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 Bulldog Drummond When asked if Santi would play again this season, Mr Wenger, the Arsenal manager, said: “I hope so. Santi is far from starting to run again; he had a little procedure and we have a meeting with the medical people. Certainly he will not be available in the next six weeks.” That is actually …
Read More “Santi update, team v Swansea, more from Özil and Torino story is fake news.”
By Bulldog Drummond The early team news Coquelin and Bellerin are still about a week away from returning, Theo is maybe two weeks from returning. Gibbs and Mert are also out as well, obviously, as are Santi Cazorla and Mohamed Elneny. But coming back (and I would have thought absolutely certain to play) are …
Read More “Swansea v Arsenal: the prelims and early team news”
By Tony Attwood I have often wondered just how much people know about their football clubs. Or indeed how much some people know about football. And whether the number of people going to games is going up or down. It is not often that such ramblings within my brain can all be answered at once, …
By Tony Attwood An elite group of nine European ‘super clubs’, including five from the Premier League, are now so wealthy that nobody else has any realistic chance of catching them financially. That is what a new official report from Uefa says, although it is not clear what it intends to do about it. …
Read More “Recent transfers, total cost of squad, and salaries against position in the league”
By Tony Attwood As you might have noticed (if you ever read the home page of Untold Arsenal with its daily list of Arsenal anniversaries through the club’s history) today is both the ninth anniversary of the launch of Untold, and the anniversary of the meeting that AISA Arsenal History Society had with Rt Hon …
Read More “The funniest (and also the most embarrassing) transfer story this January”
By Tony Attwood I can remember, from my days as a child, Arsenal playing Racing Club de Paris, and wondering who they were, and why the match happened. Such childhood memories are of course notoriously unreliable, but I do recall it seeming a bit odd. One of those things that old people knew about, not …
By Tony Attwood Here’s a thought and a half: Olivier Giroud has scored 12 goals from his last 17 shots on target in the League, FA Cup and Champs League. Here’s another: he takes less time on the pitch to score that Lionel Messi, Diego Costa or Sergio Agüero. His figures at Arsenal now look …
Read More “Arsenal don’t have a plan B. Well, actually we do. It’s Giroud.”
By Tony Attwood As I was preparing myself for another day’s publishing on Untold this morning two curious things happened. One, not curious in itself, was that Andrew sent me his regular match preview for the weekend concerning the referee for the forthcoming Arsenal match. The other was that the Daily Telegraph newspaper attacked PGMO …
By Sir Brightly Plusfours; UK Government Czar of all the balls I am delighted to have this opportunity to address the ensemble of readers who are known as the most positive, fervent and enthusiastic of Arsenal supporters this side (and indeed that side of) the Great Wall that divides us all. My mission is to …
By Tony Attwood If you read my ramblings on a fairly regular basis the is a chance that you may have picked up the fact that a) when I did play football in my younger days I was utterly useless at the game b) when I played the indoor five a side game in later …
Read More “The nine health benefits of playing football, and what to do when you get too old.”
By Sir Hardly Anyone Our young Mr Cohen cost anything from £40,000 to £80,000, opinion varies, but in terms of his age there is an agreement he is 20, which makes him rather old for a youth signing for Arsenal. His position is best described as Bellerinesque. Well, ok not best described as Bellerinesque, …
By Tony Attwood Do Arsenal players really care about the club they play for? Do they care about how the results go? Are they properly prepared for each game? Or are some of them a bunch of highly paid guys who really couldn’t care less, and who simply turn up and go through the motions? …
By Tony Attwood Untold has a number of correspondents from around the country, and indeed from outside the UK, who regularly feed in thoughts and ideas relating to the issues that we cover on the site, and this week brought in an email on the topic of the way refereeing is undertaken in the Premier …
Read More “Could football learn a thing of two from the way games are refereed in rugby?”
by Tony Attwood Actually it was me that was in total meltdown as in the original version I wrote something, changed it, wrote something else and totally screwed up what I was saying about Messsi, Barcelona and Real Madrid (the last bit of which I then cut). Excuses are there many, but the key point …
Read More “BT Sprout in meltdown; Giroud sails on; must be time to knock Lucas.”
By Bulldog Drummond. The fighting Just on a month ago Preston North End were forced to fine two of their “players” (Jermaine Beckford and Eoin Doyle) for fighting each other on the pitch during a match against Sheffield Wednesday. Both players were sent off, obviously, and the fines levied on the players were promised …
By Bulldog Drummond Once upon a time the FA Cup third round kicked off at 3pm on a Saturday afternoon. Now if you get a match on a Saturday afternoon you are lucky. Our match this evening makes travelling back by train difficult – the last train back leaves at 2017, making it a tight …
By Tony Attwood This weekend’s match sees what has become an increasingly rare meeting between the two Invincibles – the only two sides in top division history to have gone through a season unbeaten: Preston North End and Arsenal. Indeed it is the first meeting of the pair since Arsenal joined the ranks of …
By Tony Attwood During the last couple of days a friend of mine has received messages on her Facebook page telling her that Mrs Trump has filed divorce papers against President Elect Mr Trump Facebook is starting to charge everyone who has fewer than 10 friends, from midnight Stephen Fry has died The queen hasn’t …
Read More “How football laid down the rules for the post-truth world”
By Tony Attwood Some Arsenal supporters get very angry at any match that Arsenal does not win. This is true both home and away. I have often wondered why. Of course some of the people who were at the Bournemouth game might be saying that their moaning resulted in Arsenal waking up and scoring three …
By Sir Hardly Anyone Big news, we have just done a transfer. Or so we are told. We are signing Cohen Bramall who is a 20-year-old defender from non-league side Hednesford Town who play in the Evo Stick Northern Premier League. Newsbreak has this story: “Arsenal have almost completed the signing of Hednesford Town left-back, Cohen …
Read More “Arsenal sign their first player of the window, and it is quite a surprise.”
By Tony Attwood 10 years ago Alan Green on Radio 5 would criticise referees regularly – not ever suggesting bias but rather their incompetence. 5 years ago Alan Green was silenced on the subject, and even the Wiki page about him now has no mention of his numerous run-ins with refs nor the controversy surrounding …
By Tony Attwood Everyone, it seems, (other than those at Chelsea) is now complaining about the way the football fixtures have been sorted out. Right at the start of the holiday period the bean counters at the Telegraph worked out not only how many days rest various clubs had but also how many miles they …
By Sirs Hardly Anyone Before today we already had nine players and a manager (well the manager) who were all ready willing and able to quit Arsenal for pastures new if not pastures greener, at least according to “reports”. But now the bloggettas and journalists are getting themselves into a right lather – and when …
By Tony Attwood In every transfer window various newspapers do their own survey of what each of the PL clubs need. Some papers (such as the Observer – a UK Sunday paper) also do a review submitted by fans (what the Observer rather pompously calls its “Fans Network” – which is seemingly one blog or reader …
Read More “The players Arsenal need this January – compared with what other PL clubs need”
By Tony Attwod The Story so Far Arsenal v Crystal Palace 01 January 2017 – The Match Officials. Expect major errors and bias. The Palace comes to the Emirates. Arsenal v Fat Sam: the prologue Arsenal play the Palace. Part the Second And now the conclusion As Mr Wenger said, “The level of confidence or the …
