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Mikel Arteta: Top Of The Klopps

Riou

In The Winchester, Waiting For This To Blow Over

Country: Northern Ireland

Player:Gabriel
Yeah, Mikel really putting over the youngest squad in the league thing, heard him say it a few times now....we will probably be hearing it alot this season.

He was talking about Auba getting back to his best this season today/yesterday, but still managed to squeeze that phrase in :lol:
 

Barry

Definitely Not An Old Poster
Yeah, Mikel really putting over the youngest squad in the league thing, heard him say it a few times now....we will probably be hearing it alot this season.

He was talking about Auba getting back to his best this season today/yesterday, but still managed to squeeze that phrase in :lol:
I watched the interview and it made me a little nostalgic about Wenger to be honest. I don't think Arteta comes across badly, but you just wish that he would think a little bigger sometimes. Wenger wouldn't have used that question to play down a young team's chances - he would have been talking about their potential and future development.
 

Trilly

Hates A-M, Saka, Arteta and You
Trusted ⭐

Country: England
I watched the interview and it made me a little nostalgic about Wenger to be honest. I don't think Arteta comes across badly, but you just wish that he would think a little bigger sometimes. Wenger wouldn't have used that question to play down a young team's chances - he would have been talking about their potential and future development.
Looking back at the results that Wenger was getting with such young teams it makes me kind of doubt the “he lets them just figure it out themselves” idea.

If anything it gives me Klopp/Pep vibes where every player knows exactly what they have to do in their position. It’s why we could replace guys without suffering too much as long as they had the required attributes (which was usually just technical ability). You can’t tell me that Wenger turned Theo Walcott into a 30+ g/a player from letting people just figure things out on the pitch.

I took his attacking genius for granted, even if it did loss potency towards the end, it’s still 10x better than what we’ve seen under Arteta.
 

Xanth

Active Member
Lol, I'm mostly 50/50 on Arteta and would gladly see him leave if someone like ten Hag or even Potter becomes available but I come here and feel like some kind of superfan. There are valid criticisms of him but I just feel like a lot of the ones that get written stem from mental gymnastics, bad interpretations, or hyperbole.
 

Sanchez11

Nobody Is Coming!

Country: England
Lol, I'm mostly 50/50 on Arteta and would gladly see him leave if someone like ten Hag or even Potter becomes available but I come here and feel like some kind of superfan. There are valid criticisms of him but I just feel like a lot of the ones that get written stem from mental gymnastics, bad interpretations, or hyperbole.
No chance of hyperbole!!
 

Macho

In search of Pure Profit 💸
Dusted 🔻

Country: England
Lol, I'm mostly 50/50 on Arteta and would gladly see him leave if someone like ten Hag or even Potter becomes available but I come here and feel like some kind of superfan. There are valid criticisms of him but I just feel like a lot of the ones that get written stem from mental gymnastics, bad interpretations, or hyperbole.
I’ll admit you come here and read this thread, it doesn’t read like he’s gone a decent chunk of games unbeaten.

I’ll be honest I came in this thread to praise exactly that, but read something him being far superior to Ole amongst other things and lost it.

Not cause I’m an Ole superfan, but that guy is on the verge of the sack and as far as I’m concerned, to date he’s done far better but there you go.
 

Xanth

Active Member
I’ll admit you come here and read this thread, it doesn’t read like he’s gone a decent chunk of games unbeaten.

I’ll be honest I came in this thread to praise exactly that, but read something him being far superior to Ole amongst other things and lost it.

Not cause I’m an Ole superfan, but that guy is on the verge of the sack and as far as I’m concerned, to date he’s done far better but there you go.

Fair enough, although I think it's hard to do a fair comparison of Ole and Arteta because of the gap in quality between their squads. I can't really gauge how Ole would have performed with the teams we've had in the past couple of years or Arteta with the United squad.
 

Riou

In The Winchester, Waiting For This To Blow Over

Country: Northern Ireland

Player:Gabriel
Arsène never just let the players figure it out themselves.

He constructed a great system, that allowed attacking players to shine...by a combo of creating patterns of play for our players to rely on, but also trusting them to deal individually with what happens in games.

Both very effective and very fun to watch.
 

AbouCuéllar

Author of A-M essays 📚
I’ll admit you come here and read this thread, it doesn’t read like he’s gone a decent chunk of games unbeaten.

I’ll be honest I came in this thread to praise exactly that, but read something him being far superior to Ole amongst other things and lost it.

Not cause I’m an Ole superfan, but that guy is on the verge of the sack and as far as I’m concerned, to date he’s done far better but there you go.
That was a very sound post by @Blood on the Tracks IMO.

Arteta > Ole . Arteta needs to prove he's not ****, but Ole has already proven it. And the points he makes about Arteta obviously having a grip of tactics that Ole doesn't is totally true (we can see this even in their matches last season, where despite being **** and United finishing 2nd we got a win and a draw), while also pointing out that Arteta's tactical approach has some serious downfalls in the rigidity of the play it is producing much of the time.

Anyways, it all goes back to what we all know, or should know. Arteta's current managerial skill / results are quite poor. But there are ingredients there and aptitudes / intelligences as a coach that Ole simply doesn't have and give reason for hope. That doesn't change the reality of the current managerial skill / performance level elicited, but it does keep one like myself in that constant state of "just when you thought you were out, they pull you back in", and there is simply an upside to Arteta that there just isn't to Ole (nor was there to Em*ry, for example, as much as people like to bring up that Em*ry > Areta nonsense here, which is just that, frankly, pure nonsense).
 

Macho

In search of Pure Profit 💸
Dusted 🔻

Country: England
That was a very sound post by @Blood on the Tracks IMO.

Arteta > Ole . Arteta needs to prove he's not ****, but Ole has already proven it. And the points he makes about Arteta obviously having a grip of tactics that Ole doesn't is totally true (we can see this even in their matches last season, where despite being **** and United finishing 2nd we got a win and a draw), while also pointing out that Arteta's tactical approach has some serious downfalls in the rigidity of the play it is producing much of the time.

Anyways, it all goes back to what we all know, or should know. Arteta's current managerial skill / results are quite poor. But there are ingredients there and aptitudes / intelligences as a coach that Ole simply doesn't have and give reason for hope. That doesn't change the reality of the current managerial skill / performance level elicited, but it does keep one like myself in that constant state of "just when you thought you were out, they pull you back in", and there is simply an upside to Arteta that there just isn't to Ole (nor was there to Em*ry, for example, as much as people like to bring up that Em*ry > Areta nonsense here, which is just that, frankly, pure nonsense).
Depends who you ask, because for me Arteta has ran his course and I am just waiting for the club and certain people in the media to accept it.

The only thing you could say about Ole is he has a better squad, but in all honestly there is at best a handful of UTD players this forum would unanimously take. Emphasis on unanimous.

Arteta's biggest super power is his failures aren't actually registered as failures it's just glossed over until the next game or the next incident. There's zero upside to this.
 

Lidl_Reed

Wants a new name
Are you guys not realising after sacking the greatest manager in the history of the club that it's the players and not the manager? Trust the process and back Mikel.
 

Barry

Definitely Not An Old Poster
Looking back at the results that Wenger was getting with such young teams it makes me kind of doubt the “he lets them just figure it out themselves” idea.

If anything it gives me Klopp/Pep vibes where every player knows exactly what they have to do in their position. It’s why we could replace guys without suffering too much as long as they had the required attributes (which was usually just technical ability). You can’t tell me that Wenger turned Theo Walcott into a 30+ g/a player from letting people just figure things out on the pitch.

I took his attacking genius for granted, even if it did loss potency towards the end, it’s still 10x better than what we’ve seen under Arteta.
Totally been thinking the same myself. I think he did lose it towards the end and there was a lot wrong with the squad that was down to his decisions.

But in that period before which was disappointing at the time but with hindsight.. he had so many players performing well whose level dropped when they left us for other clubs. There's a certain alchemy in that for sure.
 

Trilly

Hates A-M, Saka, Arteta and You
Trusted ⭐

Country: England
Depends who you ask, because for me Arteta has ran his course and I am just waiting for the club and certain people in the media to accept it.

The only thing you could say about Ole is he has a better squad, but in all honestly there is at best a handful of UTD players this forum would unanimously take. Emphasis on unanimous.

Arteta's biggest super power is his failures aren't actually registered as failures it's just glossed over until the next game or the next incident. There's zero upside to this.
Martial, Rashford, Bruno, Shaw and maybe Pogba have played the best football of their lives under Ole. There’s something in that.

I’m of the school that getting a team to score goals is easier than getting a team to defend, that’s why teams like the Old Burnley and Palace sides had a ceiling.

I’m not sure what Arteta has done to be better than Ole, the former has made quite a few players worse and fallen out with others, he’s also incapable of getting this team to perform relative to our wage bill/squad cost/talent. Ole is out of his depth but he’s at least got that squad performing at around where they should have been up until recently and there are at least four players who will thank him for raising their game to new levels.
 

Batman

Head of the Wayne foundation for benching Nketiah

Country: USA

Player:Saliba
Looking back at the results that Wenger was getting with such young teams it makes me kind of doubt the “he lets them just figure it out themselves” idea.

If anything it gives me Klopp/Pep vibes where every player knows exactly what they have to do in their position. It’s why we could replace guys without suffering too much as long as they had the required attributes (which was usually just technical ability). You can’t tell me that Wenger turned Theo Walcott into a 30+ g/a player from letting people just figure things out on the pitch.

I took his attacking genius for granted, even if it did loss potency towards the end, it’s still 10x better than what we’ve seen under Arteta.
Agreed. The idea that Arsène just kind of rolled a ball out and let everyone do what they wanted was always silly because especially in the early years, you could see the difference in a player after a short time under him. Guys who maybe took more long shots were looking to make a penetrative pass into the box instead of hoofing it after a few months at Arsenal. Someone like Henry who was a prototypical winger didn't just figure out how to be the best striker in PL history and the 2nd best striker of his generation by himself. Wenger quite clearly had a way of maximizing the innate ability of young players as evidenced by the fact that you'd struggle to find one who improved after he left us.
 

Blood on the Tracks

AG's best friend, role model and mentor.
Trusted ⭐

Country: England

Player:Rice
Maybe this is blasphemy but I wouldn't put Arsène down as a great tactician. He was good in that respect, but too rigid to be considered great.
To be honest I wouldn't put Fergie down as a great tactician either.

Wenger's superpower was big picture development of talent and engineering a level of self belief in players, that frankly he had no right to do. In that respect he was a bonafide genius.

Different eras and different types of personalities but Arsène is in the Clough category for me. They intrinsically understood how to motivate footballers and allow the players themselves to reach their full potential.

That last point is where Arteta falls down currently. It would be hard to argue he's maximising the potential of 5 players in the squad at the moment. Wenger would do it for 90% of his squad in his pomp.
 

Batman

Head of the Wayne foundation for benching Nketiah

Country: USA

Player:Saliba
Maybe this is blasphemy but I wouldn't put Arsène down as a great tactician. He was good in that respect, but too rigid to be considered great.
To be honest I wouldn't put Fergie down as a great tactician either.

Wenger's superpower was big picture development of talent and engineering a level of self belief in players, that frankly he had no right to do. In that respect he was a bonafide genius.

Different eras and different types of personalities but Arsène is in the Clough category for me. They intrinsically understood how to motivate footballers and allow the players themselves to reach their full potential.

That last point is where Arteta falls down currently. It would be hard to argue he's maximising the potential of 5 players in the squad at the moment. Wenger would do it for 90% of his squad in his pomp.
I kind of struggle with this one. I think someone like Mourinho or maybe even Pep might be a bit more astute tactically in terms of flexibility within a given match BUT those guys also had the benefit of having seen football that had already been changed by what Wenger was doing at Arsenal and building from it. I also think that if you consider how the Invincibles played without an out and out striker because Henry really wasn't a typical 9, nobody has really managed to play football like that before or since with a sort of perfect asymmetrical formation that was equally dangerous on the counter or dominating possession AND managed to go unbeaten with no real drop off through squad rotation. It didn't adapt because it didn't have to adapt. The later years where he was more rigid for periods seemed more a product of limited, unbalanced squads and yes a bit of stubbornness than an actual inability to adapt but he also kept us in the CL playing a totally different brand of football with younger and smaller, more technical players than what he'd had prior to Vieira's departure and he won trophies with 4-5 different formations, playing beautiful football in each.
 

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