Maresca, Slot ‘humiliating’ Arteta as ‘billion-pound bottle-jobs’ Arsenal ‘won’t win the league’ with him

Stewie Griffin was in with a 458-word mail shortly after Arsenal drew 0-0 at home to relegation-threatened Everton. Mikel Arteta is getting pelters and not just from him. There is a genuine shout for him to be replaced by Cesc Fabregas.

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Billion-pound bottle-jobs
Oh dear. What a surprise! Did anyone honestly expect anything else though from Arsenal? FAKE Basque Allardyce vs the OG Real Deal Set-Piece king Dyche! If anyone was ever going to be equipped to stop Arteta’s only real means of scoring a goal, it was going to be someone like Dyche. I actually stuck a bet on “under 0.5 goals” prior to the match, the outcome was THAT predictable. Gracias Mikel! 😄 Arteta is just lucky Moyes and Pulis ain’t still around to neuter his expensively-assembled team of goal-shy chokers!

I’ll leave it to other eagle-eyed analysts to point out that for the second week running, Arsenal have had an opportunity to significantly dent both Liverpool and Citeh’s points lead – and on both occasions, we’ve seen the Bottle-job choking tribute act fail to create a single thing from open play.

I said this two seasons ago and I’ll repeat it: Arteta doesn’t coach the attacking side of the game. There is zero creative attacking pattern, zero improvisation, not a single player capable of pulling out a moment of improvised brilliance outside of Saka. Imagine spending over £700m to assemble a Pulis Tribute act that’s more toothless than a pensioner munching through their gum-shield! If Arsenal don’t take the lead in matches or fall behind, you’re almost guaranteed that they will not win that match.

A reminder, that Mikel Arteta is paid an outrageous £15m a season!!! His £65m ashtray is on £280k a week, whilst the £50m Brazilian beach-bum is on £240k a week. What did they do again? 🤔

Arsenal fans spent the entire summer mocking Chelsea’s dysfunctional shitshow, whilst exalting Arsenal’s “stability” as a paragon of virtue. We heard similar shite under Wenger about “stability” (which some others would simply call “persistent mediocrity?) The irony is, of the two clubs, Chelsea appear to have a young team going somewhere, and capable of scoring several goals in a match – Enzo Maresca, a guy who was coaching in the Championship last year is playing superior football and racking up more points in his first major job. We’ve all talked about Slot, and how his showing on a nothing summer spend, is a humiliation for Arteta.

I’ll say again: it will be absolutely beautiful to witness the kinds of absurd excuses Arsenal fans will come up with this time, to excuse such shocking choking and managerial ineptitude. Irony is that the “billion-pound bottle-jobs” is Arteta’s Arsenal – and not Maresca’s Chelsea. Who knew!
Stewie Griffin (10-man Liverpool coming from behind twice and scoring 2 goals from open play. Didn’t Arsenal fans tell us you’re not allowed to score goals if you’re down to 10? Isn’t that the reason they scored zero goals at Bournemouth, zero goals v Brighton after the red, etc?)

Arsenal need a change to win the Premier League
Although I think Arteta has done a good job at Arsenal after taking over from Unai Emery, I don’t see Arsenal winning the league under Arteta.

Liverpool slip up and Arsenal have a massive chance to capitalize on, and what do they do? Draw 0-0 against Everton at home. Whenever there is an opportunity to get closer to the top of the table, they almost never take advantage of the situation.

If Arsenal are going to win the league, they need a different manager, someone like Alonso or Fabregas going forward, but will that do much of a difference? I also love how Arsenal fans rip into United so much, but their own team can’t even win the League cup or Europa league.

If anyone deserves the title as a “bottle job team” it’s for sure Arsenal, they won’t win the league any time soon, I’ll give them another 5 years maybe even more.
Rami, Dubai

Arteta the bridesmaid
Let me attempt to beat Stewie to the punch. Arteta looks increasingly like a “never a bride, always a bridesmaid” manager. Realistically he should have 2 Premiership titles in his CV. Out of the Premiership in November this year.

Odegaard, for all his abilities can’t finish. Maybe a chance at a Mickey Mouse domestic cup, but who really cares about those these days. Play the kids please, they look your best bet at progressing from the current bottle job players and management.
Ken B AFC

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Woo, Everton!
What a result !!  Special thank you to Arteta for taking Odegaard off.  Never have I been happier to park the bus.
TX Bill, EFC

Stop drawing lines
Who ever thought it was a good idea to start drawing lines, so we could disallow goals such as Chris Woods’ goal against Aston Villa? When in doubt, just freeze the frame as accurately as possible (the first flaw in the system) and if you can’t tell with the naked eye whether or not it’s offside, the goal stands. Only draw lines when it looks offside on the frozen image, to confirm your initial (offside) thought.

Drawing lines to help you disallow a goal because somebody’s a millimetre offside, just doesn’t make any sense.  The more goals the merrier, if you ask me. And to those who say ‘offside is offside, it doesn’t matter whether it’s an inch or a yard’, well, it does matter, even more so with the flawed technology we now use.

The thinking should be that if it ‘s impossible for the linesman to see, the flawed technology should not intervene.
G. Thomas
Breda

The Robertson problem
Almost halftime against Fulham. This isn’t the first time Robertson has been a weak link this year. Unlike Salah he isn’t still performing well as he gets older and needs replacing. He’s lucky he’s not out of contract because I don’t think hed be getting a new one.

Great servant and enjoyed some great moments but you can’t be both sentimental and successful in football. Kerkez seems like a natural replacement perhaps Hughes can call in a favour or two…

To be honest we haven’t played awful and have been punished by a very efficient Fulham team. I also keep hearing people rave about szoboszlai and I’m not sure why. All season I’ve been trying to figure out what he’s good at , he’s an average passer, when he does shoot they’re almost always awful shots…what is he good at? Can another red tell me? Both Elliot and Jones do the same things he does but they both chip in with goals and assists.

Second half is going to need to be much more productive and Salah needs to get in the game more. Slot is a better manager than I’ll ever be but is Diaz really more productive as the CF? All his goals apart from one came from playing on the left.
Lee

Newcastle, Isak and Howe
Other than his soulful doe eyes, two things make Alexander Isak special. The first is his ability to receive the ball. Isak generally gets the ball under pressure, but with so soft a touch it invokes Thierry Henry. Sometimes it doesn’t work out but more often than the odds would seem to allow, it does. The second is his almost bizarre agility. If you’ve really watched the lad, you’ve seen how difficult he is to foul, even with intent. He’s like a genius pipe-cleaner man on amphetamines when he has the ball. The goal was the least of his contributions against Leicester and excuses his misses on its own.

Jacob Murphy’s name is going to adorn my next shirt. He’s like Sean Astin’s Rudy: not technically gifted, but a grafter. He gets into a lot of great positions to miss those chances. And his surprise, humility, and delight in a goal warm my cockles. Last time he got a brace, we were sh*t-kicking Spurs 6-1.

Howe got this one very right, to the extent that Leicester didn’t even pretend to attack for long stretches of the match. He needs to get most matches right if he wants to avoid the press microscope. On the other hand, the board seems comfortable with him; right now, perhaps only the supporters could bring Howe down.

I’m in his corner. Lewis Hall was phenomenal again today, and that reinforces my belief in Howe as a developer of players. Elliott Anderson and Chris Wood might be the tip of an iceberg of Howe-improved players on the market, and that could bring a Pep-esque premium on player sales. In fact, I think it’s Newcastle’s only real chance of success in the mid-term. We’re not so far behind the league leaders in squad value as we were when any of our best players were signed. If I’m the PIF guy looking at trends, that’s the one I see.

What Newcastle need in January is a fast right-winger who gets on the scoresheet regularly. I’m still lamenting the cheap sale of Christian Pulisic to AC Milan. He would have made us so much better…and for Almiron money.

I believe that PSR/FFP rules as they presently exist are inherently unfair in that they draw the ladder up behind the clubs who did all the unrestrained spending that now needs restraining. But this season, they might be helping to produce tightest league in years. Liverpool have been the pick of the litter, but even they have been showing cracks. Clubs like Brighton, Brentford, Bournemouth and Forest are pushing into the Europe conversation like others did in the 90s, and identifying the right mid-range (£15-30 million) players is starting to look like the new EPL meta.
Chris C, Toon Army DC
PS — Antonee Robinson has already surpassed my best expectations. What a player.

It shoulda been me!
Once again the total incompetence of the FA has been exposed.  Appointing Thomas Tuchel was a terrible idea.

Not that I’ve got anything against him or think he’ll do a bad job, far from it.  But with a little bit of patience they could now have around £8million to invest in grass roots football.

No disrespect to Serbia, Latvia, Albania and Andorra but they are all thinking “if we can finish second, we’ll have a play off”. It’s almost as easy as a Man Utd FA Cup run.

I would have been more than happy to do the job for a measly £500k a year with a £1mil bonus on qualification, Thomas could then take over and guide us through the tournament,  all the players would be fit and raring to go ads i’ve had a word with a few mates in the pub and they’ve agreed to play in all the home qualifiers, some cdon’t think they can get the time off work for the away games.
Howard (play all the games over a bank holiday weekend) Jones

Harry Kane gonna fill his boots
Hi

No chance Harry Kane is going to miss any of the WC qualifiers, gonna score lots and lots of stat fillers.
Mel – Dublin, Berlin, Athlone Town

Premier League rejects
Genuinely curious as to why premier league rejects appear to be doing so well in Italy?

de Gea, Pulisic, Lookman are in WhoScored’s top team for the season. Mkhitaryan is doing well at Inter, Kean is doing well at Fiorentina, McTominay and Lukaku are getting good reviews at Napoli. These players were (on the whole) derided by Premier League commentators.

Is there something in the water/ food/ weather? Is it a much easier league (Man City’s loss to Juve sitting 6th in the table would normally suggest no, but given the funk City are in ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ )? Are Italian clubs better at getting more out of their players through coaching / support or playing them in roles that are to their strengths? Or are these players just better adapted to the Italian style of play? Or is it just random – with enough player transfers some transfers are going to succeed?

Put differently, is this a Premier League problem (failing to get the most out of players) or an Italian problem (Serie A isn’t what it was)?
Ben Morton-Harmer

Stress fractures
There is no denying that looking at peps recent behaviour he is cracking under the stress in a way which would make rafa look put together. Vandalising your own head and trying to fight rival fans in the street while also responding in snappy ways to playful rival ribbing all points to someone losing their grip a little

Something else I wanna point out which is 100% speculation on my part but I think pep might be drinking a few too many glasses of red wine a few times too often. Both before and after his defeat to Liverpool he was slurring his words a little and swaying off balance and he is known for drinking a bit even getting told off by camacho in the latter end of his playing days for allegedly training while a little drunk. If that’s the case, and that’s a massive and probably wrong if, it would go hand in hand with stress, many people drink when stressed.

The issue really is pep doesn’t seem to have an answer to his problem and now seems to lean heavily on rodri. Having lived through years of asking Gerrard to drag the corpse of Liverpool over the finish many times I can tell you being totally reliant on one player is never good. But city shouldn’t be, unlike Liverpool who had few genuine world class players in Gerrard’s time city are littered with them. Are the players just not responding to peps methods anymore?

Perhaps it’s not coincidence that in the season which city will be found guilty or innocent of actual cheating (thus rendering peps work the result of cheating ) that pep is cracking up. It’s understandable really. Also for once he’s not been able to open the cheque book because of that investigation so he’s put in the position of having to use what he has. That might change in January as cities recent $250m bond sales might go to transfers or it might be them trying to clean up their books in preparation of punishment. Who knows?

Gonna be an interesting season, I wonder if pep regrets signing that extension?
Lee

How football works
Latest from Anthony Gordon says “Who said I was ever going to leave?”

I’ll answer for you – your agent!

All so you could get a nice pay rise after a season of diving and getting yellow cards for “professional” fouls.

Liverpool fans, would you like to have Anthony Gordon in your team to replace Mo Salah? Didn’t think so
Fat Man (you simply have a good agent, just shut the fuck up about any noble bullshit because it doesn’t wash)

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