• The Arsenal

  • Arsenal - Ipswich, Friday 27 December at 20:15 UK time.

I'm making this earlier then usual as we need to figure out how are we gonna attack from now until Saka comes back.
No better game to start with then this, Ipswich are dog shit, they have 12 points, have won 1 in the last 5 and lost the other 4, in fact, they only won 2 games this season. Only scored 16 but conceded 32. Funny thing, out of the 2 games they won, one of them was vs Spurs away from home hehe.

We last played them in the league in 2002 and in the league cup in 2011, it was the semi final, we lost away from home 1-0, but got a 3-0 win at the Emirates. I think Cesc scored in that one, I also remember someone scoring from a corner. I'm old.

Now a lot of our attacking tactics over the years have been "give it Saka and pray". Now we have to change things up, how do you guys think we will do it? Saka is our best scorer and our number 1 guy in creating and assisting.

Raya
Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, MLS
Ødegaard, Partey, Rice
Martinelli, Havertz, Jesus

I would go with this front 3, all of them are confidence players and I would love them all to get in on the action, scoring and assisting.
Maybe harsh on Trossard...but what can we do. I would still keep MLS in the team, Califiori is back but the kid has done enough to keep his place. I also want more from Odegaard, he needs to step up big time, in terms of end product. Do you think with all the games coming up that Arteta will rotate ?

I was at the League Cup final in 2011 (a horrific shit show) but weirdly I don't remember playing Ipswich in the previous round at all.

The front line will probably be Trossard-Jesus-Martinelli, unless the manager thinks Jesus needs a rest.

    Bring Back Kerrea Gilbert I was at the League Cup final in 2011 (a horrific shit show) but weirdly I don't remember playing Ipswich in the previous round at all.

    Weirdly, I also don't remember it, which is weird because I remember being pumped at the prospect of trying to break out trophy drought.

      Bring Back Kerrea Gilbert oh, they were continuously slagging him off about something... After a while, I interjected (I know, right?) and then got a "I'm a season ticket holder, what right have you got?" response. All a bit of a storm in a teacup really, especially given the final score.

          RocktheCasbah

          Haha, reminds me of a couple of seasons ago, season we finished 5th, I sat next two a couple of right plonkers who were moaning all the way through the match about Arteta.

          I was getting well irritated, fortunately the guy in front of me turned around 10 mins before the game and told them ‘for the love of god please shut up and let us watch the last 10 mins without having to listen to you to moan’ and it worked a treat. We scored a last min goal which got the crowd going, one of them stood up, looked at him mate and said ‘idiots’ and left as we chased another goal.

          I thanked the other guy later as we were leaving 😆

          Only other time I got irritated was also against Brighton, this time in the league cup, guy next to me was relentlessly going on about how shit Eddie is. He’s another who left early.

              goon it's really annoying. When I was at the United game this season, there was a woman behind me screeching every time we lost the ball, swearing every time one of our players made a mistake. I get that playing United has its history and can be a tense affair but honestly becomes quite grating with someone shouting in your ear every five seconds.

                1 attacker on the bench and 4 LBs 🥲 the long season continues...

                Why isn't Partey or Merino starting instead of dropping Havertz back into the midfield?

                  Trossard–Jesus–Martinelli up top is it, with Havertz officially at left 8, but who knows what actually happening?

                  Especially against the likes of Ipswich, time to take the handbrake (a little bit) off

                  USArsenal I think arteta will only play this setup at home or against weaker teams away

                  we need to move the ball much quicker up the pitch when we set up like this though. against palace we tried our BAU ball circulation from deep and ended up getting outnumbered a few times. don't try to outnumber them in our own half. move it forward quickly and outnumber them in their half