Official Gooners Thread - A New Hope

[Farrandeelin]

Arsenal must be a crap team if Rooney managed to score against them. 

[Dinny Breen]

As for Arsenal fans, I honestly do believe they are the most patient. They don't demand success. They're the only club who consistently win titles every decade, albeit just 1 or 2 titles, and are always thereabouts. I think the 60s was the only decade they didn't since the 30s. Even during the dark old days of the George Graham years when the football was dire, we grinned and bore it.

True, the fact that Arseal have only 16 managers in it's entire history tells it's own story and having lived through the O'Neill and Don Howe era's I'm accustomed to Arsenal not been a great success, Arsenal is a club that has a culture of trying to do things the right way which is why there was such aghast over Graham's bungs. Arsenal are a club that until recently had gentleman serve players their afternoon tea on away trips, they have a very old, strong and unique culture and I hope that never changes.

Wenger won't be fired because it's just not the Arsenal way and any Arsenal fan over 20 must truly appreciate and accept that.

[Dinny Breen]

Avoid defeat Sunday and the Gooners are back in the title race and actually have the easier run it of the big three, big if considering their Nemesis is back and scoring...the door is ever so slightly ajar...

[ONeill]

The game last year - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_91RmRaioNk

[Norf Tyrone]

Saw this coming. Arsenal shed goals against good sides. 0-3 Chelsea, 1-3 Utd, 2-4 City etc. Clichy, Denilson and Almunia had mares.

I think Wenger's project has to stop. He seems to set the highest of targets and usually gets them. Going through a season unbeaten was the magical high. This time, it's not working. Winning a title with a group of players he has nurtured since their teens, playing total football, just won't cut it against experience, power and class.

Even if RVP had been there, the gaping holes at the back would also still exist. It's a pity he didn't back up his squad this Jan with experience like a Gattuso or a Villa or an Upson - or players similar to that. I think he is stubbornly holding out hope he can still do it with this squad, winning with this type of football.

Fergie's a different breed to Wenger. Alex just wants to win every year and will do what it takes. Amazing the amount of times he plays Park and Fletcher against Arsenal, and Wenger has yet to find an answer to that. It was a replica of last year's CL game.

As for Arsenal fans, I honestly do believe they are the most patient. They don't demand success. They're the only club who consistently win titles every decade, albeit just 1 or 2 titles, and are always thereabouts. I think the 60s was the only decade they didn't since the 30s. Even during the dark old days of the George Graham years when the football was dire, we grinned and bore it.

Excellent post. IMHO the only progress that Arsenal has made this year is Vermallen- a very good signing. I think Arsenal would be dramatically transformed by one player, and that player is Darren Fletcher!

A hard-working, busy midfielder a la Fletcher, and a goalkeeper is all Arsenal are shy when they have their squad fit and healthy. The other thing I think they miss out on is that winning spirit. I think winning a trophy will give some of 'the kids' a winning mentality. That's why I cannot understand Wenger's approach to the cups. A great chance to change the mentality.

Hopefully they still suffer that mentality for Sunday!!!

[AFS]

Saw this coming. Arsenal shed goals against good sides. 0-3 Chelsea, 1-3 Utd, 2-4 City etc. Clichy, Denilson and Almunia had mares.

I think Wenger's project has to stop. He seems to set the highest of targets and usually gets them. Going through a season unbeaten was the magical high. This time, it's not working. Winning a title with a group of players he has nurtured since their teens, playing total football, just won't cut it against experience, power and class.

Even if RVP had been there, the gaping holes at the back would also still exist. It's a pity he didn't back up his squad this Jan with experience like a Gattuso or a Villa or an Upson - or players similar to that. I think he is stubbornly holding out hope he can still do it with this squad, winning with this type of football.

Fergie's a different breed to Wenger. Alex just wants to win every year and will do what it takes. Amazing the amount of times he plays Park and Fletcher against Arsenal, and Wenger has yet to find an answer to that. It was a replica of last year's CL game.

As for Arsenal fans, I honestly do believe they are the most patient. They don't demand success. They're the only club who consistently win titles every decade, albeit just 1 or 2 titles, and are always thereabouts. I think the 60s was the only decade they didn't since the 30s. Even during the dark old days of the George Graham years when the football was dire, we grinned and bore it.

Excellent post. IMHO the only progress that Arsenal has made this year is Vermallen- a very good signing. I think Arsenal would be dramatically transformed by one player, and that player is Darren Fletcher!

A hard-working, busy midfielder a la Fletcher, and a goalkeeper is all Arsenal are shy when they have their squad fit and healthy. The other thing I think they miss out on is that winning spirit. I think winning a trophy will give some of 'the kids' a winning mentality. That's why I cannot understand Wenger's approach to the cups. A great chance to change the mentality.

Hopefully they still suffer that mentality for Sunday!!!

One of the papers at the weekend had a stat that showed that Arsenal's first team squad had fewer winner's medals than any of the top seven teams. United's squad had almost six times as many. Even Spurs had more than Arsenal.

[ONeill]

Good feeling about this match, despite Drogba's tendency to humiliate the Arsenal defence every time he togs out against them.

There's a feeling of nothing to lose - just throw the sink at Chelsea. If it works (even a point is acceptable) then with Arsenal's handy enough 13 game run-in it's game on.

The big doubt though is finding a reason to believe the defence has shored up in a week. Big Campbell, if fit, would be worth a shot.

[ONeill]

Manuel Almunia's nerves add extra edge to Arsenal's visit to Chelsea

Right from the beginning of his Arsenal career, Arsène Wenger has been aware of the particular tension that gnaws at goalkeepers. One of his earliest signings was Alex Manninger, a young Austrian with a strapping physique, terrific reflexes, and bags of potential. What Manninger did not have, however, was big-match temperament. The slightest mistake would antagonise him, and his team-mates soon became used to the sight of him sitting in the dressing room with a towel on his head barking at himself in German.

Arsenal's current custodian shows his torment in a different way. Manuel Almunia is capable of looking so vexed, with the baggage under his eyes causing such strain, it seems he can not have slept for a week. Perhaps he has not. There has been plenty to toss and turn about in between a sobering and error-strewn defeat at home to Manchester United and a visit to a Chelsea team who have slammed seven goals past him in the past two meetings.

Visible nervousness is hardly a useful asset for a goalkeeper. Arsenal's season has been punctuated by individual errors at the back. Not all of them are Almunia's, but sometimes the defenders in front of him lapse in concentration because they appear to be worried about what the man behind them is – or is not – going to do. Will he clear the ball or shank it? Will he come for the cross or stay? Will he catch or flap?

Earlier this season, when Chelsea went through an uncharacteristically vulnerable spell and conceded virtually any time a high ball was hurled into their box, you could sense their defence was similarly uneasy about Petr Cech, whose form hit a rocky patch. Uncertainty is virulently contagious.

As the former double-winning captain Frank McLintock says: "The goalkeeper is absolutely vital. It all starts from there. If he's nice and calm and full of authority it sets everything up in front of him. Almunia has lost confidence in himself. When the ball is knocked back to him he swings at it, he panics."

Even Wenger admits Almunia worries too much. "I think he puts a lot of pressure on his shoulders. Too much," he mused at the training ground last week. "If you look well across Europe you see that goalkeeper is the most difficult job in the world today. And it is even harder in England. Everything is quick, people stand on your feet at crosses. It is a terrible job."

The Frenchman tries to be empathetic. "A goalkeeper is always in a negative publicity. If a striker misses two chances and scores two he is a hero. If a goalkeeper makes a fantastic game and makes one mistake he is a villain. They are under massive pressure because of that fear to make one mistake, knowing that it can kill the team and the game. It is may be the most pressurised job in football."

Almunia's mistakes have been worryingly numerous this season. His ranking, in terms of saves to shots ratio, charts him as 19th in the Premier League. Hardly the foundation required to win titles. Brian Clough used to say that Peter Shilton won him 15 points per season. At some point Wenger has to calculate how many points his keeper is costing him.

Although Arsenal's manager still pledges faith in the Spaniard, the view in the Emirates audience is an overwhelming lack of trust in the club's No1. It is the most hotly debated topic in N5. For how long can he keep his place?

But the trouble is, none of the three young understudies on the books looks ready yet to elbow him out of the way – Lukasz Fabianski has had his own hairy moments, Vito Mannone looked raw when he was promoted earlier this season, and although Wojciech Szczesny (probably the most gifted of the lot) is earning rave reviews on loan at Brentford he is 19 years old and rightly honing his skill.

If there was an argument for strengthening a position of weakness in the transfer window, Wenger didn't want to hear of it.

An eye for a goalkeeper has never been his greatest gift. David Seaman was the perfectly solid base at the club when the manager first arrived, but the selection recruited to emulate him include Manninger, Richard Wright, Rami Shaaban and Almunia, who have all struggled with varying degrees to prove they have nerves for the task. Jens Lehmann, who nobody would accuse of having a nervous disposition, was the exception to that rule, and he was a law unto himself.

Before joining Arsenal in 2004, Almunia had spent the majority of his career in the Spanish second division. Even he did not expect to become first choice for a member of the Champions League establishment. Five years into his time in north London, with nearly 150 Arsenal appearances under his belt, the 32-year-old is still heavily burdened with the pressure of his position.

Wenger has dealt with goalkeepers going through a rotten spell in hardline fashion before. Lehmann never forgave Almunia for stepping in when Wenger suddenly dropped the controversial German. The Arsenal manager is adamant he has no qualms about doing the same again.

"I am not afraid to make a tough decision," he says. "My only target is to make the right decision for the club. But after a game like Sunday we have to believe in our players rather than change half of the team. Almunia has done very well recently. People always look for a scapegoat when you lose a big game, you know."

He then added that Fabianski has "a little issue" with Chelsea after handing their London rivals a gift in the FA Cup semi-final last year, which suggests a change is not imminent. Even so, the Pole is not the only one who must wonder how many more flaps he must watch from a distance before he gets another chance.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/feb/07/arsene-wenger-manuel-almunia-arsenal

[Archie Mitchell]

Groundhog day for Arsenal.

[From the Bunker]

[The Worker]

Goonhog day

[ONeill]

Actually playing rightly

[tyroneman]

Once again completely toothless against a decent defence

Once again bullied by a decent striker

Once again nothing on the bench

why spend money eh Arsene?

[ONeill]

Eboue did more in 5 mins than Walcott did in 70.

[Archie Mitchell]

Arsenal did alright in 2nd half but relying too much on Fabregas to create and score goals.