Unai Emery

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Is Unai Emery the right man to take Arsenal forward?

Poll ended at Tue Aug 27, 2019 9:36 pm

Yes
18
27%
No
22
33%
Unsure
16
24%
Doesn't matter as long as Kroenke is in charge
10
15%
 
Total votes : 66

Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby theHotHead » Wed Feb 13, 2019 6:42 pm

Power n Glory wrote:
Read this on Le Grove yesterday evening.

The manager will be here this summer, of that there is no doubt. My view is things should be improving more rapidly than they are. That view is shared by people who work in and around the club, and those who are paid to write about it on the regular. There is a counter to my view that also makes sense, that is that Emery is grinding out ugly results and we’re in the mixer, which is all anyone ever wanted. His view on taking top 4 is to scrap like a prizefighter and worry about how that looks in the summer.

I just wanted to touch of a few of the arguments. One consistent theme I keep hearing is that the manager doesn’t have the players to affect the performance. I find this view maddening.

Benrd Leno – Internationally capped keeper and a huge upgrade on a declining Cech. The best keeper we’ve had since Lehmann.

Sokratis – Has won titles in Germany, is a natural leader, we all love him because he is mean to other players.

Kola – Bundesliga team of the season. Has 5 assists to his name this year.

Bellerin – Was having a great season. Was tracked by Barca in the summer. One of the best young right backs in the world. Injured, sure, but our defence has been shite all season and he was here for 19 games. Also landed 5 assists.

Koscielny – Would have captained France had he not been injured. Has come back and settled pretty well.

Monreal – Capped for Spain, has been a high performer over the years, even if his pace is in decline.

Torreira – The first proper DM we’ve had since Patrick Vieira, a superb player. Looked off form of late, but that seems more due to fatigue and the box to box rampage he’s on of late.

Matteo G – 19, but one of our best performers this season.

Xhaka – Captain of Switzerland, master of stats, a player the savants adore.

Mikhi – Title winner at Dortmund. Hasn’t been great, but he’s capable and he assisted the assister. I think we missed him.

Auba – The most clinical striker we’ve had since Thierry. 3rd in EPL top scorers

Lacazette – We all love him. What a striker, probably our most valuable player. Hugely effective. Top 10 EPL scorers. Maybe as cool as Bowie himself. Incredible finisher.

Ramsey – So good, Allegri signed him at Juve. Has played 921 EPL minutes this year.

Mesut – Broken for sure, but the closest thing to world class we have.

Please, spare me the ‘ this squad is so shite’ nonsense. It simply doesn’t correlate with reality or our current league position. It’s so subjective and the margins are paper thin. Chelsea finished 5th last year and are 6th this year under a new manager. They’ve not had a striker all year, given the context of what they are trying to do, is their squad so much better than ours? They’re playing Kante in an advanced position, Jorginho is shite, DL has been targeted, Barkley is awful, their defence shipped 6 vs City and 4 vs Bournemouth, their hail mary was signing Higuain who looks more out of shape than the Tango man. That squad didn’t deliver under Conte in season 2 and it’s failing miserably under a manager who can’t convince the players fancy football is the future. Chelsea didn’t invest in Sarri in the same way many think Arsenal didn’t invest in Emery. They swapped like for like with keepers and added Kovacic on loan and Jorginho was their big signing (and he’s tanked). Will he land a season 2? Doubtful if the players go any harder at ending him.

We should be doing better on the pitch. Our lack of pressing is a focus and discipline issue. You can teach it. There’s no magic approach, you just need to enforce it. Mesut Ozil was dropped because he wouldn’t do it, yet here we are, Mesutless and still not doing it? Spurs press. Leipzig press. Dortmund press. Liverpool press. Why do we not press effectively?

Style should be fairly straight-forward to impose. Emery isn’t teaching Stoke players to express themselves without violence. He’s trying to get players who have literally only artistically expressed themselves for ten years to channel the fancy into something more practical. What I don’t expect is the style to work immediately, however, we’re not even seeing a bad version of the vision, unless I’m missing something?

Klopp went into Liverpool with a shite squad, he had his team playing heavy metal football with average bodies and the big thing was: ‘He just needs a good center back’

Pep implemented his expressive brand of football and he hobbled to 4th in the first season. It was clear what the plan was. They were the best team in the league transitioning from midfield to attack, but they couldn’t play out of the back. So he went out and upgraded on Bacary Sagna at center back and invested in fullbacks better than Zabaleta and Clichy.

Wenger came to Arsenal in October from Japan (no pre-season), added Anelka, Paddy, Garde (relative nobodies) and transformed a group of alcoholics (late in their careers) known for shit football into a team that finished 3rd (joint with 2nd/4th on points) in year one. Anyone doubt where the club was heading? Think about what he did for a second, it was unbelievable, and you think Emery has it bad?

Bielsa taught Championship players his ways, they play explosive attacking football with an outrageously aggressive press. Favre has Dortmund back to their best. Even Stevie G has brought some vision to Rangers in Scotland. My point here is these teams all have worse players, but that hasn’t stopped a vision emerging on the pitch. Even Paddy has Nice conceding under a goal game @ 0.96 down from 1.36.

Arsenal don’t have an ‘if you just did this’ list of players. Why? Because no one knows what we’re shooting for. What was the point of Suarez as far as you can tell? Arsenal don’t have a settled formation. Does anyone think a couple of wide players blows this team up next season? Would that solve for the lack of pressing and the porous defence? I’m not so sure.

Signing a keeper good with his feet hasn’t led to us playing out the back more, against Huddersfield Leno went short 7 times (12% of his total passes). We have defenders who can pass, so what’s the excuse for the hoof? Nacho dropped 85% pass completion, Kos was 90%, Mustafi 74% (iffy, but not awful considering how poor he’s been).

The only plan Emery does rigidly stick to is using his fullbacks to transition the ball forward, which was strugglebus.com against Huddersfield. Kola had particularly bad numbers, but nowhere near the as poor as AMN. You’d take him over Lichtsteiner or Jenko, so obviously I can feel for Emery there. The club is going to need to upgrade there this summer for sure.

It’s crazy to think the club saw a presentation last May that basically said it’s all shit and I have nothing to work, but that’s the narrative now.

My worry here is when I think about the type of players Emery REALLY wanted to solve our issues. Banega, Carrasco, Perisic, Nzonzi and Suarez. Are we moving forward with names like this?

A comment from Valentin in the comments:

At PSG Emery got his own players. All of them flopped and failed to adapt for the more aggressive Ligue 1. He got Krychowiak a year later he was on loan at WestmBrom where he helped to get them relegated. He got Jese, six months later he is on loan at Stoke that he helped get relegated.

Emery tends to favour players he is familiar with. Players who will be grateful for the opportunity and will obey diligently his instructions. The problem is that now he is at a higher level of club, being a diligent tidy players is not enough. You need special talent and none of them ever had that.

Ever Banega, Suarez are good decent players but for the sort of money/salary you expect more. None of them look like the kind of talent that will propel Arsenal forward and catch Liverpool or ManCity.

Broader point: The football is subpar and the fans who go to games are not showing up. The atmosphere is totally sterile. There is no excitement around the club.

However, let’s talk about what is incredible, amazing, and positively life-affirming. For all the cries of ‘we are shit’ from the Emery flag wavers, we are actually sitting in 5th, 1 point behind a resurgent United. We have been dire to watch all season, but we are closer than spitting distance to top four, we’re so tight in on them you can smell the Lynx Africa emanating from the sweaty jowels of Phil Jones. United’s next three games are PSG, Chelsea (FA Cup) then Liverpool, then Palace away. All potential bread mops ready to wipe out the OGS gravy train.

Our next two games are against Bate, who have finished their season. We can rest our players weary legs, then go HARD at Southampton and Bournemouth who we welcome at home. Confidence could be SOARING HIGH before we go to Wembley to topple Spurs annoyingly positive season, followed by United (H), and Wolves (A).

The absolute magic of Emery is that we have been dreadful, but we are still more than in it… he has made winning ugly an art form and it’s working… and really, in the Europa League, we only have to worry about Chelsea (who look finished) and Napoli.

Additionally, the summer is all for Emery. He will have a full preseason. He’ll get to spend £40-100m. I don’t think we’re playing in a tournament. He’ll have all his ducks in order to go hard at next season. Then we’ll see where the football is… then we shall see if patience was indeed a virtue.

Ok, that’s me done. See you in the comments. x


A lot of good points made.

:clap: :clap:
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby theHotHead » Wed Feb 13, 2019 6:46 pm

weaponx57 wrote:Well with Sven gone I seriously doubt we will unearth any gems. Raul is not good at that only knows how to bring in expensive players like Neymar and now that Stan owns 100% both Stan and their board are unanswerable to everyone.

Huh ??? so how on earth did we manage to uncover any gems before Sven came to Arsenal?

the crap some of you write is unreal.
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby StLGooner » Wed Feb 13, 2019 6:49 pm

theHotHead wrote:
weaponx57 wrote:Well with Sven gone I seriously doubt we will unearth any gems. Raul is not good at that only knows how to bring in expensive players like Neymar and now that Stan owns 100% both Stan and their board are unanswerable to everyone.

Huh ??? so how on earth did we manage to uncover any gems before Sven came to Arsenal?

the crap some of you write is unreal.



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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby Goonerz » Wed Feb 13, 2019 6:52 pm

Angelito wrote:^ Exactly.

If this side is shit, like some are insinuating or claiming, then last year's side was even shittier. So, then why did Wenger have to go if it's the squad's fault and not the manager's?

That's now how it works. We had a good, albeit uneven, squad and we've added some good/great players in the summer to have a better squad than last season. It's the manager's job to get this side performing to a certain level.

Unai has been unlucky with injuries. That's for sure. What's also for sure is that the injury crisis at Arsenal isn't anything new. I feel we have the owners to blame for not having a top-class winger in the side. We also have Unai to blame for not playing our best players in a free-flowing attacking style.

As mentioned in the above post, Arsenal players have always played free-flowing football. So, I'm not sure why we're acting like a team that used to park the bus is made to attack all of a sudden. It's the reverse actually. Emery doesn't need 5 years to turn around the "mess at Arsenal" (Luzh). It's not like Unai took over at Southampton or something. You can't give 5 years to a manager in today's setting unless he's fulfilling the objectives set by the club.

Because he is the one that bought all of them. Whose fault was it that wenger had more than 10 years to rebuild and all he did was waste money given to him on average or overrated players.

An Engineer that is given the task of designing a new model BMW has not excuse if his invention fails. You don’t then blame the next design engineer for trying and failing to make the car function.

Wenger bought a lot of gabbage. The side he left us was so Unbalanced, weak, fragile and a joke.
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby BS221B » Wed Feb 13, 2019 7:03 pm

Angelito wrote:^ Exactly.

If this side is shit, like some are insinuating or claiming, then last year's side was even shittier. So, then why did Wenger have to go if it's the squad's fault and not the manager's?

That's now how it works. We had a good, albeit uneven, squad and we've added some good/great players in the summer to have a better squad than last season. It's the manager's job to get this side performing to a certain level.

Unai has been unlucky with injuries. That's for sure. What's also for sure is that the injury crisis at Arsenal isn't anything new. I feel we have the owners to blame for not having a top-class winger in the side. We also have Unai to blame for not playing our best players in a free-flowing attacking style.

As mentioned in the above post, Arsenal players have always played free-flowing football. So, I'm not sure why we're acting like a team that used to park the bus is made to attack all of a sudden. It's the reverse actually. Emery doesn't need 5 years to turn around the "mess at Arsenal" (Luzh). It's not like Unai took over at Southampton or something. You can't give 5 years to a manager in today's setting unless he's fulfilling the objectives set by the club.

Imagine if Wenger left behind a squad like SAF's Manchester United. Wele, Cleverley, Fletcher, Jones, Smalling, declining Rooney and RVP, old man Carrick ,Ferdinand and Evra :rofll:

SAF got best of these players for the last time ever in his final season, and dropped the bomb to the next manager. Its been six years and they still not able to rebuild despite spending over £800m.
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby ag6789 » Wed Feb 13, 2019 7:48 pm

I see the Arsenal squad full of reputed internationals, with proven abilities. Yes, Wenger, in his last year's didn't effectively manage then, though found a way to win 3 FA cups, get to Caribou cup final and EL semi-finals, which, many clubs like Spurs , Liv'pool, will grab w/both hands any day.
Most of the current squad achieved those.
If they were that bad, we would be mid-table or 7th-8th like Liv'pool few yrs back.
As, the earlier posts noted, position by position, we have a competent bunch, not being utilised effectively.
Anyway, next month and half will tell us a lot about where we are heading, but ending 5th-6th w/no trophy challenge is unacceptable by any standards, and will be considered regression. We cannot spend 400 billion and wait for another 5yrs to see any progress. A good manager utilises properly, what he has and make improvements on the way. If Unai, is unable to do it by early next season, he has to go. He's not the man to lead us forward.
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby theHotHead » Thu Feb 14, 2019 8:40 am

There is another way of looking at this. Expectation. Any sane person would say that Arsenal would be expected to beat Wolves, Newcastle, Crystal Palace, etc, with the value of our squad and the money we have available to us, I am sure we can all agree. Football is not won on paper but there is a reason why bookies have "favourites" to win. Expectation.

So given this expectation its also fair to say that, if we have better players than those teams why do they defend better than us? All of the arguments stating our players need to be better to perform better is therefore absolute nonsense. Simply put, if worse players can defend better than us it is clear and obvious that our current players CAN DO BETTER!
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby Ach » Thu Feb 14, 2019 10:39 am

Probably cos they don't attack as good as us and we haven't yet found the balance whilst these clubs don't give a shit about attacking.
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby Losmeister » Thu Feb 14, 2019 11:56 am

people who use the word utilize instead of use are not to be taken seriously... ever
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby UFGN » Thu Feb 14, 2019 12:31 pm

theHotHead wrote:There is another way of looking at this. Expectation. Any sane person would say that Arsenal would be expected to beat Wolves, Newcastle, Crystal Palace, etc, with the value of our squad and the money we have available to us, I am sure we can all agree. Football is not won on paper but there is a reason why bookies have "favourites" to win. Expectation.

So given this expectation its also fair to say that, if we have better players than those teams why do they defend better than us? All of the arguments stating our players need to be better to perform better is therefore absolute nonsense. Simply put, if worse players can defend better than us it is clear and obvious that our current players CAN DO BETTER!


Or...... some of those teams do actually have better defenders than us. I've said this before but no-one wants to think about it. We don't need to buy Horray Fanceybollocks from Timbuctoo, we need to buy Shane Duffy or Ben Mee
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby Power n Glory » Thu Feb 14, 2019 12:58 pm

UFGN wrote:
theHotHead wrote:There is another way of looking at this. Expectation. Any sane person would say that Arsenal would be expected to beat Wolves, Newcastle, Crystal Palace, etc, with the value of our squad and the money we have available to us, I am sure we can all agree. Football is not won on paper but there is a reason why bookies have "favourites" to win. Expectation.

So given this expectation its also fair to say that, if we have better players than those teams why do they defend better than us? All of the arguments stating our players need to be better to perform better is therefore absolute nonsense. Simply put, if worse players can defend better than us it is clear and obvious that our current players CAN DO BETTER!


Or...... some of those teams do actually have better defenders than us. I've said this before but no-one wants to think about it. We don't need to buy Horray Fanceybollocks from Timbuctoo, we need to buy Shane Duffy or Ben Mee


It’s the system. We play a highline, both fullbacks push up and can’t defend, both CM’s that are supposed to protect the back four either push too high up the pitch or fail to mark the danger areas when on the back foot….headless chickens and it shouldn’t take much for the manger to tell them to not get drawn out to wide areas and leaving massive gaps.

We hardly concede goals on set pieces and look a lot more organised in that area so it’s not just a case of having terrible defenders. You can’t keep looking at individual players whilst ignoring the system. Our defenders are also expected to push forward and play the ball out from the back. The players you’ve mentioned don’t have that sort of responsibility.

Finding defenders that are comfortable playing the ball out from the back, have the pace to play a highline and physically strong enough to cope with the Premier League is not an easy task. The teams that can’t afford defenders that can do all that I’ve mentioned won’t play the way we play. Even the teams that can afford them won’t allow the sort of undisciplined, piss poor defensive behaviour each week form the players that should be helping to protect the defenders.
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby Losmeister » Thu Feb 14, 2019 2:22 pm

UFGN wrote:
theHotHead wrote:There is another way of looking at this. Expectation. Any sane person would say that Arsenal would be expected to beat Wolves, Newcastle, Crystal Palace, etc, with the value of our squad and the money we have available to us, I am sure we can all agree. Football is not won on paper but there is a reason why bookies have "favourites" to win. Expectation.

So given this expectation its also fair to say that, if we have better players than those teams why do they defend better than us? All of the arguments stating our players need to be better to perform better is therefore absolute nonsense. Simply put, if worse players can defend better than us it is clear and obvious that our current players CAN DO BETTER!


Or...... some of those teams do actually have better defenders than us. I've said this before but no-one wants to think about it. We don't need to buy Horray Fanceybollocks from Timbuctoo, we need to buy Shane Duffy or Ben Mee


There are so many defenders in the permier league that are better than what AFC trots out there...

we also have a rather ordinary GK, after years of below avg Cech.
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby gamechannel » Thu Feb 14, 2019 7:49 pm

This coach is a f***ing pussy... Defensive tactics against BATE! Let that sink in..
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby rewb1 » Thu Feb 14, 2019 7:53 pm

so everytime we dont score, we are playing defensive tactics?
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Re: Unai Emery, Arsenal Head Coach

Postby CynicalGooner » Thu Feb 14, 2019 7:53 pm

We had twice as much possession as they did, that's not defensive tactics that's being absolutely shit with the ball
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