Yeah. It’s not right for the team and the fans to enjoy themselves. How dare they.

Agreed. That is why I think its essential to strengthen the squad behind the existing first choice midfielders. More Lokonga types (I don't mean exactly the same attributes, but the same profile in terms of potential).

Roy Keane was (still is) big on Partey. He has taken far longer than I thought for him to show anything close to the player I thought we were getting. His shooting is way off target but he seems to be far more on target for Ghana and even for Atletico once in a while.

As for the left side, I agree that Emile Smith Rowe seems to work best with Tierney. I would like to see Martinelli as a lead center forward. I'd like to see him play a similar role Henry did. I'd like to see how that would work out. It might not but I'd like to see it tried.

I love Tierney's committment. I really do but I also seem him as a bit of a one trick pony. He's very uncomfortable on his right foot. he needs to work on that. He only seems to have one thing in his locker, use his pace to go left and cross. If he's over played left and forced on his right foot, he's stuck.

The fact that they clearly aren't enjoying it is not diminishing it for me at all. Long may they moan and gnash their teeth ... especially the ones who were laughing so hard after our first three games.

"No one likes us and we don't care"

I've adopted that mindset as well.

I see that cart horse lewandowski bagged himself another 2 goals yesterday taking his total to 45 for the season. Pathetic effort

*%^@ off Lewandowski stay away from our club !

Further to this point, I don't think it's fair to look at spending in just one window. We had a big rebuild on our hands, of course we're going to spend more than Man City who already have a finished squad. Their need to spend last summer wasn't very big, because they've already spent a fortune assembling their squad - I had a quick look at their starting eleven in their last game and the average cost of those 11 players was £49m. And that's with an academy player starting.

Aubameyang is scoring regularly now. Perhaps we should put a bid in for him.

I wouldn't expect anything less from Ashley Young who is a diving, cheating, cry baby, prat.

I’m not aware of anyone calling Lewandowski a cart horse. What I did is question the wisdom of signing a player who, depending on when the 2022/23 Premier League season starts, may well already be 34 before playing for us (his birthday is in August).

Considering the problems we faced in getting rid of Özil and Aubameyang when they had been given extremely lucrative contracts in their thirties, I really don’t think it’s unreasonable to express such doubts.

Especially as Lewandowski is on £369k a week, so £19.2m a year, at Bayern. Giving him a two year contract meeting his salary at Bayern would therefore cost £38.4m. Added to which his Bayern contract doesn’t expire until the summer of 2023, so you can be damn sure they’d want a transfer fee that’s significant enough to tempt them to sell. What would that be? £30m doesn’t sound an outlandish possibility. Taking account of wages and a transfer fee, for a two year contract it could thus cost Arsenal £68.4m to sign a player in his mid-30s, so inevitably on his way down.

I don’t think a remarkable scoring record for someone who plays for the biggest club and best team in what’s approaching an uncompetitive league (if Bayern win it, and they’re six points clear though Dortmund have a game in hand, this year will be their tenth Bundesliga title in a row), stops my question from being valid. Particularly as signing Lewandowski would contradict, if not reverse, Arsenal’s current transfer strategy of signing young and hungry players with the potential to improve.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.thesun ... owski/amp/

I think you have that the wrong way round. Players like Lewandowski are why Bayern is so formidable. His records for Dortmund and Poland prove that. Also, he's been formidable in the champions league, against the best defenders in the world.

There is obviously the chance that his form would drop for us. However I would be surprised if he wasn't able to score upwards of 20 goals combining with Saka, Ødegaard, etc.

For me, the big issue would be whether we need the drama of such a high profile signing.

I would like to see us go with Emile Smith Rowe on the left, and Martinelli take on the Lacazette role. I'm optimistic, perhaps myopically, that it will work for us.

Nice gif going round of Rob Holding coming on the pitch and holding up his fingers....5....2....3 He's come on in our last 3 away games to beef up the defence and seal the 1 goal victory. It is a nice tactic for Arteta to have up his sleeve.

I accept your point that he was a reason why Bayern have been formidable. But their domination of German football didn’t start when they signed him. Indeed, Bayern had won consecutive Bundesliga titles and the Champions League before he did. Indeed, I thought the year before Lewandowski signed, Bayern had won the quadruple. The Champions League, Bundesliga, and Germany’s equivalent of the FA and League Cups.

I think you have to understand just how dominant Bayern Munich are over there. Apparently 25%, so one in every four football fans in Germany, support them. Manchester United don’t come anywhere close in England. The only country I’m aware of that do is Scotland, where I’ve read three quarters of football fans support one or other of the Old Firm. Is it any wonder the last time a club that wasn’t called Celtic or Rangers won the league was when Ferguson led Aberdeen to the title in the 1984/5 season? But at least in Scotland there are two comparable clubs at the top. Germany’s second club, Dortmund, are way off Bayern’s stature.

Everyone is so excited by what’s happening at Arsenal. I think part of that is the transfer strategy of recruiting young and hungry players with potential. I simply don’t believe the short term fix that a declining Lewandowski will bring to our goal scoring is worth turning our back on the policy. We desperately need a new forward or two. I’m not denying that. But for me, Lewandowski isn’t the right player profile for us. I outlined what he could cost earlier. That’s a bloody expensive short term fix, and I just think the money would be spent better elsewhere.

.....and will be remembered for a pigeon managing to perfectly direct one of it's sh*ts directly in to his mouth during a game more than anything he achieved on the pitch

I wish a pigeon would get to work in this guy. At least Young isn't an Arsenal fan!

https://www.justarsenal.com/i-have-loft ... ans/305945

I completely agree with your last paragraph.

I don't think the comparison with the Old Firm is quite right. They are big fish in a small pond. You can't say that about Bayern, who are the strongest team in the biggest pond of them all, i.e. the Champions League. Obviously this isn't just because of Lewandowski. But he is their best player.

We've taken a big step this year in beating those mid table teams home and away. That's what top 4 teams do. Wolves, Villa, Leicester - 18 points out of 18. Palace and Southampton to come.

I've seen criticism of our record against the other top teams, and yes it is poor, and yes in other seasons we've had more points from those games but for me those games are the final building blocks to becoming a title challenging team. How do you win those big games playing your game. Sure you can play a 10 man defence and hope to nick a set piece but that isn't progress. If you want to dominate and win the league you find a way to beat them with your own game.

Are Bayern the strongest team in the Champions League? I hope you’re right as I want them to win it. But I’m not sure they are, or will.

Best player? Better than Neuer and Kimmich? For me, Neuer is the best keeper I’ve ever seen, and in saying that I’m avoiding calling him the best of all time. I’m not even sure I’d call Lewandowski the best Bayern forward I’ve seen as I remember Gerd Muller.

But does being the highest goal scorer automatically make someone the best player? Again, I’m not sure. It can do, or it can go together with the likes of Shearer at Newcastle, Kane at Tottenham and Henry at Arsenal. But I don’t think the title ‘highest goal scorer’ automatically coincides with ‘best player’.

For just one example, I consider Kante as Chelsea’s best player and he certainly isn’t their top scorer.

I’m still wondering just how we managed to lose to Everton. They have been quite awful throughout this season.

As I recall we seemed to be playing with some kind of hangover but at least some of the story is when you see the referee isn’t going to protect you from actual violence on the pitch it can certainly make you shrink somewhat. They should have seen two reds and neither ‘tackle’ (one stamp) was even given as a foul!!

I think Lewadowski would be a resounding success for 2 seasons at least. He’s an astonishing player. I’m not sure he would match the profile of player we need in the role, I think Arteta is looking for someone who is going to cover a lot of ground and do the holding up linking role Lacazette has been doing. Ronaldo has shown no matter how good you are, you can’t do repeat sprints to premier league levels as you reach your mid 30s, but you can get goals if you have quality, as Lewa has in spades.

If it was a Davor Suker type signing and you had someone younger earmarked for the role, let’s say we thought Balogun was going to make it but take two season, then I’d be so up for it. Who better to learn from?

The problems might be firstly the style thing, and also I don’t think we could make it work financially. He seems like the exact kind of ageing quality player that Italian clubs take on. I’d say Juve but they signed the guy we wanted.

*%^@*** wankering prat.
Seems the new thing is to criticise us and our celebrations when we win while bigging themselves as tough oponents because we celebrate against them.
Neves young, who's next.
Absolute hypocrites.
A culmination of a hard weeks training ,sweat and tears and it all comes together with a hard thought win.. .
And we are not allowed to celebrate!!!
Idiots

Tougher than that. A culmination of three hard games in 6 days.

No, it’s just more internet equivalent verbal diarrhoea from him.

This *%^@*** spurs team just won't *%^@ off!!!
Kane and Son are serious threats to our top 4 hopes.
We just can't shrug them off. We lose. They win. We win they win.
West ham bloody woeful.
Draw would have been perfect.

Next fixtures after the break.
Spurs home to Newcastle.
Us away to.palace on the Monday.
Another tough away game for us.
Will probably be on same points by the time we play palace.

If they’d just mark Kane… every goal is Kane to Son.

This Tottenham side is very interesting. They're really good in the final third, and really poor everywhere else. Weak midfield, shaky defense, can't handle being pressed, mediocre passing...but as long as they have Kane and Son playing they're a threat to anyone.

Spurs have Kane and Son, their two best players for 30 years, probably 2 of the top 8 or so prem players of the last 6 years - yet even with these world class players they win nothing. Kane will still want out in the summer and Son is getting close to 30. Their status is such that no matter what money they have they won’t be able to sign players of that caliber. Spurs are also already in for £75m to make two loan deals permanent even before any summer spending starts

They are the only threat to top 4 for us. We just have to beat them to top 4. It will be a sliding doors moment for both sides if we make it

Well Young hasn't been away from Man U that long.

That’s why some of us weren’t convinced it was a good idea for us to request a postponement of the original fixture for the North London derby at White Hart Lane. Kane and Son wouldn’t have been available and there’s no reason to think they won’t play in the rearranged fixture.

Obviously it’s impossible to tell what the score would have been on the original date. But I would much rather play Tottenham without Kane and Son, as would have been the case, than with them which presumably will be the case whenever the game is played.

To be honest I’m not as willing as you to write Manchester United’s chances off.

To be fair, that guy Own Goal is having a very good year for them as well. He's scored 7 goals this season.

I agree with that. Even taking away just one of them limits the other one a lot.

Conte is an excellent manager. The worry has always been can he organise them defensively to complement their outstanding forward line. Arsenal are in a very decent position but it would be foolish not to remember that our lead can be wiped out in 2 games.

Villa will give them problems and they will lose to Liverpool. Both games away. Chelsea, Man Utd, West Ham and spurs for us makes for a very, very dicey finish.

We really needed West Ham to get something out of this game. But it is what it is.