Media move on to regular insults against Arsenal to hide the real data

By Tony Attwood

As we have been noting the media absolutely will not touch the story concerning Arsenal’s dramatic tactical switch which reduced the level of tackling by the club last season and so reduced the yellow card level for the season by 45%.

To achieve this Arsenal were engaged in a major change in their approach, which again has never been mentioned by the media.  Instead they plough on hour after hour with transfer tales of which we know from previous years, will be 97% or more inaccurate.  Arsenal will then be blamed for being too slow in acting in the market.

As part of this we are now seeing the introduction of stories in which Arsenal are supposedly asking every club going for any player who can move.  In response the player is saying “no”, he doesn’t want to play for Arsenal.  It’s becoming quite a dominant Arsenal theme.

Attached to this we are now also seeing daily put-downs of Arsenal, which as we’ve seen from the various statistics presented here, have nothing to do with the truth.  Here are a few samples for our new section which (until I think of a better title) I’m calling

Gibberish of the day

The Gunners face a crucial summer transfer window after a largely dismal season under Mikel Arteta.  (Team Talk).

New signings with similar quality from elsewhere are a must if Arsenal are to progress.  (Team Talk)

You can genuinely get better odds on Arsenal being relegated than winning the Premier League… (CaughtOffside)

Premier League grades: Chelsea, Leeds, Man City top of the class as Arsenal flounder  (ESPN)

A run of five straight wins to close the campaign can’t mask another very disappointing season for the Gunners. An eighth-place finish means no European football for the first time in 25 years, which will serve as a huge blow to the finances and reputation of the famous club. Mikel Arteta will not survive another year like this, while fans continue to hope absentee owner Stan Kroenke sells the club or finances some major signings to change the mood. Grade: D+   (ESPN)

Xhaka: Quality? Or the Most Overrated Player of Recent Years (and That Says Something!)? (Arsenal Arsenal) 

Premier League grades: Arsenal’s season to forget (ESPN)

Bundesliga Side Indifferent Over Arsenal’s Interest In Star, Gunners Face Forking Out Big Fee    (Inside futbol)

Arsenal transfer chief Edu facing £20m Tiago Tomas heartbreak despite talking for ‘months’ (Daily and Sunday Express)

This is the coverage Arsenal are now facing hour after hour as the media try to cover their own backs, having told us how awful Arsenal were, only to find that the stats say the opposite.  It’s total denial and deliberate distraction.

And of course it might have an effect.   Agents and players might well be influenced in terms of where they want to go, but the chances are that Arsenal actually are not looking to buy very many players, given the way they performed after Christmas.  So a transfer window of a couple of purchases could be all that Arsenal are actually after.  The media can then portray it as a total disaster, exactly as they predicted.

Then if Arsenal do ok next season it will all be put down to pure luck.

There is also one other factor that the media choose never to look at – the balance of the squad in terms of “home grown” and “non-home grown” players within the limit of 25.

In this regard Arsenal are being helped enormously by having several players in the squad who are home grown and will thus not take up the places normally filled by foreigners.

The rules for next season have not changed: clubs are only permitted to include up to a maximum of 17 foreign players, although as ever this only applies to over-21 players who can be used by clubs throughout the season.

Arsenal were short on the home growns last season, and as a result had a squad that had a full complement of foreign players, but had spaces in the home grown list.  From that list Bellerin is tipped to leave, but Chambers, Holding and Iliev will probably stay.  Even with Bellerin staying that still leaves four places for home growns.   I suspect Willock will be one and I think Smith-Rowe will be old enough not to be in the under 21s next season.

So assuming I am roughly right in this counting we are going to have two home grown places available without selling anyone.  After that it will be one in one out.

Arsenal against the Media

6 Replies to “Media move on to regular insults against Arsenal to hide the real data”

  1. The left back rumours areticling me, apparently we have been in for 4 players and all of them not wanting to join Arsenal cause we’re apparently crap. Not the fact that we have one of the best left backs in the world and people do see much playing time behind Tierney

  2. Here us another from Just Arsenal repeating an Online Mail story.
    Two Arsenal players make top ten transfer flops of the season – Just Arsenal News (Willian and Partey)
    As an Arsenal supporting blog they could and should have highlighted the eight Arsenal players recently making it into the top twenty list (which is factual) as Untold did but they apparently prefer to propagate the negative crap above which is not factual, just the opinion of some idiot at Online Mail.

  3. In more positive news, Steve Hackett has recommended that Arsenal push for VAR changes, having been robbed of Champions League football, a fact which both the Sun and the Mirror (copying the Sun) have stated.

    So it’s not all bad. And 8th is not a good season, even though it ended quite well, so without knowing what we know, the media are bound to report that, as bad news sells better and gets more clicks. Having said that, everything points to a far better next season and hopefully a change from PGMOL and the media. Things do change and there is less wriggle room for Mike Riley’s dirty tricks each season.

  4. Since Arsenal are no longer a big club , shouldn’t the media be looking elsewhere for news ? Or at the very least , be making up stories of those other big clubs ? Boring , boring ole Arsenal !

  5. Sally,

    Steve Hackett was the lead guitarist for Genesis until 1977. I hope you are referring to Keith Hackett, whose Twitter account is well worth following, although I’m following Steve too.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *