There's no doubt what our biggest failing was last season, it was our defence and our ability to leak cheap sloppy goals. Reading Arseblogger this morning, he is concerned that these problems have not been adequately remedied, I am not quite as worried but I do agree that further strengthening is needed. The spot between the sticks is a problem as the boss has clearly lost faith in Almunia, Fabianski is not good enough and that leaves two youngsters, one of whom is a great prospect, but that is not enough for a title challenge. I am not convinced by the move for Schwarzer, he has experience I know, but he does look slow and cumbersome with his aged joints.
I am also not sure why Gallas seems so rated now he has gone, personally I think he has been poor for over a year, never dominant in the air or physically. If Arsene has faith in Koscielny and has paid 10mill for him then he deserves a chance before being written off as too small, after all he an inch taller than Gallas and no one ever went on about his height! If Campbell signs on then we have a reasonable complement of centre backs. For me the balance in our squad in terms of defensive midfielders is not right and has not been for a while. The only midfielders we have who can defend are Song, Diaby, Eastmond and Frimpong; two of these are unproven youngsters. Meanwhile we have a whole host of attacking players in midfield. Personally I would have replaced Denilson with a player who could defend.
This nasty, stupid and vindictive piece of journalism from Leo Spall in the Mail attracted a hell of a lot of criticism and quite rightly so. Pete Gill has completely dismantled it very eloquently at F365. Not only is Spall's useless writing foolish but it is in such appallingly bad taste on this occassion, he really should be ashamed of producing such offensive dross. Eduardo should be remembered with respect. Elsewhere a valid perspective on how the deliberate fouling of certain sides never gets punished ands how this can have a massive impact on games, something I'm never shy to point out. The Online Gooner points out just how stupid the new 'home grown' quotas are, they will not help matters at all. If the FA wanted a better England side then they would do well to create a footballing environment in which the clogging sides would struggle as violence was not rewarded, they seem to avoid this though for some reason.
ps I have now lost count of the number of Barca players that have openly tried to unsettled Cesc by talking of his desire to leave Arsenal in the media, David 'rat goatee and diving master' Villa is the latest in this long line of scum. If Cesc really wanted to leave he would make this known himself and he would hand in a transfer request, he has not, so all these little c*nts should keep their whoring mouths shut, something they find extremely difficult by the sound of things.
24 comments:
It is so transparent that the litany from Barca-c*nt players who have come out with 'Fabregas wants to join us' is orchestrated by the 'Less-than-a-club' officials. They all say the same words; they come out on a daily basis from a rota of personnel. It is infantile, embarrassing and utterly contemptible. If I were Fabregas I would be so ashamed to be linked with these twats.
Incidentally, why are Xavi and Villa not away on holidays now? They have just finished a long season and the new one starts in a couple of weeks. Could it be that these statements are not really coming from them at all?
I agree, it is clearly a campaign orchestrated by the club. Despicable, truly.
I am proposing that Arsenal fans World wide post letters once a week for the next four weeks to UEFA & FIFA complaining about Barcelona FC's persistent public 'tapping up' of Cesc Fabregas.
Also post a letter just once to Arsenal FC requesting that they formally complain to UEFA & FIFA about Barcelona FC's rule breakin...g disrespectful behaviour.
I have drawn up 3 template letters that I will email to willing participants. All that you will need to do is type in your own Name & Address before printing off & posting.
A momentum is needed in this regard & can be boosted by you forwarding the email I send you to every single one of your Arsenal FC supporting family & friends and encouraging them to post letters off once every week for four weeks to UEFA & FIFA and just once to Arsenal FC.
The aim of repetitive letters would be to create an Administrative headache for UEFA & FIFA with hopefully thousands of letters received from all over the world. It would be a great way to display the strength of feeling from Arsenal FC fans.
The purpose of the single letter to Arsenal FC is again to display the strength of feeling from Arsenal FC fans.
The Arsenal FC hierarchy seem to exist in an 'Ivory Tower' immune or just simply ignorant to the feelings & wishes of their fans.
My email address for this campaign from where I will email you the letter templates is …….. ArsenalFansHateBarcelonaFC@gmail.com
COME ON !! …… Lets DO this & be taking substantive action for a change instead of simply bleating on web blogs which achieves nothing as it goes unnoticed by those who should hear the complaints the most.
I will post this on the anti Barca facebook group ………….
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=116042895106146
& also on as many Arsenal blogs as possible via ……………
http://www.newsnow.co.uk/h/Sport/Football/Premier+League/Arsenal/All+Sources
"1979gooner
About Me
a dedicated gooner who will try to stay calm when casting his judgement upon anything football related"
"David 'rat goatee and diving master' Villa is the latest in this long line of scum. If Cesc really wanted to leave he would make this known himself and he would hand in a transfer request, he has not, so all these little c*nts should keep their whoring mouths shut"
Cesc could always come out & say he doesn't want to leave - that would shut Villa/Xavi/Puyol et al up. Oh I forgot, he does want to go.
I'd say sell him & spend the money on Ozil, a top class keeper & CB. On second thoughts don't. That 30m will just disappear into the same black hole the Dudu money has.
To season tkt holders like myself laying out a grand+ every summer - we are being MUGGED OFF!!
Forgive me for not being sufficiently angry at either Bastardelona or the Daily Fail, but I have to tell you about Thierry Henry.
He was terrific last night, in his Red Bulls debut in the, ahem, friendly against The Scum. At the half Spurs were losing 1-0 to the starters of an MLS team -- several Europeans have decided our league is as good as England's 2nd division, so what does that say about Twitchy's team? Then the Red Bull manager took out Henry and the starting goalie, put in Canada's Number 1, and Robbie and Bale scored.
And the Spudfans took the piss on our manor? After beating MLS backups? Perhaps the final piece of evidence that Spurs fans are dopes.
Tonight, at Red Bull Arena, Vieira and, ugh, Adebayor lead Man City against Sporting Lisbon -- the Arena is a short walk from a huge Portuguese neighborhood in Newark -- and on Sunday, a doubleheader, Sporting vs. Spurs and Red Bulls vs. Man City. I think I'm going to enjoy that day a lot more than last night.
yes anonymous,
if there is anything you disagree with about the description of david villa then please feel free, i feel it is factually accurate
Then Eduardo is diving scum aswell I assume? Or is one dive (one major one at least) to you?
Then Eduardo is diving scum aswell I assume? Or is one dive (one major one at least) nothing to you?
villa dives every time he plays, eduardo does not
simple as that
So cheating is fine as long as it is infrequent?
you are very tiresome,
eduardo was a very honest player on the whole,
the only arsenal player who cheated regularly was eboue and he got a lot of abuse for it,
he has changed his ways significantly since
david villa is a routine cheat,
his rolling around on the ground in the WC final after minimal contact was something special and his routine diving throughout the competition was a disgrace
that's my opinion
by the way if yuo are going to quote things out of context, the 'scum' was referring to all the barca players who have deliberately tried to unsettle cesc by speaking to the media in a deeply unethical and unprofessional manner
by my count this is a rather large number of barca players,
if you choose to defend this then come on, go for it, i don't think anyone could defend it,
if you are going to come back here repeatedly with your rather tired repetitive comments then i would go elsewhere, you will not be welcome, you have been warned
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRG7gNkcnYM
this is a man who has been sent off for diving and who does it very time I have seen him play
BTW if eduardo is the best example you can come up with, his 'dive' wasn't that clear cut by any means, as evidenced by the ban being overturned:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/europe/8236689.stm
so at least get your facts right before you pick another losing argument
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0uYDpUcFeo
just another bit of despicable barca cheating for you, I'm sure you didn't see that though
My god you are so defensive, I generally don't have a problem in the fact that you hate Barcelona, I couldn't give a monkeys about them. My problem is that your specs aren't even Arsenal tinted. They are coated in red, so much so that you are afraid to admit your bias. That genuinely is my only problem here.
David Villa dives, I have never denied this, Barca players cheat, again, I've never denied this. So don't get all worked up about that because we are two people who agree on that point.
You can show me Barca players diving but I can do the exact same with Arsenal players. Eboue did it plenty, as you've pointed out. Here's some more:
There's big Jens from a few years back at about 1:30 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mP5mLY16xTc
Here's Cesc after a vicious attack - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbhhezrUVXk
Arsenal players put in bad challenges too, Van Persie on a Slovak in the last 16 of the world cup, Gallas against Bolton.
It doesn't take a genius to scour the web and find bad challenges/cheating on the part of any side. Nobody is guilt free, that is all i'm saying.
You wanna know something, everybody cheats at some point, everybody. Including Arsenal players. Including Barca players, Including bloody Timbuktuian players. Once again, let me stress, because you keep seeming to miss this point, i'm NOT defending Barcelona, their players or their conduct, simply pointing out that your hate campaign against them is irrational considering that every other team out there cheats too. I think if you could step back from this situation you would be able to see this and see that.
As for your defense of Eduardo, UEFA backtracked because they knew the implications of upholding the ban. It was a foolish move from UEFA in the first place because they set a precedent that they couldn't follow through with. Eduardo undoubtedly got lucky. I read back, I know you believed at the time that he dived and I hope you aren't backtracking now.
Again, I respect your opinion on Villa, you think he is a cheat, fair enough. When I've watched him i've seen a quality player. My opinion is that Eduardo is a cheat. He took a dive and unapologetically took advantage of the referee. I know he did this once but I don't think that because he cheated infrequently, that he should be seen in any other manner.
As I say, that is my opinion, I hope you will respect it considering.
Finally, as for the Cesc case, I wish Cesc would just come out and say one way or another what he wants. Ronaldo was slaughtered for being so coy a couple of years ago, how long will it be before a bit of patience is lost with Cesc?
Genuinely, no bad feelings here, i'm just trying to make my point and at least have you be able to take it in without thinking that I am attacking Arsenal.
Anyone else reading this, could I have your opinions (Hopefully your balanced ones!). Do you think I am being harsh here?
Maybe i'm expecting too much considering this is a blog dedicated to Arsenal, it's just that it is hard to trust judgement on here because even when you refer to outside evidence it seems to often come from other Arsenal blogs, hardly balanced is it?
Anyway, best wishes, I enjoy our debate
hi,
fair enough.
I know everyone cheats to a degree, but some cheat a hell of a lot more than others, so saying everyone cheats and ignoring that some people are far worse is silly in my eyes.
Barca are very dodgy in the way they play. They are pretty bad cheating wise and Arsenal are saints in comparison, this is all I'm saying, Arsenal are a pretty damn honest side, I know I'm biased but I do think that a lot of neutrals would agree with this.
Your idea of everyone cheating and having no relativism at all is nonsensical.
Cesc- well I have a lot of respect for him and the fact he hasn't come out on this. He has done what very few pros have done in the modern age, he has shown some respect for the club who pay his wages and his contract.
Cesc knows that Arsenal will sell him if Barca pay a decent fee, he respects the club. If Barca won't pay the fee then they can f*ck off if they want him on the cheap.
Cesc is behaving as a model pro and should not be criticised for this, he most certainly should not speak out as the Barca players are, this is unethical and unprofessional by both club and the players involved.
Barca's behaviour as a club has been a disgrace, completely arrogant and disrespectful, they deserve all the abuse they are getting. Contracts have to be respected to some degree, the future of a competitive game depends on it.
ps
your Lehman example is poor, he was barged by Drogba and fell over, there is no feigning there
the Cesc one, he was flicked in the face and made a bit of a meal of ie, but nothing like what we have seen from many others, he stopped pretty quickly when he realised there was no damage and got on with it
if that's the best you can do, it goes to prove my point that Arsenal have been a very honest and clean side compared to most
1979 - I swear that was all I wanted, when you said you were biased in some way, my heart did a merry jig!
I completely agree that we are all biased and we have our preferences, I just felt that you hadn't really ever acknowledged that before. Now we can make some progress!
I would agree that Arsenal, at this moment, are a relatively honest side. I would also argue, though, that a bit of cynicism and mental toughness is what has held Arsenal back over the last few seasons. Patrick Vieira's era is the perfect example. When he patrolled that Arsenal midfield, there was a definite element of toughness, plenty of cynical trips and an amount of goading. Added to that you had Campbell, no nonsense, Lehmann generally winding them up and Pires certainly taking a few tumbles that were perhaps unneeded. This team, however, were champions.
Do you not sometimes think that this Arsenal need a bit of that?
I agree that Barca are prone to gamesmanship but if you watch Spanish football, every side is like that. Barca, generally because they play neat passing football which doesn't often require the gamesmanship in La Liga, are, by a margin, one of the cleaner sides in Spain.
The thing is, they are a product of their environment. Spanish sides get away with it in Spain, it is a bigger part of the game there than it is here and hence it is simply a part of a team's gameplan. This is not an excuse for their behaviour, it is massively frustrating when a bit of play-acting goes against you, however, I just dont really see that Barca are worse offenders than the majority of European sides other than the fact that their players and the club itself have been involved in so many high profile games over the last few months.
And because of a certain involvement with a Mr Fabregas
I don't know what to make of it. You praise Cesc for keeping schtum but would you not agree with me in that Ronaldo got plenty of grief for that same stance? Seems a little odd to me.
The comments - I don't really believe this myself but the Barca players could simply be being asked what they think about Cesc possibly coming to Barca, they aren't exactly going to say 'we don't want him here.' They are his mates and they want him to come to the club. Clearly though, you'd have to be pretty naive to not think that these comments have a certain orchestration about them.
The comments are intended to stir but in all honesty I think there are a couple of things to note. These guys are his temamates and, i'd guess, his friends, I cannot imagine that they would be so so vocal in their comments if Cesc had not implied or straight out told them that he wants to join them. Clearly there is no way to prove this but it does seem fairly comfortable to say that Cesc has a big interest in going.
Secondly, although tasteless and, to some, making Barca appear classless, I just don't think there is anything technically that they are doing wrong. It's a pain in the arse but in all honesty, it can only have an effect if Cesc himself wants to act on it.
He is a grown man, capable of making his own decisions. Surely he is level headed enough to make this decision on his own. If he were to be influenced by these people then you'd have to question his whole mentality. He's a big boy, he'll make his choices.
By the way I love your optimism about contracts being respected but I really think that that ship has sailed!
It will soon be make your mind up time for Cesc, does part of you not feel that this whole saga and all this annoyance could be ended by Cesc simply coming out and saying either way what his decision is?
Personally, I believe that he will be here for at least another season. And I heard a few saying they would take it if Barca offered £40m for him, would you take that? I'd definitely be holding out for nearer to £50-60m in this inflated market.
Oh and with the Lehmann clip, it is 1:30 into the clip, trust me, when you see it, you'll think it isn't too bad an example! It is a pretty desperate dive, after which he springs up immediately after learning he isn't getting a free kick!
And the Cesc one, well for me, that is a bit of a biased opinion to me. I have no love for Chelsea and especially for Robben. However, Cesc makes a bloody big meal of it, I just think you were slaughtering Spain for this in the WC final but that was pretty much in the same mould
Agree with the Spanish culture, I have to disagree that Barca are good for Spain, I think they are pretty bad from what I've glanced at in recent years.
"I just don't think there is anything technically that they are doing wrong."
There quite clearly is. They are unsettling a player who is under contract with another club. Whether it is against the rules of the game is debatable, whether it is right or wrong is not.
Politically it would not be wise for Arsenal to report Barca but if they did they would probably have a decent case. Barca have never agreed a fee and have clearly discussed things with Cesc, this is most definitely against the rules of the game.
Eduardo is a not bad player but Arsenal is a ball- less footballing club.
What a shameful club this is.
How could u guys support such a club? What club is this? French? Dutch? What kind of idiotic coach signs young players from abroad as his hobby?
Why don’t you have your own youth system?
Where are your English lads?
What league does this club belong to?
World Premier League held in England?
Fabregas deserves more than this stupidity. He deserves to win something. He deserves to come home.
This is a circus. Certainly not where he belongs.
What kind of damn club stops their players from going home?
You bought him for cheap and now u want to sell him for what? 60mil to his own parents.
Damn you!!
This sounds exactly like a Nanny of 5 years trying to steal our boy away….and now you are asking for ransom??
And you made a Spaniard/product of Barsa’s Cantera be your captain??
Aren’t u guys ashame of yourselves?
Same way we could have stopped Yaya move to Man City. Or we could have raised the price tag to 45 mill if we wanted as he is easily amongst the top 3 DM’S in the World. But wth? The boy wants to join his brother. How could we ever stop him from joining his family??
That’s what u call pride, boys.
LEARN A THING OR TWO BESIDES THE WHIPPING WE GONNA GIVE YOU YET AGAIN IF WE MEET IN THE CHAMPIONS LEAGUE.
visca barsa,
your words demonstrate again just how low barca are,
you can't stoop much lower can you?
"What kind of damn club stops their players from going home?"
A club who have a contract for a player
"Same way we could have stopped Yaya move to Man City. Or we could have raised the price tag to 45 mill if we wanted as he is easily amongst the top 3 DM’S in the World. But wth? The boy wants to join his brother. How could we ever stop him from joining his family??"
Maybe this is why Barca just had to take out a big feckin loan?
Mate, i'm a critic of Arsenal, I've posted plenty previously in these comments but your comment is just a bit stupid. Grow up
Barca puta,
please depart unless you have anything interesting or intelligent to add,
your arrogance and comments show nicely how low your club and supporters have sunk,
adios
I Hope Arsenal can be champion again
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