Why the f**k were we in 'All out Attack' mode after 5 mins??!

[o2be a gooner]

Same vs liverpool??

Seriously- who decides this?!

Teams like Norwich etc don't go to Chelsea with these kinds of tactics

[gco40203]

It was a perfect illustration of wenger's tactical ineptitude. His weakness has always been his tactical nous or more to the point his lack of it. We only play one way which is fine if we were playing fulham, villa or sunderland every week but we don't. Having got it so wrong against city you think he would have learnt but to then get hammered by liverpool and chelsea just shows that he is too stubborn to learn from his mistakes.

The first two goals yesterday were carbon copies of those against liverpool. The player on the ball was left isolated by his team mates pushing too far forward and then pressured into giving it away which then left the defence totally exposed against the fast break.

Yesterday was crying out for Flamini and Arteta to start in the middle to keep things steady for the first half then depending on the game we could go more attacking in the second half. Instead we had kamikaze tactics and game all over after 20 minutes and title challenge over.

[Wembleygooner- raised in hornsey]

because mourinho successfully got under wengers skin and made him decide, rashly, to go that way.

[redgunamo]

no real need to do anything special or different. Just try to play our normal way and see how it goes.

In fairness, we play the same way against Norwich City too.

[Wilsheres Clockwork Toy]

[Pat Vegas]

[Bergkamp's Brain]

If we consider games like this a "free hit", that would say a lot about how we see ourselves in the grand scheme of things.

Personally, I still think our lack of a top quality striker and overall lack of pace is the fundamental problem. Top teams know they can squeeze our midfield without any fear of being caught on the break or in behind. Good teams can employ these tactics without fear, poor teams still fear being caught so sit deep and get diddled eventually.

The gulf between Spurs and Chelsea or Liverpool, this season, is quite big. All three teams used the same tactics against us, but Spurs weren't good enough to make use of their advantage. Liverpool and Chelsea were.

[TRENT COLTON]

"What is wrong with us?! How amazingly arrogant of us to think that having both our full backs pushed up beyond our midfield is an ok situation in the first 10 mins of this game. It's inept, because Gibbs is a fine player already, but he's committed suicide twice and the game's over. In what universe does that sort of play become acceptable? Which other team would be that arrogant or ill-disciplined? I'm so bored with us because that level of ineptitude isn't funny any more and its making good players like Gibbs look like turkeys"

[Deleted Account]

with quality players.

Ferguson could easily negate Walcott's pace leaving him with nowhere to run and he soon sussed out how to contain Henry and later on RVP.

[redgunamo]

Abramovich/Mourinho/Chelsea, do we.

Liverpool is a bit of a googly because, despite not being in the top four last season, they were still able to resist our advances for their best player. This was most certainly not part of our calculations.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

spilled over in to hacking down our players more often than not.

[TRENT COLTON]

:cry:

[David Pleat AHADF (Royal Welsher and monkey lover)]

Wenger went out and blew 42 mill on a player quite frankly Arsenal didn't need when the whole world new the club was screaming out for a striker. Suarez was clearly unsettled and a bit more and he was as good as Arsenals. I swear that Ozil signing was to shut the fans up.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

until cl qualification is assured. That means we will likely miss out on our preferred targets. Not getting Suarez last summer is turning out to be a massive own goal. If the agent knew he had a clause in his contract, we should have forced them to exercise it. Why we made that offer then sheepishly wondered off with our tail between our legs is still a bit bemusing.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

[Bergkamp's Brain]

Wenger waited until after cl qualification as he does these days. This year was a freak as Bale went to Madrid and they had to balance the books. This won't happen next summer. We will be left panic buying at the last minute after we sneak into the cl group stages.

I remember asking people on here whether 24 hours has changed everyone's mood toward the summer dealings. All those ********s and a couple of non-********s who had been moaning had totally changed their tune.

[redgunamo]

The importance of that is easy to understate, imo.

[David Pleat AHADF (Royal Welsher and monkey lover)]

spurs were splashing out in the summer and the unrest of the fans. But amazingly we were talking about the end of Chelsea with their old guard and look what Jose has done there. Remember they may have won the CL but were way of the CL places.

[redgunamo]

We will still be waiting for the others' leftovers for the time being regardless.

[TRENT COLTON]

Perhaps we should've secured that loan deal before we went chasing after Ozil

[Bergkamp's Brain]

He is a touch player and needs a season to settle in.

The down side was that we signed a player that we didn't really need and didn't get a player for a position that we were desperate for.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

I doubt it though

[redgunamo]

to blow our warchest this Summer http://www.awimb.com/images/smiley_icons/ohwell.gif

[LadyG -keeping the spirit of the unbeatables alive]

Wenger is all about winning the game the right way, fairly and with honour. He is not about personal gain and glory and he's like that personally and professionally. He's a man of principle and he's not going to step over you to achieve his goals.

Mourinho does not give a stuff, he is all about his personal achievement and recognition. He wants to be remembered as THE best Manager and he doesn't care who he has to knife in the back or poke in the eye to get there. Everything is about having the focus on him.

Many will see the latter as the right personality type for a football manager. I certainly would like Wenger to be a bit more ruthless like he used to be, and both could be described as arrogant in different ways but I would not swap Wenger for mourinho.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

and we had finished 3rd. It isn't about who much we spend, it is about when we spend it

[redgunamo]

The problem we have with him is, to quote Vincent Hanna, that "he's good."

[redgunamo]

[Bergkamp's Brain]

It was Wenger's choice to buy those players and he got the players that he wanted. Not scrambling about in the death throws of the transfer window to pick up a panic buy. The money available is a bit of a red herring.

[redgunamo]

[Bergkamp's Brain]

In 2012 it was early as we finished 3rd even though we were selling RvP. In 2011, we finished 4th and it was late August even though we were selling Cesc and Nasri. Last summer ..... you see the pattern?

[redgunamo]

Agreed.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

until late August.

If we do have a bit more money, and I can't stress that I mean a bit more, not a lot more, we need to finish 3rd so that Wenger is in a better position to get the players he may want before the World Cup.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

[redgunamo]

somehow hoodwink players into joining us before they can look on Twitter or read a paper and discover that Manchester City or Chelsea would've offered them more.

If they want them, they get them and we pick up the pieces, regardless of whether we finish third or fourth, imo.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

I suggested players that Wenger would want and realistically be able to get. Why didn't we get Higuain? He never went to Chelsea or Man City or Bayern or PSG or Monaco. He went to Napoli. Cutting through the crap, we'd have bought him had he been available in the last week of August.

[redgunamo]

I think Real Madrid always knew they could wait a bit and get more than we were offering. And so it proved.

[LadyG -keeping the spirit of the unbeatables alive]

Hence I wouldn't want him at the Arsenal. But then I'm a principal person as well.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

the way I see it, of course.....

We finished 4th, we had to qualify for the cl group stages, we wanted a striker.

At the time we bid, We had not qualified for the cl, so the club probably budgeted for an offer in the region in the £20M range just in case we fail to qualify. Napoli came in and offered £35M. We lose out. We qualify for the cl, our budget increases and we have more money, but no striker available. The only available player is Ozil, who doesn't quite fit the needs but is a quality player.

The questions to ask are

1) Had Higuian been available in the last week of August, don't you think the club would have made a better offer for him?
2) Had we finished 3rd last season, don't you think the club would have competed a bit more with Napoli for Higuain?

This is all hypothetical but it is logical, isn't it?

[redgunamo]

that Wenger has strict policies regarding what players are worth, according to Him. To His credit, He seems to treat the club's money as if it were His own.

There's scant evidence that He would willingly or knowingly "overpay" for Higuain or anybody else, regardless of the time of year.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

redgunamo wrote on Sun, 23 March 2014 14:30



that Wenger has strict policies regarding what players are worth, according to Him. To His credit, He seems to treat the club's money as if it were His own.

There's scant evidence that He would willingly or knowingly "overpay" for Higuain or anybody else, regardless of the time of year.





In answer to your last point, that is absolutely correct. The theory that I have put forward has never been tested, so it remains just a theory. There is no empirical evidence to test that theory as the conditions have never existed to test it.

[redgunamo]

[Bergkamp's Brain]

Mark Schwarzer v Gonzalo Higuain. One that can be easily mitigated, if desired, one that can't.

[redgunamo]

They say we didn't offer enough.

Even the Suarez pursuit illustrates the point; we would've been happy to pay around 40, apparently, but not more.

I've said it before; once we start paying big money for Wenger's players, we won't actually need Wenger anymore.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

However we may not have had the money for Draxler as we may have spent it on Ozil :shrug: