that replays show that the Tottenspud Sanchez cleanly won the ball, and hence the free kick was in error. But others are saying that the reason for the free kick was a pull, and hence the clean tackle is irrelevent. it is all just agenda on the medja. And we will probably see this the rest of the season.

    Soccer Laduma no mention of officials.
    Marca reports that the Tottenspud were operating solely on the counter attack. They had slightly more possession than Arsenal all game. How does that work? Marca mentions the dispute in the first goal, but no details as to what was disputed.

    Also in today’s news at Marca, is that Pochettino wants ‘real’ trophies for Tottenham, not FA Cups. 🙂

    —-

    Oh, Marca has a Flamini story. He’s set for a trial with Rayo Vallecano.

    http://www.marca.com/en/football/spanish-football/2017/11/17/5a0f1172ca4741466f8b4592.html

    Good luck Mathieu!

    —-

    See how I responded there? Anybody can do it.

  93. whinging? We’ll see who says what the next time we lose. Because every team loses a match from time to time…we can support our club or try to tear it down when that happens. Attacking fellow supporters after we win the NLD is pathetic.

  94. there is a great deal of misunderstanding about what is and isn’t offside. The law basically says that a player can be given offside, not called offside, if he or she does not have at least 2 opponents between or beside themselves and the goal when the ball is played and that they have interfered with play, profited from their position or distracted an opponent (keeper,defender) and thus profited by these infringements. There is no specific advice in the law about which part or parts of the body count in determining offside, but referees are told in their training that the entire body of the attacking player must be beside or behind his or her opponent, regardless of which part it is….so as an assistant, I would give offside IF I could clearly see anything of the attacker, when the ball was played. I remember in a woman’s game, there was a particularly well endowed lady who I gave offside because her endowments were visible but nothing else.:)

  96. The line drawn by a television analyst showing a player onside or not is so easy to manipulate and it is used in a deceiving manner.

    Assuming an attacking football player can run a 100 m in 11s, and assuming a constant rate (admittedly not strictly true), a player will move about 9cm in 1/100 of a second. How long is a foot in contact with a ball…more than that, I think. Basically, I’m saying that there is going to be a grey zone on the offsides and to be more accurate TV should show the offside calls better by showing the distance covered by the player when the ball is in contact with the ball rather than just taking a snapshot placed somewhere within the grey zone. And given today’s technology I don’t accept that this is not possible.

  98. WOO HOO, HOO ! Was able to watch only from the 70th minute but was very impressed with our boys. Well done guys!
    More impressive was that we nutmeged Deano and the PIGMOB!
    Never easy at all.
    We should have murdered them Spuds ! What a crap team. But then again , they rarely fail to amuse me with their foot in the mouth antics!
    Up the Gunners !

  99. No one’s attacking you bro, just opining that its a bit tedious to complain about the ref after this win. Honestly GGG, can u honestly say Dean screwed us up in this match? Can u say that and still claim to be a honest fellow?

  100. nope weren’t screwed by Dean, however it was far from a flawless performance. Can’t imagine that we got all thse yellows and they didn’t. The one yellow they got was called by the assistant referee. Alexis pulls down our Alexis on a break…nothing. Mustafi given a yellow for…kicking the ball. The overarching point was that he is not a good referee, though.

  101. @OMGArsenal,

    The updated IFAB rules do account for body parts:

    “Offside position
    It is not an offence to be in an offside position.

    A player is in an offside position if:
    – any part of the head, body or feet is in the opponents’ half (excluding the halfway line) and
    – any part of the head, body or feet is nearer to the opponents’ goal line than both the ball and the second-last opponent
    – The hands and arms of all players, including the goalkeepers, are not considered.

    – A player is not in an offside position if level with the:
    – second-last opponent or
    – last two opponents”

    http://www.thefa.com/football-rules-governance/lawsandrules/laws/football-11-11/law-11—offside

    The rules clearly state that the hands and arms are not considered, hence Lacazette was correctly ruled onside while the well endowed lady from your example was correctly called offside.

  102. Let me guess, if a person complain about the ref when their team lose and also complain about the ref when their team win, it surely mean that person is consistent in their view and not one that flip flop?

    Anyway Arsenal won and it’s a good day. Enjoy.

  103. @5th Gen Gooner
    Who would have thought by game 12 we would have been robbed of 7 points by referee

  105. I disagree that only lacazettes arms was in offside position. However I’m not complaining, sometimes we’ll be on the receiving end too. I know someone will tell me about “it all not evening out”. For me the jury is still out on that

  108. Tony, *gollum gollum* performed as predicted 🙂
    I’m not a soothsayer. I don’t have a crystal football…

    Still an awful performance & display in the art of, and I quote (don’t shoot the messenger please) “game management”
    And as the loud & audible towards the official at HT and FT and if you rewatch just before the free kick for the first goal (no yellow?) and also at other time when the home team have won 2-0, they all indicated that…

    …in spite of this blatant and obvious audition from *gollum gollum* this season to be the next head of the pgMOB (it is, precious to him) he couldn’t help himself today, old habits die hard, and the card to foul ratios in this match were simply weird. Remarkable. And so many if not most of the paying punters at this football match felt compelled to remark upon it.
    I’m proud of each and every single one of them! 🙂

  111. ‘most/all of Mike Deans errors favoured Arsenal’ Now there’s a truth. His mistakes favoured Arsenal. His honest decisions including several cheats favoured Spurs. He knows that he is a cheating corrupt bastard – part of the select PGMOL group who are corrupt & rob football of sporting honesty.

  112. @Menace,

    Oh no Dean is not dishonest. He is honest. Sure is. He is honest to his paymasters. He is honest towards his club. Unlike some who come here, who are not even honest in support for the club they “love”

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