• The Arsenal

  • Arsenal v Sunderland | Premier League | Saturday 5th March 2011 - 15.00

Tony Montana wrote:

We should have won despite the ref.

Why were we not on top for 70 mins?

It does sound lovely to think that teams can come out and deal with the pot of luck that officiating seems to be by putting in 10/10 performances every week. Obviously we've got to take our share of the blame for the result because football is made up of so many variables - some more important than others - but the referee deserves every bit of contempt coming his way.

In the past 5 weeks alone we've had the Everton game, the Newcastle shambles and now two decisions that were pretty clear - there wasn't even a shadow of doubt there.

It would be really unfair to call this a performance of chokers. We tried extremely hard today, wasn't good enough for the referee unfortunately.

Rohit wrote:

Championship winning teams win 1-0 every now and then but if we aren't allowed to do that what do we do really.

We're still gonna win the league.

This result will feel better in about 25 hours time.

How was this a performance of chokers? We absolutely gang-raped them with huge pressure for 20 minutes straight. Guys like Wilshere, Nasri and Arshavin played their hearts out to get the win at the end.

I felt even before this game that United will win tomorrow.

How the linesman doesn't see the push on Arshavin is beyond me?

Why do we even bother trying to stand up to United? Everyone wants them to win it anyway.

Those calls would never, ever have happened at Old Trafford. It's infuriating to the point of rage. I'm just so so so so fed up with it.

Tim wrote:
Rohit wrote:

Championship winning teams win 1-0 every now and then but if we aren't allowed to do that what do we do really.

We're still gonna win the league.

This result will feel better in about 25 hours time.

United will beat Liverpool keeping the gap at best, 3 points. We then play them at the Emirates and it's not foregone conclusion that we'll win.

I mean WBA next week might kill us. They call problems all over the shop for us.

Tony Montana wrote:
qs! wrote:

Maybe but we had a perfectly good goal ruled out and a pen not given that likely would have been another goal had Shava not been fouled.

In a game as tensely poised in a title race with so many out those decision really do play a massive part.

And bar the 2 big decisions he allowed them foul us to break up play time and time again but every foul for us he pulled out a card. Ideally we would win anyway, like we did in the Everton match but really refereeing like that has an absolutely massive impact.

Fair enough but Chamakh could have smashed it into the net.

I hope if we don't win the league people won't be blaming it on the refs because our problems will then be forever glossed over.

So because Chamakh hits the bar its ok we had a goal disallowed and a clear pen not given?

Ricky1985 wrote:

Why do we even bother trying to stand up to United? Everyone wants them to win it anyway.

Those calls would never, ever have happened at Old Trafford. It's infuriating to the point of rage. I'm just so so so so fed up with it.

WE HAVE TO!

We've won the league before so we'll have to do it again.

I can't even......

WTF kind of officiating was that? We always had the chance to blame our players for playing like idiots but today we actually won. That goal was perfect. That penalty was supposed to be given. Why the heck was the ref being so picky against us? Seriously that was the worst officiating I've seen in a long long time. Im furious that we lost a game that we actually won.

I hope Wenger rips him a new one in the interview

Tony Montana wrote:
Tim wrote:

We're still gonna win the league.

This result will feel better in about 25 hours time.

United will beat Liverpool keeping the gap at best, 3 points. We then play them at the Emirates and it's not foregone conclusion that we'll win.

I mean WBA next week might kill us. They call problems all over the shop for us.

United wont beat Liverpool.

Tony Montana wrote:
Tim wrote:

We're still gonna win the league.

This result will feel better in about 25 hours time.

United will beat Liverpool keeping the gap at best, 3 points. We then play them at the Emirates and it's not foregone conclusion that we'll win.

I mean WBA next week might kill us. They call problems all over the shop for us.

You're right Tony. Utd will win all their games, we'll lose all of ours. We'll probably get relegated.

Gurgen wrote:

How was this a performance of chokers? We absolutely gang-raped them with huge pressure for 20 minutes straight. Guys like Wilshere, Nasri and Arshavin played their hearts out to get the win at the end.

Agree. This is a tough league, there aren't any easy games and as bad as we were in the first half, Sunderland did make it very tough.

We had control of this game, i said at half time Sunderland wouldn't be able to keep this up and once they tired, like you say, we were all over them, everyone.

We should have won this.

Gurgen wrote:

How was this a performance of chokers? We absolutely gang-raped them with huge pressure for 20 minutes straight. Guys like Wilshere, Nasri and Arshavin played their hearts out to get the win at the end.

Absolutely. Denilson and Diaby weren't great but the rest of team put in a lot of effort.

We'll see what happens in the next few premier league fixtures. For me, the collapse is on. If you look at the Title Race thread I was one of the optimists in there, but the last two games have imo shown we don't have what it takes to break the glass ceiling. Anyway it's 4 am in the morning over here, and i have to nurse my injured hand and sleep. Night all.

if we had got the three points and utd had lost tomorrow the championship would have swung massively in our favour, they still have a cushion now and are still favourites. If they win I fear its as good as over.

You're not going to win every game by 3 or 4 goals, especially with 5 key players out, so when you do score or get shoved over in the area you could do with the ref not screwing you over.

qs! wrote:
Armor wrote:

Credit to Samir Nasri today. One of the few who looked actually bothered before the 70th minute. He didn't deserve that result.

Really? I'm a big fan of Samir but today he made so many poor decisions. Held onto the ball too long, too often. Not his usual self.

I thought Kos, Djourou and Szczesny were great. Jack was good too. Chamakh looked a different player when he came on to what we've seen recently.

I thought Nasri was our best player today, offensively at least. He wasn't perfect but so much of anything good we did, went through Samir.

Ricky1985 wrote:

Why do we even bother trying to stand up to United? Everyone wants them to win it anyway.

Those calls would never, ever have happened at Old Trafford. It's infuriating to the point of rage. I'm just so so so so fed up with it.

You know what really got me today. When they got a free out because Shava stood in front of the keeper at a corner and the keeper ran into him. Do we ever get a decision like that in our favour? Absolutely not. We're not playing on a level field.

Only Arshavin Nasri Szczesny Koscielny Sagna Clichy showed obvious commitment to play for us today. I know some others does, but there are a few select ones who clearly don't care about us. Fucking idiots. Not surprising when that someone went off we suddenly played so much better