Wednesday 15 February 2012

Terrible result, a terrible performance and terrible officiating

That was poor.  It was not even against a good Milan side in my opinion and that makes it all the more depressing.  It has to be said that 4-0 was in no way a fair reflection of the football game though, we thoroughly deserved to lose but not by that margin.  Nothing really dropped for us tonight and it all combined to see us go down by a heavy scorelines, and surely out of the Champions League, perhaps for the last time in a while.

Leaving the Ox on the bench was not a good decision, we lacked width and pace to support RVP in the first half particularly.  Walcott was unimaginative and ineffective, Ramsey anonymous and Rosicky average, there just wasn't enough quality to back up our leading Dutchman.  Milan looked fairly open to me in the first half, we just didn't have the tools with which to take them apart and everything dropped from them at the other end.

Boateng opened the scoring with a blinder, the new pairing of Koscielny and Vermaelen did not look well drilled, such a shame that our reliable German has picked up such a bad injury at such a key time in the season, Boateng nipped in between the centre backs and blasted home an unstoppable finish in off the bar, one nil.  The second Milan goal was clearly offside, a clear error from the officials.  We created nothing going forward in the first half, despite a decent amount of possession, the build up was too predictable, too slow and too ponderous.

Robinho then added a third in the second half after an unfortunate slip by Vermaelen, a very good finish into the bottom corner too.  Henry had come on for the useless Walcott, and he did add a bit of a presence alongside RVP, his flick set up RVP for a cracking volley which produced the save of the match from a low left Abbiati hand.  Ibrahimovich is a disgrace of a footballer and this was summed up by his embarrassing dive for Milan's penalty which turned out to be their fourth goal, Djourou stood his ground, made no tackle and did nothing, the cheating Swede threw himself over and should have had a yellow for his pathetic acting.  The ref obliged though and made our night even worse. 

A 4-0 defeat it was, we still had time to see another fine Abbiati save, this time from an RVP header.  Overall we were just not good enough and deserved nothing from this game, our attacking play was particularly predictable and toothless, while our defending was pretty shambolic at times, big Per was definitely missed. 

It was particularly hard to take the margin of defeat against such an average Milan side, especially when one goal was clearly offside and another down to a blatant act of cheating.  We were not outplayed in the midfield, we shaded possession, so do not believe the nonsense that will be spouted in certain sections of the media in this regard.  The problem was our toothless attacking play and this was partly down to a lack of quality and partly down to poor tactics from the manager.  Depressing and the worst I have seen us in Europe for a very long time indeed.


48 comments:

Danish Gooner said...

Didnt deserve it !! Come on you cant have watched much of the game we got a shafting and we deserved a shafting.

1979gooner said...

Danish

read what I have written

we thoroughly deserved to lose but not by a 4-0 scoreline

Anonymous said...

Have too disagree mate. We were simply awful in all areas. What a way for Le King to go out...

Anonymous said...

We were gloriously shit. Manager andg make weights (Arteta, ramsey, Song, Gibbs, and Walcott) need to shoulder some blame. I hope we get stuffed by Sunderland. We need to crash and burn so a clean sweep can be made before we rebuild. Forever Arsenal.

Anonymous said...

Don't forget that Van P should of had a penalty just after Ibra's pen.

Anonymous said...

It was a penalty all right. Djourou was squared up and had his hands all over him.

Ibra owned our defense today.

Accept it.

Danish Gooner said...

No we deserved 5 or 6 .

Anonymous said...

The offside decision was wrong, but it was marginal. Can't blame the ref for the rest of it. The penalty was soft but Djourou had his hands all over Ibra's neck. Well beaten and deservedly so, we had no fluency in midfield and were toothless in attack.

Stuart said...

Didn't deserve a 4-0 scoreline?

No, not at all, it could have quite easily been 6 or 7 had Milan taken their chances. They scored more goals than we had shots on target!

Didn't take a rocket scientist to work out that tippy tappy football on those flanks was not going to be possible. Milan skinned us, balls into channels, direct, quick with good movement, a bit like we used to be.

We were predictable, slow paced, average and never really looked like threatening.

Anonymous said...

We were shit and were lucky to get 0. If you think we were cheated then you were watching another game. Milan could have scored at will if they wanted.

1979gooner said...

Never a penalty.

Ibrahimovich cheated, plain and simple.

MjM said...

No imagionation on the offensive side of the pitch, poor marking on the D. AW and his bonehead choice not to start OX absolutely makes me sick! At least I now have a free evening in March open seeing that CL is over for the Gunners. A few weeks ago someone asked if it could get worse. YES it can and it DID. FA is last and soon dying chance for a trophy...fading...fast...

Anonymous said...

It fair to say hazards a yid after watching that crap,it's over,live with it.you got schooled big time by a team we beat last season.ha ha ha ha ha ha ha kevtheyid.

Anonymous said...

Your a poor side,can't wait to play you in 2 weeks.just saying

Kalix said...

Nothing surprising! No midfield, no runs and no ideas. Sagna looks worse and worse the longer his Arsenal career lasts. Sure, he's been injured but he is useless going forward and I think he has lost the defensive game. Even Vermalen looked bad today. Walcott lousy. Wenger must ask certain players if they really w3ant to and have what it takes to win games. Lousy game and the FA Cup, forget it. What we can hope for is that we win the home game against TottenFord ... Otherwise we have nothing to look forward to this season, unfortunately.
But still...Let's go you reds.

Anonymous said...

We were very poor, no excuses. Walcott in for unfair stick I think - we aren't playing to his strengths. When did you last see us turn the full back? We make things far too easy for the opposition. No pressure on the ball, no directness when we have it.

Anonymous said...

Why do supporters from other teams comment here simmply to cause offence, just grow up and get a life

Anonymous said...

I'm dissappointed

Anonymous said...

We were very poor, no excuses. Walcott in for unfair stick I think - we aren't playing to his strengths. When did you last see us turn the full back? We make things far too easy for the opposition. No pressure on the ball, no directness when we have it.

Danish Gooner said...

Fuck off Wenger !!!!

Anonymous said...

If Milan are average, WTF does that make us? This was another inept defensive display, slow attack and a non-existent 'scared' midfield.
Song back to his worst, Ramsey AWOL, Rosicky just shit - only Arteta was looking for the ball. Same old, same old Arsenal - yet we moan but do fuck-all about it. THIS IS A MASSIVE CLUB WITH A SMALL TIME BOARD!!

There are managers out there who have tactical prowess, I can assure you.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...

we were shit wenger has to go should of being 7 bye bye van we will miss u

Anonymous said...

Hehe this season just keeps getting better and better!

Anonymous said...

arsenal is crashing fast someone help

Anonymous said...

Arsenal were terrible. I live and work in Italy and tomorrow at work shall be a day to forget very quickly. Milan could of scored more goals but eased off in the last 20 minutes. I have been a gooner for over 40 years and I have never seen such a shambles. Things need to change at arsenal because it is all too sad now!

Anonymous said...

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha o dear can't wait to play you,bale gona rape you,rafas gona buck you and adies gona hunt you.you times gone,suck it up and live with it.

Anonymous said...

Milan were much better than us tonight. They were faster, well drilled and had a game plan that we could not cope with.
I just don't understand why we simply don't deliver when it matters and it happens every season.
Wenger will probably blame the pitch and the officials again for our demise tonight.

Really feel sorry for all those Arsenal fans out there in Milan tonight. They deserve better.

Anonymous said...

Wait to hazard gets you next season,yid army

Anonymous said...

Why the hell did he take Gibbs off to bring Ox on? Meant shifting Song, meaning that our diddyman midfield didn't have a tackler amongst them. Why not take off Rosicky who was awful today. He looks like a player that has been out of the game for two years. All he did was take the ball infield and either hit sideways passes to help Milan reform or lose possession like he did before the pen. Why not just do a straight sub?We lack muscle in the middle..We used to have Paddy, Petit, Parlour...strong guys..now we have Arteta, Ramsey and Rosicky...Way too weak. Surely Arsene isn't so vain he can not see it..or is he? Why else would we have a 15 million misfit sat on the bench after a transfer window? I think that Arsene is like so many other successful managers - after a while they believe they can do no wrong..just like Clough

Anonymous said...

Arsenal football club as a whole have let us all down this season. We need for someone to take charge upstairs and tell AW to buck his ideas up and not be happy with jus trying to finish 4th each season!!! As for the comments by yids, you had 1 trip in champions league and you think your mustard!!! This season is not over for us, please can you tell me what silverware you are going to take this year???? And if you even think we are finished with you lot your having a bubble!!! You ain't out of our reach yet you know. You bunch of mugs!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

JUST WHAT WAS OUR GAME PLAN COULD SOMEONE PLEASE EXPLAIN.
REALLY REALLY POOR- NO PACE NO CRAFT NO HOPE
TIME TO MOVE ON ARSENE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE- THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES

Johnny said...

You forgot to add that the ref denied Arsenal a penalty which was just as much or more than the one he gave to Milan to pad their lead.

Wouldn't give us an away goal, eh?

Anonymous said...

Hmmm... I have neva seen anytin like dis... Im still speechless... I think my tongue ran away. We WERE SCHOOLED! Now dats how to play football

Anonymous said...

Djourou in the team will most of the time be a blunder of a decision. Seriously Arsenal will not rebuild with this kind of squad, even manager. Does Kroeke care anyway? Doubtful!

Anonymous said...

So how many still disagree with Dennis Bergkamp now?

Anonymous said...

So, this is Arsene's beautiful football...

Anonymous said...

Arsenal were shocking. But the spurs fan who thinks hazard will sign for them is in dreamland. They can't even afford a adebayors wages never mind hazards.

Anonymous said...

Yh we deserved to lose but fucking hell gunners!!! Stick by ur team and keep the faith. Just need a couple of new big name signings (hazard,benzema,goetze or pato) need to offload Ramsey, maybe if arsenal fans wernt so critical all the time the team would perform better.

Anonymous said...

Don't think I've ever seen a poorer performance from Arsenal. We've had some nervy, panicky looking games in the last few seasons but at least we had periods in each game where we played something like our style of football.

Yesterday looked like a PL team vs a pub team.

Seeing a team of decent players ALL playing badly makes me think the coaching is to blame. Nobody is doing the right thing at the right time. When we have the ball on the flanks, There's at LEAST 2 of their players doubling up. When they have it on the wing, there's 1 of our fullbacks struggling to get back into position.

Rosicky didn't even try n pretend to go down the line before cutting inside, just predictably ran inside every time, but what's he doing on the left anyway?

With all the talk about attacking, they forgot to defend.

Well deserved beating no complaints.

Anonymous said...

Wenger u morron get da fock out fron our great club,u are making our club a laughing stock.

Anonymous said...

they deserved to lose by more you stupid AKB

Anonymous said...

This is the worst arsenal side i've seen in a long time.We've become totaly stagnant.The club needs a big clear out starting from the top i.e. Wenger.Players just aren't playing for the manager.Alot af average players on board, Walcott, rosicky, gibbs, arshavin, arteta,Djorue, squillachi,etc. Walcott especially has had his chance, why do you think any of the "big" teams have never made enquiries about him? He's one dimensional and everyone knows how to play against him.Club needs to be overhauled and start again without the board trying to make money instead of winning trophies. If we don't get cl next year, nobody of quality will sign for us and we could loose the bit of quality we have RVP! C'mon Arsenal the fans deserve better than this.

Harris1985 said...

Did anyone notice Wenger didn't once get off his lazy ass to give the players instructions or energy yet Milan's coach didn't sit down once!! all match he was telling his players what he wanted from them. Wenger is finished! Need knew life in the club! This is the worst Arsenal squad Wenger has ever had yet he still stands by it! Other clubs are laughin g even worse feeling sorry for Arsenal!

Anonymous said...

Awful analysis.... Milan had a hatful more chances... how many did Arsenal create?... not a shot until the 66th minute.. it could have been more for Milan... it's an Arsenal blog, but you could try and write at least a little objectively...

Anonymous said...

Awful article, full of excuses, daydreaming and whining.

Anonymous said...

6-0 would have been a fair result; in the last 20 minutes Milan got sloppy and wasteful. This is typical pro-Wenger bollocks.

Uncle Mike said...

Blaming the refs or the pitch won't help: We were hideously bad. Neither Rosicky nor Walcott should ever again suit up for The Arsenal. It was so bad that Arshavin and an 18-year-old (Oxlade-Chamberlain) would have been an improvement. Without question, our players deserved to lose, even if we as fans did not.