Author Archives: keenosafc

Great result for The Arsenal? Or another away day failure?

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Having sobered up from what was a decent local away day out to West London, I am in reflective mood this morning. My sunrise yoga session really cleared my mind and forced me to consider yesterdays result.

Was it a great result for The Arsenal? Or was it another away day failure against a top side? And more specifically, another

Having been spanked against Liverpool, and lost away to Stoke, Arsenal were finding themselves adrift in the title race before it even begun. Before yesterday’s game, we were already 7 points behind Manchester City.

A draw brings that in to 6, not a big difference, but that is just a couple of games. It also keeps us just 3 points behind Chelsea in 3rd, and a single point behind Liverpool and Spurs.

Defeat would have been a disaster. It would have meant 2 wins from the first 5 games. A draw is a brilliant result compared to recent games away to top sides in the Premier League.

And it was not just the result, but the performance. We put in a brilliant defensive display, restricting Chelsea to just 1 decent chance. Alvaro Morata was anonymous, and Chelsea showed how much they struggle without Eden Hazard on the field.

At the other end, we were a threat. We hit the post, carved out a handful of chances of our own, and had that goal disallowed. We proved that we can compete with the best teams in the league, even if on this occasion we did not beat them.

A lot will be made of our poor record, but in the last 4 games against Chelsea in all competitions, home and away, we have now W 3 D 1 L 1. Not a bad record!

It is another tough game with a line through it. We always lose to Liverpool, Stoke and Chelsea away, so getting a draw from those 3 games is better than we usually expect.

With home games against WBA and Brighton, and a trip to Watford, coming up, this draw sets us up nicely to start building an unbeaten run. 3 wins from those 3 games will take us to 5 unbeaten. We then visit a poor Everton side before hosting Swansea City.

The draw against Chelsea could be a catalyst which could lead us to winning all 5 of those upcoming games. It will mean we go into the game against Manchester City on an unbeaten 7 game run, and hopefully closer to them in the table than we are now. Hell, beat City and there is a good chance we will find ourselves above them.

The performance also showed no sign of fatigue after the Thursday late-late night game against Koln in the Europa League. That should give us confidence going into further Sunday games.

On the other side of the coin, Arsenal’s poor record away from home against big sides is well documented.

Yesterday’s draw just adds to this poor record.

It is another game Arsenal failed to win, another game Arsenal failed to score in. And it leaves us 6 points behind the Manchester clubs in the league table.

 

Since Roman Abramovich took over at Chelsea, Arsenal’s record at Stamford Bridge has been atrocious.

P 14 W 2 D 3 L 9 F 11 A 27

And 5 of those 11 goals we scored against Chelsea were in a single game.

Yesterday was yet another game without a victory at Stamford Bridge. And another day we failed to score against them.

Since we beat Chelsea 5-3 way back in 2011, Arsenal have scored just 2 goals in 6 games. Yesterday’s 0-0 is part of that run. History will show it is another game Arsenal failed to win, another game Arsenal failed to score.

Keenos

 

Arsenal have a new cult hero?

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Typical Wenger signing. An unknown on a free transfer. #WengerOut was what I saw a lot of people tweeting when we had confirmed the signing of left back Sead Kolasinac on a Bosman from Schalke. How wrong they are.

The signing of Kolasinac is a perfect example why it is not about what you spend, but about who you buy.

When you look at Manchester City spending £150-odd million on full back this summer, we have got the best of the lot in Kolasinac. And he is quickly becoming a fans favourite.

Even if you did not have half a brain, it would not have been too tough to realise that we were getting a quality player in Kolasinac.

Last season he was named in the Bundesliga team of the year ahead of the likes of David Alaba. His numbers were brilliant.

12 interceptions in a single game; the most in Europe’s top 5 leagues and the most assists by a Bundesliga defender in 2016/17. His 5 assists for Schalke was also more than any other player for the club.

Since his arrival at Arsenal, he has grown in stature every game he has played. A tank of a player who battles for every ball, you imagine in another life he would have been a Bosnian War General. He can clearly handle himself.

He has already made his mark for the club this season, with 2 Premier League assists. And last night he scored a fabulous goal. He is an all round defender. He can cross, shoot, tackle, intercept, and bully opponents.

And it is not just his football that speak loud, it is his attitude.

After scoring against FC Koln on Thursday, he raised his shirt to show a Schalke t-shirt underneath. It was to wind up the Koln fans. It is stuff like this that fans love. It is stuff like this that put someone like Lukas Podolski in the fans hearts so quick. It is stuff like this, alongside his performances on the pitch, that will quickly make him the new terrace cult hero.

Just as long as his performances on the pitch are high and not overshadowed by the over stuff, we could be seeing one of our greatest ever left backs slowly develop in front of our eyes.

Sead Kolasinac – It is not what you spend, but who you buy.

Great attitude.

Keenos

Questions to Answer after Chaotic Koln

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I’m trying not to be a complete hypocrite here and I’m sure I’m not the only one whose ever been in wrong end/wrong seat/bought off a tout/jibbed etc, so half of me is thinking well done Koln fans…but tonight was a shitstorm which could’ve ended much worse than just an hour delay, which prevented many fans from staying the whole game….

  • Why did the police decide to escort so many Koln fans to the ground ?
  • Why were the police and stewards totally clueless once they arrived and when they were inside the ground ?
  • Were proper searches done on all fans entering ground ?
  • Why and how did the club manage to sell Koln fans so many tickets in the home end ?
  • Why did the club fail to enforce their own rules on away fans in home seats ?
  • Why did a steward once questioned say “leave if you don’t like it” ? …very professional that one !

The club/stewards/police need to have a proper think over last night, they got it so so wrong on all levels.

The warning signs where there and there early…

The Koln fans have been buying tickets off our ticket exchange on memberships in their own names.

The Koln fans were bragging of travelling in numbers. Local banks had run out of pound notes. The police would’ve been aware of how many had entered the UK.

The Koln fans spent all afternoon marching around London in big numbers, blocking up roads

10,000 (est) pitched up on Highbury field’s hours before the game Yet when they arrive at the ground an hour before kick off there is no plan to deal with them whatsoever.

If this was us at an away it would be a lot, lot different.

Firstly the local plod would do there best to either split us into smaller groups earlier in the day or contain everyone, probably also give us a few digs.

They’d get us to the ground then funnel us in one at a time searching us, checking tickets and sometimes photo ID. Any disorder and they would get the tear gas out and start wacking people. Our club would then be in fear of a fine or points docked.

But last night wasn’t totally about fans disorder.

I’m sure loads did jib in/let in to prevent trouble outside, it was simply about how easy our club made it for Koln fans to get tickets in home seats, they could’ve easy gave them 20,000 tickets in the 1st place and prevented all that happened.

The concern for the future is that it has happened once, it will happen again. Koln have shown that if you turn up on mass, Arsenal and the police will buckle. What will now happen when the mad Serb’s turn up? Or the jibbing Scousers?

Arsenal got lucky last night that the total chaos did not turn into much more than a few Koln fans getting a couple of slaps. It could have been a lot, lot worse.

GC