EPL: Sunderland - Arsenal - 24/04/16, 14:05

[Trilly]

Wenger literally said exactly the opposite pre-match:

“Between Thursday and Sunday and Wednesday and Saturday morning is exactly the same,” the manager said. “You know we played on Wednesday night at Barcelona and then on Saturday against Everton at 12.45pm.
“It’s no problem. In fact, there’s a very interesting study that has come out from Uefa that shows that the points taken by the teams three days later are not less than after four or five days. It’s the opposite and that is quite interesting.
“The study has been made in all the five best leagues in Europe. Nobody has proven that it is a disadvantage to have only three days rest. The points on average are better than after four or five days.”

http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/20160422/-three-days-rest-doesn-t-affect-result-

He's an incredible hypocrite. Surprised this hasn't generated more attention.

 

[Mrs Bergkamp]

The only disadvantage with playing on a Sunday is the pressure to match the results around you. City won yesterday and put the pressure on us to win today. Of course we bottled it.

 

[progman07]

We suffered a little bit physically in the second half

Bravo Wenger, you didn't rotate, and you didn't even sub the supposedly tired players in time, yet you pulled out this excuse. Bravo.

We are supposed to have a squad that we couldn't improve in summer, yet we cannot even rotate the team against teams in the bottom half of the league.

 

[US_Gooner]

He's an incredible hypocrite. Surprised this hasn't generated more attention.

I do my best to call out Wenger's bullsh*t but, honestly, it would be a full time job.

 

[General]

If he was worried about the physical condition of his players, why did he pretty much pick the same team when we had adequate replacements on the bench. Why did he leave it till the 70th minute before making a change? This is why many fans accuse him of not knowing how to rotate. Give that squad to another manager who knows what he's doing and we would batter Sunderland.

When the team needed a helping hand and a bit of direction, the manager was nowhere to be seen. This is what modern football is all about. Gone are the days when your quality and superior fitness would've carried us through these games. We had a freekick when a Sunderland player picked up the ball and took ages to hand it back. Nobody challenged him to hand it back early, it was shocking to watch. We were gripped by fear and scared of losing the game.

 

[rich 1990]

And to think there are people who genuinely think he's a world class defender and a leader.

Pick up on one mistake, ignore the dozens of times he saved Per's arse. Let's not turn on one of about 4 who's performing at the minute,

 

[tap-in]

What? We aren't getting 4th. United are 5 points behind and a game in hand. We've got City away to come. United will be favourites for 4th.

Oh forgot Utd had a game in hand. Ok, so I may get my wish of 5th!

 

[US_Gooner]

Oh forgot Utd had a game in hand. Ok, so I may get my wish of 5th!

Realistically, the magic number is 7 pts; so any combination of Utd dropping pts or us gaining pts >= 7 will leave us in 4th or better.

For example, Arsenal W-L-W == 6 pts which takes us to 70 pts.
But if Utd win all their remaining == 12 pts which takes them to 71 pts.

Our +12GD is unlikely to be overtaken by Utd.

 

[Prawn Sandwich]

Anyone else expecting one of those timely "open letters" from the Usmanov ripping into the club's board level soon!?

 

[Charisma]

Missed the game, so I just rewatched it and I could barely sit through the 90 mins. I skipped through most parts of it. ******* awful performance, I'm glad I gave this one a miss.

I've actually started to dislike watching us play mainly due to Arsène Wenger. He needs to leave this club and he can take Giroud and that bald ******* **** Gazidis with him.

 

[adpree]

Anyone else expecting one of those timely "open letters" from the Usmanov ripping into the club's board level soon!?

Not going to achieve anything. They will probably just ignore anything Usmanov has to say at the moment. If they engaged Usmanov in any manner, it's just going to undermine their position further.

 

[adpree]

AW's got his work cut out. We miss the CL and the one thing left to brag about is over. Will possibly affect recruitment as well. This was a game worth forgetting, same issue with not finding space against teams that sit deep.

 

[dysphoria]

Pick up on one mistake, ignore the dozens of times he saved Per's arse. Let's not turn on one of about 4 who's performing at the minute,

He may be "preforming" but the point still stands, he's not world class, he looks to be on the decline(his pace) and is definitely not a leader. Not saying he's a **** defender, he's definitely the best amongst an extremely under coached bunch here but we need better.

 

[Penn_]

AW's got his work cut out. We miss the CL and the one thing left to brag about is over. Will possibly affect recruitment as well. This was a game worth forgetting, same issue with not finding space against teams that sit deep.

Oh he'll still brag about it. It'll just change to a more defensive stance.

 

[adpree]

Oh he'll still brag about it. It'll just change to a more defensive stance.

What I fear the most at this moment is Wenger has this ability to stay calm and respond in a reasonable manner to all the negatives he has faced to date, either with excuses or performances.

He is basically scrapping the bottom of the barrel on both fronts now. How he responds to this will either make him or break him. For once the fans and pundits are truly getting under his skin.