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 The Whoscored website is one of those that can be a bit confusing – in that it pours out stats, puts players in different colours, and then expects you do know what it all means. I must be rather slow because I don’t quite get it all. But they do produce a …
Read More “Arsenal’s best players this season: statistics and where they go wrong”
By Tony Attwood What matters to you? A strong, exciting Premier League in which Arsenal play, or a strong England team that challenges for the World Cup? I’ve always been in the former camp, and let the FA that runs the England team just get on with their pathetically muddled way, mostly commenting only when …
Read More “If you care about the Premier League, it’s time to be very afraid”
By Tony Attwood I tried my best with a silly April Fools gag today, and then looked around at what the rest of the world was doing in terms of April Fools in football. (I should explain it is a day when one is supposed to tell stories that are really silly but are dressed …
Read More “Spotting the April Fools – sometimes it is hard to tell”
The intensity of the battle between Real Madrid and Barcelona to find the very best youngsters and nurture them in their academies can never be underestimated. And for those of us who thought that the depths that Barcelona had sunk to with the importation of children from outside the EU without their parents, in violation …
Read More “Spanish clubs exposed as involved in “artificial footballers” project”
By Tony Attwood The cynics have written him off time and time again. Indeed the ever gloomy Daily Telegraph wrote on 22 January 2015: Abou Diaby looks to have played last game. And it needed some faith to think he could return after so many injuries. The Daily Mail had told us on 5 December …
Read More “Diaby returns along with Arteta, Wilshere and Debuchy”
By Tony Attwood And so back to Rangers, with my normal caveat that I am writing from a long way south of the border, and simply observing from far away. But as with all the articles before, I think the observations are worthwhile, not least as a warning to us all as to what can …
Read More “Beware men bearing gifts (and men who refuse to give you info)”
By Tony Attwood (and a calculator) It must have been pretty quiet at Arsenal these last few days as no less than 23 players were away on international “duty”. I’m not sure if this is an all time record but it must be close to the highest number ever. Here’s the details. 1: Chuba Akpom …
Read More “23 Arsenal players on international “duty”. Was this a record?”
By Tony Attwood The management of Liverpool don’t like the management of Arsenal. There are many origins of the dislike, probably going all the way back to 1989, but the current round of dislike centres on the remark made in 2013 when John W. Henry put a message on social media saying “What do you think …
Read More “Sterling to Arsenal slowed by the enmity between Liverpool and down south”
By Tony Attwood Ah… remember the old days? Arsenal transfer rumours: £15.8million Mario Balotelli fee and personal terms agreed ready for move That was the Daily Mirror last July. It was dumb, childish and silly but at least it didn’t have any RANDOM words in capitals. Which is more than can be said for SNAPPED: …
Read More “All these players are coming to Arsenal! Strange statistics, false analogies”
By Tony Attwood The issue of players getting injured On 10 October 2006 Arsene Wenger picked up on a comment by his old pal Lyon coach Gerard Houllier then at Lyon, who compared international managers to car thieves saying, “what the national coaches are doing is like taking the car from the garage without even …
Read More “It’s time to make Welbeck and Ramsey take the consequences”
By Tony Attwood Earlier this week we published a two part series called “Football for the fans”. (The second article follows on directly from the link above). Just days later the Guardian has rushed out (on its website this Sunday) Reclaiming football for all: presenting the manifesto for a better game by David Goldblatt Sometimes one …
Read More “Football for the fans: now the Guardian strikes back”
By Tony Attwood . Walter recently wrote a piece here about the progress Untold is making in having the views we express accepted into the mainstream. He focussed on the remarkable case of his article on stopping players harrassing refs and how it was rapidly picked up by the so-called Sports Writer of the …
Read More “Should Untold start charging the Telegraph for its articles?”
By Billy “The Dog” McGraw. IN GOAL Petr Cech (Chelsea) Luiz Felipe Scolari accused Čech and others of getting him sacking because a group at Chelsea “did not accept my training methods or my demands”. Scolari said this was because Čech insisted on being given a personal coach. Čech said he merely wanted a better car. …
Read More “All the things the media don’t tell you about the players they say we are going to sign”
This continues our list of requirements to make football better for the fans, rather than better for everyone else. Part one is here. 6. Reducing the number of internationals. This is obvious – but in fact the reverse is happening – the old friendlies are about to be replaced by yet another mindlessly conceived competition. …
Read More “Football for the fans. Our second set of demands”
By Tony Attwood Recently, Walter, Blacksheep and I started to talk about the changes we would like to see in football. Changes not for the benefit of Arsenal, but for the benefit of us – the fans. Changes that would make our watching of football more enjoyable, and which might encourage more and more people …
Read More “Football for the fans: the visions of three Arsenal supporters.”
By Tony Attwood In a very real sense these questions are linked, and in a very real sense they are not. Because if we’ve learned anything over the years it is that the performance of a player this season is often not related to the player’s performance next season. Or indeed next month. Who really …
Read More “Where will Arsenal end in the league and who should we buy in the summer?”
Millwall Lionesses v Arsenal Ladies FA Cup 6th round 22nd March 2015 (now with all the pictures added) by Andrew and Pauline Crawshaw This game was at the Den in South East London, Millwall’s main ground. The two teams had met in a pre-season friendly a few weeks earlier where Millwall did enough to keep …
Read More “Millwall Lionesses v Arsenal Ladies FA Cup 6th round 22nd March 2015”
By Tony Attwood First the (perhaps) good news. Greg Dyke of the FA has said the FA was “100 per cent behind” the introduction of video technology to help referees. Trouble is, the reputation of the FA is now so low that having them on your side could be more of a hinderance than a help. …
Read More “The FA’s latest muddle-plan. Mucking around with the “home grown” rule.”
By Tony Attwood Arsenal, as you will jolly well know, have just won six league games in a row. From the first match this season against Newcastle, up to and including this second game against them, Arsenal have played 21 games, won 17, drawn 1, and lost 3, in all competitions. That is …
Read More “The trouble with a run like this is my nervous system isn’t built for it.”
By Tony Attwood Ben Bloom, writing in the Telegraph, announced that it was “Martin Keown who this week asked why Arsenal supporters do not really love Olivier Giroud.” I expect he did, but he was just going along the line Untold had been developing for some time. . But Bloom’s assertion that “Giroud is accepted …
Read More “Arsenal reap the benefit of Wenger’s transfer vision and a stadium completed”
By Dr Billy “the dog” McGuire, senior psychologist, University Hospital of the North Circular Road I have been asked to write to you today as a matter of considerable urgency, for it seems that the psychological well-being of many of our friends of the “aaa” persuasion is now an issue of a certain amount of …
Read More “Arsenal supporters on the verge of a nervous breakdown”
By Bulldog Drummond Here’s the deal. Papiss Cissé brought forward his knee surgery scheduled for the summer after receiving a seven-match ban for spitting) and so can’t play. He’s one of many. Cheik Tioté, Steven Taylor and, and, and… lots and lots of zebras covered in stripes but not on the pitch. Fabricio Coloccini is …
Read More “Newcastle v Arsenal: Since we last played the zebras the win ratio is 80%”
By Tony Attwood When I used to play football (in a team somewhere near the foot of the 19th division of the local pub league) occasionally we didn’t have enough men and we might borrow one of the spectators. These days Newcastle is a bit like that. Well almost. They’ve got 13 fit outfield players …
Newcastle United v Arsenal Saturday 21 March 2015 – The Match Officials By Andrew Crawshaw Table of Shame Walter hasn’t published any more referee reviews since I updated the table last week Wrong Important Decisions Favouring Arsenal Favouring Opponents 2nd Yellow Cards 0 17 Red Cards 3 14 Penalties 3 15 Goals 1 6 Total …
Read More “Ref preview: The vast majority of wrong decisions will be against Arsenal.”
By Tony Attwood It was way back in July 2009 that Untold ran its first article about money laundering, reporting that the Financial Action Task Force had issued a report saying that football is at risk from criminals buying clubs, often to facilitate money laundering, tax evasion and other fraud and all that sort of thing. …
Read More “Corruption in football: the issue spreads and spreads”
