I don’t know what 28 to 29 years old territory means. But what I do know is, as Rich carefully explained, the judgement of errors is subjective. It can’t be a thing else. There’s also enough debate on here about whether penalties should or should not be given to know that is a subjective judgment too.

By the way. It’s practically guaranteed Seaman gave away more goals from errors in his 524 games than Webster did in his six games and one was a clean sheet. Do you think that alone makes Seaman a worse keeper than Webster?

A goalkeepers involvement in a goal is subjective as they could be criticised for everything. An outfield player not.

It’s not subjective that passing to an opposing player in your own box is an individual error. It’s not subjective that ridiculously diving in to take out son in the penalty area in a north London Derby is an individual mistake. It’s not subjective grabbing a player round the neck and getting sent off to cost us a game is an individual mistake.

Your pointing at the sky howling that it’s green rather than blue

Errors leading to goals is difficult to judge. In some instances it is dead easy, Xhaka v Burnley or one would assume, giving away a penalty. But to take that last example, what if a defender plays a no look back-pass that is intercepted and as the GK closes the striker down he gives away the penalty? Is that the GK assigned an error leading to a goal or the defender, or both? Are all own goals considered errors leading to goals, You'd think not as a unlucky deflection can fly in, but if you lob your own GK like Dixon then yes - but there are lots of instances between those two extremes.

Aubameyang's goal v Burnley. Arsenal fans will say wonderful forward play to fool the defender with multiple stepovers and score hard and low at the near post. Burnley fans will probably blame Lowton for allowing Aubameyang inside on his strong foot so easily and partially blame Pope for getting beaten at his near post. But I'm sure that goal won't have an 'error' attributed to it.

Each person is going to view things differently. You could test it this weekend by anyone who cares watching all the goals in the premier league and deciding how many true 'errors leading to goals' there are and see how different the figures are across the forum.

So to bring this back to Xhaka, he has conceded some quite blatant errors leading to goals but to just focus on that when he's had 10 good games prior is a bit unfair. You could argue Pépé was just as guilty for our defeat by missing at least 1 if not 2 quite simple chances to score the winner.
Is Xhaka good enough to start for us to get us in the top 4? Currently no, but if you buy quality players around him of course he can be. Of course I think we can improve on him, and realistically improve rather than an unrealistic option because I could say we could improve on Aubameyang by signing Haaland. Currently he is the 2nd best central midfielder we have and I think he will be with us next season but that doesn't mean we shouldn't be buying someone to push him for his place in the team.

Is this set in stone? Direct from Mount Sinai? I'd love to know your source.

You’ve made it quite clear that outfield players can be criticised for anything too. For an example, do you know I once (in fact many times more than once) saw someone claim Xhaka only passes the ball sideways and back when he is actually the eighth most progressive forward passer across the five top league in Europe. Remarkable isn’t it.

This doesn’t even make sense, congratulations

Because that’s subjective. If they don’t lead to anything there’s no evidence to suggest the passing is effective.

Giving away a penalty is conclusive and Xhaka has given away more than any other player.

Basically your howling at the moon and sticking your head in the sand.

Now this IS a subjective opinion but I don’t think he can. I don’t think any of the top 5 clubs would touch him with a barge pole and he when would have been available for transfer due to his previous meltdown with the fans the only club that showed interest was her Hertha Berlin which is probably his actual level.

His game is littered with errors and I think Gary Neville summed him Up perfectly when he said “he’s the least experienced experienced player of all time”

I fully agree with this. I don't think finding someone better than Xhaka will be as easy as some, but for me central midfield is a priority in the summer. If we can find someone who is good enough to grab a starting spot in midfield that's great, because that means we have improved as a team - watching Xhaka succeed is no end in itself for me. I just happen to rate him higher than many Arsenal fans at his current ability.

Whether the decision to award a penalty was correct or not can definitely be subjective. Try reading the posts of Rich. Also the aggregate totals for a penalty being awarded is on its own a hopelessly inadequate criterion for measuring player quality. You would expect a player with over 200 appearances to have more penalties awarded against him than a player in a similar position who has played a much lower number of games than 200.

Failure to engage with the argument - textbook technique. Nicely employed, actually: I'd give it 8 out of 10.

My point remains, grabbing someone by the neck isn’t subjective. Passing to an opposing player in your own box isn’t subjective, diving in with both feet isn’t subjective. These are individual mistakes.

It doesn’t even make sense. I’m not sure what response you wish to solicit

It isn’t a matter of opinion that this is *%^@*** stupid

https://youtu.be/NTKdNIk4TJ0

Henry really isn’t being subjective enough shame on him..

https://youtu.be/F_jSnpG1XkE

Disappointing comments from Neville here.

He should be countering his actual opinion by pointing at meaningless stats about recycling possession

https://www.fourfourtwo.com/news/granit ... ad-him-one

You could find specific mistakes by any player. Anyone. But what you’re trying to do is take the aggregate number of penalties conceded by Xhaka as a measure of his overall game by seeming to claim it makes him the worst. For a criterion that is undeniably subjective (despite any attempts you’re making to deny its subjectivity) and refusing to take account of games played, it’s a hopelessly inadequate measure of player quality.

It’s a fact that Xhaka has conceded more penalties than any other player since 2016. It’s not subjective it actually occurred. Debating wether the penalties should be given would be subjective but it’s a fact the referee gave them.

To suggest otherwise is an attempt to live in an alternate reality

Where is that stat from? On premierleague.com they have Xhaka down for five conceded penalties since 16/17. David Luiz had that many last season alone.

https://onefootball.com/en/news/granit- ... d-25519331

Plus others, obviously he’s given away more since this article too

If you actually type “xhaka sets new record “ into a search engine it brings up quite a lot of content for all the wrong reasons

The sky is red .... the sky is red !

Deflection alert! Answer Haz's question: 'Where is that stat from? On premierleague.com they have Xhaka down for five conceded penalties since 16/17. David Luiz had that many last season alone.'

Ah, this article didn't dispute the stats from premierleague.com so probably using the same base stats then.

Not deflecting at all. That’s where I read the detail. If Luiz has managed to “outclown” Xhaka since I take my hat off to him squire

I’m a person who complies with quantum theory and observational reality

Ah, okay, you were reporting from 2019. Crikey, have you got a fun couple of years ahead of you. How do you feel about face masks?

In hypothetical world if we bought Oblak, Halland, Mbappe, Varane, De Bruyne etc then I think10 of those players plus Xhaka would finish top 4. He might stick out a bit in that company but there are worse players who have been regulars in top 4 teams who have been dragged there because of the quality of others.
More realistically do I think Arsenal can get top 4 with 4-5 quality additions in the positions we need and keeping Xhaka, yes I do.

Top 4 maybe but no team with genuine aspirations of winning the title can have a midfielder in the middle of the park who is less mobile than Stephen Hawking.

I mean, we don't have to look far to find worse players than Xhaka in a top four team. Man Utd look like a pretty safe bet for top four this year, and their two most used central midfielders are Fred and McTominay who are both miles below Xhaka.

No I’d take them, certainly mctominay

Chelsea ? Kante and Jorginho nah they are both better

City, erm no point doing that it’s obvious

Liverpool Fabinho, henderson and Tiago.

No, really just no.

https://www.football365.com/news/sven-m ... i-torreira

Thoughts on this?
Mislintat transfers
Aubameyang - undoubted success
Mkhitaryan - not good for us but doing very well at Roma
Mavrapanos - we should be able to make a healthy profit on his future sale
Leno - Undoubted success - in my opinion the best GK we've had since Lehmann
Sokratis - plugged a gap but for £20m and at his age, zero resale it was £20m that could have been spent more wisely
Guendouzi - I still see flaws to his game inn terms of awareness and head up play, plus a lack of pace. We should make a profit on him. doesn't fit right now but was still a good purchase for the age and cost
Torreira - has to be a failure based on what was promised and he should have slotted straight in for £25m. Physically not suited to the league
Lichsteiner - plugged a gap for a year but wasn't ever good enough

A pretty mixed bag with more fails than hits for me

Yeah, I would pretty much agree with all of your assesments there. One thing that strikes me is that Guendouzi is the only real hidden gem of the bunch. Aubameyang and Leno have been great, but Aubameyang was already a top class striker, and Leno had a reputation of being one of Germany's best keepers. Sokratis and Torreira had good spells but never exceeded expectations.

Apart from getting it right with your big buys, I think you need to fill out the squad with cheaper (relatively speaking) players or players who are more of an unknown quantity but who rises to the challenge - Robertson or Wijnaldum at Liverpool, Son at Tottenham and so on. From our current squad, it looks like we're on the right track in that department too; Gabriel, Tierney, Martinelli, Pablo Mari and Cédric are all players who have performed well without costing astronomical fees or having much previous experience with football at the very top level.

Totally nailed on

https://youtu.be/RZoNaFcB7fo

I can't quite believe it, but with Smith-Rowe returning to full training today Arsenal officially have ZERO injuries in the entire first team squad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=io-q78jiGoA
Enjoy - no sideburns but a good beard.

Really? Get glasses. Xhaka is better than Fred or McTominay.

Nope he’s a complete liability. I’d take either of them.

We have better players out on loan

Therefore it follows the manager has absolutely no excuses in the league for the rest of the year. Every game is winnable. There is not one game coming up that on our day we should not win. There are numerous games that we would have no excuse if we did not win.

Great stuff.

Except for the fact that the other teams are also trying to win.

Even this unpromising material can be fashioned into a rod to beat Arteta with.

In terms of the league games we would be:
1) strong favourites for the games vs, Sheff U (a), Fulham (h), Newcastle (a) West Brom(h), Brighton (h)
2) We'd be favourites for Palace (a) and Everton (h) .....and Liverpool (h) in their current form
3) Fairly even odds for Spurs (h) and West Ham (a)
4) We wouldn't be favourites for Chelsea (a)

It isn't the worst run in, especially once we're past the spurs, west ham, liverpool games in our next 3.
I see the top 5 as must win. I'd want to win 2 of the next 3 and then realistically taking draws in the final 2 groups wouldn't be the worst results. 7 wins and 4 draws might just sneak in to a European place but that is a big ask