Fulham 1 - Arsenal 0

Premier League

Craven Cottage

23/8/08 5:30pm

Attendance: 27000

Referee: Martin Atkinson

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Fulham	1 - 0	Arsenal
Hangeland (21)

Venue: Craven Cottage		Attendance: 27000

The Teams
Shwarzer		Almunia
Pantsil		Sagna
Hughes		Toure	77
Hangeland		Gallas
Kallio	74	Clichy
Davies		Walcott	65
Bullard		Denilson
Murphy	81	Eboue
Gera		Nasri
Zamora		Van Persie
Seol Ki-hyeon	71	Adebayor

Substitutes
Stockdale		Fabianski
Stoor		Djourou
Baird	74	Song	77
Milsom		Gibbs
Teymourian	81	Ramsey
Nevland		Wilshere
Dempsey	77	Bendtner	65

Game Statistics
5	Goal Attempts	20
2	On Target	1
1	Corners	5
8	Offside	2
16	Fouls	6
2	Yellow Cards	0
0	Red Cards	0
43.2	%	56.8
Comments...
The number of goal attempts and possession tell a misleading story. We created little with the possession we had with a midfield underperforming badly. While Eboue and Denilson tried to look busy Eboue's 53 passes 81% completed and Denilsons 67 with 76% completed were way below the average for last seasons with Cesc and Flamini regularly recording upwards of 80 plus passes with completion from 85% and often more than 90%. Least productive of all was Walcott with just 16 passes (81% completion) in 65 minutes during which he found it difficult to retain and use the ball. Only Nasri 53 passes (81%) got near the sort of levels that we saw from wide midfield last season. There is little doubt that Eboue would have been far more productive employed on the right than Walcott was able to be.

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Writer: Amos

Date:Saturday August 23 2008

Time: 8:19PM

Your Comments

Rocky you wrote it for Amos? :D

Lou the Gunneress

The pass completion rate for the team as a whole must be *****. Nobody could hold onto the ball and there were countless misplaced passes from a lot of players - Denilson, Eboue, Clichy, Walcott, Nasri, RvP - I could end up listing the whole bloody team.

prits

Tee-hee, saw this one coming!

merlin

Most of the team performed ok in terms of number of passes and completion rates. There is little difference other than in the central midfield and wide right areas. That's where we fell short today. Lack of tempo and lack of accuracy in those areas.

Amos.

Amos tbh the individual player passing rates surprise me a little bit. I felt Eboue and Denilson looked worse than 81% and 76% completion rates respectively. I don't know, just a feeling that they gave away the ball really MANY times. I seem to recall the "usual" range is like 75-90% for our midfielders, roughly. I just thought Eboue and Denilson were way off today. Stats don't tell you the whole story eh?

Lou the Gunneress

Meh it's not problem. Simple case of picking up the pieces and starting again. I don't like people bashing on the team, **** happens in a game today wasn't to be, this year may not be it, in the grand scheme of things it doesn't really matter. What I would like though is for this act as a slap on the back, water in the face wake up call.

Gunners

No stats don't tell all but you are talking about 16 bad passes from Denilson in what was a low output anyway. Same with Eboue 53 passes is just too low a level that's why, though the completion rate at 81% is not too bad he simply didn't produce enough passes to disguise the poor ones. If the midfield dropped below 75 passes and 80% completion rate it would have been a relatively poor performance. Cesc has put in a couple of games where he has produced in excess of 100 completed passes. Usually he and Flamini were up around 80+ passes and 85% completion. Eboue's figures today would have been ok from wide midfield which is the sort of numbers that he produced last season. Walcott was the biggest selection mistake today.

Amos.

2 players short of our 1st 11 and we produced that? Djourou was better than Gallas last week and he is inexplicably dropped? Great desire by our captain to stop the goal enit? Arsene did very well last year to get us challenging and he has not built on it, he tells us theres money to spend and has Eboue playing central midfield. This is possibly the most confusing period in the Wenger era, I hope its not unravelling Clough style.

iceman10

Ah that makes more sense now, cheers for that Amos. Our midfielders didn't get into the game enough, hence low numbers of passes. I'm actually surprised we got slightly more than half of the possession too. I thought we lost the ball and spent a lot of time chasing it (in vein). I would've thought they kept the ball more in terms of possession. Maybe it's just my frustration speaking. But it doesn't matter now. Do we know from the stats that who was/were the most below-par? I felt Theo didn't get into it at all. Don't mean to single him out, I'm just curious how stats reflect these things.

Lou the Gunneress

As I said Nasri's level was ok. The central midfield pair were on a par if slightly better even than Murphy and Bullard. Statistically Walcott was the weakest link.

Amos.

It seemed to as like Walcott rarely touched the ball. It seems to me that the team in not playing as a team. Wenger used the pre season to test some of the youngsters but I it seems that it should have used to get the first teamers sharp. The team lacked cohesiveness and were just off on a whole. Walcott being timid, Gallas turning away from the goal scorer, RVP off the mark (I am surprised as he looked decent during th Euro's), Denilson was obviously playing for Fulhman as he passed the ball directly to them, I thought Ade played hard apart from one back pass when i think he should have faced the defense (it slows down the attack), Toure with that silly outside shot. There is enough blame to go around for this one. Then we have Arsene taking off Toure and laevind Denilson in, huh? Also any believe Djourou should have played before Toure, Bendtner in front of RVP and I can see that point. Songs played with a beautiful melody today, he should be the DM, the boy can play!!! Lets keep our heads up, God Bless!!!

Paulsito

It was a car crash of a match

GunnerBlood

Hmm cut Arsene some slack on taking off Kolo - he just recovered from malaria and played a couple of games, then had this injury. Although he played okay, we don't know how ready he was for 90 mins. And Denilson got better towards the end (but you had to). Oh well, a game to forget (but I can't)..

Lou the Gunneress

If Toure is sick/recovering why not play Djourou and bring Toure in late like last week. My problem was not really that Toure came off it was that Denilson didnt. I really do not challenge wenger but I think his decsions were off! Djourou could have come in for Toure and Song for Denilson. the result speaks for itself anyway.

Paulsito

I felt the same about the exact same thing last year - Senderos did well alongside Gallas, then Kolo came back from ACN and injury and still got his CB spot back when he's so obviously off the pace. Why does he seem to have this right to just walk back into the team? Don't get me wrong, I love Kolo. I'm with you on this, can't explain Wenger's decisions - or his lack of faith in the backup CB's? Song for me was hard to tell - he took a half-day flight back from China in midweek. Maybe he was tired, not 100%? Denilson was bad, but maybe Arsene thought using Song was just as much a gamble and he kept faith with Denilson. I don't know. Tbh I'd predicted the exact starting lineup and I'd thought it would've been enough to kill off a game like Fulham, so I wouldn't think the starting lineup was wrong. But I'm with you, if I were Arsene, I would've taken off Theo, shifted Eboue to RM and put Song in the middle as DM, with Denilson playing a bit more of a creative role. Just a thought.

Lou the Gunneress

I agree with you Lou about players just walking into the starting line up. If there is no competition for the starting line ups then the players may not play to full potential. I concur that this line should have been and is good enough to beat "Fulham" and I think that was a part of the problem, it was only Fulham. Lack of playing time and overconfidence were the main culprits and not team selection if you ask me.

Paulsito

I was also wondering if it's complacency that led to the lacklustre display, we lacked conviction and commitment. Some of the players looked as if they thought someone else would make something happen.. I said that in the forums, better not repeat. You can hop over there to see what our fellow Gooners and I said there.

Lou the Gunneress

There were a lot of angry gooners at Craven Cottage today and rightly so... from the first second it was obvious our players were not up for this - just like Arsene said after - they didnt have the right attitude. Are these guys starting to feel a bit spoilt or was it just a bad day at the office? A mixture of both I'd say, as well as all the proof needed that we are short of maturity in the middle. What a thoroughly depressing day... Walcott, Eboue, Denilson all flattering to deceive. The first two especially need some kind of rocket up their arses if they are going to progress. The only good thing that might come from today is if Arsene approaches the transfer window with more urgency.

Andy-bayor

Fulham bypassed our midfield all game with a couple of passes. Walcott was anonymous. Clichy below par. Adebayor was hogging the touchline and crossing balls (for himself i suppose). I was not convinced by last week's performance and this confirms it. Eboue is not a DM, he doesn't have the positional sense. Midfield is the link between defence and attack and if that's not right then nothing works. Wenger paid the price for thinking he can get by with a cheap solution at DM. Wonder if he'll blame the internationals?

Gael-Force

Now that we saw Wenger on the sideline in the foetus position so early in the season the signs are not good. Gonna be a long season my fellow gunners ! I was so ashamed - Denilson you suck!

Will-i-am10

I just saw Ade and RvP seeming to register NO shots on target.

stukazufuss

48 quid for a terrible view and a bunch of jobsworth stewards counting the centimetres you have stepped away from your seat. Oh Well, at least they didn't seem to take offence when everyone just ignored them. On to the game.. so dissapointing. I truly believe Gallas to be world class on his day but at the moment his head doesn't seem to be in the right place, Kolo looks a shadow of his former self too. Denilson had a stinker but looked very assured in pre-season??..Gael and Bac struggled to dominate. Eboue is not a central midfielder, or a winger, or a defender.. And please don't get me started on Ade. Of the current side only Bac,Clichy,Cesc,Al Song,RVP and Nikki B play with any heart. Nasri will come good but it will take a while. All rather depressing really, what with the excitement of the new season and all that. BTW, the gooners who booed the lads off at half time today are a disgrace.

cesc la vie

nobody was man enough to take control of the midfield....OH CESC FABREGAS PLS COME BACK SOON!!!! T_T

gooner_till_i_die

the main problem was our inability to hit the target,when it mattered,if RVP had scored his first chance instead of putting it past the post it would have spurred us on,adebayor cant hit a barn door.....we miss a clinical striker, if only eduardo was fit

fran merida

What the fck happened there?

storagematt

the main problem was our inability to hit the target when it mattered,if RVP had scored his first chance instead of putting it past the post it would have spurred us on,adebayor cant hit a barn door.....and we miss a clinical striker, if only eduardo was fit

fran merida

oops double post.....my pc is playing up

fran merida

might as well all give up now - disgraceful

D4NNYT

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