Champions of conceding a first minute goal three times in a calendar year

You'll never sing that

Hello,

And welcome back to another week of Arsenal and this newsletter.

Not a ton happened this week before the match. There were some discussions of outgoings with Balogun rumored to be going to Monaco and Teirney confirmed to be heading to Real Sociedad.

Both are making career moves for better playing time and to places that are just nice to live in. I hear San Sabestien is beautiful and what I know about Monaco is that there’s a harbor, there’s consistently an F1 race happening year-round, and everyone has a glass of white wine that automatically refills when you drink to the bottom.

Both sound like a lovely place to live and I wish them both well.

Arsenal is a club with a lot of history. Most of it is good. Some of it is amazing. On Saturday, Arsenal added another piece of history to their club. Arsenal became the first team in history to concede a first-minute goal three times in a calendar year.

Andreas Pereira picked up a wayward pass from Saka and honestly looked like he accidentally shot past a twisted-around Ramsdale to grab the lead for Fulham within the first minute.

I like the idea of being champions of a record, this is not a record that I like being the holder of. It’s a weird pattern that I would enjoy Arsenal dropping. The rest of the half felt off, there was wayward passing across the board from Arsenal and we didn’t feel like we quite had our footing until we made a double substitution in the 56th minute. Vieira and Zinchenko, the players that Arteta subbed on, provided a better balance to the team offensively.

I kind of get what Arteta is attempting with the formation where Partey is inverting from right-back, but it’s not working. It’s like those pedestrian crossing buttons at intersections, you think pushing that button is going to make the lights change, but it doesn’t. Arteta just needs to go back to waiting for the lights to change the way that they were (the old backline please.)

Vieira in particular looked bright. He won a penalty in which Declan Rice comically grabbed Decordova-Reid away from Saka so he could take the shot. Only after the referee made sure the ball was about one millimeter back from where Saka had originally put the ball.

Enforcer Declan Rice clears the way for the penalty to be taken.

Fabio Vieira also had the assist on the go-ahead goal that Eddie Nketiah put away. From there it was really just a team loss of concentration that also led to the first goal, which helped concede the second. On a corner, no one marked Palhinha and he had a good finish to give them the equalizer. It was another lack of concentration that almost led to a late winner for Fulham when a quick restart led to Traore having a ton of space, only for Ramsdale to save it with what looked like his face.

Arsenal applied a lot of pressure in this match, it really just came down to defensive concentration issues that made this match a lot closer than it should have been.

One last thing before I go, I’m interested in knowing if people enjoy this format. I’ve been doing it for a bit now and just wanted to check in about that.

And finally, this newsletter is extremely close to 6,000 subscribers which is a big number in my book. A reminder that if you tell your friends about this newsletter, you could get a free hat!

Anywho, this week’s podcast and pet photos are below,

Poorly

Podcast:

Unfortunately, the Poorly Drawn Arsenal animated podcast is back again. It’s kind of like the video version of this podcast.

This week we discuss rumored outgoings, what we know about the city of Monaco, the match against Fulham, and why Fabio Vieira would make a bad lunch lady. Watch it below and listen to it on the podcast app of your choice here.

I Illustrated a Book:

This a reminder that I’ve illustrated a book! It is about the invincibles and was written by Dave Seager who was written five Arsenal books. There are 39 drawings in the book; if you pre-order now, you get a free calendar, which is a fun little treat.

Olive and Velma update:

Cuddly Olive and her tongue

Velma sleeps on a pair of shoes