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 We’ve been looking at different aspects of the new reign of Mr Emery at Arsenal and trying to see where it leads. Articles thus far include How to kill a player: the issues of Ozil So should we be supporting Emery, given the way things are going? Is Mr Emery getting …
by Tony Attwood I suspect that anyone who was present when Patrick Vieira came on as a substitute for his first appearance for Arsenal at Highbury, will never forget the moment. Young and inexperienced though he was, and with his manager on the other side of the world still working in Japan, and with a …
Read More “Is Mr Emery the right man for the job? The worrying signs…”
by Tony Attwood Yesterday Walter in his article How to kill a player raised the issue of how the club is treating Ozil, which itself raises the question, how does the issue of Ozil fit with our long-running banner headline “supporting the club the manager and the team.” It’s something I have been becoming increasingly uncomfortable …
Read More “Is Mr Emery getting Arsenal right, or is he leading us down the wrong path?”
by Blacksheep Hello everybody, I doubt you’ve missed me but it has been a very long time since I wrote anything for Untold. This is mostly because I’ve been busy writing non-football stuff but also because I’ve not really had anything to say. Like Tony I was initially quite encouraged by the recruitment of Unai …
Read More “So should we be supporting Emery, given the way things are going?”
by Bulldog Drummond Arsenal’s commentary on the injured shows us Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang In full training. Mesut Ozil In full training. Sokratis In full training ahead of schedule. Granit Xhaka In full training. Aaron Ramsey Right knee. Being assessed ahead of BATE Borisov (a). Whether they will all play or not is another matter of course, …
Read More “BATE v Arsenal: ruminations on the team, the injuries and BATE’s potential”
By Tony Attwood I have not kept exact records over the years on the issue, and sadly I don’t have the spare time to go back and check, but I get the impression that there are more articles in the mainstream media about referees these days than there were even just one year ago. It …
Read More “How the media comes daily to the rescue of the referees”
By Sir Hardly Anyone It is rarely difficult to distinguish between a football journalist with a grievance and a ray of sunshine, and that is certainly the case in the aftermath of the latest wild ranting and raving from Jamie Carragher. Take for example the Daily Express’ approach with its headline “Chelsea news: Jamie Carragher …
Read More “Sir Hardly Anyone reviews the opinions of Jamie Carragher on Arsenal”
By Tony Attwood There have, for many years, been certain clubs that are apart from the rest, because of their crowds and their historic results. The exact list of such clubs has changed over time, but it has, since the end of the first world war, included Manchester United and Arsenal, because of the consistently …
Read More “Arsenal are quite clearly a top four club, but there’s just one problem”
by Tony Attwood Arsenal have now finally improved on last season’s awful away record. Here’s the current table for away games only Pos Team P W D L F GA GD Pts 1 Tottenham Hotspur 13 11 0 2 30 13 17 33 2 Liverpool 13 9 3 1 24 8 16 30 3 Manchester …
Read More “Arsenal beat the away barrier, but it is still not enough”
by Bulldog Drummond Unai Emery has put forward the view that the poor away form of Arsenal is a psychological issue, and of course there may be something in that. But the interpretation put on the remarks by journalists has as always been very short term, rather than looking back over this season and last …
Read More “Huddersfield v Arsenal and the issue of away form”
by Bulldog Drummond Huddersfield must know that they are going down – it would be one of the all time escapes if they didn’t, and there is no sign of a turn around in recent games… Here is their league record since 1 December. Date Game Res Score 01 Dec 2018 Huddersfield Town v Brighton …
Read More “Huddersfield v Arsenal: injuries; the awful away form and the team”
by Sir Hardly Anyone You need a certain type of mind these days to be a football journalist. A mind not cluttered with issues of reality or the detail of mere fact. A mind that is allowed to run free hither and thither, gambolling across great swathes of fantasy unhindered by any notion of reality, …
Read More “Mindless twaddle: Sir Hardly Anyone’s roundup of Arsenal media inventions”
By Tony Attwood With Arsenal sitting in sixth position, where they were at this moment last season, and with just the one loan signing in January, many of the pundits have given up on the club as a source for news or indeed a source of knocking copy. Instead they are looking around for …
By Tony Attwood One year ago after 25 games the league table in Mr Wenger’s final season had Arsenal 6th on 42 points. We were eight points off fourth place and the much derided (at the time) challenge for a Champions League place. Team P W D L F A GD Pts 1 Manchester City …
Read More “This year last year: how Arsenal have progressed under Mr Emery”
By Bulldog Drummond.You don’t need me to tell you that Arsenal’s form of this year has been erratic following the hammering by Liverpool. Date Game Res Score 01 Jan 2019 Arsenal v Fulham W 4-1 05 Jan 2019 Blackpool v Arsenal FAC W 0-3 12 Jan 2019 West Ham United v Arsenal L 1-0 19 …
Read More “Manchester City v Arsenal. Who blinks first and the teams.”
By Tony Attwood It was nearly ten years ago that Chelsea were banned from signing any more youth players – a ban that was eventually overturned on appeal. But now Chelsea are once again waiting to see how an enquiry by Fifa into their transfer dealings in the youth market will pan out. But this …
By Tony Attwood Without playing Arsenal have moved up to fourth in the league – the much sought after “not a trophy” position. Team P W D L F A GD Pts 1 Liverpool 24 19 4 1 55 14 41 61 2 Manchester City 24 18 2 4 63 19 44 56 3 Tottenham …
Read More “Denis Suárez joins Arsenal as we get to the “not a trophy” position.”
By Sir Hardly Anyone So far this transfer window the grand net spend or profit of the bigger clubs are Arsenal – nothing Chelsea – £49.1m net spend – Christian Pulisic who was immediately loaned out. Liverpool – £17m net profit Man City – £15m net profit Man U – nothing Tottenham – £11m profit. So …
Read More “Transfer updates: who has spent and who we are getting today and tomorrow”
By Bulldog Drummond So what of today? We obviously don’t have Sokratis for several games, and although Koscielny seems just to have bruised his jaw rather than had it broken, I suspect he won’t be risked even if he feels fit. Meanwhile it may be just me but I am finding one or two of …
Read More “Arsenal v Cardiff: the team and the track record”
Caution and Liverpool Part 2 – Some Details By Gordon Haverland This article continues from the previous post The curious effect of referee actions on the top six clubs this season. Treatments There are two kinds of treatments, the ones where a physio does not come on to the field to bring the player off …
Read More “The curious case of the uneven effect of referee activity in the PL. Part 2”
By Gordon Haverland and Tony Attwood Is there really any evidence that Premier League matches are being rigged via referees? That is a question that we are often asked, and we have often replied that yes there is some evidence, but it is not definitive. However we also note how the PGMO which runs …
Read More “The curious effect of referee actions on the top six clubs this season.”
By Tony Attwood If the question above were posed as “What SHOULD Arsenal do now” rather than as it is written, the answer would undoubtedly be very complicated. But Arsenal commentators on football don’t do complicated – they like simple, easy solutions. And therein lies another problem. For the problem with simple solutions to complex …
Read More “Out of three of the four competitions already, what does Arsenal do now?”
By Bulldog Drummond I imagine that Petr Cech will play in goal, as that seems to be the arrangement and the player has to stay match fit as he is the backup for the rest of the season. In defence we could use the back four approach although obviously we don’t have Hector Bellerin for the rest …
By Bulldog Drummond As you will remember Arsenal are constantly being criticised in the media. And yet for a team which is being heavily criticised, especially for its defence, Arsenal’s home form remains unquestionably good… Home games only Team P W D L F A GD Pts 1 Manchester City 12 11 0 1 40 …
Read More “Arsenal v Manchester United: FA Cup 4th round; the form.”
by Bulldog Drummond These two clubs – Arsenal and Manchester United – utterly dominate the FA Cup between them. Indeed the total number of finals that they have played in (20 each) dwarf other clubs as the table below shows. Club Wins Total final appearances Arsenal 13 20 Manchester United 12 20 Liverpool 7 …
Read More “The battle of the two evenly match Cup giants: Arsenal v Manchester United”
