Man U 1-0 down away to palace at half time. Pogba playing badly, Sanchez not much better.

Are Man U playing worse since they signed Sanchez? Martial was playing well from the left now he’s been shunted to the bench or wide right. I’d take him off Man U’s hands in a heartbeat.

When you look at Arsenal’s squad it is not suited to any formation.

There are no natural wide players so the 4-3-3 in its pure form doesn’t work.
He 3-5-2 seems sensible but we don’t have a midfield 2 worthy of it and don’t really have wing backs that give enough end product or centre backs who are comfortable on the ball.

There are players in the squad who even if you built a team and a formation around them I would struggle to say what their best position would be?

I see part of our problem as having no strong national identity in the team .

A block of players who maybe could sit around over a few drinks get half p***sed ; form a plan and confront Arsene , tell him a few home truths ...... a strength in numbers sort of deal .

Early years Adams , Winterburn , Dixon , Keown , Bould , Seaman , Parlour ...... later Lauren , Vieira , Pires , Wiltord , Petit , Henry ,

Look at us now
Čech , Czech
Bellerin , Spain
Mustafi German
Kos French ,
Kolasinac Serb
Xhaka Swiss
Wilshere English
Özil German
Aubameyang Gabon
Mkhitaryan Armenian
Ramsay Welsh

Elneny Egyptian
Iwobi Nigerian
Welbeck English
Lacazette French
Ospina Colombian

... a squad selected by the United Nations general assembly . No chance of a cohesive internal uprising .

One more nail( hopefully)

Edit:;grab a bit small so need to click to see

Now Van Aahnolt gets the second. 2-0 to Palace.

Sanchez making a great impression.

Not happy with this , with my other interests , can’t actively cheer on Utd but I’m kinda hoping they win on this occasion

Belter from Matic, there you go Pete. Utd showing the kind of fight we are currently incapable of.

You owe Matic a pint or ten. United 3-2 looks likely.

What a goal...............

Not that you don't have a point but I'd put belief, lack of leadership and direction. Mental fragility above everything.

On paper it's a decent squad much more capable of what we have witnessed so far.

Wenger just doesn't know how to get much out of them. I think it's that simple.

Just had a look on north stand chat ( main seagulls ) forum it’s gone down rather well as you can imagine

With Ramsey stalling on a deal and Bellerin close to an exit last summer we are in danger of running out of home grown players.
We have just sold ox, Theo and szczesny who all counted. Chambers should be sold. Welbeck and iwobi don’t produce much.
Home grown players cost a fortune and we aren’t going to have a lot of money to spend. I don’t think it is an exaggeration to say that the last few years of complete miss management may leave us in the doldrums for 5-10 seasons. Every season out of the champions league will make it harder to get back.

Lee Dixon also spoke very highly of Grimandi, saying if he was still a player with the current squad he'd make him an automatic first choice starter.

Wenger is just FOS. Same old excuses ..... City played a stronger team after playing us, and WON!

Nothing about Wenger matters if Stan supports him. Josh seems more interested in building if his tenure with the Denver Nuggets is anything to go by.
Stan can win. The L.A. Rams had a complete 180 turnaround becaus he focused on his mandate to bring a winning side to LA.

Arsenals current defense chasing the ball.

I'm beginning to think it's one of the best wind-ups ever? Surely no-one can be that oblivious??

Lee Dixon’s comments at the AGM are very telling. For an ex player to be making comments like that for me says regardless of what Arsene thinks it’s the end for him.

I mean he slagged off the training and called Kolasanic bang average. The elephant isn’t just in the room it’s running around bashing the furniture to pieces.

The sun reporting this morning that Wenger is sadly a lonely guy who spends the evenings dining alone in Totteridge pondering things like who invented the question mark.

It didn’t have to be this way even though some of us saw this coming

The rumours of Wenger to Everton are interesting.

Fat Sam. It's personal. Do the math.

The Times say Wenger has told his coaching staff that he will not walk away & the club will have to sack him to bring an end to his reign.

I think it's a case of the press looking at moshiri and adding 2 and 2 together and coming up with 8.

Can you see Wenger at Everton. Their game was always based on energy defensive discipline and tough tackling all things Wenger is renowned for

I could care less. It's personal with Fat Sam.

With Fat Sam it's personal. However you slice it.

Well done Daz - Northern Ref was a bit obvious, but your AG alter ego is genius. Perhaps you'll get a script commission out of it?

Mourinho, Fergie, Pardew there were always hostilities.

But with Fat Sam? It's personal.

Belated Happy St David's day, butt.

Forget Wenger for a second.

You're Wnger, if you prefer you're the new manager, how do you sort out the mess we are in, how do you change things tomorrow, not next month or next year, tomorrow?

Imo it's the same old problem, the tippy tappy passing out of defence.We need a Cazorla and i think we have one. Mki should move back to centre mid and spray the ball around to get us moving out faster.

Can't see any other solution to a quick fix.

More so than Mourinho ? I'm not so sure

Also Wenger doesn't strike me as a Charles bronson man on fire type intent on revenge. He wouldn't take a job just to spite someone else plus today it seems he's insisting on being buried in the Arsenal dug out when he finally pops his clogs. Can't see him managing another English club

How about a job swap with Sam? Could be the solution

The greatest revelation from Dixon q and a last night was that Bould was allowed to do some work with the defence, there was a notable improvement then when the media started reporting Bould had been coaching and responsible for the improvement Arsene stopped the sessions.

He's literally harming the club for his vanity. Horrible man ugh

It was said at the AST do last night, which I attended, that Wenger's on £10m a year which will have to be paid up. Worth every single penny in my view. I just hope Gazidis can convince Kroenke it is.

Football contracts routinely run from 1st July to 30th June. So if he's sacked the day after the last Premiership game of the season which is on 13th May, he'd obviously be sacked on 14th May (I'm assuming we won't reach the Europa League final which is on 16th May). Paying up his contract from 15th May 2018 (his first day of unemployment) to 30th June 2019 (the end of his contract) would cost £11,287,671 (and a few pence).

Bargain of the decade in my view.

Did you enjoy the AST doo Bernard ? Sounds like Dixon’s revelations were fascinating.

I read a comment that if we don’t qualify for champions league this season it will mean there is little funds available for transfers this summer

I did. His passion for the club really came through. He spoke politely about Wenger but clearly wants him out. He did say though that he has no faith in the board getting the right replacement.

This article is interesting.
https://www.football.london/arsenal-fc/ ... e-14372909

If I had to guess, I'd say we would be infinitely better under Josh when his father dies or gives him the reign. Why? Stan has never ran the day to day operations of his sides. He's always had someone else do it and he gets called in on major decisions. Josh on the other hand has ran day to day operations and as such responsible for the success of the teams he is responsible for.

I'd even suggest had Josh had Gazidis' job, Wenger would have been gone. I am also curious how him having more involvement in the club impacts Gazidis?

Also, The Arsenal has a far higher public profile than either of the Denver sides which are small market American sides. He will feel more of an obligation for us to do well on the pitch. I'm guessing.

http://www.caughtoffside.com/2018/03/06 ... y-neville/

Remarkably, Dixon claims Neville told him that Valencia were desperately looking to offload the Germany international but couldn’t find a buyer for him until Arsenal came in and signed him for £30million.

Which is amazing considering what Liverpool and spurs spent when they had years out of the champions league. Not to mention the lower teams in the league still spending £40-50m each, even promoted teams.
I get that our wage bill is much higher but so is our income. Shirt sponsor, stadium sponsor, highest gate receipts, previous European money, tv money - all of that must outweigh our greater wages when comparing to lower prem clubs who still spend. Not to mention that we actually made a profit in the transfer window.

I’ve come to think that we need some form of footballing miracle to get back up to the top table. That miracle can come in a few different forms.
Sugar daddy with millions to spend (city, Chelsea)
Top manager and scouting network to unearth cheap gems (spurs)
Top manager to produce fantastic tactics and improve the current team to be greater than the sum of their parts and beat teams who are a lot better on paper (Raineri for the Leicester season)

It seems the most realistic is a combination of the last two. The last one should be the easiest to make a difference with.

A surprising proportion of the population is that oblivious or obtuse, even without the 'block foe' function. For example, apparently 7% of Arsenal fans want Wenger to see out his contract. The mind ... it boggles, but there is no denying that such such astounding things do happen.

No you are missing the point. With Mourinho there are good reasons that stem from their footballing interactions (not least, getting whupped each time they meet). Had they met in a different context, say, at the local fish and chips outlet, they might now be bosom buddies. But with Fat Sam its personal. Capice?

Rich, I think its not nearly that simple, Leicester notwithstanding. There are 3 clubs (Chelsea, both Mancheser clubs) who have no problem spending a couple hundred million pounds in a transfer window. Tottenham and Liverpool have great managers and they can get close to us in buying especially since they will now have CL money and we won't.

If we got the best manager available (Juve, Atletico, etc.) I think the best we'd manage is 3rd, runner up at best. Its just the world we live in now.