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Ed if you think players with no experience of these run ins are going to cope mentally as well as players who won 4 of last 5 seasons, have much better players and a generational manager at peak of his powers, then fair enough.
Call it bottling by all means and we can agree to disagree.
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I wouldn’t so much say Arteta is a bottler, but he is now in his 4th season at a big club, has had a very healthy budget for the last few years and is still some way off the title. Whilst it will always be hard vs a great team in City, should they still be conceding the amount of goals they are with the money they’ve spent? Should they not have developed a stronger mentality by now? Arsenal currently have 81 points with 2 to go. Liverpool finished with 82 points in 2013/14. So they’re still similar seasons for me. Rodgers took 2 seasons to get there. Arteta has taken nearly 4 seasons to get there.
Also Eddie Howe may well get Newcastle to top 4 in just over one season, something Arteta has taken a lot longer to do at Arsenal.
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*Correction, Liverpool finished with 84 pts in 13/14.
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Arsenal all but confirming the destination of the league title and in the process allowing a rampant Manchester City to either confirm it or even celebrate it against Chelsea next Sunday. What is more they are within 8 goals of the magic 100 total and may even give that a nudge in the process. I don’t think I’ll tune in for that one 🙂
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Right you toss pots! Other than napoleon this time 😉
It’s a bit of both in reality but let’s be clear, at the start of the season we were hoping.. to get top 4 not expected but to challenge for top 4
Yes many other teams imploded all season but the points we have and the place we are is deserving regardless
We have massively over achieved but we have also shown the inevitable collapse that the world and his wife has expected and waited for all season!!
You can’t compete against this city team and now they have the record breaking striker and always capable of 15-20 match unbeaten run
We fell short and gained some great experience snd fan hopefully build on this tho again against city it’s almost like what’s the point 🤣
Proud of the boys yes disappointed as they put themselves in such a great position but that’s life
Could be worse like the perennial chokers spuds
I notice Nancy disappeared after the Newcastle result 😃
Next year is going to be mighty interesting and especially the summer window!_____________________________
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Spot on Steve. It’s entirely possible for both to be true. You did overachieve and you did choke when it really mattered at a time when you dropped points you shouldn’t be doing. That you had that run in recent weeks dropping all those silly points is nothing to do with City being better. You didn’t lose 0-3 at home to Brighton because City are better than you.
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As I said, it’s on a lesser scale but nobody had us finishing top 4 but we’ll have bottled it massively if we now lose it simply because we put ourselves in such a great position for that to not be a risk. Expectations change throughout the season.
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Is it the case with Arsenal that they basically got a really great chemistry going with some players, which shot them up the league, bred more confidence in the whole team, but ultimately masked their deficiencies which were bound to limit their ambitions? As I said above, my concern as an Arsenal fan would be the amount of goals they’ve been conceding over the last few years. It’s still too many and seems to show few signs of significantly improving. But this seems to be getting overlooked.
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Ed, although leaning towards a more harsh appraisal, I am inclined to agree with you on the point of bottling it. I believe once immersed into that bit of a blip, Arteta struggled to find a way to swiftly bounce back.
Now, I look at this as 2 Tiers; 1 being Arsenal have genuinely had an excellent season from the point of view of where they were at the start, the players brought in and the progress made, i.e. a Champions League spot.
2- Once entering into the realms of challenging for the Title, again the only real team to challenge Manchester City effectively over the course of a whole season. The fact of the matter is that every other team fizzled out.
Going back to bottling, I’m not a fan of that term personally, but I agree that in recent games, courage, belief and confidence was lost. It may have spiraled from the 2-2 draw at Liverpool and a point of Arteta’s substitute selection was picked upon. That led to points dropped at West Ham where they should have won, and furthermore, more points dropped at the Emirates against Southampton.
They lost their way that’s what’s vivid. I believe they had depth of players to see through that final tail end of games, but just lacked experience, authority and game management.
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Combined with that, T-1000 simply haven’t dropped points!
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Us losing games had nothing to do with city Ed but when you face a team you know aren’t going to stop points at the pointy end of the season it’s ramps up that pressure
It’s very much a one team league now and has been for years so finishing second isn’t really choking
Huge points difference to last year
Some great results but we are so far from a finished article as first 11 or squad let alone to breathe the same rarified air as city! Let’s see if any team can do anything to at least make it interesting but I doubt it no matter what is spent!_____________________________
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Good to see you stevo mate 👍 I hope banjo is good too.
Nine as always thinking of you too bud. Each time I log on. Hope you are reading even if you don’t have motivation to post.
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Imo I totally expected arsenal to go through a period of poor form like they just have had at some point this season. It’s usually a lot earlier and if it was the first 7 games of the season that they dropped points but then they got to this stage on this level of points we couldn’t possibly describe it as bottling a title, we would just praise the improvement. Seems rather unfair that the point at which you experience bad form determines how the 38 games as a whole should be judged.
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Lucky, unfortunately mate, that’s the world we live in and because of the succession in recent of not so good results that have hampered Arsenal’s title challenge, some people will just go with the tide and the here and now.
It’s the same with football fans in the example of wanting to rip up their season tickets if their team have experienced a bad season.
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I don’t think Arsenal will challenge next year. I agree mikuis it feels similar to Liverpool 13/14 but Arsenal have a much better team. It’s a huge opportunity missed and I never thought for one minute they had the experience to win it
You are in a race with city and there is just no room for error. You need to be about 25 points a head of city in jan. They always finish very strongly. I wouldn’t call it a bottle job just a severe lack of experience for a title run in
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Agreed Sean and to be fair Arsenal could reach around the 85 point mark again next season but that won’t get you a title against this city side. 95 points is now pretty much what is required to seriously challenge City and it will take a hell of a side to go the distance with them.
Maybe your lot can because you have before, but I can’t see chelsea or utd doing it.
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I think tgis was a one off for Arsenal lucky. City were not themselves at times this season and it was a huge opportunity to capitalise but there had to be no room for error
I think tgis was a one off challenge for a while. I could be wrong though. They fell way to short in the ganes v city. Other clubs be stronger next season etc
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Yeah Sean I didn’t expect them to get 80+ points this season and I would agree odds are against them repeating the total next season for many reasons.
Point is though even if they do repeat it won’t win title. They probably would have needed 95 points to beat city to the title this year.
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It’s usually a lot earlier and if it was the first 7 games of the season that they dropped points but then they got to this stage on this level of points we couldn’t possibly describe it as bottling a title, we would just praise the improvement. Seems rather unfair that the point at which you experience bad form determines how the 38 games as a whole should be judged.
I totally understand your point here Lucky but that’s just the nature of sport and performance measurement in general. Say, for example, Arsenal had lost these games at the beginning of the season and rallied around to get up to where they now are and finish a few points behind City. The end result would be the same but they are completely different situations. Failing at the vital moments when the pressure is on is when character and mentality is put to the test. There is no pressure on Arsenal at the beginning of the season. Lots of decent sides win when the pressure is off. Performing when the pressure is at its peak is a sign of where you’re at, not doing so when it doesn’t really mean anything. Spurs were the masters of it under Poch. They lost a league to Leicester when everyone else was faltering. They didn’t turn up in a CL final. The choked in both cases. That’s not to say they didn’t do well getting there, too.
It’s not “unfair” imo to compare losing games you shouldn’t when not under pressure to losing games you shouldn’t when the pressure is at its highest.
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Ed,that they lasted this long before suffering a sustained loss of form is what I find remarkable, not the loss of form itself when it did come
The season is a 38 game marathon and they simply didn’t have the legs to go the distance in the end.
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