Mikel Arteta: Aston La Vista To The Title?

[CaseUteinberger]

Whereas another defeat will bury our top 4 hopes (at this stage the flowers are growing our on grave if you ask me), meaning there is no real hope.

Top 4 is gone. Top 6 is doubtful. We have just thrown too many points away along the road. Or have had them stolen by bias anti Arsenal refs. I still hope we can somehow get to 6th but we really have to go on a tear for that. Something we haven’t been able to all season.

 

[MikeVinna]

Willian will start this won’t he

 

[dashsnow17]

wow fair play, wouldn't have expected him to know who Rocky is, his time is usually taken up by gushing over Man City legends.

 

[Blood on the Tracks]

I am still pretty okay with Arteta, having been skeptical when he was hired. But it is clear that it was and is very risky to hire someone completely without head coaching experience like Arteta. I am still surprised the club decided to go this way. When Wenger was hired he was nowhere near as inexperienced and unproven as Arteta. He was unknown just in the way that the English league was still quite insular at the time.

I'm sure I'll attract all the 'But were 9th, he's rubbish' posts with this.

I actually think for a first time manager he's done a fairly decent job so far.

To see someone with no experience come in and lay down the law and freeze out / kick out the bad influences was something I found very impressive.

Last year he did a good job in the league. The FA Cup was the icing on the cake.

This season started off very poorly but results have got better and we're seeing a much clearer identity to the way we play.

I really hope we get top 6 and / or win the Europa, but I think I'm going to be going into next season with quite high hopes.

 

[Arsenal1508]

I'm sure I'll attract all the 'But were 9th, he's rubbish' posts with this.

I actually think for a first time manager he's done a fairly decent job so far.

To see someone with no experience come in and lay down the law and freeze out / kick out the bad influences was something I found very impressive.

Last year he did a good job in the league. The FA Cup was the icing on the cake.

This season started off very poorly but results have got better and we're seeing a much clearer identity to the way we play.

I really hope we get top 6 and / or win the Europa, but I think I'm going to be going into next season with quite high hopes.

FFS

You don't commit to 250K in Wages to Auba and 200K on Willian if you think he has done a fairly decent job so far.

May I ask what your opinion of Roberto Di Matteo? He won the CL FFS.

 

[Rex Stone]

@American_Gooner if we finish 7th do we qualify direct for Europa?

 

[A_G]

@American_Gooner if we finish 7th do we qualify direct for Europa?

7th will qualify for the Uefa Europa Conference League as long as Southampton don't win the FA Cup. Otherwise, they'll go into the Europa League and 6th place will go into the ECL. Here's a summary of the different scenarios:

The situation in England is a little complicated, due to its second cup competition. By rights, the winners of the Carabao Cup go into the UEFA Europa Conference League as UEFA considers it to carry the least worth of England's three spots outside the Champions League berths.

In any other season, by now we'd know who that is -- but the final between Manchester City and Tottenham has been delayed until April 25. If the winners qualify for Europe via another route the place transfers to the league. We can be pretty sure that City are going to be playing in the Champions League, but if Tottenham lift the trophy they will be in the UEFA Europa Conference League unless they finish in a European place in the Premier League.

If Man City win the Carabao Cup, the place for the UEFA Europa Conference League will go to 7th in the Premier League (6th if Southampton win the FA Cup).

West Ham (5th), Tottenham (6th), Liverpool (7th), Everton (8th), Arsenal (9th) and Aston Villa (10th) are the most likely contenders. Would it be a prize or a poisoned chalice?

 

[Blood on the Tracks]

FFS

You don't commit to 250K in Wages to Auba and 200K on Willian if you think he has done a fairly decent job so far.

May I ask what your opinion of Roberto Di Matteo? He won the CL FFS.

I didn't say he was doing a great job overall. I said I thought he was doing well for a first time manager. Which is an important distinction.

Willian had the track record, the move hasn't panned out great. He still has the most assists of any Arsenal player this season though.

Renewing Auba was an absolute no brainer. I'd love to here all his detractors work out how we were going to replace a proven top 10 in the world goal scorer on a limited budget. We couldn't.
He having a poor season by his standards, still scoring about 1 in 2 which isn't bad, but the guy has 84 goals in 140 games for the club, that's top class.

 

[Arsenal1508]

I didn't say he was doing a great job overall. I said I thought he was doing well for a first time manager. Which is an important distinction.

Willian had the track record, the move hasn't panned out great. He still has the most assists of any Arsenal player this season though.

Renewing Auba was an absolute no brainer. I'd love to here all his detractors work out how we were going to replace a proven top 10 in the world goal scorer on a limited budget. We couldn't.
He having a poor season by his standards, still scoring about 1 in 2 which isn't bad, but the guy has 84 goals in 140 games for the club, that's top class.

It really was not a no brainer renewing Auba. my the time he played out this season, he'd have been 32 years old. I said the same thing on Özil too - no way we should have offered him those stupid wages.

We only have people in charge that think inside the box and brainless. No one is thinking about the well being and long term success of this club.

Wilian - FFS you are really going to use his assists as point of plus? FFS man FFS. How many of his assists actually played the players into positons? Anyways, forget about talking about that tosser.

 

[Atlas]

It’s kinda like how our former players who have gone into management refuse to acknowledge anything they’ve learned from Wenger. Thierry cites Pep as his reference, Paddy is low key a Man City guy as well.

Van Persie whilst not in management speaks more about Fergie than Wenger.

Not a big deal, it’s their opinion and as a professional I’m sure they have additional insight.. but it’s annoying for sure just give Arsenal legends their flowers whilst they are alive ffs

That’s a good point really. I guess tactics have moved on since the days when the Arsenal 4-4-2 crushed the PL and Wenger is often said to have allowed players to go out and express themselves which doesn’t really work anymore in the era of the high press and players having clearly defined roles.

Wenger was a revolutionary manager when he first came in and he transformed the league in many ways but like Mourinho he eventually became outdated. I wish Wenger had managed Real Madrid or Barca at some point because he never had the chance to manage one of the giants with unlimited budgets purely because he was too loyal to Arsenal and wanted to see us through the difficult early Emirates years. Henry left to win the CL Wenger deserved to do the same. The way some of the fans treated the man who sacrificed that to manage a club with barely any budget is an utter disgrace. The way he eventually left is a black mark on the clubs history for me.

 

[Jury]

I get told off on here for 'gloating' when we win ffs.

Sometimes need to check this is actually an Arsenal forum.

It's quite telling that someone should say you're 'gloating' tbh. That would suggest that you were rubbing their noses in their misfortune...

 

[Jury]

If we're in this position this time next year with fans in the stadium or without, the fan base will be demanding Mikel's resignation, and I'll be one of them. Pretty sure the club will pull the trigger anyway.

 

[Macho]

If we're in this position this time next year with fans in the stadium or without, the fan base will be demanding Mikel's resignation, and I'll be one of them. Pretty sure the club will pull the trigger anyway.

I don’t believe you

Pretty sure a lot of you will sit there saying that it’s somehow less embarrassing, find positives in it somehow - and get on with it tbh.

Guess time will tell?

 

[CaseUteinberger]

The way some of the fans treated the man who sacrificed that to manage a club with barely any budget is an utter disgrace. The way he eventually left is a black mark on the clubs history for me.

I can understand this view from an emotional fan standpoint, but looked at more neutrally, I struggle to see Wenger as having sacrificed anything for Arsenal. He was after all extremely well reimbursed for his services over his employment period with the club we support. It's akin to saying that a high ranking CEO, who didn't switch to a larger competitor at one point in his career, and then finally is sacked when the company he stayed with is doing poorly, has sacrificed anything. Not sure anyone would have much sympathy for that CEO. Like I said, I can understand your view, but I wouldn't use the word sacrifice here, not for a very well-paid professional football manager.

 

[Jury]

I don’t believe you

Pretty sure a lot of you will sit there saying that it’s somehow less embarrassing, find positives in it somehow - and get on with it tbh.

Guess time will tell?

The mistake you're making is you think people are willing to put the managers job before the success of the club.... Where do you think the motivation to do that would come from? It's a very strange stance.

The 'less embarrassing' thing was because we had a side that was evidently capable of better, playing like mugs. When you're building and not a lot is expected of you, it's less embarrassing. I don't know what's hard to understand about that. It looks even better if you manage to pick up a trophy as well, so there's that too. Part of the embarrassment and what made it worse was we had a legendary manager still at the helm. It was a massive 'LOL' factor for the rest of the league, not that that was the worst thing about the situation--far from it.

Every manager gets his due period, just as Emery did. Mikel will be no different. What you're seeing from those you think are pro-Mikel is just a normal level of patience and realism. 9th at this point next year wont be good enough because he'd have had enough time to show more improvement than that. No strings or hidden agendas,

 

[Blood on the Tracks]

I can understand this view from an emotional fan standpoint, but looked at more neutrally, I struggle to see Wenger as having sacrificed anything for Arsenal. He was after all extremely well reimbursed for his services over his employment period with the club we support. It's akin to saying that a high ranking CEO, who didn't switch to a larger competitor at one point in his career, and then finally is sacked when the company he stayed with is doing poorly, has sacrificed anything. Not sure anyone would have much sympathy for that CEO. Like I said, I can understand your view, but I wouldn't use the word sacrifice here, not for a very well-paid professional football manager.

The talk of sacrifice when it comes to anyone in football get's a bit silly when you put in in perspective. I'm not knocking Wenger because he did show massive loyalty to the club when he could have departed for Barca, Real, Bayern, England etc multiple times.

He (deservedly) took over £20m from the club in his last year. Over the course of his tenure here Arsène must have earnt somewhere in excess of £70m. I've no issue with it, he deserved every penny. But he could have left if he wanted to, he chose to stay. He got screwed at the end but no-one can say he wasn't adequately rewarded financially for the job he did.

 

[CaseUteinberger]

He (deservedly) took over £20m from the club in his last year. Over the course of his tenure here Arsène must have earnt somewhere in excess of £70m. I've no issue with it, he deserved every penny.

I take a slightly different view on this as I think both current professional footballers, managers and CEOs are very much overcompensated. I wish nurses and teachers were much better paid instead. That the minimum wage was increased here in the US so you always could live of one full-time work salary. But that is a political issue and for a different forum and/or thread!

 

[scytheavatar]

Renewing Auba was an absolute no brainer. I'd love to here all his detractors work out how we were going to replace a proven top 10 in the world goal scorer on a limited budget. We couldn't.

And yet we still need to find that "proven top 10 in the world goal scorer" this summer............... at Auba's age it was always going to be a folly to think we can rely on him for long.

 

[Blood on the Tracks]

And yet we still need to find that "proven top 10 in the world goal scorer" this summer............... at Auba's age it was always going to be a folly to think we can rely on him for long.

He's 31! He's in his peak years. He doesn't need replacing. He's having an off year by his standards that's all. He'll most likely still end up with 20 goals for the season.

Look at someone like Vardy, similar player to Auba. Still going strong at 34. It's only on here that fans thinking players are ready for the retirement home at 30

 

[Blood on the Tracks]

I take a slightly different view on this as I think both current professional footballers, managers and CEOs are very much overcompensated. I wish nurses and teachers were much better paid instead. That the minimum wage was increased here in the US so you always could live of one full-time work salary. But that is a political issue and for a different forum and/or thread!

I agree with you, it obscene that anyone can earn that amount of money a year. Let alone in football management which isn't exactly a job vital to society flourishing.

Just within the imperfect system as it stood I think Wenger earnt his money more than most.