Arsenal - (A) - Post Match

[lucas]

Have you actually seen him play this season before today?

Yes, every game. And he doesn't do enough for me to warrant a place in the first 11.

[G]

Scum play Arsenal next week, that'll be interesting.

[Mattshark]

Have you actually seen him play this season before today?

While his work rate is good, end product is far from good enough. We need him to add that.
Gerrard I would like to see further forward, but he seems stay deep more often than not and he very rarely shoots anymore I think that has take so much from his game.

[Fredo]

Scum play Arsenal next week, that'll be interesting.

A draw there and a win for us, we'll be back to 3 points off the top. Lot of knee jerking in here and in the match day thread.

[Rigadon]

Henderson. I think he needs a long break from first team action.

Maybe go see that sports psychologist fella to work on his confidence. Seriously lacking a pair of balls!

I don't think Henderson is the problem per se. The midfield three of Gerrard, Henderson and Lucas is the problem. Also, a (relatively flat) midfield three in front of three centre backs (especially one that doesn't include Agger) is wrong.

[JohnDoe]

This doesn't make any sense. Coutinho has been out for several games with injury but is generally the source of our attack. Henderson has been fantastic going forward in many games. Moses has been a generally decent component of our attack as well. Of course we're dependent on Suarez and Sturridge to score... they're strikers and they've been typically brilliant together. To say we've got no proper offensive set-up is really unfair. I'm not really sure what you expect.

Moses, bar his first game, hasn't been very good. Henderson has a great engine but he can't shoot or pass very well. Coutinho is the only midfielder we have with an ounce of creativity. The team has no stamp from the manager or a real identity. I have no problem with playing three at the back, but it feels like we're doing it because we have "too many" good CB's, and not because of a tactical decision.

[Kinell]

A draw there and a win for us, we'll be back to 3 points off the top. Lot of knee jerking in here and in the match day thread.

It's the performance and the difference in class shown today rather than the result being the worry.

All our expectations have just been grounded a bit

[Fredo]

In hindsight, we did miss 1 or 2 really good chances. Had they gone in, maybe it would have been a different result.

[destinydude]

Seriously? I think that's a bit dramatic.

You do realise that we are still third in the table, and we're not going to be the only team to lose at The Emirates this season. This Arsenal team is very good - better than us at the moment, something which isn't the manager's fault.

It's not that dramatic and I've outlined my reasons, in the match thread, as to why I feel that way

Out position in the League hardly matters at this stage as it hardly mattered last year. We've had 11 pts from 7 games after switching to 3-5-2 and we don't have the personnel for a 3-5-2 with Johnson/Coutinho missing half the games. Add to that, none of the 3 CBs are ball playing CBs. What's the ****ing point of a 3 man defense then?

Our midfield too is quite slow and our full backs aren't really creating many chances. It's quite predictable to see why a 3-5-2 was going to fail.

We've been bailed out a bit by Luis/Sturridge scoring some good goals else we've very little going for us as a team since the switch.

[Robbie-9-Fowler]

looking at that first goal then, Flanagan will be getting bollocked and rightly so.

[Kinell]

Moses, bar his first game, hasn't been very good. Henderson has a great engine but he can't shoot or pass very well. Coutinho is the only midfielder we have with an ounce of creativity. The team has no stamp from the manager or a real identity. I have no problem with playing three at the back, but it feels like we're doing it because we have "too many" good CB's, and not because of a tactical decision.

[kingfunk]

For me this game was 95% hope and 5% expectation, so cannot really say I am surprised. We were out played and out classed by a better team. The team selection could have been better but neither here nor there. It's extremely disappointing, but we as fans are the architects of our own disappointment, at the start of the season the majority of us would have taken this position but because we have had such a good start we are all disappointed.
We are still on track, don't lose the hope, or kick toys out the pram, stick behind your club, manager and players. We will get there.

[Fredo]

We weren't outclassed.

[Robbie-9-Fowler]

Moses, bar his first game, hasn't been very good. Henderson has a great engine but he can't shoot or pass very well. Coutinho is the only midfielder we have with an ounce of creativity. The team has no stamp from the manager or a real identity. I have no problem with playing three at the back, but it feels like we're doing it because we have "too many" good CB's, and not because of a tactical decision.

I think Moses has something to offer, we can't have top class players on the bench, we're not really in the position to at the minute.

I agree though we are very 'plain' in midfield, nobody looks like they can do anything apart from the odd 50 yard Gerrard pass. Nothing is expected of Lucas which is fair enough but as you say Henderson has a great engine and nice short passing but not a great deal more. He does a job but for me he has to either add more to his game over the next year or his place might become under threat again at the club.

[destinydude]

looking at that first goal then, Flanagan will be getting bollocked and rightly so.

It came from Cissokho's side and what's Flannagan's fault there? Lucas was supposed to be tracking Cazorla.