Sunderland 1 - 4 Arsenal

Sunderland was up for it today, but simply didn't have the talent to compete.  Arsenal dominated throughout.  Cazorla is still injured, and Monreal was out.  (Gibbs played quite well today.)  Otherwise, it was the usual suspects.  Alexis keeps producing up top.  Ox was the more effective of our wingers; Iwobi has gone off the boil.  He has a great future with us, but for now, I'd like to see Alexis on the left and Giroud up top--or even Perez.  Ozil had a good game; Coqelneny protected the back line well but again showed that they are not the duo that can help unlock defenses.

Our goals were all very good.  The Sunderland spot kick was just barely earned, and due to the enterprise of a switched-on Duncan Watmore.  (I like that guy.)  We weren't alive to the danger and our mids were nowhere to be seen.

How about Giroud?  Two touches, two goals in his first five minutes.  Wenger needs to play him.  They were big ones, too, the go-ahead (and winning) goal and the insurance goal.  Alexis had a fantastic 90 minutes though and has to be MOTM.

Liverpool and Man City both won, so it's still a three-way tie at top of the table.  Man U and Spurs both dropped two points and Tottenham sits three back.  Chelsea plays later this weekend.  Next up is a trip to beautiful Bulgaria to attempt to bag the three points that makes advancing to the knockout round a done deal.  If we manage this, the showdown with PSG at the Emirates should decide the group winner.  Next weekend it's the North London Derby, which is likely to be a spiky affair.

DC United 2 - 4 Montreal

Ridiculous.  Fortunately, I had to go and pick up my wife after the first 15 minutes, so I missed the rest of this miserable game.  Two garbage time goals do not begin to confer some respect on a team that did not seem to understand the concept of 'playoffs'.  Three minutes and a dumb corner is given up and not defended, and that, it seems, was that.  I will try not to read anything about the game, and am delighted I didn't attend in person.

I liked this team, and thought they might go far.  Wrong.  They let their fans down today.  Games like this can test any supporter's patience.


Arsenal plays Southampton at home in the next round (the quarters) of the League Cup.  It isn't scheduled yet.  I hope we go for it.  Liverpool and Man U are the other heavyweights left in the competition.  The two-legged semis are annoying, but it's silverware.

Next up in the league is a trip to the Stadium of Light.  There was a time when I thought David Moyes might be a candidate to replace Wenger.  That seems like a really dumb idea now.  The three-time manager of the year has bombed out at Man U and Real Sociedad and is not looking too brilliant at Sunderland.

Arsenal 2 - 0 Reading

Another game, another goalkeeper, as it was Emi Martinez's turn to put in a fine performance in the net.  It's nice to have such depth at a vital position.  And speaking of depth, I believe Wenger made ten changes from the EPL game Saturday.  The mostly young guys did pretty well, showing some flair and a lot of industry.  I wouldn't put that team on the field against Tottenham in the league, but they dominated Reading today.  AOC scored the goals, and we could have had more but for some nice saves from al Habsi and some hustling blocks from Reading's defenders.  I expected Perez to find the net today, but this was not his day, unlike the Nottingham game.

Well, after tomorrow's games, we'll see if the draw continues to be kind to us.  Spurs were knocked out by Liverpool, and of course there's the Manchester derby tomorrow.  It would be great to be able to rest the starters and give the kids another run out against lower division opposition.  But we should be looking to win this cup.

Arsenal 0 - 0 Middlesbrough

Middlesbrough was well organized and they all did their jobs.  But playing at home, the Gunners should have created far more chances.  I think we got one shot on target the first half.  We wasted free kicks in great positions and corners.  Cech (man of the match) had to do more than his opposite number; we could easily have been down two goals at the half.  We played a comfortable game at home mid-week, so that's no excuse.  I think this was a game that needed more creativity from midfield.  Ozil was flat today, and neither Coquelin nor Elneny is going to contribute much to the offense.  This may have been a good day for Ramsey had he been healthy, or Xhaka had he not gotten red carded.  Cazorla is hurt.  Maybe we'd have done better with AOC instead of Elneny in a 4-1-4-1, but my suggestion would be to have started Lucas Perez, either as above or move Alexis left and sit Iwobi, who was not doing a whole lot.

It was apparent that the win streak was more than a little lucky.  We can play with anybody, but struggle to break teams down when they bunker in.  With no Giroud, crosses are to no one.  (If Bellerin is working on his crosses, it is not evident.)  We got what we deserved today, maybe more than we deserved.  This performance should be a wakeup call:  Arsenal is unlikely to top the league if they drop points like this, no matter how brilliantly they play from time to time.  This is the sort of game we have to get three points from.

Arsenal 6 - 0 Ludogoretz

I have to take my hat off to the boys from Bulgaria.  They were game.  They almost scored a couple times in the first half.  To their credit, they tried to play with us, and didn't look bad.  But they sure got torched.  It took twelve minutes before we rang one up, courtesy of a very nice chip from Alexis.  He was standing still and was not much pressured, so the degree of difficulty wasn't high; but he put it exactly where he wanted.  Theo's strike was better, I thought, a rocket just under the crossbar near the right corner.  The second half was all Gunners.  One minute in, and a fortuitous chance for the Ox who buried it in the lower right corner.  Then it was the Ozil show:  two right-footed goals and one with his left, after sequences that cut the defense to ribbons.

I was disappointed that Lucas Perez didn't start, but no way was Alexis going to be left out.  I figured Xhaka would play, since we can't use him in the next three FA games, but I got that wrong.

We're in good shape in the group, but still have work to do.  We want to win it, of course, and these six goals might help.

Arsenal 3 - 2 Swansea

The recent string of four games against the Swans at the Emirates without a win was snapped in entertaining fashion Saturday.  I can't remember seeing a game that had more great scoring chances; it could have been 10 goals scored.  Theo could have had four himself.  Fortunately, his two plus Ozil's crisp volley into the roof of the net were enough.  All our rivals bar Chelsea dropped points, making this a very good weekend indeed.  We now sit joint top on points, second on goal difference (by one) to Man City.  There's a crowd close behind us, of course.

This being Bob Bradley's first day on the job, no one knew what to expect.  But Swansea played their usual positive game, which made for open play.  Arsenal started brightly, dominating for long stretches.  The breakthrough came when a slick move culminated in a Bellerin header that was not dealt with by the Swansea center back who met it first; Walcott nicked it off him and with one swing of the leg rapped it just past a desperate Fabianski.  Shortly thereafter, a corner dropped into the center of the six yard box, where a free Walcott deftly touched it into shooting position and beat Fabianski cleanly.

The Gunners were cruising, but after a Swansea attack broke down, Xhaka was caught trying to play it out of the back; Sigurdsson barreled in and curled a very good left-footed shot past Cech a yard or two inside the far post. Cech seemed to be expecting a near post effort instead and got nowhere near it.

In the second half, Arsenal was on top, scoring in emphatic fashion when Alexis assisted Ozil for the third time this season.  (Oddly, Ozil has no assists yet.)  A soft lofted cross was met by a sweet volleyed strike that rocketed the ball past a helpless Fabianski.  Once again, the Gunners lost focus.  Iwobi stopped tracking back as Barrow carried the ball down the right.  As he did several times, Barrow beat Monreal and put in a well-timed cross that Borja swept in.  In truth, it was poor defense from Mustafi, who should have been much tighter to the goalscorer.

With more than twenty minutes of normal time left, Barrow burned Xhaka and started to race down the right.  A 4 v 2 break was on, but Xhaka kicked out to trip up Barrow from behind, for which he was given a straight red.  Most observers figured it deserved a yellow, but Wenger's not appealing the decision.  Arsenal survived several attempts on goal, mostly from headers nodded straight at Cech.  We missed a few chances for a fourth goal, two golden ones by Walcott, who hit the inside of the right post once and blazed over from close range in stoppage time.  Arsenal made hard work of it, but were the better team on the day and deserved the three points.

Xhaka made the game's biggest mistakes for us, but otherwise he was quite good.  Cazorla was a good partner in the engine room.  Walcott was the recipient of some fabulous luck (or poor defense), but put the chances away in the first half.  Plus, give him credit for being in the right place.  Alexis was a real danger but seemed a little off his usual pace.  Iwobi was a threat on offense but a liability on the left when we didn't have the ball.  Ozil was solid enough, and what a goal.  The defense was fine, with Bellerin and Koscielny being nearly flawless.  Monreal had a tough time with Barrow, partly because Iwobi was not helping him.  Substitute Chamberlain looked dangerous and set Walcott up a couple times.  Coquelin came in and did very well, as did Gibbs.  Cech did his job.

This was the first of seven games in a 23 day span before the next international break, when Alexis will no doubt be run into the ground by Chile again.  The remaining games are:  Ludogoretz, Middlesbrough, Reading (League Cup), Sunderland (A), Ludogoretz (A), and Tottenham.  Xhaka misses Middlesbrough, Reading, and Sunderland because of the straight red, but Elneny needs minutes anyway and Ramsey is about to come back into the squad.

I wonder why Lucas Perez isn't playing more.  Surely we didn't spend that money on him just so we could win the League Cup.  Iwobi is fine, but Alexis is better on the left than up top.

It looks like a wild season.  Any of six teams could win the league, I think:  the Manchester clubs, Liverpool, Arsenal, Spurs, and Chelsea.  I like our chances.  Giroud has barely featured, and Danny "Like a New Signing" Welbeck could make it back in the spring.We have a top quality backup for everyone except Bellerin.  And Jenkinson could be back in not too long.

By the way, I thought Chambers played well for Middlesbrough in their 1-0 loss to Watford.

The Wenger Era at 20, and Other Stuff

Most of us have not won the Nobel Prize, or run major corporations, or been elected leader of our nation.  I certainly have done none of those things.  Yet I do not feel that on that account that my life has been a failure, or that my family should have fired me and replaced me with a higher-achieving fellow with better taste in menswear.  There are intangibles, and sentimental considerations.  Football (or any sport) has very little room for sentiment, and that's understandable, but there's more to being a successful manager than winning trophies, even at the "big clubs."  Arsene Wenger has been a great servant to Arsenal in many ways.  His first decade brought the silverware, as he made dramatic improvements in every facet of the way Arsenal was managed.  Some of these were copied by other teams; Wenger's analytical approach meant that he adopted some best practices ahead of the other English managers. He fostered an entertaining and winning style that relegated "boring, boring, Arsenal" to the dustbin.  He made some prescient player selections.  He built for the future by upgrading the training facilities.  He developed players.

But this was not all that Wenger brought, by a long shot.  His temperament is first-rate.  He shows loyalty, both to his players and to his bosses.  He respects others and has earned their respect.  If you look at some of the many interviews he's done over the years, especially the retrospectives that so many are doing now, you get a better sense of his value as a manager and as a man.  This (and Arsenal's incredible run of Champions' League qualifications) has kept his job secure through the silverware drought that ended with the FA Cup victory in 2014.  A few random observations:

I can't recall Wenger ever complaining about the ownership.  Every year, fans and writers say that he "won't spend."  It's not his money.  If Stan Kroenke told him he had £120M to improve the team, Wenger would spend it.  Indeed, in some recent years money was made available, and he's spending it.  The Board is protected by Wenger, who never lets on that he can't make these decisions without approval.  He's not an idiot; he knew that more TV money was going to make transfer fees balloon, and he'd have loved to buy players before those fees doubled.

I also don't remember Wenger calling out players.  The worst he'll say is that "the team lost concentration" at some point in the game.  A Mourinho-like tirade about how his players let him down would be unthinkable.  I imagine he's honest with his players one on one, and tells them where they fall short.  But in public, he backs them up.  If there are former players who have bad things to say about him, I haven't seen it.  In one interview I saw, with Gallas, Campbell, and Wright, only one player could remember Wenger getting angry once at halftime.  No hairdryer treatments for him.

He considers his job to be bringing out the best in people.  He tries to build confidence along with developing skills and forging cooperative play.  It works pretty well.  His loyalty to the club is unequaled in the modern game.  He could have left for other big clubs many times; he appears never to have seriously considered it.

Boy will we miss Wenger when he's gone.  But his influence will endure, like Chapman's and Graham's, as long as Arsenal exists.


OK, so where are we now?  It's congested at the top.  Frankly, our form is not that overwhelming.  We're quite solid, but except for one brilliant stretch, goalscoring is not what it ought to be.  I'm mystified as to why Lucas Perez has not been given more of a chance up top.  Alexis is better than Iwobi on the left.  I'm not agitating for Giroud to lead the line, but as good as he is in the air for a small guy, Alexis is not a great target option.

I wish Coquelin luck with his recovery, but it's not a bad thing to give Xhaka and Elneny some minutes in midfield.  When Ramsey is fit, he should slot in for Cazorla to keep him fresher.

I better wrap it up now.  I could ramble on for a while, but it's late.

Burnley 0 - 1 Arsenal

Wenger admitted that we were "lucky" to get the three points, and he was certainly right about that.  Cech and the defense had good games, but everyone else looked flat.  A Gunner watching the game with us in a Portland ME bar speculated that the guys who played so well against Chelsea and Basel were a bit leggy and the lineup could have done with some freshening up.  Well, Isaac, I think you nailed it.  I'd have liked to have seen Perez start up top, with Alexis on the left and Iwobi on the bench.  We had no one in the middle who could serve as a target, as well.

This might have meant less if Ozil or Cazorla could have made a few killer passes, or if Burnley had not been so disciplined and hardworking.  In truth, Burnley earned a point for their tactical excellence.  It must have grated to see that last-second goal stand.  Only obstructed vision could explain the referees' not chalking it off for handball and/or offside.  Both Kos and Ox were just barely onside when Walcott made his beautiful headed flick, but when Ox struck the ball towards goal, Koscielny was surely offside when it hit him on the elbow and bounced in.  That elbow may even have spared AOC the embarrassment of seeing his shot balloon over the bar.  We stole two points.  [Edit: After looking at replays, I now think Kos may have kicked that ball himself.  He had to reach back for it and that may explain the upward flight of the shot.  If he was the only player who got contact, it wasn't offside.  I still think that it was handball, but I'm glad the ref didn't see it that way (or see it at all).]

But that's OK with me.  North London had a good day today, and Manchester did not.  I like that.  The team learned some lessons today, I hope, about persistence.


DC United managed to beat Toronto last night, bringing them to fourth place and a near lock on a playoff spot.  I don't see why they can't make a run.

DC United Finds Its Groove

I liked this team from the start.  I figured they should be scoring a lot of goals, with their high-tempo aggressive style and talented roster.  But they weren't.  A few mid-season additions seem to have fixed that problem, though, and now DC has the inside track for the final playoff spot, and could even move up the table a notch or two.  I'm not a big fan of playoffs in league soccer, but if United wins them again, I'll happily take it.  The way they're playing, no one will be taking them for granted.  Let's see how they do in Toronto tonight.  It'll be a real test.