{"id":6203,"date":"2022-05-18T06:54:20","date_gmt":"2022-05-18T05:54:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=6203"},"modified":"2022-05-21T16:16:39","modified_gmt":"2022-05-21T15:16:39","slug":"the-splinter-in-your-eyes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=6203","title":{"rendered":"The Splinter in your Eyes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Watching the match with an increasingly certain sense of an inevitable calamity, counterbalanced just enough by that tragicomically irrational optimism of football fan, I could only admire and respect the cheery tenacity of the faithful away fans who had all throughout the season represented the Arsenal with a consistency that if were replicated by the team itself would have been most reassuring about the progress that we all, at least most of us, try to believe is being made. But progress is never linear, and the old clich\u00e9 about two steps forward and one step back came to visit Arsenal at the time of the season when it was least welcome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though this is supposed to be a match review, something that I should have written at least twelve hours ago if not earlier, I find in me not a molecule of enthusiasm to recapitulate the actions, in a structured or chronological manner, that had unfolded on St. James\u2019 Park, often a site of Arsenal triumph in the recent past, but in this occasion turned swiftly into the burial grounds of Arsenal\u2019s hopes of returning back to the Champions League (no, I don\u2019t think even the pasta gods can cause an upset on the final day of the season). If you belong to that rare set of Arsenal fans who do not yet know the result, we lost 0-2, put on one of our most abject performances of the season, and suddenly looked like a team that have reverted all the way back to the form and confidence of those late summer days when our season had started with a bone-chillingly horrific run of results. The result was more than well justified, Newcastle was much the better team, there were no egregious refereeing errors that skewed the course of the match away from us, and we hadn\u2019t had to consume any particularly indigestible slice of bad luck. \u00d8degaard and Emile Smith-Rowe \u2013 two players of immense potential and already some memorable performances under their belt — had two of their worst performances in Arsenal colors (nearly as bad as the Villareal semifinal last season), Tomiyasu (likely not fit enough as the forced substitution in the first half demonstrated) was uncharacteristically troubled, Xhaka and Elneny, after a series of eye-catchingly composed and progressive midfield performances, reverted back to their worst incarnations, Nketiah convinced us again of why Arsenal has remained unconvinced of his future roles as a reliable striker for us, and the entire team for the most part simply forgot to play. White and Gabriel didn\u2019t look fully fit, Saka has been running on fumes for a while now, and Newcastle won almost all the duels, pressed more energetically, and played with a sure footedness that completely deserted us.         <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think it was Adorno who had said that the the splinter in your eye is the best magnifying glass. The pain of experiencing this temporary regression \u2013 temporary, for I am convinced that the team has made noticeable progress especially as evidenced in the upward curve in the second half of the season \u2013 handicapping us exactly when we needed the team to overachieve also bring to our field of vision the cracks and crevices that must be addressed to sustain that progress and then build upon it. In a certain way it is indeed impressive that after going into the second half of the season with no genuine top-class goal scorer \u2013 whatever is your opinion of Aubameyang\u2019s latter day misdemeanors, he had in the past often single-handedly won us matches where our performance didn\u2019t necessarily deserve a victory \u2013 in the squad, then losing our main midfield player and the first choice left back (who is also often a talismanic figure full of sangfroid and bloody mindedness), and then the first choice right back, who had proved to be essential to the tactical versatility which facilitated the frontline youngsters to express themselves best, we managed to go into the final weekend of the season with still a mathematical chance of qualifying (no, it won\u2019t happen, don\u2019t hope for the improbable) for the Champions League next season. (But in the same breath one might say that maybe a little bit more foresight and proactive attitude in the winter transfer window may have seen us bolstered enough to help us through this final stage where we are likely (surely) to fall agonizingly short of what would have otherwise been a truly exciting achievement.) Anyway, after accepting that bit of well-deserved applause coming from the mirror in front of us, let us also acknowledge that a lot needs to be done over the summer in improving the matchday squad in all possible ways by adding both depth and quality, and depth in quality, especially given that we would also have Europa to contend for, and surely should also try to seriously go for the domestic cups. Qualifying for the Champions League in 2023-24 has to be the minimum goal, and to quote one of Mikel\u2019s favorite phrases, a \u201cnon-negotiable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And once that essential prerequisite of squad strengthening is achieved, the real work would begin, and I am looking forward to a rapid maturation and growth of the matchday collective \u2013 the playing squad, the manager, the coaches, all of them can and must evolve \u2013 in the next season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Watching the match with an increasingly certain sense of an inevitable calamity, counterbalanced just enough by that tragicomically irrational optimism of football fan, I could only admire and respect the cheery tenacity of the faithful away fans who had all throughout the season represented the Arsenal with a consistency that if were replicated by the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6203"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6203"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6203\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6218,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6203\/revisions\/6218"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}