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 Of course when Arsenal are losing it is dead simple for the media. The club needs to buy these players immediately, and sack the manager. And let’s report a gathering of a hundred people outside the club as an uprising on the streets. Interestingly the media treats each of these topics rather …
Read More “As Arsenal improve, so the level of wild, unproven attacks on the club rises”
By Dr Billy “the dog” McGraw The last 24 games this season and last: not yet title winning form but getting closer Tottenham and Arsenal have been using very different methods of developing their clubs of late, and as we ponder the notion of getting St Totteringham’s Day back this year (that’s the day when …
Read More “Tottenham and Arsenal, which club is progressing, which is slipping?”
By Tony Attwood From the Guardian feed on yesterday’s match. This is the article that starts: “Arsenal won five in a row not so long ago. They followed up that sequence with four losses in five, then last Wednesday rocked up at Chelsea and routed their London rivals 4-2.” Factually correct of course, but clearly …
Read More “When reporting on Arsenal, reality is the last thing in the journalist’s mind”
by Tony Attwood No one would pretend that this has been a glorious season, just as very few people will recognise the supreme irony of fans who proclaimed that Wenger should go because “fourth was not a trophy” are now anxiously looking at the league table in the hope that we might make fourth after …
Read More “The last 24 games this season and last: not yet title winning form but getting closer”
By Bulldog Drummond Arsenal v Manchester United: the tackles, the fouls and the yellow cards Arsenal v Manchester United. On home / away form we are clear favourites. Because Untold is based in the East Midlands and because of the kick off time of today’s game we’ve just got time for one more article before …
Read More “Arsenal v Manchester United and the implication of the tactics and the team”
By Bulldog Drummond Arsenal v Manchester United. On home / away form we are clear favourites. Elneny and Eddie: what happens now to Arsenal’s heroes against Chelsea? One of the intriguing factors this season is looking to see how various clubs near the top of the league have performed against each other. And indeed as …
Read More “Arsenal v Manchester United and the evolution of Arsenal’s new secret weapon”
By Bulldog Drummond Arsenal v Manchester United. On home / away form we are clear favourites. Manchester United are one of that small number of teams that have beaten Arsenal, more than Arsenal have beaten them. The current score is 100 wins to them, 85 to us with 50 draws. Although to get to this …
Read More “Arsenal v Manchester United: the tackles, the fouls and the yellow cards”
By Bulldog Drummond Elneny and Eddie: what happens now to Arsenal’s heroes against Chelsea? No sooner is one member of the “big six” swatted away with ease than up pops another one ready to be dealt with. But the big news is that Manchester United have finally got their new manager. He is a …
Read More “Arsenal v Manchester United. On home / away form we are clear favourites.”
By Tony Attwood I have long wondered (and occasionally mentioned) my puzzlement over why Mohammed Elneny was not utilised more in the Arsenal team, particularly when we were hit by injuries. Indeed back in 2020 I wrote the headline What do Arsenal have to do to get a good press? Play Partey and Elneny. It had …
Read More “Elneny and Eddie: what happens now to Arsenal’s heroes against Chelsea?”
By Tony Attwood Chelsea v Arsenal: a ray of hope in the recent home and away figures Oh what fun. After such a miserable three results, smashing the Russian Oligarch XI 2-4 at the oil terminal was a wonderful victory. And the “There’s nobody here” song was a beautiful bonus. Even the complete cock up …
Read More “There’s nobody here, just like the old days. Arsenal smother Chelsea”
By Bulldog Drummond Have Arsenal improved or declined in relation to last season? Chelsea v Arsenal: Tackles, fouls and yellow cards Chelsea v Arsenal: a ray of hope in the recent home and away figures We know that Chelsea have a few injury problems, with Mateo Kovacic, Callum Hudson-Odoi and Ben Chilwell all out. Alexandre …
By Bulldog Drummond As we approach tonight’s game against Chelsea there are many correspondents talking as if the whole of Arsenal is a disaster, and suggesting that the management should be changed along with most of the players. It is interesting that this is primarily the result of three games – which is exactly what …
Read More “Have Arsenal improved or declined in relation to last season?”
By Bulldog Drummond We had quite a debate recently after a reader tried to convince us all that the analysis of tackles, fouls and yellow cards was pointless when “everybody knows cards are a product of quality and not quantity of fouls.” Actually, not everyone knew this, simply because it is completely untrue, as the …
Read More “Chelsea v Arsenal: Tackles, fouls and yellow cards”
By Bulldog Drummond The home and away figures of Arsenal and Chelsea return us to a sense of reality after the wild assertions that Refs give yellow cards because of the quality of the fouls committed which according to our correspondent “everyone knows” but which the figures show is completely untrue. Pos Team P W …
Read More “Chelsea v Arsenal: a ray of hope in the recent home and away figures”
By Tony Attwood La Liga president Javier Tebas, president of La Liga, got rather annoyed with the Super League clubs accusing them of “lying more than Putin.” This was just about the time Juventus chairman Andrea Agnelli told an audience at the Financial Times’ “Business of Football Summit” in London last month. “Twelve clubs signed …
Read More “The Super League is still alive and kicking and here’s why”
By Tony Attwood The correspondent known as “Ukp” recently wrote to Untold, commenting on our use of the “tackle/foul/card stats” noting that this is “where you analyse numbers of fouls Vs number of cards and deduce ref bias, when everybody knows cards are a product of quality and not quantity of fouls.” I am not …
Read More “Do refs give yellow cards because of the quality or quantity of the fouls committed?”
What happened to the 134 players said to be coming to Arsenal last summer? Last summer the journalists’ failure rate in predicting transfers was 96%. And what made this even more staggering than the size of that number is that this was their most successful window since we started tracking transfer rumours around ten years …
Read More “The 58 players Arsenal tipped to sign this summer with over 130 days to go”
By Tony Attwood They are pretty much pariahs around the world – Russian athletes and teams are banned from participating in any form of world sport, as a protest against the invasion of Ukraine. Except in football, where Russian officials are still welcomed with open arms. So when the Fifa Congress opened in Qatar, there …
Read More “If Fifa won’t ban Russian officials from its gatherings, we should get out of Fifa”
By Tony Attwood Reading the game: why do journalists always know more than managers? Obviously, we all want Arsenal to improve. Probably the only time no one talked about improvement was after the Unbeaten Season. But the rest of the time we want each season to be better. And the media tells us day after …
Read More “For some Arsenal fans improvement isn’t enough; but this is not the time to change again”
By Tony Attwood Arsenal: another defeat. What has gone so wrong after last year’s triumph? Arsenal are of course not the only team that has had an upset of late. Bayern Munich were knocked out of the Champions League by Villareal managed by… well since you ask, Unai Emery, so recently removed from Arsenal. Now …
Read More “Reading the game: why do journalists always know more than managers?”
By Tony Attwood Nitram’s comments after the game yesterday told us a lot of what has gone wrong. He quoted the average statistics from our last 3 matches: Arsenal Possession = 70% Opponent Possession = 30% Arsenal Shots = 55 Opponent Shots = 23 Arsenal Shots On Target = 13 Opponent Shots On Target = …
Read More “Arsenal: another defeat. What has gone so wrong after last year’s triumph?”
By Bulldog Drummond Update: Tottenham lost at home to Brighton. Top of the table now reads… Team P W D L F A GD Pts 1 Manchester City 31 23 5 3 72 20 52 74 2 Liverpool 31 22 7 2 79 22 57 73 3 Chelsea 30 18 8 4 64 23 41 …
Read More “Southampton v Arsenal: the sequences and the Arsenal team”
By Bulldog Drummond Arsenal’s salvation: After 30 games we always improve The Guardian has come out with one of its famous statements: “if Arsenal show up and play with an ounce of positivity then Ralph Hasenhüttl’s usual forward-thinking approach should allow for plenty of chances. Chances have so often gone unfinished this season, however.” So …
Read More “Arsenal and the “big chances” myth ahead of the Southampton game”
By Bulldog Drummond Southampton v Arsenal: how the refs treat each team, how the managers have done Arsenal’s salvation: After 30 games we always improve The continuing strange tale of how PL referees punish tackles There has been some commentary concerning the injury list and how we are being decimated by injuries. We are in …
By Bulldog Drummond As we saw yesterday there are huge variations in the ways that referees treat different teams in the Premier League when it comes to tackles, fouls and yellow cards. Now it is time to focus just on this weekend’s opponents, Southampton, and their differences from Arsenal. Those differences are modest but are …
Read More “Southampton v Arsenal: how the refs treat each team, how the managers have done”
