Also whatever Ramsdale is wearing is painful on the eyes

Half time report for those not watching...

Ramsdale - Hasn't had to do much. Overall looks fine
Saliba - Look good. No lingering signs of injury so far.
Gabi - Few iffy passes but overall good
White - Very active and playing well
Kiwior - Playing the inverted role and looking quite natural. Has spent most of the game in Nurnberg's half including drifting over to the right a couple times. Could be a sign that we need to go ahead and let KT go. Interesting to see if he gets more time at LB on the US tour.
Partey - Looks solid
Trossard - Has looked fine at LCM. Drifts to the sideline a bit too much at times.
Vieira - Looks solid. Pretty active so far. No mistakes but nothing exciting either. Took a couple bad free kicks.
Nelson - Very active. Had a couple nice cutbacks but nothing came from it.
Saka - Looks like Saka. Been hacked a couple times. Hoping he comes out at half. Maybe move Trossard to the wing and put Havertz at LCM?
Eddie - Really hasn't done anything.

Overall we have controlled the match but not doing enough in the final 3rd. Would like to see Balogun in the 2nd half. Maybe he and Jesus together with Jesus on the wing.

It looks a bit highlighter bright but may not be as bad with a better stream. The camera's don't seem to be handling the bright sun very well.

Thought Trossard and Nelson kept getting in each others way quite a bit. Trossard definitely likes playing winger more than CM. Good connection between them though

Agree. Think that is the issue with Trossard drifting wide from that LCM spot. He is capable of playing more central but his instincts will always be to get his heals on the sideline. Unless the others around him adjust to that, there will end up being congestion around him. Saw the same issue at times during the season when he was playing F9. However in those games Martinelli had enough positional awareness to drift inside and take up his vacated space.

Halftime subs

Hein for Rams
KT for Kiwior
Cedric for Saliba (White shifted to CB)
Jorginho for Partey
Jesus for Saka
Havertz for Nelson (Trossard shifted to LW)

*** EDIT *** Eddie appears to be playing LW and Trossard F9 (at least for now)

Eddie and Jesus are playing wide right now with Trossard up top. Interesting

Balogun on for Trossard

wangus12 said:

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Balogun on for Trossard

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With Jesus shifting inside. May be testing out Eddie & Balogun to see who can be more versatile. My recollection of Eddie's prior W outings were that he quickly disappeared.

I'll stop multitasking to watch Balogun.

Nwaneri for Vieira
Trusty for Gabi

Balogun hits the post on a tough angle from a poor pass decision from Jesus

Dang Nwaneri got some pace

Long distance goal for Nurnberg off a bad pass from Hein

Ugly

Not sure he is ready for fulltime 1st team action but I would like to see him get some time in domestic cups this season.

Nwaneri's control at his age is starting to remind me of Cesc. Getting him to resign is gonna turn out to be a great move

Walters for White
Lewis-Skelly for Eddie

Balogun looks to be in the middle now with Jesus at LW and Nwaneri at RW

Oh damn what a bad miss from Balogun

My 2nd half assessment for those not watching...

Hein - Some iffy moments. Needs a loan for regular reps
White - Solid at CB. Not as active but to be expected with a different position.
Gabi - Same as 1st half.
Trusty - Didn't notice him too much. Made a couple iffy passes and out of position on a couple breaks but recovered well.
Walters - Positionally sound but otherwise looked a bit nervous.
KT - Looked to be playing more inverted. Overall looked solid but didn't stand out to me like Kiwior did.
Cedric - Felt like he was playing for a spot on the roster. Maybe trying a bit too hard to impress at times.
Jorginho - Similar to Partey. Played solid but you pretty much forget he is there.
Havertz - No major issues but didn't really stand out
Vieira - same as 1st half
Jesus - Very active. Looks to be in form. Just missing that final touch.
Balogun - Very active at RW & ST. Missed 2-3 decent chances. Really should have put atleast 1 of those away.
Eddie - Same as 1st half but from the LW. Got a few more touches but didn't really do anything with it.
Nwaneri - Biggest standout in MF. Not sure he is ready for regular 1st team rotation but he needs some domestic cup appearances this season. Liked him at RCM bunch better than RW.
Lewis-Skelly - Pretty active but didn't stand out.

MLS did have the great ball to Balo at the end there. Balogun really had a rough day finishing

Didn't realize that was him. He and Nwaneri look so much alike when you aren't zoomed in.

Balogun overall looked much better than Eddie both at W & ST. Missing that last chance was rough. A good/seasoned ST buries that.

Positive today was the number of shots but the negative not many on net, much less the back of the net.

Guy on another forum thinks Nwaneri made that pass

Ethan Nwaneri. 🌟 pic.twitter.com/vpGg6b79A9

— afcstuff (@afcstuff) July 13, 2023

Vieira needs to watch his back. If Nwaneri keeps it up we may see Vieira loaned in Jan.

Amazing how quickly the internet turns on players. Reddit loved Turner after the pk save the other night, but today people are saying we definitely need another GK because of Hein's mistake and apparently now Turner is nowhere near good enough.

Balogun is now the worst and must be sold immediately (probably some angsty brits mad about his switch) because of his misses even though Jesus and Eddie were even more anonymous today.

Trusty also needs to be sold because again he isn't any good while he did nothing out of place besides a few bad passes which every player had

wangus12 said:

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Amazing how quickly the internet turns on players. Reddit loved Turner after the pk save the other night, but today people are saying we definitely need another GK because of Hein's mistake and apparently now Turner is nowhere near good enough.

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Turner is fine as a backup. As an American, I would prefer he was starting somewhere.
Hein needs a loan. Not because of that mistake (happens with all GKers at times) but because he is young and needs minutes to develop.

Quote:

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Balogun is now the worst and must be sold immediately (probably some angsty brits mad about his switch) because of his misses even though Jesus and Eddie were even more anonymous today.

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For today's game... Balogun = Jesus & Eddie was terrible. The problem with most internet fans is that they look at the individual in a vacuum. Yes it sucks that Balogun missed that open goal but Jesus misses stuff like that all the time and 70-80% of Eddie's goals are sitters.

Quote:

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Trusty also needs to be sold because again he isn't any good while he did nothing out of place besides a few bad passes which every player had

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Today didn't really tell me anything about Trusty. I'm guessing he is sold or loaned mostly because I think we will run with Gabi & Kiwior at LCB and won't need a 3rd. Even if KT is sold, I don't think we really have room for Trusty.

Besiktas offering 2.5m for Holding. Ho do we get constantly lowballed on every offer. At worst I'd expect 10m in today's football economy

Can't imagine there isn't an English team that he could make better that could afford atleast 10m.

Lot of smoke that the lawyers are finally happy with the fine print and that Rice is back in London to sign the contract. Announcement could be imminent as it's already early afternoon in London, but should be made today or tomorrow so he can fly out to DC on Sunday.

Same for Timber as well

We've had one breakfast yes, but what about 2nd breakfast. Announce Rice you cowards!

The Arsenal family continues to grow ❤️ pic.twitter.com/VovE3Zt24J

— Arsenal (@Arsenal) July 14, 2023