Mikel Arteta | Lego Graham Taylor

He completely messed up his tactics after the first goal. I maybe a minority but I felt Arsenal were the better team even if they gave PSG possesion because it felt like PSG had no idea how to beat Arsenal's defence. It could have been an 180 min match and I wouldn't have seen PSG scoring.

The best player on the pitch was Havertz throughout the first half and Arteta dropped him deeper to replace Odegaard when he was their best forward and looking like the only player who could score another goal for them.

Eze should have replaced Odegaard instead of dropping Havertz deeper.

Trossard and Saka looked poor from the start and he should have bought Martinelli on for Trossard sooner.


If United fans can see Gyokeres can't hold up the ball whilst Arsenal are playing long balls I don't really see why Arteta can't. They had alot of opportunities to counter but Gyokeres is just as bad as Hojlund with his back to goal.

I think Arsenal have a very good defence so I see them performing at similar levels for a few more years but Arteta clearly isn't an elite manager.

Arteta's has to renovate Arsenal's attack after spending quite alot of money on that already - but it genuinely seems like its chucking **** at a wall and seeing what sticks.
 
hellhunter said:
They beat Bayern this season already.

Granted though, their path to the final was a sequence of byes and their last outings vs strong sides in the league (City twice, United) weren't great
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A lot of top teams don't really turn up until knockouts, I don't really take stock in the group stage results.
 
For me, as a United fan, the best thing about Arteta is he's brought Arsenal right back to their roots.

Now we can firmly and fully say that the
Wenger era was a blip.

The way Arsenal won the title this season, with Judo from corners. The horrible negativity they showed last night. That was the real Arsenal.

George Graham Arsenal, 1-0 to the Arsenal. Boring, negative, defensive, ugly. The idea of Arsenal being supposedly the best football team in England, which they insisted on for so long, is fully dead.

Arteta has made Arsenal a team you hate watching and can fully lock in to hate watching. I'll always remember him for that.
 
He has to go big this summer and push for Morgan Rogers or another serious creative and industrious player. They can't keep carrying Odegaard, who is embarrasing always hobbling around.
 
#07 said:
For me, as a United fan, the best thing about Arteta is he's brought Arsenal right back to their roots.

Now we can firmly and fully say that the
Wenger era was a blip.

The way Arsenal won the title this season, with Judo from corners. The horrible negativity they showed last night. That was the real Arsenal.

George Graham Arsenal, 1-0 to the Arsenal. Boring, negative, defensive, ugly. The idea of Arsenal being supposedly the best football team in England, which they insisted on for so long, is fully dead.

Arteta has made Arsenal a team you hate watching and can fully lock in to hate watching. I'll always remember him for that.
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Ironically I thought they played the best football in the league in the 22/23 season. They’ve been more successful with the anti-football, but it’s weird that they have totally let go of what they did Artetas first real title challenge.
 
#07 said:
For me, as a United fan, the best thing about Arteta is he's brought Arsenal right back to their roots.

Now we can firmly and fully say that the
Wenger era was a blip.

The way Arsenal won the title this season, with Judo from corners. The horrible negativity they showed last night. That was the real Arsenal.

George Graham Arsenal, 1-0 to the Arsenal. Boring, negative, defensive, ugly. The idea of Arsenal being supposedly the best football team in England, which they insisted on for so long, is fully dead.

Arteta has made Arsenal a team you hate watching and can fully lock in to hate watching. I'll always remember him for that.
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It was a blip. And this is more of the Arsenal I remember growing up, snidy yet defensively sturdy.

Their team is built for league campaigns which explains why they did OK in the group stage and were always going to be difficult to overhaul in the PL no matter how much they tried. In cup ties and finals their attack doesn't do nearly enough. Great if you have a game plan but for some reason he focuses more on the weaknesses of others than strengths of his own players.

Even though PSG were the better side they were fallible. The final just didn't need Arsenal going a goal up because it was obvious they'd offer nothing more.
 
Mike Smalling said:
Ironically I thought they played the best football in the league in the 22/23 season. They’ve been more successful with the anti-football, but it’s weird that they have totally let go of what they did Artetas first real title challenge.
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Arsenal supporting mate keeps pointing that out. Playing nice football got them second places, so trying something different to get them over the line. They also like to mention players being tired and therefore having to play more conservative, but it's Arteta's stubbornness in the first place that leads to players being overplayed. How many minutes did Norgaard even play?
 
TheGame said:
Feck off you insufferable cnut.

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And it was only a matter of weeks ago after West Ham's disallowed goal Arteta insincerly said he finally approached how tough it is to be a referee. Well, Mikel, refs have a tough job whether big calls go for you or not. As it was, Saka could easily have conceded a penalty for handball, Mosquera might have received a 2nd yellow for the penalty he gave away and Madueke's penalty appeal was 6 of one half a dozen of the other.
 
hellhunter said:
Arsenal supporting mate keeps pointing that out. Playing nice football got them second places, so trying something different to get them over the line. They also like to mention players being tired and therefore having to play more conservative, but it's Arteta's stubbornness in the first place that leads to players being overplayed. How many minutes did Norgaard even play?
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You have to wonder if that narrative is just a bit wrong. Yes, they got over the line with this new ultra-negative, set-piece football, but they did so getting basically the same amount of points as in 22/23 and fewer than 23/34. They even bottled a six point lead late, but City just weren’t up for it. I wonder if they couldn’t have won this league being more expansive as well - it would be different if this approach got them 95 points.
 
If this was an exhibition of the best of English football, it was a rather dire one. Conceding possession, time wasting, long throws and relying on dead ball situations to drag the game to penalties. I understand the frustration of coming so close when you haven’t won the completion before but I don’t think any tears need to be shed by neutrals on their behalf.
 
Mike Smalling said:
You have to wonder if that narrative is just a bit wrong. Yes, they got over the line with this new ultra-negative, set-piece football, but they did so getting basically the same amount of points as in 22/23 and fewer than 23/34. They even bottled a six point lead late, but City just weren’t up for it. I wonder if they couldn’t have won this league being more expansive as well - it would be different if this approach got them 95 points.
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Yeah can't disagree with that. I suppose you have to find rationalisation for watching this football all season, so anything to make you cope really. End of the day I don't expect them to care too much, 22 years is a long time. But surely you don't want this to be your Plan A, B and C next season as well
 
Only Arteta could make a Champions League Final look like a League 2 team playing away to Man City in the FA Cup. He has the artillery or maybe even the arsenal to set his team up to be more adventurous than what they dished up. Shit on a stick won the Premier League. Thankfully, it didn't win the Champions League.
 
They played really well for the first 20-30 mins I thought, Havertz is actually an excellent footballer for such a shit footballer. But then they got drawn into the classic Arteta negativity, got tired in the heat (understandable), and dropped deeper along with the tempo. Still had the odd chance but they needed to go for the throat in the first half and get a 2nd goal and they couldn't. That was where the game was won and lost.

I do think they were harshly done by on the penalty in the sense it wasn't even checked by VAR when it 100% should have been - someone certainly fouled someone in that challenge! On the other hand VAR could have easily checked it and ended up giving Madueke a yellow for foul play.
 
hellhunter said:
They beat Bayern this season already.

Granted though, their path to the final was a sequence of byes and their last outings vs strong sides in the league (City twice, United) weren't great
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They are very good beating top sides when it is not a knockout or a crunch game. They also beat PSG last season in Group stages but the moment knock out happens they lose because their football is to grind a 1-0 out. Happened in the finals of carabao as well.
 
TwoSheds said:
They played really well for the first 20-30 mins I thought, Havertz is actually an excellent footballer for such a shit footballer. But then they got drawn into the classic Arteta negativity, got tired in the heat (understandable), and dropped deeper along with the tempo. Still had the odd chance but they needed to go for the throat in the first half and get a 2nd goal and they couldn't. That was where the game was won and lost.

I do think they were harshly done by on the penalty in the sense it wasn't even checked by VAR when it 100% should have been - someone certainly fouled someone in that challenge! On the other hand VAR could have easily checked it and ended up giving Madueke a yellow for foul play.
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No, people think this because we're used to how cowardly refs in the PL do it. It should only go to VAR check by ref if it's clear and obvious. Neither of those apply here and it was the right decision.

VAR barely got involved yesterday because the ref had shit under control but if he made a glaring error, I'm sure they would have. This is how we want VAR to be used.
 
Dirty Schwein said:
No, people think this because we're used to how cowardly refs in the PL do it. It should only go to VAR check by ref if it's clear and obvious. Neither of those apply here and it was the right decision.

VAR barely got involved yesterday because the ref had shit under control but if he made a glaring error, I'm sure they would have. This is how we want VAR to be used.
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Well in that case that's yet another variation on how VAR is supposed to be applied. Red cards, pens, offsides on goals, those kinds of big decisions are all supposed to be checked by VAR. They don't have to tell the ref to stop the game to do that. Honestly I wouldn't mind if rules were made such that VAR interventions were minimal at all but you can't just decide that at the end of the season, they need to pick something and stick with it and I think we all know well enough that they won't.
 
arthurka said:
Arteta is insufferable, just can't stand him.
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This.

His behavior on the sideline; disgusting, disrespectful and extremely childish.

His interviews is even worse. He should be glad that the football team behind him sign such good players for him.

His behavior in the locker room is even worse. Have you seen the documentary following Arsenal. Jesus.
 
Can't stand the man in victory and defeat. Has nothing to do with Arsenal's PL success either, he's just a very unlikeable and irritating bloke. Arsenal's Football on the pitch mirrors that.
 
I really struggle to see where he ends up after Arsenal. Which “big club” will put up with this type of football? Atletico after simeone? Maybe a fallen giant from Serie A (Milan? Juve?)? I can’t see any other big club being happy with this move type of football, even if he won the UCL. He’s shown before that he could set up an attacking team but that was 2-3 years ago & he couldn’t get them over the line so he became super defensive.
 
Arteta would likely be hailed a genius by the usual suspects the media had his tactics succeeded in winning last night, 1 shot on target, 25% possession in 120 minutes and used every dark art possible to bring the contest to penalties and still lost was mildly humorous.
 
Ish said:
I really struggle to see where he ends up after Arsenal. Which “big club” will put up with this type of football? Atletico after simeone? Maybe a fallen giant from Serie A (Milan? Juve?)? I can’t see any other big club being happy with this move type of football, even if he won the UCL. He’s shown before that he could set up an attacking team but that was 2-3 years ago & he couldn’t get them over the line so he became super defensive.
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My hot take is that he’ll basically be a bust wherever he goes post Arsenal. Can see his career following a similar path to another defensive, grating Spanish prick, Benitez.

Feels like there’s been a very specific confluence of circumstances that have worked out for him at Arsenal that I just can’t see repeating elsewhere.
 
IrwinwasbetterthanCarlos said:
My hot take is that he’ll basically be a bust wherever he goes post Arsenal. Can see his career following a similar path to another defensive, grating Spanish prick, Benitez.

Feels like there’s been a very specific confluence of circumstances that have worked out for him at Arsenal that I just can’t see repeating elsewhere.
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Being given 5 years and hundreds and hundreds of millions helps.

Yesterday it was £50m signing after £50m signing that he was able to bring on.
 
IrwinwasbetterthanCarlos said:
My hot take is that he’ll basically be a bust wherever he goes post Arsenal. Can see his career following a similar path to another defensive, grating Spanish prick, Benitez.

Feels like there’s been a very specific confluence of circumstances that have worked out for him at Arsenal that I just can’t see repeating elsewhere.
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Could well be right. Unless he miraculously does a 180 and changes how he sets his team up, I don’t see any big club being an option for him, other than the ones I mentioned.
 
IrwinwasbetterthanCarlos said:
My hot take is that he’ll basically be a bust wherever he goes post Arsenal. Can see his career following a similar path to another defensive, grating Spanish prick, Benitez.

Feels like there’s been a very specific confluence of circumstances that have worked out for him at Arsenal that I just can’t see repeating elsewhere.
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He's not leaving arsenal anytime soon. With the PL win, he has credit in the bank and with the reports of stadium expansion, they might not want to spend too much on players. So he'll become somewhat similar to Wenger in that he will be the front man to manage the football side of the club with bare minimum investment.

(Not comparing him to Wenger - just the situation)
 
Its complete anti football. It was a non league side playing againt the pl in the fa cup. Psg are far from prime barac and arsenal have the players to go toe to toe with them, could've easily got a 2nd goal at 1-0, hes a negative coward
 
Mike Smalling said:
You have to wonder if that narrative is just a bit wrong. Yes, they got over the line with this new ultra-negative, set-piece football, but they did so getting basically the same amount of points as in 22/23 and fewer than 23/34. They even bottled a six point lead late, but City just weren’t up for it. I wonder if they couldn’t have won this league being more expansive as well - it would be different if this approach got them 95 points.
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To be fair I get the tiredness argument that's a very long season.
 
It's alarming how basic concepts like tactics and styles rarely get mentioned.

It seems like alot of people are shocked to see Arsenal set up the way they did?

This PSG side are simply devastating and we've seen how quickly they can pull teams apart. Arsenal or any team currently, cannot match it without being ultra cautious and defensive.

If Arteta set up completely differently, less defensive minded and ended up getting mauled by them 3 or 4 nil then he'd get slaughtered as much.

He set them up to be as effective as possible and in all fairness he was a penalty kick or 2 away from winning it.

He has played to his strengths and it's won him a PL and almost a CL, against the two most corrupt, state run, soulless 'football' clubs in the world.
 
If arsenal attacked and played open they could have done well, but they also could have gotten hammered imo depending on how good psg were. They did not attack well yesterday but they were excellent defensively imo. The time wasting and cheating is pathetic though. Atletico, barca and madrid do this too though, albeit more sporadically in the case of madrid and barca.
 
iKnowNothing said:
He's not leaving arsenal anytime soon. With the PL win, he has credit in the bank and with the reports of stadium expansion, they might not want to spend too much on players. So he'll become somewhat similar to Wenger in that he will be the front man to manage the football side of the club with bare minimum investment.

(Not comparing him to Wenger - just the situation)
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I agree with you, he’s not going imminently, but he’ll leave at some point.
 
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