Nah you're right you were great. You'll finish at worst second next season, will probably win the league after thrashing an up-for-it City in a super competitive Cup final.
Mikel Arteta | Lego Pep watch
- Thread starter Samid
- Start date
See, that's a massive jump from what I said. I didn't say anything about how we will do next season. I'm merely asking how our previous season was deemed flukey and got some weird reasons.
World class bellend is Arteta. Clown.
What you and your fellow Arsenal fans are saying is mostly nonsense. You get super defensive about anything that is levelled at the team, and are incapable of seeing how much of an advantage your lads and Arteta had with recuperation. It wasn't even just about the gross amount of games (though it was a big factor), it was about the space between games at a key time during the season, allowing you to train and work tactically rather barely recuperate before the next 90mn. It's a boring conversation, it's absolutely blatant to see (it was obvious at the time and it's as clear in retrospect), and this insecurity that anything negative said about your team needs to be discussed to no end as if it negates any successes the team has had, is frankly tiring.
You played some good football for large parts of the season, you have some young exciting talents, but yeah you had a flukey season that enabled you to finish second. So what?
Yet our best form of the season was when we had Europa League games, and our worst form was when we were out all the competitions, so not sure how that argument holds sway?
We get super defensive because the points we hear don't make sense, that's all, and yes it is tiring hearing these daft reasons why.
You choked for certain games at the tail end of the season, because of mentality issues. It still doesn't change that overall you had a much easier schedule than everyone else - had it been similar to others, you just would've likely crumbled even more. The first half of the season also had some very flukey results with last minute winners in games where you barely deserved a draw, and you were massively outperforming all your underlying stats - which wasn't going to last either.
The points don't make sense because they don't fit into your pre-made narrative of the team having made constant progress over the years. They make sense to many other people because there's a less passionate take about it.
Is it a normal part of football now that fans calculate the amount of rest their rivals have between games to calculate how much of advantage they get?
This is just a product of football tribalism. Another team has success? Worse still a rival? Easier to brush it off as potluck, a fluke, dismiss it as a flash in the pan.
Undeniably, however, Arsenal have taken a massive leap forward from where we have been in recent history and Arteta deserves huge credit. Arsenal fans can see it in the performance every week, we’ve taken the proverbial step up. The fact opposition fans “care” about us again is a good sign, too. For a decade or more we weren’t even in the conversation. I take the little jabs and wishful thinking as wins for us as a club. It feels like we’re back at the head table.
Whether that will be sustained to the degree we’re title challengers for the foreseeable remains to be seen. But we were last season and the league table doesn’t lie, as cliché as it is, a 38 game campaign irons out the wrinkles. Our point haul throughout most of the year was enough to put us in with a shout in any season, regardless of what our competitors might have done.
I was actually a little pessimistic heading into this season. I don’t feel as though we had a particularly good preseason. This time last year, for instance, we were flying on all cylinders and were well placed to hit the ground running. Which we did. This year we’ve been very experimental, a little disjointed, the new signings haven’t quite jelled, but I was encouraged with what I saw yesterday.
This coming season just feels a little more open than prior years. City are undoubtedly favourites again, but they’ve lost some depth and starters, haven’t really brought in anyone to move the needle (yet). I’d expect Arsenal, Liverpool and United to give a decent account of themselves behind the treble winners. Newcastle could easily kick on again, but are obviously fresh into their development, Spurs it feels are a step below and who knows what to expect from Chelsea.
Excited for the season ahead.
Undeniably, however, Arsenal have taken a massive leap forward from where we have been in recent history and Arteta deserves huge credit. Arsenal fans can see it in the performance every week, we’ve taken the proverbial step up. The fact opposition fans “care” about us again is a good sign, too. For a decade or more we weren’t even in the conversation. I take the little jabs and wishful thinking as wins for us as a club. It feels like we’re back at the head table.
Whether that will be sustained to the degree we’re title challengers for the foreseeable remains to be seen. But we were last season and the league table doesn’t lie, as cliché as it is, a 38 game campaign irons out the wrinkles. Our point haul throughout most of the year was enough to put us in with a shout in any season, regardless of what our competitors might have done.
I was actually a little pessimistic heading into this season. I don’t feel as though we had a particularly good preseason. This time last year, for instance, we were flying on all cylinders and were well placed to hit the ground running. Which we did. This year we’ve been very experimental, a little disjointed, the new signings haven’t quite jelled, but I was encouraged with what I saw yesterday.
This coming season just feels a little more open than prior years. City are undoubtedly favourites again, but they’ve lost some depth and starters, haven’t really brought in anyone to move the needle (yet). I’d expect Arsenal, Liverpool and United to give a decent account of themselves behind the treble winners. Newcastle could easily kick on again, but are obviously fresh into their development, Spurs it feels are a step below and who knows what to expect from Chelsea.
Excited for the season ahead.
I mean, the points totals kind of do that for themselves. At the end of the day, that's what league seasons are decided on.
I just find it bemusing how you can call a team flukey over a 38 game season, if that's the 'sense' other people agree with then yeah, we are going round in circles and it is tiring. I'll leave it there.
I would say it has always been a normal part of football fandom to look back on how a team performed in a given season, and the context surrounding the performance, to try and assess whether it's likely to happen again. Especially if said team is a rival team, vying for the same thing that your team of choice is.
Arsenal shat the bed last season, got dicked on by City 3 times, and are celebrating a Charity Shield. It’s genuinely hilarious stuff.
Are they precisely not the reasons why they are celebrating yesterday?
Not to mention the fact everyone that wins the Charity Shield, eh....celebrates winning the Charity Shield?! Liverpool, fresh from a cup double and being pipped to a quadruple, celebrated it last year... hilarious eh?!
Something is hilarious alright
You make some good points in the rest of your post, but this doesn't really make sense because:
1) on here, people definitely (albeit reluctantly) recognised that Liverpool a few seasons ago were very good and deserved to get where they got (though it was an awful feeling), or that City are the strongest team in Europe (with the caveat that they've cheated their way there)
2) the cliché about the table not lying after 38 games doesn't preclude something from being a fluke - Leicester's title a few seasons ago was a fluke for various reasons, it doesn't make it any less undeserved; it did however indicate that it was unlikely to keep things up in the long term
You don't have to agree, it doesn't really matter as the next season will tell more about it. But all the underlying stats, which are usually more useful to determine continued success, do indicate Arse were overperforming last season.
Yeah it was funny, teams winning anything other than Premier League or Champions League should just collect their medals and walk off the pitch without smiling unnecessarily and pointlessly.
When entire seasons of top flight football are written off a "fluke", the word becomes pretty much meaningless.
Who wrote it off?
I guess the Arteta out T-shirts will stay in the drawer for a wee while yet after his major trophy win yesterday.
I can't stand Arteta unsportsmanship. He complains about every damn little decisions on the pitch. Pep, Klopp, Jose and LVG are a saint compared to this nutcase.
Most of the 'hilarious' results from last season came from a club much closer to your heart, so I wouldn't say too much tbf.
I find this quite a lazy comparison honestly. There are a magnitude of differences between Leicester and Arsenal, the biggest one is that instead of us selling two of our three best players last season, we signed them up on new contracts. And instead of barely spending money to strengthen, we've spent £200m+.
The keeping things up in the long term is largely irrelevant compared to Leicester. Won't start with the other reasons such as the linear progress since the end of 2020 rather than a sporadic random incredible season.
Could be a good result mentally as City have easily beat them and can Pep keep all his players hungry after last season plus missing the odd player? Perhaps Arsenal can do slightly better and City drop back a bit. Of course most are expecting Arsenal to flop, they were supposed to collapse to 4th last season but held on close to the end.
Looking at your post history you seem like an oppo on here to WUM. My guess is your really an Arsenal fan posting under the guise of being a neutral Bolton fan. You’ve made 38 posts on this forum the vast majority of which involve taking digs and being critical of Utd or spent in Arsenal related threads talking them up.
Last edited:
It's not a direct comparison, so the rest of your post is irrelevant.
I didn't. Saying a fluke isn't writing it off.
What will happen this season? Tune in this weekend to start finding out.
As a United fan I’d love Lego Pep to fail miserably, and I hope he is sent off this weekend for being a knob in the technical area haha.
As a United fan I’d love Lego Pep to fail miserably, and I hope he is sent off this weekend for being a knob in the technical area haha.
Fine. I’m not sure there’s any substantial difference. Describing an entire season of top flight football as a “fluke” renders the term pretty meaningless.
Hi all. New poster, Arsenal supporter, I come in peace.
A little strange to read about games per week/scheduling as an advantage vs City last season when they can buy 24 worldies and rotate their starting 11 every 3 days as well as having been caught cheating in 100+ instances.
Utd supporters should hate what the City owners have done to the league. If the club isn't punished sufficiently to deter further financial crimes, City will surpass Utd's trophy haul in the next 15 years. City supporters won't care if they were all 'bought' either.
At least with Arsenal, the rivalry between our clubs is legit/fair.
A little strange to read about games per week/scheduling as an advantage vs City last season when they can buy 24 worldies and rotate their starting 11 every 3 days as well as having been caught cheating in 100+ instances.
Utd supporters should hate what the City owners have done to the league. If the club isn't punished sufficiently to deter further financial crimes, City will surpass Utd's trophy haul in the next 15 years. City supporters won't care if they were all 'bought' either.
At least with Arsenal, the rivalry between our clubs is legit/fair.
Not really how the fatigue aspect works though - a intense schedule early on can easily lead to drops in performance later in the season.
However I do agree with most of your points. Some of the United posters in here are doing mental gymnastics to try discredit Arsenal's season. I think there's no reason for you not to push on this season given that you've strengthened well, kept your key players and you have one of the youngest average XI in the league that now has a year of experience behind them of competing for the title.
Pushing on this season could simply mean competing with City again. It wouldn't be a failure for you guys to finish behind them again - I even think finishing top four and getting into 1/8's of the CL would be a decent season.
Let's not go overboard.
We're really not that much different from a few years ago. I'd take the 2016 Ozil and Alexis over this team, any day. Played more fluid football and conceded less goals.
Arteta has spent alot of money in recent years. Time for him to deliver more trophies; preferably a bigger one but I'd settle for the FA Cup, so long as we respectably challenge for the league this season without bottling it again. I also want to see some progression in Europe, but I know that it's our first season back, so won't be easy.
I am happy with another top 4 finish and advanced to the knock out stage of CL. It is understandable that expectation is higher and more pressure is on Arteta given the result last season and the money spent on transfer.
Christ alive.
Tbf he's spot on. You lot are rubbish, you'll probably get relegated.
If your talking about 15/16 when we also finished 2nd, we might have conceded less, but we also scored 23 goals less as well.
I get what he means to a degree. The Ozil & Sanchez years were disappointing because they’re coloured by hindsight. They didn’t amount to anything. But at the time, it felt exciting, it felt like progress. Who’s to say in three, four, five years we’re not looking back at 2023 as another false dawn.
I can just about understand that viewpoint. But don’t agree with it. Arsenal feel different and one of the major differences I think is we have a modern manager now in Arteta who is tactically astute. I love Arsene, he’s our clubs greatest servant, I grew up under his stewardship and idolised the man. However, I do think little by little the game got away from him. Naivety crept into his set-up and we never really put ourselves in a position to challenge properly.
Arteta, love him or hate him, is a very intelligent manager and a product of the modern tactical approach. I have the utmost confidence Arteta can be adaptable and find ways to navigate superior teams or clever set-ups if necessary. Time will tell whether we'll kick on and properly challenge, or this will be another "almost" ignition.
Most refs are crap and deserve being mocked.Nice?
You clearly haven’t considered what the average IQ of a PL player is. Three inches smaller, they’d be digging ditches.
Is this serious? Klopp has been moaning about it for years, as has Pep, as have loads of managers. There’s an obvious advantage in having more rest time between games. Just because fans discuss it doesn’t make it any less impactful.