Football: Sarri state of affairs

[Spockydog]

Just now, Mark Antony said:

Since coming on Torreira looked much better than the other Arsenal midfielders.

...while Xhaka continues to amaze everyone with how shit a footballer can be without losing his place. 

[Mexal]

2 minutes ago, Spockydog said:

...while Xhaka continues to amaze everyone with how shit a footballer can be without losing his place. 

Indeed. Best part about this Arsenal team is Lacazette/Aubameyang. Everything else is mediocre. Management needs to clear out a lot of players if Emery wants to play this way.

[Iskaral Pust]

I’m glad Lacazette finally started.  His sub appearances really suggested he should. 

City scored two screamers yesterday, but surprisingly only a narrow win against Newcastle.  

[Nas!]

23 hours ago, polishgenius said:

West Ham are bad.

They certainly are.  It is awful to watch them right now.  I think it will be a long season for Hammers fans.

But this was what they were all shrieking for, wasn’t it? To bring in a manager who plays attacking football?  For the board to spend some money on players? 

I still think they’ll get into it and score enough goals to get by.  I suspect Pellegrini will abandon hope of playing a 4-2-2-2 at some point and settle on a 4-2-3-1.  Lanzini will come back and provide  some much needed influence in the middle.  There will be a lot of grumbling and nail-biting along the way. 

Having said all that, it would be pretty amusing if West Ham went down after the owners finally gave the fans what they wanted. 

[Consigliere]

Solid enough. At least we didn't look completely clueless in attack - we were actually quite good going forward even with 10 men. Lukaku got two but had enough good chances to have scored more which hasn't always been the case for him in a United shirt - usually if he misses one, he'd be lucky to even get another half chance. We made the game a bit more difficult for ourselves with Pogba's missed penalty and Rashford sending off but still looked comfortable with 10 men - it was a good time to play Burnley. Bardsley was lucky to not have been sent off as well in that incident with Rashford. Mee should have seen red as well for deliberate handball when he was the last man. The ref (Moss) did not have a good game.

 

ETA. since I criticised Fellaini before, I'll say that he did have a very good game playing almost as a 3rd CB. 

[Raja]

I don't know man, I think we'll struggle in a midfield of Guendouzi & Lucas; Xhaka makes mistakes, and he made one today, but I think he's kinda integral to the way we build up play. We'll see how we do without him in the midfield, because the one half where we haven't had him play, we've been kinda poor ( Cfc away second half) 

[Mexal]

12 minutes ago, Raja said:

I don't know man, I think we'll struggle in a midfield of Guendouzi & Lucas; Xhaka makes mistakes, and he made one today, but I think he's kinda integral to the way we build up play. We'll see how we do without him in the midfield, because the one half where we haven't had him play, we've been kinda poor ( Cfc away second half) 

That Chelsea half looked like a tactical switch rather than a byproduct of Xhaka being removed from the game as every player sat back and no one showed an ounce of desire to move forward. I don't think Xhaka's build up play outweighs his lack of discipline and consistent boneheaded mistakes in dangerous positions. I'm willing to give him a shot with Torreira but with the eye of replacing him next summer.

[polishgenius]

Solid enough game for us. When Pogba and Lukaku turn up, as they did despite the missed penalty for Pog and a few fluffed chances by Lukaku, we're good. Jose did, to be fair, get the tactics right today, though Burnley where clearly knackered which helped.

Watford after the break will be a tougher test, obviously.

[Iskaral Pust]

Well done Watford.  Spurs have been a bit fortunate so far by taking their goals very well without generally playing very well, and have conceded a fair amount of chances.  Both of Watford’s goals today came from set piece headers despite Spurs playing three CBs who are powerful in the air. 

Son will be back soon but I doubt he displaces any of the front four at the moment, but does he offer valuable rotation & back-up.  Alli is perhaps the least impactful attacker at the moment but his pressing is so valuable while Wanyama is missing.

Predictably bad by Burnley.  Everyone, absolutely everyone, warned them they would need a deeper squad for an EL campaign.  I wanted to believe that if they made it into the EL group stage they would eventually get used to it and still eke our enough points to avoid relegation.  But on form so far, perhaps they wouldn’t. Perhaps the EL group would have left them stuck in the bottom three at Christmas.   They will get one of their good keepers back soon, and Defour will return soon.  It will get better for them but it has been abysmal so far. 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

4 hours ago, Nas! said:

Having said all that, it would be pretty amusing if West Ham went down after the owners finally gave the fans what they wanted. 

Their old stadium?

[Mark Antony]

https://streamable.com/lea7d

what a goal. 

[Raja]

5 hours ago, Mexal said:

That Chelsea half looked like a tactical switch rather than a byproduct of Xhaka being removed from the game as every player sat back and no one showed an ounce of desire to move forward. I don't think Xhaka's build up play outweighs his lack of discipline and consistent boneheaded mistakes in dangerous positions. I'm willing to give him a shot with Torreira but with the eye of replacing him next summer.

I certainly agree that he's made big mistakes that have cost us. Torrerira looks like he could possible do both, but we'll see. I wouldn't mind seeing a Guendouzi/ Torerria midfield, but I feel like that's the reason Xhaka has been pretty much a started in his position since he's joined us. He's the only one who can sort of set a tempo from deep, Guendouzi can't do that, at least not yet. 

[Mexal]

52 minutes ago, Raja said:

I certainly agree that he's made big mistakes that have cost us. Torrerira looks like he could possible do both, but we'll see. I wouldn't mind seeing a Guendouzi/ Torerria midfield, but I feel like that's the reason Xhaka has been pretty much a started in his position since he's joined us. He's the only one who can sort of set a tempo from deep, Guendouzi can't do that, at least not yet. 

I don't know. I think Guendouzi does it pretty well. He moves the ball quick and moves it forward. I guess we'll see how it works out if Torreira ever starts.

[Raja]

1 hour ago, Mexal said:

I don't know. I think Guendouzi does it pretty well. He moves the ball quick and moves it forward. I guess we'll see how it works out if Torreira ever starts.

I just feel like we have no amount of tempo to our attack without him. And to be quite honest with you, yes, he gives the ball away, but we've got a enough people in the box to deal with that cross. I feel like Xhaka's mistakes are kinda getting highlighted hard over the last few weeks, Lacazette for example made mistakes in the cfc game that led to goals

Edit: Watched that goal again, and yeah, I'm not really blaming Xhaka for that one, we have almost everyone back, Bellerin doesn't get out to his man *at all*, xhaka makes those kinds of balls all the time. There was enough play after that not to put it all down to him, it's the back 4 & him that are culpable there ( Monreal specifically too). People don't like Xhaka, and that's fine, but he's become a bit of a scapegoat at the moment. 

Monreal is more culpable on him for both goals. 

[Davrum]

7 hours ago, Mark Antony said:

https://streamable.com/lea7d

what a goal. 

So adorable that the commentator was so impressed he quoted the name of a massive hit film to express his joy.

[Consigliere]

The Seville derby last night between Betis and Sevilla was a great game as usual until the referee spoiled it with a horrendous decision. Roque Mesa sent off (second yellow) for dangerous play. If anything the GK should have been sent off (or received a yellow card at least) and Sevilla awarded a penalty. What makes it worse is that La Liga is now using VAR but the video ref chose not to intervene. 

[Jordan La Cabra]

The first Old Firm Derby of the season wasn't as entertaining as it was hyped up to be. Despite a low score-line of 1-0 to Celtic, the game was anything but close. A combination of the frame of the goal and some brilliant saves from Allan McGregor helped keep Rangers in the game, but Celtic bossed it.

In fairness to Rangers, there were quite a few of their players playing in their first ever Old Firm, whereas the Celtic players are verging on veterans in playing - and winning - this fixture.

You can see that Gerrard has clearly learned from Rafa Benitez, as he was employing similar defensive tactics to those his old gaffer has been using recently.

[Mexal]

13 hours ago, Raja said:

I just feel like we have no amount of tempo to our attack without him. And to be quite honest with you, yes, he gives the ball away, but we've got a enough people in the box to deal with that cross. I feel like Xhaka's mistakes are kinda getting highlighted hard over the last few weeks, Lacazette for example made mistakes in the cfc game that led to goals

Edit: Watched that goal again, and yeah, I'm not really blaming Xhaka for that one, we have almost everyone back, Bellerin doesn't get out to his man *at all*, xhaka makes those kinds of balls all the time. There was enough play after that not to put it all down to him, it's the back 4 & him that are culpable there ( Monreal specifically too). People don't like Xhaka, and that's fine, but he's become a bit of a scapegoat at the moment. 

Monreal is more culpable on him for both goals. 

Yes, there is always more people who are responsible for a given goal in every situation but Xhaka has given the ball away, in a dangerous position, against the run of play more times than anyone else on the team over the last few years and these have resulted in goals. The reason it's highlighted is because it happens often enough that it's noticeable and always seems to come from an unnecessary lack of concentration. And then when you add in his inability to follow runners through the midfield and complete lack of discipline (e.g. a yellow in every game so far this season), you have a player that does some things well but ultimately hurts the team in inopportune moments. This isn't a "last few weeks" thing. This has been going on since last season. Xhaka isn't the only player in the world who can move the ball forward from deep.

As for tempo, I think Arsenal lacks tempo in general and it has little to do with whether Xhaka is on the pitch or not. When you have players like Ozil, Ramsey, Iwobi, Bellerin who are mostly one footed players and incapable of beating anyone off the dribble, you inevitably end up with a slower transition from defense to attack, especially if there is someone near them or they receive the ball on their off foot as they pull the ball back to create some space for themselves which allows the defense time to get in front of them. Arsenal has no direct attack speed when they pick up the ball and it's why it feels like they're rarely score goals against the run of play. I'm still waiting for them to put the ball over the top or through the lines and catch a Lacazette/Aubameyang run.

[Mexal]

I was just thinking about it and I think what I'd actually love to see them try is playing a 4-2-3-1 with Ramsey/Torreira in the pivot, Ozil back in the 10 role, Mhki or Welbeck on the right and Auba on the left. Ramsey also feels kind of wasted in his advanced MF position now and Ozil is only good as a 10.

[Iskaral Pust]

The Xhaka discussion reminds me of the debate on Xabi Alonso in his last season at Liverpool.  Not that Xhaka is anywhere close to Alonso. 

When Xabi first arrived, his passing from CM helped set our tempo and control games.  He played alongside Hamann and later Mascherano to help him win the ball back.  It became a trade-off that keeping his possession play in the team required a superlative ball-winner alongside him.   Eventually it seemed like the frenetic pace of PL MF play had overwhelmed him and Benitez wanted Gareth Barry instead.  Of course it all fell apart and we ended up with Aquilani and our MF fell apart.  After narrowly finishing second in the PL in Xabi’s last season (2008-9), our team declined badly without him until Coutinho and Suarez arrived.