Arsenal 2018-19: Spanish David Moyes

lars10

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Yes, they made a big thing about it on twitter and even gave him his own hashtag.



(he's still shitty)
Thanks. I disagree with your assessment, but agree he hasn’t played to his potential. He still helps create a ton of chances.

I had a #10 Özil Jersey made last year since I thought Jack was leaving.. happy to see the change for now.
 

Dummy Hoy

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Just chiming in that I loved what I saw from Torreira during the World Cup. At 22, that’s the kind of playe you want to sign.
 

hube

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I think we still see some players move out, but this has been a pretty decent, decisive summer so far. For the first time in a few years I'm actually excited about the season.
 

lars10

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It's against Boreham Wood in a pointless match but hooo buddy, PEA, Reiss Nelson and AMN (Tory) look ON FIRE
Yeah.. when you get a hat trick within 17 minutes you’re doing something right regardless
 

mikeford

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They're not listed as being in that league on the wiki entry and that BBC article doesn't say what league they're in at all so... Huh?

I mean it says they're in 5th tier but i think they're likely wrong about this given everything else I've read says they're in Oberliga Nord
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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Terrible news. Can't wait until he puts a bunch of debt on the club a la the Glazers at Man United to finance some other business.

Kroenke's major sports teams have played 51 seasons and won one league title, and that was the first season after the bought the Avalanche when he hadn't time to mediocritize them yet. Arsenal's second place finish in 15-16 is the only time any of his teams have even finished second.
 

67YAZ

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Arsenal fans crack me up. The club is a very well run mid-sized corporation (size in terms of revenue). There’s zero indication that Kroenke will load the team with debt a la the Glazers. He could, but that has not been his MO with his other teams. And even if the £550m needed to buy up the remaining 40% is assumed as team debt, EPL revenue projections are so rosy as to mitigate the impact. Arsenal will continue to be a well run team competing for a Champions League slot every season. It’s not like Tom Hicks or Ken Bates are running the show.

And if you dream of an Arabian Prince or Russian Oligarch swooping in and pumping in billions to win trophies in vain glory...this is actually great. Much easier to buy out a single owner. Plus, this is a club with international brand recognition, a newer world class stadium, and a very healthy balance sheet located in the city of London. The much bigger issue is Brexit in this scenario.
 

shaggydog2000

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Kroenke has been able to do pretty much what he wanted without outside objection for years. I don't see what is going to change, except that some of the financials will become a lot more private I suppose. I'd definitely like somebody else to own the team, but a Russian/Uzbek Oligarch with a sketchy background (are there other types?) isn't that much better to root for. He is in it for an investment, but we know they make a lot more money in the Champions league, and I doubt he will tell the team to spend just enough money to guarantee they make that, but not so much the accidentally win the league and make him even more money.
 

mikeford

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Arsenal fans crack me up. The club is a very well run mid-sized corporation (size in terms of revenue). There’s zero indication that Kroenke will load the team with debt a la the Glazers. He could, but that has not been his MO with his other teams. And even if the £550m needed to buy up the remaining 40% is assumed as team debt, EPL revenue projections are so rosy as to mitigate the impact. Arsenal will continue to be a well run team competing for a Champions League slot every season. It’s not like Tom Hicks or Ken Bates are running the show.

And if you dream of an Arabian Prince or Russian Oligarch swooping in and pumping in billions to win trophies in vain glory...this is actually great. Much easier to buy out a single owner. Plus, this is a club with international brand recognition, a newer world class stadium, and a very healthy balance sheet located in the city of London. The much bigger issue is Brexit in this scenario.
He literally added 500m to the debt balance IN ORDER TO DO THIS BUYOUT.
 

67YAZ

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He literally added 500m to the debt balance IN ORDER TO DO THIS BUYOUT.
KSE, not Arsenal, took out a 2 year loan from Duetsche Bank to finance the deal. It is backed not by the 60% stake in the club, but by Kroenke’s wife. BUT OK.
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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Arsenal fans crack me up. The club is a very well run mid-sized corporation (size in terms of revenue). There’s zero indication that Kroenke will load the team with debt a la the Glazers. He could, but that has not been his MO with his other teams. And even if the £550m needed to buy up the remaining 40% is assumed as team debt, EPL revenue projections are so rosy as to mitigate the impact. Arsenal will continue to be a well run team competing for a Champions League slot every season. It’s not like Tom Hicks or Ken Bates are running the show.

And if you dream of an Arabian Prince or Russian Oligarch swooping in and pumping in billions to win trophies in vain glory...this is actually great. Much easier to buy out a single owner. Plus, this is a club with international brand recognition, a newer world class stadium, and a very healthy balance sheet located in the city of London. The much bigger issue is Brexit in this scenario.
The club is run fine from a business perspective but from a footballing perspective not so much. The choice to keep Wenger so long was catastrophic and the repercussions of his terrible transfer market dealings and roster mismanagement at the end of his reign will be felt for a long time. Per transfermarkt, the total value of the Arsenal roster is now about 520M while those of the other top six clubs range from 750-950M. Wenger and Kroenke put this club into a deep hole together.

The issue with Kroenke is his astounding track record of mediocrity as a sports owner and the fact that we’re probably stuck with him for a long time now. This has been obvious for a while, ever since he refused to sell to Usmanov at a very inflated price a couple years ago. But him buying out Usmanov just confirms it.
 

rguilmar

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What does Xhaka do that's good?
Get red carded?

In all seriousness, he does have some toughness to him that the Gunners seem to lack and a nice long range shot.

That being said, I think Lucas Torreira takes his spot in the starting XI sooner rather than later. I’m a huge fanboy, so take it with a grain of salt, but Torreira is a better passer and more creative player, with toughness and smarts. He just finds himself in the right spot all of the time defensively, whereas Granit seems to lose his mark all too often (admittedly didn’t catch a lot of Arsenal last year).

Xhaka is... taller?
 

mikeford

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Translation: I confirm once again the information that gather and I mentioned live in the Open game on @ESPNagora. Ozil had an argument with coach Emery at practice this week, came out screaming and is cut today. Information from more than one source linked to the club. #PremierLeagueNaESPN


Ozil will be playing in Turkey by 2020, book it.
 

JimBoSox9

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Ozil looked a ton more engaged today, especially in dropping back to take possession in the middle third. In the first half when Newcastle was doing a stout job in the defensive mid, he had a couple touches that came closer to unlocking a scoring chance than anyone else. The goal was a post-hoc cheeky smart knock back left against the goaltender's momentum, when it looked like he had the whole right side to shoot on.
 

67YAZ

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Gazidis heading too Milan, leaves Arsenal at end of October & starts at Milan on December 1.

He's bailing on the rebuild and seemingly the Arsenal board could neither muster a new deal to keep Gazidis or the will to force a quicker decision. I guess that's a theme with this board.

But here's a chance to bring in someone new, someone who can bring a fresh perspective without any commitments to the Wenger years...or, possibly, the Emery year...But the search for a new chair will be intriguing.
 

Time to Mo Vaughn

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Is Gazidis really a loss? 2009-2018 hasn't exactly been a wonderfully successfully run for the club resulting in two straight years finishing out of the Champions League. I guess there's plenty of blame to go around with most of that on Wenger, but perhaps Wengers final years could be looked at as one of the Gazidis's ineffectiveness. Wenger's final contract was certainly the result of a complete lack of succession plan.
 

The Gray Eagle

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Gazidis heading too Milan, leaves Arsenal at end of October & starts at Milan on December 1.

He's bailing on the rebuild and seemingly the Arsenal board could neither muster a new deal to keep Gazidis or the will to force a quicker decision. I guess that's a theme with this board.

But here's a chance to bring in someone new, someone who can bring a fresh perspective without any commitments to the Wenger years...or, possibly, the Emery year...But the search for a new chair will be intriguing.
They've already announced Sanllehi will be in charge of football and Vinai Venkatesham will be in charge of commercial responsibilities. There's not going to be anybody new coming in from the outside, though Raul just came over from Barcelona in February.
 

mikeford

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Talks between the club and Aaron Ramsey have broken down and the cub has withdrawn its contract offer. Ramsey is set to leave in the summer now.
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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Eight wins in a row but I'm not sure a single one has been convincing. I'm cautiously optimistic about the Emery era and think we'll play better over time as players better understand the system. But we are seriously riding our luck right now and I wouldn't be surprised if it came crashing down pretty hard at some point soon.
 

Time to Mo Vaughn

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Eight wins in a row but I'm not sure a single one has been convincing. I'm cautiously optimistic about the Emery era and think we'll play better over time as players better understand the system. But we are seriously riding our luck right now and I wouldn't be surprised if it came crashing down pretty hard at some point soon.

Luck at this point is fantastic. I expected Arsenal to start slow with their first new coach in twenty years and get better as Emery finds his feet under him. If they can scrape wins out now and improve because they become more cohesive I'm optimistic I won't have to be praying for a Europa spot.
 

The Gray Eagle

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That second half was pretty convincing.

Fulham aren't good, but people have been talking about how Arsenal have been struggling with mediocre performances against mediocre teams, so it's good to see this. And any team that can put together the buildup and finish to that Ramsey goal is a team with the potential to be great offensively.

In recent years, a run like this with an emphatic road win would often lead to the team getting overconfident and underestimating the next opponent and needlessly dropping points. It'll be interesting to see if that happens again.
 

mikeford

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9 wins in a row is good any way you slice it. they havent been giant killing and havent really even looked good for most of it but winning, even winning ugly, breeds confidence.
 

lars10

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9 wins in a row is good any way you slice it. they havent been giant killing and havent really even looked good for most of it but winning, even winning ugly, breeds confidence.
I think the main takeaway has been that they now have two legit strikers that can score out of nothing. They’ve also had to transition to a new style while also integrating a number of new players. I think generally they’ve shown at times they haven’t played all that much together yet..but then that goal yesterday..with each pass and flick better than the next with the most decisive, aggressive pass being the second to last that put the ball in toward the goal rather than the more passive pass out to the wing for a longer cross.

They just need to play better against the big clubs and most likely add a player or two to compete with Liverpool and Man City.
 

mikeford

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They just need to play better against the big clubs and most likely add a player or two to compete with Liverpool and Man City.
They need to play better against everybody. Like I said, they have not looked good or played well much during this run but they've pumped out results anyway. That's encouraging because I do think the form will come but outside of Fulham and one of the Europa matches, I can't say they've really played well.

This year isn't really about challenging for the league though. This is a season to get back into the CL and go from there. Anything else is gravy.
 

lars10

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They need to play better against everybody. Like I said, they have not looked good or played well much during this run but they've pumped out results anyway. That's encouraging because I do think the form will come but outside of Fulham and one of the Europa matches, I can't say they've really played well.

This year isn't really about challenging for the league though. This is a season to get back into the CL and go from there. Anything else is gravy.
Yeah..they haven't played great. I think their offense is ok, but they hadn't really had any link up play until Saturday. I think that has a lot to do with the new players...but they also have at times looked not really ready to play out of the gate.

If they play this way against the big clubs they'll get smoked..but if they continue to improve as the season goes along? who knows. Def hope for top four.
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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He’s frustrating at times but I’ll always be grateful to have gotten the opportunity to watch Mesut Ozil. He did three separate brilliant things for that goal. And his earlier finish was pure class (after creating the opportunity in the first place).