I don’t understand how everyone seems to think that Eden Hazard has had a better season than Alexis Sanchez?

Hazard has been tipped to easily win the Player of the Year awards this season and to me that is preposterous! Alexis Sanchez has been far better and done a lot more to deserve the accolade.

On a straight statistical shootout, Alexis Sanchez wins hands down. Both players have (co-incidently) played 45 games for their clubs this season, and while Sanchez has scored 22 goals, Hazard has only scored 18.

Then we come to assists. In all competitions, Alexis Sanchez and Eden Hazard are both tied on 12 assists apiece.

And finally, we come to other match statistics:

[Courtesy of the Squawka Comparison Matrix]

You can see that Alexis Sanchez has a better shooting accuracy, wins more tackles and makes more interceptions.

So as well has been more effective in an attacking sense than Eden Hazard, he also works much harder for the team defensively (and we all knew that as we see him close down and track back for pretty much the whole match – in every game).

So individually Sanchez is better, and he is more of a team player.

Then we have other factors. Eden Hazard has been at Chelsea for 3 years now, so is much more comfortable in a side which he has grown and developed. Alexis Sanchez however only joined Arsenal in the summer and despite moving to a brand new country and having to familiarise himself with new teammates (who don’t even speak the same language as him) he has putting in phenomenal performances throughout the season.

Another factor is how the player makes the fans feel. How many times has Sanchez excited the fans? He tracks down players, shows moments of brilliance with his skill and can score goals from 30 yards. He scores all kinds of goals, including headers, and has been played in several different positions throughout the season.

Eden Hazard has a whole team based around his game and while he has been skilful, he scores similar types of goals.

Hopefully people voting will take a look closer at the facts when deciding who is their Player of the Year, but I fear that they will take the “easy option” and just vote for the Chelsea man.

1. Alexis Sanchez is not a team player

There is no doubt that Alexis Sanchez is a special player. He’s scored 22 goals for Arsenal already this season and scored the goals which put us through yesterday – but for all his talents he’s not a team player.

Arsenal are all about incisive passing and movement but Sanchez is a player where this breaks down. Far too many times yesterday he lost the ball (he wasn’t the only one) and when a simple pass wide was the better option he always opted to play it short so he could get the return ball. He dribbles far too much, losing the ball, and at times wants to do everything himself. If he could just not “hog” the ball as much he’d be the perfect player  – because his work rate, desire and determination are exemplary.

2. Arsenal are always far too complacent against the “smaller” teams

In last seasons FA Cup semi-final we scraped passed Wigan on penalties, and even against Hull City Tigers in the final we struggled, conceding two goals before staging a brave fight back. But why do we always struggle against “lower” sides?

Reading were excellent yesterday, and gave absolutely everything. And that’s the problem – Reading clearly wanted it more. Talent-wise, Arsenal hold all the aces but Reading were the team who would, as Arsene put it, “die on the pitch”. So it begs the question, where was Arsenal’s passion?

Why didn’t Arsenal “give everything on the pitch” to try and win? We were lethargic, sloppy and where as bad as Reading were good. If it wasn’t for the mistake by Adam Federici for the winner, who knows what would have happened? When it comes down to the lottery of penalties Reading had a real chance of knocking us out – and we wouldn’t have anyone else to blame except ourselves.

It’s a dangerous game and don’t forget we did the same against Monaco in the Champions League in the first leg – we thought we could just turn up and win.

3. Arsene Wenger will never be able to make a good substitution

Aaron Ramsey badly needed replacing yesterday and while the Giroud substitution was obvious, Arsene is afraid to make a bold move and Walcott should have been on before the end of the 90 minutes. Ramsey was struggling on the right hand side and ended up drifting inside, meaning Arsenal were far too narrow. Özil, Cazorla, Coquelin and Sanchez were all in the middle so Ramsey was pretty much redundant.

There are too many games when we’re losing and need a change from the bench but most of the time, it never comes and Arsene just seems to “hope for the best”.

4. Mesut  Özil is showing how important he is to Arsenal

A lacklustre Arsenal were struggling yesterday but Mesut Özil was our best player by a country mile. Only he, Koscielny and Coquelin (and then Giroud when he came on) put in good performances and if it wasn’t for his beautifully clipped pass to Sanchez for the opening goal God knows where we would be today – quite possibly devastated we missed out on the FA Cup final.

As well as the assist, Özil came agonisingly close with a direct freekick and took the corner which Per Mertesacker really should have scored from. His movement was excellent and his passing was precise – when most of our players kept losing the ball.

5. Aaron Ramsey takes far too many touches on the ball

When a team like Reading are setup to play on the break, the one thing you don’t want to do is give them time to get men behind the ball and re-group. But every time Aaron Ramsey got the ball he slowed the game down and by the time he released the pass the chance to attack had gone. Most Arsenal players take 2/3 touches on the ball but Aaron Ramsey takes about 7! For a side like Arsenal who pride themselves on quick movement and passing, Ramsey’s persistence on taking far too many touches is infuriating.

In January 2013 when Theo Walcott had 6 months remaining before he was free to speak to other clubs, he signed a new deal worth £100,000 a week, making him the highest paid player at the club.

Previous to the latest deal he was on £55,000 a week, and as well as a hefty paid rise he also received a £3 million bonus for staying “loyal”. Ahem.

You could say he took advantage of Arsenal’s poor situation at the time – we were bedding in new signings such as Lukas Podolski, Olivier Giroud and Santi Cazorla at a time when we were still affected by the loss of Robin van Persie.

Before January 2013, Arsene had opted to mainly use Theo Walcott as a substitute while the protracted transfer talks stalled. He had been offered £80,000 and £90,000 during negotiations, but declined them both. He was in a very strong position and rightly or wrongly, managed to engineer a deal which was beyond his worth. Arsene wanted him to sign a 5 year deal worth £90,000 a week, while Theo Walcott ended up getting a 3 and a half year deal worth £100,000 a week.

Fast forward 24 months, and the situation has completely changed.

We are at exactly the same position yet again – Arsenal and Theo Walcott are trying to negotiate a new deal but the pacy forward holds a completely different hand these days. Whereas 2 years ago he held a royal flush, now he holds a pair. A pair of 2’s.

He’s been injured for lengthy periods and hasn’t been worth his £100,000 a week by a long shot. Also in that time Olivier Giroud has improved and become Arsenal’s most important attacker. We’ve also brought in Mesut Özil and Alexis Sanchez, two truly world class forwards. In essence, Walcott’s absence has hardly been noticed.

Arsene Wenger has come out and publicly stated that while Theo is “quick on the pitch, he’s not necessarily quick when it comes to contract negotiations”. And if that wasn’t spiky enough for you, Theo has had to come out and deny a “bust up” with Arsene Wenger.

Clearly the current position is this – Arsene feels Walcott and his representatives held Arsenal over a barrel 2 years ago and would rather offload the striker now rather than increase a wage he feels is already undeserved. Arsene also holds all the aces as in terms of the squad and team he’s on the periphery. The sad fact for Theo is that basically, we don’t actually need him.

The team is on a great run of form and we’ve done it without Walcott. And in that run, one of the games we lost was at Tottenham when arguably, Walcott was culpable for their winning goal when he failed to close down the cross.

Look, I like Theo and on his day he is effective. He can finish when given the chances but his game is limited – in a sense he’s similar to Lukas Podolski. He came from the same academy that created Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Gareth Bale, but has stalled whereas the aforementioned players have progressed (in varying degrees). Theo Walcott is only 25 years old but on the graph of progress should be at his peak right now. He can’t help the team defend and the quality of his passing is sporadic.

And I can’t see where he fits in the current team.

The inconsistency in his performances is baffling to me. Putting all the contract issues aside, on his day he is fantastic, no doubt about it. If you look on YouTube at a compilation of his goals and you think this guy is a world class player – poise, pace and deadly finishing. If he managed to perform at his top level week in week out, he’d be on a par with Gareth Bale.

But he isn’t. While Bale’s market value is around £80 million (apparently), you could only see Walcott fetching around £25 million max.

So, the bottom line is would you sell Theo Walcott? Cast your vote below!

They say it’s the hope that kills you, and tonight was exactly that.

Arsenal dominated the game and scored a deserved goal when Olivier Giroud lashed in from close range. But after that, we showed Monaco too much respect and it paid in the end.

The game plan was clear – keep it tight, score a goal in the first half and then build on that in the second. Unfortunately, we didn’t push on as much as we needed to in the second half.

I understand that we needed to keep Monaco at bay but the majority of possession was sterile and sideways – Özil being the most guilty of that. There comes a point in the game where you really kick on and turn up the pressure but we were too patient and turned on the switch too late.

The introduction of Aaron Ramsey gave the team that extra lift and he did well to score his goal – but it was all left a little too late. We always needed to score 3 goals anyway so Arsene Wenger should have thrown caution to the wind earlier on, rather than with 25 minutes remaining.

We had the chances to score and in the end Monaco had the luck. Giroud had a chance which bounced off him and was fortunate to land in the goalkeepers arms, and Danny Welbeck had a shot fortunately blocked by a Monaco defender who was already on the floor.

Theo Walcott hit the post, and Arsenal should have scored but Olivier Giroud and Alexis Sanchez ended up getting in each others way.

The performance was very good, but too patient. With Olivier Giroud on the pitch, and with Mertesacker and Koscielny going up towards the end, we should have really belted balls into the box and given Monaco something to think about – but even with 10 minutes left, and even in injury time – we persisted in sideways passing instead of fizzing the ball into the penalty area.

There were also chances where I was screaming for Arsenal to shoot, but they ended up playing that extra pass.

The sad thing is that Arsenal performed fantastically tonight in an away game, in the Champions League. Even though the first leg ended up killing us off, we did enough tonight to progress. If you evaluate the two legs we were the better team. We did really well tonight and naive in the first leg – Monaco were good in the first leg but non-existent in the second.

It’s an all too familiar story for Arsenal fans and tonight I feel devastated, dejected and deflated. You’re hoping and praying that Arsenal can fashion 3 good goal-scoring opportunities to give us a chance of that 3-0 we needed and we were so so close.

There’s not much more we could have done tonight overall – we defended excellently (when Monaco did decide to actually attack) and generally, we played very well. The one thing I regret is the lack of urgency and incisiveness upfront. We got into excellent positions and needed to be more clinical. Giroud and Ramsey both took their goals well but tonight is one of those nights where a truly world class striker makes the difference – someone who can take a half chance or fashion something out of nothing.

Yet another year where we get knocked out at the first stage and it’s back to focusing on the FA Cup and Premier League. It’s the same old feeling Arsenal fans are only too familiar with – major disappointment and the feeling that we could have qualified.

All the statistics are against Arsenal, and I’m sure you’ve seen them all today in the newspapers and online. Basically, no team has managed to overhaul a 2 goal deficit after being away in the second leg of the tie.

Monaco have basically conceded only a handful of goals, have the best defensive record in this seasons Champions League and Ligue 1, and are virtually invincible at home.

So the bottom line is Arsenal need a miracle.

The fact of the matter is the minimum Arsenal need to progress is to score 3 goals and concede none. We can concede one goal and score 3, which would take us to extra time.

And that’s what we need to hope for.

Our domestic form is excellent, and one of the best in the Premier League, but after the spectacular collapse against Monaco in the first leg we are left in a very poor position.

Can we score 3 goals?

According to Arsenal.com, we’ve scored 3 or more goals on 9 occasions this season, although I’m not sure which teams they were against. Winning 3-0 at Monaco is not impossible, almost impossible but not impossible.

We have to just go for it. We have to keep it tight for the first 30 minutes and see if we can nick a goal. The first goal is massive for the tie and as long as we have enough time to score a couple of more then we have a real game on our hands.

We can afford to be slightly more adventurous as a Monaco goal still means 3 goals will keep us in the tie.

What do I think?

I think we can do it. It will be so difficult to win 3-0 but if any team can do it it’s Arsenal. We are setup to attack and if Giroud, Sanchez, Cazorla and Özil are all on song then we are capable of scoring against any team. The injury to The Ox is a big blow because of his inventiveness and pace, but we still have a top quality side to field in Monaco tonight.

If Arsene Wenger prepares the team in the right way and we’re correctly motivated and play with the aggression we’re capable of, then anything can happen. There might be a case in playing Tomas Rosicky if he’s fit, because he is a big player in the big games, capable of setting the tempo for the rest of the team. Even if he only played the first half or first hour, it would stand us in good stead in a must win game.

We just have to believe! #COYG