The Skipper

Hesitating? He was phenomenal with his command of his area. He caught every ball he attempted to go for. He didn't hesitate at all, he was very assured. In both games.

And no one disagrees with that. But it wasn't just him who was poor in the first - our other midfield generals in Matic and Fabregas lost numerous of balls themselves. It's like you're pinning the bad first half performance solely on Oscar which is completely untrue. There were others who were just as poor, if not even worse. It's just incredible how you're just focusing on the poor (and almost completely blaming Oscar for the first half) and not giving Oscar any credit for turning around his performance.

They have 4 finished WC players but their problem is the distribution of those players. How does one effectively fit in those four? They don't have the best squad in the PL at all, what are you smoking? They have no WC player deeper in midfield, no WC player in defence. I'm not too worried tbh. I was worried a few months ago when I thought they'd buy world class players all over the gaff to fill in those massive gaps in their XI but they haven't.

Last season the problem was that we didn't take our chances. With the likes of Fabregas and Costa in our squad now we'll 100% be more efficient. If it's a similar game to last season I think (hoping) we'll win comfortably.

I thought we were discussing today's game here, not the last 8 months? And why are you acting like he was the only poor player in the first half? Like he was the only player to lose the ball when plenty of others did the same?

That's true, but Samsung themselves are also pretty prominent. We're a prominent club.

I always say to my Arsenal mates that if CFC had Giroud last year we would've won the title.

Got 50 odd pts so far, still got Rooney and two spuds players to go (Eriksen and Kaboul). Hopefully they have huge games.

Yup, I agree, it's been overlooked because he's normally so good but Matic was a massive reason as to why we failed to control the game in the first half.

Interesting. Don't forget that they might bring in more players after this as well.

If they buy him will it mean that they've spent the most in a transfer window in the PL?

Out of curiosity... Who would you have taken out for him?

You obviously didn't watch the game, and if you did, you probably didn't watch the second half.

Why is his thread still missing a squad number?

Disagree. Ramires is rash but we need his legs in midfield to help stop Everton's game, and also his pace on the counter.

At least Torres won't be the most expensive player in the PL anymore.

Ramires has to start, maybe for Schurrle. Apart from that I'd keep the XI the same probably. Hopefully we can get a positive result this time around, Everton are a very good team.

Perhaps not, but IMO it'll just take a slight tweak and ensuring players perform their roles correctly, rather than bringing in another player completely.

Anyone got a gif of that pass he made to Ramires?

That has more to do with the fact that we didn't expect Leicester to be this 'brave' going forward and also Matic IMO, who had a quite poor game today by his own standards, he gave the ball away needlessly in our own half on numerous occasions. Small tweaks to fix that, we don't have to bring in Ramires to fix that. I'm sure you know that with more expansive football we'll generally be more exposed at the back also...

Fabregas was horrible? Wow, I don't know what people are watching sometimes. Sure, he wasn't amazing but he had a solid game, especially in the 2nd half. People are putting too much stock into that first half performance.

Nope, I think we'll continue to see the Matic - Fabregas pivot especially in games where we're expected to dominate, like this one. We had our best period in the game in the 2nd half without Ramires on the pitch. Today's first half performance wasn't solely due to Fabregas and Matic failing to fully control the midfield. The whole team was substandard. Also you need to stop looking at it as a Fabregas - Matic duo, and start looking at it as a Oscar - Fabregas - Matic trio. Sure, against better teams we'll put in Ramires, and Ramires will get plenty of game time but it won't be because of 'Matic - Fabregas' per se. I look at Ramires as Oscar's competition tbh, or as let's say the 4th midfielder that can come in and replace Fabregas, Oscar or even Matic.

We created enough chances today to win even more comfortably but we just weren't clinical enough and Kasper made some good saves as well. I don't know how anyone could be so dissatisfied with that 2nd half performance.

He was really good today, even in the first half he wasn't as bad as the rest of the team (even though he was very isolated). Another excellent performance IMO.