It Doesn't Have to be Intentional

Everytime someone complains (usually the great Arsene Wenger, and quite rightly) about unfair, violent tackling and over the top physical play, the response usually is, "So he wants us to stop tackling? That's ridiculous!" Or, "So he's suggesting that players go out to intentionally injure their fellow professionals? That's ridiculous!"

B0th responses are strawman arguments. They create this ridiculous argument out of thin air (a strawman), something that has nothing to do with what was originally said, and is easy to knock down. And then, they laugh at it and smash it to bits.

No one's ever said that tackling needs to stop. Every time Wenger criticizes bad tackles, he mentions that he likes the physical battles and the "commitment" in English football. He understands that this is part of the game.

No one's ever said players intentionally try to injure other players. It doesn't have to be intentional. If you drive recklessly on the road, you might not be trying to hurt yourself and others, but there is a good chance that you will. When managers send their players out with instructions to kick and foul and the opposition players, there is a good chance that you will injure them, sometimes badly.

The player doesn't have to be an axe murderer either. If he's going out there sliding in studs up with two legs then he's bound to hurt someone. Maybe Shawcross et al aren't bad people. Maybe they are just stupid. Maybe they don't understand how dangerous their actions are. Either way, they are unfit to play the beautiful game until they change.

I'm glad Danny Murphy has spoken out. I hope more players do. And I hope mindless pundits, managers, and players don't get away with these pathetic excuses.

Our Defensive Combinations and Attacking Defensive Midfielders

Two things I'd like to touch upon.

One, our defensive combinations. We saw against Partizan, Koscielny was rested (or dropped?) and in came Djourou who played with Squillaci.

Although the Koscielny - Squillaci combo resumed on Sunday against Chelsea, I think what Wenger really wants is to have at least one of Djourou or Vermaelen playing together at any time.

The reason is that Djourou and Vermaelen are very good on the ball, and their distribution from the back is excellent. Koscielny and Squillaci, while not terrible, aren't as good with their passing. This might be part of the reason why we struggled to keep good possession against both West Brom and Sunderland.

Toward the end of last season, we had to play Campbell and Silvestre together, and we sorely missed the ball playing abilities of our first choice center halves as Campbell and Silvestre both kept hoofing the ball clear and inviting pressure back onto themselves, or just making awful passes into midfield and losing possesion. We saw a bit of that against West Brom on Saturday, as well, with Squillaci in particular playing some bad passes into midfield.

As the season wears on, our first choice CB pairing might end up being Vermaelen and Djourou (just like pre-season 09). But that depends on the fitness and form of Djourou, who so far has been a bit error prone but that could be mainly down to lack of match fitness.

I just thought of this and decided to share, I don't know if the statistics back this observation up sufficiently. I will check if I get the time, hopefully. Maybe Santry could help us?

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Now, a lot of people have been complaining about Song pushing forward too much. I may be blind as a bat with red tinted glasses, but I have noticed that as well. I don't see much wrong with it either, to be honest.

The key to understand Song's new role is to understand our new formation. We still play a 4-3-3, but the triangle in midfield is sort of switched, and we now have 2 midfielders sitting deep, while one is given the freedom to go forward.
I wouldn't call it a 4-2-3-1 either because Fabregas, Nasri, Wilshere have a habit of going everywhere and if needed they drop very deep to pick up the ball. So there's no AM or second striker, but one of the midfielders moves up to take up that role at times.

But anyway, now that we have switched from a 4-1-2-3 (or 4-1-4-1 as Wenger described it) to a 4-2-1-3(?), Song has more support in midfield, with the other midfielder dropping in line with him to help out with the defending.
This means Song can make forward runs more often, knowing that there is another player there to cover for him.
So unlike what people have suggested, he is not leaving a gaping hole in midfield, but rather alternating with his midfield partner to attack or defend. As we saw against Partizan, Denilson was often times the deepest lying midfielder.

But is Song any good at this? We've seen in the past that he is extremely good at driving forward with the ball. He uses his size and strength well to guard the ball.
Maybe with Diaby or Wilshere alongside him he should do less of this, because they both like to dribble forward, but if someone like Denilson is playing beside him then it makes perfect sense for him to make these runs, because Denilson doesn't do that.

The only problem with this is that Song isn't the best passer. He goes forward and too often tries the killer pass which most of the time doesn't come off. Also, he can't shoot at all (although he can finish well from close range). I'd rather he lay it off to one of his teammates and try to work 1-2s. Or just work on his passing/shooting.

Song's new found attacking mentality isn't a bad thing. It gives us another attacking option if things aren't working well, and is one of the positives of this new midfield set up this season.

Blackburn Glorious Tactic Make Benefit Arsenal

In the game against us last weekend, Blackburn employed the tried and tested method of defeating the big teams - the glorious tactic of aerial football. A very unorthodox, innovative way of playing that catches every team off guard and they end up leaving Ewood park with no more than a point. A point if they are lucky.

The reason Blackburn's tactic is so surprising is that it goes against the very fundamentals of football. Players are required to not use their feet at all. Kicking of the football is not only unnecessary, but also discouraged. Usually, other parts of the body are employed, usually the head, to make contact with the ball, and elbows, shoulders, and sometimes the buttocks to make contact with opposition players. In some town meetings at the center of Blackburn, which happens to be a black hole, that the new tactic be renamed "headball" and Blackburn Rovers FC be renamed the Blacburn Headball Club.

The headball tactic might have been perfected by Sam Allardyce, but it actually came about as a result of the town's efforts to bring in bigger, heavier people to counteract the gravity of the newly discovered blackhole. One of those people was, as fate would have it, Sam Allardyce himself, as well as some of the Blackburn players key to this tactic.

There is also, another, possibly more important reason behind the invention of headball. The problem facing Blackburn was that the ball, when kept on the ground, would be too easy for the black hole to suck up. It would literally disappear into the ground. The solution? Keep the ball in the air for as long as possible, out of reach of the mighty black hole.

People have, in the past and present, called it an "ugly" tactic. But the game against us was anything but. The drying the ball with the touchline towel tactic was condemned by my fellow gooners but I thought it added to the suspense. Blackburn would have hoped Pederson's deliveries were a bit more accurate, though.

But as entertaining as the glorious tactic of headball can be, it can sometimes fall short in terms of end product. Sam Allardyce is constantly criticized for not adopting a more pragmatic approach. Pundits often saying he prefers style over substance. Although that is not entirely true, it is a fact that creating chances of scoring through the air is actually very difficult.

That proved true as Blackburn's only clear chance came with the ball firmly attached to the ground.

Other teams have shown that, at least at home, you can play football and get a result against the big teams. Fulham showed that recently in their 2-2 draw against United. They were passing the ball well, pressing well, and kept United on the back foot for much of the match. Blackburn, on the other hand, were content to give up their home advantage in favor of sticking to their tried and true principles of headball.

In the end, I think as great as the headball tactic of Blackburn is, perhaps they need to risk the ball being swallowed into the ground and play it with their feet. That may not be pretty but it'll give them a shot at becoming more than just a 10th place team.

Blackpool Join Training Session & Theo Plays Center Forward

Earlier today, Arsenal were going about their usual training when suddenly 10 men from the local Blackpool team showed up. They proceeded to challenge Arsenal to a match which our boys eagerly accepted.

But hold on, said the Blackpool players, we only have ten men! So you cannot play Cescman and Robin! Fineeee, said the Arsenal players, and the match was underway.

What Blackpool didn't realize was that this Arsenal side has an unbelievable depth of talent, and even without their two talismanic attackers, they were still too good for the ten men from Blackpool.

In the end, the match ended. The score was six-nil to The Arsenal.

It's easy to overlook such a match, since it was just a training exercise, but it is important to note a few things. One of them being that Rosicky is a genius. I can't believe people wanted him out. Every time he touches the ball, he makes something happen. He knows exactly what to do and when, and has the calmness to pull it off with two or three trolls breathing down his neck.

The other thing is Walcott. He is showing people that he is, indeed, a footballer, and that he does, in fact, have a brain. The man advantage we had helped him, because he was able to leave his right wing duties to Bakary Sagna (who was also impressive) and focused on playing in and around the box. At least that is how I remember it. Anyway, it worked for him because he got 3 goals, which is more than any of the Totts players have scored in the league put together. On today's evidence, I think Theo could play up front if required.

In fact, all of our front three seem completely interchangeable. Chamakh, van Persie, Arshavin, Walcott - put them anywhere you want across the front three and they'll score goals.

The last thing to notice was that we scored 5 goals without Cesc and Robin. Last season when Robin got injured our goals dried up, and although we started scoring again we never did with the same urgency as with him in the side. We just have an incredible depth of attacking talent in this team.

Liverpool Play American Football

Liverpool were being thoroughly outplayed in the first half. Arsenal, although, not creating many chances, were certainly dominating possession, and you felt that if things stayed the same way, Arsenal would find a way to unlock the Liverpool defence.

Roy Hodgson, the wily old manager that he is, thought of an unorthodox yet brilliant plan. He told Joe Cole to sacrifice himself.

After Joe Cole got sent off, the timid, fearful Liverpool finally came to life. They got a goal through some egg nogg and went ahead. While Arsenal, so comfortable in the first half, looked rattled. Hodgson's gamble had worked.

Then Liverpool did something strange. They started playing a type of American football. They would get the ball, move up ten yards, play would stop, then they'd start again . They did this by sending the ball down the wings and looking for throw-ins and freekicks and corners.

This worked as well to confuse Arsenal (they kept shooting over the bar thinking that'll get them points) and ruin their rhythm with all the starting and stopping.

Liverpool also tried some unorthodox time-wasting tactics (a certain slug must be envious) where their players would fall down and pretend to be blind. It all might have worked to give Liverpool the three points, if it weren't for Jose Reina.

Jose Reina, the nice guy that he is, decided that Chamakh's header deserved a goal, and threw the ball into his own net as it came off the post.

Soon the final whistle was blown, but Liverpool wanted to continue and play over-time. The referee, finally showing some sense, wouldn't allow it.

In the end, it was a draw both teams will not be unhappy with.

Silverware The Only Measure of Success?

"Success is measured in trophies."

I read that statement (or something similar to it) almost everyday on blogs or forums. Usually it refers to how the last five or so years have been a failure. It is obvious that we haven't won anything since 2005, and that is not a good thing, but have the years since then have really been a huge failure?

I don't think so. The problem with equating success with the number of trophies is twofold.

First fold is this: Trophies by themselves don't mean much. Peter Hill-Wood said in an interview

a few weeks or months ago that if we had put more effort into trying to win the FA Cup and League Cup we would have, and I agree. Wenger said a year or two ago that winning the Carling Cup and finishing 11th would not be a successful season for Arsenal (that was after the Totts won the Carling Cup and finished 11th), and again, I agree. Success means more than just the trophy count, it means actually doing well the whole season, in competitions that really matter. I wouldn't like celebrating a domestic cup victory if we didn't do well in the league and didn't have the Champions League to look forward to the following season. I suppose it's nice to have trophies to parade around but my opinion is that they don't mean much if your team isn't really any good.

The league is the best indicator of how good your team is. And we've been consistently near or at the top end of the league in the past few years. And we have reached the final once and the semi final of the Champions League in that time as well. So no trophies, but we've done well.

The other fold is that the trophy winning club is very exclusive. The teams that win are most often the ones with the largest stadiums and the largest fan base and the most financial power. If success is only measured in trophies then 18 teams in the EPL last season were miserable failures. It's obvious that trophy count isn't the right criterion for success.

Success for a club is doing the best it can with the resources that it has. In that respect, we haven't done badly either. In fact, we've done very well. We are a club that should be challenging for trophies, but people have to understand that we haven't had the resources that Chelsea and United have had.

If you are one of those who think that success is only measured in trophies, then why you are an Arsenal fan is beyond me. We are not a club that has ever consistently won anything. Our record of winning silverware, or even being one of the best teams, is patchy at best. Arsene Wenger has probably changed that for good because now we are always consistently near the top, challenging for the title. And the teams that beat us are capable of spending far more than we are. That is changing now but that's how it has been for a long while. So you have to understand that while we're competing with these teams, and are supposed to beat them, we're working with a disadvantage right from the start.

So although it's not acceptable that we have nothing to show for our efforts over the past 5 years. Nothing to celebrate. It still doesn't mean we have been a failure. People need to look past the trophies and recognize the good work Arsene has done. The work that I hope he will continue doing for years to come.

If Cesc Had Left

So we have managed to hold on to Cesc, but what if we hadn't?
This kind of speculation seems to be reserved for the doom and
gloomers but I'm going to give it a go, because I don't think the
conclusion would be that bleak for Arsenal.

Earlier on in the summer, before the papers were covered in
quotes from Barca players, there was a lot of chatter about how
Arsenal were a sinking ship - our best players are leaving, our
manager, failing to win a trophy for centuries, will leave at the
end of his contract (and the season). The message was that
Arsenal are in a downward spiral and they're about to
disappear into nothingness.

But is that really true? Cesc is a very important player for us,
but those with an anti-Arsenal or anti-Wenger agenda tend to
overestimate his importance. Not by overestimating him as a
player (that's impossible) but by underestimating the strength
of Arsenal as a club. No doubt the departure of Cesc will be a
setback, but if we look a bit deeper we'll find that it'll be a
setback we'll recover from quickly and completely.

Cesc plays two roles in our team - one as a playmaker and
a scorer, a player who is central to every flowing move, the
fulcrum of the Arsenal attack. The other role is that of a
leader. Not only because he has the armband, but also
because he is one of longest serving members of the squad.
He is relatively young, but he already has a lot
of experience, which is a precious commodity in this
young side. So we need a player or two who can fulfill those
roles. There are few players in our first team that can play
the playmaker's role. Maybe not as well as Fabregas himself,
but well enough for an Arsenal team fighting for the title.
There's Samir Nasri, who did replace Cesc in the
center after his injury, looks comfortable in that role. His
best game was against Porto at the Emirates, and the
way he played, we didn't really miss Cesc. And he topped it
off by scoring that goal.The indication given by his pre-season
performances is that he'll be even better this season. I think
he is the most obvious and immediatereplacement.
The other options include Arshavin, Rosicky, and RvP.
They are all capable of playing in the hole behind the main
striker. They are all very creative and technical players.

But who can replace him as captain? Again we have more
than one choice, but I think our current vice captain RvP
would be the obvious and best successor. He is not only one
of the most gifted players on the planet, but he is someone
who really believes in the Arsenal way and he has the
hunger and drive to lead our players to success.
Then there are our extremely promising young players
like Ramsey and Wilshere. These two are cannot
immediately replace Cesc but in the near future they will
become a crucial part of our first team. I think because of
the incredible young talent we have at the club, the money
we get from Cesc's departure might not all be spent on
immediate signings. Some fans might find that
disappointing but I think our youngsters are good enough
that we don't need too many players coming in from outside.

And I think that is a crucial fact. We can compete without
spending a lot. So we might not be able to spend 50m
every season on new players, but we can rely on our young
players to step up and do the job. And when we do need
one or two signings to complement the talent already at the
club, we have the proper financial backing to do that.
That is, I believe, what makes us so strong, and it is the
reason why our stars leaving us in the past hasn't hurt
us too much.

It is also the reason the papers are all wrong to suggest
that Arsenal are in a crisis. There is no crisis, no sinking ship.
The beauty of what Arsene Wenger has created is that even
if Cesc leaves, even if Wenger himself leaves, the club can
still keep going steadily forward.

Cesc Decision is a Win for Football

"It is important for football that players do not move away. That nobody can just come in and say 'we want him and you go.' So it is important that the policy we entered into a few years ago is productive. And i believe for the whole football world that it is massively important that Arsenal is successful and that there is not only one way to have success in football - to just put a huge amount of money in."

That's what Arsene Wenger had to say about Cesc's staying with us. He thinks this is good for football, not just for us. I agree with him.

Arsenal are trying to accomplish something great. Usually in the world of football the clubs that spend the most are the ones that win. If Arsenal win, we will have done it by spending a considerably less amount of money than Chelsea, United, and Man City. A premiership victory for Arsenal will prove to the world that the biggest, most powerful clubs do not have a monopoly on trophies, and clubs with less spending power can also win through proper planning and hard work.

Keeping Cesc at the club is significant to all of this because it shows that the big clubs can't just swoop in and take whatever player they want without caring about the rules or showing any kind of respect to other clubs. It also shows that small clubs can indeed hold onto their best players to give themselves a good chance at succeeding.

But is the Arsenal approach fundamentally flawed? Will we ever win anything? I do believe we can. I have faith in Wenger and his players, but of course there are no guarantees. That doesn't, however, take away from the fact that our holding onto Cesc is a little victory for Arsenal and football.

We Want To Win Things For Wenger - BS

"He has done great work at Arsenal and we want to win things for him."

Words of Bakary Sagna. I think he is absolutely right - Wenger has done great things at Arsenal. There are a lot of blogs and blog commenters out there that are saying things like "Wenger has taken us as far as he can" but they are way off the mark.

"We're not paying our hard earned money to see a team that doesn't win," they say. Well, besides the fact that no one is forcing them to spend this cash, they are also forgetting the fact that most clubs in the footballing world don't win anything. Ever. The fact that we even have a chance is something very rare, and something to be cherished.

Under Wenger, Arsenal FC has enjoyed, and is enjoying, one of the most successful periods in the club's history. I'd like it if people didn't forget Arsenal's history and where we are in terms of the big picture.

Arsene Wenger is the man who really made me fall in love with Arsenal. I love his dedication to his ideas and his principles, and his patience, which is often mistaken for stubbornness. I love his commitment and absolute focus on his work. His whole life revolves around football and he will sacrifice anything to be the best he can be. He is a bit mad, but he's also a genius. He is everything I want to be.

Let's hope Sagna and the rest of the team does win things for Wenger this season. I really hope so. I also hope he's been working on his crossing...