Untold Arsenal: Supporting the club, the manager and the team
"I believe the target of anything in life should be to do it so well that it becomes an art." A Wenger
By Tony Attwood Our next match is again going to be on Pay TV with Sky at £14.95. The protests continue, money is being sent to local foodbanks, and the dreadful Sky and the BT Sprout continue with their doomed venture although this might be the last weekend of it. But whereas with football there …
Read More “The desperate need to sort out Arsenal’s away form”
By Tony Attwood Back in August as this season was about to get under way, the Guardian published the article “Home advantage prevails despite absence of fans.” You might think that pretty well does it for the approach that Untold has been taking which is that a) The home benefit has vanished b) The reason …
Read More “Despite media denials, away advantage now outweighs home advantage”
By Tony Attwood That was a fine roll out by our second XI I thought, and there are several players there who are obviously making their way solidly towards the first XI. Joe Willock stands out for me but is certainly not the only one. And while I am not a fan of the Europa …
Read More “Why Wenger and Ferguson could only happen in the Premier League”
By Bulldog Drummond “Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta has confirmed that David Luiz will return to the squad against Molde in the Europa League on Thursday night according to Sky.” So says Sports Mole but they don’t give us a team sheet prediction. However they do say “Arteta is expected to name a much stronger lineup to …
By Bulldog Drummond The first thing to report is the rather helpful note that appears on the Wiki sites about today’s opponents, telling us that they are not to be confused with Mold FC – a club that coincidentally was formed at the same time as Arsenal. Mold is a Welsh team, and we are …
Read More “Arsenal v Molde; Ole, referees and football in Norway.”
By Bulldog Drummond As yesterday’s research paper showed, and of course all the other research papers that we have come across which have built up to this point, referees from different countries have responded in different ways to crowdless grounds. All are favouring the away teams more, but by how much differs from one country …
Read More “Arsenal v Molde and the implication of the new referee research”
By Sir Hardly Anyone Here we are again. And before we commence with the commencement let us recall what was said yesterday. For on that day around this time the top five stories were 1: Elneny is an undroppable. 2. What Pochettino said about Arsenal and Tottenham 3. The magic of Nikolaj Duus Moller – …
Read More “The top six Arsenal stories doing the rounds today”
By Tony Attwood As you will know if you are a regular reader, Untold Arsenal conducts its own research into the way football is refereed, such as our famous 160 games series in which the first 160 games of a season were reviewed and the results presented complete with video evidence. The analysis, which is …
Read More “Home advantage has vanished: referee competence blown wide open”
By Tony Attwood Measuring the number of tackles, fouls and yellow cards each club gets is something that only Untold does. Quite why no one else mines this rich vein of data I don’t know, but we do it, and the results continue to be extraordinary, and bizarre. It was an idea that emerged last …
Read More “Fouls, tackles yellow: how one club is getting away with murder”
By Sir Hardly Anyone. 1: Elneny is an undroppable. The Sunday Express tell us that “Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta has found three new undroppables in addition to Aubameyang.” These three, as you will probably have guessed are Thomas Partey and Gabriel Magalhaes, and Mohammed Elneny. A slight tap on the back for Untold since we …
Read More “The top six Arsenal stories doing the rounds today”
By Tony Attwood In the UK, as indeed in America and some West European countries, we tend to hold our opinions in very high regard. We take our opinion or view as an ultimate reality. I see it this way, I think my view is right, and so I am right! Extend this one step, …
Read More “Keane goes on the attack against Arsenal over one word!”
by Tony Attwood OK I won’t keep you waiting, in case you don’t want to read my article. The change is we are tackling far less and thus getting a much lower number of yellow cards. Arsenal last season were hampered by one very significant factor that bloggers, journalists and broadcasters simply would not touch …
Read More “The incredible hidden change Mikel Arteta has brought about at Arsenal”
by Tony Attwood Whichever way you look at it, Arsenal are currently outdoing Manchester United. We are unbeaten in the last five Premier League games against them, winning three, drawing two. Is that not worth a mention? Apparently not, because the Guardian in its report of yesterday’s match still needed to paint a negative. “It …
Read More “What do Arsenal have to do to get a good press? Play Partey and Elneny”
by Bulldog Drummond The Manchester Evening News gives us a headline of confirmed news, but no team, so it is back to our usual haunts in the search for insightful insights and other what-not. The Independent suggests, for the side they delightfully now signify as “ARS” Leno; Bellerin, Mustafi, Gabriel, Tierney; Thomas, Ceballos, Xhaka; Willian, …
Read More “Manchester United v Arsenal the team news, confirmed and otherwise…”
By Bulldog Drummond The injury league table continues to be frustrating for Arsenal. Here is the top of the table in terms of number of players currently out. Crystal Palace: 9 Everton: 7 Liverpool: 7 Brighton and Hove Albion: 6 Fulham: 6 Leicester City: 6 Arsenal: 5 Burnley: 5 Leeds United: 5 Manchester United: 5 …
Read More “Manchester United v Arsenal: injuries and the home / away conundrum”
by Bulldog Drummond Tackles are not the only way of committing fouls or getting yellow cards, but they are the most common so is a good place to start as we try to get a feel of which each team in this afternoon’s game is likely to get up to. Likewise committing fouls are not …
Read More “Man U v Arsenal: tackles, fouls, yellow cards. Who’s helping who?”
By Tony Attwood BeIN Media and PSG boss Nasser Al-Khelaïfi was acquitted on Friday in Switzerland in a television rights case, The one time Fifa deputy director Jérôme Valcke was found guilty but escaped imprisonment but was fined and now has a criminal record. This case was the first that has come to court in …
Read More “PSG & BeIN boss escapes imprisonment, FA and media sigh a deep sigh of relief”
By Tony Attwood It’s the Guardian, and its the weekend, so it’s time to run an article knocking Arsenal. Why they feel the need to go on and on and on and on doing this week after week after week, I don’t really know. You might have thought they’d have had enough of it by …
By Tony Attwood The British media, alone in most of Europe, have studiously ignored the dramatic series of court cases that have been engulfing world football – probably because they are having difficulty reconciling what we have discovered with all that they have said before in supporting Fifa, and English bids to host the world …
Read More “It’s judgement day (part 1). The result of the first case involving Fifa is due shortly”
By Tony Attwood It is not exactly my first choice for watching Arsenal, nor indeed my second, but as an option it will do. A ten minute drive from my village to the neighbouring (and at night, sleepy) settlement of Rothwell – a place where during the Bronze Age mourners buried their dead alongside offerings …
Read More “Arsenal win again; the village fails to stir itself”
by Bulldog Drummond In the last couple of years a number of newspapers have started to put up headlines which say “the confirmed teams” a day or two before the match. The details that follow are nothing of the sort – the club doesn’t actually confirm the team until one hour before kick off at …
Read More “Arsenal v Dundalk the unconfirmed confirmed confirmations of the teams”
By Bulldog Drummond Just in case you missed the opening game in the Europas, here’s a quick summary The injury league remains much as before with Arsenal still near the top, but not at the top. Crystal Palace: 9 Everton: 9 Liverpool: 7 Arsenal: 6 Brighton and Hove: 6 Fulham: 5 Leeds United: 5 Manchester …
Read More “Arsenal v Dundalk: injuries, the table and a video of last week’s fun”
by Bulldog Drummond The League of Ireland is a summer league, but this season, just half a dozen games in, the season was stopped due to the virus. It only resumed on 31 July. In the early games after the re-start, Dundalk, whom we play tonight, had three defeats and two draws, including getting themselves …
Read More “Arsenal v Dundalk: the first ever meeting with a side from Ireland”
By Tony Attwood There is a lot of doom around at the moment following the defeat to Leicester, as if supporters expected that after winning the FA Cup and Community Shield Arsenal would storm ahead and at least get into the “fourth is not a trophy” spot from the off. But life in the league …
Read More “Good runs, bad runs, manager changes. How’s Arsenal doing?”
By Tony Attwood You might recall how the media went bonkers when Arsenal made some of its talent spotting staff redundant. There was as ever no comparison made with other clubs – Arsenal were simply singled out and hammered for several days in the press. And yet when Liverpool behave in a far, far worse …
Read More “The disgraceful way some football staff are treated, and how the media respond”
