by Tony Attwood Of course the negativists were dubious about Arsenal’s chances against Olympiacos; doubly so when they saw the substitution of Elneny, complaining he was exactly not the player we needed at this moment, and pondering how Arteta could make such a crucial mistake as such a critical moment. The Guardian follows this point …

Read More “Exceptionally good news for Arsenal; except the media don’t see it.”

By Bulldog Drummond Quite possibly because many websites have been following the Daily Mirror lead which suggests that Arsenal are about to sell half of their first team squad, there is not too much info available about Olympiacos.   Indeed the match fixing findings and banning from the league have been totally ignored by the media …

Read More “Olympiacos v Arsenal; the Arsenal line-up, and what could be done about referees”

By Tony Attwood Even Wikipedia is having a go at Arsenal now.  For in its article Arsenal FC in European football it has this… European honours of Arsenal F.C. Honour Titles Years European Cup Winners’ Cup 1 1994 That’s it.   Elsewhere in passing we do have a note about Arsenal winning the Inter Cities Fairs …

Read More “Olympiacos relegated from the top league, but we are still playing them!”

By Bulldog Drummond So it is Olympiacos tomorrow which means they are most likely top of the league, and most likely involved in a match fixing scandal.  That at least is what we might expect from their past behaviour before we do any research at all. Since the start of February they have played ten …

Read More “Arsenal v Olympiacos. Non stop flights from £38 for the one way trip.”

By Sir Hardly Anyone Interestingly, occasional slight justifications and explanations for Arsenal spending money in the summer on the transfer market are starting to emerge.  The prime one being that because we are no longer spending money on players who are on the payroll but not in the “25” we now have lots of spare …

Read More “The six big money transfers for Arsenal this summer, and how we pay for it”

By Sir Hardly Anyone Now I know my name causes some mirth among the lower classes, but if might turn out to be a dire warning.  At least if the Daily Mirror has its way. For the Daily Mirror has on its site today what appears to be a serious article called “Arsenal keep or …

Read More “Sell them all! The Daily Mirror’s shocking plan for Arsenal.”

By Tony Attwood You can’t take in the news these days without realising that there is a lot of anti-vaccination propaganda going on at the moment.  It has different edges to it, as for example if you get vaccinated it won’t bring you any personal benefit, or it will have a negative effect, or it …

Read More “Anti-vaccination and anti-Arsenal. Nothing much is making sense.”

By Tony Attwood Swiss Ramble, the Twitter poster with an interest in football finances has recently posted a series of tweets on Arsenal’s finances, and I thought I would draw out a few points. If you are a regular reader you will know that my view is that the club has spent a considerable amount …

Read More “Arsenal’s finances are really getting into a mess and a half.”

By Sir Hardly Anyone We have long known that 97% of the transfer stories journalists report are nonsense.  We know that their eternal kow-towing to referees, and also that their all-powerful organisation the PGMO, holds god-like status to journalists and won’t ever be criticised in any way whatsoever, despite its nonsense fake statistics and refusal …

Read More “Journalists? Revealed: the depths of behaviour we are dealing with, every day”

by Tony Attwood It is, I guess something that most of us  have known for a long time but even so it is good to have the final proof. Publications like the Daily Mirror with its lapdog website Football London, churn out transfer rumours by the score, hour after hour, day after day after day. …

Read More “The proof that transfer rumours are generated by computers not people”

by Tony Attwood   Most areas of business employ consultants.  People who come in from the outside, are given access to all areas of the business, see it afresh, and then point out problems. All companies of any size that are sensible and are concerned about their long-term well-being rather than short term expediency use …

Read More “It’s so simple to stop referee errors like yesterday’s, so why do they continue?”

(selon certains y’a pas penalty mdr) pic.twitter.com/Kx83gyp7ws — Arsenal FR (@Arsenal_FRA) March 6, 2021 Is it really that easy to influence a referee? That is the headline over an article in the Athletic.  I’ve reprinted the opening below, but in essence it leads with the referee showing how he stops himself being influenced by players, …

Read More “Burnley v Arsenal. Is it really that easy to influence a referee? Seemingly yes.”

By Bulldog Drummond Let’s have a peek at who we have used the most this season listed by the minutes played, which is usually a fair indication as to which players the manager likes, when all are fit… Below is our top 20 appearances listed in minutes (substitute appearances listed under games in brackets).  This …

Read More “Burnley v Arsenal: the team and this season’s appearance numbers”

Text By Bulldog Drummond Photo by Trappedinburnley Well, yes my headline is wrong.  Not “injuries” but “injury”.  It is Emile Smith Rowe.  He has an injury which is either groin, or hip or pelvic depending on who is talking.  The official line on 3 March was that “Emile had a scan yesterday, it doesn’t look …

Read More “Burnley v Arsenal: the injuries, and an encouraging run of results”

By Bulldog Drummond Prior to, and after the Leicester game the figures for Arsenal in relation to tackles, fouls and yellow cards looked very promising as it showed that Arsenal were following a key strategy.  The management have now fully realised that Arsenal winning is not primarily about how Arsenal play, but about how Arsenal …

Read More “The key tactical issue that Arsenal must observe in the game v Burnley”

By Bulldog Drummond As we have noted a number of times, getting into the Europa League next season isn’t just about Arsenal winning games, it is about the clutch of teams above us doing less well than they have been. So I thought I’d have a little look at just how this is going, in …

Read More “We need to do well, they need to do worse. Could Arsenal really make the top six?”

By Tony Attwood On 6 June 2019 we did quite a bit of boasting.  Indeed the headline of the day said it all.   “We predicted six champions before the season started” we crowed.  “We got all six right,” we concluded. And in fact that was the second year running we got six out of six. …

Read More “Why some of the six regular league winners in Europe are not winning this season.”

By Sir Hardly Anyone It is being reported that Jürgen Klopp has told Uefa and Fifa that Liverpool will not allow its players to go and play (or indeed sit on the bench) for their countries if they are having to travel to a location which will mean that upon their return to England there …

Read More “Let’s hope Arsenal go down the same road as Liverpool over international release”

by Sir Hardly Anyone Traditionally, Untold has taken more note of the 25 player rule and the notion that only 17 players can be foreign grown, than the inventors of transfer rumours.  Our view has been that people who run newspaper columns and blogs propagating the rumours of transfers (97% of which are always wrong) …

Read More “FA accused of getting most of its post-Brexit transfer rules wrong!!!”

By Tony Attwood There is an article on the Football.London site which runs with the headline “Stan Kroenke could force Mikel Arteta into transfer rethink at Arsenal as £182m mistake revealed” It is, I think, one of the most misleading articles I have seen in the last couple of hours, and I thought it was …

Read More “Are Arsenal really utterly hopeless at all transfers or is it the media that’s wrong?”

By Tony Attwood Every year around this time, websites start to tell us that they have had access to the results produced by a super computer to tell us who is going to win the league. They don’t actually tell us what a super computer is, nor indeed why for something as simple as predicting …

Read More “What is a super computer and does it tell us anything we don’t know?”

Written by Darryl Rigby, Immigration Advice Service The United Kingdom formally exited the European Union on January 1st 2021, ending a near-50-year alliance that had previously made trading goods with the rest of the continent much more straight-forward Throughout the ‘Leave’ vs ‘Remain’ debate, much of the arguments centred around the economy, and in particular …

Read More “4 Transfers That Would Never Have Happened Under Post-Brexit Rules”

By Tony Attwood Sky Sports have presented a list of “days lost” to clubs by players being injured or ill. It is an interesting list and is combined with a note from Sky that notes that this is fractionally under 10% higher than for the first 26 games last season. Then they suggest that “the …

Read More “How much are Arsenal’s injuries responsible for our place in the league.”

By Tony Attwood This is a very curious and odd league table at the moment.  The almighty glorious wonderful Liverpool of yesteryear have slipped down to sixth and are hobnobbing it with their neighbours (three points below and two games in hand). Arsenal and Tottenham (the latter being regularly tipped for great things, largely on …

Read More “6 goals, 6 points, 6 places: the journey to the Europa League next season”

By Tony Attwood There is a little piece about the weekend’s Arsenal match in the Guardian which reads… “Brendan Rodgers looked glum at full time. He looked even glummer as the man from Radio Leicester informed him the airwaves were already alive with callers asking if Leicester City were about to repeat the collapsing act …

Read More “How Arsenal beat Leicester: tackles, fouls, yellows, and the referee”