JoeIt’s been a while since I last posted and as it’s (yet another!) international break and I’m holed up sick it was a good time to reflect on where we stand after seven games. At the last break I asked whether we were as low as we could get. Three matches, three losses, nine conceded and none scored. It was bleak reading and I said in that post Mikel Arteta had to reflect on what had gone so wrong and come up with something fast. Fast forward from then and we’ve taken 10 points from 12 available, including a big three against that lot from Middlesex. We sit four points behind the top four and it slowly looks like Arteta knows his best team.
The result against Tottenham showed what style of football we could play. Fast, aggressive and at times on the counter. Some of the movement on that day was unreal, helped by the fact that the Spuds just didn’t turn up. That result more than the others bought Arteta time. With his signings in goal, across the defence and in the midfeld they showed purpose and drive. I’ve spoken at length about his desire to play 4-3-3 so won’t go back into that too much but with this crop of players it looks possible.
I surprisingly missed the Brighton game due to a stag do but of course found a pub with a fuzzy screen showing it. If you’d have offered me a draw the week before I wouldn’t have taken it. Offered a draw after I saw the torrential conditions I’d have happily taken it. We didn’t really click in that match, Tomiyasu after playing three blinding games was unusually off the pace (though not enough to stop him scooping player of the month) and we didn’t really manage to string much together. But a point all things considered: the conditions, Brighton’s start to the season etc. isn’t a bad one.
We’re going the right way up the table but now the fixtures get a bit tougher, we play an unpredictable Palace on Monday, then an unpredictable Aston Villa on the Friday before a cup date with Leeds and then a trip to the King Power to play Leicester. What makes those games difficult is that all of those teams are capable of getting a result but are equally capable of blowing up. It’ll be up to us to get stuck in and try and impose our game on them.
Thing’s might be, maybe just, starting to change. We’ll wait and see! Till then lets hope our players come back injury free.
COYG!
-Joe