Mikel Arteta: Aston La Vista To The Title?

[Dokaka]

Remember when me you, @Tir Na Nog and @GDeep™ were calling for Arteta when the rest of the forum were popping their corks at Emery coming. Good to see you're still all in. I've had my doubts this year, but he's still here and who knows he might make us proud yet.

I was stanning for Arteta from day 1 it sounded like a possibility, how dare you leave me out.

 

[Mrs Bergkamp]

Voted 4 and open to having my mind changed if we really improve. My main gripe was that where he was deliberate in his actions eg playing out from the back, we were dire for too long. The system of play was a bit confusing and then gradually more evident but it was horribly sniffling until players lost what looked to be a fear of expression. He seemed to stumble on ESR when we were down and out with nowhere else to go-apart from the Championship! There seemed to be double standards eg the treatment of Willian vs Pepe. There's also a question mark over a lot of his man management although I've no gripes about ditching Mustafi and the other seniors. I think the youth project should be well managed and nurtured and I worry that his CV might be his overwhelming motivation to the detriment of the clubs long term success. I still think we should be keeping an eye out for another manager in case he decides to cut and run but I really hope he can somehow get us in to the CL next season.

 

[2Smokeyy]

@Troopz deciding he’s got to be Arteta-Out because he was Wenger-Out in the past (even though he’s now accepted he was wrong on that) is vintage AM.

Maybe just ... stop hounding our managers?

Making things up, I see.

I guess that’s what those bootcuts be doing to you.



#Needed

 

[Lidl_Reed]

You guys would have hounded Wenger Out if he had these results.

 

[Riou]

To all the Arteta Outers...

 

[Jury]

Making things up, I see.

I guess that’s what those bootcuts be doing to you.

View attachment 2096

#Needed

Bootcuts and flares are back... I wouldn’t go there, but some high profile bods are being seen in them.

 

[Iceman10]

You guys would have hounded Wenger Out if he had these results.

Why is there always the ignoring of a manager in between Wenger and Arteta, albeit a manager unlucky in my view because he suffered as a result of Sanllehi’s bad transfer moves? Some extra patience no doubt comes from a few here not wanting a trap of changing managers every one and a half years. On top of that, do people not remember that the Wenger separation package impacted the next transfer window within the framework of FFP? Changing managers is not without cost and we don’t have resources of Chelsea and United.

Not to say Arteta is unsackable but probably why he still is safe is because unlike Emery it appears he still has quite strong backing in the dressing room, which means although some people call him a fraud the players in our squad don’t believe he is, and rightly or wrongly are bought into “a process”. One or two players who are backing him might be suck ups in a comfort zone, and that is another matter, but I don’t believe most of the players in our squad are. Don’t make me out to be a strong Arteta backer because I’m not at this point. Just responding to your comment.

 

[Lidl_Reed]

Wenger separation package impacted the next transfer window within the framework of FFP

Err... what? Wenger was not renewed. He was never sacked.

 

[Iceman10]

Err... what? Wenger was not renewed. He was never sacked.

He was paid around 15m when he left. I didn’t use the word “sacked”. Do you really want to be so pedantic?

 

[Lidl_Reed]

He was paid around 15m when he left. I didn’t use the word “sacked”. Do you really want to be so pedantic?

Sauce for this payment?

 

[Iceman10]

Sauce for this payment?

I believe this is common knowledge for most Arsenal fans, amount confirmed in the club accounts. Not all of this 17m was to Wenger, it was for him and his coaching staff, with him leaving one year before his latest contract was up.

Bear in mind also if I knew how much the separation for Emery was I would have stated that. I don’t think anyone can dispute changing managers with years left on their contracts costs a lot of money. OK for Abramovich, most recently to Lampard, but we don’t operate on the same sugar daddy oligarch financial doping club model, at least not yet.

Google: The Times Arsène Wenger 17 million

(Can’t get the link embedded in here properly for some reason)

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/...es-with-Arsène-wenger-and-his-staff-605bbcxzz

 

[GoonerBoy19]

You have to be patient with young manager's. Arteta will make mistakes but if it works out it will be good for club on a longer run. Its a calculated risk club is taking, unless club goes into relegation level he wont be sacked. MK8 would definitely have been given a goal from our board and they are one of the most lenient board in the league. These jokers wont take any decisions unless fans gets desperate similar to Wenger,Emery situation. Sacking Arteta and hiring Tuchel is what every top club would have done in mid season, but things work differently at Arsenal. Lets hope Arteta works out and doesn't move to greener pastures once he starts delivering, already he is getting noticed by Barca.

 

[Makavelii]

I also think we should be patient with Mikel. He could still become a great manager.

We’ve seen streaks of very good consistent performances. Other than that, there was just one long disaster streak (a new manager is entitled to at least one of these) and some bad luck more recently.

You have to give him the benefit of the doubt that the bad streak/inconsistency is just lack of experience and he may yet be able to stamp it out.

I strongly vote keeping him till the season is finished and then see how he goes at the start of next before sacking.

Some of the best managers ever had poor first season or two in the Prem.
E.g. Ferguson came 11th in his 1st and 3rd seasons. Klopp came 8th in his first full season.

 

[AbouCuéllar]

Arsène Wenger would have done much better than Arteta is currently doing imo. The goalposts have been shifted for Arteta many times this season but our fans were quick to hound our greatest ever manager out (me included and I was wrong for doing so) even though he never had us performing this bad despite losing a key player every other summer and working with limited resources compared to our rivals.

Again, arguments like this totally ignore all circumstance. There was obviously a major faction of Arsenal fans who acted real ****ish with Arsène, but let's live in reality, we were anything but 'quick' to get Wenger out, he was sacked years after the decline and rot had already begun in the club; no other big club in Europe would've allowed him to continue so long with a project that was not progressing. Again, this is coming from someone who was a fierce Wenger defender up until 2014-15, but in retrospect he easily could've been sacked as early as after the 2010-11 season and absolutely shouldn't have gone past 15-16.

Wenger > Em*ry , yes, but I dread to think where we'd be now if the same Wenger who had the club in steady decline, out of Europa League and dropping levels with each season, had picked up the club where Em*ry left it off. Orden of events matters here, and the Em*ry hiring was absolutely catastrophic, even moreso than the generally catastrophic administration of the club by Gazidis in the years prior, and letting Wenger go a number of years too long and in so doing allowing the club to be passed by by rivals and fall into decadence, outdatedness, and decline.

To repeat. Order of events matters lots here, as well as all the context of the club's progression and project with respect to its competitors. Arguments like yours and makingtrax do away with absolutely all context. No, I don't believe at all Wenger would have us doing better than Arteta did having picked up where he did from Em*ry disasterclass, I'd be surprised if we were even in Europe (let's not forget Arteta won the FA Cup to have us in Europe in the first place); Wenger's offhanded managerial style is outdated and doesn't work in modern football, much less with the highly flawed group of players he would've inherited after Em*ry.

 

[Makingtrax]

Arsène, but let's live in reality, we were anything but 'quick' to get Wenger out, he was sacked years after the decline and rot had already begun

I've stayed out of the Arsène discussion over the last couple of pages for obvious reasons. But this is the ****ing limit. I've challenged you before to produce one single actual footballing metric to show that's true in comparison to his spend and you haven't. This is a decent football discussion forum, not some seat in the pub where you're spouting boll*cks and your mates are nodding because they've had 4 pints and can't be arsed to argue with you.

Arsène over performed every single year for his spend right up to 2015/16. Between 2004 and 2015/16 our actual expenditure was below West Ham. No other manager in the world could have acheived his level of acheivement on that spend by buying cheap and selling to our richer rivals yet still mixing it up with them. He's been gone 3 years and we're currently 10th. Time for the Wenger haters to stop!!

 

[AbouCuéllar]

I've stayed out of the Arsène discussion over the last couple of pages for obvious reasons. But this is the ****ing limit. I've challenged you before to produce one single actual footballing metric to show that's true in comparison to his spend and you haven't. This is a decent football discussion forum, not some seat in the pub where you're spouting boll*cks and your mates are nodding because they've had 4 pints and can't be arsed to argue with you.

Arsène over performed every single year for his spend right up to 2015/16. Between 2004 and 2015/16 our actual expenditure was below West Ham. No other manager in the world could have acheived his level of acheivement on that spend by buying cheap and selling to our richer rivals yet still mixing it up with them. He's been gone 3 years and we're currently 10th. Time for the Wenger haters to stop!!

I'm not an Arsène hater--I love Arsène--and you are out of touch with reality, mate, only in England were people not amazed how long took to sack and what the hell Arsenal were doing not not sacking Wenger for so many years with a decadent project without progress. Again, graphs like this remove all context, like the fact that Arsenal has quite different possibilities recruitment wise being a CL club during that time and a massive club with huge draw to players, possibilities that don't apply for clubs like the ones you mention.

 

[say yes]

On behalf of everyone who reads this forum: please **** off with the non-stop Wenger chat. It’s been done to death. Go and use the Arsenal History section if you’re desperate to discuss it.

 

[say yes]

Moving on, this is a great piece:
Didn’t notice it on tv, but against Leicester and City Arteta was getting Mari to push up into midfield and compress the space. High risk strategy (leaves Luiz 1v1 behind) but fascinating tactical tweak which seems to have caught the opposition off guard.

 

[OnlyOne]

I also think we should be patient with Mikel. He could still become a great manager.

We’ve seen streaks of very good consistent performances. Other than that, there was just one long disaster streak (a new manager is entitled to at least one of these) and some bad luck more recently.

You have to give him the benefit of the doubt that the bad streak/inconsistency is just lack of experience and he may yet be able to stamp it out.

I strongly vote keeping him till the season is finished and then see how he goes at the start of next before sacking.

Some of the best managers ever had poor first season or two in the Prem.
E.g. Ferguson came 11th in his 1st and 3rd seasons. Klopp came 8th in his first full season.

I also think we should be patient with Mikel. He could still become a great manager.

We’ve seen streaks of very good consistent performances. Other than that, there was just one long disaster streak (a new manager is entitled to at least one of these) and some bad luck more recently.

You have to give him the benefit of the doubt that the bad streak/inconsistency is just lack of experience and he may yet be able to stamp it out.

I strongly vote keeping him till the season is finished and then see how he goes at the start of next before sacking.

Some of the best managers ever had poor first season or two in the Prem.
E.g. Ferguson came 11th in his 1st and 3rd seasons. Klopp came 8th in his first full season.

I don’t know how to highlight parts of your post but have we ever seen a good consistent streak under Mikel? I can’t think of any.

 

[Makingtrax]

Please vote in the poll

Voted 5 in the poll for obvious reasons:

Against Arteta: position in the league, up and down results, tactical problems such as slow transitions and stumbling into use of no 10 etc (no clear vision), over emphasis on defence even when playing weaker teams (and we've still lost), poor man management of some players (eg Pepe) and throwing players under a bus in public, OTT shouting of instructions on the pitch side, use of dodgy agents, long contract for ageing players, a lot of money has been spent on players in the last three years (more than ever before)

For Arteta: better football in recent games so signs he's learning, we're starting to score more goals as well, hard to be too critical during covid year with no fans present (unusual times for all managers), defensive metrics over the season are good overall, we've spent a lot in the last 3 years but Arteta has only had a recent input, his communication skills are very good, seems to be less stressed with the players (more signs of learning), like the idea of a young manager rather than one of the older ones doing the rounds.

Really not sure how anybody can vote outside of 4,5,6 at this stage.