New Players
The sharp edge of the attacking force is now being placed on the shoulders of a French, a Spanish, and a Geman player, all of whom are new to the team, on the one hand, and new to the premiere league on the other. It was clear from the first two games that the misplaced passes, the misunderstood or mistimed runs show that the new players need time to integrate with the play of their new teammates and their roles in the Arsenal team tactics. You could see the consternation on the faces of all three new players when they were tackled in ways that would have clearly been fouls in the leagues they are coming from, but where the premiere league referee in each game just motioned play on. They will take time to get used to the premiere league. The truth is that, when the passing and running off the ball was fluid, Arsenal did find openings in both the Sunderland and Stoke games. More importantly, the cohesion was better against Stoke than it was against Sunderland. It is these facts that lead me to believe that with time, this starting team for the Stoke game, augmented by the play of Theo Walcott, Jack Wilshere, and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, will produce goals and even, as expected, spectacular goals. Note that last season Olivier Giroud scored 44% of Montpeliers goals and Lukas Podolski scored 64% of Colognes. Different leagues we would all say, but the fact is they have experience scoring large numbers of goals. The fans and the media just have to be patient. Arsenals next game is against Liverpool and this would be a good time for the new boys to show what they have learnt in the first two games.