Man City went top of the table on goal difference and now Arsenal have to play Newcastle today. On paper this should be straightforward. Newcastle are in 14th, they have lost their last three games and there are serious questions being asked about Eddie Howe's future. Talk of him getting sacked if things do not improve very soon.
But here is the thing. Arsenal have lost their last two games as well. And Arsenal under Arteta have a habit of doing this. Every single April it happens. They bottle it when it matters most and the pressure gets to them.
So yes Newcastle are bad right now. But Arsenal are chokers. And chokers choke against bad teams just as much as good ones.
Saka is apparently returning which should be good news. But is it the same Saka? Because this season he has not been pulling up trees before the injury. He has been inconsistent, below his best, and I am not convinced he comes back and suddenly transforms this Arsenal side. I hope I am wrong but I am not convinced.
And then there is Arteta. Where do I even start. This man has the best squad in the league, everyone said so at the start of the season, and he still cannot get it right. The rotation is criminal. Every April the same players are running on empty because he does not know how to manage a squad properly. He was Pep's assistant manager. He sat next to one of the greatest managers of all time for years and did not learn the most basic lesson of all which is how to rotate a squad properly.
The Gyokeres situation tells you everything about Arteta. We were all saying Arsenal need a proper goalscorer and they went and got one of the best strikers in Europe. And now Gyokeres looks lost out there. Displaced. No confidence. A shadow of the player who was unstoppable at Sporting. That is not Gyokeres failing. That is the Arteta system suffocating a natural goalscorer who needs freedom and chances and instead gets asked to press and hold and fit into a rigid structure that was never built for a striker like him.
And the substitutions. It was criminal what he did to Eze against City. The man cannot learn. He does not understand game management, he does not understand momentum, he makes his substitutions too late every single time and when he does make them they are wrong.
One cup. That is what he has won since he joined Arsenal. One cup. And he is on around fifteen million a year, one of the highest paid managers in world football. Make that make sense.
Win or lose today I genuinely believe Arsenal will stick with Arteta and that in my opinion is just wrong. If he loses today he should be sacked in the tunnel. The project is going nowhere under him and the longer they wait the more this squad gets wasted.
Newcastle might just nick this. Arsenal are there for the taking right now and everyone knows it.
Let me know your thoughts.