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 Under current regulations the Premier League clubs sell their broadcasting rights collectively, the money received being shared between clubs in the league, and to a small extent through solidarity payments with the Championship. So the clubs that bring in big TV audiences don’t get as much as they could, but they agree …
Read More “Why are club owners so against proper regulation and financial control?”
By Sir Hardly Anyone Half of the referees who took Arsenal games last season, have had an Arsenal game this season. The man who took control of five Arsenal games last season and awarded more fouls against Arsenal per game than any other referee has already had four Arsenal games this season. At this rate …
Read More “Why do we keep getting the referee who always awards fouls against us?”
By Tony Attwood Following my piece about media coverage this morning, I stumbled across another Mail article from the same writer as before which says, “Mikel Arteta would finally appear to be moving Arsenal forwards. It has taken a while and his team are still short of where they need to be, but there are …
Read More “Arsenal back in the Champions League next season? It’s looking likely.”
By Tony Attwood There is a piece in the Daily Mail today by Ian Ladyman that says, “Mikel Arteta would finally appear to be moving Arsenal forwards. It has taken a while and his team are still short of where they need to be, but there are signs of progress.” That sentence symbolises all that …
Read More “Arsenal’s progress is utterly stunning – and here is the absolute proof.”
By Tony Attwood With the African confederation now being run not by African officials who have an understanding with the European Leagues where their best players play, but by Fifa head office in Switzerland, and with Fifa in ceaseless war with the club associations such as Uefa, it is not surprising that after a one-off …
Read More “How will we cope without Aubameyang during the Africa Cup of Nations?”
By Sir Hardly Anyone When it all happens at once the football media invariably has one response: ignore it all and say Arsenal’s manager is in trouble. It really is laughable… Prior to yesterday’s match the Daily Mirror – owners of Football.London, ran the headline Mikel Arteta in danger of repeating Unai Emery mistake as pattern …
By Tony Attwood There was a huge amount of publicity concerning the opening three league games of the season, with the media particularly enjoying ranting at Arteta and demanding his removal from the club, Some alleged Arsenal supporters went along with this, and comparisons were made between those three games and Arsenal throughout their history. …
Read More “Have Arsenal truly recovered from those opening three defeats?”
By Tony Attwood We noted last weekend how, in playing Arsenal, Liverpool upped their level of fouling dramatically – and ultimately disrupted both the Arsenal team and the Arsenal manager enough, to be able to take the game. Newcastle are made of different stuff but once again the foul was the weapon of choice. While …
Read More “For the second week running Arsenal face a team that uses fouls as a defence”
By Bulldog Drummond According to the Telegraph, speaking of Newcastle and the new manager’s regime, “Some players have been so tired after the more gruelling sessions that they had to go straight to bed when they got home.” Which might help us along to getting the win and the rebuilding of confidence after the Liverpool …
Read More “Arsenal v Newcastle: videos of past games, and notes on past victories”
By Bulldog Drummond The story so far: Arsenal v Newcastle and when life in Europe really isn’t worth it Both Arsenal and Newcastle are at the bottom end of the injury table – Arsenal with two men out and Newcastle with three. This compares with the upper reaches which includes Everton with nine men down, …
Read More “Arsenal v Newcastle: injuries, tackles, fouls, yellows and changing the team”
By Bulldog Drummond We’ve often repeated the phrase “fourth is not trophy” which was endlessly used by the Anti-Wengerians during the record-breaking era of constant appearances in the Champions League. So often in fact that it hardly bears repeating – and yet as a symbol of getting into Europe it does have a certain force. …
Read More “Arsenal v Newcastle and when life in Europe really isn’t worth it”
by Tony Attwood It’s a while since we’ve reiterated the rules on yellow cards (one of our three prime measures of club and player tactics) so in case you have forgotten they are… Five yellows accumulated before match week 19 results in a one-match ban. Ten yellows accumulated by week 32 will result in a …
Read More “Which club has the dirtiest players in the Premier League this season?”
By Bulldog Drummond On November 12 we ran a couple of stories about Qatar and the way the state is treating the migrant workers who have worked on the World Cup stadia and outbuildings, and on the way it is trying to suppress such stories. You might remember Small publication threatened by Qatar World Cup …
Read More “More Qatar arrests show that visitors and journalists alike are in danger”
By Tony Attwood According to an “exclusive” in the Daily Mail “Football’s lawmakers IFAB [are planning] to discuss increasing half-time to 25 MINUTES in a bid to accommodate Super Bowl-style entertainment shows.” (Their capitals, not mine. They do that sort of thing in the Mail). They then go on to talk about the “15 minute …
Read More “25 minutes for half time? That’s what the international board are wanting”
By Tony Attwood I can’t imagine that there are many football supporters for whom the playing of matches is not the key element within the notion of supporting a club. Unfortunately the attitude of many club owners is becoming increasingly removed from the vision of the supporters. Because for many owners football is merely the …
Read More “For Arsenal football is just a route to marketing opportunities, no matter how awful”
By Tony Attwood Yes one year ago after 12 games played, Tottenham were top of the league. And just to prove that I am not making it all up, here is the table Team P W D L F A GD Pts 1 Tottenham Hotspur 12 7 4 1 24 10 14 25 2 Liverpool …
Read More “Last year after 12 games played, Tottenham were top, 7 years ago we were 8th”
By Tony Attwood Given that Arsenal have not graced the second tier of English football since the 1914/15 season* it might seem that worrying about the level of debt in the Championship is hardly relevant to an Arsenal blog. But actually the state of affairs in the Championship is relevant to all of us, both …
Read More “The new game for the billionaires: buying a multiplicity of football clubs”
By Tony Attwood What helps a club get to toward the top of the league? Is it a policy of team rotation and using lots of players? Or the number of tackles that the side put in? Or maybe a propensity for fouling. Or perhaps the opposite – not fouling. Or maybe it is changing …
Read More “What factors (beside scoring goals) make a team rise up the league table?”
By Tony Attwood I am very sorry to say that as usual I have not made myself clear to everyone in terms of my review of the Liverpool game relating to tackles, fouls and yellow cards – figures which if you are a regular reader you will know we have been tracking for over two …
Read More “An informative spot of media support for Arsenal following Klopp v Arteta”
by Tony Attwood Gary Hoffman has left his job as chair of the Premier League after just 18 months in the job. The reason is that the 18 clubs other than Newcastle and Manchester City didn’t like the way they were not consulted over giving the Saudi sovereign wealth fund the ok to buy Newcastle. …
Read More “Reasons to think that the Premier League is not in control of its own destiny”
by Tony Attwood Liverpool’s decision in the game against Arsenal, dramatically to increase the level of fouling from its normal level is a statistical fact that can’t be denied. Before this weekend’s game they had committed 107 fouls, at a rate of 9.73 per game. Now it is 122 at 10.17 a game. 15 fouls …
Read More “Liverpool v Arsenal – the rather alarming implications”
By Tony Attwood The Arsenal policy, as we have tracked it over recent years, is to try and cut tackles down dramatically, and this of course has changed Arsenal’s style of play. In the end the referees are forced to reduce the number of fouls given against Arsenal players, simply because we are not tackling. …
Read More “Liverpool v Arsenal: Liverpool adopt a level of fouling not seen before”
by Tony Attwood On 26 September 1970 Arsenal lost 5-0 to Stoke City in the League. Which was surprising because prior to the match we had played nine, won five, drawn three and lost one. We were sitting third in the league and with a goal difference plus +11 (although they didn’t measure goal differences …
Read More “For Arsenal it’s that déjà vu thing all over again”
by Bulldog Drummond Now here’s a sentence you don’t see everyday in the Evening Standard. Liverpool, we are told, are Facing an Arsenal side in excellent form, OK pause for a moment to pick yourself up off the floor, before we proceed to notice that the only problem with the little article is that although …
Read More “Liverpool v Arsenal: the predicted line up and media ramblings”
By Bulldog Drummond It is of course self-evident that a win against Liverpool today would mean far more than three points. For the media’s utter devotion to Liverpool (which we used to symbolise by writing the club’s name always as Liverpool!) is as strong as ever. Explanations and excuses would follow of course, but it …
Read More “Liverpool v Arsenal: how we have changed in just 12 games!”
