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 One of the first times that we really started suggesting that there was something amiss with refereeing in the Premier League was in December 2010 when we ran the story There is something seriously wrong with EPL refereeing. An opposite title I am sure you will agree. We may well have written earlier …
Read More “Refereeing is going down hill – the BBC knows but the press ignore the story”
By Tony Attwood The Arsenal History Society is currently experimenting with Arsenal quizzes in various guises, and we’ve put a new one up today. To make life easier we’ve also added three possible answers to each question, rather than leaving you on your own. Now of course I know that Untold readers are incredibly knowledgable …
How do we know that a manager is succeeding? Richard Bedwell Rather than come up with a short comment that would get lost in what is a long and interesting response I thought I would respond to Tony’s piece in a little more depth. In this age of data driven assessment there are, I believe, …
Read More “The three ways in which we know if a manager is succeeding”
By Tony Attwood Untold has followed the Rangers saga from the moment we picked up on the tax case issues, and noted that the press were ignoring any suggestion of odd doings by dodgy dealers that circled the club. When there is a story, and the press absolutely refuse to follow it, you can be …
By Tony Attwood A little while back Arsenal Supporters Trust allied itself with the equivalent groups at Chelsea, Tottenham and Liverpool to write to the FA about the importance of maintaining the rule that says 15% of tickets for FA Cup matches be reserved for away supporters. In Arsenal’s case this means 9,000 tickets, and …
Read More “FA bring game into disrepute, BBC try to reinvent community”
By Tony Attwood. So it seems we have made or are making or are about to make our first signing in terms of Teddy Bishop from Ipswich. It is not announced yet, so this could be another total error in reading the ancient runes and tea-leaves on my part. Man U want/wanted Bishop but the …
By Tony Attwood Since we won the FA Cup that question has been more puzzling than ever. It used to be that winning a trophy was doing well. But although the victory over Hull and the subsequent beating of Man C in the Charity Shield gave Mr Wenger some respite, it lasted little more than …
By Tony Attwood If you have not read the excellent article about supporting Arsenal from a distance, I would urge you to read it now, before moving on to this, my epilogue to that story. I was first told that Arsenal were going to target India as a market about five years ago, but at …
By Tony Attwood When I was a young writer, trying to break into the business full time, I adopted the tactic of writing articles and books that by and large no one else was trying: different approaches, different styles, different ways of looking at issues. As a result I got a lot of rejections from …
Un-important Gooners. A rant. A whine. A cry…. distant gooners. by Arsenal 13 This is what happened during the West-Ham game. Comments section of the Untold. Most people know this. BUT compiling it again to show the person and for the people with similar views where they are wrong. For generalization, lets name him X, and …
By Tony Attwood The FA has a section on its web site called “Media comments and Social Networking cases – Charging guidelines” It says in part, The following types of public media comment, including on social networking websites, may be considered to be in breach of FA Rule E3: Comments which are improper, which bring the …
Read More “After the game, it all depends on what you do with the comments”
By Tony Attwood According to the Daily Mirror and several other newspapers the transfer window is now open. But no! Woe! Woe! and Thrice woe! (which is really only meaningful to British readers who remember Frankie Howerd). The window is jammed shut. It will not open. Pliers, crowbars and ratchets have been ordered. But it …
Read More “Panic ensues as transfer window fails to open; Zelalem goes US”
By Tony Attwood Thanks for everyone for the goodwishes. I feel a bit of a fraud – it was just a bug, and I slept for about 24 hours. Anyway I’ve struggled up to the computer complete with pint mug of water, just to see what new year’s eve holds in store. The papers are …
By Tony Attwood The result of Barcelona’s behind-closed-doors appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport against the charges of dealing in children (often referred to as child trafficking) between 2009 and 2013, has been rejected and it is confirmed that they will not be allowed to sign any players in 2015. Although the appeal …
Read More “Barcelona lose their final appeal as dealing in under aged children confirmed”
By Billy “the Dog” McGraw In my last piece about how outdated views of logic and reason have come to dominate the debate on football I tried to suggest that the contemporary vision of considering evidence and then looking for the simplest most straightforward explanation based on evidence, has been thrown out of the window. Instead …
THE RED BADGE OF COURAGE……Don McMahon I have seen so many bloggers writing sarcastic and demeaning comments about the Club, the players and particularly the manager over the years I have followed AFC… and one thing they all seem to have in common is that they are totally blind to one side of the Arsenal. …
By Tony Attwood So where have we got to? One defeat in the last nine 20 goals for, nine goals against in last nine Seven wins, one draw, one defeat in last nine Five wins, one defeat, one draw in last seven league games OK it is not the form of the Unbeaten Season, but …
Read More “Transfers and results, results and transfers. Is there a connection?”
By Bulldog Drummond Taking his lead from the invidious aaa and their allies within mediaeval journalism (I rather like that phrase) the Rather Large Sam speaks. Arsenal are weak and so can be exploited. West Ham, quoth he, are going for Europe – and indeed Europe quakes. A goodly length in times past Europe quaked …
Read More “Foresoothe tis the eastern quarter away. Gadzukes”
By Billy “the Dog” McGraw. Abuse levels on Untold seem to on the up, which is a bit of a shame, so I thought I would pop in with a couple of comments on a post that was sent in the other day, but not published. (It is printed below exactly as submitted). “Calling people …
Read More “The dangers of the retreat into mediaeval journalism in football”
HOW THE PLAYERS’ PSYCHOLOGICAL STATE AFFECTS THEIR PERFORMANCE…. By Don MacMahon Anyone who has watched football, regardless of the level (perhaps with the exception of very young players) will realise that a team that is losing a match by more than one goal seems to find it an almost insurmountable obstacle in their efforts …
Read More “How the players’ psychological state affects their performance”
By Bulldog Drummond. This is one of those games where the journalists hedge their bets, saying simultaneously that Arsenal can’t lose and a shock could be “on the cards”. (Isn’t it funny how journalists have their own little turns of phrase? Does anyone say “on the cards” any more, other than journalists?) Anyway, there is …
Read More “QPR on Boxing Day. Arry’s predictions, Coquelin and maybe Theo.”
By Tony Attwood Koscielny, Ozil, Ramsey, Arteta, Wilshere, Theo, Bellerin, Gnabry… you know the story. And it is fairly obvious that this is a contributory factor to the club’s current position. Especially when we think that Giroud, Debuchy, Gibbs, Flamini and Monreal, have all had injuries this season as well as those currently out. Goodness, we …
Read More “The causes of injuries: how the press drew false conclusions”
By Tony Attwood Looking at the responses to Arsenal’s match at Liverpool I began to wonder if in making the key issue in the build up to this match last season’s result, we weren’t missing the real point. For is being beaten by Liverpool, or indeed any other team, a sign of disaster and a sign …
Read More “What exactly do these results against Liverpool tell us?”
By Tony Attwood Just two weeks after Untold published its 10 point plan for how an open, honest and honourable referees’ organisation would look, and PGMO allowed a journalist into their hallowed offices for a chat. Coincidence? Of course it was. Untold is just a blog run by a few enthusiasts who feel that PGMO …
By Tony Attwood “Football is fickle” is an old phrase. And an apt one. It used to be that one season your club could be great, then next rubbish. Then it was one month to the next, then one week to the next, then one day to the next. Now the chances are that unless …
Read More “Football supporting and football journalism in a spiral of decline”
