Category Archives: Arsenal

North London Derby fall out continues as pundits embarrass themselves in criticism of Arsenal

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And the fall out of the Premier League accepting Arsenal’s request to postpone the North London Derby continues.

We have Jamie Carragher tweeting that Arsenal will be “all ok for Liverpool on Thursday”.

The muppet completely ignoring that the only reason Arsenal are facing Liverpool on Thursday is because the Scousers had 13 billion to one false positives which got the first leg postponed.

Then we have his Sky Sports colleague Gary Neville.

In between his political ramblings and announcement that he had joined the Labour Party, he took the time out to say ‘enough is enough’ when it comes to postponements.

Why it has taken him until the 20th game to be postponed is beyond me. His silence on the previous 19 games – from Tottenham to Manchester United, Leicester and Wolves – is telling.

Ian Wright was right when he said Neville only cares now as it has disrupted the Sunday TV show he was being paid to host.

I bet if the game was at 3pm on Saturday, like Burnley v Leicester City was due to be, Neville would not utter a word.

In fact we know he would not utter a word because he didn’t. All this Covid postponement talk only came after Arsenal requested the Spurs game to be postponed. Not after Leicester City got their 4th game, and 2nd in a row since putting out a team in the FA Cup, postponed.

Then you have Jamie O’Haha.

He decided to dig out Arsenal for not plying their academy (note: he never questioned why others didn’t play academy players). He baited Arsenal fans who then piled in, then proceeded to delete his Twitter account.

On his return he took his time to talk about mental health and criticise Arsenal fans behaviour.

This is a fella that now earns a living trying to get a rise out of people and make outlandish statements for attention.

Maybe if he can’t handle getting it, he should dish it out on a national radio station.

And then we go onto Spurs fans.

The irony of Spurs fans crying for the last 48 is that they got the ball rolling on postponements. they were the ones that begged the Premier League to postpone their game against Brighton in December.

It is literally their fault the Arsenal game was postponed. Had they not asked for the Brighton game to be postponed and just got on with it, it would’ve set a precedent and every other side would’ve just cracked on.

And finally we have the countless written journalists calling Arsenal out.

Like Neville, they were silent on the other 19 games postponed. Is it that 20 games is too many? Or is it because it is Arsenal?

Micah Richards is the only man who dared go against the grain and make the point that it is not Arsenal’s fault the game has been postponed; but the Premier League’s fault.

Hey opened the flood gates, created the rules, and now it’s members are taking advantage of it.

The Premier League should never have let Spurs postpone the game. They should have forced them to play like they did Arsenal at the beginning of the season.

It has been forgotten that in the opening 3 games of the season, Arsenal had to play on despite having numerous Covid cases.

Had we requested a delay of the Brentford game, it would probably have been rejected.

Opening game of the season. Friday night. Brentford back in the top League in their new stadium.

Arsenal lost that game and Jamie Carragher was jumping in the crowd celebrating. He failed to mention Covid at any point.

In other news. Fans need to learn the offside rule.

We saw it in Chelsea v Tottenham and again in West Ham against Leeds.

The rule is not that you the attacking player has to be behind the last defender, it is that there needs to be 2 defensive players between the attacking player being passed to abs the goal.

For Chelsea, Kepa showed great awareness by over committing and ensuring he caught Harry Kane offside.

Leeds’ Rodrigo was also about a yard offside when the ball hit him and went in. Those Leeds fans claiming it was not offside as he was level with the defender need to give their head a wobble.

Even Gary Lineker showed his lack of understanding in the rules:

And for those who then doubled down by saying “but he wasn’t interfering with play. The ball was going in” – if the goal was allowed to stand it would have been given to Rodrigo; the man in the offside position.

If scoring a goal is not interfering with play I don’t know what is!

Have a good Monday and stay warm.

Keenos

Tottenham only have themselves to blame for North London Derby postponement

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Football fans are hypocrites.

We all hate diving, yet turn a blind eye when we win a game through a penalty that never was. we all hate VAR until the offside decision is given in our favour. And so on.

Throughout the last couple of months of the pandemic, I have had a consistent view.

Football games should not be postponed due to “Covid and injuries”.

Every Premier League side has registered over 50 players across their A and B lists. To announce they are unable to field a starting XI and 7 subs is just laughable.

It was interesting to note that last weekend, faced with forfeiting the tie, no FA Cup game was postponed due to Covid. Every team managed to put out a side.

Then we return to the Premier League and all of a sudden Everton v Leicester City is postponed due to the visitors being unable to field and XI. It is just a joke.

Therefore I am very dissapointed that todays North London Derby game against Tottenham has been postponed.

But it is not Arsenal’s fault.

The Premier League set the tone back end of 2021 when they postponed a Tottenham game due to Covid.

Then as the festive period rolled on, games got suspended left, right and centre due to “covid and injuries”.

The Football League then postponed the first leg of Arsenal and Liverpool’s League Cup game due to “Covid, injuries and the African Cup of Nations”.

Teams should not be asking for games to be supended. That is all.

However, having seen almost every other club getting a game postponed, it is no surprise Arsenal went down this route. And you can not really blame the club.

As soon as the authorities opened the gates to postponments, it would have been unfair for them to suddenly close them.

What we need is to start next year with a clean slate. Make it clear that games will not be postponed. That teams either put out an XI or forfeit the game.

A final thought.

It is interesting to see the media turn on Arsenal this weekend, whilst they have remained fairly silent on other postponments.

Sky have led the criticism. It seems Gary Neville et al are happy to support postponments when it does not affect their TV show. As soon as a game is postponed that leads to no Sky Super Sunday, they are up in arms.

Do not just blame Arsenal. Blame Tottenham, Liverpool, Manchester United, Wolves, Leciester City. The Premier League. Blame them all.

Pandora’s box was opened when Tottenham begged the Premier League to postpone their game against Brighton.

Todays game should not have been postponed. No game should have been postponed.

Keenos

Arsenal should be targetting Vlahovic AND David

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Dusan Vlahovic

The Serbian striker is one of the most in demand players in world football at the moment.

It is a toss up between Dusan Vlahovic and Alexander Isak as to who I think we should be targetting. Both are a similar age and have a similar profile.

In the end I have opted for Vlahovic over the Swede due to him backing up his excellent breakthrough season (21 goals in 37 Serie A games) with 16 goals in 19.

Isak meanwhile has struggled this season with 4 La Liga goals in 15 games after scoring 17 in 34 last season.

Vlahovic is one of the hottest players in the world this season and there will be no shortage of clubs lining up to secure his services.

Mikel Arteta seems to want a “Giroud-type” upfront. Sacrificing a bit of pace in behind for a forward that can hold up play; bringing his young attacking midfielders into play.

Vlahovic seems to be the right type of striker, with the work rate and hold up play to go with his goals. He also fits in with the age profile of those around him.

He will be a huge investment but will only get better and would be the ideal man to replace Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang for the long term.

Jonathan David

Arsenal were first linked to Jonathan David in 2020 whilst he was still playing for Gent.

At the time I viewed him as a second striker. Arsenal were short of a decent number 10 and he looked like a viable option to play in behind Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.

He would provide a different outlet for the team in comparison to Mesut Ozil – more pace and power than technical ability.

In the end he joined Lille for €30 million.

Whilst in France he has played further forward, but his bet performances have come playing just off Turkish striker Burak Yılmaz.

Arsenal are not only in need of new strikers, but they also need to reinforce the positions in behind the striker.

As it stands we have Bukayo Saka, Martin Odergaard, Gabriel Martinelli, Emile Smith Rowe and Nicolas Pepe.

Pepe is likely to depart in the summer which will leave Arsenal with 4 players for 3 positions. Ideally we want at lease 5. David could fit in as that 5th option.

The Canadian would provide top class cover and competition for Odergaard; giving us a different option behind a main striker.

He is also capable of doing a job out wide; so if Odergaard is out and Arsenal decide to keep a technical rather than physical 10 (IE play Smith Rowe there), David could fill in out wide.

David would also become Alexandre Lacazette’s replacement, becoming the 2nd choice striker behind (hopefully) Dusan Vlahovic.

Instead of us having to sign a new striker to replace Aubameyang, another to replace Lacazette, and an attacker to replace Pepe, we could go for just Vlahovic and David and that is all basis covered.

In the 4 attacking positions, we would then have: Vlahovic, David, Saka, Odergaard, Martinelli and Smith Rowe. Charlie Patino and Folarin Balogun than provide additional youth cover

Keenos