Granit Xhaka

Wenger like Ferguson doesn’t believe in midfielders only having one job, ie defending. Saying he’s a B2B doesn’t mean he won’t be our deepest midfielder but he will have times while he’s expected to come forward and get involved with the attack.

It does make you wonder what the exact idea was with this signing.

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:facepalm:

I don’t want to see Xhaka marauding up and down the field. All I can see is Song’s scenario play through again; from having an astute DM to then having muddled playmaker DM that didn’t suit us at the time. We did get some lush goals from this but that’s beside the point.

Xhaka is already moulding into a brilliant DLP coupled with a decent defensive brain, but we have any one of Cazorla/Ramsey/Elneny/Le Coq (as b2b - who can play alongside him) and Mesut at #10. To me that looks like a balanced midfield. Our possession is nowhere near as good as it used to be and when we have everybody three-quarters up the pitch, we eventually get dispossessed and a break occurs leaving whoever is back left in the wilderness whilst we chase back through the trees. All because Xhaka is a poxy b2b.

It’s brinkmanship. And I bet if he is used in such a way that we’ll see a fair amount of red cards in the process.

@YJYUX

.#WengerGonnaWenger

Xhaka isn’t a B2B at all. Sure he may push forward now and again, but no way is his job to be sprinting from B2B at every given opportunity.

For me he’s a deep-lying playmaker that also has the ability break up play with his aggressive nature. Kind of like Xabi Alonso but with a bite to his game. He’s just too cumbersome to be marauding up and down the field IMO.

Not sure why Wenger mentions Xhaka as a B2B. He was comparing him to Petit and praising he DLP qualities few weeks ago

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Wenger wants his players to have the ability to bomb forward. But Xhaka is more of a defensive DLP, tbf.

Wenger always seemed against a “proper” DM. Coquelin is the closest we’ve come in years and that wasn’t exactly him going out and identifying a target and even then, I always saw him as more B2B when he was younger and he does still like to charge forward.

I think this might be a slight difference in terminology between a pensioner and the Football Manager generation. I highly doubt he means that he wants Xhaka to play as what we’d define as the textbook B2B, running up and down all game and sat next to a proper holding DM. His description - engine, power, long pass, coming deep and distributing, I mean he’s not exactly talking Matuidi or Ramsey here is he and a few weeks ago he was comparing him to Petit which seems pretty fair and that’s still using most of the qualities he mentions.

Nobody likes to call anyone a midfielder these days, you have to be a DLP, B2B, DM, AM. Really he’s mix of many things and B2B is probably just the label Wenger’s stuck on him this week to say he doesn’t just sit there and make tackles and hit long balls.

I would imagine he probably means he’d want to play something like Xhaka // Cazorla, with Xhaka maybe doing some of the leg work and Cazorla pulling the strings from deeper on the occasions that Xhaka was further up. Cazorla isn’t exactly a textbook midfielder so there’s probably going to be some give and take with the roles of the pair. Coquelin likes to have the odd burst and Cazorla stays back, I’d imagine this would be a similar kind of set up but we’ll have to wait and see.

I know we criticise Wenger for a lot but I highly doubt he’s going to be end up doing a square peg, round hole job on Xhaka. He’ll probably turn into the king of our midfield in the next few years.

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I also think terminology may have been mixed up, as much criticism can be levelled at Wenger I think the Xhaka signing will turn out to be a masterstroke as our midfield general in years to come.

Best believe Wenger would not drop that kind of money on a CM if he didn’t know what he intended to do with him, under the right management Xhaka could end up being a complete midfielder in the vein of not only Alonso but also Kroos as well who I believe he also shares some similarities with.

B2B for Wenger probably means he’ll be able to do everything which seems to be his obvious trajectory.

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I just want to see Xhaka-Cazorla already FFS. I understand the idea behind Coquelin–at least it must be in Wenger’s mind–is to win the ball back higher up the pitch, but nothing facilitates winning the ball back higher up the pitch than controlling the game in the opponent’s half and a Xhaka-Cazorla midfield should help us do just that.

That’s the most frustrating thing about Wenger to me these days, there’s just no real vision of how to play, none of that arrogance from before of, I don’t care who the opposition is, my team playing my way is better. I just see a lot of survivalism and a lot of half-assed tactics. I have to wonder to what extent the Liverpool, Chelsea, and Everton fiascos from the spring of 14 really traumatised him.

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Panties
Bunch

Over miniscule quote.

Only Arsenal Lillies…

Xhaka is a player capable to play in all the positions on midfield, probably Wenger was sure to be understood. I don’t think he prefers the swiss as box to box midfielder, but his immense qualities could be good in some occasion when the team needs to up the line of the midfield and play with major pressure on attack. Especially Granit (like Elneny) have a weapon who Coquelin, Ramsey and Cazorla don’t have: a powerful long shot.

Wenger, with his quote about Xhaka, hasn’t caged the player into a specific role like the deep-lying midfielder, confining him in a single battle to play with Francis Coquelin, excluding Cazorla and Ramsey.

Sincerly, despite Santi Cazorla is the light of this squad, I would like to see Granit with Ramsey or with Coquelin or Momo Elneny. I want a couple capable to balance power and technic, to balance the weight to fight against hard midfields to beat like Chelsea (Matic- Kante), Manchester United (Fellaini - Pogba), Everton (Gueye - Barry), the same Soton who have caused problem at home playing with Oriol Romeu, Davies and Jordy Clasie.

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Hopefully that will be the midfield announced today. We played our only good football all season in the first half of the Watford game when we had Xhaka-Cazorla on the pitch.

Despite playing him a lot thus far, I still don’t think Wenger really rates Coquelin.

Best pinger of a ball at the club since Francesc Fabregas Soler. Needs to be in that deep-lying playmaker role (I believe wankers might call it ‘the quarterback position’).

Then fit Cazorla, or Ramsey, or Coquelin/Elneny next to him, dependent on whether we’re home or away, how good the opposition is and how much of the ball we’re likely to get. Cazorla doesn’t have the legs for 90 minutes twice a week anyway I suspect, plenty of opportunity for rotation.

I expect Elneny might eventually displace Coquelin from the picture altogether for that role in the team/squad, perhaps Wenger’s just waiting for him to show that. Not sure he trusts Le Coq fully.

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:joy:

Cant stand that term either

gif request on that one? unzips pants

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ea nerf xhaka pls

A gif immediately, please.

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