But never mind. The last time we had a run as bad as this in the league we went on to win the Second League/Cup Double. (Of course the AAA and the press have written that out of our history).
So to the Thorns of Haw. We have lost once of the last 21 visits and WBA has won once in those games (obviously) but some of the press quote other numbers. Mind you six of those 21 visits were to a nightclub on the outer ring road, so perhaps the record isn’t that good. Pesky thing, statistics.
According to one reporter, “Albion’s squad is looking a bit thin at the moment” which is undoubtedly due to their diet. More bully beef lads! But they do have Brown Ideye, who should be happy after Pink Tuesday, Green Wednesday Purple Thursday and Black Friday. He cost £10m.
Arsenal have won 11 of the 16 Premier League WBA/AFC games in all locations (including two on the moon, on Pluto and six on the Quazar Galaxy…)
[Kalm Down Bulldog – editor]
And we’ve never failed to score in 11 league and cup games on the edge of the M6/M5 interchange. So a hattrick for Giroud methinks.
West Wobbly You have won one of their last six league games. Or three of their last 15 and have not scored a league goal (aside from an own goal courtesy of Leicester) for the last four and a half hours of playing the game.
But they have the highest number of penalties scored. Three. They have let in ten home goals which is more than anyone except Everton, and let in two or more in their last three home games.
The Arsenal team?
Martinez
Gibbs Koscielny Mertersacker Chambers
Flamini
Cazorla Ramsey
The Ox Giround Alexis
Sunning themselves on the beach a selection of: Szczesny, Huddart, Bellerín, Rosicky, Podolski, Campbell, Akpom, Sanogo, Welbeck. Monreal
—————————
Today after nine minutes a banner will be unveiled in the Smethwick End (to the left of the Arsenal block) reading ‘Justice for Jeff’. The screens at will display a picture of the player with the words ‘If in doubt, sit them out’ which refers to the dangers of concussion in sport.
Jeff Astle died at the age of 59 on 19th January 2002. The Coroners Court found considerable evidence of trauma to his brain that was similar to the brain of a boxer. He said the main candidate for the trauma was heading a heavy ball and it was the repeated trauma that appeared to be the problem. H.M Coroner, Andrew Haigh, ruled “Mr Astle’s type of dementia was entirely consistent with heading a ball and the occupational exposure has made at least a significant contribution to the disease which had caused his death”.
The FA and Professional Footballers’ Association promised to conduct a ten-year joint study into DBD and the medical links associated with head trauma through heading footballs. Twelve years on, this research has never been concluded or published.
The people arranging the event are respectfully asking that if you are aware of any former players who may have died of, or are sadly living with Alzheimer’s or any other Degenerative Brain Disease please email dawnastle@justiceforjeff.co.uk – this information is vitally important to forthcoming research.
The aim of the campaign is threefold
- SUPPORT – for those in football and their families who have had similar experiences, or who are still living with dementia.
- EDUCATION – head injury in sport and its associated immediate and long term risks is a major public health issue, and in effect an industrial disease, but one for which there is little or no awareness in sport, education, health and allied agencies, never mind public awareness. There needs to consistent, clear and robust information on aspects of all head injury management, including CTE, and see this information disseminated effectively.
- INDEPENDENT RESEARCH – this is a complex and fast moving field and one where there are international experts in research in brain injury positioned to lead. It might be argued that sports agencies, including the FA/ PFA have been guilty of trying to take on research in this highly complex issue, in this highly complex organ ‘in house’, and through their own sponsored research. Invariably, this has failed to deliver.
You can keep up-to-date and learn more about our campaign by visiting our website justiceforjeff.co.uk or through our Facebook (facebook.com/justiceforjeffastle) and Twitter (@astle1968 #justiceforjeff) pages.
Thank you for reading.
I will never forget Eddie Hapgood, pre-war Arsenal and England left back and Captain (in his autobiography, I think) saying that in his early days at Arsenal, he often lost consciousness after heading a heavy wet ball.
He said that he eventually got over the problem.
We don’t need 10 years research to tell us that if our ankle is constantly kicked it will be damaged.
Do we really need ten years research to tell us that if we constantly hit our head against an object moving at great speed it is going to eventually damage whatever is inside our head.
When Eddie played the affects of smoking on the body were not understood. Now we know how and why smoking is a killer, so the wise amongst us don’t smoke.
Driving a car is dangerous. To lessen the danger we now accept the wearing of seat belts. The idea was scoffed at, at first by some but now using them for most of us is automatic.
Heading the ball in football is an essential part of football. We now know that this constant banging the head by a fast flying object is likely to cause brain damage.
Now that we know and understand this surely the time has come for footballers to wear helmets that will provide protection for the brain.
I suspect that this idea will be laughed at, at first as being one for ‘softies’ and footballers are strong and heading the ball is ‘all part of the game’.
But give it time and the wearing of head protection will a natural part of the football strip, complete with advertisements.
Colario,
I know of one outfield player who always wears a helmet in my county. I’ve seen that team play twice and he always had his cech-helmet on. I think he got a head injury before and decided to wear it on doctors orders.
Im sure the baLLS now are 10 times lighter, im sure the players will be ok
if not they should consider the high top trim
@Colario,
Not having kicked a football now for 70 years, I thought the modern ball was ultra light and the danger from heading was now a thing of the past. Am I wrong?
no nicky you are not wrong
I hope the defense is as you predict because I feel Monreal needs a rest and a rise. What a team player!
Who’s there today?
The ball may be lighter but it flies through the air much faster than in the past and as we know the faster the object the more damage it does when it hits something be it moving or still.
Helmets are worn in cricket and what we know this side of the pool as American football. The latter the game for ‘toughies and college heroes’, so why not football players?
Do we think the boss will start Walcott today? Since the boss is not desprate, I think he should start from the bench in our home game with d Saints. The boss should have subed Arteta in d beginning of the 2nd half in our game with Dortmound. Why? Arteta was on yellow and he won’t denfend 100% anymore to avoid picking up a 2nd yellow. And in a Champions League match, 100% defending is paramount. This is not an after thought. I twitted this at d end of d first half when the players were heading to d dressing room. Check my twitter account @SamuelAA to confirm. Arteta would hv escaped this injury had the boss sub him early on. Did u hear how the WBA manager was berating d Gunners’ defending as a vunerable defence? In the past we used to have beast-Sol Champbell and beast-Patrick Vieira at the heart of the Gunners defence and midfield. And no team dare to blasphemy the Gunners or to think of breaking their legs as the are now doing. I think the boss must address the area of lack of beast defenders at Arsenal.
Rotation where possible!!…
Michael Ram,
Monreal is the silent hero of this current team. Alexis is the man without any doubt but the Spaniard has been reliably omnipresent this campaign.
Kudos to him.
Go go go GUNNERS
What are the odds on Mulumbu dishing out a thuggish tackle and getting away with it?
COYG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
watching in Goa & commentator – sounds like Pleat (curb crawler). He is worse that Foy. Welbeck should have had a pen but ‘nobody’ saw it.
Monreal has been removed by a nasty foul.
WBA gk time wasting
Menace give the screen a wipe, and put your specs on !
AB, definite foul on Giroud in penalty area. Foy as usual hasn’t a clue over what constitutes a penalty.
Chris Foy blows for halftime just as Sanchez breaks loose! WTF.
come on you gunners,we should be at least 3 up here. The finishing is not there again, where have we seen that before?
@Al,The ref’s a con
Good half , reassuring to have Kos back , Baggies have defended well but will crumble second half
AB stop wiping your eyes with shit. Danny was fouled in the box. He was pulled by his arm with only the keeper to beat. A clear penalty. So get your stupid spud mate out of the commentator box and crawl round Kings Cross.
Cool your panties , Arsenal will walk it second half , got to say I thought Foy was Ok
Surprise surprise
BT Sport all agree Giroud being fouled in the box is not a penalty.
Keown becoming just as big a prat as the rest of them.
Saying any PGMO official is OK is like praising small pox. They are cheats. Welbeck was pulled by his right arm when one on one with the keeper. Foy & his assistant saw it but let it go.
It was a clear penalty on Giroud.
Have you seen these prats in BT Sport studio? This is how I imagine big immoral decisions at PGMOL are being made – an old bald prat that preaches about morality and “The Purity of The Real English Football” (you know, the one that resembles to Pulis’ Stoke) followed with nods of younger bald prats like Shearer.
I was at the Ems last week when Man U was gifted the game by PGMO. So I know what these germs can infect.
The commentators are atrociously bias and stupid. My god, why are idiots are in charge of the game I love so much?
I don’t get McManamans logic… Giroud gets the ball, then defender makes contact with Giroud, then clears ball therefore no penalty no penalty!
COYG!!!!!
Josif – Shearer is a dumb ass footballer that got away with strength & FA support. He couldn’t manage a polish on a pair of boots.
Surely it is within them to win this with a couple of well taken goals, not one iffy pen
Foy found his cards!!!! shocking how many will he give Arsenal for imaginary fouls?
AB – I agree but we should have got a penalty in the first half.
Welbeck’s technique is something Wenger’s staff will have to work on. He has a great work-rate, amazing pace but his technique, especially the shooting one, is something he has to improve. He should have had ten goals on his account by now.
@jambug: keown a prat? Are you serious? The man’s a gunner through and through.
Yyyeeeeaaahhhhh
get in there!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
As much as I like alexis, he is getting a little too selfish for me, both in the dortmond game and today. and dat guy WELBS!!!
oh Danny boy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What a run by Santi! Let’s nail this one!
Superb goal more to follow
Foy at it again!!
AB your spud mate Dawson trying an elbow on Giroud.
Yesssssssssssss get in there….come on lads see this game out – no mad rush to attack, counter attack when it’s time.
Foy wants to play left back for the Baggies!!
Even the despicable Michael Owen agreed that doubling up on Welbeck was a foul
One booking for pulling , if you think this game is dirty , well you’ve obviously never played the game
Do we practise corners? serious question///
If all you look at is bookings then you have had played in England with the cheats as refs.
Dawson stamped on Giroud and got no booking so what the F do you think I’m looking at.
Yes are leading, so lets keep our back tight. On the head injuries, very very interesting. Yrs ago, when I was a CD, I collided with an opponents head. The impact was quite sivere, because after that when I stood up, I started to feel dizzy and sat down for a few minutes. I felt a strange numbness and after that it was fine. I forgot about that incident untill a few months ago when I read an article in the paper about the implications it might have. I was very very lucky by the looks of it. Fingers crossed.
Even Arsenal time wasting against this dross !
Curb Crawler complaining about time wasting by Arsenal!!
Good indication , exactly how long have you been a professional ref
Watch Foy in hie element! He is cheating as PGMO know how.
Told you easy
COYG!!!
That will do nicely!Onward and upward!
COYG! Aha and Amen!
I think we all agree that AB is a complete twat.
Not at our fluent best, more injury concerns, nervous at the end, but got what we wanted and needed, clean sheet as well. Well done all of them, a mention for Martinez,thought our rookie keeper did well.
Hopefully they can start building some momentum.
We’re back in contention for the fourth place trophy
Well done Arsenal. As the famous chant has it TO THE ARSENAL ONE NIL!
COYG
I’ll second that , be lucky !
No he just wants to play the ‘special one’ over here 😉
AB go play in the traffic with your Barbie.
Well done the team!! One nil to the Arsenal – excellent.
AL agree about AB – an absolute bone head – he adds a new dimension to the term “mentally challenged”!
The special brew one? 🙂
Foy was asking the WBA to start rotational fouling with his decisions. But fair play to WBA they played a fair game. Thank God for the Post, finally we had a bit of luck.
MOTM Cazorla, Welbick was awesome, and Gibbs great as usual. Now please lets give Sanchez a rest.
Another win and a clean sheet. Lets keep this going. Will go home watch the game.
Looks like the charm is for me to start watching from minute 5 on. Never mind, great victory, in spite of the non-called fouls and penalties we should have had.
AB
You really are something.
I Don’t know exactly what it is, but it ain’t pleasant !!
@Al,
If you noticed, Foy again finished the game when Sanchez was heading to an empty goal.
Florian
Switched BT of the second the whistle went, but I’ll bet my bottom Dollar they make a massive fuss about that early 2nd half off side call against Albion.
Anyone else saying “don’t fuck this up” for the last 5 minutes?
A performance straight out of last season, and yes, a scary last five mins
jambug,
I was watching a live stream, in the pub, no sound, so I wouldn’t know, but still very happy
Good shout on Martinez Mandy, two clean sheets for a guy under a lot of pressure. Great to see Kos and Per back together, a great team.
Will, certainly did!
Thought I’d have a listen to BT. I turned on just in time to catch this gem from Keown.
Re the penalty appeal for the poss handball.
Keown: I think it hit the inside of the leg, but I’ve seen them given.
When we get fouled in the box it’s no way a pen. When the ball hits Per on the leg “I’ve seen ’em given” WHAT THE FUCK KEOWN !!!!
LVG has said he doesn’t want to lose his balls. It’s the way he said it ….. honest -I’m a journalist!!
Yassin
Yup, noticed it too. Not sure whether it was Sanchez or Welbeck who had the ball, but their keeper was in our box. And soon as our player got the ball with an empty goal ahead of him that was Foy’s signal to blow his final whistle. Pretty much the same way the first half ended. Strange.
@AB,
When Wenger said that 4th place was LIKE a trophy, it was more than like w trophy, this fourth place was the reason we could go on and get the money and prestige to have Sanchez, Ozil, and all other top players with us today. It was so important to not fall off 4th place. But sure you and your likes and the stupid commentatots who know nothing about football and tactics and management know better than that. Please when you comment here, care enough we like to celebrate an Arsenal win no matter how/why, cause we are so deluded, so your boring sarcasm is not welcomed
Jambug
Think Keown is slowly getting compromised by the system. Sad really.
Does Martinez remind anyone else of Buffon? He certainly does to me, and I love his ball distribution.
Hope Monreal is ok, such an important player we can’t afford to miss at the moment, or at any other time.
AB
Go and check how much CL qualification earned the Club over the last 10 years.
Then go and check how much the Emirates cost to build.
Then tell me it wasn’t as good as 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 FA CUPS.
I’ve now realised what you are, and yes, it is very very unpleasant !!
A decent performance but I am still worried about our finishing.
Was there sitting in east side millennium corner, right next to away fans.
Will,
I agree with that. We should just score more goals with the forwards we have. But Giroud being out for a long time so he will need some more matches to come back to a good level.
Welbeck still being too nervous in front of goal if you ask me but if there is one manager who can train a forward in to becoming a quality finisher it is the one they want out.
And as I just wrote in my match article: today a complete new forward line that has played together till now for the total amount of zero minutes.
Once we get the finishing to a higher level I think we could destroy every team.
The ‘offside’ was a big talking point for Pleat. WBA could have won the match if it wasn’t called.
Apparently United’s win against Arsenal was the best all season despite the additional 3 players from PGMO. Fellaini is still on the pitch – the toilet brush on legs.
@Will and Walter,
Agree, we should finish our so many chances, but its nit the quality of our forward, as much as it is the calm and concentration when in such position that we lack. I hope this awesome goal from Welbeck (what a jump!!!) Can calm things for him.
@Menace,
To speak the truth, that offside could have changed the game. Still we got a lot of Penalty calls not given for us today (add thr fouls which sanchez and chamberlain was heading straight to goal). Its time we get lucky from the refereeimg and post denying them an equalizer.
I agree Walter and we with the players we have out it could only get better.
The thing is, I/we don’t deny decisions go our way. Of course they do. And today there was one, the offside. But as usual there was far more that went against us.
But what do the media want to focus on? The one that goes OUR way. Well there’s a surprise!
But what I/We contest is the averages over a period of time, which is really the only way you can judge how a team is treated(by the officials. As much as you cannot determine who is the best team over a season on one result, you cannot determine how a team is treated by Referees in one game.
So what I/We do here on untold is evaluate statistics, not over 90 minutes, but over a season, then over many years.
And the Statistics prove beyond doubt:
-We get less penalties than all our direct competitors.(despite the ball spending a considerable amount of time in the opposing box)
-We concede more penalties than all our direct competitors.(despite the ball spending very little time inside our box)
-We get more cards per foul than EVERY other team.(despite being a bunch of wimps without a midfield enforcer)
-We get more broken limbs than EVERY other team.
These are all things DIRECTLY ATTRIBUTABLE TO HOW WE ARE REFEREED.
If anyone wants to contest this, please, none of the ‘you’re paranoid’ crap.
Show me the statistics to prove me wrong.
Still top of the yellow card table.
31 bookings so far this season for our wimpy little midgets.
Compare with the likes of Crystal palace, who have commited 50 more fouls than Arsenal but they’ve only received 18 yellows.
Questionable quotes –
First Law of Living: As soon as you start doing what you always wanted to be doing, you’ll want to be doing something else.
A pessimist is a man who is never happy unless he is miserable, and even then he is not pleased.
The horizon is a place where the earth and sky meet but disappear when you get there.
Tact is the ability to make your guests feel at home when you wish they were.
If you try and don’t succeed, cheat. Repeat until caught. Then lie.
It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others.
If you’ve ended up in hell, and you’re mad at someone, where do you tell them to go?
Nothing is fool-proof to a sufficiently talented fool.
Tasos
Well said sir!
I notice we are not being flooded with statistics to discredit what we say !!
I wont be holding my breath.
@jambug
And I would bet a pound to a pinch of s**t that on average our yellow cards are issued earlier in the games than most other teams.
It would be a miracle to get a 50/50 penalty decision go our way. Hell it would be a miracle to get a nailed on penalty shout go our way!!
Jambug
Those stats are from the start of play today so you can actually add one more yellow to Arsenals list I believe.
One yellow issued for every 4.03 fouls. That’s the lowest booking per foul ratio in the league.
Tasos
Cards-to-fouls ratio has been a ‘bug bear’ of mine for years, therefore I did an in depth piece about it on UT a couple of months ago.
We’ve been at or near the bottom of that particular table for at least 10 years.
Joke doesn’t even begin to describe it !!
I feel we will simply have to up our game on Wednesday against in-form Southampton.
Today, after taking the lead, it seemed as though we were determined NOT to surrender it (as we have done this season).
Consequently we “parked the bus” which, for a team like Arsenal, was not a pretty sight.
Anyway, the mode gave us 3 points, the object of the exercise.
Nicky
I agree, ‘parking the bus’ is just not our game. Thank heavens it ended up working today.
I really hope, and believe, with the striking potential we have, once it all clicks, we will get back to the days when we will score enough goals to make ‘clean sheets’ an irrelevance.
At least I hope so, because keeping clean sheets is NEVER going to be our forte !!
Jambug – you’re spot on.
Parking the bus only because we were getting fouled every time we attacked. The consequence was that we had players up front with foul turnover permitted by Foy.
It will take a while for us to get a strong team as we are serially fouled from match to match. Amazing how media spout stats of United injuries but keep quiet on Arsenal.
These people are never satisfied; the team is criticized on another week for not holding on to a lead, then we have to put up with labels of ‘parking the bus’ in order to hold on to a lead, without any consideration that the same team put in a shift and a half mid-week to see off Dortmund, and have a list of injuries greater (arguably) then any other PL side!!!
Unreal!!