Saturday 11 February 2017

Smashed Title Dreams & Hull City Preview

Ok so here we go again, it’s been much difficult to bear  long long week for an Arsenal fan after the Chelsea game collapse, pretty much kissing our title hopes goodbye. It was an accomplished performance from the blues, professional as it was complete in the manner of delivery. Kudos to them on their title tilt. Not like it was much of a challenge from Arsenal anyway, the gunners have over the years failed to push for the title beyond February even when it seemed to be on offer like it last season and this season has been no different. It’s only normal to see a lot of extremely passionate reactions to after that loss at Stamford bridge, from the far right to the far left including everything in between, now the question isn’t about Wenger staying on or not. While I wouldn’t want to waddle into all the arguments between the two factions of Wenger-in or Wenger-out brigade, I believe it’s clear to even a blind man that something needs to change about the frail “mental strength” or ze mental strength as Arsene likes to call it and I mean from the boardroom to the pitch. Yes we may have shown fighting spirit more this season but, for stuff of real champions, we simply lack the bottle...…….look at Chelsea Period!!
On the match itself, I had said it was as accomplished as it was very professional from a well drilled Chelsea side. Conte efficiently stifled our front four while delivering swift but effective blows that killed us of. The gift from Cech was just a reflection of the mental psyche from the players. The Hazard goal, oh my that was just pure Genius from him. How we allowed him to waltz his way to scoring such a beauty….i leave you to “hazard” a guess. The only good thing from the game was Giroud’s goal, not much of a consolation for the fans as it was for him. He has finally scored against all the teams in the top 6. He is a much maligned striker, but this season he has shown he has the professionalism and mental strength to do the job of scoring when called upon. Kudos to the HFB, he will still have his critics but he keeps answering them.

Hull city come to town in what might turn out to be a continuation of our downward spiral in form or a snap out of it wake up call. While the league may be gone, its still imperative to keep pushing, second place is very much up for grabs and if Wenger doesn’t want to soil that sentimental record of never finishing below Tottenham, then he had better whip his boiz in line or else he may be going out on an all-time low. Spurs this season are looking the real deal though so it would be interesting to see how we can make them uncomfy till they capitulate but we need to catch Man City first so first lets do that by winning and keep on winning, I hope that’s not too much to ask of this Team? The form book shows Hull city to be feeling the effects of new coach Marco Silva with their two wins in the last four games, Arsenal have suddenly lost two games on the spin. I need not tell you what disaster it would be to drop any more home points. Do we have the players to win this game? Of course with a cast of Sanchez, Giroud, Walcott, Welbeck and Perez who must be asking his gods what else he needs to do to get a consistent run in this team, we have what it takes on paper to steam roll 90% of the EPL teams but we also know that this is the EPL and especially with Arsenal, one can’t be too sure these days. My predicted line up will be as shown below
Subs: Ospina, Giriud, Welbeck, Perez, Jeff, Gabriel, Holding,  Oxlade
Image Credit: The UK Guardian Online.
There you have it folks, a win will most definitely go some way in assuaging some valid concerns while the matter of Wenger in or out remains a debate for another day. thats it from us, do enjoy the game wherever you are........Ciaooo