Tag Archives: Arsenal FC

Arsenal: 10 Games In, 5 Points Clear

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So we are 10 games in and top, clear by 5 points, who would have thought that!

I wanted to do a write up after the 10th game as I have continually said judge us after 10 games. Well those 10 games are now done but can you judge us on those games? Can you honestly say we can mount a challenge for the league title after being top and 5 points clear after 10 games? I’m not asking you to say we will win it, but can you predict us having at least a challenge this season?

Well lets look at who we have played, as the first thing people say in response to us tablewinning the championship is look at who they have played. We have played and beaten Spurs and Liverpool at home who so far, have probably been our toughest opponents. We beat Sunderland, Fulham and Swansea and Palace all away from home and got a good draw up at West Brom. Our other games were Stoke and Norwich at home which we won and the infamous Villa game.

All in all we havent had that much of a tough start but how often do people say that to win the league you need to be beating the so called smaller teams, and that is what we have done so far.

In terms of tests we are in for a big one in the next 2 months, we have United this Sunday and will also play Chelsea and Man City along with Champions League games whilst also contending with the busy Xmas period.

I say we have put ourselves in with a great chance of being up at the top come Xmas even though the teams we have played and beaten might not convince the pundits that we can win this. Being at the top, leading the way brings confidence and a good momentum to continue playing and scoring like we are. The next 2 months will tell us a lot more about our team and squad, I know a lot of our own fans still need to be convinced and I hope we are still there or thereabouts come January 1st.

In terms of whats different around the club and around the players its hard to put your finger on the dramatic improvement we have seen. We had a good finish to last season, particularly after the game in Munich. We seemed to kick on from that and that’s where our improvement started I think. We have players who are playing much better than they were before, Ramsey, Szczesny, Giroud, Gibbs, we have made 2 important signings in Flamini and Ozil and put all that together with the fact that we didn’t lose anybody in the summer and you can start to see why we are now playing better. Our defence is settled, Gibbs and Sagna in particular are impressing me, Per and Koscielny are becoming a great partnership in the middle of the defence and Szczesny seems to have kicked on a gear. Giroud has his first year under his belt and is leading the line well. The team is confident, you get that feeling that they think they can do something with this group of players and with the style of football they are playing.

The losses against Chelsea in the COC and against Dortmund in the Champions League we disappointing. I felt we matched Chelsea and the game was even until they scored the second goal. A bad mistake by Jenkinson let them get in front and we were fighting from then on. We had good players on the pitch and were pushing forward trying to get a goal back, Chelsea are a team that can hit you on the break which is what they did. I think the Dortmund game was similar, after going a goal down we got back on level terms and had chances to go in front. We were pushing forward and left ourselves open, they broke well and punished us. Both of those games were not to far out of our reach so when pundits say about those 2 games being out first true tests and we failed both of them, I don’t agree with that view. The results could have easily been very different, hopefully we will learn from these games and not make the same mistakes again through the season.

Sunday is massive for us, for the first time in ages we are going to Old Trafford with the possibility of being able to upset them and get something from the game. I don’t think a draw is the worst result in the world, just cannot lose.

When it comes to the games against the big teams, the top 4 or 5, we need to be winning our games at home and not losing away. It starts Sunday.

I’ll be there and cannot wait for it!

Up The Arsenal!

Matt

The Arsenal and Me – Joe’s Story

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February 2005, I was aged 11:

“Sit down Joe, I’ve got something to tell you.”

My Mum made it sound like someone had died in the family, when in fact she was trying to calm the reaction she knew I’d give down before it happened.

“Your Dad’s done it, he’s got hold of those two season tickets from work, your going to Aston Villa vs Arsenal.”

I’d waited years to see my heroes, this unbelievably strong, quick, unbeatable team of Thierry, Dennis, Bobby and the rest. I could do nothing else but burst out crying. There was one catch…

It was in the Holte End, Villa Park.

holte

The “North bank of the Midlands”.

I didn’t care, I turned up in my Arsenal shirt (under a jacket that my old man made me stick on), gloves, hat and I sat there with thousands of Brummies as for the first time ever, I saw The Arsenal walk out live on to the pitch.

“Whatever you do, don’t go mad when they score” the old man warned me.

Within 10 minutes, Freddie scored and amazingly I kept my cool. But when Thierry Henry, my hero and idol from the age of 7 went through and smashed it past Sorensen for 2-0, I couldn’t do anything else but jump out of seat and scream (They weren’t going to attack an 11 year old.) My Dad eventually joined in with me, two southerners buzzing in the Holte End, facing the Gooners at the other end of the pitch. And after Cashley Cole scored what is still one of the best goals I’ve seen from the Arsenal, I was made up.
I genuinely didn’t mind cheering Juan Pablo Angel’s late consolation. My day was complete, and I have been hooked on the drug that is watching the Arsenal ever since.

Luckily, since then I’ve got in the right seat, whether that was for the final season at Highbury, the Emirates or a few away games. Me and my 17 year old brother head up there together a lot now, and people can say what they like about ticket prices, how its “wrong” and how “football has been ruined by money”. And in fairness the older fans are probably right. But for us younger lads, this is all we’ve known. And the thrill and adrenaline rush when The Arsenal hit the back of the net is like no other feeling in the world. Keep backing the lads, eventually they’ll get it right. And hopefully I’ll have a seat when the finally pick up that Premier League title.

Joe

 

If you would like to tell your Arsenal story, click here

Arsenal most followed Premier League club – Full stats revealed

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At the weekend, Arsenal passed 3,000,000 followers on Twitter, making them the first Premier League club to pass through the milestone. This surprised me when I see Mesut Ozil has over 4,000,000 and Justin Bieber has 46,000,000. I thought I would explore how many followers the rest of the Premier League have;

Premier League – 3,014,009
Arsenal – 3,005,680
Chelsea – 2,970,819
Liverpool – 2,086,130
Manchester United – 1,296,966*
Manchester City – 1,275,000*
Tottenham – 689,142
Newcastle – 304,220
Everton – 267,676
West Ham United – 228,383
Aston Villa – 221,244
Fulham – 177,848
Sunderland – 176,191
Swansea City – 171,814
Southampton – 156,853
Norwich City – 155,216
Stoke City – 148,038
West Browmich Albion – 104,770
Cardiff City – 79,997
Crystal Palace – 67,720
Hull City – 59,577

Now a lot can be made from the above data. You could argue that it is a cross-section of society and therefore indicates the level of support of each club throughout the world. But it would be ludicrous to claim that Manchester United have less supporters throughout the world than those above them – their amount of followers was surprisingly low.

What it does show is, Manchester United apart – Arsenal still have a strong world-wide supporters base, still above the nouveau clubs Chelsea and Manchester City. Although Chelsea have shown the amount of fans you can gain through success. Are they now supported more throughout the world than Liverpool? Perhaps.

What is certainly shows is Arsenal’s online presence. For a long time, it has been a belief of mine that Arsenal have the strongest online presence in the UK. We have the most and best blogs & podcasts. We eat up social media. It is why media outlets write so much about us, as they know writing about Arsenal will get more online hits then any other club.

And how does Europe compare?

Barcelona (English) – 10,438,412
Real Madrid (Spanish) – 9,318,902
Barcelona (Spanish) – 5,604,562
Barcelona (Catalan) – 3,898,654
Galatasaray – 3,238,592
Arsenal – 3,005,680
Chelsea – 2,970,819
Real Madrid (English) – 2,734,033
Fenerbache – 2,490,906
Liverpool – 2,086,130
AC Milan – 1,560,114
Manchester United – 1,296,966
Paris Saint-Germain – 900,593
Juventus – 836,397
Olympique Marseille – 774,761
Bayern Munich – 714,642
Borussia Dortmund – 611,246
Atletico de Madrid – 518,833
Inter Milan – 403,667
Valencia – 322,284
Ajax – 277,414
Celtic – 189,556
Olympique Lyonnais – 187,281
FC Porto – 134,317
Benfica – 132,109

A few things jump out. Firstly the popularity of Barcelona & Real Madrid. This clearly shows them as the two biggest clubs in the world. But also shows a fascination with both clubs outside of Spain. The fact that Barcelona’s English account is has the most followers shows the fascination with them outside of Spain, and in the UK itself. Real Madrid’s English account also being high shows the unhealthy fascination with Spanish football and El Classico within the UK.

The second thing was how high Galatasaray and Fenerbache were. this perhaps shows why the ‘Arab Spring’ spread so fast throughout Social Media such as Twitter and Facebook. Twitters popularity in the ‘middle east’ and surrounding area is interesting – and not really for a football blog – but the popularity in Turkey is likely to also be the reason why Mesut Ozil has 3,000,000 followers.

Lastly is the lack of followers both German clubs and other Central European sides have. Which shows more how little Twitter has taken off in Central Europe.

A lot of opinions can be made about Twitter, including size of football following, Twitter throughout the world, and popularity of social media throughout the world. Or you can just say this was boring and pointless.

Either way, I found it interesting

Keenos

*Manchester United also have an Official Indonesian account (93,747), Spanish (31,891) & Malaysian (9,551)
*Manchester City have an additional 9 foreign language accounts totaling 33,202
*All at time of writing, Noon on Sunday 3rd November