Olympiacos 3-1 Arsenal: Hilarious Team Performance.

Arsenal performance a joke on the night

Match report and highlights can be found here.

I must say that at some point, I stopped grimacing and just started laughing at our performance last night. I decided it was not worth getting annoyed over because I have come to accept some Arsenal Players as just over-paid squad members. A game which should have been approached with a care-free spirit was approached with such timidity and calamitous individual performances, as to leave everybody involved with the club in no doubt  as to how poor we can be in depth.

Players such as Arshavin, Chamakh, Squilaci, Fabianski and Mannone quite honestly have no future at the club based on the performances of last night and their general performances thus far. They have been at the club long enough with little improvement when called upon. They should be moved on to lesser teams where they will shine.

Fabianski, a man who ought to be challenging Szczesny for the number 1 spot competely screwed up his chance to stake a claim to the spot. For the first 24 minutes, he could not do anything right. I was not surprised to see him get stretchered off. Thats the story of his Arsenal career so far. He chokes up when put in the team then injures himself. Vito Mannone had the howler of the entire group stage I think with his missed Karate kick that resulted in the second goal moments after he came on for Fabianski.


Squilaci is just Squilaci. Always unlucky, always involved in all things bad at the heart of our defence. Djourou is not a right back, oh when will Sagna return?

Arshavin just doesn't seem to want to be at the club anymore. He should just be sold to Manchester City or Barcelona. For a captain of his national side Russia, he does little at Arsenal to suggest he is a leader nor a good striker. My African brother Chamakh is really looking out of his depth at Arsenal. I think Bordeaux did to us what we did to Barcelona with Hleb...

Our tactics were wrong, we played too narrow and with shortballs. that made us easy to close down. We needed to expand the pitch, make angles for passes and generally hold the ball for longer spells. Our continued timidity was playing perfectly into the hands of Olympiacos. They were good on the night but we made them look like Barcelona.

Anyway, the performance didn't tell us anything that we didnt already know and expect. But we were all hoping for more. I was surprised to see Vermaelen and Santos start the game. As it turns out, Santos could miss the rest of the season with that ankle injury. It looked bad when I say the replays. But here's to hoping. I think we may need to buy a leftback in January because Gibbs won't last the distance and playing Vermaelen there is not good for the team in the long run.

So we lost, but Marseille produced a miracle in Germany to beat Dortmund by 3 goals to 2 after being 2 goals behind. They progress in second spot in our group and they could face Barcelona in the next round. Good luck to them.

Let us get back to the league and focus on the up coming Everton game. The manager has a decision to make this January regarding the future of some players and strengthening the squad. On the evidence of last night, a striker is needed.

We may have been halted in our tracks by Olympiacos, but thankfully that was a nothing game for us really and we panicked... shame.

Onwards march the Arsenal!!