Category Archives: Arsecast

Arsecast
April 26, 2013 posted by arseblog

Sideshows, defence + Arsecast 276

Sideshows, defence + Arsecast 276

Morning all and welcome to a sunny Friday.

Sideshows. Fun things in their literal sense. There’s the main event but there’s also something on the side to divert and amuse us. It’s little known, but during his Glass Spider Tour, David Bowie provided a number of these, including otter throwing stalls and beat poets who were so androgynous even the great man himself couldn’t tell if it was a boy or a girl.

They were a distraction, something to take your focus off the fact that even his incredible red suits and LED spider stage couldn’t make up for the fact that Bowie made a song with Mickey Rourke rapping in it (don’t believe me? Look it up). That’s something we’re faced with this weekend.

All the focus is on the fact that the Dutch Skunk is coming back, but the main event is far, far more important than any former player, regardless of how horrendous, traitorous and downright despicable he is. I’ll admit I love the pantomime of it. The guy who, regardless of what else happens, unites the crowd. Sure, there are some who think he was right to leave, others who think that by behaving the way he did he is history’s greatest monster, but during those 90 minutes I don’t think there’ll be too many people pleading his case.

Tim Stillman addresses this in his splendid column this week so I don’t want to go on about it, but underneath the cape and twirling moustache and mwa ha ha ha of it all, there’s a very important football match for Arsenal to concentrate on. While a good result will be made all the sweeter because of the circumstances, the bottom line is we need something from this game as the race for the top four draws to a close.

I don’t think the players will be as distracted as the fans, in fairness. For them players coming and going is part and parcel of professional life. There’ll be some back-slappery and maybe a few jokes but they’ll be fully focused on what needs to be done on the pitch. As Tim, and others have said during this week, perhaps the fact they’ll have to stand and applaud the champions will sting them, give them that bit extra they need to take points against a team that have won 12 games away from home this season, more than anyone else.

At Old Trafford Arsenal played poorly but handed United, and him (of all people), an early lead with the kind of defensive lapse which, eventually, saw Thomas Vermaelen consigned to the bench, and Arsene Wenger says recent improvement at the back has played a key role in the recent good form:

That’s where we’ve improved the most, it’s very important for the confidence of the team that we have such a [defensive] stability. As I said many times, we are an offensive team, but you are only a good offensive team if you have a good defensive stability. In the last two months that was much better.

I’m still not 100% convinced the balance is right but there’s no question being solid at the back is the best platform on which to base your game. For too long this season it was about scoring as many as possible and hoping we could keep the opposition out. When it worked, it was kind of spectacular and enjoyable. The 7-3 win against Newcastle was tremendous fun but the kind of game that would have people weeping into their coaching manuals.

And the issue was that when we didn’t score, or when our attacking game failed to click (not an irregular occurrence), we were banjaxed because clean sheets were hard to come by. It got so desperate that one of the solutions was to throw Serge Gnabry into the mix. A fine talent and obviously a player with potential, but so not ready for first team football at this stage.

The answer was to go back to basics from a defensive point of view. It took too long, and some untimely defeats to bring the manager to that conclusion, but better late than never, I suppose, and the upshot has been us taking 19 of the last 21 points and we’ve lost just once in the last 14 Premier League games. Laurent Koscielny puts this down to the protection offered by the midfield, Ramsey and Arteta in particular, but there’s been an improvement all through the team.

Sunday will likely be the toughest test yet of the team’s new-found defensive capabilities, but with points so valuable, we have to find the kind of efficiency that brought about the win in Munich. We had fewer chances than they did, but took them, and we’ve been a little below par in terms of creativity in recent games. Obviously, there’s plenty more to talk about before kick off and we’ll do that over the next couple of days.

Other than that there’s a heap of speculation this morning linking us to Fiorentina striker Stefan Jovetic, but unless there’s something concrete this, like the return of Sideshow Rob, is a distraction from what we need to do between now and the end of the season.

Right then, onto this week’s Arsecast and I’m joined to discuss the week that was by Philippe Auclair. On the agenda, Suarez and The FA, the United game this weekend, who the manager is going to pick up top and what other changes he might make ahead of the game. There’s some Amaury Bischoff PI and the usual waffle in there too.

You can subscribe to the Arsecast on iTunes by clicking here. Or if you want to subscribe directly to the feed URL you can do so too (this is a much better way to do it as you don’t experience the delays from iTunes). To download this week’s Arsecast directly – click here 21mb MP3) or you can listen directly below without leaving this very page.

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Happy listening, have a good Friday, news throughout the day on Arseblog News, more here tomorrow.

Arsecast
April 19, 2013 posted by arseblog

Giroud a positive + Arsecast 275

Giroud a positive + Arsecast 275

*boilk* (with thanks to the good people of Kentucky).

Morning all and welcome to Friday. Instead of preparing for Arsene Wenger’s press conference this morning, it rather unusually took place last night and the boss gave the latest injury update ahead of the Fulham game. Lukasz Fabianski remains out with his injury update, but apart from that it seems as if we’re in good shape. He said:

At the back everyone should available. In midfield we have a few people to check like Cazorla, Wilshere and Oxlade-Chamberlain. They will all have tests but I hope they should be alright. We also have to test Rosicky who was not ready to start on Tuesday. There are a number of uncertainties about our squad but I will sort that out on Friday morning.

Fingers crossed there’s nothing too serious. We need as many fit and healthy between now and the end of the season and Fulham is going to be a tricky game. We can take a proper look at the options tomorrow but what’s encouraging is that we actually have some. If certain players miss out there’s a certain amount of confidence to be had in the players like can come in, and that’s encouraging at a time when every point is so vital.

It looks as if Olivier Giroud will continue up front despite some spurned chances against Everton on Tuesday, and he’s got the full backing of the manager who has praised his development this season:

He has good physical potential. He wants to play every single game, he has a good basic stamina and he can absorb the games. He is very extrovert but as well he has a basic positive nature. He wants to do well, he is desperate to do well, but he is not the one who hides afterwards. I think you will see more from him next season, and there’s a lot more to come from him.

He’s a topic of discussion on today’s Arsecast, where we try and figure out what the manager does in the summer. Despite criticism, I think he’s had a pretty successful first season in English football and it’s not unreasonable to think he can improve and score more goals next season. At the same time, it’s impossible to escape the fact that Arsenal don’t really have another option for the central striking position.

There’s nobody to share the burden, so when we fail to score he’s the man in the firing line. And I guess that’s the weight of responsibility at a big club like Arsenal. But does Arsene Wenger go out and buy somebody top class this summer, or a back-up player? If the former, and he spends big, it relegates Giroud to playing second fiddle, but then what kind of a player do you get if you sign somebody to understudy the Frenchman?

Anyway, it’s an issue for the summer but for now it’s clear that the manager is talking in a way which will also provide a confidence boost to a player who we need to score goals in the final five games of the season. Another thing to bear in mind is that he has been something of a presence at the back too. While it’s generally not something you base your opinion of a striker on, as a relatively small team having somebody who can get his head to corner etc is not a bad thing at all, and we talk all the time about how defending is not the sole preserve of the back four.

Giroud's 'defensive actions' in the Premier League via @squawka

Giroud’s ‘defensive actions’ in the Premier League via @squawka

It’s why I think his contribution this season has been far more positive than anything else, but come summer, I’d like us to sign another good striker and let the two men battle it out. We’ve seen recently that competition for your place is a good thing, and maybe somebody who provides a different kind of option in and around the box would be ideal. In the meantime, let’s hope Giroud can add to his goal tally.

The boss has also waxed lyrical about Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, a player who has struggled in his second season but looks as if he’s finally finding some form at the right time. I think we’ll see a lot more of him in the next campaign, but the big question is where. He’s yet to fully nail down a place, so how he forced his way into the team on a more regular basis is going to be an interesting one.

Bonus reading: Tim Stillman column from last night.

Right then, onto this week’s Arsecast and I’m joined by @gunnerblog to chat about Everton, Norwich, Giroud, Ramsey and more. There’s some TalkShite Radio in there and all the usual flim-flammery.

You can subscribe to the Arsecast on iTunes by clicking here. Or if you want to subscribe directly to the feed URL you can do so too (this is a much better way to do it as you don’t experience the delays from iTunes). To download this week’s Arsecast directly – click here 20mb MP3) or you can listen directly below without leaving this very page.

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And that’s yer lot. Have a good Friday, back tomorrow to talk Fulham and all the rest. Until then.

Arsecast
April 12, 2013 posted by arseblog

Will being benched buck up Vermaelen? + Arsecast 274

Will being benched buck up Vermaelen? + Arsecast 274

Good morning and welcome to Friday after what seems to have been a long week.

We can now start looking ahead properly to tomorrow’s game against Norwich and the early team news is that both Jack Wilshere and Theo Walcott are likely to return to the squad. Obviously that leaves the manager with some decisions to make. We’ve been over the Gervinho/Walcott issue, I maintain the Ivorian should keep his place, and so he should if he continues to play well.

The Wilshere situation is made a little less complicated by the fact Tomas Rosicky is likely to miss out with Arsene Wenger saying he’s a ‘big doubt’ because of a hamstring problem. It’s a shame for him that he doesn’t get to follow up his two-goal display against West Brom, but when you consider the quality of the replacement it could be a lot worse.

That said, with Podolski fit again the manager could drop Cazorla back into the midfield and start the German, leaving Wilshere as a substitute to come on if needed. Given that Jack was left out deliberately to ensure that he didn’t aggravate a potential injury, it wouldn’t be too surprising if he were eased, rather than thrust, back into things.

One man who will definitely come back into the team is skipper Thomas Vermaelen. Having been dumped onto the bench in Munich, where he remained until called up on in the wake of Mertesacker’s red card last Saturday, he’ll have a chance at redemption tomorrow. Arsene Wenger has, as you’d expect, bigged him up, saying of his reaction to being dropped:

He took it in a remarkable way. He is a great man and I didn’t make him captain by coincidence. I knew there is something mentally special there. He responds in positive situations and in less positive situations like when you don’t play.

They know there could be rotation with the three centre backs from the start of the season, depending on good and less good periods of any individual player.

There’s definitely an element of confidence boosting going on there, but there’s no question that Belgian has been below-par this season. He made the kind of mistakes that saw other centre-halves at the club roundly pilloried, but he was shielded from that kind of backlash because he’s popular, the captain, and still had the goodwill his goalscoring exploits created.

His assist for the Dutch Skunk at Old Trafford, for example, was abject defending. In the end the pantomime storm of Santos and the shirt swap served to protect him, and I think if outrage can be in any way constructive, it would have been far better to be angry about the carelessness of Vermaelen’s defending than the fact Santos took an ex-teammates shirt when it was handed to him as they trudged off at half-time (quite deliberately, in my opinion too, but that teacup has already been chucked out)

To me he looked like a player who had slipped, unconsciously I’m sure, into something of a comfort zone. The armband meant a guaranteed start – it certainly worked that way for most of the season – with the manager reluctant/unwilling to change for one reason or another. Perhaps he thought the dip in form was temporary; it wasn’t. Perhaps he thought Koscielny wasn’t the man to replace him; he was.

When Vermaelen sat alongside Wenger at the press conference in Munich he answered questions like a man who fully expected to start the game and to captain the side. Why wouldn’t he? The manager had given no indication that he’d change and dropping your captain, like it not, is a bit different to dropping any other player. But out went Vermaelen for Koscielny and since then Arsenal have looked better defensively.

I think much of that has to do with a changed approach to how we defend, but I think some of the issues we’ve had this season (and before) have been because Vermaelen struggles to maintain positional discipline. He likes to try and win the ball high up the pitch, which is great when it works, but when it doesn’t there’s all that space for teams to exploit.

Now, I’m not trying to pin all our defensive problems on him, far from it, but for me his poor form stretches back into last season and the manager was a bit too slow to recognise it and do something about it. Hopefully being dropped will be something of a shock to his system and will shake him out of the funk he was he was in.

I’m not sure he’s ever going to be the defender we hoped he might, at 27 the flaws in his game are still too apparent, but between now and the end of the season it’d be good if he reacted positively to the last few weeks and and performed to a higher standard. The manager, finally, sent the message that nobody is untouchable in this team, it’s now down to Vermaelen, like Walcott and Szczesny and others who find themselves sidelined by the form of others, to take their chances when presented.

Right then, onto this week’s Arsecast, and I’m joined to discuss the week that was by Tim Stillman. There’s some Arshavin and the usual guff as we prepare for the Norwich game.

You can subscribe to the Arsecast on iTunes by clicking here. Or if you want to subscribe directly to the feed URL you can do so too (this is a much better way to do it as you don’t experience the delays from iTunes). To download this week’s Arsecast directly – click here 20mb MP3) or you can listen directly below without leaving this very page.

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We’ll have news updates throughout the day on Arseblog News. Arsene meets the press this morning so there’ll be plenty going on.

Back here with a full preview of the Norwich game tomorrow.

Arsecast
April 5, 2013 posted by arseblog

Continue the evolution + Arsecast 273

Continue the evolution + Arsecast 273

Hello there, and welcome to Friday.

Normally we’d have an Arsene Wenger press conference to look forward to but the boss can’t make it this week because he’s lost his voice. Rumours that he suffered this injury around the same time as Gervinho started finding the net seem unfounded to me.

“No, in the net, Gervinho.”

“Between the two sticks.”

“NO, BETWEEN THE TWO STICKS AND IN THE NET.”

“THE TWO STICKS THAT MAKE UP EACH SIDE OF THE GOAL, NOT THE CORNER FLAGS.”

*croak*

Anyway, it’s been left up to Steve Bould to give us the updates on team news and so on, and heading into the game tomorrow there’s little new. Both Wilshere and Walcott remain sidelined although they’re both back outside running (someone should run an EXCLUSIVE about that), but neither are expected to be back any earlier than the Norwich game.

What’s interesting to me anyway, and it’s a point I make in today’s Arsecast in the chat with @thegoonerholic, is that even if both were fit, the boss would have to stop and think about whether or not they’d play. As much as Gervinho frustrates, he’s got 2 goals and 2 assists in the last two games, and Walcott’s recent form has been pretty poor. With no goals since Jan 30th, it’d be a risk to bring him straight back in.

Similarly with Ramsey and Wilshere in midfield. The Welshman has done very well, Arsenal have won two of the last three games he’s started. Which isn’t to say we don’t miss Jack, but it’s good to see that the squad, whose depth we bemoan, has eased the burden when it comes to those two players being out.

Interestingly, given yesterday’s blog post, Bouldie has given props to Ramsey for the way he’s come back into form, saying:

Aaron has been fantastic. Seeing him in day-to-day training, he works extremely hard. He never moans, gets on with his game and has done everything he’s been asked to do. He’s physically fantastic and he gives something to the team. I think he’s improving all the time.

He was getting a bit of stick [from some supporters] to begin with and I think he felt that a bit. It takes a big character to come back and he’s come back massively.

I said what I needed to say yesterday so I won’t dwell on it, but I’m all for every single one of our players finding form between now and the season’s end. There’s no doubt that the futures of some are more uncertain than others, but if everyone can contribute on this run in then we’ll be better off for it.

Watching the display against Reading it was obvious that the team has rediscovered some confidence, the way we knocked the ball around was fantastic – and even if you might want to qualify that by highlighting how poor the opposition were, I’d say a good part of that was because we made them look poor by playing well. Bould points to the game against Bayern as the one that reinstalled some belief:

The big thing for us was getting that result at Bayern. I think we’re more or less the only team that’s won there this season so it just gives everybody a belief that we’re doing alright. It was an important game for us.

And perhaps with a tiny little ‘Toldyaso’ hat on, he said:

I think everybody has realised that clean sheets win games a lot of the time. We’ve improved.

The increased focus on our defensive duties has been an important factor, no doubt about it. It gives us a genuine platform to go and win games. Bayern and Swansea both required full concentration from all 11 players, especially when we didn’t the ball. We stayed disciplined, accepted that sometimes it’s not the best idea to try and win the ball high up the pitch leaving space in behind, and we took our chances when they came.

There’s no question that greater application defensively was a huge part of both those wins, but it’s so important that we maintain that for the final 8 games. There have been times we’ve watched this Arsenal team and had Eureka moments. “That’s it, that’s the blueprint!” we cry as a performance brings about a good result, yet a few games later the team seen unable, or unwilling, to do the very things that were so effective. I hope a couple of clean sheets doesn’t alter the way we approach the game against West Brom, or the one after that, or the one after that.

It might be slightly against our nature, but either you evolve or you get gobbled up or left behind. If we’ve had to sacrifice some of our attacking intent is it a bad thing when the last three results have been so good? Arsene and Steve Bould have to ensure that we keep doing the hard work, the rewards will come if we do.

Right then, onto this week’s Arsecast and joining me to discuss a quiet week, and my fears that this might be the last Arsecast ever, is @thegoonerholic. On the menu, Gervinho, Rosicky, Reading and the run-in. There’s Mick Bendtner and the usual waffle too.

You can subscribe to the Arsecast on iTunes by clicking here. Or if you want to subscribe directly to the feed URL you can do so too (this is a much better way to do it as you don’t experience the delays from iTunes). To download this week’s Arsecast directly – click here 19mb MP3) or you can listen directly below without leaving this very page.

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That’s yer lot, news throughout the day on Arseblog News, back with a full West Brom preview tomorrow.