Category Archives: Arsenal

A travellers guide to Arsenal’s potential Champions League opponents

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PSG
Parc dec Princes
Expected allocation: 2,000

The French are cowards.

Do nothing all day, but after the game they like to pick off fans walking home in smaller groups. And Paris is one of my least favourite cities.

The area around the Gare du Nord is alongside Brussels-Midi/Zuid for undesirables. But at least with Brussels there are some half decent pubs in the very near vicinity of the station.

Paris’s only saving grace is that it is very accesible with multiple flights and the Eurostar.

There are better trips available.

Inter Milan
San Siro
Expected allocation: 4,500

The San Siro is one of the worst stadiums I have been too – and I will not be disappointed if it is demolished.

I was there back in 2011 when we lost 4-0 (I think?) to AC Milan. It was a half decent city to drink in – just avoid the main square as that is where all the divvy Arsenal fans will go to chuck beer.

Like anywhere in Italy, the police are aggressive and will very quickly be battering you no matter if you are doing nothing wrong. Just one of the downsides of being an English fan abroad.

The San Siro is a bit like Newcastle’s ground. A long old walk up to be miles away from the pitch. The only difference is you get to sit behing a perspex screen covered in bird shit.

Inter are currently top of Serie A, so based on the chances of us going through, that we have recently played there, and my dislike for the stadium, Inter Milan is one to avoid.

Napoli
Stadio Diege Armando Maradona
Expected allocation: 2,736

There are two sides of Naples.

On a “normal day” it is a great city to visit. Lot’s to see and do and the locals are welcoming. Very little tourist crime as they need the income.

But on a football day it becomes a completely different city, and the dark side of the locals quickly appears. The result is a small away allocation in comparison to the 80,000 seater stadium.

I would advise anyone to visit Naples, but as a city break, not for football.

Lazio
Stadio Olimpico
Expected allocation: 9,000

“Naples light” is the best way I can describe Rome. I was there when we played Roma and, like Naples, the city has two sides.

During the day, it was completely harmless. Locals and Arsenal fans mingling happily together. Then as darkness fell across the city, the trouble began.

We were advised to get a huge park about 2 or 3 hours before kick off. That park was then surrounded by police to stop Roman’s getting in. Eventually we were bussed to the stadium – do not take any loose change as the stewards will rob you confiscate it. Although oddly the bars give you change! They even tried to take my dad’s walking sticks off him.

Beware of oranges thrown into the away end. They usually have razor blades in them.

I was there for Roma, and apparantly Lazio fans are more vile. When we went through (on penalties), the Roma fans then tried to set alight their own stadium. Many of the locals than rush back to the main station (where you get dropped off in the coaches), so that they can take you back to your hotel in an overpriced cab.

No thanks.

FC Porto
Estadio do Dragao
Expected allocation: 3,200

It felt like we played Porto every year during the late 00s with 3 trips in around 4-years.

Cracking city, and Super Bock is probably my favourite beer (still do not understand why it is not easily available in the UK). It will still be chilly in late February, but warmer than the UK.

13-years since we have been there so would not be upset if we had to go back! Decent allocation.

RB Leipzig
Red Bull Arena
Expected allocation: 2,261

The only city on this list that I have not visited, and for that reason it is a “yes” straight off the bat.

A small allocation is not great, and as it is a new city tickets will quickly sell. Another tick in the “I am going” box is that the ground is in the city centre (unlike many German grounds which, like many new English ones are built on the fringes of the city). The ground is around a half hour walk from the main station.

Germany is always a decent trip. The German’s have pretty much the same mentality as the English – drink beer, watch football, drink more beer.

A downside alongside the small allocation is that from the looks of things there are no direct mid-flights from a London airpoty on Sky Scanner and Google Flights right now for February / March.

It is on the list, but those lack of flights are concerning.

FC Copenhagen
Parken Stadium
Expected allocation: 3,856

Spent a bit of time in Copenhagen this year and it is easily one of the best cities I have been to, and less than a 2 hour flight from London.

Hotels are a bit pricey, but beer is cheap if you head to one of the pubs in Vesterbro. I can highly recommend McKluud and Freddys Bar. Bottles of Carlsberg (it is 4.5% over there!) and Tuborg will set you back €2.50.

Arsenal will have good memories (1994) and bad memories (2000) of the city.

Considering the flight time, decent city, allocation and odds of us going through, Copenhagen is the trip I would want most.

Keenos

Arteta criticised for trying to win a game and blamed for horrendous scenes in Turkey

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Is Mikel Arteta the only manager in world football who can lead his team to qualifying top in the Champions League, and yet still get criticised for trying to win a game?

We explained on Tuesday that Arteta would not be playing the kids. It was more important to give those fringe squad players a run out then put some academy players. The fringe squad players can influence how we do this season in the 3 remaining competitions. The kids can not.

PSV had a 100% record in their league. It would have been detrimental to our youngsters development had they started in Eindhoven. It could have been a deer in headlights moment and we could have lost by a few. The same people criticising Arteta about not playing the kids would then have blamed him for playing them…

And gone are the days where you would take some kids in your match day squad so that they could “experience” travelling abroad for a game. Whilst the main Champions League game is occuring, the two teams academies also play eachother a few hours before.

So our U19 team would have travelled to Eindhoven with the senior team. Stayed in the same hotel. Gone through the same match preperation process. And then played against players of their same age group.

We won 3-1, with the likes of Amario Cozier-Duberry, Myles Lewis-Skelly, Charles Sagoe Jr and Ismail Oulad M’hand all playing. For me, it makes more sense for these guys to get game time against a European U19 team, then sit on the bench and maybe get 10 or 15 minutes of a senior game.

And as the old saying goes, if they were good enough, they are old enough. Had Arteta (who sees these guys train at London Colney every day), thought any of them were better than the XI he started with, they would have been playing instead.

Sometimes we put too much pressure on your players, demanding them to start when they are perhaps not ready.

Ethan Nwaneri is 16. Lewis-Skelly is just 17, Cozier-Duberry 18. They are all already playing “up an age group” performing week in week out for our U21 team in the PL2, and faced senior opposition this season in the EFL Trophy. We need to let them develop at their own time.

“But they could have been bought on as subs”.

In this sort of dead rubber, Arteta would have pre-planned his substitutions.

Considering Mohamed Elneny and Cedric Soares have not played for so long, I doubt either were scheduled to play more than 60 minutes. Likewise, William Saliba went off without any clear injury so you have to think that was premeditated.

The plan would always have been to take Saliba off after 60 minutes and give Declan Rice a run out at centre back. This is something that could happen in games considering our current defensive injury issues. It is also a tactic we could use when chasing a game – play a more attacking midfield, move Rice into centre back who then pushes into midfield when we are on the ball.

I am sure had we been comfortably winning, Arteta would have bought Nwaneri on for Elneny and Reuell Walters on for Ben White. But on the 60th minute, the score was 1-1 and PSV were on top the game.

They were controlling the midfield and finding space on our right hand side. Putting Walters and Nwaneri on would have been throwing them into the deep end, weakening the XI where PSV were strong and handing even more of the initative to them.

As soon as Ben White and Martin Odegaard came on, the attacks down our left stopped and we regained control of the midfield.

Towards the end of the match, Arteta put on Emile Smith Rowe.

Like those that started, the Englishmen could have an impact in the second half of the season. It is important that he gets minutes and slowly builds his match fitness up. For this reason, it is surely completely understandable why Smith Rowe came on instead of Nwaneri.

The final sub was Gabriel Jesus – sent on to try and win us the game. Do people really have a problem with Arteta trying to win a game of football? And considering we had no teenage attackers on the bench, the only other forward option would have been Bukayo Saka.

In the end, we drew 1-1. The likes of Jorginho and Kiwior got 90 minutes under their belt. As did Nketiah. Reiss Nelson got 88.

Against Brighton, I imagine we will line up: Raya, White, Saliba, Gabriel, Zinchenko, Rice, Odegaard, Havertz, Saka, Jesus, Martinelli.

Four of those players did not play Tuesday, 1 played less than 10 minutes and 3 played half an hour. Considering we play Brighton sunday (and they are due to play today), Arteta has shuffled the pack well.

We have seen with both Manchester City and Tottenham how quickly momentum can change in football. From flying high at the top of the table to unable to put a run of wins together. We lost last Saturday so it was important that we tried to win Tuesday. And at least we did not suffer back to back defeats.

It is Brighton up next and, a bit like after the Newcastle defeat, we need to quickly get back to winning way.

Post-Newcastle, we won the next 3 Premier League games. Do that again we go into the New Years Eve game against Fulham top of the league!

In other news, it is unbelievable that the media in England are trying to associate (and subtly blame) Mikel Arteta for what happened over in Turkey.

For those that do not know, the president of Turkish top flight team MKE Ankaragucu ran onto the pitch after his team his team conceded a 97th-minute equaliser in a 1-1 draw with Caykur Rizespor and punched the referee.

This has led many in the UK to point fingers at the behaviour of Mikel Arteta.

Arteta’s crime is have the gall to say that the Premier League, being the best league in the world, does not get the officiating its status deserves. Considering every weekend Match of the Day are debating a poor decision, surely everyone agrees with Arteta (and the statement Arsenal put out). But they did not.

It was not that they disagreed with what Arteta or Arsenal said, it is that they hate Arteta and Arsenal. So instead of saying “yes, officials in this country do need to improve, and clubs need to work with them to get better”, they spent weeks defending poor decisions.

The issue in this country is that our referees are poor, and they refuse to accept criticism. Their arrogance means that anyone that dares criticise them gets a ban, and they now influence the media by giving Sky Sports access to decision making.

Turky has a problem with violence against referees. England has a problem with our refs being poor. I am not sure how the British media have managed to blame Arteta for a grown man in Turkey being unable to control his emotions.

On to Brighton…

Keenos

Match report: PSV 1 – 1 Arsenal

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PSV Eindhoven (0) 1 Arsenal (1) 1

Champions League Group B, Matchday 6 of 6
Phillips Stadion, Frederiklaan 10a Eindhoven, Netherlands
Tuesday, 12th December 2023. Kick-off time: 5.45pm

(4-3-3) Aaron Ramsdale; Cédric Soares, William Saliba, Gabriel Magalhães, Jakob Kiwior; Mohamed Elneny, (Jorge Luiz Frello Filho) Jorginho (c), Leandro Trossard; Kai Havertz, Eddie Nketiah, Reiss Nelson.
Substitutes: Ben White, Bukayo Saka, Martin Ødegaard, Gabriel Jesus, Emile Smith-Rowe, David Raya, Karl Hein, Oleksandr Zinchenko, Declan Rice, Ethan Nwaneri, Reuell Walters.

Scorers: Eddie Nketiah (42 mins)
Arsenal Possession Percentage: 58%

Referee: Tobias Stieler (Germany)
Assistant Referees: Christian Gittelmann (Germany), Mark Borsch (Germany)
Fourth Official: Martin Petersen (Germany)
UEFA Referee Observer: Michael Ross (Northern Ireland)
UEFA VAR Team in Geneva: VAR Christian Dingert (Germany); AVAR Tiago Martins (Portugal)

Attendance: c.35,000

Mikel Arteta has certainly rung the changes from the team which lost at Aston Villa last Saturday evening. The centre backs William Saliba and Gabriel, along with forward Kai Havertz, are the only men to keep their places. Amongst the eight changes for tonight’s game include goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale, whilst Emile Smith-Rowe is on the substitute’s bench and could make his first appearance in two months.

We kicked off this final match in Group B tonight, and although it was a very slow start, it was a fairly positive one. Mohamed Elneny tried to slide the ball through to Eddie Nketiah on the right wing but it was well intercepted by a PSV defender, and then as a reminder just how dangerous the opposition can be, as the ball came across into our penalty area, Ismael Saibari had a good chance to open the scoring, but Gabriel denied him fortunately.

A few minutes later, Leandro Trossard took our first corner from the right and played the ball short towards Eddie Nketiah but it was cut out by an alert PSV player. After Reiss Nelson tried to play a one-two with Eddie Nketiah on the edge of the PSV penalty area, which was well defended, and we then won a free kick as Jordan Teze pulled back Leandro Trossard, but sadly the spot kick went nowhere.

The home side started to pressurise us in various areas of the pitch, and although we managed to hold them, they looked very dangerous as they moved around with and without the ball.

At the other end, Eddie Nketiah spun beautifully on the edge of the penalty area and laid it off to Leandro Trossard on the left, who flicked it in towards the back post but it was just out of reach for Kai Havertz.

On the half hour, Mohamed Elneny drilled a great shot towards the bottom left hand corner; the goalie Walter Benítez was beaten all the way but it bounced off the post and out for a goal kick. So close!

Finally, with three minutes of the half remaining, Eddie Nketiah took one touch to control a pass across the edge of the penalty area; he let it come across his body and his second touch was a superb strike into the bottom right hand corner of the net.

Although the home side came back at us during the injury time period, we managed to go into the break one goal to the good.

The home side got us underway for the second half this evening, and within the first two minutes, they came at us quite strongly, and although the effort was neutralised by Gabriel, it served as a lesson for us to be always alert for danger.

Two minutes later, sure enough, they grabbed the equaliser through a clever shot from Yorbe Vertessen after a quick raid on our defence.

The match started to settle down a bit with both sides looking for gaps in each other’s midfield and defence. PSV won a corner, as William Saliba headed behind a cross from Armando Obispo, but Patrick Van Aanholt’s resulting strike went straight into a wall of our defenders, and went nowhere, thankfully.

On the hour, Cédric Soares curled one in towards the back post but it came off Eddie Nketiah’s chest and bounced wide. Cédric Soares, William Saliba and Mohamed Elneny (who looks like he had a hamstring injury) were replaced by Ben White, Declan Rice and Martin Ødegaard, just before an unfortunate collision between Kai Havertz and Eddie Nketiah flattened the latter, and he had to receive medical attention as a result.

A great chance by Reiss Nelson hit the side netting and almost immediately at the other end, a shot by Ismael Saibari hit Aaron Ramsdale’s right hand post and bounced back into play, only to be cleared by Gabriel, confidently.

Eddie Nketiah had a great chance to score, but Patrick van Aanholt robbed him of the chance, and in our defence, Declan Rice was working as a centre back clearing balls and tackling strikers in order to stop any chance of a quick goal by the opposition, who were testing our defence constantly, although Jakob Kiwior has been instrumental in stopping any further goals.

Jakub Kiwior got the ball in the net from a Martin Ødegaard free-kick, but it was cancelled out by the VAR team for offside.

With three minutes of the match remaining, Kai Havertz and Reiss Nelson were replaced by Gabriel Jesus and Emile Smith-Rowe, and shortly afterwards, Gabriel missed the ball and it rolled through to Guus Til, who only had Aaron Ramsdale to beat but the angle was tight and he dragged the shot wide of the far post, thankfully.

In the six minutes of injury time, Aaron Ramsdale made a great save from Mauro Júnior and we almost grabbed the winner right at the end of the game when Leandro Trossard’s shot from close range was palmed away before the rebound shot by Jakub Kiwior flew over the bar; the referee blew his whistle to finish the match shortly afterwards, and overall, both sides were happy with a draw here at the Phillips Stadion tonight.

The good thing is that we still finished top of Group B, and face one of the other seven runners-up in the next round (despite the draw), and as such go into the knockout stages in a dominant position, and although there was nothing in tonight’s game for either side really, both teams made a decent fist of things.

Although there was a lot of changes in the side, which was to be expected, overall, it was a satisfying performance and score, all things considered, it was a fair result.

Remember everyone, keep the faith, get behind the team and the manager, as this season is going to be crucial for our future success in all competitions.

Stick with the winners. Our next match: Brighton and Hove Albion at the Emirates on Sunday, 17th December at 2.00pm(Premier League). Be there, if you can. Victoria Concordia Crescit.

Steve

Too Dearly Loved To Be Forgotten: Arsenal v Racing Club de Paris 1930-1962 by Steve Ingless (Rangemore Publications, ISBN 978-1-5272-0135-4) is now available on Amazon