An assessment of the squad so far this season. by KM
It’s that International (boring) break time again and while England play Estonia in a pointless game of football where the only interesting news are if Walcott is going to get that front role again, we can take a look at how the squad is doing since August.
As ever with Arsenal the only one word I can think of to describe our season so far is inconsistent. We have flashes of brilliance mixed up with periods of mediocrity. We didn’t do enough in the summer though and that is regardless of the fact we are two points off the top. We were 12 points off last season and there still is a room for improvement in our squad.
We have two first team players who came up from the ranks, not because we want to play the youngsters, but because we simply didn’t have enough bodies to put on the pitch. Having that in a world of football where the Premier league makes a 5 billion pounds bonanza from TV and commercial contracts. It is more a case of bad planning rather than not having money. We are waiting on experiments to work, instead of having a fully armed squad to win the title.
We are always 2 players short, so there’s an excuse Arsene can use. Those 200 millions would’ve surely covered a DM and a solid CB to partner the Boss, never mind the remaining that could’ve easily put in a real striker, rather than hoping Theo would work. Anyway what’s done is done.
Our squad looks okay on paper. I would still put City on top when I look at their best starting XI and their overall squad, but we finally have a proper goalkeeper. The impact of Cech was already highlighted in the games he didn’t play. He brings priceless experience. After the West Ham game he put on a tweet stating something similar to “Made some mistakes and no points today, but looking to the next game”, which is exactly the kind of mentality we need.
Character is the ability to stand up when you are down and recover. It is why Champions win when they don’t play well. Ozil, Sanchez and Cech were sublime against United. They all came from teams where winning trophies is everything. They were coached that unless all the top prizes are won, it’s not good enough. Something most of the Arsenal fans slaughter me about, but I will continue to bang the drums on this topic, until I see the same mentality at Arsenal. And if we cannot teach it in the dressing room, we can buy it from outside. The problem here is that Wenger doesn’t like players with character, who raise their voice and that’s why we are labeled “soft” so many times.
Other players who need a note are Coquelin and Bellerin who I mentioned earlier. They came in as temporary replacements, but made the positions their own and are an integral part of our squad now. Nacho Monreal is another player who deserves more credit than he gets. He is the new Mr. Consistent around here since Sagna left and he’s giving Gibbs zero chance of getting back to the first squad.
Theo Walcott is also a player making serious progress as a CF. Now I still think that against the very best oppositions Walcott will be inefficient. He’s a real threat when we are a goal up and play the counter attacking style, but if we chase a game against a deeper sitting team we are in trouble with him. Sometimes you just need to throw balls into the box and then we really lack a physical presence, which really helps when you need to hold a player off and give other players time to link up. Or other times you need to defend balls thrown into the box and again we lack height.
A striker, a replacement DM and a CB still remain positions where we can improve, but other than that the squad is good. Thanks to the inconsistency of all teams, we are in with a chance. Whoever gets it right the sooner and keeps it up till May will be Champions. Hope it’s us.
Konstantin
Hmmmm. I think we have been 2-3 players short for quite some time now. Nothing new in that.
a decade and counting we have been 2-3 players off
the injury argument is null and void if you reinforce as you should
guys dont forget the daily kiss your lucky egg ritual to keep le coq kos sanchez cech and theo injury free
If that is a Cool Runnings reference you are awesome
Sorry to be off topic so early but did anyone else see Jose’s responsr to Capello’s comments? “A coach with his experience would have been better served to talk about football without mentioning the work of a colleague…. I prefer to show respect for my colleagues”
Comedy gold
And the comedian of the EPL goes to……
He ll join mental hospital shortly. Hevis out of control.!!
We have to deal with what we have unfortunately. Beggars can’t be choosers and we begged all summer for a top striker and DM
I hope Wilshere and Welbeck will be available by January. I hope we have no more long term injuries. Again thanks to Wenger getting rid of several players through sale, release and loans and only bringing in a GK, we basically need every player in the first team squad. Lack of depth in a few areas
Key to the season is few injuries
beggars with 100 million to spend
brilliant 🙂
Where would this team be without Sanchez? He has carried the team and he could use some top class help.
Wenger still needs another signing of this quality.
err its not like theres an alexis sanchez conveyor belt based in the hills of tocopilla
if there is …the hell are u doing dicky ..get a move on
If only we had 200mil during a summer transfer window. We can dream ehh?
Wait….
Wait… we had 200 million for summer transfer window?? I thought only 50-70….
Pick any number you like, still reckon it beats the 0 we spent.
I will use the number 11.
#CECHmate
That the 11mil we got back from player sales/loans? You’re a sharp one…
Apart from Podolski, who have been sold really…. Many are released and that wages contributions have been given to Giroud, Walcott, Cazorla in form of new contracts. And rumours are there that we are going to offer new contracts to Ozil, Monreal and Sanchez, etc. So there is the money utilization from sales/loans.
i’ve seen a similar article like this on justarsenal before………. Or i’m i mistaken?………. I can’t be….. We have always been 2-3 players short in ages!
For majority of time gone by, we simply didn’t have the funds to buy the type of 2 to 3 players required. On top of that we were selling first team players. We have been bringing in allot of players over the last three seasons and some real quality ones too. We also had to get allot of players off the books.
This season we were upset for obvious reason. However, Theo is looking very dangerous and I couldn’t say for sure that whichever striker arrival we expected could of or would have looked as dangerous as Theo. We wanted a top defensive mid too, but were not going to get a big earner as Coq rightly holds down starting position. A decent back up though, fair enough but the boss has his own opinions too. End of season is when we can properly judge whether we are two to three players short, you never know ..Arsene may be right on this one.
True Talk: Its easy to say player X will fit into our team properly, and he will easily score this amount of goals, while there are factors that he will take time for settling in EPL, matching to our playing style, understanding with our players, etc. I am not saying that this will obviously be false for every player but the coach knows better than we know. For example, look at Ballotelli for Liverpool he was a good signing for team on paper, but how he fared is too far from comparision