Goonerholics Forever

As The Arsenal were winning their first League and FA Cup Double in 1971, David Bowie was putting the finishing touches to his song “Changes”. 

The last time Arsenal completed the Double was, of course, in May 2002. Fifteen months later, in August 2003, vice chairman David Dein surveyed the football landscape and made the now famous observation, “Roman Abramovich has parked his Russian tank in our front garden and is firing £50 notes at us.” 

In 2003 the Arsenal vice chairman was in Monaco for the Champions League draw where the Invincibles eventually drew Internazionale, Dynamo Kiev and Lokomotiv Moscow – a draw to make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck, when viewed now, 19 years later. Arsenal at that time were rated 5th in Europe and things badly needed to change for Chelsea if they were to challenge for top trophies and become London’s, let alone England’s, top side.

Well, change things did. The Dein Prophesy – if only Ludlum had been on the ball, so to speak – came horribly true, as Chelsea bought trophy after trophy, and skewed genuine competition with their oligarch’s ill-gotten roubles. About £2.1 billion pounds worth to January 2022.
And now things must change again. It turns out that the tank built by the steel of Roman Abramovich was not only firing £50 notes at Highbury, N5, but was also being readied to fire shells, at the command of his friend Vladimir Putin in Moscow, at cities across the peaceful country of Ukraine, ironically the home of Dynamo Kiev, the other team from that Champions League draw of 2003.

As a result of his ties to the Russian President, Abramovich has now been sanctioned by the UK government to the extent that his businesses are no longer allowed to operate here and Chelsea must be sold without profit to the owner. As ownership changes again, just as David Dein claimed in 2003 that Arsenal had a squad good enough to challenge in Europe, we might be seeing the beginning of an era where that will again be the case.

The Raine Group, an American merchant bank, are handling the sale of the club, and Abramovich will have the final say on to whom, although he cannot receive any of the money himself. However, Chelsea being Chelsea and a Russian oligarch being involved, things are already getting even more complicated. Due to the current complex standing of the club, I began this preview very early with a view to tracking events leading up to our kick off. The Raine Group apparently have had previous dealings with the American Ricketts family and there is/was concern amongst the other bidders that the latter are/were being given unfairly advantageous information about the sale. Chelsea fans are also seemingly worried about the Ricketts family taking over, as the founder of their wealth has a history of making Islamophobic remarks in a number of emails in 2019. Could be a case of out of the frying pan and into the fire – what a shame !

Update: The Ricketts led consortium have now withdrawn from the bidding process and will not submit a final bid due to “unusual dynamics around the sales process.” Make of that what you will.

The eventual proceeds from the sale will go to “an entity” from where they will be distributed to a mixture of government, the Premier League and who knows where – it’s not really clear from what I can discover. Maybe there is someone reading this who can explain better than I ? In any event, until a new owner or owners are in place, Chelsea cannot buy or sell players, cannot offer new contracts, cannot sell club merchandise or any new tickets for games. As a result there could be some unaccustomed gaps in the crowd for our visit, although probably not to the extent that it will affect the home side. Sadly!

So where does David Bowie’s song come into all this …? Some claimed that Bowie was a Chelsea fan, something that is honestly unclear, but The Bowie Prophesy – ok, leave it – as things began to change for Arsenal in 1971, makes interesting reading as things change again for Chelsea in 2022. The song is thought to have been about growing up and considering the various personalities he created as he grew older. There is though an irresistible connection to Chelsea’s oligarch owner in the lyrics as they relate today back to our fateful Champions League draw in 2003 – 

Ch-ch-ch-ch changes

Turn and face the strange

Ch-ch changes

There’s gonna have to be a different man……

But still the days seem the same

And these children that you spit on

As they try to change their worlds

Are immune to your consultations

They’re quite aware of what they’re going through

Ch-ch-ch-ch changes

Turn and face the strange

One of the few things that is certain about Chelsea is that without Abramovich’s ill gotten money they would never have challenged the Arsenal as London’s or anyone else’s top club. The head to head league stats show that of 169 meetings between the clubs, Arsenal W65, D50, L54. Prior to the arrival of Abramovich in 2003, Chelsea wins in the league were a relative rarity apart from in the 1960s when they definitely had the upper hand. Only in the 2005-6 season, as the roubles began to tell, did they gain superiority over us. The other factor was that José Mourinho used the Russian riches to buy the best big, physical talent around at exactly the time Arsene Wenger was assembling his team of very young, smaller, Barcelona style, technical players in the new incarnation of Wenger Ball, and that physical superiority counted heavily against a young Arsenal side.

As I began writing this preview Chelsea had surrendered a 1-0 lead at home to Brentford to eventually lose 1-4 to their newly promoted West London rivals. They then went on to exit the Champions League at the hands of Real Madrid, and the hope was that that kind of on-field collapse would continue as the team seized up in the confusion surrounding the club. Unfortunately they have since just won their FA Cup semi-final against Crystal Palace, and beaten Southampton 6-0 at St Mary’s, where we, of course, came undone on Saturday to lose our third Premier League game on the trot since our 1-0 win at Aston Villa. That was our fifth consecutive away win in the league and had begun to convince us that Arteta’s Arsenal are showing signs of being made of the kind of stuff needed to once again stand up to the likes of Chelsea. 

Some, not all it must be said, were optimistically looking at Chelsea’s third position in the league as our finishing target, as we seemed to have found a good level of consistency. How quickly things can ch-ch-change again. We have to hope that our current form is a blip, albeit an injury induced one, as Mikel Arteta must reconsider our limited attacking options as we now fight to get back into fourth place.

The Teams
Mateo Kovacic is a big doubt for Chelsea, having been withdrawn after 26 minutes against Palace on Sunday. Other than that Ben Chilwell and Callum Hudson-Odoi seem to be their only concerns, unless you count Ross Barkley who still apparently plays for them. Yes, I’d completely forgotten too.

As we know only too well, we are in a bit of a fix at the moment. Kieran Tierney and Thomas Partey are out for the rest of the season, while Takehiro Tomiyasu’s absence looks set to continue. Alexandre Lacazette may or may not be available after testing positive for Covid-19 at the weekend. Mikel Arteta seems to want to stick with a back four, so the selection decisions would seem to be in the attacking half of the team. Eddie Nketiah could hardly have looked less effective at Southampton, and Lacazette has been out of sorts for weeks. My own choice, depending on whether Arteta trusts Tavares for this one would be:

Ramsdale;

Cedric, White, Gabriel, Tavares/ Saka;

Xhaka, Odegaard, Lokonga;

Smith-Rowe, Martinelli, Saka/ Pepe.

If Arteta opts for a back three, I would go for:

Ramsdale;

White, Holding, Gabriel;

Cedric, Odegaard, Xhaka, Lokonga;

Smith-Rowe, Martinelli, Saka.

The Holic Pound
Not surprisingly, given recent form, Chelsea are quoted around evens or slight odds on to win this one. Arsenal to win is 16/5 with Betfair, with 5/2 for the draw. The same company are offering 11/1 for a 0-1 Arsenal win, or 16/1 for a 2-2 draw. William Hill will give you 45/1 on an Arsenal 2-3 victory. 

The match is on Wednesday 20th April, kick off at 19.45 UK time, and is on Sky Sports TV. Referee is Jonathan Moss, Fourth official is Andy Madley and Chelsea Insurance, sorry, VAR cross hairs of whatever required thickness to rule out Arsenal goals, will be provided by Darren England.

And finally, can you name three English football clubs whose names contain swear words …?

Answer: Arsenal, Scunthorpe and F***ing Chelsea 😏

Enjoy the game, Holics 🤞🏻

Embed from Getty Images

How quickly Arsenal have turned from a band of overachievers, as they seemed with reason to be prior to the international break, to a club in the doldrums as they have appeared in their last two matches.  Now they face a Saturday away day at St. Mary’s, and another game with “banana skin” written all over it.  As if this fixture hasn’t been a nearly perennial banana skin for the Gunners anyway.  The players must focus and concentrate on the job at hand, and not let minds wander to extraneous matters such as recent setbacks or the quick turnaround until Tuesday’s tussle with the Chavs.  After last Saturday’s home defeat to Brighton Mikel Arteta described his team’s poor performance saying “We were sloppy, we had no purpose to attack, we were really imprecise and we didn’t want to play forward.”  In other words, this is inadequate form for a Champions League-chasing club, especially considering Arsenal’s unacceptable performance at Crystal Palace in the previous match.  

As a matter of fact it is now over a month that Arsenal have gone winless excepting their narrow victory over Aston Villa on March 19.  Losses to Liverpool, Palace and Brighton have knocked the Gunners right off the seemingly solid fourth place perch they enjoyed after five consecutive wins in February and early March.  In Arsenal’s last four outings since their two goal triumph against Leicester on March 13th the Gunners have scored only two goals but conceded seven.  Fatigue, injuries, the lack of signings, and the clear-out of the potentially useful Calum Chambers and Ainsley Maitland-Niles have taken a toll on the team’s resilience it seems.  Facing the most challenging moment of his managerial campaign Arteta now has to find a trick or two up his sleeve and put the Gunners back on a positive path.

The Opposition

Placed 14th in the table after 31 games played, the Saints have had a fairly typical season by their standards of the last half decade.  Counting forward from 2017-8, the season before they appointed manager Ralph Hasenhuttl, Southampton have finished 17th, 16th, 11th and 15th, a consistently bottom half side that has always somehow managed to avoid relegation. 

But having lost last week 0-6 to Chelsea the Saints are in a rough spot, conceding 19 times in six games since the first weekend of March, including four league defeats to Aston Villa, Newcastle, Watford and Chelsea, and an FA Cup exit to Manchester City.  Saints drew their other league match in that stretch, against Leeds.  One pundit wrote that Southampton defended against the Chavs as if they were rabbits caught in car headlights, but if Arsenal’s form of the last two weeks is allowed to continue then Saints defence could look solid as a rock.  The South coasters normally line up with a back four consisting of  Ghanaian Mohammed Salisu and Polish international Jan Bednarek in the middle, flanked by full-backs Tino Livramento and Kyle Walker-Peters.

Saints’ midfield usually features James Ward-Prowse and Oriol Romeu in the middle of things, with Mohamed Elyounoussi on one side; and one of Adam Armstrong, Stuart Armstrong, or Ibrahima Diallo, who started at Leeds.  Nathan Redmond has made 15 starts, usually in a left wing role.  The Gunners must be alert seeing as Ward-Prowse seems to do nearly whatever he wants with a free kick.  Last season he registered 39 shots on goal and six assists from set pieces.   In January, Pep Guardiola called the him the best free-kick taker in the world; and JWP leads the league again with three goals scored on free kicks.  His most recent such exploit came at Leeds where his free kick equalizer ended Saints’ run of three straight league defeats.  Saints’ front line is usually led by the duo of Che Adams, who has scored 7 goals, and Chelsea loanee Armando Broja, who has added 6 goals in fewer appearances.  Broja has looked especially dangerous in Saints’ attack in the one or two games I have seen.

Arsenal

Seeing as I wrote this prior to Arteta’s pre-match press conference, I will turn to a couple of other punters to provide some insight on the team we could deploy against Southampton.  In light of the injury suffered by Kieran Tierney and the obvious desire to avoid a repeat of Nuno’s display against Palace, no less an authority than TTG pointed out in the drinks that Cedric played left back at St. Mary’s last season and did really well, so that could be a good solution for this critical fixture.  TTG added that we might see Ben White at right back until Tomi returns with Rob Holding coming in at White’s usual center back slot.  Not thinking it would be of any use to question TTG’s tactical judgment, I’m agreeing with his choice on that front too.

The esteemed Dr. Faustus used a recent drink to provide some other useful tactical adjustments.  He would replace the knackered Lacazette with Martinelli, who he suggested would better synchronize our attacking players and help avoid the scenario in which our counter-attacks fizzle out because the center forward moves slower than the fullbacks.  Faustus gave credit to Laca for his work done, no doubt wondering why Arteta didn’t notice that Laca looked knackered weeks ago, but the Doctor added “we need to be more aggressive and front footed in the opposition third.”  Faustus and several other drinkers asserted their confidence that Sambi Lokonga is capable of doing a decent job of replacing the injured Thomas Partey in the defensive midfield role.  I would add that Eddie Nketiah put in a solid performance as a substitute against Brighton, so he remains an option up front but maybe not as a starter in such a critical fixture.

The holics’ pound

I can’t say I’m expecting a fluid or truly inspiring performance this week but do think Arsenal are capable of pulling up their proverbial bootstraps and avoiding calamitous errors as they strain to get back to playing like a side that deserves to be chasing the European places, even as the Champions League spot now looks difficult.  So I’m going for a tight 0-0 until the last ten minutes when Gabriel Martinelli pulls a rabbit out of his socks and Arsenal escape St. Mary’s with all three points.  A tonic for what ails ye, fingers crossed.  But it’s not likely to be comfortable viewing for long stretches so keep that sofa within arm’s reach.  

Enjoy the game, ‘holics.

The Arsenal’s prospects of finishing in the top four now look somewhat slimmer than they did only a couple of weeks ago. The news prior to the Palace match that Kieran Tierney required knee surgery and is probably out for the rest of the season was bad enough but the lethargic first half performance against Palace culminating in a 0-3 defeat and more significantly, the injury sustained by Thomas Partey were further blows to our aspirations. It seems very likely that neither of those two key players will be available during the run-in. The boss has a big challenge!

Our nine game run-in begins with a visit from Brighton who currently sit in relative safety in 13^th place on 34 points but must be casting anxious glances over their shoulders as they endeavour to ensure a 6^th consecutive season in the Premier League. The ‘Seagulls’ began this season well, further enhancing Graham Potter’s reputation as an up and coming English coach. Brighton’s form even led to cries from some Arsenal fans (who should have known better) for Potter to replace Mikel Arteta after we started poorly with a Covid ravaged squad and difficult early fixtures. 

Brighton did have a great start sitting in 4^th place after eight matches in mid-October with four wins, three draws and a solitary defeat while Arsenal sat in 12^th having begun to climb the table with three wins and two draws after three initial goalless defeats. However, that was as high as the Seagulls soared or as bright as Brighton glowed. A subsequent preponderance of home and away draws (nine) plus three victories (two away wins at Everton and at Watford) and five defeats saw Brighton sitting securely in 9^th place by early February. Then a run of six straight league defeats, four at home, with only a single goal scored (away at Newcastle) was ended only last weekend with a 0-0 draw at home to Norwich. However, in that goalless draw against Norwich, Brighton had a total of 31 shots on goal though only 4 were on target, and they also missed a penalty. This was apparently the equal highest total number of shots taken in a Premier League game this season along with Manure in their 7-0 win against Leeds.

Brighton clearly have a problem scoring goals. In their 30 Premiership games to date they have scored 26 goals, conceding 36. Closer scrutiny reveals that this deficit is more marked in home games where they have scored only 10 goals in 16 games whilst conceding 20 goals. At home they have won only 3 and lost 7 of 16 games played. In contrast, their scoring record in 14 away games is better with 16 scored and 16 conceded yielding 4 wins and 3 defeats. Draws, you ask? The Seagulls are top equal with Palace for drawn games in the PL. They boast a total of 13 draws and have drawn exactly half of their 14 away games to date. All this suggests that they are likely to sit deep, defend in serried ranks to knick a point but to break out occasionally in the hope of stealing three points as they did at Burnley, Brentford, Everton and Watford. That’s a list that we should avoid joining.

Brighton’s line up is reasonably predictable. They will have three big lumps at the back perming three from Dunk, Veltman, Cucurella and Duffy who will all hoover up every high ball into the box. Lamptey and March are their ‘go to’ wing backs bombing forward to support their forwards when given an opportunity. Their midfield is generally designed to obstruct rather than to create and their selection here is less predictable. I suspect Potter will put three into midfield to stifle us rather than just the pair of Gross and MacAllster whom he played against Norwich. I expect him to supplement them with either Bissouma, Moder or Lallana. Up front I think we will see our ‘friend’ Maupay alongside the tricky Trossard and expect Danny Welbeck to drop to the bench to accommodate the extra midfielder. Brighton’s goal threat comes from Maupay (9), Trossard (4) and MacAllister (4) with Danny Welbeck chipping in 3.

The challenge for the boss is how to recover the stability and security our defensive unit exhibited before Lady Luck deserted Arsenal at Palace, in the absence of both first-choice full backs and the screening defensive midfield pivot. It’s an interesting conundrum complicated by the continuing unavailability of Tomiyasu at right back, Tavares’ clear lack of confidence in his last two appearances and Xhaka’s previous poor performances when asked to play as a single pivot, especially against top opposition. I think Sambi Lokonga is too inexperienced to play as a single pivot in PL games and I am not convinced that Elneny, willing worker though he is, can do it much better. So, Xhaka is the best option we have to replace Partey (sorry, TTG!). Arteta has previously addressed a leaking Arsenal defence by playing a double pivot and he may well choose to do this against teams that offer more threat on paper than Brighton. The upside is added defensive security but the very clear downside is our markedly diminished offensive creativity and end-product. I just don’t expect Arteta to play a double pivot tomorrow as this is yet another ‘must win game’.

Likewise, I don’t expect Arteta to revert to a back three tomorrow which, as previously noted, reduces our end product. However, I do think it would be prudent to do so against our three remaining ‘top six’ opponents. I also think that a back three is a better structure for Tavares as he is clearly more comfortable as an offensive wing back than as a ‘back to the wall’ left back. Whether he plays tomorrow depends on how much Arteta believes his fragile confidence at Palace can be bolstered by further game time and that is a judgement only Arteta can make. Whilst Brighton at our place might be regarded as a good game to start rebuilding his confidence, it really depends how low that is and a rampaging Lamptey might prove another handful for him. If Tavares doesn’t make the cut, then I expect Cedric to switch to left back and Ben White to move to right back in Tomiyasu’s continued absence with Rob Holding partnering Gabriel at centre back. Lokonga added vim, vigour and passing accuracy when he replaced a sub-par Partey on Monday so I expect him to join the party tomorrow. He can be expected to add to our offensive creativity with crisp interplay in midfield. Whether he can compete with the Brighton midfield heavyweights remains to be seen. I expect him to be first choice to partner Xhaka when we do adopt a double pivot.

The other question facing the boss is whether to persist with our hard-working but non-scoring captain at ‘centre forward’. I personally would, if only because we have so many forced changes to key personnel at the back and in midfield that a bit of stability up front may help the players around him to adapt to the changes behind them. However, I fully understand the lobby urging Arteta to replace him by either moving Martinelli inside or giving Nketiah a full match to show his worth. I just think we should start this match with Lacazette. However, I would have a low threshold to make a change early in the second half if we are either ‘home and hosed’ or struggling to score. It would be a good opportunity to see how we look with Martinelli leading the line against three big lumps or, alternatively, to give Nketiah a good run out to gain match sharpness. If only we could rely on Eddie as a potential starter it would make it more difficult for opposition coaches to set up against our otherwise entirely predictable front line. Having chosen to persist with Lacazette, I find it almost impossible to choose between Martinelli and Smith Rowe on the left but on the basis of their Palace performances, I would choose the former. ESR would be a good early option from the bench, especially if Odegaard hasn’t recovered his form.

Thus, I expect the following starting eleven:

Ramsdale

Cedric, White, Gabriel, Tavares

Odegaard, Xhaka, Lokonga

Saka, Lacazette, Martinelli

The Holic Pound

Once again, the Holic Pound has been donated to a Ukrainian cause so I haven’t looked at any bookmaker’s odds. Neither team is banging goals in so I expect a low score. I look forward to a 2-0 victory for the Arsenal but not without scares.

This game is definitely a ‘must win’! If we don’t win this we can almost certainly kiss goodbye to fourth place and start worrying about whether we can find the form to stay in the top six.

Enjoy the game, Holics, wherever you are watching.