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Watford v Arsenal

Discussion in 'Arsenal' started by remembercolinlee, Oct 13, 2017.

  1. lazarus20000

    lazarus20000 Well-Known Member

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    I watched the incident and it was far from scandalous. Yes it was a little soft, but I've seen plenty of these decisions given and if the boot was on the other foot, we would think it was a pen too. What we really should be getting annoyed at is our inability to kill the game off. Players like Iwobi, Ozil and Bellerin should have taken their chances, but didn't. Not putting our numerous chances away are a great deal more scandalous than some random soft pen.
     
    #81
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  2. blukyt

    blukyt Well-Known Member

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    It's pathetic than some of us are making the penalty an issue. In real time in looked a definite penalty to me. In slowmo it could go either way. If that was an arsenal player getting a penalty like we would say "he was just too quick for the defender and if than was anywhere else on the pitch it would be a definite FK".

    This whinging about other things and not looking at ourselves I feel is also the way AW carries on. That's just how I feel from watching this team. Players come out saying with multiple apologies. 1 great after and then go back to type.

    The main issue was Iwobi not keeping the finish on the ground. Ozil and Bellerin not being clinical in front of goal. For me, I am harder on Ozil because he is supposed to be one of our best players. With is experience and what he is demanding those 1v1 should be a formality. Like I have said we need a dynamic #10. Ozil is too pure. I'm hoping jack can work on his shooting and finishing. Because outside Cazorla, he's the closest thing we have to that.
     
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  3. lazarus20000

    lazarus20000 Well-Known Member

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    I agree. You could see from AW that he was going to make it his main focus and use it to deflect attention from our team's poor finishing. If you don't make your chances count, the opposing team will punish you. This is the way of the PL nowadays, the overall quality is just better.
     
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  4. BobbyD

    BobbyD President

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    Lazarus and blukt are bang on. Soft penalty maybe but nothing absolutely scandalous. People are just going with the controversial pundits view. Whats more worrying other than the lack of finishing watford off was the meltdown of your team after conceding. No character shown at all
     
    #84
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  5. lazarus20000

    lazarus20000 Well-Known Member

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    I've noticed that when Kos goes off injured, the team tends to pack up. I agree, when we conceded, it knocked the stuffing out of us. Strange considering we were well in the game and had the best chances.
     
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  6. J T Bodbo

    J T Bodbo Well-Known Member

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    I agree about contact. It seems to me that the laws are hopeless for the game as it is played today.
    However , I would make 3 further comments.
    1) EVERY club thinks they are hard done by (except Manure)
    2) You have no idea how difficult it is for small/ unfashionable/ arriviste/ new entrants to the division to get fair treatment-well that's how it seems.!
    3) Most of the replays analyses the leg contact. But Bellerin did push Richarlison, however gently. He should have known better, and actually he shouldn't have let Richarlison get in front of him. That was the mistake, not the ref's judgment.
    Watford have beaten Arsenal 3 times in past 4 games-perhaps we should be regarded as the big club! Only joking
     
    #86
  7. ToledoTrumpton

    ToledoTrumpton Well-Known Member

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    JT I kind of agree with you, but

    1. I'm not sure many clubs have the same case Arsenal do. I watch a lot of football and it seems like Arsenal get stiffed at least once every game. I don't see that most games.

    2. I think we do have an idea, but whenever we play smaller teams, particularly if they beat us, the commentators always make a big deal about how we were intimidated by the aggressive tackling. Troy Deeney even intimated the same thing after the last defeat. Yet if we are aggressive back, red cards and penalties, every time.

    3. Incidental contact is defined as contact that does not affect the run of play. There is no way that the contact that occurred between the two players affected anything. The ball went out of touch seconds after. Incidental contact is allowed, if it does not involve a challenge for the ball, i.e. tackle.

    But Watford have Arsenal's number in the same way that Stoke used to. I think once teams get wise to the way referees seem to treat Arsenal, beating us is fairly straightforward. Despite what I said, I really don't think that there is a conspiracy against Arsenal, it is a cultural thing, and it does work against us. I just think that English referees don't like how Arsenal play, so that no matter how hard they try, they find objectivity impossible.

    There is no doubt that Giroud gets called for fouls Andy Carroll never gets called on for instance.
     
    #87
    Last edited: Oct 18, 2017
  8. lazarus20000

    lazarus20000 Well-Known Member

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    The main issue is our current team isn't savvy, they are just too nice. I am happy at the fair way we generally play but this does not reflect the realities of the PL. Even when we foul, we look awkward doing it. The thing is, players like Deeney are limited, he's even admitted to this fact, so he looks to get any advantage he can get. There is no mystery that current opposing players and in the past have sought to rough us up and intimidate us. We need to address these issues and learn to handle the not so nice sides of football, as these things happen from the bottom to the very top.

    Can you imagine the Invincibles ever being intimidated by the likes of Watford? They were damn fine players but also knew how to deal with unpleasantness when they arose. Take Vieira, he was fantastic to watch, graceful on the ball and commanded the center of the pitch like a general, but he wasn't scared of any rough stuff and did what he had to do to make sure Arsenal were on top. We have NO players close to that right now and it shows on the pitch when we meekly surrender games, even when we are the better team! The irony is, would Wenger buy Vieira if he was available right now? I don't think he would.
     
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  9. ToledoTrumpton

    ToledoTrumpton Well-Known Member

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    I understand what you are saying, but our total of red and yellow cards are no lower today than they were in Vieira's day. We match our play to what is an acceptable level of cards. If you think Vieira et al were more aggressive, and got away with it, then you are just proving my point.

    Check out this table and go to 2016/17:
    http://www.footstats.co.uk/index.cfm?task=leagues

    What this shows is that our fouls committed per game total is very low. Strangely though fouls committed by the opposition is also very low. We commit the 5th least fouls, but other teams when they play us, despite all their talk about being tough, really go easy on us, because we win the 3rd least number of fouls in the league.

    Now go back to Vieira's era. The difference is we were winning fouls. The last two years when refs stopped calling fouls for us, we haven't done so well.

    This year, we commit significantly more fouls than our opposition do, apparently. We are obviously to tough and aggressive.
     
    #89
    Last edited: Oct 19, 2017
  10. winifred122

    winifred122 Well-Known Member

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    Congratulations, Thomas. You've blinded me with science.
     
    #90

  11. TheBear

    TheBear Well-Known Member

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    No, You just have yo watch us play to understand this.

    With bigger more robust side we could match teams with physicality. We don't have that and often end up fouling opposition because our players get outmuscled and outworked.
     
    #91
  12. ToledoTrumpton

    ToledoTrumpton Well-Known Member

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    That just makes no sense. How do you reconcile that with Ozil being one of the most fouled players in the PL. Does that mean he is the most hard-working and physical players in the league?
     
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  13. gills4prem

    gills4prem Active Member

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    Most fouls = easy soft target???
     
    #93
  14. BobbyD

    BobbyD President

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    You got any official stats? Not in the top 20 for last year apparantly
     
    #94
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  15. TheBear

    TheBear Well-Known Member

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    Ozil probably gets fouled a lot because managers tell their player 'He doesn't like it if you turn it into a scrap'. They think thats his weakness. (which it probably is)
     
    #95
  16. winifred122

    winifred122 Well-Known Member

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    "Probably"?
     
    #96
  17. Diego

    Diego Lone Ranger

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    He doesn't appear on any most fouled list anywhere, even Wilshere appears on most lists and he hardly plays <laugh>
     
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