Arsenal fan here. I watch all the Arsenal games even now unless they are not a day before or during the exams :p
Back in college, I used to watch most of the PL games, the knockout games of the CL. Europa League was eww anyway, but lately I have been watching Europa too :p
Its good to see a "Gooner" here :) I used to watch almost all matches right until I took UPSC plunge. Nowadays its difficult to watch them and not feel despair.
Who are you rooting for in Euro 2020?
I'll be rooting for France and Bukayo Saka :p
Netherlands and Belgium. They deserve to win a trophy. They have quality players and came close too in past tournaments. I feel bad for them.
And obviously Saka too. He is a genius but I think we should go slow on him. He has been playing non stop. Give that kid a rest.
Shocking WC 50 years ago. But its not surprising. They won 2019 cricket
WC through a weird rule. And yesterday, I felt bad for Denmark. Definitely, not
a penalty and Arsene Wenger says so :P
Though I know some of us are busy preparing for mains and also this is football related thread, I can’t help myself but to express my excitement on how this F1 season has turned out to be. Lately F1 has become very boring with Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton dominating year after year. But I have been following only these past 5-6 races and wow what a thrilling season this has turned out to be.
I hope Max does win this weekend. He has been phenomenal this season. He deserves the championship for the consistency he has shown over these past few years. There are shades of Senna and Schumacher with his aggressive attitude and “crash or yield” driving style.(I do agree he went bit too far in Saudi GP) And not to mention his immense control behind the wheel. What a grip this guy has.
Lets hope we have a great finale (and a safe one too)
Though I know some of us are busy preparing for mains and also this is football related thread, I can’t help myself but to express my excitement on how this F1 season has turned out to be. Lately F1 has become very boring with Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton dominating year after year. But I have been following only these past 5-6 races and wow what a thrilling season this has turned out to be.
I hope Max does win this weekend. He has been phenomenal this season. He deserves the championship for the consistency he has shown over these past few years. There are shades of Senna and Schumacher with his aggressive attitude and “crash or yield” driving style.(I do agree he went bit too far in Saudi GP) And not to mention his immense control behind the wheel. What a grip this guy has.
Lets hope we have a great finale (and a safe one too)
Drive to survive will be a box office this season
haha yea! But I’m very astonished to see the way they portray Max in DTS, particularly his relationship with Ricciardo.
I think he won’t feature in DTS as he said he will boycott them.
@AzadHindFauz Now that mains is over, we must revive this thread. And even more so important given that Arsenal is doing good as of now :) Sports has been a great stressbuster during this period.
All, what is your Top-4 PL prediction ?City
Liverpool
Chelsea
Arsenal/West ham
West Ham is doing quite well. Just not consistently though, and squad depth is an issue for them. But Moyes has done really fantastic job. Just remembered it now, he was Manutd manager. Think that club has much deeper problems than just a manager.
Unpopular opinion- SAF didn’t leave behind a sustainable winning team, just made sure he won with whatever players he had at his disposal.
Also I personally think they shouldn’t have bought Ronaldo as they were doing perfectly fine and it was more of emotional buy and kind of disturbed the harmony.
Arsenal was on course for easy top 4 (3rd place was doable too) had we not messed up this transfer window.
Honestly United, Spurs arent there yet. Majority of the points that these clubs have scored in PL were won with margin and that is not sustainable in long run. For spurs, they are just one player injury(Kane) away from massive decline in performance.
Arsenal does have a squad problem exacerbated with a mentality issue. Further on top of it the deficiency of a pull factor (Vlahovic saga) and you may or may not agree but Arteta is not the long term solution, he is in the same league as OGS and/or Lampard(Yes, despite the FA cup and CS success) and eventually, I think Arsenal will remove him to have a better competitive chance. Apart from this yes definitely a leader is needed in the dressing room.
I was a huge critic of Arteta, but thats from my limited understanding of game from tactical perspective. Since last season, I have paid attention to tactical aspects of his game (despite being football player in college) and I am still to fully grasp them. Now I am starting to realise why he is so rated well and why he is best bet for Arsenal long term ( thought I personnally believe he will replace Pep - yes, he's that good). You seriously cannot compare with OGS and Lampard from tactical perspective. To be honest I was big Lampard fan but he has been a huge disappointment. Lampard may be good in man management but thats only one aspect of it. I hope he has learnt his mistakes and does well in Everton.
OGS is definitely better than Lampard but surely not at Arteta's level. He has been clueless sometimes, or maybe I wasnt that proficient enough to grasp it fully. Anyway, he did relatively okay but I believe ManUtd have supported him and spent well on transfers.
I feel league competition truly tests your team's ability from all aspects. And cup competition tests your managers tactical intelligence. Mou, Tuchel, Diego Simeone are brilliant in this and thats why you would see them winning CL games frequently despite having weaker squad. Pep, Klopp, SAF, Wenger (initial years) were amazing squad builders and you can see them winning league frequently.
Arteta was initially emphasising on tactics, and he did well by winning FA cup, reaching UEL semis, but he has been quite poor in squad building initially and thats where Arsenal did so bad in PL in last 2 seasons. He has seemed to realise this and Arsenal have been diverting their focus to long term goal of league win and results are there to see in the first half of this season. But again this transfer window has been a big mess. So maybe next season. I dont know.
But I fully agree with you that Arsenal lacks a good squad and a leader but thats ok because many of our players are quite young.
Anyway I would just wait for couple of years, and see if I am wrong completely right or wrong about Arteta.
@Arsene ever since I made my last comments I made a case to watch every Arsenal game (given that everyone was so confident about growth under Arteta) and I can't disagree any longer that tactically he has done something really positive with this squad....transfers too now appear to be inch-perfect (read Ramsdale and Odegaard) so yeah barring injuries I feel Arsenal are set to take top 4 spot, they even have a well-spaced fixture to allow good recovery periods.United actually lost onto top 4 hopes after the Burnley draw only and then Watford draw and City loss have more or less sealed their chances...they squandered all the points in easier fixtures long before the testing ones began...there is no hope now
The growth is there but the oncoming fixtures aren’t kind. Arsenal enjoyed a good fixture list in the recent past but now in the crucial period of the season very difficult fixtures are piling up.
Though I’m hopeful, I’m still preparing for disappointment. Liverpool tonigh, Villa on Saturday. Also play Chelsea in a future midweek and then play United on the following Saturday. Still have the London derby to contend with :/
However, if Arsenal prevent a loss today, that would be a proper step up. That being said I’m still very happy with how squad is playing right now and also impressed by their mentality. This team looks like a proper professional no bullshit team. Might not have the best players, but have an amazing team which I’m very proud of :D
"Though I’m hopeful, I’m still preparing for disappointment" - this happens before every game even now.
They definitely have been more consistent but it could also be due to relatively easier fixtures. More importantly my love this game has only increased and became more eager to watch each passing game which was unlike the case until last year.
