Fulham v Arsenal: “Once you are first, you can just focus on your performance”

 

 

By Tony Attwood

• Fulham v Arsenal: back to the era of thick and fast 
• Fulham v Arsenal, the referee’s form and his favoured results
• Fulham v Arsenal: what has happened in the past
• Fulham v Arsenal: at last we can have a league match again

That quote in the headline above comes, as you may know, from Arsene Wenger..  Arsenal didn’t win the league that season, Leicester (currently five points off the leaders in the Championship) did, but we get the idea. 

But now we are back at the top, and the long wait for another title means, by and large, it is only the journalists who are making a big fuss about it.  The rest of us have fingers crossed (which, yes, does make typing difficult).  But unlike the journos, we’ve seen it before.  “Chickens”, “hatching” and other idioms are best left to those with little knowledge, but a lot of space to fill..

According to a calculation in the Guardian, which I haven’t bothered to check, and may or may not be right, Arsenal have spent 773 days at the top of the Premier League since they last won the title.   (They, of course, don’t mention that in doing so Arsenal had the only Unbeaten season, but then, they’ve probably forgotten.  Since the Unbeaten season, Arsenal have won the FA Cup five times, giving Arsenal 14 FA Cup triumphs, more than any other club.)

But during recent years, Chelsea, ManC, ManU and Liverpool have won the Lague, so it seems Arsenal really aren’t very good according to the media.  And to make the point the Guardian tells us that Arsenal’s recent victories (against Newcastle, Olympiakos and West Ham) are against sides that “sides Arsenal have struggled against under Mikel Arteta.”   So, probably just like then.

But this plays it down a bit, doesn’t it?  There have been two successive victories over Newcastle.  Four wins in the last six against Olympiakos with a goal total of ten for Arsenal and four for Oly.  And three wins in the last four against West Ham with a goal difference of 13 for Arsenal and three of Wham.  And they are saying Arsenal have struggled to beat these teams!!!   This is taking the standard everyday bias of newspapers against Arsenal to such insane proportions that it looks like a fantasy world.

As Arteta so rightly pointed out, the media’s view was, “‘You go to Newcastle, if you lose in Newcastle, the Premier League is over,’”    That is indeed the mindless gibberish of the media utterly unableto cope with the fact that their manipulations of the statistics used to suggest Arsenal would lose against Newcastle, Oly and Wham were indeed manipulations, and they know it.

They will of course, go on knocking and knocking Arsenal again and again, and if we should win the league this season, they will find excuses, most likely Arsenal being lucky because Liverpool, ManC and Chelsea were having rebuilds while Tottenham were, well, they haven’t won the league in 64 years, so we don’t really worry there.  They won’t mention their owner’s suspended prison sentence, nor their debts either.

On the injury league table, Arsenal have sunk a little having five men down, placing the club in ninth position, alongside Burnley, Leeds United, Liverpool, and Wolverhampton.  Here’s the table

1. Chelsea: 12 players injured
2. Sunderland: 8 players injured
3. Tottenham Hits: 8 players injured
4. Brighton and Hove Albion: 7 players injured
5. Aston Villa: 6 players injured
6. Everton: 6 players injured
7. Fulham: 6 players injured
8. Newcastle United: 6 players injured

And here’s the team

Sports Mole go for an Arsenal win and have a team of

Raya;

Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, Calafiori;

Eze, Zubimendi, Rice;

Saka, Gyokeres, Trossard

Goal proclaims today, “The Gunners haven’t won at Craven Cottage in their previous two attempts,” but does have the decency to predict Fulham 1-3 Arsenal.  They go with much the same beam but have Zbimendi in midfield

Reya

Calafiori, Gabriel, Saliba, Timber

Merino, Rice, Eze

Trossard, Gyokeres, Saka

TalkSport seem to have backed off, giving a starting XI.  But Racing Post oblige not only with a starting XI but a subs bench too.  Their team change has Zubimendi, in the middle of midfield and no Merino, and they have a subs list of  Merino, Martinelli, Norgaard, Nwaneri, Lewis-Skelly, Mosquera, Hincapie, White.

So there, more or less, we are.   More tomorrow.