Tag Archives: sports

5 Arsenal obsessions rival fans need to get over

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Mikel Arteta out of his technical area

There is nothing that winds up opposing fans more than Mikel Arteta daring to stand outside his technical area.

You literally have Aston Villa and Newcastle fans boasting about “only watching Arsenal to count how often Arteta is outside of his technical area”.

How said must your lives be that rather than enjoying a Sunday roast with your family, you are hate watching Arsenal. But not only are you hate watching, you are only really concerned with a man standing outside his technical area – something every manager does. These are grown men spending their Sunday’s doing this. Hard drives need checking I think…

Set Piece FC

Last season it was “Set Piece FC. Arsenal are so boring”.

12 months on almost every Premier League club now has a set piece coach. Those fans that once criticised Arsenal are now celebrating how a dedicated set piece coach has changed their team both defends and attacks set pieces.

The best bit is we are 3 games in and have yet to score from a corner. I wonder if Sky will be putting up their “goals from set pieces” anytime soon? #JoviarOut

Southern Softies

For decades, we were labelled Southern Sofites. Could not handle teams playing physical against us. Rough us up and collapse.

We now have a team of 6ft+ physical specimens. And all of a sudden being a little bit more physical is seen as a negative?

I am sure opponents preferred it when we had diminutive playmakers like Cesc Fabregas, Tomas Rosicky and Samir Nasri. Players who their teams could dominate physically.

When Arsenal were being physically dominated by the likes of Chelsea, pundits put it down as our “opponents wanting it more”. Now we want it more, those same pundits and fans want the game to become non-connect.

PGMOL champions

We won the title, without resorting to sugar daddy spending and collecting financial charges on the way.

I always respected the way Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool won the league (Arnie Slott’s only title was won on Klopp’s work). They were a well run club, had a brilliant manager, and every aspect of the club moved in one. they showed that you could compete, and beat, Man City without having a dodgy Russian billionaire buy you, or become a sports washing project for a Middle East oil nation.

Arsenal have replicated what Liverpool did, and deserve credit. But that creates an issue.

Many fans, including Arsenal, hid behind Man City and Chelsea’s financial wealth for the reason their team was not winning. Now that Arsenal have won, that excuse is gone and they can not handle it.

Rather than just accept that Arsenal are well run, and their club is not, they do mental gymnastics to try and diminish Arsenal’s achievements. The truth is, they should be holding their own team team higher level, then talking about PGMOL title as a coping mechanism.

North London Forever

You’ll Never Walk Alone is an American show tune from the 1945 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Carousel.
I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles is a popular American song written in 1918, released in late 1919.

North London Forever was one mans ode to his home town, Angel. It was never written about Arsenal. It was adopted by fans as a club anthem. And it has more association with Arsenal Football Club then the many American song’s that other clubs sing.et for some reason opposing fans get their knickers in a twist over it.

Yes, we were founded in South London. But we moved to Highbury in 1913. That is 113 years ago. Since then we have had two World Wars and one World Cup.

The irony is, Louis Dunford could have been singing about any white working class area throughout the UK. If opponents stripped away the connection to Arsenal, they would quickly recognise there own deprived areas in his words. It is a brilliant anthem.

Keenos

Ignore the “PSR 4”

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Another transfer window, and the so called PSR 4 are at it again. Chelsea, Aston Villa, Newcastle and Nottingham forest. All doing these strange little deals with each other, summer after summer.

Whilst fans of some of the clubs look at England’s 6 biggest clubs and cry “cartel”, the PSR 4 have shown time and again over recent windows that they are in bed with each other, overpaying for average players to move money about and satisfy accountants.

Their fans “celebrate” selling and buying players at hugely inflated sums like it is a trophy. But the truth is they have all gone backwards since they begun this game.

At the centre of the PSR 4 is Chelsea. Now without a major trophy in 4 seasons, they have finished 12th, 6th, 4th and 10th since they began playing financial games.

Chelsea are now in a spiral where they need to keep doing these questionable deals to keep the business running. It could all quite quickly collapse around them and in 12-months they could be in serious financial trouble.

Whilst their fans “celebrate” these new players, Chelsea’s business these days basically involves them having to buy players they do not really want to sign and selling players they do not really want to sell. Each transfer window, they buy and sell more, giving those fans a new signing endorphin hit. But every summer their squad, their team, gets worse.

Aston Villa fans are amongst the biggest cry babies in football. Their owners have refused to invest in the infrastructure of the club, which would have led to increasing revenues. Instead, they opted to overspend on wages which left them close to spending more on players salaries than they generated in income. Whilst their fans cried that “our owners can not invest what they want”, they failed to recognise that their owners have no interest in investing. If they did, stadium enhancements (which sit outside financial rules) would have already happened.

If have lost count how many dodgy deals Villa have done. And selling Morgan Rogers and gaining Alejandro Garnacho and Nicolas Jackson sums them up.

They basically sold a player they did not went to sell, for a higher fee than they would have likely accepted. Fair enough. But to make the deal happen they have signed two players they do not really want. And the result will be they have also overspent, and their fans will be crying about how it is all unfair. It is their owners choice the route they went down when spending money.

Aston Villa may have seen some success, and risen to 4th in the league, but their financial dealings is now catching up on them. They have lost 4 key players this summer in Rogers, Ezri Konsa, Youri Tielemans and Lucas Digne. Emi Martinez and Ollie Watkins could also be out of the door. Their slide down the table is inevitable and these silly little deals with Chelsea, etc will not save them

As for Newcastle fans, they are only slightly less annoying that Villa fans.

They cry about “having to sell Eliot Anderson due to PSR”, but ignore that around the same time they recruited Joe Willock, Bruno Guimaraes and Sandro Tonali. Maybe they should have developed their own rather than trying to just buy their way to the top.

The Newcastle project peaked in 2024/25 when they won the League Cup and finished 5th. Last season they slide to 12th and this year it looks no better. Whilst their fans celebrate “getting one over the Premier League” by being involved in PSR 4 deals, their squad continues to get weaker.

Finally Nottingham Forest. Just signed Liam Delap for huge money. I would not be surprised if Morgan Gibbs White now goes the other way. From 7th to 16th, I now have money on them to go down this season. Each time they did one of these questionable deals, they sold better players and recruited worse – just like all of the PSR 4.

Whilst fans of Chelsea, Villa, Newcastle and Forest celebrate these deals, it will eventually come to bite them on the arse. They are simply moving debt around, and not resolving their underlying financial issues. This summer, none of them have improved their squads despite huge spending. I think at least one of them will go down. And that is a victory for common sense spending over what these guys are doing.

Compare to the likes of Brighton and Brentford. Well run clubs who are both in Europe this season. You never hear their fans moan about financial unfair play or do these hugely inflated swap deals to increase revenue. They just got on with running good businesses. And they will be a success for it.

What I would say is let the PSR 4 have them transfer window endorphin hit. Ultimately, they are all becoming weaker through this alliance and things will only get worse. Their fans though will keep celebrating their transfer business because it is all about spending big in their heads, not caring who they actually sign.

Keenos

Opening day victory for Arsenal as rivals stutter

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If you were not already optimistic over the new season following last weekends thrashing of football, this weekends results should have more than whetted your appetite.

A comfortable opening day win against Coventry City took us to top of the table, and then the rest of the weekend unrolled.

Firstly we had Manchester United putting the “it was only Coventry” argument to bed by losing to Hull City. Then in the later kick off, Tottenham lost to Brentford.

A few years ago we lost to Brentford on the opening day of the season. Our team was stripped to the bare bones with Covid illness and injury. At the final whistle, Jamie Carragher and Gary Neville were in with the crowd celebrating. Mikel Arteta was being written off and no mention of our squad issues were discussed.

Following Brentford taking Spurs to the cleaners, their apologists were out to whoever would listen. From “bought a lot of players who need time to settle” to “this was basically Spurs’ B team due to their injuries”. The truth is you can not put lipstick on a pig. Spurs have bought a bunch of mid-table players and suddenly were being labelled as title challengers. Meanwhile out title challenge was being write off just because we tried and failed to sign Vinicus Jr.

Moving into Sunday, we very nearly got a great result with Manchester City v Bournemouth. Man City needing two late goals to come back from the brink. More excuses followed of “sold a lot of players” and “new manager”. But all the game did was reinforce what we all saw in the Community Shield – Man City under the ex-Chelsea boss are not the same as Man City under Pep.

Finally Liverpool. A 98th minute penalty to draw against Newcastle. And as with those before them, pundits were lining up to defend them. The justification was new manager, new players, and key players returning from injury. Claims of more will sign and that will drive them forward.

Tonight we have Chelsea. Will they be another title contender to fail to win on opening day? Or will they grab the 3-points in the West London Derby (is that the worst derby in English football?).

All I know is you can only beat what is in front of you. We beat Coventry. Comfortably. Liverpool, Man U and Spurs all failed to win.

Now I am not crowning us champions already. Liverpool won their first 5 games of last season and looked ready to romp away with the title before losing 6 of their next 7. But anyone that thought we would be worse than last season having not signed Vinicius Jr should have had a wake up call. And anyone who thought Man U, Liverpool, Man City and Tottenham were all going to be hugely better also would have had a wake up call.

Next up is Aston Villa away, who I have not even mentioned yet.

Thrashed 4-nil on the opening day of the season. Lost their best centre back in Ezri Konsa, best midfielder in Youri Tielemans and best attacker in Morgan Rogers, the trio could soon be joined out the door by Ollie Watkins. Villa fans put Unai Emery on a pedestal. Some Arsenal fans still try and make the case that Emery has “proved he is better than Arteta.”

The truth is Emery is what he has always been – someone very good at managing the 6th to 8th best team in the league, getting them to top 5 or 6 consistently, winning the odd minor honour, but never capable of pushing them on to the next level.

I would not be surprised if this is Emery’s last season with Villa. They look like a team who will really struggle. Maybe even a relegation battle ahead. And he will crack under the pressure, as he always does, become a tinkerman and then walk away. Villa fans will then blame is all on the PSR fella.

Enjoy your week. It will be a good one!

Keenos