We are deep in the trenches of this international breakthrough. I’ve cleaned out the basement, pruned the garden and cried a few times… but we’re close, folks – real football is just around the corner.
The break was kind to some, especially the Arsenal players. Declan Rice was handed the captaincy by Thomas Tuchel and oversaw a very dominant win against a hapless Wales side. Bukayo Saka reminded the world that he’s still that guy: he found himself in a one-on-one on the right, made a little space and lit a stunner into the top corner. Very Bukayo. I don’t like him playing non-Arsenal minutes, but this two-week spell is good for his fitness.
Jon Dahl Tomasson started the international breakthrough by saying this about Gyökeres:
“If people say he has no impact, then they don’t understand football and they have no idea about football.”
Sweden just lost 2-0 to Switzerland, and Alex Isak and Gyökeres failed to shoot on target. Their local media and fans were not happy.
Emphatic said this:
“Viktor Gyökeres looked lively. Then he got tired. And heavy. The number of mistakes increased. And overall it can only be said that Gyökeres was one of the absolute weakest players on the field.”
Swedish fans added:
“His form has been declining lately. I don’t really know what happened, but he doesn’t really seem to believe it at the moment. It feels so resigned and uncomfortable.”
Yes.
Spain play their first match against Georgia today – you would imagine Zubimendi will get a clean sheet due to the Rodri issues. Let’s hope he stays fit, because he will be terribly important for Arsenal over the next four weeks.
There’s a nice interview in it The Guardian where he talks about his contract with Arsenal and what Arteta’s proposal was like (the gist: he’s a madman). I liked this piece about the difference in competitions:
“Yes. The mentality is: be a man. Confront it hard. It’s more direct. In Spain, when you get the ball, it’s more about keeping it; [in England]when you win it, it immediately goes on the attack. Transitions are inevitable, harder to control. But [handling] that’s not about the ability as such, it’s about getting your mind used to it. That’s different from La Liga, but what struck me most is the dead ball, how important it is. I see a lot of goals from there and they are often the opening of the game. We have a set play coach and we work on that almost every day.”
Interestingly, the interview assumes he is a quiet guy, both on and off the field. He is not afraid of the move to England, not worried about his adjustment and has complete confidence in himself as an Arsenal player.
I don’t want to talk about Gyökeres all the time, but I feel like part of his problem right now is that the badge makes him look heavy. He thinks too much about delivering results instead of just doing what he is good at. Forwards can’t have any mental baggage, and sometimes when I see Big Vik on the ball I feel like I can see the cogs humming in his head. He needs to go back to his instincts and believe that he deserves to wear the shirt, just like Zubimendi.
Finally, a little snippet from Geoff (OG writer) about a piece of stadium history you may not know. This is about a meeting he attended with David Miles before the Emirates were built:
I was shown plans for three stadiums.
To expand and rebuild on the London Dome, now of course renamed the O2 Arena.
Ashburton Grove (our current stadium).
A new location in St Pancras, opposite the international station.
After thinking about it for about three minutes, I suggested the location of St. Pancras – which was a country mile away. Within a nanosecond I saw the enormous and immediate benefits.
The first, selfishly, was for me and my boys – it cut down my travel time immensely!
The other reasons I gave when asked were that we could build a huge stadium, right in the heart of London, with the ability to go in any direction, to go home or frolic in the countless bars and restaurants. David Miles said: “But if we built such a big stadium and didn’t fill it every game, it wouldn’t look great.”
I countered that the top level could be disguised with billboards that fell down if the stadium couldn’t be filled. I also suggested that we could become the capital’s tourist choice – a place you could go if you were in London, knowing you were almost guaranteed to see a match.
Instead, Arsenal chose Ashburton Grove, where you have huge problems getting back to the centre, have to queue for 20 minutes to get frozen at Arsenal Station, and can’t get to Holloway Road because we never gave Livingstone the £10 million we promised to put an escalator in it. God only knows what that would cost now.
Arsenal at King’s Cross would have been very interesting, especially considering how global the game has become and how complex reworking the space would now be.
Okay, I’m done. See you in the comments. X
PS Members Therapy Session below. It was a good one. Sign up and become a member. X
#INTERNATIONAL #BREAK #PAIN #PRIDE