Arseblog ... an Arsenal blog » Tim Stillman

Kai Havertz arrived in England as a mystery wrapped in an enigma. His technical quality was obvious enough; but Chelsea simply did not know where to put him or how to use him. Arsenal sold Granit...

https://arseblog.com/2024/05/the-spirit-in-the-kai/

Jurrien Timber marked his return from injury this week with an outstanding goal from left-back for the U23s at Ewood Park. As any sensible person knew when he injured his ACL in August, this camp...

https://arseblog.com/2024/04/flexibility-breeds-resilience/

Bukayo Saka has 41 starts in all competitions so far this season, Ben White has 40 and Martin Odegaard 39. Last season, Saka made 42 starts and Odegaard and White had 39 a piece. That virtuous tr...

https://arseblog.com/2024/04/to-the-left/

In the 2021-22 season, Arsenal’s starting eleven had ten core players in it. Ramsdale; Tomiyasu, White, Gabriel, Tierney; Partey, Odegaard, Xhaka; Saka, Martinelli / Smith Rowe; Lacazette. Only...

https://arseblog.com/2024/04/arsenal-band-to-orchestra-gabriel-jesus-oleksandr-zinchenko/

I am an anxious person. I always have been. People are driven by different motivators in life and mine is anxiety. It’s why I am early for everything, it is why I am well organised and it’s a...

https://arseblog.com/2024/04/boring-boring-arsenal-is-my-favourite-arsenal/

Over the last few seasons, Arsenal have been able to create a strength in depth to their squad. The majority of players recruited since the summer of 2021 have been successful to some degree, sav...

https://arseblog.com/2024/03/he-comes-from-portugal-now-how-does-he-play-for-arsenal/

In recent years, Arsenal have enjoyed a glut of cult hero right-backs. Lee Dixon begat Lauren, begat Bacary Sagna, begat Hector Bellerin, begat Takehiro Tomiyasu (briefly), begat Ben White. The l...

https://arseblog.com/2024/03/faith/

A few weeks ago I wrote a piece about the flexibility of the squad assembled by Edu and Mikel Arteta. In the article, I argued that while the increasing depth of the Arsenal squad has been a welc...

https://arseblog.com/2024/03/the-kitchen-sink/

A lot of the focus on Arsenal’s evolution this season has rested on players the club bought in the summer. The signings of Kai Havertz and David Raya gave birth to lengthy discourses on both pl...

https://arseblog.com/2024/03/what-next-for-zinchenko/

Last week, Rio Ferdinand indulged in some pretty pub bore level analysis (what else is new?) in his assessment that Phil Foden can be considered ‘world class’ (whatever that actually means) w...

https://arseblog.com/2024/02/bukayo-saka-float-like-a-butterfly-sting-like-a-bee/

I have a theory about Bukayo Saka that, essentially, there are various alternative timelines where he blossoms into a world class player for Arsenal but in a totally different position to the one...

https://arseblog.com/2024/02/have-you-ever-played-with-plasticine/

As Arsenal fans we have been witnessed some outstanding central defensive partnerships over the years. I was raised during the George Graham era when Tony Adams, Steve Bould and Martin Keown were...

https://arseblog.com/2024/02/platform/

In September, I wrote a piece affirming my belief that David Raya had been bought to displace Aaron Ramsdale as Arsenal’s number 1, despite all the talk of potential goalkeeper rotation and com...

https://arseblog.com/2024/02/david-raya-jigsaw-falling-into-place/

When Emile Smith Rowe was announced as part of the starting line-up on Tuesday evening at Nottingham Forest, I wasn’t the only Arsenal fan who cocked an eyebrow in surprise. Like a lot of Arsen...

https://arseblog.com/2024/02/emile-smith-glow-up/

In the middle of Arsenal’s 22 match unbeaten run at the outset of Unai Emery’s Arsenal tenure in 2018, Statsbomb ran an article entitled ‘Arsenal aren’t this good’. I remember it causin...

https://arseblog.com/2024/01/the-birth-of-knowledge-or-the-death-of-innocence/

Last May, I wrote a piece entitled ‘Thank you for the good times (before the good times fly away’).  The theme of the article was that, after two seasons of riding the crest of a wave at the...

https://arseblog.com/2024/01/nothing-lasts-forever/

Even if Arsenal have improved immensely over the last 2-3 years, 2023 wasn’t really a vintage year for the Gunners. They played a lot of good football, far more than they would have played in m...

https://arseblog.com/2024/01/lessons-3/

Arsenal have scored four goals in their last five games and that perfectly reflects the number of points they have taken in the same spell which, clearly, is pretty disastrous for a team that has...

https://arseblog.com/2024/01/massive-issues-in-attack/

Oleksandr Zinchenko is a player who giveth and who taketh away for Arsenal. At the end of last season, I wrote about an increasing sense of supporters becoming frustrated with the Ukrainian as th...

https://arseblog.com/2023/12/zin-and-yang/

On this day (assuming you are reading this on Thursday) four years ago, I sat on a train to Merseyside with carriages full of excited Arsenal fans. We were on our way to Goodison Park to watch on...

https://arseblog.com/2023/12/vamos/