Mikel Arteta has admitted that his team performed poorly in their match against Fulham, resulting in a 2-1 defeat.
Arteta’s side had hoped to capitalise on Manchester City’s poor form to create a significant gap at the top of the Premier League table. They aimed to end the year as leaders but suffered a setback with a loss to West Ham before facing Fulham.
Fulham, known for their toughness under Marco Silva, met expectations by defeating Arsenal 2-1. It was a disappointing day for a team aspiring to be champions, and Arteta acknowledged that their performance fell well below the expected standard.
Arteta said, as quoted by the BBC:
“We weren’t good enough. We lost three days ago when we deserved to win, but today we were nowhere near that level.
“We conceded two very similar goals, giving the ball away. Defensively we were second best.
“We had a great performance against Liverpool, against West Ham, this is the one you have to isolate as it is our worst performance of the season.”
Just Arsenal Opinion
It is great that Arteta is making this admission. We now expect him to prepare his team to do better in the next few games.
If we keep dropping points, we will even struggle to make the top four at the end of the term.
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And Arteta was the poorest with his game plan
How so?
Isolate means singular
This performance has happened more than once this season
Not sure Arteta has been found out.
We used to play with overlapping full backs.
Bellerin Nacho Kieran. Just to name so many.
Now 2 centre backs
Ignoramus bit harsh I thought.
Pot calling kettle black. Look in the mirror before call othe people ignoramus, in case you’re carrying the label on your forehead.
Our football is sluggish. Who do we blame for that? We dont score most of our goals from open play. Who do we blame for that?
Arteta knows it better than any of us that the team has lost its quick, incisive and rapid passing ability; He knows Havertz, Georginho, & Zinchenko can’t cope with that intensity, but will not leave them out of his teams. Arteta had a drea: in which Havertz mesmerises defences and scores the most goals in the team. Then he’s redeemed but unfortunately that’s a dream. Someone pleeeeze talk to him to play Partey and ESR and bring back Arsenal from this humiliating slump. Does he even consider himself human, coz to er is human.
The manager is to blame! It’s not the only poor game. The team has not yet produced the standards of last campaign. He simply failed to build from last campaign. Our strength last year was the midfield pair of Partey and Xhaka. They made Saka, Odegaard and Martinelli to play better. Partey moves the ball quickly forward but is injury prone.
Instead of conserving the winning team and building from there especially with the arrival of Declan Rice, he dissembled the team beginning with the departure of Xhaka and then beginning the season by turning away his back to Thomas Partey before he even got injured.
A composition of Odegaard, Rice and Partey will win all games in the league. But the manager doesn’t see this!!!!!! Kai Havertz isn’t simply the answer. All the runs the manager claims he’s making may be good but he doesn’t have the defensive acumen of Xhaka.
To solve our problems, play Zinchenko alongside Rice and Odegaard in midfield and Tomiyasu behind them; otherwise, sign a defensive midfielder, a center forward and another full back.
One last error is the introduction of Raya. I believe the manager and the Kroenkes and trying to make significant sales to balance books and Ramsdale is in that conversation. Unfortunately, the Raya experiment isn’t working. The team has been really shaky with him as stopper. This manger and owners should stop playing around with our emotions. If Ramsdale is not reinstated, we won’t even get top 4 this term.
Atangana from Maryland, USA
Very well put. I still believe he can get us top four, but that is his cap. Last year to a great extent was serendipity that we figured something out while others had troubles. How MA failed to maintain our sharpness from last year with added players seems to be a major issue. Maybe his ego or inexperience, he failed in tactics and transfer, for winning us the championship. MA needs time to mature and learn, I am convinced he is a rare talent but not the person to bring us to the top.
Best Comment here so far. You nailed it.
I don’t know if you’ve noticed yet, but Partey is STILL injured.
I agree with your points except the implication that xhaka was intentionally moved on (ie arteta disassembled the team) – it seems far more likely that xhaka wanted to move, I get the impression he’s wanted to move for a while, possibly for personal reasons. If anyone recognised his importance, it was arteta – he’s the one who convinced him to stay a couple of years prior.
As mentioned, I tend to agree on the other points.
If you really look at our midfield options now, we only have one high quality cm who’s reliably available in rice. The others are either injured too often (Partey), inconsistent (jorginho), below the level (elneny), or are attacking midfielders being shoehorned into deeper roles and not adapting to it as bernardo was able to at City (havertz, Vieira, trossard, ESR) – it’s not a good situation!
I’m sorry but this is simply inaccurate stuff, as usual parroted by those who wish to simplistically blame the manager for a poor run of form.
It was simply not possible to maintain last season’s MF. It is essential to remember that Xhaka wanted to leave. Partey has been injured for most of the season so has not been an option. Tomiyasu has also been in and out of the team due to injuries and fitness issues. Even Zinchenko was out at the beginning of the season. He was also unavailable for the last game.
The last few games we lost were not because of Raya.
Unfortunately, some people are just stating their personal biases as reasons when they have little to do with the actual games we lost.
Can Arteta just STOP pushing Havertz into the team even when he’s not performing. It boggles the mind why Martinelli is always picked on for substitution even when he’s clearly the strongest performer in the team. Saka, Rice and Havertz can be poor throughout the game, but will not be rested. Whenever they are, the rest of the team bears the brunt of his stick. ESR could’ve, and will always give a better performance in place of Havertz. Saka has not been able to go past defenders in a while, opting to veer inwards or pass back instead. Rice carries way too much on his shoulders, and therefore cannot excel. If only, Arteta could play Rice and Partey in their proper positions, with Odegaard or ESR, leave Havertz out for only a few games, the team won’t look so confused and out of ideas. ARTETA; IF WISHES WERE HORSES, WE’D ALL RIDE. Enough of your wishes with Havertz and Georginho.
The ego, delusion and denial continues….been poor for many games already, not sure how MA can say it’s only 1 poor game unless he’s just being dishonest.
It’s a new year, YES IT IS!
To his credit, Arteta didn’t make any excuses. He said it was our worst game of the season, we gave the ball away and we weren’t good enough. Those of us “fortunate” enough to have seen this game know he wasn’t exaggerating, so now that’s out of the way, let’s get back on the winning track.
Agree, but it’s a bit disconcerting that he considers the whu game as a great performance.
This a a false narrative.
Arsenal created far more chances than WH but WH were more effective than Arsenal in both boxes. These were facts pointed out by Arteta. He gave a honest and balanced assessment of the game.
I’m going off the quote in the article: “We had a great performance against Liverpool, against West Ham” – we didn’t have a great performance against West ham. This is the false narrative. Few watching really thought we were the better team, and no one really thought it was a great performance.
Davi, Spot on!
Worrying signs of not WISHING to see the PLAIN truth.
Just as so many flatly refused to see the stark staring truth of Ozils massive idleness for several seasons prior to him leaving.
I called out that OBVIOUS idleness in his second season here and wanted him out ever since, though it took another five long fruitless years to finally happen.
I am 72, been following actively since age seven and have not time to waste waiting for ANY manager who plainly and wilfully refuses ro face the BLATANT OBVIOUS TRUTH.
The perf against West Ham was far from acceptable, which OUGHT to have been said by MA.