summerbreez says:

it looked like a practice game but we looked well in some patches there was some nice moments in the midfield is Archivan finished with Arsenal ?i just dont know what is wrong with him
glad with the win we need another win on sunday i am worming up as we begin to have shape

sam says:

its well known fact that arshavin cannot play 2 competitive games in 3 days.
so having him, rosicky and misfiring theo walcott in the same starting line-up was suicide and we won’t be so lucky against stoke.

oh yes! with this same line-up on sunday we will be STOKED
time to unleash the the ox and the korean tiger

selby jr says:

I think santos when fully fit and integrated properly could be awesome. He has a touch of class. Kos was a hero. Mert actually blocks and tackles very well but it is worrying how slow he is. And Jenkins worked really hard. Defence looking pretty good. However the midfield is shocking, walcott is a joke and we need to play two strikers

duke 0f arsenal says:

A win was all we need to boost the confidence but consistency is the main thing to do well. Maybe JD suits in Europe games.Jenkinson complements NB & Charmarkh, Gervinho complements VP,Walcott, Kozzer & Mert suits in Europe games, Song goes to Europe & BPL, against very technical teams we should have 2 DM as Plan B and go for Draw/Win while Ramsey suits Europe & BPL. 2 cents opinion.

Go Gunners 4 Eva.

mids says:

we just need jack back badly u can see the hole waiting to be filled by him,especially along side technical players like kosielny (ho by the way deserve a new contract in my opinion as hes a beast)santos ho always tries to play balls to feet.what a win though as a lot of people seem to under estimate that win forgeting that the likes of chelsea and man u didnt manage to go back to england with the 3 points.ps i was watching the game in itv and jsc sport and listening to both set of pundit everyone are desperate to see the arsenal disappear from the elite

aussie gooner says:

Along with lots of other gooners I have been very dissapointed with our team for some time, however tonight I am pleased for the team performance in general and pleased to actually win a game 1 nil. Cant remember the last time we toughed one out and actually got the points, deserved or not.
Good on the boys and good to see them smiling and congratulating each other at the end.
Per and Kos were very tight – theo and arshavin were complete wastes of space.
what else can you say – theo just isnt good enough and arshavin is possibly the laziest footballer in the world.

NepaliGunner says:

The analysis is true and I agree, but I still disagree with your assessment of Arteta. He will never be as creative as Fabregas, or even Rosicky, but he is solid and something Arsenal needed right now. He is the player who does not panic on the ball, and works hard. I would like to see him taking a few more risks with his passes, but I think Wenger has asked him to be prudent, and keep it simple. Especially away to Marseille. Hence I would give him a 6.5-7 because he made some good interceptions and pressed well.

Johnny Deigh says:

Walcott had his moments. First, judging by the way he fell in the box, it looks like he was taken out while he was shooting. Second, he made two very good runs that Song and Jenkinson missed the opportunity of playing him through, dallying on the ball too much.

Otherwise, Theo needs to be more direct in going for goal when on the flank. Trying to cross the ball to RVP when he is alone in the box surrounded by 4 defenders isn’t going to work.

young gunnerz says:

I think Arshavin deserves a 1. That is the number of passes i can recall that he made. I think he should be benched and be given substitute appearances until he finds better form. at times he seems like he doesnt have the energy or drive sigh idk.

Waleed says:

Koscienly’s early struggles, and a couple of high profile errors, have given him a bad reputation. He is, even in the Premier League, a most underrated defender. He is super super quality. I have always argued for him and it makes me smile that he’s getting credit for that performance.

GoonerB says:

I am glad gooners are warming up to Koscielny as I rightly pointed out in your previous ratings,he has been the best of our central defenders since Vermaelen’s injury.I think he is one defender who is very much underrated.What do gooners think about the news making rounds about Arsenal trying to snap up Paul Pogba?I’ve watched the kid play and I must admit he is pretty good.He has dribbling skills and most of all Vision especially to make long range passes.I would love it if wenger got one over fergie for denying us Ronaldo,Smalling,phil jones etc.By the way I am so sick of Ferguson waiting for Wenger to identify players then goes ahead and signs them.

Jack Mo says:

We were told before the game that Santos wasn’t match fit and he was only playing since Gibbs was injured, So i wasn’t surprised by his show. He does look to have something real good to offer if he tried hard.

I was waiting for your opinion on Jenkinson, as you were too harsh on him after Sunderland game and he was good enough against Marseille if not immaculate, You got it right this time. But you wrongly picked on Arteta who being deployed as a part of 2 man defensive midfielder did quite a lot to prevent pressure being too much on our defenders. Yes he should give those probing passes in the final third that we know he can, but he handled his principal responsibility well.

As for Rosicky, he was once again denied a rise in his assists statistics tonight by our attackers, especially Wallcott, he delivered a number of good balls that our attackers should have done better with.

Koscielny to me remains the best central defender in Arsenal despite his occassional errors.

Walcott, Gervinho and Arshavin remain some of ur most dangerous players but not as much as to warrant total exclusion of Alex Oxlade Chamberlain and Park Chu Young. If Wenger wants everyone to perform, he should hand all his men equal powers to fight for positions and performances and not age or experience should be the gauge of who deserves to play.

It feels good to have Wojciech Szczesny in goal, he is one you can count on.

All in all, it was 5th win in Six games, a clean sheet, a ground out result, a probable guarantee for qualification to knocck out round of Champion’s League days after the return to top half of the Premier League table and so, We all have a reason to be happy.

If we can’t play free flowing football, then the hell with it if we keep registering wins at this rate. After all, what has the free flowing football brought us in the last 6 years?.

But I still think we have enough players to take us back to top on both beauty and results.

Manix says:

We have to be happy with any win these days but one thing is very worrying, does someone have the stats of Arsenal’s number of goal opportunities since the beginning of the season, all competitions includes?? We will only have those kind of scoring opportunities against weak teams…Sunderland, Marseille, etc but we’ll get punished by any other above average team. We keep on firing at the defence but they have been doing a hell of a job since the beginning of the season considering the number of times the ball comes back to them coz the other half of the team is not performing.
Where is the Arsenal play? We used to play quick one touch football and now every time a defender (or other) has the ball he battles to find a partner, slowing the game down and giving time to opponents to get organised. That’s why we are not seeing the Arteta we expect.
Definitely need a playmaker (Hazard, Hazard or Hazard) that will get the team moving and to get back to our good old quick game.
Still think we’ll make top 4 though. Up Gunners.

Ar7 says:

Arshavin is just lazy…Good talent but wasted. He needs to “wake up his idea”. How many times he has claimed he wanted to improve his game? Talk is cheap…

Why does AW insist to start a player that is lazy? His wealth of experience in managing players should have warned him about lazy players.

Dino Abby says:

I think the article has been fair & quite accurate in its analysis. Chris rightly mentioned that as long as we get the three points we should be happy. The tiny steps that we made last sunday and last night were good and much needed. The spirit of the article was very positive while it remain practical and realistic in giving praises so as not to go overboard.

So guys, my point is we can disagree and debate on some of the views and ratings but please lets not bring harsh words and sarcasm in these discussion as we are happy with the overall improvement we are seeing and we are ‘one’ in rooting for the team.

My own take on the game is to say Wenger is spot-on with his his strategies. Main aim is not to lose on counter attacks which Marseille can do very efficiently. Marseille was marking very aggressively and closing down spaces at lightning speed, especially in the first half. Thus, the reason why Arteta was very discipline and cautious with his role knowing that Song has the licence to go very much forward whenever he wants. Djourou is still working to build back on his concentration as ability wise he has no worries of. Santos is still short on fitness and so has to pace himself well for the entire 90 minutes. And he did well overall. I just hope the injury Jenkinson suffered is minor because his overlapping rum was menacing and his crosses were good. At only 19, we’ll have a gem of a right back in the next few years.

Arshavin, at 31, will be more effective coming as a super sub but I supposed Wenger will pick games where Arshavin can start depending on Wenger’s overall assessment of the situation of our team vis-a-vis the opposing team of the day. My only concern is Theo, who has not being playing well of late. He still lack varieties in his game.

Considering we don’t have Vermalen and Jack, we’re not doing bad at all at the moment (I don’t remember the MUnited game). We’ll be better when Vermalen returns shortly and if we buy another very creative midfielder in January to boost our current midfield engine, we should not worry about being in top four because we will be fighting for the title.

Cheer up guys..

leo says:

i think arteta played well, santos was a lil bit off color, walcott still struggled, arshavin was below par and all these put some form of pressure on the midfield as well as the defense.
but i like what prof did by changing the parttern of our game from 4.3.3 to 4.4.2 and that helped the team alot to raise their game and also penetrate the OM defense. In all we didnt do so badly, we were committed and it was a good win. We should now take this spirit into the stoke Game and make sure we win. GO Arsenal!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!