Gunners gearing up for life after Arsene Wenger

Arsenal’s chances of winning a first Premier League title since 2003-04 were already decidedly remote as it was, but the 3-1 defeat to Manchester United at the Emirates Stadium extinguished the last remaining hopes.

There’s still plenty left to play for in the current campaign, with Champions’ League qualification via either a top four Premier League finish or by winning the Europa League now being the priority.

For the hopelessly optimistic among the Gunners’ faithful, you can now back Arsenal at odds as big as 125/1 (with Bet Victor) to win the Premier League.  More realistically, a ‘Top 4’ finish can be backed at 6/4 with Paddy Power, whilst Europa League success is a 6/1 shot with William Hill (which looks less than generous with the likes of Atletico Madrid, Napoli and Borussia Dortmund all potentially destined for the competition via the Champions’ League).

Anyone predicting a fourth FA Cup success in five seasons will be tempted by the 10/1 offered by Bet Victor and you can get a tempting 7/1 with Unibet for Carabao Cup glory.  All those betting odds will be subject to change over the coming days and weeks, so be sure to check out the Freebets.co.uk Arsenal team page for all the very latest bookies prices and football news from a Gunners perspective.

Events off the pitch could be equally fascinating at the club over the coming months, with changes clearly afoot at the Emirates Stadium.

It seems increasingly unlikely that either Alexis Sánchez or Mesut Özil will still be Arsenal players by the time the 2017-18 season gets underway.  Speculation that either player could be sold in the New Year seems wide of the mark, with Arsène Wenger being unlikely to sanction any sales with so much left to play for this term and with the January transfer window being notoriously difficult to sign top quality players should he require replacements.

From the player’s viewpoint, both Sánchez and Özil could almost certainly get better personal terms by moving at the end of the season on free transfers (and they can of course agree a pre-contract from January), so there’s little benefit in either seeking a move prior to then.

The summer transfer window could be hugely significant for Arsenal’s future, with the comings and goings being a good indication as to how the club will operate post-Wenger.

With Aaron Ramsey, Petr Cech, Danny Welbeck, Nacho Monreal and Theo Walcott all out of contract in 2019, the club will want to avoid a repeat of the contract situations with Sánchez and Özil, so there could potentially be some significant changes to the Gunners squad on the horizon should the players they want to keep not put pen to paper on new deals.

The imminent arrivals of Sven Mislintat as head of recruitment and Raul Sanllehi (Barcelona’s former Director of Football) as head of football relations, added to the earlier appointments of Jens Lehmann (first-team coach), Darren Burgess (Director of high performance) and Huss Fahmy (contract negotiator) are further signs of the club’s gradual transition process towards the eventual departure of Arsene Wenger.

Wenger’s announcement that he is set for an end of season review was seen by some as an indication that he might be leaving halfway through his current (and surely final) two-year contract, but this is just his customary annual review and is unlikely to signal anything more contentious taking place.

There’s no clear favourite in the managerial betting odds as to Wenger’s successor as yet, with Thomas Tuchel, Diego Simeone, Patrick Vieira, Massimiliano Allegri and Carlo Ancelotti being among the market leaders at present.

 

Arsene Needs To Leave & How Arsenal Should Have Lined Up Against Liverpool

Before the game I predicted that Arsenal would lose 3-1.

It seems that prediction was somewhat optimistic.

There’s particular things you can be certain of in life – the sun rising in the morning, the birds singing in the trees – and Arsenal losing every time they go to Stamford Bridge, Old Trafford, Anfield or the Britannia Stadium.

After the disappointing performance against Stoke which once again showed us that an Arsene Wenger side doesn’t have any mental strength or fight for a realistic title challenge, we arrived at Anfield in a massive need of a positive result to put some confidence in the camp.

Yet we do what we do every single time we go to a top side. We inexplicably play wide open football.

Arsene Wenger, are you taking the piss?

You almost want Alexis Sanchez to leave because the Arsenal setup (as it has been for the last 12 years) is just shambolic.

We have Koscielny, Mustafi, Holding, Mertesacker and Chambers who are central defenders yet Arsene Wenger persists in playing Nacho Monreal in there. We have a right back at left back, and play Oxlade-Chamberlain as right wing back – a player who wants to leave the club and clearly doesn’t care!

The midfield is a joke with Ramsey and Xhaka who don’t know their head from their arse and are presumably told to just randomly wander around the pitch?

Alexis is sapped of any motivation, playing with a bunch of idiots who are told what to do by an even bigger idiot (that’s Arsene Wenger if you didn’t know). We have a decent squad yet for some reason, Arsene Wenger is playing the wrong players and playing them in wrong positions!

For all the hope, promises and bullshit fed to the Arsenal fans all summer, it’s the same old bollocks!

Arsene Wenger has lost the plot. After losing at Stoke, it would have made sense to keep it tight and hit Liverpool on the break? But Arsenal’s naivety in their setup meant that Liverpool picked us apart similar to Mayweather picking off McGregor a few hours earlier in the day.

It doesn’t take a genius to work out how we should have setup and lined up against Liverpool. We should have setup like this:

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Seriously, is that so hard?!

Mesut Özil can’t (won’t) defend so why put him in midfield? The Ramsey / Xhaka combination is clueless and certainly need cover in the form of Coquelin.

Bellerin should never be asked to fill in on the left (would you play Roberto Carlos or Maldini on the right?) and if Nacho Monreal is definitely needed in the back three (instead of Mustafi’s transfer status) then use Kolasinac on the left – why the hell did we buy him just to sit on the bench? Playing Hector Bellerin over an actual left back is just fucking crazy!

What the hell is going on at Arsenal? Arsene Wenger has 100% lost his fucking mind.

What drugs is Arsene taking because I want to know what the hell he’s thinking.

I have been an Arsenal fan for over 28 years now and I can literally tell before the match if we’ll lose or not. Chelsea away? We’ll lose. Manchester United away? We’ll lose. Liverpool away? We’ll lose. Stoke away? We’ll lose. It’s just a joke that a so-called experienced football manager makes the same mistakes against the same teams time and time and time and time and time and time again.

Seriously, the mind boggles!

It’s got to a stage where Arsenal are just conning the fans now. Ivan Gazidis, Arsene Wenger, the whole lot of them at Arsenal just spout shit. The same old rhetoric, the same old platitudes, the same old spin – just stop already.

The fans don’t believe it, the media don’t believe it – and more obviously the players don’t believe it.

Arsene Wenger is a huge legend for Arsenal Football Club but he has proved over the last 10 years that his ideas are tired, he’s stubborn and that he has no idea on how to move the club forward.

His USP was guaranteed Champions League football but now he can’t even ensure that – who knows where we’ll bloody end up this season.

 

Arsenal Top-Four Dream is Kept Alive

Recently, we’ve experienced an incredible match when the Gunners clashed against the Red Devils of Manchester United. As you all know, Arsenal was able to end the 25-match unbeaten streak of Manchester United in the Premier Leagues with a great score of 2-0 at the Emirate Stadium. At the same time, Arsenal has revived all hopes of securing a spot on the top four of the league after the goals scored from Danny Welbeck and Granit Xhaka.

The game was indeed Arsenal’s first competitive win over Manchester United under the management of Jose Mourinho. The Portuguese coach preferred to keep his players fresh for their Europa League match instead of keeping their chance of staying in the top four position in the Premier Leagues alive. The last time United lost a match was in October, and rotating the life-up for the Arsenal Vs Man Utd match has proved to be fatal for Mourinho.  Now with just a couple of matches left, the Gunners are keeping their fingers crossed to move up a rank on the table.

The Gunners managed to stay in the hunt for this much coveted fourth place in the Premier League during their awesome match against Southampton lately. The goals came in from Olivier Giroud and Alexis Sanchez in the second half. This was Arsenal’s 4th win in their last five matches and if they can move within just one point of Liverpool, they can beat Stoke City.

It was Sanchez who played fabulous in the second half and slotted home in the box after wrong-footing two of the defenders. Giroud later came in as a substitute and nodded one in from a close range. Southampton was not threatening, with only one chance in the first half when Gabbiadini got a close range shot and forced Petr Cech to make the save. After this defeat, Southampton stays in their tenth position on the table. On the other hand, Arsenal has moved up to the fifth position, with only three points separating them from Manchester City, who are currently clinging to their fourth spot.

Until Arsenal plays their next crucial match within a few days, you can play numerous football themed slots at Spinandwin.com. These include some interesting slot titles such as Football Champions Cup, Football Star, Cup Carnival, Goal!, and Golden Goal Trophy. Plus, here you can find slots covering a wide range of themes from Animals and Nature to Pirates and Treasures.

Arsene Wenger seems to be handling the pressure well and has made his team deliver on the pitch despite many fans wanting him to step down. This short recovery of the team could mean that we will continue seeing him manage the team. He would most probably have to prove that he can still make Arsenal reach the top -four position in the Premier League for the twentieth year in a row. With their confidence boosted after their last few wins, we can only expect to see them bring out the best of football for this end of season.

 

Arsenal: The Chaff from the Wheat

It’s time to sit down, accept Arsene Wenger will be the manager of Arsenal for next season, and focus on what we need in the team to be Champions come May. There’s going to be a lot of talk about possible players coming in, with Kylian Mbappe and Riyad Mahraz looking real possibilities, but before we start getting excited about the new action men we need to clear some space in the toy box. There were some real disappointments last season but who should be cast aside and who should we hold on to like a Macron handshake?

Goalkeepers

So, an easy kick-off, as Petr Cech must stay. He hasn’t had the best of seasons, but Liverpool’s costly errors between the sticks proved what a tricky position this can be to get right. David Ospina should also remain and have game time in the Europa League and League Cup, shared with the young rookies Damian Emiliano Martinez and Matt Macey.

Defenders

Talk of Hector Bellerin moving is disturbing and, as one of the best in his position in the world, he must be retained. Laurent Koscielny is also a keeper and Nacho Monreal has done enough to be retained but shouldn’t be the first choice at left-back. Carl Jenkinson seemed to be out the door in January and should certainly be gone this transfer window. He’ll likely be joined on the bus out of Emirates Stadium by Kieran Gibbs, Mathieu Debuchy, and Calum Chambers. All of whom showed some promise but are unlikely to be representing a Premier League club with title ambitions ever again.

It’s been a long time since Per Mertesacker showed promise but his performance in the F.A. Cup final coupled with his experience and voice in the dressing room make him a valuable squad member. With Sead Kolasinac arriving on a free transfer from Schalke, we’re left with Shkadran Mustafi, Gabriel Armando de Abreu, and Rob Holding; of those three, Gabriel should be moved on.

Assuming Wenger continues to play three at the back, that gives us Koscielny, Mustafi, and Kolasinac, with Mertesacker, Monreal, and Holding as back-up. Bellerin is superb at right wing-back and we require someone of his quality to be brought in to take up the left wing-back role.

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Source: FC Arsenal Live via Facebook

Midfield

Who knows how our season might have turned out had one Santiago Cazorla not been so needlessly risked and subsequently injured. Hopefully, those injury woes are a thing of the past and he can form a midfield partnership with Granit Xhaka, with Aaron Ramsey and Mohamed Elneny providing cover in the centre. That leaves no room for Francis Coquelin, who has not been up to standard, and Alex Iwobi, who looks unlikely to ever make the grade.

Theo Walcott is still a great player, with a good goal and assist ratio and should obviously be retained along with Lucas Perez, who didn’t really get a chance last season. I would have been in favour of keeping Ales Oxlade-Chamberlain but if The Ox has had his head turned and is unsettled, we should get as much as we can for him. The same is true of Jack Wilshere; if you can’t hold down a place in Eddie Howe’s Bournemouth team, you’re not going to walk into the Arsenal team.

That leaves us with a few youth players to get some minutes in the cups and the elephants in the room, Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil. It goes without saying that they should be retained and a marquee signing or two early in the transfer window might just be enough to convince them that their future with the Gunners has the prospect of glory, despite what the bookmakers might think; Arsenal are an outside 12/1 for the 2017/18 title in the early football betting.

If they can’t be retained, Arsenal should make sure they don’t ply their trade in the U.K. next season and spend an obscene amount of money replacing them.

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Source: Arsenal via Facebook

Attack

This is easy; Yaya Sanogo is on his way, Danny Welbeck and Olivier Giroud remain at the club, and we spend big on a colossal centre forward who can guarantee twenty plus goals per season.

It’s crazy season for transfer gossip and rumours but let’s sort our house out first and only retain those that can make a meaningful contribution to the team. It’s a make or break season for Wenger and, without European football to really worry about, he needs to sculpt a team that’s capable of making up an 18-point gap and he can’t do that with deadwood lolling around the club.

 

Why Finishing 5th Could Be A Massive Blessing For Arsenal

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So Arsenal finished the season in 5th. Now the dust has settled, does it matter?

I do find it amusing that it is widely accepted that Arsenal have had an awful season. Yet despite having a “disastrous” season, we were in touching distance of Manchester City and Liverpool for the Champions League spots. If we were in crisis, then how about those two North West clubs?

Yes, between January and April we have been awful and yet we finished 5th. People need to get a grip – seriously, after a “disastrous” season most teams get relegated.

For me 5th doesn’t matter and in the cold light of day, is a blessing.

The Europa League is a joke. The sooner we agree on that the better. It’s a poorly organised competition and playing on Thursday nights is a massive burden on a Premier League season. We have two choices; take it seriously or use the kids.

For me it’s a no brainer. Play the kids. First of all it would be a great experience for them, and secondly they could do well in it. If you listen to Jose Mourinho, the repeatedly goes on and on about how much of a pain the competition is, despite wanting to win it so they get Champions League football next season.

But the message it clear – far too many additional fixtures, played on a day which severely interferes with the domestic calendar. If you want to win it then fine, but the road to success can cause major problems, and even then you’re not guaranteed to win it.

If we treat it like a European “League Cup” and play the youngsters, then we’d only have the Premier League and FA Cup to concentrate on. The Champions League has been a distraction in many ways, and a problematic one considering we don’t get further than the last 16 anyway. Why not focus on the Premier League instead? This gives us the perfect excuse.

Look at Chelsea this season. No Champions League football and they win the league. And Leicester City the season before. No Champions League football, and they win the league.

Simplistic perhaps, but if we had a real chance at actually competing for the Premier League, it would be next season.