Michael Keshani

His hold up play has been atrocious apart from Newcastle, when it was very good, and the passes are the holdup play. It’s impossible to do good holdup work if you’re completing 5 passes

I’d be more in line with this if the time on the ball had much promise. Half his passes are over or under hit and slow attacks. I worry about how much we can adapt to him being a black hole in possession

An average of 6.2 passes per game from 10.3 attempted. There’s a certain leeway for going to Anfield and St James’ and playing City, but 5 passes completed in a game where we had 68% possession and completed 129 final third passes at home vs -this- West Ham is really quite concerning.

If you wanted to give me 180 minutes to make all those worries even more pronounced, these would be them.

Soon as I said this he was rubbish for the rest of the game but fair play to him, there’s no faulting the work rate.

Aside from absolutely everything else, if you wanted to give me 25 mins to calm my worries about Gyökeres down, these would be them. Done very well so far.

This is the point of hope, definitely, and for what we paid him getting good numbers vs the non-top 6 is absolutely fine. And if he’s gonna be a success we’ll prob need a bit of time to meet his skill set in the middle, but the limitations at this point are stark in the context of the side

Okay, no more questioning, criticising or concerns. Sorry about that.

Yeah I’m trying to be conscious of the confirmation bias angle hah, when writing about him/the forwards last week I do definitely see how it can be a deal that works out and how the early schedule has been far from ideal for him but I’m watching with worry

Mate says he plays like he's 5'8, and which sums it up well imo. The hope is there's that bit of adaptation that means in a lot of games we can bridge it, he can get better finding box space and our ball dominance means we can just turn that into him scoring being our focus. But it's a big change.

Yep, same across the board. And Arteta is clearly trying to plan around that - playing Trossard yday for more ball retention, playing Merino for pressing/physicality/outlet - and that's not making us any better.

It's the use of the frame that's the biggest issue here imo. Haaland's a giant and knows how to manoeuvre that, VG's a big fella but can't seem to just protect the ball. Gab Jesus is half a foot shorter and there's no comparison between what they can do back to goal

And Haaland's back to goal work isn't great but he can win aerials, protect the ball and play simple passes that are to a team mate and not a yard behind. Maybe it's adaptation but it's worrying that all these issues were things visible for SCP and picked up by every report I read about him.

I don't want to hear 'we're not creating enough for him' when he lost possession 13 times yesterday from 22 touches, and he's had 6 starts and still hasn't cracked 7 completed passes in a game.

If you're going to be as low-touch and low-pass as Erling Haaland for a proper team, you have to be Erling Haaland, and all the movement and strength that comes with that, before you even get to being of the level where 22 league goals is an off season.

God damn, where was this when I was firmly in the game

I wasn't subtle, admittedly 😂

Thank you!

Morning everyone!

I wrote about the changes to Arsenal's forward line, the new boys, the new configurations, where everyone fits, the hopes, dreams, expectations and worries.

I was as diplomatic and even-handed as I could be - can YOU tell where my scepticisms lie?

Look at the new signings in the forward line, how everyone fits, expectations and hopes and, for one and a half, let’s say, a few worries.

There’s going to be a lot of mutual adjusting needed, but the plus side is undoubtedly how varied the threat is now.

This Summer I Went Signing: Part II In a sea of new additions, Arsenal's forward line has seen more change than any other part of the team. A look at how it could all fit together and the variations within.

NEW:

This Summer I Went Signing, Part II

#arsenal #afc

Cheers! Tried to be very even handed against scepticism but did mean it ended up very long haha

Look at the new signings in the forward line, how everyone fits, expectations and hopes and, for one and a half, let’s say, a few worries.

There’s going to be a lot of mutual adjusting needed, but the plus side is undoubtedly how varied the threat is now.

This Summer I Went Signing: Part II In a sea of new additions, Arsenal's forward line has seen more change than any other part of the team. A look at how it could all fit together and the variations within.

NEW:

This Summer I Went Signing, Part II

#arsenal #afc

I see it, I think he's caught between roles atm. He's a very Mr. Wenger LW but not an Arteta one, I always loved those wide containers (though never liked Ramsey as one cos I always wanted him CM hah). Said to mates at HT we may have to Grealish him, but hope we can find a nicer balance than that

Tbf I agree with that fully. Think if I didn't have the worry about signing him for LW in July I'd not feel the worry now, as it were, but it's not the easiest situation to come into with the team chopping and changing constantly and as you say, integrating other new players in the same areas

I hope so, Hincapie is interesting there cos he's much more of a strict overlapper than Calafiori. Eze also coming in to a very fluxed team with all the injuries, and these CL games are a new one for him, so lots of grace, but it was my concern in July and I still have it

Thought he was fine vs Forest, but it's much more just a point of concern than writing him off by any means. As I said, great player, but fit is difficult and we've played with very different kinds of LWs in Arteta setups, so either we adapt or he does

This game is doing absolutely nothing to allay my worries that despite Eze being a lovely player, he's perhaps not the ideal fit for where we are and what we need. But he is at least definitely a very good player, which can't be said for all. V happy for Martinelli, he really needed that.

Feel like whenever this comes up we're just agreeing with each other, but it's true! Plus when you talk to STs they have no idea how we live, every single one is amazed at the detail that silvers have no ticket transfer facility ffs