Weekend Football Thread 17 - 19 *spoilers*

Soldato
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Not the people who've written us off as title contenders, because at this moment in time even though we're playing well up front we still have defensive frailties and I think we'll come up short this year.

I'm just annoyed at the naysayers who put Tottenham, City and Villa above us in the pecking order, saying we are going to struggle to hang on to 4th place. I don't think we've struggled much so far in all fairness. :)

I don't think Arsenal are poor defensively at all this season, if Arsenal camped behind the ball like most teams they'd almost never concede, but they wouldn't have set a record for the most goals ever scored either (so far). The reason Arsenal keep conceding is because they throw about 6 or 7 people forward in most attacks leaving space for counter attacks etc. (see the City game!). It's a by product of Wenger's style of football. I personally don't mind leaking a few goals if they score 6 up at the other end, the problems come when there's a game like the City one, something like 20+ shots and only 2 goals, the team continue to press later in the game and become vulnerable against counter attacks. I guess you can't have your cake and eat it, Arsenal will never sit back and defend under Wenger, and that's why I watch them week in, week out, it's entertainment, win or lose :)

Listening to some of the interviews over the last few weeks from the players, they seem to know what to do to improve (attack and defend as a team, win the games vs teams outside the top 4 like Man Utd last year) and they're doing well. I think this year is Arsenal's best chance at the title since 07/08, not sure if they'll do it (injuries so far have been ridiculous, they're not going to get better), but certainly, they're in with a great shout.
 
Soldato
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I think this will be the tightest title race in a while, which can only be exciting for everyone who's a fan of football.

Villa are being overlooked massively at the moment and I think they're the best bet to break the top four at the expense of Liverpool.
 
Caporegime
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First off, anyone watching the Fulham game and all the stewards having to drag tonnes of beach balls off the pitch/off fans before the start :p Can see that happening quite a lot for the next couple weeks.

Secondly, Arsenal are playing exactly as I expected, big wins against the bottom 6(or who will end up bottom 6 end of season), slightly too close wins too often, and losing against most of the top teams due to certain people in the team. I also predicted it was Liverpool most likely to drop out of the top 4, its also ridiculous for Arsenal fans, or anyone else, to get all over confident after beating Birmingham a whole 2-1, to start talking about dropping out of the top 4 being laughable, or title aspirations.

Infact, before people get all up themselves they might want to remember certain members suggesting, more than once, we had the best squad in the league and have been fully capable of winning the league the last few years, but for bad decisions and starting out of form players over other better players in the team.

Infact very few people, that are Arsenal fans, were talking about Arsenal dropping out of the top 4, most of them think Song is a god and our team is great all over, now while they are wrong about Song, a fan who thinks he's fantastic, and knows the quality we have everywhere else, why on earth would they be predicting us dropping out of the top 4, over 2 teams that lost their best player(or close to best), Chelsea who barely strengthened(basically didn't) and Arsenal with several long term injured players due back and Arshavin from the start and available for all competitions.
 
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Associate
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we have had a bad couple of games why play 3 centre backs? massive couple of games next lyon, united , everton that we should win two out of the three. Why do we have these **** owners
 
Soldato
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What did G|mp do this time? :D

we have had a bad couple of games why play 3 centre backs? massive couple of games next lyon, united , everton that we should win two out of the three. Why do we have these **** owners

Is Benitez not responsible for anything at Liverpool?
 
Soldato
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Yes but everything seems to fall back on how awful the owners are and that it's their fault they have the current squad they do and not because Benitez bought them. :p

True, I rate Benitez but he is fairly rubbish in the transfer market.

Sorry if my previous post came across as rude, I was in a bad mood and posting crap on another forum as well. :p
 
Caporegime
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Getting annoyed with all the Tottenham, Man City talk regards to breaking the top 4 and nothing about Villa, We've had a couple of blips but then so has everybody else. We've beaten 2 out of 2 playing the usual top 4 and generally we are performing well. Will be interesting watching the rest of the season.

I don't think Aston Villa are being overlooked any further than they deserve to be. They're expected to finish 5th-7th and I believe that's where they will end given the start to their season.
 
Caporegime
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Looking like Keane and Crouch will be lining up against Arsenal.

Defoe 3 match ban and Pav looking away.

Jenas usually pulls out a top performance against Arsenal though. :)
 
Soldato
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I reckon Liverpool v Man U is gonna be some match this weekend. Does anyone know if Ferguson has got a touchline ban or is it just a fine

Any ban he does get will be not be in effect until after this weekend, so he'll definitely be there at Anfield. I really don't see anything other than a resurgent Liverpool at Anfield, there will be goals though as both defences have been shaky all season. Best news is that Rooney will play. :)
 
Associate
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Any ban he does get will be not be in effect until after this weekend, so he'll definitely be there at Anfield. I really don't see anything other than a resurgent Liverpool at Anfield, there will be goals though as both defences have been shaky all season. Best news is that Rooney will play. :)

Usually a game has goals written all over it ends up in as 0-0 as both sides go out playing a defensive setup.
 
Soldato
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First off, anyone watching the Fulham game and all the stewards having to drag tonnes of beach balls off the pitch/off fans before the start :p Can see that happening quite a lot for the next couple weeks.

Secondly, Arsenal are playing exactly as I expected, big wins against the bottom 6(or who will end up bottom 6 end of season), slightly too close wins too often, and losing against most of the top teams due to certain people in the team. I also predicted it was Liverpool most likely to drop out of the top 4, its also ridiculous for Arsenal fans, or anyone else, to get all over confident after beating Birmingham a whole 2-1, to start talking about dropping out of the top 4 being laughable, or title aspirations.

Infact, before people get all up themselves they might want to remember certain members suggesting, more than once, we had the best squad in the league and have been fully capable of winning the league the last few years, but for bad decisions and starting out of form players over other better players in the team.

Infact very few people, that are Arsenal fans, were talking about Arsenal dropping out of the top 4, most of them think Song is a god and our team is great all over, now while they are wrong about Song, a fan who thinks he's fantastic, and knows the quality we have everywhere else, why on earth would they be predicting us dropping out of the top 4, over 2 teams that lost their best player(or close to best), Chelsea who barely strengthened(basically didn't) and Arsenal with several long term injured players due back and Arshavin from the start and available for all competitions.

We've lost to City and UTD, hardly all of the big teams is it? That last paragraph made no sense, please learn to write again.
 
Soldato
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Usually a game has goals written all over it ends up in as 0-0 as both sides go out playing a defensive setup.

True, I'd be quite happy with a 0-0 and a point, we've not been great all season and I know we'll face a different Liverpool to the one who has lost 4 times already. A loss for Liverpool would effectively rule them out of the title race being 10 points behind Utd, a win on the other hand brings them right back into the mix.
 
Associate
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I really don't see anything other than a resurgent Liverpool at Anfield, there will be goals though as both defences have been shaky all season. Best news is that Rooney will play. :)

Yeah I agree, im a Pool fan but I have to admit that Carra has not been on form at all and Insua is good going forward but he cant mark players at all and his choices of position is all over the place.

Its gonna be a rough game and I would say at least 3 goals
 
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