The silly season is over, time to get behind the team

The silly season is over, time to get behind the team by Mahdain Well another silly season has passed and hopefully it takes along with it all the agendas, rubbish rumours, silly childishness, entitled demanding, drivel opinions and outright idiotic outbursts. Finally the summer transfer window is shut and thankfully so because it was just …

When it is serious

WHEN IT IS SERIOUS…….Don McMahon This article continues our series on the interpretations and meanings behind the laws of the game.  FIFA’s concern about players returning to the field of play with serious head injuries is justified and proportional to the need. That said, the player also has his word in this decision and if …

Oh that lovely transfer deadline day (part 2)

By Walter Broeckx This article is the second of me walking around in the virtual world of Arsenal fans and supporters on transfer deadline day.  Part 1, if you missed it, is here. All the moaning fans were for 100% sure we would sign “Fa Kin No Wan”. Again. Again! AGAIN!!!! Anyone daring to suggest …

Oh that lovely transfer deadline day (1)

By Walter Broeckx As I had stayed clear almost the whole transfer window of the madness that surrounds these things I thought it would be nice to have a look at how fans reacted to it on the last day before the window slamed shut or whatever the expression is that people like to use. …

The unofficial referee review: Leicester – Arsenal or Mission Impossible

Guest appearance By Mike T Its one of those things that you say “ok yes” and you think you will do something but after an hour or two when reality kicks in you think to yourself why on earth did I agree to do that? I thought I better point out that Tom Cruise I …

Welbeck and Henry on the same starting line at Arsenal.

So now we know the 2014 results: In: Calum Chambers Mathieu Debuchy David Ospina Alexis Sanchez Danny Welbeck Out: Benik Afobe on loan Nic Bendtner Johann Djourou Thomas Eisfeld Lukasz Fabianski Carl Jenkinson on loan Chu-Young Park Bacary Sagna Wellington on loan Jon Toral on loan Thomas Vermaelen Ryo to FC Twente on loan Ignasi Miquel to …

Who to buy? Danny anyone?

 In 2013 we had Boris Johnson, Mayor of London as our guest previewer talking through who we ought to buy.  Here’s what he predicted who we would buy.  All the names were taken from prime tips of the day. 1:  Diego Costa. 2:  Stevan Jovetic 3:  Kevin Strootman  4:  The New Jack Wilshere “Arsenal are …

The psychology of supporting

By Tony Attwood I’m endlessly fascinated by the way football fans respond to football.  Obviously I meet different groups of fans in all sorts of places, restaurants, pubs, car parks, trains, and in the ground itself, and most are reasonable decent people who can instantly understand that we are each regular guys who, through fate …

12 Unbeaten; AAA lead the sheep; Leicester do the water treatment

By Tony Attwood We filled the away section, out-shouted the home support for most of the match, but then, oh dear. I don’t know how many times the “49” song was sung, but it was great, it was powerful and it drowned the home support, and left even their mascot (who loves to goad opposition …

Leicester away, all the details plus tomorrow’s newspaper headlines.

  By Bulldog Drummond It is my motto always to live an exciting life – to go to strange places (Leicester here I come), do unusual things, and wherever possible wear strange hats.  I also try to be hearty and jolly in a sort of unremitting way, except when dealing with the sort of hearty …

Leicester v Arsenal 31 August 2014 – The Match Officials. (“I wouldn’t trust him as a ballboy”)

Leicester v Arsenal 31 August 2014 – The Match Officials By Andrew Crawshaw Before I start on the officials for Sunday, here is a table illustrating the wrong important decisions to date – two games, six wrong game changing decisions, five against Arsenal and these two games were officiated by two referees who I considered …

How Chelsea sneaked in Willan, but Man U failed with Rojo

By Tony Attwood 10 August 2013: In a somewhat unexpected result Arsenal beat Man City 3-1 in a friendly.  Sebastian Perez Cardona  appeared for Arsenal, and the AAA and their journalistic allies made much of the fact that the player did not have a work permit. He came on as a sub in the 67th minute wearing …

But….. he got the ball (or “It’s the consequences squire, not the intent”

HE GOT THE BALL……by Don McMahon Recently, there has been a lot of debate about a statement that pundits, media types and commentators on TV and other media regularly use to justify a serious foul during play, often committed in a manner that is excessively dangerous and careless/reckless. As Tony mentioned to me in a …

Champions League Draw: Arsenal Belgium goes mad

By Walter Broeckx As you may recall from an earlier post, a few months ago I was voted chairman of the Arsenal Belgium official supporters club. Since then our new board has done an amazing job. We have used all the resources we had on social media and our own website to spread the word …

Showing character is as important as playing nice football

By Walter Broeckx So Arsenal have done it again. For the 17th consecutive year we have managed to qualify for the CL group stages. And we all know how important that is for a club like ours. As long as we are paying for the stadium it will be an important part of the income …

Unbeaten run gets to 11: but were the press actually there?

By Tony Attwood This was quite a night in the Emirates.  Noisy, some serious long-term chanting, nervy.  I thought the elderly gent (well, my sort of age) just along from me was going to have a heart attack but his wife helped him up at the end and he made it out.  You could feel …

Alexis on the score sheet, Arsenal go in the group stage

By Walter Broeckx Well that was an interesting match I think. Just as in Turkey we didn’t get it handed over on a platter. It was hard work from the start to the finish. Not helped by a ref who just as the one  in Turkey managed to go from brillant to blind within seconds.  …

Arsenal v gobble gobble gobble. A preview.

By Bulldog Drummond So, having brought you Arsenal against some toffees it is now time to face the turkeys. I don’t have to bring you the news about Giroud since it is all over the papers, displaced only by the heroics of the players from one of the Empires greatest ancient cities – Milton Keynes. …

Liverpool’s story telling: a different way to approach football

“I can categorically tell you Mario Balotelli will not be at Liverpool,” Brendan Rodgers said earlier this month. There’s quite a difference between that sort of statement and the sort that Mr Wenger says, which is mostly of the “I can’t tell you, because nothing is agreed, but yes, we are looking,” variety. But what puzzles …

Everton, the assistant, carrying the flag and an experiment

By Walter Broeckx After a few articles about our match against Everton a few interesting discussions could be read in the comment section.  I thought it would be interesting to go in to this matter a bit deeper. As an assistant with over 100 matches done including teams of the Jupiler League in Belgium I …

One weight, two measures: double standards on the field.

by Don McMahon The above expression is a direct translation from a local French expression (I bet Walter knows it and maybe has a similar one in Flemish as well) and it basically means that a double-standard is being applied to some decision or judgement or use of tools that need to be encouraged. In …

Arsenal’s tactical revolution slowly comes to fruition

by Tony Attwood Last season Aaron Ramsey scored 16 goals in all competitions.  Which is a fairly decent total – until you remember that he only played 35 games, when it suddenly becomes a very good total.  It is almost one in two.  In the league it was 10 goals in 23 – again approaching …

Untold Ref Review: Everton/Arsenal. What is an advantage, and what’s wrong with assistant Garratt?

By Walter Broeckx Referee : Kevin Friend Date 23/08/2014 At the start of this match it seemed that the ref got an easy game. No real fouls. I think he fell asleep after some 10 minutes and then when he had to act he lost his touch somehow. There was hardly a foul being committed …