Unai Emery: Adios

[krackpot]

I'd like to see us try Edu as manager.

He can prep for his role for a season, and take over from Emery if it is going south.

 

[Jury]

Klopp managed to get some very mediocre players to perform consistently enough so that the stars of the team could carry it to a head to head battle for the EPL and now an UCL final.

I know one of our favourite past times on here is to kick the **** out of Liverpool, but they don’t really have any mediocre players. Kicking the **** out of Henderson was always fun but he was never a mediocre player— he was always above average. I look through their first 11 and I don’t see any mediocre players. They all have claims to being decent in CL terms at the very worst. They all offer something valuable. They have only lost one game in the league all season and they’ve just been the better side over both legs in the Champions League game against Barcelona. That’s not all down to the manager.

 

[<<reed>>]

I'd like to see us try Edu as manager.

He can prep for his role for a season, and take over from Emery if it is going south.

 

[El Duderino]

I know one of our favourite past times on here is to kick the **** out of Liverpool, but they don’t really have any mediocre players. Kicking the **** out of Henderson was always fun but he was never a mediocre player— he was always above average. I look through their first 11 and I don’t see any mediocre players. They all have claims to being decent in CL terms at the very worst. They all offer something valuable. They have only lost one game in the league all season and they’ve just been the better side over both legs in the Champions League game against Barcelona. That’s not all down to the manager.

Do you think Shaquiri, Origi or Matip would have managed to play like they did yesterday, the former two filling in for Salah and Firmino, under Emery?

 

[Artisan]

This along with Edu news are pretty nice to hear. Get some of the Invincible lads finally involved with the club.

 

[berric]

This along with Edu news are pretty nice to hear. Get some of the Invincible lads finally involved with the club.

Overmars to replace Raul in the long run and promoting Ljungberg to first team coaching in the future... Dreams, dreams...

 

[BobP]

Overmars to replace Raul in the long run and promoting Ljungberg to first team coaching in the future... Dreams, dreams...

Overmars for Raul would be a like for like replacement.

Can see Vieira as manager as well.

 

[Dj_sds -]

I know one of our favourite past times on here is to kick the **** out of Liverpool, but they don’t really have any mediocre players. Kicking the **** out of Henderson was always fun but he was never a mediocre player— he was always above average. I look through their first 11 and I don’t see any mediocre players. They all have claims to being decent in CL terms at the very worst. They all offer something valuable. They have only lost one game in the league all season and they’ve just been the better side over both legs in the Champions League game against Barcelona. That’s not all down to the manager.

Top notch manager, player recruitment and asset management is behind liverpools new found success imo. Its also the reason i dont agree with money being the most important factor for success. There are too many variables to just simplify it to investment in players. United are living proof of this.

 

[Jury]

Do you think Shaquiri, Origi or Matip would have managed to play like they did yesterday, the former two filling in for Salah and Firmino, under Emery?

Well that will remain a mystery forever, I reckon. How on earth are we ever going to know that?

None of the front three were fantastic. Origi scored a tap in and reacted well to the corner unchallenged from 6 yards. On another day that hits his ankle and it goes over the bar. He wasn’t even looking at the ball.

Shaqiri is a class player. He was class at Stoke under their manager, and the manager he had before that. He’s capable of great things, albeit not too consistently.

Why does our new manager suddenly come under the spotlight after nights like those? It’s so masochistic

But saying that, there were people murdering Klopp on here not long ago, and now he’s the messiah again.The bipolar life of a football fan.

 

[Jury]

Top notch manager, player recruitment and asset management is behind liverpools new found succes imo. Its also the reason i dont agree with money being the most important factor for succes. There are too many variables to just simplify it to investment in players. United are living proof of this.

I 100% agree with you when you say money isn’t the most important factor for success, but what success are we talking about with regards to Liverpool?

 

[progman07]

I think a big part of it is Emery's lack of communication skills / language. We have the wrong personality to manage not only this squad but for the top level imo. He might have the ability but he's not a leader. Sign better personality this summer else he will have to go.

Agree 100%. The guy looks and talks so uninspiring, I cannot imagine he can transmit half the motivation to his squad someone like Klopp or Guardiola does.

The fact that we got Emery to solve our defensive and structural issues, yet we still look unbalanced and unable to defend worries me a lot.
He was never looking like someone who will motivate our players to go to war, nor did he look like someone who prefers beautiful football, so we should at least have got someone who coaches players well and sets them up to concede less goals than before.

 

[Dj_sds -]

What success?

1 el final, 2 back to back cl finals. They will probably win it this season. Humiliating Barcelona in the process. Challenging for the title until the last day with a points total that would have made them champions in 8 out of the last 10 years or so. Success doesnt have to be trophies only. Liverpool have shown massive improvement over the last couple of seasons and i think that can be classified as success.

 

[Jury]

1 el final, 2 back to back cl finals. They will probably win it this season. Humiliating Barcelona in the process. Challenging for the title until the last day with a points total that would have made them champions in 8 out of the last 10 years or so. Success doesnt have to be trophies only. Liverpool have shown massive improvement over the last couple of season and i think that can be classified as success.

Improvement isn’t success. They’ve won **** all. If they inexplicably drop off now, as can happen, nobody’s going to remember the great nearly men. If they lose the final half their fans will want Klopp gone

 

[A_G]

Think Henry Winter was pretty fair here:

When Gerald Arthur Cooper, the frustrated choreographer in The Full Monty, tries to elicit some co-ordinated movement from his maladroit dance troupe of former steelworkers, he eventually pleads: “All I want to do is get you in a straight bloody line.”

One of the ungainly group, “Horse”, famously has the answer, observing: “Well, it’s the Arsenal offside trap, isn’t it?” Everybody understands, they fall into line, and step out as one as if led by Tony Adams, instantly organised.

Many Arsenal supporters can recount the scene, almost verbatim, delighting in the place their legendary old defence holds in popular folklore. When Arsène Wenger oversaw his first Arsenal game, away to Blackburn Rovers on October 12, 1996, he could call upon such defensive experts to protect David Seaman’s goal as Adams, Steve Bould, Martin Keown and the full backs Lee Dixon and Nigel Winterburn (with another centre back, Andy Linighan, on the bench at Ewood Park). Wenger inherited well-drilled class. Unai Emery inherited Shkodran Mustafi.

Many reasons exist why Emery, who succeeded Wenger last summer, deserves emotional and financial backing despite a season in danger of fading to grey, unless Arsenal go on to win the Europa League in Baku on May 29. A tiny minority of fans on social media got #EmeryOut trending after Sunday’s dispiriting home draw with Brighton & Hove Albion, which ruined their hopes of finishing in the Champions League positions.

Some criticism of Emery is undeniably due. A return of a solitary point from games against Crystal Palace, Leicester City, Wolverhampton Wanderers and Brighton is pretty wretched. Emery is clearly prioritising the Europa League, a competition he won three times with Seville, which may pay off (and bring a place in the Champions League), but it is a gamble.

The 47-year-old Spaniard also needs to quicken his learning of English, as even super-patient TV is tiring of his set replies. The loan signing of Denis Suárez from Barcelona, in January, has been calamitous. Emery needs to show more ruthlessness and belief against the smaller teams. He seems to enjoy the underdog role against the leading sides, perhaps echoing his personality, and has registered some impressive results (beating Tottenham Hotspur, Chelsea and Manchester United) but is less adept when needing to inspire his team against less celebrated opponents.

Supporters have every right to express their grievances, just as others can point out that such a club as Arsenal are above hounding a manager out in his first season and can also list the problems Emery has been bequeathed.

He is working with a squad of Europa League quality, not Champions League, barring the talent of Alexandre Lacazette, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Laurent Koscielny when fully fit and Mesut Özil when in the mood. Any comparison with the superior squads, smart structure and winning culture of the leading two in the Premier League, Manchester City and Liverpool, is pointless; they have been building assiduously, investing properly, while Arsenal have been regressing under Stan Kroenke, becoming a big noise fallen silent.

The teams occupying third and fourth positions, Chelsea and Sp**s, boast more accomplished starting XIs than Arsenal’s, and Chelsea also have a better squad, even with Maurizio Sarri ignoring gifted youngsters and the odd exiling of Gary Cahill. If Cahill were at Arsenal, he would be a fixture at centre half and captain.

Commanding centre backs are expensive but a widespread criticism of Arsenal’s owners, the Kroenke family, is that they want to do things on the cheap. They are running Arsenal on a Europa League budget, so deservedly get Europa League football.

On joining last summer, Emery knew Arsenal needed defenders, so Sven Mislintat, the then head of recruitment, got Stephan Lichtsteiner — a very strange piece of business, slow and now 35, a free signing from Juventus. Cheap. The 30-year-old Sokratis came from Borussia Dortmund for £17 million. Again cheap. He could be a leader but is alienating some Arsenal fans with his simulation. Konstantinos Mavropanos, the 21-year-old centre back from PAS Giannina, cost £1.8 million. Again, cheap. And injured for four months.

None of the defenders brought in has really improved a back line urgently requiring rejuvenating. Mustafi is error-prone, notably gifting penalties with a challenge on Crystal Palace’s Cheikhou Kouyaté, a push on Tottenham’s Harry Kane. A compilation of his gaffes has been viewed 258,000 times.

Emery has one centre back of genuine substance, Koscielny, another of genuine promise in Rob Holding and an excellent attacking right back who can get caught out of position, Héctor Bellerín. Unfortunately for Emery, injury has claimed those three for significant periods of the season. Ainsley Maitland-Niles, willingly helping out in defence, is a central midfield player and, at some point, deserves a run there.

In defensive midfield, Mohamed Elneny is too risky and Granit Xhaka’s decent passing range is let down by either lapses in concentration at opposing runners or in costly challenges. Lucas Torreira and Mattéo Guendouzi are certainly upgrades but they need time to settle in. They will, especially when Guendouzi learns that opposing coaches are targeting his failure to run back.

Clearly, if Arsenal want to challenge more they need more investment in the squad. If Josh Kroenke, who seems more football-savvy than his father, Stan, truly understands the situation, or engages people around him prepared to advise him properly, then Emery may receive the more substantial transfer kitty this summer.

Emery last summer walked into a famous club, full of great staff, people working proudly for the Arsenal, a club full of history and with an impressive, money-spinning stadium. He also walked into a complete mess, and that is why he deserves some respite from the storm never far from the air around the Emirates.

He is having to deal with the legacy of Wenger’s imbalanced squad, issues from Ivan Gazidis’s time as chief executive, the failure to appoint a director of football, and the awarding of a lucrative, lengthy contract for Özil. The failure to keep Aaron Ramsey, who happily played in a range of positions, and brought discipline, energy and goals to midfield if required, should shame some at Arsenal. On Sunday, Ramsey stood on the pitch at the Emirates, his footballing home for the past 11 years, tears streaming down his face, his contract having been run down because Arsenal failed to act quickly enough. The squad needs overhauling yet one of those worth keeping is off to Juventus.

Emery also needs to confront a culture of institutionalised softness that has built up since The Invincibles of 2003-04, bringing more hunger, more edge. Players who are frequently up for the big games, but not the lesser ones, deserve to have their character questioned.

It is too nice at Arsenal, another hangover of the Wenger era. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain realised that and moved to Liverpool even before Wenger left. The players need to challenge each other more. The players are kept away from the media, so they are challenged less, and the soft culture continues to fester. All these ills would be addressed with more intelligent and stronger leadership from the top. But Emery has walked into a power vacuum. Kroenke should step in and give some direction. But doesn’t.

Emery has arrived in a nation increasingly torn and angry, with footballing tribalism even more acerbic, certainly in word form, and social media a platform for instant carping and point-scoring. Snapchat and snap back. But some perspective, rarely found on social media, is needed.

Even when Emery tweets upbeat messages about Arsenal’s wonderful Foundation, some of the replies included: “Concentrate on winning games, please”, and, “Your team selection and substitutions recently have been just terrible, sir”.

When the former Paris Saint-Germain coach tweeted “solidarité avec les Parisiens” after the catastrophe that befell Notre Dame, one of the first replies from an Arsenal fan was: “Sell Mustafi and donate the proceeds to the restoration as a gift of solidarity please.”

Emery has arrived in north London with their rivals Sp**s reaching the Champions League semi-finals and moving into the best stadium in the country.

Whoever had stepped in this season, even a well-loved former player such as Mikel Arteta, would have had to deal with this difficult dynamic. Emery deserves support in testing times, and for his board to show some naked ambition.

 

[Jury]

Maybe we just need more Henderson and Milner types? Power and passion. Running around a lot. Shouting. The British way.

How would Özil have reacted in a game like that? How long would Xhaka have remained on the pitch? How many penalties would Shkodran have given up? Does Kola even lift?

We need a British core again.

 

[krengon]

Improvement isn’t success. They’ve won **** all. If they inexplicably drop off now, as can happen, nobody’s going to remember the great nearly men. If they lose the final half their fans will want Klopp gone

Yep football is cruel like that, only winning is success.

 

[Jury]

Yep football is cruel like that, only winning is success.

People’s perceptions change all the time. At the start of the season winning the Europa league would’ve been deemed an incredible achievement for our new manager. We have more than 1 foot in the final, and in a final it’s 50-50. We could well win this thing. That doesn’t seem to matter now because other teams have done good stuff without actually winning anything.... We are all upset because we are bitter fans, but the bitterness is making us self harm. I’m resisting at the moment, but I’m witnessing a lot of it right now.

 

[Hexagon9]

Think Henry Winter was pretty fair here:

Yep, it’s fair but just stating the obvious. People on here could’ve written it, albeit with a touch more bile!

 

[AfterTheEraEnds]

This is from one of the Liverpool blogs, not sure if we are allowed to post links. Just goes to show, you never know. Give it sometime, if things dont change. Then change the manager.

https://anfieldindex.com/32950/its-the-hope-that-kills-you.html

 

[Jury]

I think a lot of the fallout is due to us not having quite progressed to the EL final, and the nervousness that brings. Add to that the possibility of Sp**s (they won’t) joining Liverpool in the final, and it’s doom.

A Sp**s exit and us getting to our final will put a complete different complexion on things. Sp**s will be trophyless again, and we’ll have either Chelsea or Frankfurt in a very winnable final. I imagine this thread will get a bit of a break in the meantime.