I wasn’t able to watch the match closely yesterday because my union took a one day direct action (strike) against the University to protest one year of delays in our contract negotiations. One year ago to the day, the Librarians, professional staff, and press professionals signed cards to join SEIU. It’s been a year and the University continues to delay on our contract by coming to the bargaining table with non-starter demands (like splitting Librarians and Professional staff) and taking away established benefits. In addition, all of the union member’s pay has been frozen and the University is telling staff that they can’t receive promotion during this time “because of the contract negotiations” – which isn’t true.
Personally, I have taken on a huge new responsibility (I now run a Makerspace with 4 students and have a contract classified staff working in my other department) and was told that I couldn’t receive promotion during this time because of the contract negotiations. I recently pushed back against this and will be having a meeting soon to work out how we finish this paperwork to put in for the promotion.
And the effects of inflation are very real here in the USA. I’m well paid but I’m a single dad and I notice it when my main “fun” expense (which is food, I’ll be honest) doubles over a few months. Last time I went to the store I paid $1 for a single small tomato. This last year I also had to put the max I could into my health care spending account for various reasons. It’s tight out there and I’m not even in a bad situation!
And what’s been happening is that Librarians and pro staff have left the University in DROVES for higher paying jobs elsewhere. This, of course, piles more work on the already beleaguered staff who remain. For example, we are currently doing FOUR searches for new staff in my tiny Library. It’s nuts.
So, forgive me, I barely watched the game yesterday.
From what I saw I didn’t miss much. Some are suggesting that’s a.. bad thing? I wouldn’t. Arsenal basically traveled beyond the wall, played a game of football against the northmen, on a frozen astroturf pitch, and came away with a very professional 1-0 win. Looking at the stats, they didn’t even have a shot in the final 25 minutes (we didn’t either, buttttt…) so all together that’s a positive. We played a host of backups and got away with a 1-0 win on tundra.
I’m curious about Arteta’s post match comments: “The second half obviously there are a lot of things to improve, we know that, I’m not going to get too deep into that, I understand as well, why this is happening. But I think the boys deserve credit as well for the way they tried. Quality-wise, in terms of dominance and how we want to play, obviously there are a lot of things to get better than what we done today, but it’s another win, move on, now it’s Leeds.”
What happened in the 2nd half that he’s talking about here? Turnovers? He seems to imply later that Matt Turner’s distribution got worse in the 2nd half. I’m curious what folks thought who had a chance to watch the game closely.
One thing that did surprise me was Rob Holding starting at LCB. I was actually thinking about who I would use as Gabriel’s sub the other day and landed on Tomiyasu. He’s our most two-footed of the group which was why I picked him. But I guess Mikel Arteta sees Holding as the better choice. I trust Arteta’s judgement and I’m not second guessing him, rather I’m saying I guess I was wrong to think Tomi would be Gabriel’s backup.
And finally, I made some pan dulce conchas for my friends at work. I used this recipe as the base and added some cinnamon and orange zest. Very flavorful, light, and not too sweet. I would make these again and again.
One tip on making pan dulce (or any enriched bread, such as Challah or brioche): give yourself a LOT of extra time for the dough to rise. This is especially true if you live somewhere cooler (temp wise, not Brooklyn). That final rise before baking is crucial and I find that two sheet pans of bread will rise at different rates. During my bake last night one sheet pan (with 6 loaves) was ready fully 20 minutes before the 2nd sheet pan. How did I know they were ready? The crackelin was well cracked and the loaves “jiggled” when I shook the sheet pan. I didn’t see any technical flaws with my bake but I might even have been able to leave them another 10 minutes. But it was already 2000hrs and I needed to get to bed!
Kind of an ugly match. Probably a combination of latitude, ball behaving differently on turf, and players not wanting to get injured.
But we got the win, which apparently a lot of teams going there haven’t. It was their first home loss in 14 European matches.
And I was pretty impressed with Turner yesterday. Probably would have given him Man of the Match. He did a great job as a sweeper keeper with the high line. Had to come out a number of times. And a good punch on the corner at the end under a lot of pressure. He’s not as good with his feet for distribution as Ramsdale, but few are. Feeling reasonably comfortable with him as a backup as he seems to be settling in.
You did not miss anything Tim. Wished I had skipped it to be honest. Agree with SLC_Gooner, MOTM, Turner.
The Europa League is boring. Wake me up when the semis come around.
Only scouts interested in inexpensive developmental signings want to watch this stuff. I’m not that.
I like where we are in the league, and I hope that our start is suggestive of a finish in the Champions League places
Not been around much; a lot going on.
I agree with Doc (previous post) that the Liverpool result feels like a watershed moment in the turnaround fortunes of Arsenal FC. It’s very consequential. We’ve waited a long that for that performance against that club, and we bossed them to hell and back.
Lots of misplaced passes and bad control which was uncharacteristic of our recent play. I blame the turf.
I think Holding played because Tomi needed a break. Easing him in, sort of thing. Wouldn’t read too much into it
Yes if Holding can’t start this game then what’s the point of having him in the squad? Still a good defender, just not as good as the clutch we have right now. It’s quite a luxury to have Rob as a 3rd or 4th choice. He would be starting for a lot of teams. But we do take a hit on ball progression and quality possession when he plays.
We are also a lot more open with Sambi instead of Partey and that was further compounded by Odegaard in the Xhaka role. We just about got away with it but I doubt the boss deploys that duo again in those roles anytime soon. Bodo didn’t get anything late in the game because the boss brought Partey and Xhaka in to ice it. But before that they probably should’ve scored.
Game state is also one of those funky things for us right now that I’m almost starting to get worried when we take a lead in the first half. Once again we ceded impetus to the opposition after going ahead. I do think we play a different game at 1-1 or if we went down a goal and wouldn’t have been so passive.
And then you have to credit Bodo for playing with a lot of structure and belief. They probably deserved at least a draw if I’m honest. I’m not terribly worried about that though. Their record was what it was for a reason.
Tim have you been watching Bake-off? The conchas were one of the challenges last week and yours look better than a lot of the contestants’ did.
That episode was really tough to watch though.
HA! I do watch Bake off. In my corner I will say that I had all day to make my conchas. The contestants only had a few hours. Like I say in the post, enriched dough is tricky (because of the amount of fat) and rising time always varies from loaf to loaf. I’m not at all a fan of bake off’s bread challenges, people shouldn’t be making bread in less than 4 hours. It can be done, of course, but the results are both not tasty and not great for you. Good bread takes time.
Well, there are still a lot of reasons to have him in the squad. First, he’s not that bad. His ball progression is very similar to Benjamin White when he plays RCB – he doesn’t carry quite as well and there is a slight dip there but largely concerns about his ball progression are a bit overplayed. He’s also English and we need English players. And he’s a damn good defender. I think he would start on a lot of teams in the Premier League.
But the reason I wondered why Tomi should play as LCB backup is because he’s far more two-footed than Holding.
Yeah I agree with you in essence. I think the other main reason he’s not playing is because of his slow first step. Playing Gabriel or White allows us to play several yards for their head which makes the press more effective by shrink in the field on the opposition. I totally agree that Holding would start for a lot of Premier league teams that like to play from a deep block. He would start for Wolves, Bournemouth, Everton, West ham, Aston Villa, maybe even Tottenham lol.
Bukayo opens the scoring, with a difficult chance with his right. Cant stress enough the value of two-footedness, particularly out wide. Thing I like about this team is the number of ambi players in it… Saka, Martinelli and Tomiyasu.
If you’re Leeds, you’d be incredibly frustrated with Rodrigo’s Hollywood ball that Saka pinched, but do drool over Odegaard’s weight of pass.
Happy to win but much more concerned about the performance. MASSIVE let off for Arsenal to win this one and I have to say it was more about riding our luck than about being good defensively. They absolutely should have scored at least one goal in this game, even without the penalty miss. Our bad habits of giving away at least one big defensive error every game, and of playing passively with a 1-0 lead were both on display. I haven’t seen this team lose control of a game like that all season. In the second half there was a 10 minute spell, I think it was after the penalty miss and before the first sub, when we were just wide open. In general though in the second half the front players couldn’t hold on to the ball and then couldn’t pressure the ball after it was turned over, so Leeds kept mobbing us and then measuring pass after pass behind the defenders, resulting in last ditch defending over and over again. Gabriel Jesus looked badly off the pace and I wonder if he was playing hurt. Even Saliba made two huge errors, one for the penalty and another with giving possession away on the edge of his box. Gabriel Magalhaes was having a good game but almost spoiled it by reacting to Bamford’s shove. Thankfully it was such an obvious foul it had to be given. When Leeds play with that kind of tempo and aggression, they look like a really good side. I can see how Chelsea lost 3-0 here.
One of the few positives was that Arteta figured out how to stem the tide. Ben White was gassed and we needed more protection on the flanks, so switching to a 5-4-1 and bringing Tomiyasu back to right was sensible and it made the last 15 minutes plus stoppage time a lot more comfortable than I’d have thought (from open play at least!) based on how the second half went to that point. The other positive was Aaron Ramsdale having his best game of the season (insert joke here about how he was in his comfort zone playing for a team getting battered). Tomiyasu, alone of our defenders, excelled in basically everything he did. Last but not least, Closer Holding was deployed and maintained his 100% record seeing out these sorts of games.
We are up against another aggressive pressing team away from home next weekend at Southampton, which has been a difficult fixture for us in the past. Maybe it was the long away trip to Norway. Maybe it was the intensity of last week’s game against Liverpool. Maybe we weren’t quite as up for it and maybe the season is starting to take its toll on some of the regulars physically. No matter the reasons, we cannot play like this again or we will go home with an L.
Doc, good summary. The biggest concern for me was the extent to which Odegaard, a primary setter of our tempo, totally disappeared from the game in the 2nd half. He went from very good, to shocking. Couldnt keep the ball if they gave it to him giftwrapped. Gave the ball away for fun, was careless in possession, and was key to Arsenal not having control. A walking sub by the hour. Contrast that with the delicious weight of pass for Saka’s excellent goal.
Gabriel 6 needs a spell on the bench, IMO. He’s an increasingly erratic and ill-disciplined defender. Time may be coming to play Tomi in his natural position, give White and Saliba a run in the middle, and let KT and Zinch have a shootout for LB. Tierney being effectively 3rd choice in a spot he owned feels wrong. It’s true as you said 2 big errors came from Saliba (errors are part of the game), but he’s going to keep his head in fraught situations, where Gabriel isn’t.
Fair play to Leeds… they came at us hard 2nd half. Key was disrupting the passing and tempo of Ode and Partey. You’d be forgiven for asking if Jesus played in this game. He was the least effective of the front 3.
I’d agree with both Doc and Claude. That 2nd half was our worst of the PL season, including the loss at Utd. A lot of folks not playing well, and Leeds to their credit got tactics right and worked very hard.
And while I’m not a fan of VAR…it did exactly what you’d want it to do in this match. Corrected important missed or incorrect calls.
And surprise…City lost. You could have gotten pretty long odds against us topping the league by 4 points at this stage.
Thanks SLC.
All that said, Im not going to lose sight of the big picture… which is that 9 wins out of 10 is utterly utterly astonishing, and something you dont see in a lifetime of supporting soccer teams. It is very special.
Yes, I’ve noted what didnt work well for us; but I’m more inclined to laud the team for an ugly win. Those, for me, define a team’s character for more.
Let’s see how long this fantastic ride can continue.
I’ll take the ugly win today. Three points is three points
Random trivia related to the table…each of the top 4 teams has given up exactly the same amount of goals…10.