Arsenal News 24/7
Agree..saw enough of kos v liverpool last year to know he'd be good enough for us
Articles
Written by Omomo14 on Tuesday, 25 October 2011 10:43
WOW! It feels like Christmas after our 3rd straight win and our 2nd consecutive league win.
Wenger elected to rest our captain which was what I wanted before kick-off. Robin van Persie has started lots of games in the past few weeks, he played 2 90 minutes games for Holland during the international week and he has also started our last 4 league games prior to the Stoke game on Sunday.
RVP has been in inspirational form, anything he touches right now turns to gold. He came on Sunday when the game was tied for the ineffective Chamakh and instantly made an impact running' into the near post to tap home Gervinho's low cross. The 2nd goal was almost similar, Good burst of pace from Gervinho on the left hand side to beat his marker then put in a lovely cut back cross to set up RVP for the 3rd goal.
In 2011, RVP has been on the score's sheet 25 times in 26 appearances in the league. Only 2 players have bettered that return and they are the 2 best players in the world - Messi and Ronaldo.
The talk doing the rounds right now is how we are a one man team which in my opinion is BULL CRAP! Yes, RVP has been the man doing big things for us at the moment, still we can't take away the involvement of other players especially for the goals he has scored. Theo and Gervinho have done incredibly well in feeding RVP.
The media come out to feed us lies and we on the other side believe their sorry tales. What if we are a one man team? Are we gonna be the first or the last that depends on a particular player for inspiration? Tell me where Barcelona and Real Madrid would be without the goals of Messi and Ronaldo? Tell me where City would be without the key passes of Silva or where UTD would be without the goals and ability of Rooney? Why do the media pick on us all the time?
RVP is our captain and its only normal we look up to him for inspiration when we need a little bit of pushing. Whilst I agree he can't do everything by himself and other players must come to the fore but as it stands his goals are pushing us up the ladder, if this is the case, a million and 1 fans are happy and contempt with it. Our prayer right now is that he continues to bang in the goals and stay injury free.
At the beginning of last season, up until RVP's return from injury in December, I watched UTD's games a lot and admired the movement of Chicharito when without the ball. Chicharito's movement off the ball reminds me Inzahgi which is a marvelous ability to have. At some point I looked at our then current strikers including RVP and thought none of them could measure up to him in terms of movement without the ball. Fast forward to January this year and RVP has added the brilliant off the ball movement to his locker.
Most of RVP goals this year has come from being in the right place at the right time and you can only achieve this by having the intelligence of anticipating where the ball would be placed, looking for spaces to occupy and understanding the game.
In our last 2 games, Gervinho has come out of his shell with 2 good performances to come out of it. He and Ramsey completely changed the game when introduced in the 2nd half of the Marseille game at the Velodrome. What Walcott lacked in the game, Gervinho brought in with abundance. The ability to beat his man under intense pressure, stretch play and draw opposing full backs inside thereby creating space for our midfield players to run into.
Against Stoke, he was highly impressive. He scored from a beautiful lofted pass from Ramsey and set up 2 goals for RVP. Without him I kind of find it hard to see where RVP's goals would have come from. His pace and ability to beat his man created RVP's goals.
One of the key areas of our formation is our center back pairing. We have started to see a solid partnership being built.
Mertesacker and Koscielny are becoming a force and in our last 3 games we have let in 2 goals and the 2 have come from set pieces. Mertesacker brings calmness into our defence, no rash challenges and reads the game brilliantly. We can all agree that he lacks pace but rarely do you see him beaten for pace. I agree its too early to sing his praise but truth be told he has added positives into our defending.
Koscielny on the other hand has always been a player I admire. Right from the very minute he was purchased from Lorient, I fell in love with him. Like RvP said the other day he has everything to become a top class Center Back.
Koscielny and Mertesacker compliment each other well. What Per lacks in pace, Koscielny has in abundance. Per brings experience into the back line and Koscielny can only feed from it.
Wenger has come out to say that when Vermaelen returns, he won't work straight into the starting line-up which is a huge testament on how good Koscielny and Mertesacker have performed together.
Vermaelen is our best defender and when he is fit and returns Wenger will have no choice other than to start him. Who fills the 2nd slot would be a big ask for Wenger. I wouldn't want to be in his shoes.
All in all we are getting there with some positive results being churned out. We play Bolton today in the Carling Cup and the fringe players will have to make a huge statement most especially Park who has got a big chance to move ahead of Chamakh in the pecking order. A win today will just about put us in the right frame of mind looking ahead to the London derby against Chelsea at the Stamford Bridge.
Fancy writing your own articles for fellow Gooners to read? Click Your Vision section.
-
25-Oct-2011 12:00 | | Vuja De - The Real McCoyTo my discerning eyes, Koscielny is already a top class defender, but one who can only get better and better.
-
25-Oct-2011 12:39 | | richieOne hell of a lot to agree with you on! Mertasaker in my opinion is slow for the modern game especially since the active- inactive off side rules came into play. But, and its a bloody big butt (Ja lo ain't even in the reckoning) Per can aways make up for his lack of pace by speed of thought. If Mr Mertersaker reads the game well enough then he will always position himself intelligently and not get caught out for pace.
Its strange too that PM on arriving said Tony Adams was an inspiration, because old Mr Arsenal himself wasn't blessed with great pace either, but he made up for that with grim determination and good positioning. I also agree Mertasakers presence in the defence seems to have given theat same defence an air of greater calm. Its still early days but possible having a lump (and Per is certainly that) with you give the others more confidence.
Couldn't agree any more with you about Gervinho. Plenty on these very pages have given him the average player tag. It seems to me Gerv is anything but average his incredibly clever lay off for Ramsey against Marseille is a perfect case in point he actually look to see the player behind him before playing the cushioned lay off. His touch before scoring against Stoke was perfect, and both his cut backs for RvP left our captain in exactly the spot to score, and those cut backs were possible because he beat his man. RvP might be Batman but has Robin ever had a better Robin?
-
25-Oct-2011 12:47 | | Vuja De@ Richie...I can just imagine Walcott and Gervino squaring up to each other, trying to establish who is the "better Robin" to Van Persie's Batman.
-
25-Oct-2011 13:15 | | richieYeah but you can't imagine RvP squaring up to little Theo and chinning him the way Adeybayor did to the young Bendtner, because he wanted to be number one striker and didn't want any young whipper snapper intruding. That 3 man attack works for me. Robin in the middle just behind 2 wider forwards, especially if Theo can learn to make intelligent off the ball runs of the type he rarely makes now.
The sceen of 2 caped crusaders arguing over who should be Robin cut a pretty picture though.
-
25-Oct-2011 14:11 | | Charles - LondonWhen we sold Nasri people said that we didn't replace him i disagreed. Yes Nasri was immense last season for us but his first two seasons were avarage. Gervinho, i have always said will be better than Nasri. His impact already has been outstanding. Pace, skills, assists, goals, he has it all and can only get better.
Our defence is also improving game after game and i will but it down to the presence of PM and Kochienly has been great also. However, our KP for me is our best player so far the season and i only hope he gets better. Arguably the best KB in PL so far this season.
I am a bit worried that if RVP get injured we may struggle. I would like to see MC and Park get more game. Also, AW should try TW in the middle since we have AC and AA who can work from the right wing.
When BS, AD, JW and TV gets back in the team, i think we will suprise so alot of people this season. A win tonight and against Chelsea on Saturday will be a huge step towards that.
-
25-Oct-2011 14:24 | | 037Agreed!
We aren't a one-man team. The win against Stoke showed that. The key was our passes were clicking.
Against Sunderland, it looked like we all depended on RVP. But the way we played against Stoke showed that it is indeed an Arsenal team effort!
-
25-Oct-2011 16:55 | | OlumideMessi had 53gls & 25 assists out of barcelona's 147gls last season & media never thought they were a one man team. They always find a way 2 criticize arsenal.
-
25-Oct-2011 16:55 | | OlumideMessi had 53gls & 25 assists out of barcelona's 147gls last season & media never thought they were a one man team. They always find a way 2 criticize arsenal.
-
25-Oct-2011 16:57 | | OlumideMessi had 53gls & 25 assists out of barcelona's 147gls last season & media never thought they were a one man team. They always find a way 2 criticize arsenal.
-
28-Oct-2011 07:55 | | gunnerfan89 - arsenal NOT a one man teamvery good article.
i do agree the media r targeting arsenal... since arsenal hav started winning, d latest criticism is they hav only 1 world class player(i.e. RVP)... which is LAUGHABLE!
in d pl game against swansea a commentator said arsenal hav got 7 international captains in their squad.
in d first 11 itself there r players like walcott, vermaelen, mert'ker, ramsey, sagna, song who regularly play international games... nd r world class players in their positions.
Powered by Compojoom comment 4.1.7 stable
3 I'm not a recent Gooner that arrived with GG. I'm not one of Wengers Children who because of his management has kn... 
Comments (14)