What You Need to Know About Attending English Football Matches

It goes without saying that unless you’re English, you’ll have no clue of the immense passion that is deep-rooted in the sport of football, which has become ingrained in the nation’s culture over generations. In this article, we have listed some of the essential tips that non-native English football attendees need to know before they …

Why we really only need one new defender to get into the top four.

by Tony Attwood As we know, last season the difference between Chelsea in third and Arsenal in fifth was just two points and two goals.  So in the simplest of terms we could argue that Arsenal just need a small adjustment to get back into the top four. Team P W D L F A …

For Arsenal, only the largesse of the owner and the genius of the manager will take us through

By Tony Attwood Prior to the Europa final an article in the Guardian contained the comment, “…it is difficult to overstate just how critical this match is to Arsenal. Returning to the Champions League after a two-year hiatus has been their No 1 aim all season. No one is under any illusion about the perils …

Arsenal v Chelsea: the preview, the teams, the managers’ records and Wrighty.

By Bulldog Drummond All told it has been a far from happy build up to the Europa League final, although just as the FA always shrug off problems at Wembley cup finals and carry on doing their own thing, I am sure Uefa haven’t even noticed that fans are not ecstatic about the journey nor …

Arsenal v Chelsea: Europa Final. Using past stats to predict the result

by Bulldog Drummond This decade has been a good one for Chelsea, with three doubles: 2009–10: League and FA Cup 2011–12: FA Cup and UEFA Champions League 2014–15: League and League Cup In addition they won the League in 2017, the Europa League in 2013, and the FA cup in 2017–18.  Whatever we might think …

Untold Arsenal providing stats for the Guardian? Well yes, so it seems

By Tony Attwood Summer is always the time for a bit of a meander around the subjects we’ve plodded through during the past season, looking for bits we’ve missed and issues that maybe we could take a bit further. And of course it is also a time for taking a deeper look into what other …

England managers should stop playing into the hands of the extreme right wing

By Tony Attwood The notion that a lack of English players in the Premier League is bad for England, bad for football, and quite probably bad for Brexit, is standard fare in terms of what England managers say. And it is noticeable that they never give any evidence of why this is the case.  It …

8 players just announced to be coming to Arsenal; plus the complete list

By Sir Hardly Anyone The window hasn’t even had a key inserted in it, let alone has it been opened but we already have 32 players coming to Arsenal this summer.  And eight of these are new in the past few days. We also have one new player who is on his way out making …

The finances of the top clubs are weird and not wholly sustainable.

By Tony Attwood It may seem hard to believe but there was a time in the latter part of the 20th century when the Football League Division 1 had a “big four” made up of Arsenal, Tottenham, Liverpool and Everton.   Sometimes that was a big five, because Manchester United were included when they were …

Why the Sun decided to support Manchester City against Uefa

By Nitram and Tony Attwood CHAMPIONS BLAST BACK VENDETTA The Sun’s coverage of the Manchester City story concerning whether or not the club has been engaging in financial activities that breach Uefa rules is something to behold. Of course given the way that the Sun presents stories, and given the literacy and intellectual level that …

The 27 players Arsenal are tipped to buy and the 16 who are leaving

By Sir Hardly Anyone Each year we gather together the rumours of players coming and going in relation to Arsenal, and then at the end look at how many we got and how many were correct.  The normal figure is around 110 players rumoured to be coming and most of the existing squad leaving.  The …

The easiest way to make a profit out of Arsenal’s fixtures next season

By Tony Attwood There is no doubt that a lot of readers who are critical both of Arsenal and of my approach to Arsenal, argue that it is dead simple to predict Arsenal’s results because the manager is a turnip who insists on playing players such as Mustafi, Lichsteiner, Jenkinson, Kolasinac, Elneny, Mkhitaryan, Ozil, Xhaka …

Arsenal’s signings in 2018/19. How did they do?

By Tony Attwood With the media awash with nonsense rumours about who Arsenal are going to sign I thought it might be worth looking back at the players we signed last summer and in January.  Here is the table, with the values taken from Transfer Market, although quite how they calculate the market value of …

Laca off the Barcelona, Auba to Real Mad & Sokratis leaving if no Champs League

By Sir Hardly Anyone This week I met up with Poswinch McKillybody, to get the latest “Fleet Street” ravings.   I must admit I thought he looked under the weather, looking somewhat like a halibut which had been asked by another halibut to lend it 20 quid till next Wednesday.  When I mentioned this to another …

Gripes, innovations and bias: the curious world of the football journalist

By Tony Attwood This is the time when newspapers do their summary of the league season, an exercise which is in part the offering of opinion (fair enough) but also an exercise in deflection.  “Deflection” is known by many names but in essence it involves focussing attention on one topic while ignoring another, which is …

Arsenal Women WSL Champions – how the season unfolded

by Andrew Crawshaw After our agonising third place finish last season, one point behind Manchester City, hopes were high at the start of this season that second place and Champions League qualification would be an achievable objective this time round. We had recruited well in summer with Pauline Peyraud-Magnin,  Tabea Kemme, Lia Walti, Viktoria Schnaderbeck …

How did Emery compare with Wenger? A comparison of seasons

By Tony Attwood For this article I’ve looked back over the last ten seasons, comparing the key aspects of each season.  Here’s the table for the top six at the end of this season… Pos Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts 1 Manchester City 38 32 2 4 95 23 72 98 …

The aftermath: what one fan thought of Arsenal’s season

By Tony Attwood I have no objection to people presenting their opinions, and of course I do it all the time.  But I am troubled by some of the opinions I see. For example, the Guardian newspaper recently ran a column in which one supporter of each Premier League club was invited to write a …

Presenting a champions league final without champions – and without comment

By Sir Hardly Anyone Of course Liverpool v Tottenham will not be the first Champions League final involving a club that is not a champion in their own country. Indeed I am not sure if there haven’t been Champions Leagues finals in which neither club involved is a champion either in the season of the …

Arsenal v Manchester City (Women) match review of the end of season game

by Andrew Crawshaw I know I am late with this review, I can only apologise and claim extenuating circumstances. The Women’s Super League Season finished on Saturday, a day before the Men’s Premier League and whilst it didn’t have quite the same drama, as Arenal had won the League with a game to spare, it …

Arsenal: When rightful criticism turns into baseless negativity

By Don McMahon We beat Valencia 4-2 at their home ground. What a useless lot of twits Arsenal are, taking so much time to beat a team that had almost never lost in Valencia!  That’s the inveterate critics view….. From a psychological and cognitive point of view, backed up by neurological evidence and a vast …

Burnley v Arsenal, past games, coming below the Tiny Totts, and the teams

By Bulldog Drummond In a later post I will consider how this season has gone compared to recent Wenger seasons, but as we all know we already have four more points than we had at the end last year. As for how it will all pan out in this game, the manager said in the …

Why a win against Burnley is utterly vital to avoid chaos at the start of next season

By Bulldog Drummond And this is it for another season, except for that little issue lurking a few weeks away of the 7th European final in the history of the club (I’m not counting the super cup) to be played in front of 6000 Arsenal fans in the furthest reaches of Europe with no direct …

We may be in a final, but we can only afford Championship players

By Sir Hardly Anyone. There was much to-do this morning as Bumpus McGreggor fell into the Toppled Bollard, watering hole of the football journalist elite, for his usual pre-work quart and chaser.  For he had about him a look which clearly indicated that he had a story that was clearly his and clearly no one …

Arsenal have a desperately awful team. So how come we made the final?

By Tony Attwood As you might expect the media is full of the glory of four England clubs being in the two European finals.   BBC Radio 4 didn’t actually mention that three of these clubs are based in London, and very noticeably listed Arsenal as an afterthought after celebrating Chelsea’s win on penalties, but yes, …