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
If you have read my wild ramblings off and on over the last couple of years you might recall that in my view the financial approach of clubs such as Liverpool and Manchester U is unsustainable. This, I argue, is because their entire approach is based on three contingencies, all of which have to be …
Thank you Nahn – ~I love it when people quote Dylan at me. Although it has nothing to do with football, I run a little Bob Dylan blog which slowly records commentaries on the meaning of Dylan’s music. But meanwhile back in the real world, how about starting to talk about next season now? Perverse, …
Read More “Arsenal in 2010, beating rotational timewasting, & Bob Dylan”
The extent of the collapse of football as a contest between two teams looking to play approximately by the spirit as well as the letter of the rules was once again revealed at the Ems as Hull added the new insanity of rotational accusation to their well-practiced rotational fouling and rotational timewasting. With the Hull …
Read More “EPL bring the game into disrepute. Arsenal 15 Hull 2.”
The way Blackburn approached the game against Arsenal was, in my opinion, an utter disgrace. The Blackburn players clearly went into the match with every desire to cheat and maim. The fact that they got away with much of it, suffering only 4 yellow cards and no red suggests that the ref was for some …
Read More “Allerdyce should be banned from football for life”
Now if you have been paying attention you will recall that a little while back I mentioned “en passant” (as they say in Slovenia*) that David Beckham was going to buy a football club. Thus once again you read it here first. Now it is true that I didn’t quite get the club right – …
It was a stroll in the park illuminated by two utterly stunning goals. We won 7-1 if you count shots on target, and it revealed another element of the Lord Wenger’s masterplan for football domination. So it seems a bit churlish to complain, but I am going to anyway. If ever there was a case …
Read More “Bringing the game into disrepute as Wenger’s plan is revealed”
One of my big interests in football is the way clubs are run as businesses – a natural interest since I run a business myself. I’ve written many times about the problems afflicting clubs as varied as Manchester Bankrupt and West Iceland Utd, but in the past not mentioned Leeds United. (You can tell …
Read More “Problems at Leeds; has the Lord Wenger “lost it?””
We’ve scored eight goals fewer than Manchester Bankrupt this season. That’s right – despite what everyone is saying about how awful the attack is, we are a mere eight goals behind the team that claims to be going for a quadruped (or something like that). It just shows how the defense minded EPL has taken …
Its a bit like the proverbial bus – you wait for ages for one, and then two come along. Dennis was unique, original, a genius, something beyond everything else we had ever seen. We would not see his likes again, we were told. And then in an unguarded moment the word slipped out – Jack …
During the time before the Icelandic banks and Northern Rock went bang, it was obvious to a number of people who were watching from the wings that things could not go on as they were. I remember a colleague saying to me one day, “either we’ve totally misunderstood how finance works, or they have.” I …
Read More “A difference in financial approach: Arsenal & Chelsea”
Listening to Lord Triesman (chair of the FA) give an after dinner speech last night one thing was very clear. He absolutely cannot register that some people think the FA is of itself a very bad thing. His view more of less seems to be “it is, it must be”. Of course as chair of …
It is often said that to win the EPL a team needs an English spine. There’s no evidence presented for this – it is just something that is said. Watching Brazil last night I think I’d sooner my team had a Brazilian spine rather than one made up of John Terry types, but each to …
Read More “Brady arrested (not that one), English spines, Arsenal’s youth”
I get so hooked on all the youngsters coming through the ranks all the time, Wilshere, Vela, Ramsey, Merida and the rest, that it becomes easy to forget that the Lord Wenger has a fair old ability to work with old timers too. It was widely said that when he arrived at Highbury he extended …
The return of Keane from a championship chasing club to a relegation flirting club just six months after he went the other way for more money, is proof if it were needed of the financial disaster facing Liverpool Weetabix. Liverpool were, let us not forget, held up as a model of how football could move …
These days, when a ref makes a dubious decision, the inclination of most people is to blame the ref’s ability. The suggestion is that referees today are simply not able to keep up with the speed of the game. What most commentators don’t suggest is that the ref might have been bought. In Italy of …
I read an article on a blog yesterday in which the writer (who claimed to be writing one of the most highly read of all the Arsenal blogs) said that this was the time when Arsene Wenger had to prove himself. It struck me as one of the most crazy things I had ever read, …
I write this in reply to a detailed letter that has been published on this site, which says why we should no longer support Arsenal. I believe the opposite. Partly, because I am a naturally cheery guy (except when I am not) and partly because I am currently writing the history of Arsenal in 1910, …
The image of the band playing on the Titanic while the iceberg joined in with the percussion is so hackneyed that I always try and avoid it, but after half an hour of sitting here I can’t find anything better to describe the news swirling around football. While most of the media focusses on the …
The time wasting at the end of the game at Cardiff, with the home side holding on for a draw, rather than going for a place in the next round, sums it all up really. If Cardiff do get into the EPL they will fit there perfectly alongside clubs like Bolton, Blackburn, Fulham, WBA, and …
If we take a look at what a few clubs in the EPL are doing just now, it gives a good insight into the options on offer. Manchester Bankrupt: not just bankrupt, but even with their mega sqaud they have injury worries and a crisis meeting going on. Yes they are 6 points ahead but …
It is rare to find a day when virtually everyone is having a bad time of it: but that is the day we have today. Starting with the Tinies – you might recall that this time last year they celebrated wildly by getting into the Children’s Cup Final, and then promptly managed to go 10 …
Read More “Totts, Man Money, KGB Fulham, trouble everywhere”
It has been a while coming, but now Mr Usmanov is making his move. And the moral question is, is it possible to be against Mr Usmanov the shareholder, but in favour of the arrival of Arshavin? Russian clubs are owned by big companies for the most part. Zenit Leningrad (now known by the politically …
Read More “Mr Usmanov starts to wield his power and influence”
And so we come to see the solution. At least the handful of us left who do not occupy their time, supporting professional journalists, writing articles about “Meltdown” and calling supporters who believe in Wenger “extremists”. I speak of the new process, forced on us by the incredibly awful run of injuries to Eduardo, Theo, …
Mr Bean E Tez, manager of Liverpool Insolvency today spoke to Untold Arsenal. “I want to talk about facts. Manchester Utd play every home match at home. You probably don’t realise this but it is true. Sir Alex F Word keeps assaulting referees, and all he gets is probation. No one arrests him. No one …
Read More “Dribble dribble liver dribble, Ferrari, moan moan”
This is actually one of two headlines that have made me giggle of late. It is on the Guardian’s web site, and I’ll come back to it in a moment. And the other headline was “Barca tell Arsenal to stop talking about Yaya Toure” So starting with BarBarBarcaSheep… Of course it is just dribble from …
