Theo Walcott

[StevO]

5 hours ago, Bailey said:

He has to go inside and cover that space otherwise Rashford has lots of space between him and Keane and then the cross comes in, Rashford nods it in and everyone blames Coleman for not tucking in more.

To me he looks dammed it if he does and dammed if he doesnt. You can point fingers of blame in different directions but none of them come close to the fact we were unlucky with how the move developed and then unlucky with Martial putting the ball in the one place Pickford couldnt get to.

Exactly, two very good forwards getting our defence in a bit of a state is damn good play on their behalf. Maybe they just have better players than us? 

[StevO]

5 hours ago, Wiggytop said:

As Pete says, where’s the fun in that.

Bottom line for me is, if we had scored like that, we would be creaming our pants, like we did for Siggys goals against Fulham, we didn’t blame any of their defenders fur the goals. Martials strike was excellent,  so let’s buy him in Jan

Yes yes and yes

[Palfy]

3 hours ago, StevO said:

Exactly, two very good forwards getting our defence in a bit of a state is damn good play on their behalf. Maybe they just have better players than us? 

Definitely this we had as many chances as them and couldn’t capitalise , that highlights the difference from having a Lukaku in the side and not.  

[Hafnia]

1 minute ago, Palfy said:

Definitely this we had as many chances as them and couldn’t capitalise , that highlights the difference from having a Lukaku in the side and not.  

Very true.  Before lukaku was on the pitch they scored 2 goals. After he was introduced they scored none and conceded 1.    Oh were you saying we needed lukaku??? Ah no... I dont get that. 

As much as im not gonna slate Walcott for it.... he should have passed the ball for two excellent chances.  Took the shot as wrong options.

[Palfy]

10 minutes ago, hafnia said:

Very true.  Before lukaku was on the pitch they scored 2 goals. After he was introduced they scored none and conceded 1.    Oh were you saying we needed lukaku??? Ah no... I dont get that. 

As much as im not gonna slate Walcott for it.... he should have passed the ball for two excellent chances.  Took the shot as wrong options.

I can’t see how what you said equates to if we had a Lukaku playing for us we would have taken the chances we created. 

[StevO]

1 hour ago, hafnia said:

Very true.  Before lukaku was on the pitch they scored 2 goals. After he was introduced they scored none and conceded 1.    Oh were you saying we needed lukaku??? Ah no... I dont get that. 

As much as im not gonna slate Walcott for it.... he should have passed the ball for two excellent chances.  Took the shot as wrong options.

I’m pretty sure Palfy was saying if we had Martial, Rashford, Mata and Pogba playing for us we would have won, not Lukaku.

[Palfy]

54 minutes ago, StevO said:

I’m pretty sure Palfy was saying if we had Martial, Rashford, Mata and Pogba playing for us we would have won, not Lukaku.

What I was trying to say was you were right better players win games in my pigeon English .

Also regardless of what your views are of players who score for fun even if you don’t think they contribute much else your fucked without them, like Martial he  did very little during the game then scores a blinder and we nearly all rave about him priceless. 

Isn’t that what Lukaku did for us that’s why we need a player who week in week out can score goals, because as we witnessed you can create the most chances but when you don’t have that natural goal scorer against the big teams it means didly squat. 

[Hafnia]

I think it's abundantly clear that we do need a certain type of striker...  I'd love lacazette. Pace, good feet, technical ability and a good finisher. 

I wanted him a while back. Great signing for arsenal. 

[StevO]

13 hours ago, Palfy said:

What I was trying to say was you were right better players win games in my pigeon English .

Also regardless of what your views are of players who score for fun even if you don’t think they contribute much else your fucked without them, like Martial he  did very little during the game then scores a blinder and we nearly all rave about him priceless. 

Isn’t that what Lukaku did for us that’s why we need a player who week in week out can score goals, because as we witnessed you can create the most chances but when you don’t have that natural goal scorer against the big teams it means didly squat. 

This. Goals win football matches. 

[Cornish Steve]

2 hours ago, StevO said:

This. Goals win football matches. 

We scored a ton of goals under Martinez but still lost some crucial games. Defence is clearly important, too. In the end, though, games are ultimately won and lost in midfield. Once we have the midfield engine humming, the team as a whole will hum, too.

[Hafnia]

1 hour ago, StevO said:

This. Goals win football matches. 

Conceding goals loses football matches... Conceding possession and not winning the ball back leads to conceding goals. 

[Finn balor]

We should for me target batshui 

[Palfy]

5 hours ago, hafnia said:

Conceding goals loses football matches... Conceding possession and not winning the ball back leads to conceding goals. 

Apparently we have the number 1 ball winner in the league do we now need the number 2 & 3 as well, not taking your opportunities in front of goal losses you the chance of winning the game and contributes hugely to you possibly losing the game. 

Because it gives your opponents more confidence that you can’t finish and they are buoyed by that, and gives your own players less confidence and they are brought down by that, so a clinical striker is a must because scoring goals wins games even if the rest of the team aren’t quite up to speed surely Lukaku proved that in his last season. 

[StevO]

Palfy gets it. 

[Hafnia]

13 hours ago, Palfy said:

Apparently we have the number 1 ball winner in the league do we now need the number 2 & 3 as well, not taking your opportunities in front of goal losses you the chance of winning the game and contributes hugely to you possibly losing the game. 

Because it gives your opponents more confidence that you can’t finish and they are buoyed by that, and gives your own players less confidence and they are brought down by that, so a clinical striker is a must because scoring goals wins games even if the rest of the team aren’t quite up to speed surely Lukaku proved that in his last season. 

What lukaku proved in his last season was that he was as reliable in giving the ball away as he was scoring against cannon fodder.   

A bit like exchanging a tenner for two fivers really.  It looks like you are getting more money but you aren't. 

I'm not gonna go on about how shite he was against us last week too much other than to say that he had one clear chance and messed it up and other than that he allowed our defence ages on the ball - we stepped out and had more possession.  The game was easier.

The result of which...... He's omitted from the United squad. He's not on the bench today.  Jose gave an intentionally limp excuse which supported the stories that lukaku has pissed his teammates off this week by accusing them of not playing to his strengths. 

It was all very predictable all this....  

[Sibdane]

This is beyond boring now.

[markjazzbassist]

didn't see enough of the game to comment on his performance, i saw he was first or second sub?

[Hafnia]

Should have stopped cross coming in for their goal but done ok today. 

[Romey 1878]

10 minutes ago, markjazzbassist said:

didn't see enough of the game to comment on his performance, i saw he was first or second sub?

I thought he played really well myself. When we weren’t quite on it in the first half I thought he was one that looked up for it. 

[markjazzbassist]

2 minutes ago, Romey 1878 said:

I thought he played really well myself. When we weren’t quite on it in the first half I thought he was one that looked up for it. 

great to hear, hopefully palace was a one off performance.

[Bailey]

He didnt seem very involved in what I saw however I probably only saw 40 minutes across the whole game.

[Hafnia]

9 minutes ago, Bailey said:

He didnt seem very involved in what I saw however I probably only saw 40 minutes across the whole game.

Put it this way.... last season he was one of our first names on the sheet.   The way it stands now is that he is possibly one of the first to be getting dropped.

The management have done an awesome job in raising the bar.  He has players like gomes and richarlison setting the standard. 

[Bailey]

8 minutes ago, hafnia said:

Put it this way.... last season he was one of our first names on the sheet.   The way it stands now is that he is possibly one of the first to be getting dropped.

The management have done an awesome job in raising the bar.  He has players like gomes and richarlison setting the standard. 

I think the last bit hits the nail on the head. Today he was probably a 6/10 player, which last year was 2 or 3 points better then the rest but today that 6/10 is 2 or 3 points below most. 

[duncanmckenzieismagic]

I thought he had a good game today, made a complete nonsense of the theory that he is a lazy player

[Hafnia]

21 minutes ago, duncanmckenzieismagic said:

I thought he had a good game today, made a complete nonsense of the theory that he is a lazy player

One game doesn't make it a nonsense just in the same way that it wasn't just one game that got him tagged as lazy.

I'm not going to get involved in negatives about our players today. As a team we were excellent. 

[Wiggytop]

Back to his threatening best for me today, he made a couple of brilliant runs across their defence in the second half and was unlucky not to be able to make more of them, also seemed to link up with Seamus better today than in the last few games. Keeps his place next week for me.

[duncanmckenzieismagic]

5 minutes ago, hafnia said:

One game doesn't make it a nonsense just in the same way that it wasn't just one game that got him tagged as lazy.

I'm not going to get involved in negatives about our players today. As a team we were excellent. 

Totally agree but it’s not as if it’s the first game he has put a shift in is it?

Never thought I would see the day that you didn’t concentrate on the negatives

[Hafnia]

27 minutes ago, duncanmckenzieismagic said:

Totally agree but it’s not as if it’s the first game he has put a shift in is it?

Never thought I would see the day that you didn’t concentrate on the negatives

He's intermittent in his efforts and sadly doesnt see the dangers when he is having a few moments to himself. 

Its plagued him through his career.  I'm pleased that he seems to have responded today because 1. It means he's been told or is aware

2. He isn'tt above addressing his weaknesses. 

[Bailey]

I dont think he is lazy, I think he just lacks concentration. In one instance today he should have had an easy touch out to Seamus who was running past him but his touch was poor and it went straight to a Brighton player. However he was straight onto the Brighton player, won the ball back and then went on a run and won a throw in. 

He also lacks concentration in his runs. In an instance again today was when a move came down the left and into Richarlison who had to take a touch and turn. Before he had chance to turn Walcott had already run through the full back channel (normally a very good run) however there was no way the ball was ever getting to him and the move was 40 yards from their goal. Richarlison needed him either wide ready to drive at the back 4 or he needed to wait to make his run, get 5-10 yards further up the pitch (as Richarlison turned and the defence dropped) and give Richarlison a chance to get the ball to him. He does this a hell of a lot, he wants to put himself through on goal even if its not on. 

He definitely isnt lazy but Im not sure he has particularly great football brain.

[Cornish Steve]

I was chatting today with an English football fan in the office. He’s a Gunners fan, but he watched our game against Chelsea and was impressed. In his words, “you have one weak link: Walcott.” I agree with him.