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Paul Hardcastle's Domestic Football 18/nuh nuh nuh 19


PowerButchi

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22 minutes ago, Factotum said:

What did you think he was going to do straight away? I remember Neville talking about it at the start of the year that he needs a season to work out his players etc. There were always going to be tough moments this year. The fact is Arsenal had become toxic at home and away among the fans the last 2 seasons, but the fans are back right behind the team at the moment. There's enough encouragement to show he's getting stuff right. Obviously he'll need a few more windows to build his side. If you look at Klopp's situation it is very similar. I mean even Guardiola took a season to get it right. 

I wasn't saying it like it was a bad thing, I want Arsenal to stay like this.

Plus, this isn't straight away, is it. He's been there a few months now and I don't see what he's doing differently. Solskjaer's been here a few weeks and everyone can see the difference.

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4 hours ago, Factotum said:

The fact is Arsenal had become toxic at home and away among the fans the last 2 seasons, but the fans are back right behind the team at the moment.

You'd be surprised. Up to and including the win over Spurs, the fans were completely behind the team. Since then we've had a real dip in form and once again there is a divide within the fanbase. This time, you have half of them wishing for Ozil to take his £350k a week elsewhere, while the other half are baying for Emery's blood for leaving Ozil out of the side. Sadly I think we can expect this regularly from now on, with different scenarios replacing the current, unless we start winning everything (which isn't happening). The fans are so polarised when it comes to expectations and what they want from the club.

4 hours ago, Devon Malcolm said:

He's been there a few months now and I don't see what he's doing differently. Solskjaer's been here a few weeks and everyone can see the difference.

I'd argue they are different scenarios. The players at Arsenal mostly seemed to want Wenger to stay around forever (one might claim this is because he wasn't pushing them hard enough and gave them an 'easy life'), whereas I think the entire United squad felt freed from shackles once that miserable negative prick got the push. You could've put a mop in charge of that team and they'd perform better for an inanimate object than they did for Jose earlier this season. That said, the run under Ole has been particularly excellent.

I think the Ole situation is fascinating. He did well in his first spell at Molde, but hasn't been touted as a potential top manager since then. But then again, you need the right opportunity to show that- so perhaps this is his calling. Perhaps the team are still reacting to the change and the freedom they now have, and when the team suffer their first loss or bad result that's when we will start to see whether Ole is the right man to take on such a massive club forward long-term. He's certainly edging more and more towards a permanent contract.

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You'd be surprised. Up to and including the win over Spurs, the fans were completely behind the team. Since then we've had a real dip in form and once again there is a divide within the fanbase

I go away with Arsenal quite a bit, and I had to stop going last year as it was awful. Utterly horrible. I think the 'divide' is mainly on social media platforms etc, which maybe I should have been clearer on. At the away games this year the atmosphere's been back to enjoyable and at home there's nobody calling for Emery's head. There's some that question him, no doubt and they should, but there's not the vitriol like there was.

The point about Ole and Emery is rather redundant. Arsenal went on a 22 match unbeaten run with Emery. Its pretty much the same situation.

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They hardly beat anyone of note during that run, and weren't that convincing in the games against lower teams either. I think that run masked over some clear issues at Arsenal.

Could say the same about United and Ole, but I think wins at Spurs and Arsenal have been the key difference.

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We did beat Spurs during that run, plus we avoided defeat against the former biggest club in the world (United), the current biggest club in the world (Wolves) and the most loved club in the world (Liverpool). Yes we did ride our luck in some of those games but there was visible improvement in those performances compared to previous seasons. Those wins against smaller clubs would've been losses in the second half of last season, where we simply couldn't win away from home.

For me we have two main problems to address- defence (doesn't that sound familiar?) and creativity, which is something we haven't had to worry about in a long time. An imbalance has developed in this side- we have an abundance of deep lying midfielders, two excellent strikers, no width in attacking positions, defenders falling to pieces and little creativity beyond unwanted duo Ozil & Ramsey.

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4 hours ago, PunkStep said:

For me we have two main problems to address- defence (doesn't that sound familiar?)

That's my point though. Same old thing with Wenger. And Emery comes out today and says he has enough defenders. Same as Wenger. Are we sure this isn't the plot for Mission: Impossible 7 and it's actually Wenger in an Emery mask?

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Oh it was even more Wenger-esque than that, he also said maybe one or two signings! Wenger dug saying that shit, and then would say 'we did try but it's hard in January' after signing nobody. Just goes to show that it's the noise of the owners coming out of the manager's mouth.

Still, if the Rams win the SuperBowl next weekend, maybe the Kroenke's will divert their attention to winning something with the sawker club they bought instead.

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An absolute humdinger of a Football Trivia question doing the rounds in the office today. I don't think anyone has got any work done for the last 4 hours because of this. I finally caved and after a bit of googling got the answer.

I've played with:


David Beckham
Ryan Giggs
Ashley Young
Patrick Vieira
Sol Campbell
Aaron Ramsey
Michael Owen
Steven Gerrard
Mo Salah

Who am I?

 

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49 minutes ago, Chilly McFreeze said:

I've played with:


David Beckham
Ryan Giggs
Ashley Young
Patrick Vieira
Sol Campbell
Aaron Ramsey
Michael Owen
Steven Gerrard
Mo Salah

Who am I?

It's going to be someone from the GB Olympic team I reckon, otherwise he must've played for United or Wales in order for the Giggs link to work. I thought Craig Bellamy but there's no link with a couple. Daniel Sturridge? I don't think him and Vieira were at City at the same time though. Tom Cleverley doesn't check out with Vieira. Scott Sinclair hasn't played with Salah, their Chelsea careers were too far apart.

 

Oooh I think I have it! Micah Richards! Played with many of them for Team GB, with Salah at Fiorentina, and the rest for England or City!

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Leicester are about to bring in Tielemans on loan, with Adrien Silva going the other way. That could be a superb signing, pretty jealous of that. We should be confirming the signing of Denis Suarez soon. I don't know much about him, but I hope he's the second coming of Santi Cazorla. Perisic could be next.

No defenders though! We have Lichtsteiner instead, who moves about as fast as Scott Steiner does.

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