My views on the match: That was our best performance of the season. The occasion, the quality of the opponents and the way we stepped up meant that everyone, including the 9000 who went all put their best game on. For the first time in a game agains the "big teams" we not only soaked up the pressure, but also offered a threat on the break, which meant we always looked like we could nick something, and so it proved. I've said it before, that there's not point in lining up with two solid banks of 4 and being difficult to break down, if you don't then make Spurs/Man City/Arsenal/Southampton or whoever a little bit worried about what you'll do if they overcommit to attack. When all you do is defend, all they have to do is attack, attack, attack until they score, but if, as today, you can go at them on the break, then they're always nervous. I don't know how or why we were able to to it today, when we've failed so often to offer anything on the break, but who cares. We did and it worked. Pants - looks like a solid and reliable 'keeper. Had me worried in the final minute when he let the ball bounce loose from the shot from the edge of the box, but it was worth it to see Wellbeck's stunning miss. Nyom - I am not his biggest fan, but today I thought he was excellent. Easily his best performance of 2016 Ake - top quality as usual, though did let an Arsenal guy past him a bit too easily in the box during the first half. Prodl - shaky to start with but grew into the game Cathcart - looked like a top, top defender Behrami - just what we needed in the middle Watson - not his best game, if judged by his own high standards Gueds - apart from one awful sideways ball to an Arsenal player, he was awesome. He gives us a dynamic we've been missing. It's a shame he's not even been used from the bench much because as a wide player who can attack and create, I can't for the life of me see why our creativity starved side has not seen his introduction earlier in the season. Capoue - Worked his socks off for once and did not look casual Deeney - will one day have a stand named after him or a statue outside the Vic. This performance typified the reasons why. Ighalo - despite scoring still didn't look back to his best. It was great to see him try to play Deeney in twice, however, what's missing is quality. I don't think he's a greedy player or a bad person - I just think he has very poor awareness and bad control. By the time he knows where the ball is at his feet and has taken a second to look up, the opportunity has already gone. That's why he shoots every time, because that's all he can do. Not trying to slate him, just my observation of his limitations. His strength, on the other hand, is the way he wiggles and leans into defenders with the ball at his feet, enabling him to turn, like he did to Gabriel. That goal was pure Iggy. Subs: All the subs were actually tactically and timing wise, spot on in my view. Kiki got it all bang on, from the starting line up to the changes. Anya - has been called all sorts of names recently, today he was superb when he came on and really helped see the game out Abdi - Coming on for Gueds was the right move, less likely to lose possession and also gave a bit more steel to the midfield Amrabat - came on and chased everything up front meaning that defenders made mistakes, we got the ball in the channels and the corners occasionally and were able to better see out the final 10 minutes. Nice. All round nice.
Generally they did, but from describing that scenario you were right close to me. In that case you definitely wouldn't have missed a bald Arsenal fan shouting in our ears "You haven't won f*** all" looking like he wanted to deck us on the road. At least that woman took the banter, this guy I'm describing definitely couldn't
That pass in the first half from Capoue to Ighalo that led to him not quite being able to find Troy.. Pass of the season. Brilliant
Cathcart, what a fantastic performance, him and Deeney stand out.. I thought Cathcart was the most stupid signing we have ever made due to what we could go for when we got him, so happy to feel humble now and say I was wrong, he is quality.. He seems to be the glue in the defence, the blocks he did today as well were so brave, should be up there for player of season.
Flores....“Everyone is completely happy. They were playing music very loudly in the dressing room afterwards. I don’t know what music is playing but it’s not so good - not for my age!" Hee hee. Poor Quique! Bless. http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/watford-boss-quique-flores-hails-7551699
Cathcart. Wow Prodl. Wow Ighalo and Deeney up top second half. Wow Gabriel foul on Deeney. Ow Capoue 's pass to Ighalo. Wow Geudioura all action display. Wow Troy Deeney setting up another two goals. Wow Ighalo celebrating his goal with a big salute to the fans. Wow Geudioura thunderbolt. Lots of wows Seeing Arsenal making a desperate triple substitution. Wow Pants comedy timewasting. Erm Wellbeck playing himself into a starting England place with that miss. Roy? Everyone at the final whistle. Won Arsenes post match press conference. What? Amazing day. Amazing season. Amazing that it's with our club, our so called little club
In his career to date, QSF has won 6 cup competitions, and lost another in the final. There's something about knockout football that seems to bring out the best in him!
He definitely needs to continue to work on it but credit where its due, he played a great lob ball through to Deeney in the build up for Gueds
Well done to Mers for calling it http://football-talk.co.uk/110872/paul-merson-makes-his-prediction-for-arsenals-fa-cup-clash-against-watford/?
It worked because Deeney and Ighalo had their way with Mertesacker and Gabriel. We sit deep and create isolations and 2v2 situations, which are always going to yield chances. Just like every other win this season. I think 90% of clubs in this league have worked this out, hence our drop off since last year. But Wenger is too busy drowning in his own philosophy to worry about a team like Watford.
An interesting tactical analysis from Michael Cox (Zonal Marking) on the Guardian http://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2016/mar/13/watford-arsenal-fa-cup-tactics Basically saying that Quique was bang on
In case anyone hasn't heard it; the sweet, sensual sound of an orgasmic Jon Marks. http://wfc.net/15-16/goals/Arsenal_FAC_a2.mp3
Tactically speaking, there was absolutely nothing remotely new or interesting about how either team played today. Quique was bang on in that he changed nothing - we set up how we always do.
Nah definitely one of them. He went so close to us he looked like he was either trying to smell our heads or nut us with his forehead
I wonder if there could be a retrospective ban on the way since there was no action taken. Horrible challenge, and the club should issue a complaint, seeing as we play them again in a few weeks...
In hospital unfortunately so my ticket was donated to someone more deserving. I thought I'd never give a stuff about the FA Cup again. I'm an idiot.
I had to fly to Norway straight after the game. As the plane climbed over London there was a great view of Wembley Stadium at night - the amazing thing was that the whole of the inside of the stadium was bathed in GOLDEN light - I thought it must be a sign, then realised the entire pitch was being treated with rows of lamps......
Just back. Haven't read any other posts. My thoughts: * excellent salt beef bagel with all the trimmings from the pop-up outside the ground before the game * our back 4 were once again absolutely superb. I don't remember us ever having a better, more consistent back line than what we have this season. * the game plan worked a treat. * Igs & Deeney back to form. * great support, before, during & after the game. * they can knock down and rebuild Highbury but the Arse still can't lay the Watford ghost when it comes to the FA Cup. * my MOTM was Deeney - no fear, no complaining, no surrender. What a Watford legend.
Me neither, even in GT's golden era. McClelland & Co were great back then, I reckon this lot are if anything slightly better.
We should now have a song for Gueidora after that goal: ROCKET MAN And I think it's gonna be a long long time Till I see a goal as fast as that again You hit the ball and we thought it missed Oh no no no Your a rocket man Rocket man burning out his fuse in Arsenal's goal
"It's a committed, full-blooded challenge [by Gabriel]. It's probably a yellow card. It's the FA Cup, I like to see tackling in football, it's important." Joey Barton; Advocate of 2-footed out-of-control tackles.
You couldn't have scripted any of that could you?! I mean you could try in a kind of Roy of the Rovers parallel universe when we were back to the free scoring side of late 2015, but even back then people would think you bonkers to predict this... Four games without any of our players scoring, 9 defeats out of 10 against the top 6 sides with the team having fallen from 8th to 13th in recent weeks, and just when it matters we only go and win at the Emirates in quite possibly the performance/result of the season, courtesy of potential boo-boy Ighalo (who only last week one disgruntled fan said we should have sold in January!) and a player who barely gets a sniff earning his first start with dazzling colours and a spectacular strike that will take a long time to fade from memory, if at all. But that's QSF and the team all over - time and again this season they've defied the odds and answered their critics, and especially if our league form picks up, who knows what heights our season could reach? And it's also the nature of this amazing and unique Premier League season over - should I be that surprised in a season where Leicester are five points clear at the top, title winners Chelsea have only just climbed into a top half position, West Ham could be getting a Champions League place at the expense of both Manchester clubs, and tiny Bournemouth have all but secured safety with eight games to go? But I am surprised in the best possible sense - and needless to say, bloody delighted. And how symbolic that this result should be achieved during the first glorious rays of spring, after a series of games that had largely been as dull and frigid as the weather. And I don't think it's at all ironic that it's the exact opposite of what Flores has been criticized for that paid such dividends today - his tactics from day one have always been about forming a solid base from which to build a team capable of creating chances and scoring, so that when the latter part fails (as it will inevitably do from time to time against much tougher defences than in the Championship) we still have a strong defence to fall back on - a much more sensible approach than the other way around, as Muff are more the exception than the rule that as newly promoted teams that you can't expect to outscore teams week in week out. But I see him as entirely pragmatic rather than cautious or conservative - he's already shown on several occasions that he isn't afraid to try new formations/tactics/players to make best use of the personnel available, like near the start of the season when he quickly realized that Deeney and Ighalo had to be in the same team, and then he changed the formation to three in midfield to halt a run of four straight defeats and accommodate Jurado in his more favourable position, and then back to a more orthodox 4-4-2 when Jurado got injured. And while like I said, I wasn't expecting the manner of victory as it turned out, it wasn't entirely a bolt out of the blue either, nor do I regard it as one of those form book turned upside down cup shocks like Bradford's win at Chelsea or Blackburn's victory in Arsenal's previous home FA Cup defeat a couple of seasons before - I was always confident we'd see another West Ham/Liverpool performance before the season was out, and there'd been more than few glimpses of it coming together in the first half against Chelsea and the whole game at Man Utd, where we were excellent in all but finding the back of the net. Anyway, onto the match/day out itself - after taking the club's warnings about arriving at the ground in good time somewhat too literally, and having an 11.00 brunch consisting of porridge and your traditional English fry/grill up, I got there just after 12:30, and sure enough the warnings were proved to be a load of bollox - I was in my seat by 12:45 despite going more than halfway round the stadium to get in through turnstile M! The Emirates are a magnificent ground, easily my favourite of the big stadiums, and the feeling I get crossing the North bridge isn't that far removed from that when traversing Wembley Way. Sure the atmosphere from the home fans isn't great, but that's pretty much the norm for any big club where most of the fans expect to win everything, and this was more than made up for with the noise from our lot - infinitely better than at Wembley, with very few if any apparent daytrippers, and our fans immensely supportive of our team throughout, especially during the tense final 30 minutes when even a two goal lead could easily be squandered against a team of Arsenal's calibre. The only gripe I had was when people overreacted somewhat to the Welbeck miss to make it 2-2, so much so I was convinced it had gone in with people saying "typical Watford" (it's inevitable that any lesser team with the audacity to go 2-0 up at Arsenal will find themselves pinned back and usually concede sooner or later), but that's a tiny nitpick. And there were a few around me grumbling early on about people being out of our seats, but so *****ing what? It was great, after the club's stupidly draconian warnings to us to remain seated, to see so many blissfully defiant (if not downright oblivious) to this "rule" and stewards being content to let us be, and the scenes of people huddled together around the steps and edges of the seats and the surges when we scored were a wonderful hark back to the much missed terrace days. The match - after the first half I was a bit concerned it was going to be at best a typical performance against top 5 opposition, that we'd battle hard but not create much and ultimately lose by the odd goal or two. But it was still a far more convincing and smarter defensive display than at Spurs, and 0-0 at the break was certainly not lucky and undeserved - passes were finding players, not desperate punts out of danger that inevitably came boomeranging back (in fact remarkably very little of that until the final nail-biting ten minutes). But the second half was something altogether - regarding the Arsenal fan on 5Live who was wondering what on earth was said in the changing rooms at half-time to make them play as poorly as they did, well I was wondering the exact thing with Flores, because to a man we were magnificent. Vague half chances became gilt-edged opportunities, and with far more frequency than in the first 45 - Ighalo missed a sitter with probably an easier chance than the one he scored from, and Deeney was probably a bit unlucky with Anya's assist late on. It was still backs to the wall at times, but generally I thought we were more comfortable defending our lead than in the home game vs City. It was also particularly heartening to see our side set up to perform exactly as Michael Cox described us under Flores in his scouting report - aggressive, combative and energetic in midfield (with Deeney and Behrami best epitomizing those qualities) much like Everton vs supposed favourites Chelsea yesterday, constantly disrupting Arsenal's passing rhythm and limiting them to few truly clear cut changes despite their wealth of possession. Finally, a few thoughts on our players: Pantilimon - his towering height helps of course, but he's still a very reliable no. 2 goalie by any standards, alert and quick in his catching, not afraid to tip over under pressure, and his distribution in goal kicks is just as good as Gomes. Ake - a three-way tie between him, Deeney and Guedioura as my MotM, lets nothing pass him, and a great cross to Iggy to nearly make it 2-0 Cathcart - a rock, his passing out of defence has come on by leaps and bounds this season Prodl - awful free kick early on (what was he thinking?) but otherwise a typically intelligent performance, knows how to make long clearances without them going straight back to the opposition Nyom - the last two away games have seen him getting back to his best, really solid and actually quite composed on the ball this time Capoue - reliable as so often, fully deserving of the Capoue chant that rang out so often this match Watson - not his best, but quite tidy in possession and much improved set-pieces from last week Behrami - is fast becoming a contender for top 5 player of the season. Just a joy to watch how he turns the craft of physical yet clean midfield aggression into a beautiful art form Guedioura - has the genie finally been let out of the bottle and QSF is seeing on the training ground what many of us hoped we'd see from him on the pitch? A truly revelatory performance that successfully transferred his qualities at Championship level to the top stage and more - creativity, passing, energy and a rare (but no less beautiful) goal to top it all. Deeney - awesome team performance from back to front, with determination, running and skill in abundance - practically flattened one of their players in our half and provided two vital assists, generally seems to be playing better away than at home, perhaps that's where the underdog mentality suits him best? Ighalo - not his blistering best, but that goal could spark a much needed return to form. Like Moog said, I don't think selfishness is a problem with him, so much as poor decision making - twice in the first half he attempted to pass to a well-marked Deeney when actually shooting would have been a better option, but I think his good intentions paid off in the second half when Deeney returned the favour - as unselfish a player he is, I wouldn't have blamed him if, if Ighalo had continued going for glory like at Man Utd, he might have lost patience and thought "well ***** you, you're on your own". But these two proved the undroppable partnership that they are, and here's for more goals from them in the nearby future! Subs Anya - like others I've been a bit unconvinced by him at times, but his pace and workrate makes him a useful defensive (if this time enforced) sub, effective enough for seeing the game out like at Chelsea Abdi - gave us a bit more defensive solidity, but not sure he presently matches Guedioura from an attacking perspective assuming Adlene can keep this level up Amrabat - OK attempt late on - did enough to give us some variation in our attacking, but certainly shouldn't be starting in place of either Troy or Iggy. Now for the draw tomorrow night, can't wait. Please, please let it be anyone than Everton!
LondonOrn Never mind Marlon feckin Brando. I always enjoy reading your posts. However... From a non-pedantic twunt who happens to teach English: * no more than 10 to 15 words in a sentence * no more than 3 or 4 sentences in a paragraph * fewer dashes; they should be as rare as an Ighalo assist * ALWAYS white space between each sentence when composing a player performance list * ALWAYS double space after a full stop * NEVER give ammunition to the empty vessels lurking in these parts. For me, Behrami was MoM, closely followed by Guedioura (take note of sp. GD), the rest of the team and then the nigh-on 9000. The paramedics who attended the Settee End in Steel City following my seizure in the last ten minutes of the game said: "Serves you right you fookin Plastic!!!".
