I've never quite understood some players like Michael Owen, Carragher who hate Arsenal so much. You'd think Everton or Man Utd. Surprised he went to Man Utd. There are other northern players as well who seemed to have a grudge against us. Can't recall fully but Shearer doesn't like us either right? Does he hate Man Utd?

It's a north vs south (London) thing and/or a British vs foreigner thing. That's my best guess. A team of foreigners giving it to them large. And London to boot.

I hope fans have forgiven Cesc. My favorite Arsenal player (along with 2 others)

https://www.instagram.com/reel/C6JnMV3I ... NkeWRuenU1

It's funny, considering how crap he is, how we always score loads of goals when Havertz plays up front. I just can't figure it out.

On the other hand, when those planks really need to step up and do the business, they usually crumble so a low stakes game where they have no pressure might be the thing. It's clutching at straws to expect anything from them either way.

Thanks

Thanks again.

Comfy I bet!

Think our GD advantage is going to have a big bite taken out of it tonight. Brighton look utterly hopeless against City. Somehow coming third in everything.

You always have a bit of hope, no matter how slim. However, I think it's over. These cheats are going to win all of their remaining games unless they have it won before the last day.

Hard to disagree. Much as I try. I wish all them that they deserve and more.

Brighton were a do or die team to play City. With their style of football if they get it right they can beat the best, but if they get it wrong and they have tonight and generally recently then they are horrible and far too open and a gift of 3 points. Plenty of bad injuries for Brighton this year and I’m not sure who the player is that they’ll sell for millions this summer…..
To think Chelsea took Cucurella and Caicedo from them for £170m and we took White and Trossard for £71m

Brighton not given an obvious pen there. Good one ref and Var

Last time I looked we were top of the league. There's more than hope

Hi Rich, not sure they need to, as you say the obscene money they’ve got from Chelsea must have them set for years. They don’t spend big on transfers or wages.

Adingra looks to be the most likely candidate to be next to one to be worth 50m+ but they have Enciso too and Even Ferguson of course who was being touted at 100m+. If they come back from injury and build, their play style means these players in theory slot into ball dominant top 6 teams, ie the ones with the money, it’s very clever.

Ironically their best sales, Caicedo and Cucarella - stinking out Stamford bridge like a pair of 170 million pound polished turds - probably mean teams will be a lot more wary with Brighton players who start tearing it up from this point onwards.

I'd swap it for my bed

This may sound silly but looking at both schedules, I worry a wee bit of the goal differential being reduced significantly.

They are a point behind with a game in hand and an easier run of fixtures. They have done this several times before. We are hoping for an upset which looks very unlikely.

https://x.com/scrapytweets/status/17835 ... -j6VVZXEoA

This was the free kick City got for the 2nd goal

Realistically the only way GD becomes a factor is if City draw 1 game and then we match each others results in the 4 remaining games. So they’d have to beat us by 2 goals per game in 4 matches to overhaul the + 8 we have on them. Doable but unlikely in just 4 games I’d have thought.

We added +1 to the GD between us this midweek

https://x.com/officialvizeh/status/1783 ... -j6VVZXEoA

This wolves goal was given on the pitch but var ruled it out. It wasn’t offside, and without going to the comments which explain why it was ruled out is there anything anyone can see which deserves the var ‘clear and obvious error’ intervention?

It was for a foul in the build up, think there was a perceived arm to the face on the touchline before the pass to the winger who crosses it in. Haven’t seen it and that video is a bit grainy so can’t really tell. Might be B.S. but that was the reason given. Heard one journalist agree with the decision, whatever that’s worth.

You're right it was for an arm in the face in the build up. I'd argue that it was accidental and certainly not worthy of a VAR overturn. There is just zero inconsistency. We're told there is a deliberate very high bar for overturns because PGMOL don't want to re-referee games - which leads to penalty decisions like the one Joao Pedro should have had last night not being given (they were 4-0 down already I'm not complaining about the result), and also ones like Szobaslai was given for Liverpool earlier this season allowed to stand.

Our referee team for the NLD is Michael Oliver as ref (regularly been criticised for giving Man City favourable decisions this year after his jaunt to UAE to ref games for the City owners) and Liverpool fan Jared Gillet on VAR who has a history of awful decisions against us.

I do find it odd still that in however many years of the Premier league and professional refs that to my knowledge not a single ref when having to declare their club support has ever told the authorities they supported Man U, Man City, Arsenal, Spurs or Chelsea. The last 3 can be somewhat explained by not a single ref in the past 20 odd years coming from London - the odds of that are ridiculous. But for so many refs to be born and bred in the north-west and the only ref who claims allegiance to any of the big teams there is the Australian guy.

https://www.goal.com/en-gb/news/which-f ... 7933177b98

Howard Webb is Rotherham fan and the guy I think is the best ref in the country Anthony Taylor, born and bred in greater Manchester would die wearing an Altrincham Town shirt

Sorry Danny it’s over. It went at Villa. All those people bombing out the ground after the first goal knew what had happened. We needed them to drop points last night.

It’s theirs and I’ll go one further and say they will end up topping our goal difference by the time the season ends with the fixtures they have coming up so we will need a defeat rather than a draw anyway.

It’s gutting because we made such a noble effort and there will be nothing more ironic than us bravely beating spurs on Sunday then still losing the title anyway.

Great effort but this is virtually impossible for Arsenal given the current state of our squad. It’s a 90-100 point season required to win the premier league now. Utterly mental

Yup. We need to just keep winning our game and try to ignore what City do. Even if City do win all their games (which is likely), and if we keep them under pressure to the end, it will be an amazing feat.

Yes, even if we win our games by 1 goal, they'd have to win by an average of clear 3 goals in the 4 games (excluding the one they draw). I wouldn't put it past them but it would be some going!

If both us and City win all our games we'll naturally look at the two games v Villa and Fulham as where we lost the title, and West Ham at home. but in truth everyone that comes close can do this. If we manage to pip City they'll look at their 2-2 draw at home to Palace when they were 2-0 up with 15 to go. Only managing to scrape an 80th minute equaliser v Chelsea at home, losing away to Wolves, an unforgiveable 3-3 draw v Spurs at home when they battered them and had the lead twice and conceded in the 90th minute. A crazy 4-4 away to Chelsea where they led 3 times and also conceded an equaliser in the last minute.

Every team has these annoying results. If we finish on 89 points and City finish on 91 having won their last 9 straight and going unbeaten in 23 in the league including 19 wins there sometimes you just have to say there is not much more we could have done

Truth is we have the best team in the league right now but City have the best squad.

It’s a season of 40 games. At some point you will need to rely on the group. It’s fixable but irritating

Going back to 2019, Sokratis' potential late winner against Palace was inexplicably ruled out by Gillett on VAR. Oddly enough, even when he was officiating in Australia's A-League, Gillett wasn't that highly rated. Let's face it, he was no Roger Kirkpatrick.

You have to a$k how they did it though.

Against all hope I expect City to win the rest of their games. I don't think we will. Even if City draws a game, we'd have to win all of ours and win on goal differential. I don't see that happening frankly. This week is the toughest of the run because its 3 games in 7 days. The latter 2 being the 2 biggest London derbies. After the NLD its a game every weekend. Way more time to rest and strategize.

With all that being said, if we win all the games save a draw and included in those wins Tottenham and Man Utd then I'll be happy even if there is no title.

I'll be disappointed but will finish the season having done some amazing things.

Once could point to little mistakes and flaws in Arteta's management (or Klopp's for that matter). But ultimately this is the case of the country with the most ammunition winning the war 99% of the time.

Might not be a popular opinion but I say yes. But then again, I wasn't around back then.

Probably back page dribble but there is a current rumor, which was lightly talked about before about us being interested in Rashford if other options fail.

I don't like his lack of work ethic at times. There were games he wasn't tracking back. Wasn't pressing. I don't want to use the term 'lazy' because I've seen him press like against us. I just think he's not motivated due to internal factors. He was one of the players even Mourinho said should be sold. Talented but will he put in a shift week in, week out?

Hard work, perseverance, and proud history of success, including a massive 2 titles in their glorious first 130 years, that wasn't bought with dodgy oil money at all. They paced themselves, but from the early days it was obvious they would one day dominate world football.

Trebles, invincible seasons, etc. are one thing, but winning the title, then managing to get relegated the following season, despite scoring more goals than any other team, is surely a feat that will never be repeated.

No thanks.
He’s on over £300k, has no workrate and no defensive nous and can’t press. He has pace but can look clumsy on a dribble and tends to just hit his shots as hard as he can and is quite selfish when it comes to shooting in the final 3rd. He’s a player who has relied on his athleticism and pace and doesn’t have enough technical ability and football intelligence for me.

If he was on a free and willing to take sub £100k a week I’m still not sure I’d want him as I don’t like his attitude in a sinking Man U ship - you can learn a lot about players in adversity. Look how Rice lead an average West Ham side from the front, captain and best player.

There has been a lot of praise for Ange’s high defensive line but it’s actually Arsenal who play the highest defensive line in all of Europe’s big 5 leagues.