[Archived] Arsenal V Blackburn Rovers

[Doogs]

I know most people expected us to lose today, but we went down like a team of poodles. Did we put a tackle in all afternoon? No. You can see why we have now lost 8 games in a row away from home. Its going to be a long, long season. No doubt in my mind, that we are bottom 3 material. Lets not kid ourselves. For two years we have sold our better players, for different reasons, and replaced them with lesser players. We realy shouldnt be surprised. Our days are numbered.

[RoverRich]

Anyone know what game Fabio was at today? I'm assuming the Chelsea/Liverpool but sometimes he attends two and leaves one a bit early. Maybe he missed Robbo letting in the two at the end.

He came to both games. I think Capello should have a bit more of a look at Dunn in our up coming games with the form that he is in and Robbo is definitely worthy of being in contention for the keeper's jersey.

[jim mk2]

You've changed your tune on John Williams ...

Who mentioned your landlord ?

I was referring to Allardyce of course.

Which you well knew.

[Wing Wizard Windy Miller]

Ultimately not a surprising result. I think most people wrote this off anyway - at least we managed to score a couple this season.

£100 million + of talent against a team worth about a fith of that if we're lucky.

We know that midfield is the weak area of the team (and will remain so with Andrews in there) so not learned anything new today.

Onwards and upwards....No one will give a flying **** about this result if we win our next home game!

[philipl]

I know most people expected us to lose today, but we went down like a team of poodles. Did we put a tackle in all afternoon? No. You can see why we have now lost 8 games in a row away from home. Its going to be a long, long season. No doubt in my mind, that we are bottom 3 material. Lets not kid ourselves. For two years we have sold our better players, for different reasons, and replaced them with lesser players. We realy shouldnt be surprised. Our days are numbered.

A chap who didn't watch Burnley v Brum yesterday!

[Blueandwhitemike]

Quite a lot of ridiculously OTT posts, I know we're all disappointed, particularly after getting into the game so well early on.

The defence was poor, but it is understandable with the injuries and players who haven't played together before and an excellent opposition that tear many teams apart.

The midfield wasn't great but tried hard. Dunn was fantastic in their half, I don't know if he'd add too much to England but if he keeps this form up he'll deserve a look in.

People have gone on about us not trying hard enough against the top 4 but we did today and if the ref had been better it would have been 3-3. We should look at the negatives but we should also see that there were positives out there too.

Robinson was excellent again, surely moves ahead of Foster and Hart.

Olsson's shot was fantastic and would have been a goal of the season contender if not fo a very good save.

Overall the performance was ok against a top side in decent form with the referee on their side.

I'm confident we'll beat Burnley

[Paul]

This time last season we were in freefall under Ince.

This time last season we had just lost 2 - 0 at home to United but were 9th with 10 points. This season we are 16th with 7 points. The Ince freefall hadn't started yet, the one consolation under Allardyce is we won't get high enough to go into freefall. The Expert needs a win and two draws to put himself on par with Ince at the end of October. For the moment I'll settle for an unlikley win in two weeks time.

[Fraserkirky]

I thought Diouf was rotten today, kept giving the ball away with sloppy passing and never gets foward enough to go beyond the striker.

Andrews was shocking chased shadows all day and got paid for it.

Can we please start playing 4-4-2. We dont have the right players for this system.

[Iceman]

Still very concerned, at how slow our team is.

[chocky]

Still very concerned, at how slow our team is.

I am more concerned with our inablity to keep the ball...If we did that things would be so much better...

[den]

Quite a lot of ridiculously OTT posts, I know we're all disappointed, particularly after getting into the game so well early on.

The defence was poor, but it is understandable with the injuries and players who haven't played together before and an excellent opposition that tear many teams apart.

The midfield wasn't great but tried hard. Dunn was fantastic in their half, I don't know if he'd add too much to England but if he keeps this form up he'll deserve a look in.

People have gone on about us not trying hard enough against the top 4 but we did today and if the ref had been better it would have been 3-3. We should look at the negatives but we should also see that there were positives out there too.

Robinson was excellent again, surely moves ahead of Foster and Hart.

Olsson's shot was fantastic and would have been a goal of the season contender if not fo a very good save.

Overall the performance was ok against a top side in decent form with the referee on their side.

I'm confident we'll beat Burnley

Without wanting to go over the top, how on earth can a performance that conceded 6 goals - and in all reality it could have been ten - be OK?

"The midfield wasn't great but tried hard". Again, how can anyone be satisfied with that? Everything Arsenal did today came right down the middle. So, with Dunn being given the free role, a lot fell to Nzonzi and Andrews to keep a grip on the Arsenal lads. I'm not going to criticize a 20 year old because it is too much to ask a young boy, but I must criticize the guy next to him. To be a capable central midfielder you must have eiher a] a great technique, or b] be strong enough to get stuck in, disrupt the opposition and have an effect on the game. Andrews has neither and never will have. He's absolutely diabolical. Of course I must be wrong because Sam played him.

Anyway, the best thing about Football is that no matter how poor you are, we start the next game level. Role on Burnley.

[Blueandwhitemike]

Den it was ok because

1.they are a much better team that cost probably 10 times what ours cost.

2. we lost the 2 centre backs from the last game, had a pairing that had never played together before and Olsson who hasn't played in quite a while

3. Grella was out and to me he is whilst not great, better than Nzonzi or Andrews

4. The referee was poor

I didn't expect us to win today, but hoped we might get lucky and play above ourselves and they had an off day. I do expect us to try and have a real good go, and we did. We could have done much better but I don't think the scoreline was a true reflection of the performance and if we had got that penalty, as we should have, it would have been different.

I don't think it was a good performance, that is why I wrote 'ok'. It was pretty good for the first 60 minutes, and poor for the last 30 after the 4th Arsenal goal and the game was beyond us.

Is that clearer?

[OscarRaven]

This time last season we had just lost 2 - 0 at home to United but were 9th with 10 points. This season we are 16th with 7 points. The Ince freefall hadn't started yet, the one consolation under Allardyce is we won't get high enough to go into freefall. The Expert needs a win and two draws to put himself on par with Ince at the end of October. For the moment I'll settle for an unlikley win in two weeks time.

I am not a massive Sam fan due the type of football his teams play and systems he employs.

However he will soon put that stat to rest even with our fixtures. Following up the the win against Villa with a dingle bashing will convince me that we are no longer in trouble and will be OK this season.

[jim mk2]

This time last season we had just lost 2 - 0 at home to United but were 9th with 10 points. This season we are 16th with 7 points. The Ince freefall hadn't started yet, .the one consolation under Allardyce is we won't get high enough to go into freefall. The Expert needs a win and two draws to put himself on par with Ince at the end of October. For the moment I'll settle for an unlikley win in two weeks time.

After the heady years under Hughes Rovers were in freefall from the moment Ince arrived at the club. The one consolation under Allardyce compared with Ince is that we are guaranteed not to be relegated under the present manager. Who cares about October ? It's where we finish in May that counts.

[Paul]

After the heady years under Hughes Rovers were in freefall from the moment Ince arrived at the club. The one consolation under Allardyce compared with Ince is that we are guaranteed not to be relegated under the present manager. Who cares about October ? It's where we finish in May that counts.

I take your point about Hughes / Ince but one can't get away from the fact Allardyce is having a poorer start to this season than Ince did last. I agree about May and still maintain we will finish 15th / 16th but I do have a big question about Allardyce. By end October last season people were panicking and calling for Ince's head. It's unlikely The Expert will have reached the same points total by that point as Ince did, and the team is not playing any better. While I'm not advocating sacking the manager how far will the board allow things to drift, if we were in deep trouble under Ince I'd argue we are in just as bad, if not worse, shape under Allardyce?

[Wolverine]

Another weird display.

Without being outstandingly bad, just too many costly little errors, which led to an overall performance that wasn't good enough for the fans who parted with taime and money to be there.

Disappointing - more so as there seems to be a difference in hunger since Villa...

Dunn going off really killed it for me. I could criticise the ref but what is the point? I can't remember the last time I watched any game of football anywhere at any level where I thought the referee was consistant and fair.

We need to improve and I look forward to bouncing back in a fortnight.

[DavidMailsTightPerm]

I actually saw more reasons to be optimistic than the score line suggests.

1. Arsenal will never score so many cracking goals in one game again this season. Though defensively we weren't brilliant - their finishing was absolutely first class.

2. We had a make shift defence that I thought did ok (before you crucify me please wait).

3. Robinson could do nothing about the goals - but did well when he could.

4. Nzonzi didn't look out of place against possibly the best midfield player in the Premiership playing at the absolute top of his game. I don't think he had a brilliant game - but showed great hope for the future.

5. I thought Emerton had a reasonable game - and it was his and Dunn's withdrawal that put an end to our challenge.

6. Hoillet put in a fair subs appearance - especially considering a lot of the players heads had dropped.

7. Di Santo showed the sort of desire and work ethic required.

now the bad things ....

8. Andrews showed why he is only a reasonable squad player. Yet again he was found wanting against top class opposition. He offered nothing - didn't anticipate (in a way a defensive midfield player should), offered little going forward - and his passing was wayward at best. As much as you can blame the defence - if a midfield player is given time to pick a pass (as Fabrigas was) it is difficult to defend against.

For me we were undone by poor referring at vital times, a poor defensive midfield show - and if I am honest, a brilliant display by Arsenal. They would have beaten most teams on todays performance (especially the finishing). Though the pundits will drool over their 6 goals - I hope at least they give us some credit for contributing to an exciting game of football (after all they are quick to call us for long ball - at least give us some credit for some excellent counter attacking).

[jim mk2]

I take your point about Hughes / Ince but one can't get away from the fact Allardyce is having a poorer start to this season than Ince did last. I agree about May and still maintain we will finish 15th / 16th but I do have a big question about Allardyce. By end October last season people were panicking and calling for Ince's head. It's unlikely The Expert will have reached the same points total by that point as Ince did, and the team is not playing any better. While I'm not advocating sacking the manager how far will the board allow things to drift, if we were in deep trouble under Ince I'd argue we are in just as bad, if not worse, shape under Allardyce?

The difference from 12 months ago that it was obvious the team had lost the confidence of the manager and that Ince did not have a clue what he was doing. I don't think there is any sense of "drift" at present. I expect us to be in the bottom 5 until the new year but to pull away and finish in mid-table. In view of the resources available to Allardyce I don't think fans can reasonably expect anything better. The club is in good hands with Allardyce in charge.

[imy9]

People have forgotten very quickly that this Arsenal side have been battering sides over the last few weeks:

Arsenal 4 Wigan 0

Arsenal 4 Portsmouth 1

Arsenal 6 Everton 1

We were in the game for at least 60 minutes and I saw the best performance against a top 4 side for many a year, can anyone recall the last time we were close to beating a top 4 side and having played so poorly defensively.

[JAL]

That final twenty minutes of a midfield consisting of Diouff, Andrews, NZonzi and Pedersen, what a bunch of tarts. As the Gunners just run through them, around them, with not one putting in a challenge to stop Arsenal very, very poor indeed.

What happened to Sams teams defending as a team didnt witness any of that in the second half as the Guners moved upto and past our final line of defence with ease - simply not good enough.

When Diouff and MaCarthy were on the pitch together they looked like a couple of lazy boys.

Rovers simply had too many luxury players out there today and possibly two if not three who were completely out of their depth at this level. With Keith Andrews we certainly give Burnley a real chance come the next game, with his mastery of the shadow defender who can point or raise his hands yet is totally incapable of doing anything effectively on the pitch- thank you and good riddance Paul Ince.

[broadsword]

If people think the reaction is over-the-top, I wonder what it will be like if we lose to Burnley?

I just wonder where the points will come from. We've played a mixture of teams and have 2 wins out of 7. are we suddenly going to snap into gear? after 7 games you'd expect we'd have a fair idea of how our season will go, and thus far, it looks like a relegation battle.

[booth]

After the heady years under Hughes Rovers were in freefall from the moment Ince arrived at the club. The one consolation under Allardyce compared with Ince is that we are guaranteed not to be relegated under the present manager.

I'd love to see this guarantee, it might make me feel better.

[Gav]

If people think the reaction is over-the-top, I wonder what it will be like if we lose to Burnley?

I just wonder where the points will come from. We've played a mixture of teams and have 2 wins out of 7. are we suddenly going to snap into gear? after 7 games you'd expect we'd have a fair idea of how our season will go, and thus far, it looks like a relegation battle.

Spot on Bryan.

Who would have thought that an injury ravaged David Dunn would be seen as our best player/saviour, 5 seasons or so after he couldn't even get a game.....

How the mighty have fallen.

[JAL]

Den it was ok because

1.they are a much better team that cost probably 10 times what ours cost.

2. we lost the 2 centre backs from the last game, had a pairing that had never played together before and Olsson who hasn't played in quite a while

3. Grella was out and to me he is whilst not great, better than Nzonzi or Andrews

4. The referee was poor

I didn't expect us to win today, but hoped we might get lucky and play above ourselves and they had an off day. I do expect us to try and have a real good go, and we did. We could have done much better but I don't think the scoreline was a true reflection of the performance and if we had got that penalty, as we should have, it would have been different.

I don't think it was a good performance, that is why I wrote 'ok'. It was pretty good for the first 60 minutes, and poor for the last 30 after the 4th Arsenal goal and the game was beyond us.

Is that clearer?

The referee was poor ? O yes, thats why we shipped in six could have been more that dammed Peter Walton.

Only losers blame the referee are we losers

[Steve Moss]

This time last season we had just lost 2 - 0 at home to United but were 9th with 10 points. This season we are 16th with 7 points. The Ince freefall hadn't started yet, the one consolation under Allardyce is we won't get high enough to go into freefall. The Expert needs a win and two draws to put himself on par with Ince at the end of October. For the moment I'll settle for an unlikley win in two weeks time.

I think the comparison is hardly fair. We'll have our 10 points in two weeks time. And by the end of December we should be 20+. We've had a rough line up, which is lousy in the short term but long term we should lift things up.

And JAL, I watched the game. The referee was very poor. While Arsenal is the better side, we played well and were poised for a possible upset until the ref sucked the oxygen out of Blackburn's game. He gave Arsenal every benefit of the doubt while he pounced on any percieved infraction of the Rovers. I don't blame Sam for pulling Dunn and Emerton out. At that point a blind man could see the writing on the wall and Sam acted to preserve valuable players for a winnable match, as we weren't going to be allowed an even playing field against Arsenal on this particular day.