Watch the AFTV watch along for when they played us at OT, and go to 90th minute stoppage time and I guarantee that sympathy will disappear.
Arsenal 2020/21 - General Discussion
- Thread starter Bubz27
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They made him feel part of the team until one day when we turned up to find a younger and prettier dog fetching balls. I was disgusted. I wrote a strongly worded letter to the captain, who also works down at the local chippy, demanding answers. Only response I ever got was text that said "lol wtf do one prick"".
Did you hear about the big fight at that chippy by the way and what happened? It was crazy.
Getting consistant in the 8th spot.
Actually surprises me how good their defensive record was in the end, 39 conceded so 3rd best. Their problems were passive midfield and poor season from their strikers although Pepe seemed to finally get some good form going in run in.
Arteta will get start of next season but no way he survives another poor run.
Actually surprises me how good their defensive record was in the end, 39 conceded so 3rd best. Their problems were passive midfield and poor season from their strikers although Pepe seemed to finally get some good form going in run in.
Arteta will get start of next season but no way he survives another poor run.
Will be interesting to see how they perform next season. No European football so basically will play one game a week. They have some good players in Partey, Saka, Lacazette, Tierney, Martinelli seems to have good potential, Pepe was better this season, Aubameyang (if he is to stay). Won't be easy for them to attract quality players with no European football though.
That goals against record is surprising. I made this thread mainly based of how well their defence looked at the end of last season. Seems he's kind of kept that up. Now the hard part I guess.
The pluses of no European football means less distractions and have more time to focus on domestics.
The downsides are not being attractive to new players, players wanting to leave because of no European football as well as having less games in a season, meaning some of the squad will know that playing time will be less and resulting in a need to want away to play more regularly... potentially meaning Arsenal may have to cut their squad size down.
The downsides are not being attractive to new players, players wanting to leave because of no European football as well as having less games in a season, meaning some of the squad will know that playing time will be less and resulting in a need to want away to play more regularly... potentially meaning Arsenal may have to cut their squad size down.
No idea mate. I did hear someone shoved a rotten fish underneath big fridge. They must not have taken too kindly to that.
Well basically it all kicked off in the chippy last Wednesday. No idea what sparked it but by the end of the night the fish got battered and the chips were assalted.
Arsenal fans - are you happy that you didn't get pulled into the Conference league or sad that St Totteringham Day didn't materialize this season?
Missing out completely on Europe means you can have a smaller squad fully focussed on domestic games. I don't know how much money you're likely to lose by not being in Europe though.
Missing out completely on Europe means you can have a smaller squad fully focussed on domestic games. I don't know how much money you're likely to lose by not being in Europe though.
2nd in the form table for a while so Arteta is still the dogs bollocks!
What is this Conference League you are all on about?
Its a new european competition, if you win you get to play in the Europa the following season.
Thanks. Wish they qualified.
Kinda wish they qualified for the conference league too. Would love to see them play the 3rd best team in Moldova
No european football so they have to get rid of 5-6 players + decide what to do with Saliba, AMN etc. before then they can even think about signing anyone. Will be a tough, tough summer for Arsenal.
Question is how they can shift Auba with that contract he has. Lacazette has 1 year left I believe so that’s another one they have to sort out.
I certainly didn't want to be in it. The only real benefit I could see from being in that competition would be youngsters getting game time, & by youngsters I mean the likes of Balogun & Azeez who aren't deemed ready for the first team yet but are highly rated. The competition itself means absolutely nothing to me.
As you & others have mentioned, the benefit of no European football is that you can run a tighter squad. Arteta & Edu have got rid of some of the bloat, but there will be more to come this summer. The current squad is this.
GK - Leno, Ryan, Runarsson
Full Backs - Bellerin, Chambers, Soares, Tierney, Kolasinac
Central Defence - Luiz, Holding, Gabriel, Mari, Saliba, Mavropanos
Midfield - Partey, Elneny, Xhaka, Maitland-Niles, Willock, Ceballos, Guendouzi, Torriera
Attacking Midfield - Odegaard, Smith-Rowe, Willian, Saka, Martinelli, Pepe, Nelson
Strikers - Aubameyang, Lacazette, Nketiah, Balogun
Now, Luiz is already leaving, & Ceballos & Odegaard will return to Real Madrid. The rumoured outs look like being Bellerin, Kolasinac, Mavropanos, Maitland-Niles, Guendouzi, Torriera, Nketiah for sure, perhaps Willian as well.
Decisions will have to be made on the likes of Willock, Nelson & Lacazette.
I can imagine the squad looking something like this next season
GK - Leno, Ryan, Runarsson
Full Backs - New RB (Emerson Royal / Arrons) , Chambers, Soares, Tierney, New backup LB (Buchanan, Doig)
Central Defence - Saliba, Holding, Gabriel, Mari
Midfield - Partey, Elneny, Xhaka, Willock, New Midfielder (Bissouma / Berge)
Attacking Midfield - New Attacking Midfielder (Odegaard / Buendia) , Smith-Rowe, Saka, Martinelli, Pepe,
Strikers - Aubameyang, Lacazette, Balogun
I wouldn't be surprised to see another striker in with Lacazette leaving.
So yeah, a lot of work to do. The players I've added are the players we've probably been most linked to in each position & seem realistic in terms of who we can attract, & I've left out the unrealistic links like Hakimi, Camavinga, Aouar.
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I see massive issues with the CBs again. Saliba is unsettled any likely to go with the others not looking that great.
I look at that squad and literally only rate Tierney, Saka, Smith Rowe from this season. Obviously Martinelli is a talent but needs to stay fit this season and play.
I have to admit I was surprised yesterday at the point Spurs were losing to see that Arsenal would have gone ahead of them. In a way, it would have been hilarious to see Arsenal finish ahead of Spurs after their respective seasons. Either way a pretty shocking season and when you see the state of that squad above I can't see anything more than 7th-8th next season again.
Pepe has 15 goals apparently, maybe there's something to work with there after all
There seems to be a question mark over Saliba with Arteta. He'll be assessed coming back, Arteta is saying he'll be a massive part of our future, but I'm just not sure Arteta fancies him for some reason, so I wouldn't be surprised if we sign another right centre back. Ornstein linked us with Kounde today but that's unrealistic, someone like Joachim Anderson seems more realistic.
He finished the season with a flurry, 5 goals in the final 3 games when the pressure was completely off. Decent individual season overall, but just like the rest of his teammates, nowhere to be found when it actually mattered.
Couldn't even get into Tesco value Europe, classic!
@GoonerBear you’ve mentioned a lot of signings based on potential. Saliba too is prospect. Do you believe Arteta is the right man to nurture all these “potentially good” players?
Anyone know approx how much they have to spend this summer?
Question is what they can do this summer... They haven't improved these last seasons, things are rather pointing in the other direction.
They have to hope that they can find some young names that turns out to be hidden gems, cause which big name that would improve their starting 11 would wanna go to a team in decline that can't even give them conference european football?
They have to hope that they can find some young names that turns out to be hidden gems, cause which big name that would improve their starting 11 would wanna go to a team in decline that can't even give them conference european football?
Not sure to be honest, I'm finding it difficult to judge him just now. There's things I see that I like, but there's been plenty I've seen that I don't like. I don't mind a rookie manager making mistakes, the best still do, I watched Tuchel get selections wrong recently for instance, but managers need to learn from it.
For instance, I didn't mind Saliba going out on loan, it was handled poorly & he's admitted such, but I'm hoping that was a mistake & he'll be handled better when he comes back.
I suppose like I've said a few times, next season will be Arteta's critical year. He's had the full season now, he'll have had 2 summer transfer windows, a proper pre season, a chance to really streamline his squad.
Probably under 100M. It will depend what we chose to do in the midfield. Torreira,AMN, Guendouzi almost certain to leave will need to be replaced. Then it depend on Madrid and what they ask for Odegaard. If the price stays reasonable (40/50M), this will probably be on Kroenke like the Partey transfer. If they don't want to sell or asking for too much we'll probably fall back on Buendia/Aouar closer to the 30/40M mark and fill the gaps in the squad at RB/LB.
It sounds like us under Van Gaal we were defensively good yet abysmal in other areas. Also if you look at some of the goals they conceded you can see that the defence is not all that great but they're just setting up defensively to avoid getting hammered.
He's got the summer now to bring in new players and who knows, this could be a turning point if he makes the right signings.
Thanks @awop
Their most important transfer window ever coming up. If they get it wrong they may well cement themselves as a permanent mid-table side.
This is shaping up to be an incredible window, The Clearout Part II
← OUT ← :
Guendouzi (Marseille)
Xhaka (As Roma)
Ceballos (Back to Real)
Odegaard (Back to Real)
Willian (don't care, just leave)
Torreira (Atletico ? Serie A?)
David Luiz (Free Agent)
Bellerin (Real Betis)
AMN (?)
Nketiah (Brighton)
Ryan ? (Free Agent)
So 7 midfielders, 2 defenders, 1 striker and 1 backup GK leaving. That is A LOT of players to replace.
At the moment the half-credible links coming are:
→ IN → :
Bissouma
Odegaard/Aouar/Buendia
Josh Doig
Max Aarons ?
No Europe means we can downsize the squad a little but we need at the very least : 3 MF, 1 LB and 1 GK.
Lacazette : 1 year extension or maybe Atletico reignite their interest after letting Dembele go. Many journos insist we're after another CB on top of getting Saliba back from loan.
Optimistic: 4 midfielders including Odegaard and Buendia/Aouar (already 70/80M for this duo), 1 RB, 1 LB, 1 winger to rotate with Saka/Pepe/Auba
Reality: Probably Buendia out of the three, cheap out on the RB and stick with Chambers/Cedric, give more minutes to Martinelli, Willock, Nelson & Azeez, introduce Balogun on the wing and resign Ryan on a minimal contract.
I think Buendia would be a great addition but do you think Norwich will sell this summer? I know there’s a lot of talk about him leaving but I imagine Norwich will fight hard to keep him for at least one more season.
He’d be a great fit though, if Odegaard goes back he’d be really valuable in plugging that hole.
He wants to leave so anything above 35/40M and Norwich will probably take the money.
That would be quite an amazing surprise.
There was a leak a few weeks ago that the club (and Kroenke) took on another loan of an undisclosed amount to help with this window.
If that 250M is true it could go like that: not necessarily all of them but these are the ones that have been the most credible links.
James Maddison: 60+
Ben White: 45/50
Bissouma: 35/40
Onana: 8/12
Aouar: 20/25
Lokonga: 15/20
Isak (probably too late): 40/45 ?
That's close to 250M and you still have no proper RB and no cover for Tierney at LB. I don't think Isak is doable so that would leave 40/45 for these 2 spots so that's doable but that means we're running it down again with Auba/Laca and hope for the best.
The good thing is most of these are attainable without too much competition.
Outgoing at the moment are:
Xhaka to AS Roma: 15/20M
Guendouzi to Marseille: 10M
Torreira to wherever: 10?
AMN and Bellerin not clear yet.
Kroenke needs to just sell to the Spotify founder, rake in his profit and let an owner that actually cares and is backed by Henry, Bergkamp and Vieira run the club.
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