(The not-so-temporary quite-official) Gooner Thread

A very good post-Arsenal interview with Wenger. 

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2018/may/17/arsene-wenger-interview-emptied-desk-arsenal-mikel-arteta

Looks like its arteta... rumours about his coaching team now... main names mentioned are cazorla as player/coach, xabi alonso and thierry henry

currently experiencing the weirdest feeling...I'm cheering on Chelsea... 

Well Cazorla won't be involved. He's signing for Villarreal according to reports.

Sad to see him go, I really hope he gets on the pitch regularly again. 

Yeah. One of those unfortunate situations where it's difficult to decide who you want to lose more, but in the end one side was Mourinho and Sanchez. Happy for Giroud at least who has now won 4 FA Cups in the last 5 years, more than Spurs have won in the last 50. We keep the most FA Cups record for another season too.

Latest rumours... John Cross getting involved this morn...

Arteta to sign this week, will bring 3 backroom staff. No idea who they are to be yet. Cazorla now ruled out as he wants to go back to play at Villarreal. Talk that Henry isn't keen to take an assistant role either. Rumours persist around Xabi Alonso. 

Wilshere to sign new contract, Arteta is a fan. 

Ramsey in a bit of limbo it seems, I think he might be sold, but just weak speculation on that so far.

Talk that Bellerin and Monreal have both Spain's world cup squad. 

2 CBs are rumoured to be close to signing. The Dortmund fella and the young one from SC Freiburg. Apparently the buzz is about because Xhaka liked a post about both of them signing for us. So very long bow drawn there. 

Arteta and Alonso - can't we just put them in midfield as well as have them coach? Lehmann and Ljungberg already there and it's getting to the point where you'd rather have the coaching staff in the team than the players.

Arteta and Alonso were childhood friends in San Sebastian. They played for the same club as children and dreamed of playing for their favourite team together, Real Sociedad, as professionals. 

They eventually went very close to achieving that actually. Arteta left their childhood club for Barca and his career stalled when he couldn't get into Barca's first team, having come through the C and B team ranks. He went to PSG on loan, and then Rangers permanently, and was successful. He then left for Real Sociedad to fulfil that dream. Alonso had been playing there since his youth, but Liverpool came in for him as soon as Arteta arrived, and they sadly never got on the pitch together. Arteta then left Sociedad for Everton a year later, I imagine they must've hung out together a lot in Liverpool as friends. 

Sanchez, what a year for him. Goes from the high of winning another FA cup with us to battling for form, losing the Arsenal fans, his beloved Chile not qualifying for the world cup, then get's his big money move to re-boot things only to battle to contribute and miss out to Giroud in the FA Cup final. 

Perhaps, but he has got CL.

Don't forget he also came 2nd to the team he wanted to join :)

However he gets his first summer off in years which he never got with us so would expect him to be fitting again next season.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/how-a...

So I read this to see what its about. What I found was that the Mirror, quality newspaper.... quoted the Manchester Evening News, another stellar publication, about Sanchez's rise to stardom. Which actually is a good story. And then they make it relevant to Manu by tagging a line from a childhood friend in on the end, saying that they used to dream of playing professional and Manu was one of the teams they dreamed about... Surely you can see that that is spin right? I remember reading a very similar story, but with more focus on barca and pep when the move to city was on. There is very little information in here that confirms that he has been gunning for a manu move ever since he was cleaning cars. 
 

Maybe, but at least he is at a big club. 

Apparently unai emery has entered the frame, in london for talks today, surprising development

yea I just read that. Not someone I'm that keen on. 

Interesting developments, Unai Emery now the front-runner according to latest reporting. Arteta negotiations supposedly hit snags over backroom appointments he wanted, and Gazidis has been persueded by Emery's experience.

Cazorla has left the building. I’ll miss that diminutive, joyful little bastard.

Updated after Spain & Germany announcements...

World cup bound:

Welbeck

Elneny

Monreal

Ozil* (made 27 man squad, 4 to be cut)

In the mix but squad not announced:

Ospina

Iwobi

Xhaka

Staying home:

JW10 (missed out)

Bellerin (missed out)

Lacazette (missed out)

Koscielny (injured)

Cech (didn't qualify)

Ramsey (didn't qualify)

Holding (missed out)

Chambers (missed out)

Mavropanos (didn't qualify)

Kolasinac (didn't qualify)

Mkhitaryan (didn't qualify)

Cazorla (injured)

Maitland-Niles (missed out)

Aubamayang (didn't qualify)

Mustafi (missed out)

Even as a neutral, watching his career break down so much due to injuries was very sad to see. Loved that peak Malaga side he was briefly a part of.

Sounds like Emery is happening, the famed David Ornstein tweeted as much approx 1 hour ago. 

Seems we went cold on Arteta at the last minute, suggestions it was either his backroom staff requests, or he wanted more say on transfers, both just speculative rumours though. 

Emery sounds like the one.

His history and style of football fits the bill. 

Did very well at Valencia, and then Sevilla, with limited resources at both clubs. Did ok at PSG but they have very high expectations with the strength of the league, and the money spent on players. Despite being seen as a failure there he did win the French League Cup and FA Cup equivalents in both his seasons, won the league this year, and was runner-up to Monaco last year. Famously lost to Barca 6-1 to throw away the 4-0 first leg lead in the Champs League last season, and lost both legs to Real Madrid in the knockouts this season. 

Some concern over his mastery of English, he best get on some lessons!

Don't really know anything about him as I follow very little football outside of Arsenal games, but appears to be an experienced manager who has had some success and won silverware so probably the best option we could attract given the wages and transfer budget and not being in the CL. 

Sad to see Santi leave. One of my all time favourite Arsenal players and hope he gets back on the pitch. The free kick in the FA Cup Final and going berserk at the Backbencher while getting hugged by strangers and ending up in a sort of celebratory headlock stands out as a favourite Arsenal memory.

Happy for Monreal making the squad which is a surprise. 

Monreals versatility at CB and LB must have helped, especially if Spain opt to experiment with a back 3. I have to say if it is Emery I'm more excited than Arteta. Has far more experience but still in his mid 40's so not over the hill by any stretch.

Yeah he's better than Arteta, but still unconvincing.

Initially I felt sad that Arteta was out, I had gotten used to the idea and was quite excited.

But now having gone through Emery's career, and read a few tidbits about him, I'm super excited all over again.

He did extremely well at Valencia and Sevilla. He didn't get what PSG wanted but still, winning a domestic treble, and 5 trophies overall in 2 seasons, shouldn't be sniffed at. Had a lot of egos to deal with too. 

I really hope Henry becomes his assistant as has been rumoured, but at the same time I would be surprised - surely Henry would want to go to the World Cup? Could he do that and then come here or would that be a mess?

Absolutely love that Monreal is going over 4 Chelsea players including Fabregas. Deserves the callup after the last 2 seasons and can play across the defence so very useful squad option.

6th in the EPL, 12 points from the champs league spots, and no oil/oligarch cash - how convinced do you expect to be Buff?

As I've said earlier, I'd have loved to see Nagelsmann - but whoever comes in has a mess to sort out, and they'll probably fail in the short term. I see Emery deleting his Twitter account and looking for another job within two years. Then we'll bring in an "Arsenal" man (Arteta, Viera, Henry) to right the ship again.

I hope I'm wrong. Or do I?

If you don't hope you're wrong then you wouldn't be an actual arsenal fan. 

I don't really think Monreal was directly competing for a spot with Pedro, Fabregas and Morata. The only one you could argue hes going over is Alonso. And i reckon Alonso can count himself pretty unliucky not to make the team based on his consistant formt he last 2 years.

Being picked over Alonso is probably down to that versatility, being able to play CB. However if Spain do go 3 at the back then it would seem a bit silly. Alonso makes for an amazing wingback in that formation in particular. 

Wenger and Emery careers when joining Arsenal:

Wenger

Age: 46

Years as coach: 12

Clubs managed: 3

Domestic Trophies: 4

European Trophies: 0

Emery

Age: 46

Years as coach: 13

Clubs managed: 6

Domestic Trophies: 5

European Trophies: 3

Fabregas hasn't played for Spain since the Euros, he wasn't exactly in contention. He hasn't been picked for a single squad during Lopetegui's tenure. 

https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/cesc-fabregas/nati...

He really ought to get the message and retire from internationals, barring disaster Lopetegui looks set to be in charge for the forseeable future.

I can understand the reasoning – but for me, if we were to pick a manager from Ligue 1 I would've rather we went with Jardim.

Unai Emery lost to Jardim despite having billions of dollars of oil money. Jardim did it with a young, exciting team.

I would've been excited about someone like Nagelsmann too; though I don't believe he was available. Would've also been excited for Arteta; but purely because of the chance he could become Pep-esque and because I love the guy. It would've been a huge risk.

I've watched a bit of Unai Emery football and it seems to come down to this;

- High pressing
- Counter attacking
- Very,very conservative against big teams
- Often lose from a seemingly unloseable position
- Not great away from home

So, quite similar to Arsene, really (except for the high pressing, counter attacking stuff). I just wanted something different. It's a bit of a safe, boring appointment when we are in a position to swing for the fences.

It's interesting to note that we topped the CL group for the first time in however many years when we had Emery's PSG to face. I still remember how they lined up – 3 DM's at home. Not exactly inspiring.

Emery is at least a rung below Klopp,  Pep, Poch, and even Mourinho.

Can we just make Santi the manager? At least everyone would be happy. :)  Going to miss the little two footed magician.

I think your assessment has a negative veneer applied... but I don't disagree for the most part.

However you can just as easily apply a positive outlook, if you're that way inclined, which I am ;)

He's won more trophies than Klopp and Poch combined for starters. 

The achievements with Valencia and Sevilla are pretty noteworthy, particularly with the volatile environments, and high squad turnover year upon year. 3 consecutive 3rd place finishes with Valencia is impressive, particularly when he lost David Silva and David Villa along the way, among others. 

He might see this as a similar job, but with a better chance of retaining those sorts of players, and a higher chance of attracting them in the first place. 

I also think his efforts at PSG were fairly commendable given the environment. There were a lot of egos there. Still, he won 5 out of 6 possible domestic trophies, only losing to an impressive Monaco last season in the league. And the CL knockouts were to Barca and Real Madrid. 

I don't know about all these losses from winnable positions but we obviously saw the Barca one. Having said that, the comeback against Liverpool in the Europa League final was the exact opposite. They were overrun, he changed it up at HT, and turned the tables entirely, storming home to win. He has an amazing record in Cup Finals actually. 

The major difference is that the EPL is nothing like any of the European leagues.

"Nothing" like them? Okay then. They all have their differences; the biggest difference being that the EPL has several clubs than can spend silly money, rather than just one or two.

Anyway, I certainly am coming from a more negative perspective - it's all speculation, and it is easy to focus on his failures rather than his successes. Being measured, Sevilla - he did well in Europe, faltered in the league (5th, 5th, 7th I believe). Didn't win an away game in his last season, so will fit in well here. Did a good job at Valencia under huge financial turmoil (always finished 3rd). Won the treble with PSG; also got surprised by a pretty amazing young Monaco side. Big profile failures in the Champions League; but that could happen to anyone against Barca. So, positives and negatives everywhere he has been; but not many managers have never failed at some point.

I guess I was just hoping for a revolution, rather than a tepid evolution of what Wenger brought to the club. I think that if we want to compete with the big spending Manchester clubs in the EPL, then we need to be bold - we can't compete financially .

Emery's stock before his two years at PSG almost seems higher in retrospect than what it is now, can't read much into his league title this year given that his domestic rival lost most of their best players and replaced them with a crop of youngsters (Pellegri, Tielemens, etc) more suited to challenging PSG in the long-term after bedding in rather than the short-term. But equally, Monaco winning it (first club other than PSG since Montpellier in 2011/12) does a bit to dispel the notion that the Ligue 1 title is automatic for PSG. 

Ultimately the CL seems to be the sole barometer of success at that club (otherwise he'd have been binned for failing to win the league in his first season, which he wasn't), I think going out to serial CL winners Real this year is more defensible than last season's Barca 'remontada,' but neither are really black marks against him. 

With all of that said, it's hard to argue that he's not the best candidate on the market currently, if we exclude the managers already employed elsewhere (Allegri) and exclude Ancelotti on the basis of age (as the media always seem to, though he's only 58) and reputational damage from the end of his time at Bayern. Compared to Luis Enrique, for example, Emery's success at different clubs and in different contexts surely puts him ahead, as Enrique didn't do particularly well at Celta or Roma.

I think that's one of the main attractions of this guy, in Spain his teams punched well above their financial weight. 

This point is fair; though Ralph Hassenhuttl would've been an interesting choice.