The Stoke Saga, the Title Race and the Battle Against Man Utd

For every Arsenal supporters, the past week has been a complete nightmare. A 4-4 draw against Tottenham was painful, the defeat against Stoke added to the pain, and the stalemate against Fenerbahce concluded a disastrous week. However, what really hurt the team and the supporters was the criticisms thrown at the team and Wenger during the week.

Faye said that Arsenal players are soft, Sorensen claimed the Gunners lacked spine, and all the pundits complaining about Arsenal's preference on style over results. These comments led to a reaction by Wenger, which the British media took full advantage of.

Wenger did an interview with the club's official website, the main message he tried to send across is that his team are not softies but brave men, that the player who tackles hard is not brave, but the player at the receiving end of it is.

I could not agree more, and actually started to think even C. Ronaldo is a brave man because no matter how many bruises he ends up with, he keeps doing the tricks and keep taking players on. However, the media took these comments and diverted the comments into criticisms towards the Stoke players, claiming that they intentionally tried to injured Sagna, Walcott, and Adebayor, which I did not see anywhere in the interview with the club's site.

The pundits reacted, claiming that Arsene is a sore loser, and that he is just diverting the attention away from the poor performances. The Stoke hierarchy each had a snipe at Wenger by saying that he is this and that, blah blah blah. Wenger tried to talk sense into the footballing world, and ends up taking a beating, ironically, this is true bravery.

Anyways, the criticism towards Wenger was unfair, but the harsh words aimed at the team were. There is no doubt that they are not performing well. Firstly catastrophic defending against Tottenham and Stoke, secondly, lack of creativity against Stoke and Fenerbahce, and thirdly, an increasingly lack of fight and bite in the midfield.

Denilson and Fabregas in the middle of the park might work on PES and FIFA, but it just is not working in reality. Denilson's work rate is as good as Flamini's, but his positioning, passing, and aggression are way below what is needed for a big team like Arsenal. Fabregas's performances have been rather below average due to this.

Hleb's departure meant that attacks are not as inventive as last season, because Walcott just doesn't have that in his locker, which again damages Fabregas' game because he and Hleb worked perfectly for each other. So without two of Cesc's greatest partners, the midfield is looking poor.

The defence hasn't changed much from last season, but the midfield's vulnerability led to an even more leaky defence now. Teams are scoring all kinds of goals against us. So to sum up, we are lacking in attack and defence, due to our midfield.

Winning the title is still a possibility for the Gunners—we are six points behind, so if Arsenal win against Chelsea and Liverpool home and away, that is six points already. However, as noted in my previous article, Wenger must change a few things in the team. I am not going to repeat those again here, but he must do something in January.

The match against Man Utd is the biggest so far this season for Arsenal. This match is still the biggest match in the Premiership in terms of people watching across the globe.

The match will be decided by the midfield battle, remember when Arsenal won at Old Trafford two seasons ago? The midfield performance that day was top top class, as was the match against AC Milan last season. So despite not being a big fan, 4-5-1 is crucial tomorrow.

Diaby, Fabregas and Denilson in the middle, Nasri on the left and Walcott on the right with Bendtner up front on his own. Fabregas and Denilson will have to drop deep and win balls from Carrick and Anderson, Diaby will have to become the free man in midfield, picking balls in and around the area and use his quick feet to open up options left and right.

Bendtner will have to run the channels to open up the width and drag defenders out of position. That way, Arsenal should be able to keep the ball and have more possession than United. If United end up having more of the ball, there is no chance for Arsenal at all.

It is win or bust tomorrow for Arsenal, no doubt about it. No, I will not blame Wenger if Arsenal don't win the league this year, but not many others will accept it, and if the pressure does get to him, then we might be seeing our greatest ever manager out the door. Get behind the team and support them!