Find it strange it only takes two under-par performances from Özil for some to get the knives out. He's had an exceptional season. Forget Galatasary, West Ham and Wolves. I reckon if Arsenal made him available the likes of Barcelona, Bayern Munich and both Manchester clubs would be after him.

Think Arsenal fans should have a bit more self-pride than pining after Fabregas. He didn't want to play for the club, he went, and should be forgotten.

There is a clip doing the rounds on social media of Neville slating Arsenal for walking as city stroke the ball around, the score is 2-1 city. Barely a single Arsenal player is showing any desire or urgency to close the man down or win the ball back. That is hugely alarming and says massive amounts about our lack of infield leader and our manager.

The sad thing is I think there are potential leaders in our team who are willing to grab the team by the scruff of the neck on the pitch but I kind of feel that Wenger would actively discourage it. He has a strange utopian vision for football, and a captain bawling out a player for not concentrating is not in that vision

Agreed, we shouldn't be contemplating selling Özil but Wenger has to find a way to fit him in to these games. If Wenger wants to play 10 men behind the ball and break it doesn't suit Özil. Özil is at his best when Arsenal dominate possession and he floats around linking, probing and creating. In games like today we'd be better off playing giroud as a target man and Sanchez buzzing around him.

Ah *%^@ Gary Neville. He was full of praise for us in the first half, when we were pretty awful too. Didn't take him long to forget how *%^@ he was as a manager.

Yes I was thinking similar .
After another all to familiar outmuscled by a team with more grit it is the obvious cocnclusion

After such a lack lustre performance ...did I hear them say City haven't won at home since September

I log on the Gleiber hoping someone will post some sensational news ........ "Wenger quits ", "Ronaldo , Hummels , Vardy and Kante agree to join in January , Kroenke's wife runs off with the club tennis pro ..... just to lift the topor .

How ridiculous! He did because we were the polar opposite in the second half that's why

Cheap shots at his managerial record is stupid and lazy , in what was always a really tough job at Valencia not speaking the language. Anyone who knows the game only has to listen to Neville ( most of the time) to realise that he -and carragher - are a class above every other pundit out there and that Neville is very articulate and insightful. This includes his excellent appearance on Sunday supplement today on the relationship between players and the media

Or maybe Özil needs to find a way to influence these games himself. That is what truly great players do. He has wonderful talent, but has no appetite for the physical side of the game and will let a game just pass him by if it isn't going well.

To clarify we weren't great in the first half after the goal, but, perhaps masked by city's own lack of energy, we looked a lot mor organised and this is what Neville was probably getting at

This is what I think , he goes MIA too often in these games to be a coincidence ,

0f the teams that would take him, mourinho would not least of all to get one over Wenger , Bayern, possibly for having another German international , but they would have doubts for the same reason Real let him go , he doesn't deliver in the really big games

We weren't the polar opposite in the first half. We were poor. We got the early goal but couldn't hold onto the ball at all. Clearly, I don't know the game though.....

Ditto that, again and again.

My take is that Wenger cannot have rebels in his team. I believe Campbell is. Wenger is probably too autocratic to allow suggestions from players, unless they are his stars or favourites. This is why Wenger has to go.

It is good to have complete control, but make something happen.

Sadly, he is gone. Imagine having to listen to Wenger's usual rhetoric after every poor game.

I truly think Wenger will call it a day at the end of this season, I certainly hope he will as well, he's not a terrible manager it's just the game has overtaken him long ago and he will never see the fruits of his money saving years because of it.

I do not know how Kroenke will deal with replacing him and worry that he will go for a 'safe option' (aka as a cheap option). I really don't see how the club can progress with him as our effective owner, perhaps if the likes of Sanchez leave we might start seeing some real anger directed at him after Wenger goes. I hope so because it is concerning how many of our fans seem to be in the dark as to what a problem this guy is to us progressing and think Wenger leaving will fix things.

I agree with you both on this.

An Australian Christmas story to cheer you all up

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-12-19/t ... on/8131764

As you will of seen I cleared up that point I made after

I heard at the back end of last season via sources who have a link within the upper echelons of club that this would be his last season, and that the spin at the end would be that he was offered a new contract but would decide to retire anyway.

However , plenty of journos say that the new contract is all but signed so who knows???

I think it's down to the fans in the stadium, if enough pressure cranks up and we don't win the fa cup then he may well walk, if it's the usual general apathy amongst a few dissenting voices then it's 3 more years of 'handrakes', fake 'belief' and 'dropping physically' and more disillusioned fans finding other things to distract them away from Arsenal

Morning Wilts. I think many Arsenal fans realise the dangers of Kroenke as well as the problems with Wenger. The trouble is, it's harder to see an end to Kroenke's ownership of the club whereby with Wenger's contract expiring next summer, it is easier to see how Wenger might leave. Make no mistake I would like to see the back of both of them but if just one of them goes then my attitude is that's a lot better than both staying. Wenger's the only one I can see leaving in the near future because of his contract not having long to run. And for me, an Arsenal with Kroenke but without Wenger is, although far from ideal, miles better than an Arsenal with them both.

Plus as lom said earlier we won't know kroenke's real intentions until Wenger is gone

Of course we do,

...share price and nothing else. He thinks about Arsenal like he does his living room sofa. Just something he owns

Kroenke has already shown his real intentions. There is no hidden agenda. Arsenal is a great asset. Of all his sporting sides, my guess it generates more income than the Los Angeles Rams. Different matrix. The American professional sports leagues are really socialism applied to sports. The NFL shares revenue. The jerseys are owned by the league and the revenues are divied up using a formula.

The EPL you keep what you earn, you can have sponsors pay to be on your shirt, the NFL doesn't. Far more income potential with The Arsenal than with the Los Angeles Rams or the Denver Nuggets. Its obvious and clear, me make money and we have a club that will only rise in value.

What else is there for him? Its the same with his other sides. He's not going to be doing anything different than he's already done before. The exception may be that the NFL wants the Los Angeles Rams to be good, so he promised to 'try' (meaning spend) to make them a viable successful side because its the 2nd biggest media market in America and its great for the overall NFL if a Super Bowl team or a very good team is in LA. After years, NY has a fairly successful side that has won the Super Bowl in the last decade.

There is no such league pressure with The Arsenal. He's got a long waiting list for tickets that will have fans almost no matter where we finish.

As for the next manager, he will want someone 'pragmatic'. Someone who is careful with the money. He will NOT want or advocate for anyone who will spend to win. No one who is going to break transfer fee records. There will be a certain amount that is deemed reasonable and that's that. There may be an exception if a player is a game changer. An iconic player who can also help us win such as he did with Allen Iverson when he brought him to the Denver Nuggets. Iverson got people coming to games, buying shirts and he was good enough to propel a club into being much better.

Overall though, Stan doesn't give two cents about a title winning side. Its nice but its not his burning desire and his other sides are evidence of that.

I'll wait till after the holiday period to crown Chelsea champions elect. If they are 7 or more points ahead in the New Year, I doubt anyone will catch them. That said, runner up is wide open. Chelsea could end up doing something like Man Utd did in 2000 (I think), running away with it start to finish. Top 4 is going to be tight but we should be in it.

The quandary is this. If it seems we won't win the title but can progress in the CL especially if we get past Bayern Munich and get a 'kind' draw. If we allocate resources towards that end we could end up out of the top 4. Its going to be a tough balancing act.

Good piece as you would expect on yesterday's debacle http://www.onlinegooner.com/article.php ... FfOabTfWhA

Interesting that Kevin went public on what he told some of us last season about it being Wenger's last season ( most of you probably guessed who my 'source' was, but previously he had asked me not to tell too widely) hopefully it is so, but until it happens we will always fear he will sign again

Mind if I add one more Pete?

Wenger blames referees/media/Brexit for his own incompetence

Myles palmer today is saying Wenger has now been offered 2 year deal rather than a rolling one year contract that was rumoured. I'd be more inclined to believe Kevin though and it's interesting that the Leipzig manager said Arsenal had been in touch and would point to Kevin's suggestion being correct

Palmer has no inside track on Arsenal. He's a spoofer. He had some story during the year that Arsenal were after Messi.

He doesn't that's right his contact with the club died when dein left.

I'll say one thing about him and that whilst he's a first class prat he was one of the first to call it straight on Wenger and half his phrases like "Colney crèche " are used widely now when referring to our latest meltdown etc etc

.

Sure ! But that he does right through the season

Though of course Palmer was a full on Wenger worshiper until it became clear that sans Dein Wenger had no interest in having any contact, then the pendulum swung overnight....

This is the guy who celebrated when he heard the news that Henry had left for Barcelona.

But it also swung overnight that arsenes flaws came to the forefront too. Can't just blame it on his ego which clearly is large, nor does it mean he always knows what he's talking about
.. mostly he doesn't

Looks like the Steve gleiber official newspaper has come a cropper

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-38367563

Wonder if anyone will be posting anymore articles about it referring to every Tom, dick and Mohammed again

Jesus, you can tell we were awful yesterday after about 20 mins, because I didn't moan about the officials, despite one and possibly both City goals being offside...Still can't believe how bad that was.

Katie Hopkins has managed to make an amazing career out of being a barely literate and deliberately offensive mouthpiece for the worst excesses of right-wing ignorance. The planet would be better if she were removed from it. She exploits hatred to makes herself rich and famous.

Good job. She's an abhorrent gobshite. Apparently she's also being sued by Jack Monroe and she could come a real cropper with the costs, estimated to be around £500,000. Hope it finishes her career.

To be fair he went Anti-Wenger long before the flaws became apparent. in 08 where we were strolling to the title until 4 of our front six (plus our first choice cover for 3 positions) all got long term injuries, half our squad got tapped up, and our captain had a breakdown, Palmer had the knives out after every dropped point.

It was a travesty that team didn't win the league...best team in the country by a mile that year, but no team can cope with so many serious injuries to its best players all at the same time. Think Barca without Messi, Suarez, Neymar, Iniesta and Raketic. Or Real sans Ronaldo, Bale, Kroos, Benzema & Morata. Or closer to home, how would Chelsea's season from here if Costa, Hazard, Batshuyai (sp?), Willian, Pedro, Fabregas, Matic, all picked up long term injuries, most of which just after the transfer window shut.

That year still rankles. Would have made such a difference to the club as a whole, then and still now. We literally ran out of players, 4 of which were the result of disgraceful tackles as well.

Durham coating us & Wenger on talk sport, was a time when it would wind me up , now I just either agree and just shrug

True enough. It's not time specific is it.