arteta always seems to follow up on former links like jorginho, odegaard, raya, apparently douglas luiz. when he wants a man permanently he can drop it for a while but down the road he makes it work if the profile is irresistible. always found it notable then when a link goes completely cold like aouar
trying to imagine how arteta and mbappe would work together if we were ever to pursue it and somehow get it over the line lol
i need bro out of the club yesterday, his hamstrings are the only no he listens to
havertz stocks at all time highs, kissinger heart rate at all time flatline. life is beautiful when you keep the faith :')
arteta and edu just always know man. if only we got him on that deadline day
the chelsea tax is just devastating. this bloom into an arteta-trained b2b midfielder is gonna be scary
i hate to say it but this season arsenal is giving SAF-era yanited vibes to me but without the ref advantage. just a determined refusal to go down without a fight, almost always tactically superior even if it doesn’t always affirm the eye test. we dig in and we find a way, especially in the last 10 minutes if we’re not where we wanna be. we’re just solid winners overall, a nightmare to play against even when we don’t get the 3 points. i can see why neville rates this season’s arsenal
i think the issue is recalibrations not setting in so far. the lads built those 22/23 stats off of teams treating us like 21/22 arsenal
now both saka and martinelli are double manmarked, odegaard is manmarked and in general most teams have 7-8 players in their box at all times except for the one or two viable counters we allow
all this in addition to arteta moving tactically to be more defensive and pensive with the control of game states and having heavy, injury-informed rotation
it all amounts to a very different playstyle. from the data available, saka is the only one who has been effective at readjusting his play to account for all the changing variables. it appears like everyone else is still showing growing pains doing what is appropriate for the here and now to unlock our most effective football
kai havertz is going to go down as the best goalkeeper of his generation. tall german jorge campos regen
arteta needs to show up at his house and be like the words chelsea and man city don’t exist to you kid
read awhile back that part of the motivation, that will remain formally unspoken, for much of border wall infrastructure popping up around the world (both global north and global south) is in anticipation for migratory flows that the climate-related crises of the mid and late 21st century will cause. pretty grim shit, especially india and bangladesh, considering how vulnerable bangladesh is to sea level rise
moved into a new apartment about a month and a half go. first big girl solo apartment ever. have needed to buy pretty much everything. (always relied on student housing w furniture and fixins or on roommates)
anyway i feel like a pre-historical hunter stalking its prey for days and weeks waiting for black friday sales to go active… soon…
just so amped still that rodri failed with his little save city at the death gimmick. footballing justice. what a weekend. if only brentford had something for us
want to reiterate something: BURN IN HELL RODRI fuck you, fuck your jammy last minute goals, go fuck yourself thinking you won it all, your heroics mean fuck all, i repeat rodri go fuck yourself and burn in hell you fuuccking prick
honestly i don’t want goals from havertz, i want assists and key passes. i would love for him to slot in where nketiah is as the deputy CF, but under arteta atp bro is a midfielder. goals are nice but not mandatory
his game is growing, unevenly. there are moments here and there that if you cut and pasted into a collage would amount to a genuinely good CM performance. he is at his best in this role when he takes advantage of his stride, like that shot in the second half.
as a midfielder his only chance at getting up there and being worth his fee and wage is learning to become a transition monster. the agility to turn, the dribbling to beat his man, making passes while in full gallop. our expectations of him fail him and fail us. he’s not the xhaka upgrade, he’s not late entry into the box sneak to eat up the cutback. he’s a donkey who’s salvation is becoming a stallion.
more and more i think outside of his off-ball prowess and aerial dominance in the midfield, perhaps this is what arteta sees in havertz’s profile. someone who, if he can master his lanky awkward physical form, can eat up the entire middle third with a single 1-2 then make the key pass prior to a goal, or the assist, or do that shot against sevilla but it goes in
he’s the abou diaby replacement
you just know after newcastle arteta looked at benny and was like “fix your STUPID FUCKING HAIR”
if we crash out, we die doing what we loved… being arsenal. i cant believe they fucking have 0 xG… head is on mars honestly
we were equally impotent against tottenham and lens as we were against chelsea, in addition to our performance collapse against forest and fulham (those were more low block plus transitions vs intense pressure but still), i’m not sure how much we’re really learning when these lapses of standards keep cropping up. we keep having ‘wake up calls’ and then get caught sleeping
bruhh even john terry agrees it wasn’t a penalty. just crazy. worse season of PGMOL yet, many more to come!!
fulham are absolute criminals for this wtf