Dropping points…and the beat goes on

Today is Unai Emery’s 48th birthday. Hopefully, the man has a nice day with friends and family to celebrate the occasion, however, it’s probably a bittersweet day for the Arsenal boss. As the team continues to struggle to find form, and points, rumors are flying that he will be sacked and replaced by Jose Mourinho if Arsenal loses at Leicester City on Saturday.

So let’s try to put some of this into perspective. It was obvious that Arsene Wenger’s time had come to an end at the Emirates in May of 2018. The man had accomplished so much, but the Premier League’s new blood was passing him by. So, Wenger leaves and the board of directors hire Unai Emery from PSG. Now, I’ve always wondered, why did Emery leave Paris after winning Ligue 1 and two French domestic trophies? The Paris press reported it was because he couldn’t win the Champions League title, however, if you have just won a treble wouldn’t the PSG board give him another year to win European glory too, or had the PSG dressing room given up on the Spaniard? PSG midfielder Marco Verrati said “it was difficult to work with Unai Emery.”

Okay, enough of my conspiracy theories. Here’s our current situation in north London.

So, Emery is hired by the Gunners. He loses his first two games then puts together a string of 22 matches without a loss. I pretty good start, right?

Unfortunately, when the rubber met the road at the end of the season and we needed points to secure a spot in the top 4…we crashed and burned. We were 1-1-3 in our last 5 PL games. We finished one point behind Tottenham for the final Champions League spot. But our nightmare wasn’t over just yet. It got worse. Chelsea destroyed the Gunners in the Europa League final, 4-1. When all was said and done, we missed a Champions League spot on two fronts.

Then, we get to this season. We make some very good signings in the summer transfer window. Things were looking promising, but now after 11 Premier League games we have won only 17 of a possible 33 points. We stand 14 points behind league leading Liverpool and 6 points behind 4th place Chelsea. Plus, our PL goal differential is a meek +1.

As I have written before, these shortfalls aren’t just the fault of the manager. Players get paid a lot of cash to perform, but what confuses me is how a really good group of players can’t seem to find a path to winning games on a consistent basis. Everyone agrees we have one of the best front threes in the Premier League, yet we have scored only 16 goals in 11 games. Emery’s team selections and substitutions are also confusing. Example: why did he leave Pepe on the bench on Saturday when we needed a player of his caliber late in the game to run with the ball and open up the Wolves’ defense.

We are all confused by his tactics, by his team selections, by his substitutions, and by the Xhaka and Ozil dramas. The team looks unorganized, the defense lacks cohesion and the offense doesn’t get enough shots to win games. Game after game, the beat goes on.

Now, I’m not a necessarily a proponent of sacking coaches or managers during the season, but this is different. In order to save this season a change is needed and needed now. Is Mourinho the answer? Maybe we will find out soon enough.

If you have a comment please click on the date at the top of the post, or send me an email at yankeegooner1953@yahoo.com.

Cheers. Gunner1953