Chez

Long emulates Gabriel. Cheating.

tired maybe. Think Ralf has to gamble a bit and brung a youngster in for him to give us fresh legs

their subs have strengthened them. Not sure ours will.

good save that. Not sure I've seen him use his feet like that before

Great play from Adams. Holds it up well with back to goal then dangerous when running to it.

Partey can play a bit from what I have seen of him.

not sure there was drop off after we scored. Its just down to tired legs IMO. We chase and chase and that costs us as the game goes on. Space then opens up, the press goes and then we can be vulnerable.

teams improve, rejig formations and we tire. Not sure there is any less effort second half, just struggle to match it. Arsenal were terrible first half. They can only get better. Not sure we can much more than we did, so probably can only ever get worse.

gotcha. I call that reverse psychology the `Lee Dixon effect'. You say a player is shit, they score a worldy. You say they are great, they have a stinker. Really like Diallo, but Romeu was POTS candidate before injury. Central midfield now a strength. Thank god we got rid of Hoj. Little surprise the results have followed. The engine room of any side is critical. Happy days.

agreed. Helped by Arsenal being sloppy. It was similar at Leicester though. In that game the foxes improved and we couldn't maintain the press. Hope that doesnt happen here.

Really like Walcott at right midfield. He races back to support KWP defensively and then races the other way to support the attack. Love his effort and think this is his best position. Not right wing, right midfield.

they (front four) are working hellishly hard to press and turn over possession, and making some nice runs too. Not sure what more you want from them.

all sounds very positive, but equally he isn't signing any contract until the summer and at that point, with just 12 months left, the pressure starts to build and decisions have to be made about whether or not to allow an asset to leave for nothing. When £20m bids come in and Ings says he wont renew, then phrases like being here until the end of his contract may be in the distant past. We shall see.

Arsenal's confidence, form and fortune changed pretty much half way through that match. They are a completely different side to the one coming into that game which was on its knees. They looked very good against Newcastle midweek. Much changed line up though. Glad to see we have gone strong. Never a better chance to win the FA cup with the side we have. Hope we can re-find our goalscoring form with Ings and Adams.

https://www.standard.co.uk/sport/football/arsenal-transfer-news-ryan-bertrand-southampton-b900828.html Bertrand's agent doing his job here placing this story to give him leverage at the negotiating table.

"You would be mad to do that, because if you did, we'd know about it. Do you do that?"

https://www.standard.co.uk/sport/football/arsenal-transfer-news-ryan-bertrand-southampton-b900828.html Bertrand's agent doing his job here placing this story to give him leverage at the negotiating table.

I think he is a very good footballer and woud have made a good signing for us if the money had been there/right last summer. Excellent touch and ability. Not prolific, but a far far better player than Long, who is eating up wages. Not sure we can afford those (Kings) wages at the moment until we offload all our deadweight. Got to say that if Bournemouth want £18m for a player with 6 months left on his contract left, the thought of us selling Ings for £20m, or even putting a release clause in for that amount seems like madness. Whether Bompey get that money is another thing of course.

wants more games, goes to club that wont give him more games.

I did not know that. I thought there was big money available if he moved and he wanted that. I didn't realise he was happy to stay. Good to know. He hadn't been great, so I can see why Bagpuss chose him - I assume to raise funds to bring in shit like Bernard? I guess the money did help pay for Camara's loan too, for which I am thankful.

Maybe. Eriksson, at a similar stage of his career at Spurs had a bit of a sulk, played like shit for months, but still got his move to Inter.

the Prem prize money will be fully factored into the £150k a week wages (or whatever it is) that we have offered.

no idea. I didn't have a clue who he was before we signed him other than what I read at the time of the transfer. Must have been playing bloody well as we invested a sizeable amount on him.

You are right about world class, by which I mean would get into a world's best team. VVD and Toby. Bridge wasn't a prospect though, that could kick on. He was the finished article. Shaw the same. Already among the best in his position in the league. He (Shaw) hasn't got back to that level since. I don't think he ever will. Both were tremendous players. I think your assessment of Mane is disingenuous. The Sheff United game was December 2014 and he didn't join Liverpool until 2016. In between those dates he blossomed into one of the most dangerous attacking players in the league, enabling us to demand a huge £34m fee for him. Many felt this was not nearly enough. He has continued to shine, but now at CL level. To say no one here felt he was a world beater is bolloxs. He also was already the finished article. I agree, Ings is very good. He's at the Beattie level, when he was scoring goals for fun.

when Beattie was flying he possibly offered more than Ings, with his height and strength, although Ings has better touch and ability on the ball. Beattie is a good case history though as his form fell off a cliff once he decided he wanted a move and then subsequently got one. Imagine if we had offered him the equivalent of £150k a week and got the return Everton did for it? Perhaps now is the time to sell, although I am not sure how much we'd get for him this summer. Should we expect Ings to continue to score hatfuls of goals or are we seeing a best and end up paying for a lot less then that over the next four years. Tricky. I guess our record contract shows we expect him to continue to be great...