Really tough one today, this. Tough because the margin for error basically feels zero. Tough because it's away from home. Tough because of memories of injustice that linger from last season. Tough because Newcastle are a good team and, as I said yesterday, better than their league table position suggests. And tough because Jarred Gillett [...]
That felt very much like a professional 'job done' from Arteta and the boys last night. It literally felt like the archetypal result that ticked all of the boxes: Minutes into legs of squad players Young players given the opportunity to shine Comfortable result Controlling possession and football played Arteta's way No new injuries (that [...]
It's the first of four away ones tonight and I don't think you'll get many Arsenal fans arguing the toss over this one being the bottom of the pecking order in terms of 'must win' priorities. Preston away and the League Cup is a 'nice to have' and whilst Mikel Arteta was keen to stress [...]
In the pub before a ball was kicked, I said I would have taken a draw yesterday, so in the cold light of this Monday morning, it would be churlish of me to decry and bemoan the fact we dropped points against Liverpool yesterday. I was in a slightly unfamiliar territory in the upper tier [...]
Big game today. VERY big game. Made even bigger, even tougher, by the fact we have a number of question marks over players. We know Odegaard and Saliba are 100% out, we can be pretty sure about Calafiori, but what about Saka? Timber? There are so many questions that we all want answered and all [...]
Welcome to the part of the week in which we Arsenal fans should be calling this season: Praying time. It's that period in which we still have a solid three-and-a-bit days before we play, we won't get Mikel Arteta's press conference until tomorrow, so all we're doing is scrolling through endless speculative injury-update ITKs saying [...]
If the hope was that last night's game was supposed to inject a little bit more swagger in to the Arsenal collective psyche last night, both for the fans as much as the players and coaching staff, I think it is fair to say that all didn't go exactly to plan. Ultimately, we got the [...]
Never have I been so glad of the frequency of games at this time of the season than now. On Sunday I managed to avoid stewing on the result to much, I had a little say on the Bournemouth game yesterday but thankfully, mercifully, we have a home match against Shaktar Donestk to focus on [...]
Spent the weekend at an AirBnB which had it's own sauna, cinema room, jacuzzi and pool this weekend, so when I woke up yesterday having watched the game on m iPad, I couldn't really be arsed to pen any thoughts. Why ruin a perfect Sunday ahead by re-living the memory, eh? A new week also [...]
Tricky one, this one today, because Bournemouth are no mugs. As Arteta said, Antonio Iraloa has created a well-drilled, well-coached, progressive passing (they’re seventh in the league on progressive passing numbers just behind us, Liverpool, Brighton, City and The Scum) team who have not had some of the results they - and a few - [...]