Except there seems to be a certain floor of quality that this squad does seem too possess. We’ve been close to top four with the same players albeit with Ozil and Ramsey more involved. Even that floor isn’t met this season I think that is on the coach tbh. Of course there is an imbalance and some players are just plain shite. No arguing there.
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I think Emery got a new manager bounce in his first season and with hind sight got this lot to over perform helped by Auba getting a lot of goals (often from left wing) that season to get us to 5th.
The team then collapsed on him in his second season. Even Arteta got a new manager bounce in his early months before they collapsed on him. He’s got the added problem of Auba disappearing on him and key injuries to Martinelli and Partey.
These players can perform better in fits and starts but their rotten mentality always comes out in the end in too many players and this squad is a toxic hot bed of overpaid shit only here for the money and who are not fit to wear the shirt.
I’d also argue that other teams have improved such as Leicester in the last few years.
I want Arteta to go as he’s completely lost now (his coaching team seem to be shit since Freddie left looking at results too) and chances of him learning and doing a Howard Kendall or Ferguson type recovery look slim from here. But with the Kroenkes in charge I have no doubt we’ll continue to follow the path that teams like Villa under Lerner did no matter who the head coach is. Maybe Aligote will buy us and if we’re lucky he’ll sweep out the leadership in the club and replace well so then we’ll go forwards again.
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A lot is on the manager but I think the players have changed more than you recognize.
The last time we were even decent by XG was 17-18, when we still had a functional Ozil, Alexis was mediocre but still better than what we have now, Ramsey, and a much younger Laca and half season Auba. We were running into problems but had an attacking XG of 63 in the league.
By Emery’s first year we lose Alexis, Ozil starts being phased out, and everybody gets older, no meaningful reinforcements brought in. XG goes down to 57 and with our defense getting worse our XG differential is barely positive. We were extremely fortunate to finish 5th that year and were basically riding our luck.
Last year we further lose Ramsey, our big attacking addition in Pepe is a bust, everybody gets older again, and our luck regresses to the mean. XG down to 49 and the team is poor under three different managers.
This year the wheels further fall off as we don’t buy any offensive or creative reinforcements and our last top player seems to show his age. We also have been a bit unlucky. On pace for an XG of 42.
It’s just been a steady decline in chance creation (with luck bouncing our results around) as we went from a team with prime age Alexis, Ozil, Ramsey, Laca to one with over the hill Auba, Laca, Willian plus some promising (and not so promising) kids.
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I think the lack of experience is a massive problem now in the management layers.
Owners don’t understand the prem.
Artetas first management job.
Lewis new into football.
Vinai a marketing man.
Artetas coaching team very inexperienced at this level especially after Freddie left.
Edu has a little experience but not in any management role in the prem or in appointing/dismissing head coaches and their teams.
No wonder we are sliding to relegation.
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Nice piece in the Guardian today about the Arsenal. Well written and sums it up well.
At one point it talks about the bizareness of appointing the unqualified Josh to navigate the labryinthine complexity of elite European football.
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We’ve got @Joshua and @Josh on here who I’d trust infinitely more than Josh Kroenke with the keys to our club
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We are 15th and they are flexing about nutmegs 
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Disgusting.
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What else can the social media team do? They can’t exactly post “Merry Christmas everyone, sorry we’re shit!”
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What a bunch of Grinch’s haha
To be fair, good choice for number one haha
We’d normally do top 10 goals but don’t think we’ve scored 10 goals
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I think the XG is shite because the coach is not making the most of the potential available to him. I reckon XG is (partially) a consequence of style of play and how teams are instructed to play by the manager rather that it represents the quality of the squad? If Arteta would use a more gung-ho attacking style our XG, with the same players, would be a lot higher.
With Ceballos, Pepe, Aubameyang, Lacazette, Martinelli, Willian we have more than enough attacking potential. The XG is so low, however, because the current manager is not using this squad properly.
There is still enough quality in this squad to become 6th, at least. Arteta is failing.
Aubameyang, at ‘only’ 31, is not just suddenly going to show his age for example. Arteta had a very particular way of using/launching him on the left side by overloading the left side and have Tierney or whoever played in his place play him in. Teams figured that sort of shite out hence Aubamyang has become less effective.
This talk about them being so shite that a mid-table finish is somehow justified is rubbish in my opinion.
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That is a perfect description of the state of this club.
Arteta isn’t holding us back, he’s dragging us down.
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When’s the match day thread going up so we can all cope?
It doesn’t have to be Arteta or the players at fault, it can be both.
Our attacking XG has fallen steadily for three years, the trend started before Arteta. And when you look at the names and ages of the attacking players, it shouldn’t really be a surprise. We had legitimate world class players in their prime in Ozil and Alexis. Plus Ramsey who had many shortcomings but whose attacking game as a central midfield player was pretty elite. Now we have post-prime guys, busts like Pepe, and kids.
Arteta’s tactics are crap but we are also paying the price for our terrible recruitment in attack over the last five years, which has focused on older short term fixes who then quickly age out of their primes (Auba, Laca) or are already there (Willian) and missed big the one time we bought a player in the right age bracket (Pepe).
Another manager might improve us but nobody is going to come in and turn us into a good attacking team overnight unless the players change as well.
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Scarily accurate.