Arsenal changed tactics yesterday and it didn’t work. But why did they do it?

By Bulldog Drummond Having at least five players missing from the team through covid, and one who, while no longer suffering, is not yet back to full fitness, is enough to rip the heart out of quite a few teams.   But for a team that had already suffered a defeat in the opening game, and …

Women’s Champions League – report and videos against PSV and 2nd round draw

by Andrew Crawshaw Last Friday and Saturday  the teams remaining in the Round 1 knockout phases of the Champions and League pathways played their final games, and on Sunday the draw for the second round was made. At this point the 12 teams from round one were joined by a further 12 with direct access …

Arsenal v Chelsea: the continuing assault on the club, and the team prediction

By Bulldog Drummond There’s an interesting division in the media today between the right-wing Daily Mail and the left-leaning Guardian today.  The Mail gives a positive account of Arsenal and the Guardian rages ever deeper into its continuing anti-Arsenal approach which utterly denies that there was any improvement in the results in the last two …

Arsenal v Chelsea: will we see the return of home bias on the part of referees?

By Bulldog Drummond According to the BBC, Romelu Lukaku is set to make his second debut for Chelsea, and yes I can see what they mean, in that he played a few times for Chelsea from 2011 to 2014.  But I don’t think you can have a second debut with the same club.  A debut …

Arsenal v Chelsea: why Chelsea can tackle and Arsenal must avoid it like the plague

By Bulldog Drummond Our games against Chelsea of late have not been too bad, despite all that the media would have you believe.   Here are the last 14 matches – enough to give a fair flavour of what has been going on. Date Match Res Score Competition 27 May 2017 Arsenal v Chelsea W 2-1 …

Arsenal v Chelsea: the injuries, plus referee ineptitude and disaster areas

By Bulldog Drummond It is at this point in the season that commentators start raging about how appallingly inept Arsenal are at everything, since we have five players out with an injury or illness.  And we might remember of course that previously it was Mr Wenger’s fault as no club, it was said, had as …

Arsenal v Chelsea: leaderless, clueless and visionless Arsenal (report)

By Bulldog Drummond Mikel Arteta sent Arsenal sack warning   Metro Twenty months down the line, the manager still has no vision and Chelsea’s visit is unlikely to be played in a full Emirates (The Guardian) Those two headlines give us a summary of what the media think – and indeed each is understandable in its …

Arsenal v PSV Eindhoven – Uefa Women’s Champions League Preview

by Andrew Crawshaw The match kicks off at 15:00 Saturday and will be streamed live by arsenal.com – at least it will if they have sorted out the technical difficulties that beset the coverage of the game against Okzhptes on Wednesday. As our European coefficient (27.7) is higher than that of PSV Eindhoven (12.0) we …

Spending and tackles: is last season’s trend continuing this season?

By Tony Attwood Last season we uniquely devised a league table in which clubs were placed in order according to their results over the last 24 games of the season (approximately the last two thirds of the season, for most clubs starting on Christmas Day). The position of clubs in that league table across the …

Martin Odegaard and the covid situation at Arsenal

By Tony Attwood So we’ve signed Martin Odegaard as widely predicted, and the story is still that we are also going to sign Aaron Ramsdale as a back-up goalkeeper. The initial fee for Martin is reported as being around £30million with a further £4million in add-ons. He won’t be available to play against Chelsea having …

Arsenal are a failure without Europe; Spurs would be better off without Europe

By Dr Billy “the Dog” McGraw Arsenal as we well know (having been told so many times) are a failure, because after a record-breaking run of appearances in European competitions, this year they are not in Europe.  Utter, total disaster, a washout, a wreck of a club, a flop, a decline, a collapse, a mess, …

Women’s Champions League – How the competition works

By Andrew Crawshaw I was intending to do a scouting report on PSV Eindhoven, our opponents on Saturday, but the stream of their match wasn’t licensed to be shown in the UK (or that was the message I repeatedly got).  What I thought I would do instead is clear up some questions I had regarding …

The players Arsenal are tipped to buy this summer: from 70 to 136.

By Sir Hardly Anyone This is part two of the current list of players Arsenal are said to be chasing.  Part one can be found by looking at the Recent Posts list, at the top of the right column on this page.  Or by clicking the post above this one. So, what we find it …

Arsenal break their all time record for transfers: numbers 1 to 69

By Sir Hardly Anyone Arsenal have now been tipped to bring in 136 players this summer, the largest number of transfer rumours we have found since we started counting summer transfers some ten years ago. Here’s the list for players 1 to 69, with the rest to follow shortly. Curiously all the main action this …

11 predictions the media is making: let’s see how many come true.

By Sir Hardly Anyone The shape of our new squad is starting to emerge with the Odegaard and Ramsdale transfers looking possibly like the final elements in the puzzle, although I’m still unclear of the future of Aubameyang and Lacazette. But then up pops this gem: “Bukayo Saka could be set for a shock Arsenal …

Arsenal V Okzetpes – The match report, a thumping Four Nil win to the Arsenal

by Andrew Crawshaw I nearly got the team right.  Wälti was out following a minor knock and Nikita Parris made her debut playing on the left of a front three and fellow debutant Iwabuchi dropping into midfield. Starts for all four of our new arrivals and, as predicted, seats on the bench for our Australian …

Ødegaard signs but this media victory over Arsenal costing the club dear

By Tony Attwood The current story in the Guardian is that Arsenal are about to sign Martin Ødegaard from Real Mad for £34m, on a five year contract. Of course none of us at Untold know anymore than you probably do, but the way the more serious drainpipes, sorry “outlets” are writing it would appear …

Arsenal Women v Okzhetpes – preview

by Andrew Crawshaw Arsenal Women commence their Champions League campaign against Okzetpes on Wednesday morning in Moscow.  Our opponents qualified by coming third in the Kazakhstani league. The Official UEFA website has the following Players listed:- Arsenal Goalkeepers – 1 Zinsberger (Austria), 18 Williams (Australia), 24 Stenson (England) and at 28 17 year old Cull …

Who has spent what so far in the transfer window?

By Sir Hardly Anyone The story from everywhere is of financial and legal chaos.  Crooks buying their way into English clubs in order to use them for money laundering (a story we first started to pick up on 10 years ago and now being reported once again). Barcelona more than a billion euros in debt …

It is time for the Arsenal board to stand up to the media, and AFTV

By Tony Attwood The media are now out to get Mr Arteta, ably backed as ever by the usual anti-Arsenal suspects.  And AFTV and co must be feeling quite confident of success, given their earlier triumphs in terms of getting rid of managers. Arsenal have had eight managers who have won trophies and with Mr …

How the art of defending in the Premier League is changing week by week

    Defenders think they are different.  No, actually, that is not right.   They know they are different. They look up the field towards their attacking and midfield colleagues and see men who can take a break – have a rest in between one attack and the next, letting the defenders do their job. Of …

What the opening game means, and a perfect piece of gaslighting

By Tony Attwood and Christophe Jost The Athletic is in no mood to compromise, and indeed in no mood to back off the gaslighting.  They say, “Despite getting their first semi-proper pre-season under Mikel Arteta, Arsenal began the 2021-22 Premier League season as they ended the last…” So let’s consider this “as they ended the …

Opening game shows some clubs changing their tactics radically

By Tony Attwood Something odd is happening.  In the opening game Man U committed just six tackles.  Last season their average was 15 tackles a game! Tackles are the biggest cause of fouls being awarded on the pitch, and fouls are the biggest source of yellow cards.  Yellow cards are one of the main ways …

When it comes to commentating on Arsenal, gaslighting seems to dominate.

By Tony Attwood We’ve been discussing gaslighting in football for some time now, with a couple of summary articles yesterday.  At the same time it is clear that a fair number of correspondents do seem utterly fixated on accusing Untold of supporting conspiracy theories, without producing any evidence.  And that is getting bizarre. And we …

Is there an anti Arsenal agenda, or are we actually awful?

by Tony Attwood My point is that news is selected to fit an existing agenda.   Which raises the question: is there an agenda always to show Arsenal in a bad light?  And if there is such an agenda why does that agenda exist, and where come from? The notion that there is an agenda in …