MH14
3.9K posts


RANKING EVERY PREMIER LEAGUE CLUB’S STRIKER THIS SEASON! youtu.be/rclyUDlBGKM?si… via @YouTube

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@Cityzen_Queen Will your mum come and play the games against Bayern Munich?
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@patricktyrant Patrick this is very sad to see. You used to be debating with me just a few years ago
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Vacario should be saving that!!
What a rubbish keeper 😤😡🧤
2-0 down away from home, we’re in BIG trouble now 😵😩
#FULTOT
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@StanCollymore Nobody is gonna read the verbal diarrhoea. Keep your mouth shut
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I think it's great that Arteta recognised that basic British staples ( corners, free kicks, physicality, defending properly, shape etc etc) were needed ( alongside technique) to feel he had a chance of winning a 38 game marathon.
Graham's Arsenal, Wilkinson's Leeds spring to mind with title winning teams. In short, win however you can.
But....
Arteta and Arsenal ( documentary) has been shoved down people's throats as a purists "trust the process" narrative which is disingenuous. He basically shed every ounce of his Man City "this is how we play" under Pep to become a pragmatist. Again, nothing wrong with that but it will be criticised legitimately as an "easier" way of winning rather than sticking to a purist's principles.
Also there's the entertainment angle. Not of Arsenal season ticket holders who I'm sure couldn't give a fig about style, just "feel the heft" of that trophy. And that's fine, but ALL Premier League clubs rake in huge amounts because it delivers entertainment, that's literally what the League and broadcasters now sell as their main tagline , so rugby at corners again will come under the microscope.
Arsenal fans won't think I'm a natural ally, quite the opposite, I think on social media a lot of their discourse (for a club who've never made a dent in the European Cup, a club from the home of football, and its capital) is bizarre and has genuine delusions of grandeur that to me is funny, but I'd back them up 100% to support a team that wins however they can within the rules. Because we all want the same.
But here context and nuance isn't present, it's either shit or great so your point has a lot of merit.
But there's one final argument I'd propose for everyone who likes Premier League football, to answer. If you spend £1BN on a team and rake in money from a global audience wanting entertainment, is there a responsibility on that team to entertain or not? Me of 30 years ago would have said a firm no, Wimbledon or Liverpool of 1988 had polar opposite styles and that fit hand in glove and I loved it( "The crazy gang has beaten the culture club ")
Now? A billion on players and hugging at set pieces and over reliance on corners is a MAJOR part of the game plan ? I'm still 60% "play the fucking way that wins " but there's zero doubt that a paying audience globally ( who allow Arsenal or Liverpool or United to spend a billion) are entitled to say...
Entertain us.
Terry Flewers@terryflewers
Arsenal must be the only club in football that’s been criticised for 15 years for not being able to win ugly or deliver when it matters, and then when they actually do grind out results in a title race, they get attacked for that too. It’s a no-win narrative, and that kind of inconsistency is what’s killing the game.
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Arsenal fans sing 'North London Forever' even though they came from Woolwich.
Maybe it's your club and fans that forgot where they came from.
Dean James@DeanJamesAFC
Rory, you can’t be that out of touch, surely? This isn’t about ridiculing your club, it’s about ridiculing the fact that your club and fans have forgotten where they came from, and the fact that you were practically nothing before daddy Abramovich.
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‘By 9pm, the girls were falling over like Naomi Campbell in Vivienne Westwood platform heels’ - my diary of the horror of hosting a teenage birthday party. For @Telegraph telegraph.co.uk/family/parenti…
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