Arsenal Just Took a HUGE Risk

0:00This podcast is part of the Sports Social Podcast Network. Arsenal have just taken a massive risk and this is something that most people wouldn't have done and it could completely change what Arsenal were capable of this season. If it pays off and let me be clear it's looking very good right now Arsenal could just be about to unlock something very very special very quickly before I get into it. Hit like and subscribe and I'm going to start with a quick question. Arsenal are playing in the Champions League on Wednesday against Napoli. Do you rotate the team if so what changes do you make? I would love to know. Look what I like about Michel Arte. There's been question marks around Michel Arte. It's been a massive week. So many people were bashing him for so many things. He has to change the left winger. He has to change the striker. How lucky are we that Michel Arte does it. It would appear listen to outside noise because if he did,

1:02Zollis wouldn't have played. If he did, Kai Havards wouldn't have started and both of these guys were fundamental to the three points Arsenal just accrued against Chelsea. Now what I look for in some games is not just how do you play, how do you win? There's so many different ways to win a football match and the one that Arsenal just played against Chelsea was perfect for what we needed to see because it's still so early on in the season where you don't really know what you're going to get. Sure you can go out and blow teams away free-nil but when you need to show grit, heart, determination, that is so much more important when you're trying to understand if your team is good enough to do what most people want you to do. And that is go and win the league, fight for the title, fight for the Champions League. So I liked how we won. I thought that was a massive positive. Can you come from behind? Like I said, anyone can do it when it's nice and easy. But can you come from behind against a title rival? Everyone's been saying about Chelsea, they are in this Premier League title race. You go and listen to the media, you go and listen to the content creators

2:04before the season started. Most of them, including me, were putting them in the title race. Some people had them second, some people had third. Now I might have a different opinion on that a bit later, which we're going to get on. But Chelsea will be in and around it. That game against Arsenal, I'm sure they can take a lot from it. But I as an Arsenal fan understand that this team still has what it takes to pull through a game. And what's even more important, I feel Arsenal are picking up points where we didn't last season. Not just I'm not talking about this. I'm talking about you look at the game against Villa. I'm trying to judge if I'm trying to assess what Arsenal are, what the other teams are. And we're going to speak about who are the main title rivals because there has been some movement. But how good are your team? How do you react to adversity? What can you do when things are looking tough? Michelin, it has proven that Arsenal are winners. The players have proven we are still the best team in the world.

3:04Look for vulnerabilities. I look at other teams and I think right Chelsea, probably vulnerable defensively city. You could probably have the same question in midfield. Maybe they're a bit weak. So many additions that they haven't had time to gel when he showed in the last game against Coventry. They are nowhere near as strong as Arsenal. If you're a manager trying to look through Arsenal's team now, where are Arsenal's vulnerability? What are people pinpointing as Arsenal's weaknesses? Because I truly don't understand them. Now, I know what most people have been saying. The attack isn't good enough, but our attack is already showing that we're doing things that we couldn't last season. Not only are we picking up points when we couldn't in certain games, but we haven't relied on set pieces this season. Now, every fan I speak to is Arsenal's attack is rubbish. And I don't care what the fans say, but you listen to the media. Arsenal's attack at times isn't good enough. And I look at the way Arsenal were playing in the attacking third this season. You look at the way Ode to God's playing. You look at the way Zolis is playing.

4:05Kai Havards is playing. All of these guys are outperformed. Certainly Ode to God and Havards are far improved in their form as to what they was last season. Martin Ode to God's already doubled his goal tally in three games. Kai Havards on track to smash how many goals he got last season. Now, he was injured for a large portion of last season. He only got seven goals. But if he continues this current rate of goal scoring, he will be up and around 20 goals. And again, people laugh when you say Kai Havards can score 20 goals, but two seasons ago, he was on 15 goals and then he got injured and he missed. Was it three, four months at the end of the season? He is a striker that's good enough to score 20 goals. I like, in fact, that loads of people in the media are finally coming out and giving Kai Havards his props. OK, I know he's my mate. You either love him or you hate him. I really like what Kai Havards does. And the fact that Jamie Carragher is coming out and saying, right, even if he isn't this deadly striker, even if I think they can sign this world class striker because that was his opinion.

5:06He's a bit like Firminio where he does so much for the team that it is so underrated. Kai Havards, I feel, is going to have a massive season. Now I know the talks in the fan base are Yoko Resor Kai Havards. I'm going to have to do another separate video on that because the talking points around that are so big. It seems like we have the conversation weekly, which is good because it means there's always new talking points. Someone's putting in a certain performance and it changes the dialogue. For me, if I had to start a game like the Champions League game and it was a final or a semi final, when you have to play your best team right now, I play Kai Havards. I know some people would play Victor Yoko Res and I'm not saying that I prefer one or the other because last season, like I change last season. I was protecting Kai Havards because everyone was on to Victor Yoko Res and then it's like when one of them does good, they always put a negative on the other one. And now when Kai Havards is doing good, I'm doing it the other way. I'm like, no, I can still appreciate Kai Havards, but I can also appreciate Victor Yoko Res. Now, did he look sloppy when he come on against Chelsea?

6:07Yes, but again, he hasn't played many minutes, so I'm not going to judge him off a 15-minute cameo. I think they can both be good enough. No set-piece goals, though, that is a positive. And now I look at the team for the Champions League game and the main question is, do you rotate it? Will Arterta rotate it? I think he has to. Now, can he get away with not rotating the team this early into a season where there's not many minutes in the legs and the fatigue isn't at the highest? Yes, but I think you have to give yourself every advantage down the road. And although you probably can play players for more minutes early on in the season, doesn't necessarily mean it's a good idea. I think, I made a video probably about a week ago talking about the strength in depth, how Arsenal have two great players in every position. I've changed three or four players in this game. Off the top of my head, and again, we've just been speaking about Yoko Rez or Havots. Rest Havots in this one, play Vic the Yoko Rez. Again, you need both of these guys firing. That's one of the things I'm like, if you prefer Havots or if you prefer fine,

7:11but surely you want the other guy to do well as well. It's almost like because Kai Havots is playing well, no one wants to give Vic the Yoko Rez a chance. Not realizing we're going to have to use him further down the road. So I'm not like, let's keep playing Havots because he's in form. I'm like, right, we know he's in form. We're going to still start him in the Premier League game. But let's give Vic the Yoko Rez a chance. Let's see if we can get some goals in his legs because regardless of if Havots is good enough or he isn't, there will be moments where Yoko Rez is forced to play. And if you haven't played him at all, you need to try and gain some momentum into Vic the Yoko Rez. He's a good player, good goal scorer. So for me, I think Vic the Yoko Rez is the first change. I'd be very surprised if Lewis Skelly starts in this one. Again, nothing on his performance, but let's just rotate. Declan Rice, if he needs to come out. The talk before the season was Declan Rice and Bokai O Sakka might not be available until the first international break. These guys have basically played every game. So one thing I'm hoping is, Mikolata has learned a little bit to just rotate, trust the team.

8:14Now we know he's had a few transfer windows to where he could build the squad up to a level where I hope he can trust the team more. That's the way I look at it, bringing in players like Conza. We've already got players like Miscarra. We've brought him Bruno Gimma Rice. You've got Zubimendi in midfield. No one can tell me this team isn't good enough to rotate for five, even six players and still be good enough to beat Napoli. Again, Napoli's a tough game. It's in the Champions League. It's away from home, but their form isn't great. They're like 11th in the league. Now, sure, only three games have been played, but they've lost two, and they've only won one. And that was against Genoa, who are 19th. They've lost every single game. Lost to Como, lost it into Milan. So again, although I'm not getting ahead of myself and saying this is going to be easy, I would love it. If Mikolata looks at this game and says, right, there's an opportunity here to give some minutes to some, like Max Dalman, he's a massive talking point for me going into this game because people were frustrated that Arsenal didn't bring in another attacker. And although I think we've got enough players, that was only with the prerequisite

9:16of Max Dalman needs to play more minutes. If you'll let EFN1Y go out on loan, the only way I can see that as feasible or a good idea is if the minutes that EFN1Y would have had is now put into the development of Max Dalman. Max Dalman could be perfect for this game. Now, I don't know how Arthetta's going to shuffle it. What does Max Dalman want to be? Mikolata has deployed him, mainly from what I can remember as a right-wing. I swiffy is going to be the right-winger. That means you have to play him. Does that mean Matawake misses out? Not necessarily. Does Matawake go out onto the left? You could say whatever Ricie is is there, but he might want to rest Marti in Odegaard as well. And if Ezra plays Central, that allows you to play Matawake out on the left, Max Dalman on the right and Vic DeYocca res up front. And people can say that's not strong enough, but like these players are still great players. They're still like Max Dalman's more than good enough to play against Napoli. Give him a chance in the Champions League. There comes a point with a young player where you just have to say go. Go and play football because I know you're good enough. That's the way I'd be looking at this Max Dalman situation.

10:18Could it work? Yeah, I don't see many negatives. He might have a bad game, so what? He's 16 years old. Not every game's going to be unbelievable. We've got some tough games in this Champions League group stage, so there's not going to become many moments where you can rest these players. And I'm not looking at the Napoli one and saying go super weak because I don't look at any of our players and think we have to go. There's no super weak in this team. Every rotation option is strong enough. That's why I'm looking at Napoli and saying, let's show how good our second team is. I truly, if Arsenal rest 11 players and go Kepa must scare a change. Everything Calafuri, Zubimendi, Bruno Gimmeraias, Matawake, Yocca res Dalman, I still think we beat Napoli. Now tougher fixtures will come. We've got to play bi-immunic. We've got to play Raumadrid. But I'm not looking at the Napoli one. I'm thinking right, we need to play our best team. Kai Havurt, so to God, Declan Rice and everything like that. The final thing I wanted to touch on, Man City and Arsenal look like they're going to be going to the title. I spoke about it earlier very briefly.

11:20Chelsea are in with a shout, but the main team it seems like Arsenal have got to battle with Man City. Now it's very early. Things can still change, but if you asked a lot of people before the season, most of them probably would have said, we're going to be battling Man City. It looks like that will be the case. Am I scared of Man City? No, I think people are bigger than them up far too much. And again, as an Arsenal fan, I'm not getting ahead of myself. I'm just saying I have full confidence in this team. We're on the same goal difference as Man City. And you look at the games that Arsenal have played. We've played Coventry, Villa and Chelsea. Man City have played Coventry, Palace and Bournemouth. Same goal difference. We beat Palace 3-0. Man City beat them 1-0 again. What does that mean? Different teams played different abilities on different days. I understand that. But nothing has suggested to me that this Man City team we should be totally afraid of, because that's the dialogue I'm seeing online. So I'm Arsenal people are still putting out City are ahead of us now. City have made all these signings Arsenal because they didn't do the business that these guys would have liked to have seen in January.

12:21The Summer Transfer window. They believe we're now behind City. And I'm like, I haven't seen any of that so far. It's interesting. Look, the full match breakdown against Napoli will be coming out tomorrow. I'm going away tomorrow night. I'm going to be in Spain. And I don't know if I'm going to be able to make videos. It will certainly be a different setting if I do. I'm just going to have to stand there walking around Spain with my phone. If you want to see those type of videos, let me know. Or if you would prefer it in the, I don't know, the more professional set up in the studio, slightly more, I don't know, I'll just hand out slightly more talking points. This one's been slightly rushed as well because I'm trying to pack. I'm trying to get ready to go away tomorrow. So this one is, you know, been a bit messy as well. But that's what they will be going forward. If you guys want to continue to watch those type of videos, let me know and I'll try and make a couple while I'm out there. Thank you so much to everyone for watching and listening before you go. If you could do me a quick favor, just hit like and subscribe. And I'll speak to you all in tomorrow's video. Gooners, have a good day.