By Walter Broeckx
The first moments of the game I thought that Swarbrick was out to prove us wrong. The first poor challenge coming in leading with the forearm against the head of Wilshere and immediately he gave the deserved yellow card. Wow I thought this is how it should be done. Letting you know where the line is. Little did I know what would come later on. The part that will make me the angry Gooner.
But let us first move on to the match. A match with some casualties. After our good opening spell in which we dominated Villa and Giroud had a few heading chances the most mentioning worth incident was the fire power of Özil. His shot knocking out Baker completely. You could see his legs giving way immediately after the ball had hit him. Baker running in to the shot will have made the force of the impact higher of course but it takes some fire power to knock out a player like that.
A sad moment for Baker of course and one I don’t like to see. But this was a pure accident. I do think that Özil was aiming at something else than the head of Baker. The interruption that look ages broke our fluent rhythm for a while. Villa even showing up in our penalty area a few times. Pumping the high balls towards Benteke in the hope to get a favourable touch somewhere.
Meanwhile the kicking had started. Late challenges were seen and the ref losing the grip at times. But Arsenal tried to play their game and when Özil played a wonderful ball in to the path of Monreal the Spaniard got away on the left flank. His cross was perfect for the onrushing Wilshere who side footed the ball in the far corner. 0-1 to the Arsenal.
That was such a shock for Villa they slipped immediately and Wilshere this time with a cross towards Giroud who let the ball bounce a bit and then fired home between the defender and the keeper. 0-2 in less than 2 minutes and after 35 minutes of playing time in the first half.
A first half that was completely dominated by Arsenal. Maybe we could and should have made more of our dominance but we were happy with just dominating and monopolising the ball for the remainder of the first 53 minutes. Yes 53 minutes as Chelsea ref Atkinson added 8 minutes of extra time.
The second half was much of the same. Except that Villa moved a bit more forward and tried to use Benteke more and more. But not much happening in front of the Arsenal goal. On the other end and Arsenal goal was rightly disallowed for offside. That would have been the end of the match. A nice finish from Giroud by the way. And a bit later a nice attacking move from Monreal but just when he was going to shoot the Villa defender Vlaar made a great block on the ball. Monreal stayed on the ground with what looked like a sprained ankle. He had to be replaced by Gibbs.
Villa trying to do something but not really much troubling Szczesny apart from a few shots from distance. And then we made it easy for them. Cazorla being a bit too casual and losing the ball. The cross flew past everyone and Benteke (marginally offside maybe?) headed in at the far post. Per the captain was furious about losing the ball in that position. We still had some 15 minutes to go.
And then came the part that made me angry. I don’t know what prick came in towards Rosicky but this was a prime example of a red card offence. He came in frontal towards Rosicky leading with his elbow and smacked him right in his face. When you see your opponent in front of you you cannot come in leading with your elbow like that. Now I can imagine the usual suspects finding excuses like: he didn’t intend to hurt him like that. Well that is bullshit. If you go in to a frontal challenge in the air and raise your elbow toward the face of your opponent you are committing dangerous play. So that is at least a yellow card.
But when you break the nose of the opponent you have used excessive force and there is only one card: red card.
What did Mr. Swarbrick do? Nothing. Nada. Niets. Noppes. Rien. Nichts. (=a few other words for nothing) He even didn’t call the foul. And to make matters worse for him he broke the rules that he should apply. The rule that in case of a head injury you immediately stop the match. He did it in the first half when Baker stayed on the ground. But he didn’t do it for Rosicky. Was this because Rosicky is an Arsenal player? I think Mr. Swarbrick has to explain himself for this.
This was irresponsible from his part. Unacceptable and made my blood boil. Not giving the foul, not giving the red card and not even stopping play. This is a disgrace. And unprofessional behaviour from the ref.
For those who don’t believe what we have done with the referee reviews would you care to read the things I said about Swarbrick before the match? Well it was that he was very bad on the disciplinary front. Was I right or was I right? Of course you doubters I was right.
As a result Rosicky had to come off again as his nose kept on bleeding. So the happy Gooner sawy Oxlade-Chamberlain returning for the last 5 minutes of normal time. And then we saw a new thing and I will copyright this expression as Untold Copyright. In the past season we have known Fergie time. Extra time till United score was another way of putting it.
Well this has changed this season and Atkinson was the man to show it on the board. As a Chelsea man he knew that Arsenal was having problems because of all the kicking and punching and so he came up with 6 minutes of ‘Oiler Time’. This is new in the rules this season just as the new Oiler offside rules. Which in short summarized is just : you give offside decisions in favour of the oiler teams.
So people who say I only complain when we lose a game can crawl back in their shelf. I’m angry about some things that the ref did on the field despite our win.
But on the other hand: with all the pressure on us as we had to play after the rest we did our job despite being kicked and punched. And as a result we find ourselves TOP OF THE LEAGUE. Long may it continue.
Walter, a minor point the ball that hit Baker was struck by Gnabry not Ozil. I really hope that Baker recovers quickly as that was a clear accident . The assault on Rosicky wasn’t it was meant and should have been rewarded with a red card. I hope he recovers quickly as we’ll. A good three points and WE ARE TOP OF THE LEAGUE.
Good report Walter and a great result, well done to the team.
Re the Villa goal, it showed on the freeze frame Benteke was just onside.
On the felling of Baker (who has mild concussion), I thought it was Gnabry who struck the ball but I could be wrong.
Thanks for pointing at my mistake Andrew. Was still too angry about Swarbrick not acting in the way he should have done. I can tell you that if we don’t stop the match when a player has a head injury and we have someone assessing the match we can forget any promotion in the first months.
http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/wenger-on-a-big-win-wilshere-rosicky
Could be another costly game, possibly a broken nose and metatarsal….let’s hope for once the gods of injury will look kindly on us.
I think that elbow was meant.
I think it might be a while before another defender rushes in to block a full blown shot by Gnabry. It seemed to affect him as he was very quiet for a while after the incident. He stood near to Baker for a very long time before another team mate went up to him. He needed some TLC. Son it wasn’t your fault, you did absolutely nothing wrong and you had no way of knowing he has a glass chin.
BTW the PGMOL trying to repeat the ref travesty of a few seasons back. Lee Probert for our match against Fulham next Saturday….
Walter,
I’m as mad as you about that Rosicky incident but on the balance of play, I think Swarbrick did well. Of course, I’m not in position to argue with you on refereeing; I just think that compared to everything that we’ve see this season from the men with the whistle, he (Swarbrick) acquitted himself quite well.
Yep it wasn’t Ozil was the Magnanimous Gnabry.
I am sorry for the lad but as you said it was accident.
I thought at about the half hour mark that the refereeing had all the hallmarks of leading to a serious injury. Swarbrick started so promisingly and then let everything else go and from both teams. Flamini was lucky not to be booked and some of the challenges from Villa would have led to arrests if not on the football field. I hope we don’t have to see him again this year.
I agree with you Bootoomee up to a certain point. But that one main incident would cost him a not sufficient score if it happened in Belgium. Never mind of getting 90% correct if you let such a thing go you cannot get the required score for a ref in the top division.
I think that it was Agbonlahor who smashed Rosicky in the face. Should be a candidate for retrospective punishment, but I don’t expect it to happen.
Ref allowed lots of fouls to go unpunished. Cazorla, Ozil and Wilshere (several times) were victims of cynical fouls, usually after parting with the ball.
Walter,
I started the ref review this afternoon once I saw that we had the pleasure of Probert for the weekend. I’ll delve further into history to pick up the game you refer to.
@Walter: Wasnt that the game when Djourou got sent off for 2 yellow cards late on?
Probert vs Fulham….FFS!
Guess we will get a similar run for our difficult games in March. Just hope we have some players left by then…..
Indeed Arvind. He refused to give us a penalty in the first half also. Djourou got kicked 3 times in just seconds only to see him getting a foul against him. He even stopped a counter for us when he Fulham made a completely wrong pass and he then just blew his whistle when RVP and Theo were with two against one defender….
Oh well those are things for later this week. Now off to bed with a big smile on my face. Singing Top of the league…
Farce it’s getting bent
Didn’t we have Probert in the Newcastle match? Seems odd to have him again so soon.
In addition to a rather dodgy stream I also Try to follow the text coverage by “Arseblog”. Their comment on the Rosicky incident was telling
“Minute 80 – Referee had a look, saw Rosicky bleeding on the ground, and played on”.
Kind of says it all really, a player on the ground, bleeding from his nose and he allows play to continue. I wonder if there is cause for a private prosecution for reckless endangerment or something? I won’t hold out much hope for the Football Authorities to do anything about it.
Good write up Walter. A hard fought away win by the team and a valuable three points.
However, we can’t afford to keep losing a player a match as we have recently. Lets hope Rosicky and Monreal are not badly hurt.
Can we post the Agbonlahor challenge on Rosicky on the net and embarass the tossers in the FA into retrospective action?
I think Rosicky had a sudden bout of bleeding due to strenuous sneezing while on Aspirin.
He also violently attacked the elbow belonging to an Aston Villa player with his nose.
The BBC reported that Baker did NOT go to the hospital. The prognosis is “just” a mild concussion. He doesn’t remember the first half.
I hope someone on Arsenal talks to Gnabry, no he didn’t do a darned thing wrong.
“Can we post the Agbonlahor challenge on Rosicky on the net and embarass the tossers in the FA into retrospective action?”
AFC ought to do everything to get the Aggro tossed. If we don’t, we’re inviting worse. If the F-Alls do nothing, then it could be made a big deal. Exhibit A. How dare they allow open season on us. Headhunters. This is willful damage to AFC property and malicious assault. Let the cops make an arrest. Why not have a club lawyer do it? There’s so little protection in this war of attrition to grind us down by the business end.
Excellent stuff Walter. EPL is appalling really. Sagna was mullered off the ball. Does nose Count as head? If So Swarbrick is a ####### #### seemed Also to be half a dozen AV handballs not punished
Does someone have a Vid/Gif of the Baker incident? When I watched the match it looked like he went down holding the back of his head, not his face. He was struck by another Villa player.
Neither the match report or Wenger’s interview highlights at arsenal.com mentions Gnabry. I hope that he isn’t too shook up about knocking out Baker’s lights.
I have never seen a person knocked out from taking a shot in the head, but I once seen a goaltender take a shot in the face at point blank range. He got two black eyes and swollen lips. Baker might have some decorations tomorrow. 🙂 I think he should send Gnabry a note.
Ryo is not injured, he just wasn’t on the bench.
Apparently Mike Jones stood down from reffing EPL game at the weekend after issues in the Newcastle vs citeh game.
Shame the refs that have done us do not get the same punishment. Anthony Talyor and Martin Atkinson for starters?
We need technology to fight bias , corruption and incompetence in refs
Has anyone seen the shit storm over Newcastle disallowed goal against man city we had two goals disallowed for wrong offsides not a word.
And how about Rantetta’s link from the other day to the video where the nameless Tottenscum assailant steps on the back of Theo’s foot, toppling him, soon before he goes down with a torn ACL. That too deserves review. Is there not a case to be made?
Mandy,
I think it’s smoke and mirrors. Standing them down hardly seems punishment. Like whack-a-mole, they just keep popping up, and so it looks like the FA/PGMOL is concerned. Well they are concerned – but with managing appearances to chill out the mounting outcry (nip it in the bud lest it go too far). They know there’s trouble in the shire. Imo, Mike Jones will be back; or, if not soon, he’ll be used as a poster boy to “prove” the vigilance of the FA-PGMob.
When refs make mistakes they should not be making there match fees should be cut and dropped to the lower leagues and have to spend months not a week working there way back to PL.
@none
You are talking about the back of the head, and the AV manager was talking about the side of his head.
Our heads are hard containers, containing a brain (supposedly) nominally “floating” in fluid, where the biggest constraint is at the lower back of the skull by the spinal column. In some senses, a concussion can be considered a bruise on the brain. In the high G events that cause concussions, it is possible for the brain to get bruised multiple times. For a perfect contact near the center of the forehead in a reverse direction, it is possible to “bruise” the front, the back, or both. Getting hit off center or having rotation at the same time, could have the brain hit the skull more than twice. I hope AV has someone watching over Baker, as some symptoms take a while to develop.
But we all know they are mistakes they supposed to make for there pay masters.
” I wonder if there is cause for a private prosecution for reckless endangerment or something?”
Andrew Crawshaw,
Indeed. Is there a lawyer among us?
@BOB yeah that was the very same player Jamie ‘no brain’ redknapp was comparing him to Xavi as he played against Crystal palace at the weekend in a game he should have been banned from.
makes you sick taht the premier league throw the book at wilshire for putting his finger up whilst dangerous/reckless/illegal challenges are allowed to go on unpunished.
Also Rosicky’s broken nose from Agbonlahor without him being punished . He was just as dirty in the home game against Villa which the ‘referee’ decided to ignore as well.
If they broke his nose (and it impacts his contract renewal or not) perhaps Rosicky can then press charges for some level of assault? Couldn’t expert testimony establish the Aggro’s intent. The “in the heat of battle” excuse doesn’t seem to cover this one.
Old Data:
I am still doing old data (1992/3, the first EPL season) while the game was playing. As UA often picks up visitors from the other team, maybe some AV fans will be by.
I believe Aston Villa had the lowest cards (first yellow) per game in that season, significantly less than half the average rate. But, even the card rate when Aston Villa was away was less than the league average.
That season had fewer cards than we typically see now. And it is hard to analyze small count data. The rate at which AV got cards at home was small, but the variance is much larger than one might expect. Except that the numbers are so darned small ti could just be a small number effect. The cards given to the away team when AV played at home were smaller than league average, and also too much variance. When AV was playing away, the home team averaged less cards than was typical, and the variance was smaller than expected. The cards given to AV when they played away, were very low (less than double what they got a home, but way less than league average), but the variance in this is exceptionally small. The card data for Aston Villa playing at home was the most difficult to analyze across the entire league.
Arsenal was picking up 0.71 cards per game at home (variance too large). The away team was seeing 1.29 cards per game, and not enough variance. When Arsenal played away, the home team was getting 0.90 cards, and Arsenal was getting 1.05 cards per game with too much variance.
hey don’t know if anyone saw this article but very interesting reading and nothing taht hasn’t been said on here a lot of times
http://metro.co.uk/2014/01/13/are-poor-officials-gifting-manchester-city-the-title-ahead-of-arsenal-or-chelsea-4260509/
@Gord, will be fascinating to see the results of your findings for season 1992/93. Just to help your analysis a little bit, bear in mind that several laws of the game were different then to what they are now. First of all, the tackle from behind hadn’t been completely outlawed; secondly, goalkeepers and defenders were not red-carded for professional fouls that denied a clear goalscoring opportunity as much; and the offside law was much more in favour of the defending team as compared to today. All these laws and conditions only changed at the 1994 World Cup, for the better in my view. The change in offside may have been something that Arsenal team struggled to adapt to initially in 1994/95, possibly one of many factors in such a poor league season placing of 12th that season!
This is a comment on Randy Savage
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/25687213
> They are surprisingly solid at the back:
IMHO I don’t think Vermaelen and Koscielny were going to make it as a pair. At the moment, Mertesacker and Koscielny are doing it. I suspect that Mertesacker and Vermaelen is probably just as good. I don’g think it is that Mertesacker is necessarily so good, but rather that he provides balance to the attacking instincts of Koscielny and Vermaelen.
> Plenty of class acts in the middle
> I have said before that, when they do not have their fast, naturally wide players like Walcott, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Lukas Podolski available, Arsenal lack pace and width.
Just pointing out how dumb these quote can be. Podolski is not as fast as Walcott, the OX or Gnabry. The sentence Savage produced, really needed to be expanded.
But, the dumb thing is: is you don’t have your fast players on the field, you don’t have any fast players. If you don’t have players will to be wide, you don’t have any wide players.
Maybe Savage meant better (or even said better), but what ended up in the article is almost nonsense.
> A forward line to be reckoned with
It isn’t just that 3 (4 sometimes?) of the forwards become attackers, but in some games the two fullbacks become attackers. There are times in games, where Arsenal has 6 or 7 attackers.
> They are top without beating the big boys, but do they have to?
Savage totally cops out here. Arsenal should have beaten ManU away. Arsenal could have beaten ManC. Arsenal … In a world without referee (assignment) malfeasance, Arsenal could have won all of those games. Arsenal should be congratulated for continuing to push on and only concerns themselves with the next game.
PGMOL is still trying to influence the final standings. Arsenal is doing well, but I think PGMOL will gift enough points elsewhere that Arsenal doesn’t finish first. And part of that gift is giving yellow cards to Arsenal players in games where the opponents do nominally the same (or worse) and they don’t get a card.
So, I am guessing a 2 or 3 finish for Arsenal. I would really like to see Arsenal do well against Munich, and hopefully win Champions League.
And for next year, I (still) would like for Arsenal to have the perfect season, all wins.
And Mike Riley being charged with bringing the game into disrepute (this year).
@Vikrant Dogra
> @Gord, will be fascinating to see the results of your findings for season 1992/93. Just to help your analysis a little bit, bear in mind that several laws of the game were different then to what they are now.
Yes, I do know that changes in the laws have happened. And that initial season had 22 teams, not 20. What I was hoping, is that the EPL was created without bias. And enough numbers look funny enough, that I don’t think this was true. But what seems to be true, is that Arsenal has not yet been singled out for negative bias, it just looks to be one of many. Which means there is the opportunity to see how this bias develops. That this first season already shows unusual properties, means I need to find how something new grows out of something already crooked.
Finishing this probably means that society continues to ignore high functioning autistics who are orthogonal to the hiring process. But maybe some miracle happens and I finally get to use all this other knowledge? 🙂
I am currently in India and watched the game live on TV. I was also very pleased initially when Swarbrick carded El Ahmadi for a blatant assault. However his subsequent blindness to late tackles was abysmal. He allowed several Agbonlahor & Benteke late tackles from behind. He had a chat with one Villain instead of booking him. He allowed play to continue when a head injury to Rosicky was obvious – blood oozing from the nose.
PGMOL have a set of very consistent cheats that talk to Arsenal opponents while booking Arsenal players without any consideration. The booking of Monreal was totally incorrect as Agbonlahor ran into him and went to ground when both were supposed to be going for the ball.
The FA are a corrupt organisation with the Monopoly PGMOL being used as their tool to manipulate games and the ‘sport’ that was football. The FA have to review Agbonlahor’s elbow on Rosicky. AFC rarely complain as the FA will manufacture an incident to punish the club.
WOO HOO , HOO !
Well played the lads ! Was very impressed with the tean pressing with great pace after going 2 up .
I was under the impression that we would go on to score more
in the second half , but we slowed down some and ended having some very nervous moments at the end .
Do hope that the injuries are not too bad . Villa got away(again )with some terrible fouls and how Agbonlahor was still on the pitch beats me .
Also very glad to see AOC back .
Is it only me??…When Santi gave the ball away leading to Villa goal, our midfielders were static. Wilshere should have done more to give Santi an option.
Ramsey is very good at this. More games, and Wilshere too will learn it. pahh…missed out on a clean sheet…
@Gord
‘Some symptoms take a while to develop’. Lucid Interval is the phrase you’re looking for.
The conspiracy theorist in me says that the assaults on Arsenal are meant to fore them into the transfer market. Spending money is the only way to keep the ref manipulation in some sort of abeyance.
I believed at the time that the Anthony Taylor performance vs Villa was meant as a reminder to Arsenal that they need to spend. When Ozil came in (or rather when 40m pounds went out), the refereeing became still below par, but less egregious.
With the transfer window now open, Arsenal MUST BUY has become more of a mantra in the media, and the refs are probably going to ensure that it happens. Otherwise Arsenal will be punished. Through fair means (actually needing players) and foul (being made to need more players/rules being bent)
I believe Swarbrick has covered himself re the Rosicky assault by booking Agbonlahor, albeit seemingly minutes after the assault. Which raises the question, why did he not give a foul at the time if it was a yellow card offence subsequently? I can only infer that the referee saw nothing at the time which must mean he was subsequently informed either by linesman or 4th official. If this is the case, we need the comms between officials to be publicly available as on cricket and rugby union. Otherwise it looks about as straight as a met police officers evidence.
What made me so angry was that let us suppose that he couldn’t see the incident completely clear between Agbonlahor and Rosicky and missed the elbow. But he saw that Rosicky stayed on the floor after a header so he must have checked his condition.
The assistant on that side of the field should also have used his buzzer flags to give a signal to the ref that the Arsenal player stayed on the ground holding his head and should stop play.
And the assistant also should have used the mic to tell the ref about the player on the ground with a head injury.
But as play went on for a while the ref just let it go.
Was it a deliberate act from the ref or the assistants??
I have been warning for weeks that we will see serious injuries on Arsenal players because the refs offering no protection at all. In the last two games we have one cruciate ligament torn, one broken nose and maybe even a broken foot.
I accuse you Mr. Riley. YOU are the one to blame. Just as you did nothing to protect our players in game 50 you still keep on doing it. You still give our players not the protection they are entitled to according to the FIFA laws of the games.
Clockendrider, the yellow card against Agbonlahor was for a pull on Özil when he was running with the ball away from the Arsenal goal.
Walter,
I stand corrected.
About the Probert appointment only for the match against Fulham.
He did Newcastle and we lost Giroud after an unpunished assault on his foot. That was on match day 19. We then had match day 20+21 and now he comes back.
So Fulham can be kicking us to shit if they want… They are out to get us. It is very unusual to have the same ref with only 2 games in between. Very very unusual….
As I said Mike Riley is doing all he can to cripple us before the run in… disgusting
Prober vs Fulham? Well that brings up some memories. Lets see what happens this time.. Riley just cant help himself can he? We just had Probert vs Newcastle and here we are 3 matches later we have him again.. Wont be suprised to see Mason after him.
Dnt knw if anyone see it bt every time Arsenal plays against agbolahan he always kick out on our player,kind go bck 2 our 1st meeting dis year in d second half he kicked our player like everlasting before he was booked and subsequent years have noticed it from him.
The Ref gave us false hope wit d early card hoping our player will feel relax nd opened up 2 b kicked wit d impression that d Ref is der for them.
Nice win nd TOP OF THE LEAGUE
Arsenal 13,
Hate to disagree with you but that goal was entirely Santi’s fault. He should have cleared the ball rather than pass as he was under pressure and isn’t well balanced to make the sort of pass that he attempted. The ball was whipped in one time before anybody could respond. Our defence wasn’t even arranged for it. Per’s reaction to the goal mirrored my own and was justified.
I love Carzola and I hate to knock our players for their mistakes but this was entirely Santi’s error. I don’t think he should be crucified for it though.
The Boys did us proud against Villa’s long ball and bully boy tactics.
If Villa showed half the battle they do against us(Arsenal)/Man Shitz/Chavs, they wouldn’t be the guaranteed 6 points a season they represent to Man U!
News Flash:
Since it was recently reported that there is a shortage of headsmen in Saudi Arabia, and since Serge Gnabry has recently impressed in instant decapitations, it was reported he was approached by Saudi justice authoroties with an offer to quit his footballing career and to ply his trade as a headsman.
😉
@Shard, interesting new conspiracy theory, the refs are working hard to ensure we spend money. Now that seems odd because if we do that we become a better team seeing as Wenger declared he’d only spend big on quality. So losing to AV early in the season caused Wenger to buy Ozil, is that what you mean? That made us stronger as buying world class players usually improves a team. I don’t see how the refs, all in this together of course plotting the downfall of Arsenal (how ridiculous that looks when you write it down) can come to the conclusion that making us buy good players will aid our destruction.
This is at the behest of the evil PGMOL who’s only function is to destroy Arsenal at the behest of their leader who is a Manu supporter, I think that was the belief. In that case surely Chelsea and City should be punished frequently and why the hell are Manu way off the pace having dodgy decisions themselves?
No, I forgot the PGMOL have switched allegiances now and now support Manu’s hated rivals City. They’re almost as fickle as the imaginary AAA, this PGMOL lot.
If we won the league you lot would still dream up a conspiracy. It would go something like this: “So that dreaded intellectual Monsieur Wenger has won the league, our plan is working. Now he will be complacent and not buy any new players and the current players will become drunk on success and start going out with expensive women who are really cyber bots that our secret lab built who will hypnotize them whilst making love into playing like eleven Denilsons.”
Anyway we won so who cares. In the end the ref was not very good at taking orders from the Hooded Claw (PGMOL) and failed to stop us getting 3 points. This game could have been awkward as Villa were humiliated in the cup and pride might have pushed them to at least snatch a draw but we dominated according to the radio. Ox and Gibbs are fighting fit again too so we’re looking quite strong. Hope Ramsey will be around for some of our big games. Maybe even Diaby will be back in February or would that be a miracle?
Thanks for the report Walter, Poldi looks like hes hungry for some playing time..!
COYG!
re “the rupert” @ 9.41am
“They’re almost as fickle as the imaginary AAA, this PGMOL lot.”
Wrong on two counts – the PGMOL may have switched allegiance to the Manchester Oilers, but they are consistent in their bias against Arsenal – but then you refuse to accept the evidence. Further the AAA do exist – again you are in denial, but wrong. The AAA may vary their tactics from time to time, but they are consistent in looking for every opportunity to knife the club.
As for your following paragraph: –
“If we won the league you lot would still dream up a conspiracy. It would go something like this: “So that dreaded intellectual Monsieur Wenger has won the league, our plan is working. Now he will be complacent and not buy any new players and the current players will become drunk on success and start going out with expensive women who are really cyber bots that our secret lab built who will hypnotize them whilst making love into playing like eleven Denilsons.””
Little rupert, Brenda might think you have been smoking something illegal, either way you need help!
are you trying to be funny pretending the ref gave excessive extra time? Baker injury took about 5 minutes and for Rosicky it was about 2-3 minutes
OlegYech,
Baker took 5 minutes and the ref gave 8 extra time.
But yes I was just trying to be funny…
@bjtgooner 10:44
Well said.
OlegYch
Atkinson has been erratic as a fourth official as he has been as a ref, seems he cant do anything right. The other day at newcastle v City he gave 7 minutes of extra time. Granted na$ri received some treatment but it was for like 2 or 3 minutes, and he added 7! Like you say yesterday baker’s treatment took 5 mins, but he added 8, Rosicky’s took 2-3 but he added 6. In all he added 14 minutes of extra time in yesterday’s match, where the real injury time for both incidents was no more than 8 minutes. How can anyone even explain that?
Lawyers and Lab Rats
Scientists are considering using lawyers in place of rats in lab experiments. Researchers get less attached to them and there are some things rats just won’t do.
Keeping It In Proportion
It’s 99 percent of lawyers that give the rest a bad name.
That’s Not Funny
The problem with lawyer jokes is that lawyers don’t think they’re funny, and no one else thinks they’re jokes.
“If we won the league you lot would still dream up a conspiracy”
And if we won the league, you would still criticise and say we were not good enough!
AL
“In all he added 14 minutes of extra time in yesterday’s match, where the real injury time for both incidents was no more than 8 minutes. How can anyone even explain that?”
well how do you explain an average of 5 minutes of extra time in an injury-free match?
Then this must be at United OlegYch when they are behind 😉
Best I could find was … http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1921957-gif-aston-villas-nathan-baker-injured-after-taking-shot-to-the-face
After the ball strikes the player in the face he is struck by a Villa player.
Im not a lawyer but when you play football you effectively are a willing participant and so it would take an outside party to make the allegation. i.e it would take a fan AT the match to make the allegation that Agbonlahor assaulted Rosicky to the police for a case to be made.
none,
Tehnically speaking, why can’t Rosicky or for that matter AFC bring charges? Why only a third party?
“They are out to get us. It is very unusual to have the same ref with only 2 games in between. Very very unusual…. As I said Mike Riley is doing all he can to cripple us before the run in… disgusting.”
Walter,
When will AFC publicize this? Perhaps Gazidis is making a case behind the scenes. Perhaps he did and this is PGMob/F-All’s answer. Fans’ counter-actions can involve whistle-blowing and red-carding. A visual or public spotlight must shine. Doing nothing has produced the chronic attacks and will continue as is being predicted. Taking this one game at a time, rather than being in the ready to protest a general and spreading policy will play into the hands of the PGMob, who want fans to switch on and off after each match and not carry forward the kind of case that is being documented at UA. Also, seeing other teams’ travails as having something in common with our own (rather than being quietly delighted that they are suffering) would be a welcome step forward. We can win on an even pitch; the point is to do all and anything necessary to even it.
I am not sure of a conspiracy but we always seem to get the short end of the stick. That may be true or not but Arsenal supporters are not the only ones who are dissatisfied. This is not really a case of my team vs. your team.
This growing cacophony of criticism could easily be greatly muted by being open with the decision making of referees. This is not national security, and the Premiership has a monopoly over top level football in England so no trade secrets would be lost to rivals were information shared openly. There should be no need for the PGMOL to be so opaque. It’s quite sad really as it damages the sport that we all love.
BTW, does anyone have a link to the Rosicky incident?
@GoingGoingGooner
Best one I saw was http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/01/13/article-0-1AA3D79600000578-582_306x423.jpg
But it’s not conclusive imo.
@Stuart, don’t be dumb. If we won the league there’d be nothing to criticize.