- Arsenal in the Forest. Tackles, fouls and yellows
- Arsenal v Nottingham Forest: the home and away records
New episode of the series on Herbert Chapman: 100 years since Chapman joined Arsenal: 10, Why Knighton had to go
By Sir Hardly Anyone
The headline in the Guardian this satursday morning says Saka and Rice back for Forest visit but Ben White out, the latter part of which was utterly obvious but the former was not confirmed until now. Although even before that announcement was had Sports Mole’s predicted XI:
Raya;
Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, Zinchenko;
Odegaard, Partey, Rice;
Saka, Havertz, Martinelli
Who Scored offer us the same with just one change at full back.
Raya;
Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, Kiwior
Odegaard, Partey, Rice;
Saka, Havertz, Martinelli
Who Scored’s prediction reads, “Arsenal have won their last three home meetings with Nottingham Forest, though Saturday’s game won’t be a walk in the park for the Gunners. Forest have made an impressive start to the season and while they are unbeaten on the road this season, that record may just end this weekend.”
The Sun of course does its raging rampant negativity rant with, “Mikel Arteta’s side have endured a miserable few weeks having taken just five points from a possible 15, suffering unexpected defeats to Bournemouth and Newcastle United.”
Their view is that “The Gunners suffered three successive away defeats prior to that match, and could do with a spirit-lifting victory here,” which is probably the most boring football forecast I’ve read in the last ten years.
Just Arsenal tell us that “Gooners should be optimistic about the game; Ian Wright’s predictions of that game suggest so. “We need to get back on track. I think we beat them 2-1 or 2-0,” Wright said on the Stick to Football podcast. Interestingly, (according to the writer) “Wright’s claims were echoed by former Manchester United star Roy Keane, who responded: “I’m with you. 2-1 or 2-0, I agree. Good shout, Wrighty.””
So in desperation turning to the BBC for some semblance of something or other we find that they tell us that White will be out for a couple of months because of the nature of his injury. However “Declan Rice and Bukayo Saka returned to partial training today, while Leandro Trossard also trained and “seems to be OK”. Riccardo Calafiori is available for Saturday’s game.”
We are also told that Kieran Tierney is “not quite ready” but has “had a couple of sessions with the team.”
Speaking to the BBC Arteta said, “The energy from the players in the last 48 hours has been unbelievable” and said he hopes that will be carried through to Saturday’s home game.
Arsenal have played Nottingham Forest 105 times and have won 54 of the games (51%) with 29 (28%) being Forest wins. In the past ten games against the Garibaldis, Arsenal have won seven lost two and drawn one including a 5-0 win on 30 October 2022 on Arsenal’s ground. The last time Arsenal lost at home to the Tricky Trees was on 11 March 1989, so before the days of the Premier League, when Nottingham won 1-3.
However this was in a period in which in a run of nine consecutive league and FA Cup games between August 1984 and March 1988 Nottingham Forest won five, three were drawn, and just one was won by Arsenal (0-1 at Forest on 17 March 1987.
Finally, with both clubs on 19 points, it is worth thinking back to where the clubs were a year ago after both had played 11 games. As the table below shows, a major improvement by Forest but slippage for Arsenal, mostly caused by the fixture list but also to some degree caused by the improvement of Forest.
| P | Team | P | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4 | Arsenal | 11 | 7 | 3 | 1 | 23 | 9 | 14 | 24 |
| 13 | Nottingham Forest | 11 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 12 | 15 | -3 | 13 |
One other headline from this morning. It’s in the Telegraph. “Pep Guardiola: Most of the Premier League want Man City to be relegated” I don’t think that’s right because we all know that one year later the club would be back doing the same things as now. The people I speak to want the club banned for breaches of the rules on an industrial scale for a much, much longer period than that.
That’s about it. We’ve now got our usual drive from the Midlands to London which depending how things go and what we decide to do might mean an article in the evening, or maybe nothing until we recover on Sunday.
Did everyone see that offside, only offside because they drew a new foreleg for Merino? What is going on?
Was I imagining things or were they?
Extremely niggly fouls being called against Arsenal. Every call seems to be going the way of Forest. Both yellows were soft. Gabriel’s even more so because the player came from behind. Not sure what is going on.
@GGG
Jota pulls and spins an Arsenal player around referee gives a free kick Jota then throws the ball delaying a restart and guess what nothing not the first time a NFplayer done that at a free kick during the game but we know the rules only apply to us , the commentators even mentioned this , we want and need consistently .
Well well well.
Credit where credit is due. Man city 0 – 4 Spurs And they deserved it.
I know Liverpool will be 8 points clear, 9 ahead of us, if/when they win at Southampton tomorrow, but there is no arguing, they have had an easy, a very easy start.
This title race is wide open.
Spurs must be favourites to win the league now.
Despite the pro- spurs media circus etc. I was delighted with the outcome at the Emptyhad. Clearly 115 City don’t like it when things don’t go their way and we saw some nastiness from a few of their players. Let’s hope that their big centre-forward stays humble after this.
No doubt they will demand a re-play of the match with Michael Oliver in charge.
Another gutless referee at Man City, Twice the ball was thrown down aggressively after Brooks had the breathtaking audacity to award Spurs a free kick. A blatant block in the second half by a Man City defender – cautions – not a chance. Will we hear about City’s injuries? Didn’t seem to apply to us. If City perform like that at Anfield next week they’ll get taken apart. Call for Oliver!
Mick
Yep. noticed them incidents as well.
But the fact is, the way those second yellows were applied to us were/are still, an absolute travesty.
Like the 2 quick yellows Martinelli received from Oliver, you just don’t see those things happen to anyone else.
Personally I don’t want second yellows for those minute transgressions, it’s jus so frustrating when the letter of the law is applied to us and nobody else.
It is bias. It is cheating. And I don’t care what anybody says, it is an agenda
Perhaps someone can inform me why a shirt pull goes unpunished in the penalty area but merits a free kick and a caution between the two penalty areas. We avidly await “the referee’s ally” Gallagher to justify why Leicester weren’t awarded a penalty today. Both pundits,who have played the game, suggested it should have been given. My case rests!
Sally Pally
“Did everyone see that offside, only offside because they drew a new foreleg for Merino? What is going on?”
Just seen it, and yes you’re correct. Merino’s leg was bent back. The line they drew was to the foot of the player behind him.
Yes, it is a bit of an optical illusion as the bottom half of the leg of the player behind falls dead in line with the top half of Merino’s leg, but you saw it. I can see it. Yet these guys sat looking at it on their screens for 4 minutes cant.
Laughable.
We only see a selected sample of VAR lines and we never see the progression of movements. The line we are shown is chosen according to the predetermined decision.
Havertz was not offside at Chelsea in my view, but the commentary claimed that the line was conclusive – it was shown to us for a microsecond
I was quite happy with the way we played , mostly encamped in their half ! That is how I like us to do it . Really cannot fault anyone from our team of not playing well .
Up the Gunners !