asajoseph wrote:

Which is worse - failing to beat the worst Spurs side I've seen in years, or failing to beat the worst Utd side since before the Ferguson era?

I think this was worse, but I'm still trying to decide.

We got beaten by United so I'd argue this was worse.

I still can't believe we failed to score against a team with Tyler Blackett at the heart of their defence.

Their defence was/is terrible. We made De Gea look much better than he is too, shooting straight at him the second we got the chance.

Yeah, this raving about Da Gea's performance is nonsense.
Quite a few of those shots were glorified passes right into his hands.

Our shooting was incredibly poor. How has Wenger gone from Henry, Bergkamp, Pires, etc to this shower of feebs?

Ramsey's goal scoring got Wenger out of gaol last season, that and his great luck that Sagna, Per, Kos and Gibbs were fit for pretty much the whole season.

I'll continue thinking Walcott will be our knight in shining armor until proven otherwise.

Yeah, De Gea did his job but we made him look good. He impressed on the odd occasion, like Alexis's header in the second half. I thought it was impressive of him to get down so quickly to catch that. It was close to his body too. The chances he saved from Wilshere and Chamberlain had more to do with them being awful though.

That Sanchez header was an easy enough save. I don't think any PL keeper would've let that past them.

The time he came out early to Ox I felt he was very lucky. Chamberlain seemed to be taken by surprise but if he'd had any composure he'd easily have scored there.

I'll have to look at it again. I thought it was a good save at the time though. It was from a relatively close distance, it caught him with the weight on the wrong leg and it went close to him which made it difficult to get down in time.

There was a man guarding the near post behind him when he came out for Chamberlain too. Even if Ox had gotten the shot past him I think it would have been saved.

Anzac wrote:

Kel Varnsen wrote:

Shit result, shit performance (flatters to deceive as always), shit player and a shit manager. Fucking hate our midfield. Wilshere was our best midfielder today and he was damn near abysmal. There is no thought or plan behind the way we play. We pressed fairly decent today and created a few chances against a piss poor man u side, but couldn't score goals. I fucking hate this current side. I would sell every player except for Sanchez. Get rid of Wenger, sell 8-10 players and start over. This team is a mess.

You're not alone in feeling that way - Yuvken's said much the same earlier in this thread.
At this rate with another 2 seasons of more of the same shite I dare say that it may well be the case that the squad is beyond salvation.
In which case why not go for revolution rather than evolution?

Been saying this for ages. Sell most of the squad.

The midfield especially sucks. 

You don't need Mourinho to get a whole lot more out of this squad. Our absurd defensive personnel issues would be a problem for any manager, but our midfield & attack could do a whole lot more under most managers IMO.

I'm sorry, but Mourinho won't make our defence any better, unless he brings Ivanovic, Cahill, Terry, Courtois and Luis with him. His teams always defend better, because his teams always have great defenders.

We had Szczesny, Chambers, Mertesacker, Monreal and Gibbs out there. That's a bog standard defence.

Don't think there's much to extract from this lot. Sanchez is playing just fine in this very same setup. The rest are simply just not very good.

Our midfielders are useless. Can't create, nor can they defend. Good for nothing except 5 yard passes and running out of position.

There's a general recurring thought process that a team simply requires the correct instructions and they will perform. For instance, get Bould to run his Graham offside traps with the defence and they will eventually be able to successfully implement it.

Coaching can make a difference, but it's all about ability. Doesn't matter how much training you do, ultimately it boils down to the ability of the team. The team can't defend, because the players aren't good enough defenders?

How many of the current lot are playing at their best? How many have we seen play a lot better than they have this season?

When will it all end?

Partly you could blame the defensive issues to injuries to Koscielny and Arteta then the loss of Sagna, last year we were quite solid defensively. But Mourinho would not have Monreal as CB cover.

Chelsea had Cech Ivanovic Cahill Terry/Luiz Cole/Azpilicueta in 12/13 the year before Mourinho came and they conceded 39 goals that season in the league. Next season Mourinho comes in, same defenders and they concede 27 league goals. He made a huge difference defensively and has reformed Terry who looked like he was finished in 2012.