They have had a lot of things go their way. Not had any major injury issues yet either. Their time will come.
Mikel Arteta | Lego Pep watch
- Thread starter Samid
- Start date
That Man United team won 21 games in the league that season. This Arsenal team has already won 11 with 25 games left to play. We could win less than half our remaining games and beat United's 21 game win tally.
Arteta is one of the best young managers in the world. I think he is better than Nagelsmann. It took a while but he cleared the deck and brought in his own players and sent a message he wont tolerate any rubbish with he way he dealt with PEA.
He has always been considered a soft touch by rival fans, infact going into the season among ETG, Pep, Klopp, Conte, Tuchel. Arteta was considered the odd man out as not belonging as a manager of one of the top clubs in England.
Yes, he has had two 8th place finishes, & we failed to hold onto 4h last season, but there was always work being done behind the scenes that has put us into our current position. He is young and very early into his management career, but he clearly showing signs of being a manager that needs to be taken seriously.
How many injuries are you expecting us to have? A complete decimation of the first 11?
Arteta is shit. End of story
Covid season. Everything about that league season should have an asterisk next to it.
Deserve to be where you are,most impressive thing is being top of the league and goal difference despite Jesus not scoring in 9.
Their start has been incredible. Only three points worse off than us after 13 games in the 19/20 season.
There’re a lot of excuses and explanations being dished out for their start but they begin every single game on the front foot and have deserved to win every game I’ve seen them in this season. They’ll probably finish 2nd as long as they don’t have a disastrous injury run. They’ll definitely be in the top four.
There’re a lot of excuses and explanations being dished out for their start but they begin every single game on the front foot and have deserved to win every game I’ve seen them in this season. They’ll probably finish 2nd as long as they don’t have a disastrous injury run. They’ll definitely be in the top four.
It has been in said in this thread, many times since it's inception. It's just that it's a lazy one that doesn't actually say anything.
As impressive as Arsenal has been, I still can’t stand the sight of this lord larys strong looking cnut. Boring bastard.
They've had a far harder fixture run than Man. City last time I looked.
Already played all of Man. United, Spurs, Liverpool and Chelsea. Man. City only played two of those with the Spurs game postponed. Think by time of break Man. City will also have played two more home games in the schedule as they're at home to Brentford next week while Arsenal have another away to Wolves.
They've done very well to be top so far.
I think we are out of excuses now. They are pretty good and will sustain a title challenge. Probably win it who knows
Not just rival fans considering him a soft touch, it's not long ago there was plenty of Arsenal fans begging for him to be sacked. You're right he is the odd man out at the top clubs because he wouldn't still be in a job at them other clubs after finishing 8th 8th and 5th
As a Utd fan, I do agree with this.
Lots of bitterness in here. I can’t stand Arteta, he’s a dour cnut. But he’s got these Arsenal players purring.
You guys have really forgot the Arsenal boom busy cycle? Arsenal are always going to win the league this year as their fan base and the media would have you believe when they are top of the league in the early months of the season. Cometh January and the fixtures pile up, in the cold wet miserable weather, and by the End of February, flaky Arsenal are out of contention for every honour except scrapping for top 4.
Years ahead of us right now
They aren't collapsing this year
They’ve been massively fortunate enough with a kind fixture list and meeting the big 6 teams when they are on bad form (spurs, liverpool) or depleted with injuries (chelsea). The inevitable collapse is coming and reckon we can still finish above them.
I am still scarred by our collapse for top 4 last season and definitely understand people's distrust in us. I am not fully trusting of this (young) team myself, but even if we can't sustain it this season I am quite confident we are now as close as we've been in a very long time to mounting some sort of title challenge. I don't think this is a false dawn and I think we can now see why the board trusts Arteta.
People will talk about our lack of depth and I don't disagree, but we have had that depth tested already (we've had injuries to Partey, Zinchenko, Saka, Odegaard, Elneny, Tomiyasu) and in all comps have only lost twice (United and PSV) and drawn once (Soton). Arteta has done brilliantly to manage this squad so far, which on paper, looks quite thin. He's definitely exceeded my expectations there.
Worst case scenario ATM is we go into the WC 1 point behind City (if we lose against Wolves and City win their game) and we only have 2-3 players going to the WC (Partey, Saka and Saliba, maybe Jesus). So perhaps the WC won't disrupt us as much as other squads, but who knows. Still, if we can bring in one midfielder and one CF or winger in Jan, I will really start to get excited. Either way, am definitely just enjoying it right now.
Yeah but we stuck with him and look at the dividends being paid.
Maybe this could be us in 2 years,well maybe not due to our clueless board
Your 11 points of the pace which is a mountain for a team that has picked up 34 points from 39. United have also proven that they can't sustain a long enough run to bridge the gap. Your goal difference is also negative (not a good sign)
And if our wins against Liverpool and Spurs don't count due to their bad form, do yours??
We are one month of good results then take an absolute mauling to set us back. Still fear our board won't allow the full reign that Arteta has been given to make wholesale changes
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How long do we say this for? We are 13 games into the season now, we've played 4/5 teams from the traditional top 6, only City left to play. Played 2 at home, 2 away out of those games, and by the time next week comes, we'll have played only 6 home games and 8 away.
It's also mental to talk about easier fixture lists, we've seen how teams can drop points to any team. You can argue it won't last, we won't sustain this, talk about inevitable collapses etc and I might even agree with you, but you just can't argue now with what we've done so far up to now.
Its now morphed into timing of fixtures. For instance United today had to play Emery in his first match as Villa boss - its rather poor timing, had this match taken place two weeks ago United would likely win.
Apparently, we have been fortunate with the timing of our fixtures. Im not sure how though. Weve got Wolves this week. Im sure a reason will be sourced for why Wolves wont be 'up for it'
There’s a lot of delusions and wishful thinking here. When you look at the age of this Arsenal team, not only are we a threat this season, but for years to come. The teams that collapsed in recent years didn’t have Saliba , let alone Jesus and Zinchenko. The new Arsenal, here to stay.
We may very well have a drop, but I find it hard to believe how United, with a -1 goal difference, is going to improve that massively to claw back an 11 point gap. You're going to have to sign Mbappe or something. You had a good Oct then follow it up by being thumped by Villa. If I were a United fan, I'd be worried that you've had 4 games now (Brighton, Brentford, City, Villa) where you were essentially out of the contest by halftime (going down 2 or more goals very quickly). And unlike past United teams, never really looked like getting back into the game.
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You're in a much better starting position than we were though. From the little I've watched of United, Ten Hag has brought some of his tactics in place earlier than Arteta did. Perhaps because Arteta didn't think the players he initially inherited could employ the tactics needed. So initially we looked a bit like a Mourinho side and then we became a side overlapping on the left flank to get the best out of our best player in Auba while defending as a parked bus. Where as Ten Hag has implemented possession football, a high line and passing in triangles from the start. The challenge then is being able to stop counter attacks in such a system. It's something that currently hurts this United team at times and it often hurt many Wenger possession sides. Currently Arteta has a system to stop counter attacks, not infallible as United showed. But essentially the whole team is tasked on winning the ball back as quickly as possible or carrying out a tactical foul to stop the counter attack. You should be a much better pressing side without Ronaldo and getting in a suitable replacement. It's also pretty easy to upgrade the squad with 1 or 2 quality midfielders
One mistake I think you are making is not bringing in a director of football. Ten Hag didn't make Ajax's signings, Marc Overmars did as Director of Football. Now you have Ten Hag primarily targeting former players and 30yo Real Madrid players. You've got some good players but it looks like you haven't got the best scouting and recruitment plan in place. Caseimiro is a really good player right now. But will he be a really good player in 3 seasons time when he's 33? I don't know. If I was a United I'd hope you didn't sign Gakpo as I think that would be a mistake.
Come on now, people really need to stop it with that lazy excuse. We've played 8 of the top 11 currently in the league and 5 of those games were away.
This Chelsea side is the same that Man Utd played 2 weeks ago minus Chilwell. Yesterday, Tottenham played a weaker and more out of form Liverpool than the one we played and yet they lost.
We're not going to win the league, there isn't a team in the world that can match Man City's depth and consistency. But at the moment we're far ahead of Tottenham, Utd and Chelsea. I remember when we were struggling, some posters on here were suggesting that we sack Arteta and go with Potter. Credit needs to be given where its due, we stuck with Arteta and it's paying off.
Is this your version of they.are.afraid?
If you can keep the team together, and not melt down at some point this year.
It's 13 games. This time last year Chelsea were top and Tuchel was great
Very true, and Chelsea eventually ended up 3rd. If we can replicate that, it'll definitely be a huge improvement from where we've been in the past several years, and we would have achieved our objective of top 4. But I think what can be said is how Arteta has improved us each season - he's taken us from finishing 8th (twice), 5th last season, and we have a very good chance of improving on that now. If the board had listened to fans (like myself) we would have sacked him a year or so ago.
Mate, thats the way it will go for you guys this season, purely because you don't have the players yet to play how ETH wants to play consistently yet.
However, the signs are good. To me, you seem where we were last season. Some Arsenal fans have short memories, after 12 games last season we were 5th, we had only scored 13 goals, had a -4 goal difference, largely thanks to a couple of early heavy defeats. Sound similar?
However a lot of Arsenal fans could see what we were trying to do, we just didn't have the proper personnel to do it. I see similar with ETH, and he's barely even 6 months into the job so to see those signs so early is a good sign. Let the guy get in his players over the next couple of windows and I'm sure you'll see the levels and consistency improve further.
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Agree, there are several parallels. However, I think perhaps the biggest glaring difference - which is integral to Arsenal's development - is the backing of board. It's not just the manager. Since Arteta's appointment, it's been clear that he, Edu and the board share a clear, coherent vision for the club. They have a specific profile of players they want. I'm not sure the same can be said of United's board and its relationship/understanding with EtH, though obviously the board has spent money. At least that's what I hear from my United friends.
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It wasn't quite clear our strategy our first window either. We signed Gabriel (Martinez), Partey (Casimero) and a free transfer punt on Willian (Eriksen). So the parallels are definitely there. Utd of course have also spent big on Antony whereas we had to wait until the following summer to spend big but did so on several players.
I'm sure ETH himself will have a clear vision, as long as the board don't interfere to much and give him the funds to invest in the players he wants then I'm sure they'll continue to evolve well.
Yeah your second paragraph is my fears too,let's just say it's not been a good last 24 hours for the club with defeat to Villa, drawing Barca in Europa playoff and scousers put up for sale to boot.
Who should we sign instead of Gakpo because let's face it Ronaldo needs booting in January before top 4 out of reach
Yeah complete lack of goals and being in the minus certainly sounds very familiar indeed,at least when you lost to Brentford away it wasn't 4
I would argue that Arsenals win over Liverpool was more impressive due to the fact that Uniteds win occured when Thiago/ Jota/ Matip/ Konate were all injured and Nunez was suspended.
United beat a Liverpool team that started with Elliot and Milner in the midfield with Gomez in defence (with no attacking options on the bench) so I'd say that was a better time to play them than when Arsenal did (Thiago/Jota/ Nunez/ Matip starting with a good bench).
It could be argued that Spurs had a better 11 vs Arsenal (Richarlison started and was injured by the time the United game came around) too but they did get a red in that game.
Liverpool were very lucky to face Spurs yesterday (injuries and fatigue after away trip to Marseille) IMO.
I think we may be overthinking the fixture stuff, just a tad.
- First it was we’ve beat virtually everyone… but they were easy teams.
- Then it was we’ve beat harder teams… but at home.
- Now it’s that we’ve beaten harder teams away… but at a good time to play them.