A Lesson in Trust An Arsenal blog from a coach’s perspective. Right as Arsenal kicked off, I left my office begrudgingly to give my team talk to my High School team before their big Regional game. Max stayed to watch and kept running upstairs to sneakily show me his fingers when we scored. There were […]
I have never seen so much debate over line-ups since Saliba got injured. People bending over backwards trying to reinvent the wheel with never tried formations just to keep Holding out of the defence. Even though Arteta has priors with Xhaka at LB (it’s back ladies and gentlemen), I was pleased that he didn’t fall […]
A Humbling Epiphany An Arsenal blog from a coach’s perspective The wet rag was out. I haven’t gone to the wet rag for a while. Lori had nicked my blood pressure cuff because teaching 1st graders these days is blood pressure cuff worthy. The complaining was flowing like the waterfall in that Tarzan movie that […]
There will be mixed emotions across Arsenal fans as the Bank Holiday weekend draws to a close and another weekend of peak Barclays fades into the distance. We arrived at a stadium where our last win featured none other than Mikel Arteta in the middle of the park (with the same trim he has today). […]
What a wonderful half of football that was! I know that we all have a feeling for why we played so good, no one is blind to that fact. But sometimes you know something from feeling but you don’t know the details of it. I have tried to concretize the rotations and adaptations in that […]
The distraction trick An Arsenal blog from a coach’s perspective. Are you having more and more people asking you if you think Arsenal will win the league? I am. I’m finding it really hard to answer that. I think it’s because I don’t want to say yes. I feel like I’m somewhat in a daze. Like I’ve […]
A colleague on GT inspired me to articulate something that has been on my mind in recent weeks, by writing this excellent piece earlier today. Thomas Bahnson identified a problem that has become evident as Arteta’s team have recently struggled to break down a well-organised low block from Newcastle, Everton and Brentford. He also pointed […]
The one that doesn’t have them An Arsenal blog from a coach’s perspective Control and consistency. If you were to ask the elite football coaches for the two things that they strive for more than other it will be these two. Everybody’s trying to attain what Arsenal have achieved already. Nobody’s going to hand out […]
And as the first half of the season comes to a close, the champagne opens, the trophy’s are engraved and the players arrive for ‘The Arsenal Mid-Season Awards. Your host for tonight will be Lucas Chambers, so take a seat, pour yourself a glass of champagne and enjoy your evening. With the players in their […]
Arsenal are in the middle of a bruising playing schedule and like most fans I was concerned to see the energy and urgency in the team’s performance drop off at St Mary’s on Sunday. Fortunately, Arteta’s team, despite their first dropped Premier League points since the defeat at Old Trafford, still sit 2 points clear […]
