By Walter Broeckx and Tony Attwood
Le voilà. The new fixture list has arrived. And do we see anything strange at first sight?
Well, according to some of the British press, Sir Alex is already unhappy because he says Man Uwill have to play away from home after five of their six midweek Champions League group matches, including trips to Liverpool, Newcastle United, and Chelsea. Man City, of course have the reverse situation in which they have only one trip to make after midweek in Europe: against Chelsea at the end of November.
This is the reverse from last season, when Manchester United played at Old Trafford after each European midweek group stage game.
Which suggests maybe home or away doesn’t matter, since Man U went out at the group stages last year.
Arsenal have three away trips (Manchester City, WHU and Aston Villa) after Euro games.
Sir A has been agitated about this before, but it didn’t do much good then, and presumably won’t now. He said he would send “his man” to the Prem League computer to see how the fixtures were sorted. I wonder if he did.
Anyway, apparently the conservative forces that are in charge have not really been influenced too much as a quick review of the games shows that we play each team at home and away during the season.
When we play however is a different matter – and this does affect mid-week European matches. A Tuesday game in Europe, followed by a Sunday afternoon game on TV in the league is very different from a Wednesday match followed by a tough away game on Saturday.
But anyway, the hunt for tickets for Sunderland will be open soon now I think. I [that’s Walter speaking – Tony is just smirking as he has his season ticket] would like to make it to that game. And it is only one week after we play in Cologne in the last pre season friendly. Can I make it two in a row again this season? Time will tell but would be great. If not then I surely should make it for the Southampton game.
The first real top game at the Emirates is against Chelsea at the end of September. The weekend of 17 November we will be seeing the lot from down the road passing by. Manchester City should be coming to the Emirates around 12 January and Manchester United will be coming on April 27.
One thing I rather like is the fact that we go to Stoke on the second day of the season. So the conditions should be ok with the pitch still being a football pitch. And you know this is one of those games you want to get out of the way so you don’t have to think about them any more. From then on we can think of only football games. Unless some other teams want to adapt to a rugby style of game of course.
The season ends for Arsenal at Newcastle. But lots of balls will be kicked in before we get that far.
The actual fixture list is copyright the Premier League, and although we are sure some blogs will run them in full, one is not supposed to do this without a licence (which costs a lot).
So we’ll play by the rules laid down in the Design, Copyright and Data Act, and the EU Directive on databases, and just give a smattering of the list.
AUGUST
18 Sat Barclays Premier League Sunderland H
25 Sat Barclays Premier League Stoke City A
SEPTEMBER
1 Sat Barclays Premier League Liverpool A
15 Sat Barclays Premier League Southampton H
22 Sat Barclays Premier League Manchester City A
26 Wed Capital One Cup 3rd Round
29 Sat Barclays Premier League Chelsea H
OCTOBER
6 Sat Barclays Premier League West Ham United A
20 Sat Barclays Premier League Norwich City A
27 Sat Barclays Premier League Queens Park Rangers H
31 Wed Capital One Cup 4th Round
NOVEMBER
3 Sat Barclays Premier League Manchester United A
10 Sat Barclays Premier League Fulham H
17 Sat Barclays Premier League Tottenham Hotspur H
(it continues after that in the normal manner….)
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Walter, Tony,
These are our first-6 games: on top of the Euros, the Olympics and the Grand Tour to Asia and Africa. (Also, any intermittent CL action, would need to be included) If there ever was a time when ensuring quality backups for rotation and injury were urgent, that would now, n’est-ce pas? Behold something formidable:
Sunderland at home
away at Stoke City
away at Anfield
Southampton at home
Man City away
Chelsea at home
Imo, our collective thinking needs to stress depth as well as breadth. Ideally (and easier to say than to achieve, no doubt), we need players who – under these circumstances – can play multiple positions with little drop off in quality.
Man city got the easy way again cheaters they are all the games should have ended at the same time last day of season got the ref on there pay roll if u now what I mean THEY BOUGHT iT that was a dear prem trophy
Good article Mr Walter don’t mind Sir Alex. I like u Walter.
if the current team sticks together along with two more experienced quality additions such as giroo and mmmmm vanilla(pause), plus escaping important injuries coupled with a tight pressing ship depending on what tactics we go for then i have no fears at all even tho that start isnt the best.
i believe if we can get all that lot right we only have to really worry about the blue cheats.
and refs.
id go for
1-the half bil cheats
2-the mighty Arsenal
3-the manure decline
4-the russian experiment
I have just been informed by a decent source the Giroud deal is completed. He is usually right.
What now RVP
@Tony and Walter don’t forget that alex fugus can dictate as of when he would love to play,as Prof told us sometime back that there are team’s who can influence(TV) what time which day they want to play. Did you guys put that into perspective,yeah it has been happening and it going to happen.You get 2 matches in a week and the other one,hows that?
In the words of the old music-hall song, “Let ’em all come”.
By the time the new season starts Arsene will have sorted and strengthened the squad in such a way that will amaze all the doom and gloom merchants (and maybe surprise even the most loyal of fans). A new era is on the horizon! 😆
Arsenal.com has a list of all our potential fixtures here: http://www.arsenal.com/fixtures/fixtures-reports
The one thing we don’t have at this point is whether the CL games before an away match will be home/away. For example, CL match day 1 may work out all right for us before we are home to Southampton on Sept 15, then play CL on either the 18/19, followed by the away trip to ManC on Sept 22. However, if the CL match is away to a team in Russia, then the game against ManC becomes much more difficult.
The games around match days 2 and 4 do not look fun either.
CL match day 2 is Oct 2/3 and we have derby games before (Chelsea at home) and after (away at WHU). For match day 4, we are away to ManUre on Nov 3, followed by a CL game on Nov 6/7, and then a derby on Nov 10 at home (Fulham). The only time the schedule with respect to CL group stage looks half-decent is match day 6, when we are home first to Swansea on Dec 1, then CL on Dec 4/5, them home to WBA on Dec 8.
SAF belly-aching about the schedule is just an advanced shout-out to Riley to assign the “world-class” Webb to each of those away games after mid-week CL games. 😛
@Wooby,
Re. your last paragraph, I hope some incorruptible person in authority will check the name of the ref in the games you mention.
Three or max four addition will make Arsenal a title contender. The creative midfield role is extremely importa. When Arteta got injured, it became difficult to win games. RVP had to come for th ball from the mf and that didnt work. A mf is required, three world class strikers will be wonderful, the game is becoming very physical- stoke, Wigan, Chelsea and even city are all higly physical teams. To campaign on all fronts, three strkers should be okay.
Forgot to add, we expect more “bus parking” next season. With the confirmation of Di Matteo as Chelsea manager, Bus packing will become a routine and we should device a system to oercome that. “Parking the bus” won them the champions league and so they are most likely to adopt that sytle when playing with free flowing teams.
I would actually argue that games against other top teams following the mid-week CL games aren’t such a bad thing. A couple seasons ago, we dropped a lot of points in those fixtures, but we were playing on three days’ rest against teams that had a full week. Visiting City or Chelsea after a midweek fixture at least ensures the two teams will be on equal footing.
http://www.arsenal.com/fixtures/fixtures-reports
Looks like we are up against it from the start. Surprised they didn’t squeeze Spurs and Man Utd inbetween Champions league games as well.
Adam, they cannot put the tots in that because they play on thursdays 😉
It looks an unbalanced fixture list, with a cluster of difficult matches at the beginning of the season and also around January. However, I agree with Walter, it is good to get the horrid fixture of away to Stoke over early in the season.
Maybe we can still buy a replacement for whoever will be kicked to shit at Stoke before the end of August
The good thing about January is that there is no CL matches in the month.
Why do you talk about a rugby style of game? It is more a traditional amateur hardman on muddy/bad fields football style of game.
Im glad someone got my sarcasm
unfair fixtures, How different is it this year???..
We’ve had the whole world against us, for a few years now. And we managed to do well. Though, it doesnt look that bad this year.
me being cocky….By the time we end our season at St James’s park, we’ll be the champions (already).
Although it would be fairer if all teams participating in UCL had the same handicap (ie home league game before champs league game) I can’t be so sure the way we have it will work against us.
I think the team travelling together is a good way for them to bond and ‘be in it together’. I just hope AW has banned the use of i-pods / personal stereos on the team coach as there is nothing more isolating.
im just looking forward to seeing the arsenal in HK next month! got my tickets already and forcing my friends to go and be arsenal supporters for life! haha!
i really think TV selection is going to change things a bit.. Im sure if Fergie has his way as he normally does then all of their away matches after CL games will be played on Sundays with late kickoffs
and when do you guys reckon we’ll have the first sight of Dean? I really see him as ref on 2nd match vs stoke at their shithole..