Last week Rio Ferdinand said something along the lines of “Phil Foden is World Class. Bukayo Saka is not quite there yet”. He then proceeded to name Saka ahead of Foden on the left hand side of his England team.
Fans of Manchester City and Chelsea have tried to create a debate this season, comparing Foden and Cole Palmer to Saka. There really is no debate.
The experts will have you believe Saka is having a slow season. At the same time they will tell you Foden and Palmer have been sensational.
And this is what separates Saka from the rest. His “average” season is better than the others best season of their life:
Saka: 19 Premier League goals and assists
Palmer: 16
Foden: 15
Against West Ham, Saka got to 100 goals and assists for Arsenal. He got to the landmark quicker than Cristiano Ronaldo. And that also highlights a difference between the trio.
Saka is compared to Ronaldo, to Lionel Messi, to Mo Salah, whilst Foden and Palmer is compared to Saka.
Bukayo is the 2nd best right winger in world football – only Salah is ahead of him. When you take into account Saka is 22 and Sarah a decade older, it is only a matter of time until our Starboy is the best on the world.
2 or 3 years ago there were debates between Saka and Jadon Sancho. Last year it was Saka v Dejan Kuluveski. Now it is Saka v Palmer and Foden.”
Each time there is a pretender (and they are pretenders) to Saka’s crown, he proves he is on a higher level.
Saka is simply the best.
Keenos
We worked with the brilliant @CarlBourkeArt to create some fantastic Declan Rice bits and pieces!
In my pre-match blog, I said we can’t expect a West Ham every week. We got one!
Yes, it was only Burnley, but another 5 goals is brilliant for our goal difference – we have now added 11 in the last 2 games and a 19 goals increase in goal difference in the last 5!
Make no doubt about it, we are in this title race.
5 wins since the turn of the year and double figures in our last two games. If this was City or Liverpool the hype would be huge.
We just need to keep doing our thing. Keep winning and see where we end up after 38!
Cedric Soares has made two Premier League appearances for Arsenal this season:
Dion Dublin was on co-commentary for our 3 o’clock kick off against Burnley.
In the opening minutes, he said “Arsenal’s away form has let them down the season”.
Before the game only Manchester City (25) and Liverpool (also 25) had more away points this season than The Arsenal. The 3 points took us to the top of the away league.
“At times they have not been defensively great” was another nugget from Dublin during the 2nd half.
We have conceded 22 goals in 25 games and have the best defensive record in the league.
I do wonder if sometimes these pundits get their jobs for reasons other than their football expertise.
A couple of weeks ago Liverpool were claiming they invented post match celebrations. This weekend it was being made out that they are the only title chasing team to have ever suffered a few injuries.
Against Burnley, Arsenal were without:
Gabriel Jesus
Olexsandr Zinchenko
Thomas Partey
Takehiro Tomiyasu
Jurrien Timber
Fabio Vieira
Manchester City have had over half the season without Kevin de Bruyne, with seeing Haaland also missing a few months.
Liverpool will play the victims if they don’t win the league. They will point to a few injuries and blame the refs for not protecting players. All teams suffer injuries. It is not something new.
Wednesday is it Porto. Champions League knock out football is back for The Arsenal.
Injuries are not an excuse for teams that have spent £100s of millions on large squads of international level players. We just need to keep playing well, keep winning.
Keenos
We worked with the brilliant @CarlBourkeArt to create some fantastic Declan Rice bits and pieces!
Turf Moor, 52-56 Harry Potts Way, Burnley BB10 4BX
Saturday, 17th February 2024. Kick-off time: 3.00pm
(4-3-3) David Raya; Ben White, Gabriel Magalhães, William Saliba, Jakob Kiwior; Martin Ødegaard (c), Declan Rice, Kai Havertz; Bukayo Saka, Leandro Trossard, Gabriel Martinelli.
Scorers: Martin Ødegaard (4 mins), Bukayo Saka (41, 47 mins), Leandro Trossard (66 mins), Kai Havertz (78 mins)
Yellow Cards: Bukayo Saka
Arsenal Possession Percentage: 66%
Referee: Jarred Gillett
Assistant Referees: Darren Cann, Dan Robathan
Fourth Official: Simon Hooper
VAR Team at Stockley Park: VAR Paul Tierney; AVAR Neil Davies
Attendance: 21,311
This afternoon’s match against Burnley may possibly be a milestone one for us, as we could begin a calendar year with five consecutive league wins for the first time in our illustrious history. However, we have won thirteen of our last fourteen Premier League matches against newly promoted opposition, with the exception of a 0-1 defeat against Nottingham Forest last May. Sadly, Emile Smith-Rowe, Takehiro Tomiyasu, Gabriel Jesus, Oleksandr Zinchenko and Fábio Vieira all missed the six-nil (yes, six-nil!) victory against West Ham United at the London Stadium last Sunday, and it remains to be seen if any of these players mentioned feature in today’s match against the The Clarets at Turf Moor.
Although the home side started quickly, it was us that settled down and opened the scoring after just four minutes, when a pass from Gabriel Martinelli found the feet of our captain, whose one-touch beautiful left-footed shot from outside the penalty area ended up in the bottom right-hand corner of the net! A great start to the game. We then started to pass the ball around which frustrated the home side immensely; in fact, Aaron Ramsey picked up the first yellow card of the game when he committed a bad foul on Bukayo Saka, which in essence, was probably built out of frustration more than malice. Picking up a delightful through ball by Bukayo Saka, a confident Leandro Trossard sprinted towards the direction of the goal and tried to go around goalie James Trafford, who managed to get a foot to the ball in order to thwart our attempt to grab a second goal. We were generally playing confidently, using the whole width of the pitch in order to break the Lancastrians down, which overall is a plan that was working very well, and we appeared to be in total control here. Declan Rice and Martin Ødegaard were masterly controlling the central area of midfield and when the boys used the full width of the pitch they looked really dangerous in attack. Our pressure on the Burnley defence was absolutely relentless, as we were not giving them time to think on (or off) the ball, which must surely lead to another Arsenal goal sooner rather than later (we hope). Suddenly, after winning a free-kick just inside the Burnley half, Martin Ødegaard quickly took the free kick and slotted the ball to Bukayo Saka, who zipped off down the flank, but his exceptional low cross was scrambled away for a corner kick by a shell-shocked Clarets defence. After some strange wrestling inside the Burnley penalty area, this time between Ben White and Zeki Amdouni, we were awarded a penalty kick when Lorenz Assignon brought down Leandro Trossard (and received a yellow card for his trouble); an extremely cool, calm and collected Bukayo Saka made no mistake from the penalty spot just four minutes away from the half time break. Despite some good chances for us to increase our goal tally, the first half finished with Arsenal being two goals to the good with no reply from the home team.
Two minutes after the restart, we grabbed our third goal with style and panache, courtesy of our young star striker, Bukayo Saka, who received the ball from our captain, and then simply switched feet in front of a confused defender, and hit a magnificent right-footed shot from the right side of the penalty area in which the ball simply flew like a rocket into the top right-hand corner of the net. Surely a contender for Goal of the Month! Game, set and match to the Arsenal, who were now both comfortable and confident which showed in their general attitude to the match so early on in the second half as well. The match had just simply stagnated, as we were in complete and utter control and were keeping possession and stroking the ball around. Having said that, we were still more than keen to score even more goals; a Leandro Trossard left-footed shot from the centre of the penalty area went narrowly wide of the mark. On the sixty-sixth minute, our fourth goal was scored when Leandro Trossard’s left-footed low shot from the centre of the penalty area ended up into the bottom left-hand corner of the net. Twenty-one minutes before the end of the match, Mikel Arteta made three substitutions with an eye on the Porto match on Wednesday night; Bukayo Saka, Ben White and Leandro Trossard were replaced by Reiss Nelson, Cédric Soares and Eddie Nketiah all of whom would be getting a runout late in the game. Kai Havertz grabbed our fifth goal of the day with a right-footed shot from the centre of the penalty area with twelve minutes of the match remaining, and as our elated supporters were chanting “we want six!” it certainly looked as if that request was entirely possible now. As Emile Smith-Rowe replaced Kai Havertz with six minutes of the game left to play, we casually pressed the home side way back into their own half. Martin Ødegaard crossed a ball into the penalty area for Gabriel to head the ball down into the bottom right-hand of the goal, but it was saved by James Trafford, in an athletic manner. As the Burnley supporters were leaving Turf Moor in their droves, and the game slowed down to its final conclusion, we can all look at these ninety minutes as a job well done. In the six minutes injury time, Martin Ødegaard, Eddie Nketiah and Emile Smith-Rowe were desperately unlucky in not scoring our sixth goal, but it is to our credit as we kept going right until the final whistle, which we did of course, as all great challenging teams must surely do.
It does not matter which way you look at it, this was a superb day out for us in Lancashire. With sixty-six per cent possession, sixteen shots on goal (seven on target) and five goals in the back of the Burnley net, there was absolutely no doubt who were the dominating team in this match today. As we have scored twenty-one goals in the past five Premiership matches, our credentials are there for all to see, as we are now just two points behind Liverpool in the Premiership table, and with an excellent goal difference to boot. Every man played their part in this top notch, five-star performance at Turf Moor, and each game has now become an event, not just ninety minutes of football. The boys are back on Champions League duty in Portugal on Wednesday night, and Newcastle United are the visitors to the Emirates next Saturday night. Exciting times. Well done, chaps!
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: Porto at Estádio do Dragão on Wednesday, 21st February at 8.00pm(Champions 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
We worked with the brilliant @CarlBourkeArt to create some fantastic Declan Rice bits and pieces!
She Wore A Yellow Ribbon 