We won't get relegated.
That's about all that I'm sure about at the moment.

Poor Freddie and Per have a ferociously stressful Christmas ahead.

I wish I had your confidence Yva, we seriously don't look capable of beating anyone right now, the bottom of the league teams are picking up points from us with ease at the moment.

Ah lads seriously, pull yourselves back from the brink! We won't get relegated.

mags wrote:

Anzac wrote:

By the same token most of what ails us was either started by him directly or became established under his watch.
That is not to say it is all his fault as IMO the BoD prior to KSE is equally culpable for allowing/enabling it to happen.

AW delayed the inevitable with this mediocre ownership, Ivan, and BofD at the helm...But the league caught up to AW.  Away we go, free falling.  The half empty stadium is gonna help to change ownership, I hope. 

This.

We were very demanding with Wenger. That was due to our feeling that Arsenal is a big, well organized club and capalbe of more.

Nonetheless, it seems that the structure and management of the club was deficient and the only reason why that didn't  pose as a real problem was Wenger.

Don't misunderstand me, Wenger leaving was a necessary thing if we wanted to improve. Sadly, it also meaned putting aside maybe the only thing that protected us from complete mediocrity.

It was a bet, and we lost it

We are more likely to get relegated than staying up. This squad is championship level . The only thing Freddie can do is somehow get everyone behind the ball and not concede goals and then hope for the best up front.

GooneriC wrote:

We are more likely to get relegated than staying up. This squad is championship level . The only thing Freddie can do is somehow get everyone behind the ball and not concede goals and then hope for the best up front.

Get a grip

y va marquer wrote:

We won't get relegated.
That's about all that I'm sure about at the moment.

Poor Freddie and Per have a ferociously stressful Christmas ahead.

Going by the history of failure of Tony's League Title threads we just might. If however Dules named the thread "We Fucking get Fucking Relegated" then I'd be confident we won't.

Qwiss! wrote:

GooneriC wrote:

We are more likely to get relegated than staying up. This squad is championship level . The only thing Freddie can do is somehow get everyone behind the ball and not concede goals and then hope for the best up front.

Get a grip

If this squad is Championship level them Emery was a genius last season. 

The performances say otherwise.

y va marquer wrote:

Ah lads seriously, pull yourselves back from the brink! We won't get relegated.

There's absolutely no chance.

We're rubbish at the moment, but even at 10th in the table we're in a false position. And I don't mean we should be lower!

Stop giving us false hope Ricky. We were doomed as soon as Dula made this thread.

Honest question cuz I can't remember.... When was the last time we scored a goal that wasn't a set piece or fluke?

It feels like we have zero creativity and cohesion as a unit moving forward (same with defense but I'm not going to bother talking about that).

How the heck does a team with the players we have struggle to break down teams better? Did emery really screw us so badly with his tactics and man management that we just forgot how to operate? I thought he was bad but I didn't think he was that bad.

It really is starting to feel like there's rot more beneath the surface with some players being the culprits. How much of this situation is mental and egotistical? I've managed people and teams that got into a funk mentally that really destabilized them. It takes a sudden push to get them going or firing someone.

I'm wondering whether the switch to Freddie for these guys is just "same old faces, same problems" which is really cutting out his work with them. He's a poor guy in this situation to be honest.

This all reeks of poor and naive leadership by Edu and the others too in my mind. If they can't see this shit in front of their faces or foreseen this all happening, they clearly lack the strategic foresight to push us forward. I'm worried by the choices they're going to make because of this... when shit hits the fan, lots of people make very poor low percentage choices to make them feel better.

Anyway, just rambling at this point. I hope we have or somehow buy/get enough quality to get us thru the season with our reputation intact. This season is a write off on the epl, perhaps we can salvage something in europa with a big change...

I think we'll win against West Ham. Hopefully it'll make people relax a little bit.

I sure hope so, for Freddie at least...

It's not about the players you have though. This run we are in seriously we have to be one of the worst teams in the division didn't now that anyone can beat.

Now if we can get someone to galvanise the players we should be able to get the required results but Brighton are not a great side and came away to us and liked pretty decent. There aren't many games I fancy is to get a result in and the next fixtures don't look full of points either.

Klaus wrote:

I think we'll win against West Ham. Hopefully it'll make people relax a little bit.

It's a must win because the hammers are woeful and it won't get much easier for us afterwards.

awooga83 wrote:

we have to be one of the worst teams in the division didn't now that anyone can beat

I know we're sick of these putrid stats by now, but some figures from our games vs the current bottom three:

Goals: 6 - 6
Shots: 35 - 67
Shots on Target: 16 - 24

Captain wrote:

Anzac wrote:

Disagree = he inherited The Legendary Back4 + Seaman to build upon, what did he leave behind that was any match for that in any area of the pitch, let alone that we are supposedly better off?  

They weren't quite as legendary then...

Still good enough to win a domestic Double under AW.

Ricky1985 wrote:

y va marquer wrote:

Ah lads seriously, pull yourselves back from the brink! We won't get relegated.

There's absolutely no chance.

We're rubbish at the moment, but even at 10th in the table we're in a false position. And I don't mean we should be lower!

We currently rank 18th for shots allowed per game,
and 8th re shots taken per game.
If we lose v WHam we could drop to 16th, & whilst I don't think we're that bad I think we're in the right area as far as our stats are concerned.

be careful what you wish for

How I'd love that trophy right about now.

We were right about Wenger though, he took us below his own promised land. The mistake we made was not moving him on earlier.

Big Willie wrote:

How I'd love that trophy right about now.

it's about context. 4th place achieved by a steadily improving, competitive team and smart management - yes absolutely 

4th place achieved in spite of year-on-year stagnation and failure to see the warning signs (aka the last 5 years) - not sure about that

We were declining under Wenger anyway. He should have been moved on 2-3 seasons earlier to allow us to address the stagnation but our board have no vision or the necessary guts to take a big decision like that.

Gazza M wrote:

Big Willie wrote:

How I'd love that trophy right about now.

it's about context. 4th place achieved by a steadily improving, competitive team and smart management - yes absolutely 

4th place achieved in spite of year-on-year stagnation and failure to see the warning signs (aka the last 5 years) - not sure about that

Yup, like you said, it's all relative, and relative to where we are right now 4th place is extremely attractive right now and at any point over thr last 2 and a half years.

I’d be happy not finishing top 4, whats more important is having an owner/board ambitious to win and back a manager to win the league and a manager who develops young players. And a team with potential, i.e. players who could eventualy become £60m + players. Personally I find that as a place where the club needs to be rather than just “finishing top 4”. This season I’d take finishing outside the CL spots again, the bigger concern is having a manager in place who is building something, and playing guys like Guendouzi, Martinelli, Torreira, Willock, Tierney, Nelson etc who will increase in value, sell them off high and replace.

Ray wrote:

I’d be happy not finishing top 4, whats more important is having an owner/board ambitious to win and back a manager to win the league and a manager who develops young players. And a team with potential, i.e. players who could eventualy become £60m + players. Personally I find that as a place where the club needs to be rather than just “finishing top 4”. This season I’d take finishing outside the CL spots again, the bigger concern is having a manager in place who is building something, and playing guys like Guendouzi, Martinelli, Torreira, Willock, Tierney, Nelson etc who will increase in value, sell them off high and replace.

This is all important, Ray. Add to this is what you might think of as a human resource development plan in your office. a very clear template that spells out 

• what is the preferred playing system 
• what types of players will fit that system - skills and physicality across the field
• age profiles of players 

This will then help guide the transfer policy, so we are much more targeted in our buying and selling. This is an interesting Twitter thread from Clive on how ill-fitting our team is. He's on an Arsenal podcast and coach at a semi-pro club: 

He starts... 

At Arsenal we have long forgotten how to build a team.

We have neglected the fundamentals of a player for a specific role.

We have slow CB’s that can be dominated and fear 1 on 1 defending and encourage people to dance around them

We have FB’s that are weak and indisciplined

[color] and continues[/color]

What if we get relegated but win the Europa League?

CL football while playing in the championship?

Jed wrote:

What if we get relegated but win the Europa League?

CL football while playing in the championship?

if that's possible i'd make that trade.

18 points left to go. it's back on

Meatwad wrote:

Jed wrote:

What if we get relegated but win the Europa League?

CL football while playing in the championship?

if that's possible i'd make that trade.

It’d be a first surely. Would be pretty funny.

After our run this month, this thread may still be relevant.

Jed wrote:

Meatwad wrote:

if that's possible i'd make that trade.

It’d be a first surely. Would be pretty funny.

circumstances like that would deserve a freak occurrence like winning your first champions league while being in the 2nd tier.

awooga83 wrote:

We were declining under Wenger anyway. He should have been moved on 2-3 seasons earlier to allow us to address the stagnation but our board have no vision or the necessary guts to take a big decision like that.

And most people will still blame Wenger for that.

He was never going to step down and so it falls on others to make the decision. They let the club down as much as Wenger did.

Meatwad wrote:

Jed wrote:

It’d be a first surely. Would be pretty funny.

circumstances like that would deserve a freak occurrence like winning your first champions league while being in the 2nd tier.

Win the CL, lose the play offs.

The next 10 league games.

Home | Away

Sun 15 Dec  MCI
Sat 21 Dec  EVE
Thu 26 Dec  BOU
Sun 29 Dec  CHE
Wed 1 Jan   MUN
Sat 11 Jan  CRY
Sat 18 Jan  SHU
Tue 21 Jan  CHE
Sat 1 Feb   BUR
Sat 8 Feb   NEW

I would take this

Sun 15 Dec MCI D
Sat 21 Dec EVE D
Thu 26 Dec BOU W
Sun 29 Dec CHE W
Wed 1 Jan MUN W
Sat 11 Jan CRY D
Sat 18 Jan SHU W
Tue 21 Jan CHE L
Sat 1 Feb BUR W
Sat 8 Feb NEW W

Whoever who can deliver above 21 points out of 30 in those fixtures can have the job

Qwiss! wrote:

Meatwad wrote:

circumstances like that would deserve a freak occurrence like winning your first champions league while being in the 2nd tier.

Win the CL, lose the play offs.

honestly i'd make that trade too. once i was willing to sacrifice arsenal's over a century without relegation for a damn europa league, i pretty much have go with the first champions leagues trophy in exchange for a 2nd year in the championship.