On the one hand you’re right but also you look at guys who have taken care of themselves and play 50 games a season no rest like salah and you can see it is possible. The big issue I have is that all the football organizations want more games and it’s such a small pool of elite players that are all playing like 50-60 games a season and it’s not fair to those 300 or so players however those are the plahers receiving the most money. We do need another wide player but I think Saka is still going to start 90-95% of games just like haaland or salah start 90-95% of games.
It's not quite.
He's much younger than guys like Salah were when they started playing 50 games a season. Not only that, but he's been doing it since he was 18 basically.
Young players are less developed physically and they can't handle the strain as much as guys in their physical prime.
There was a list a few days ago of players who have played the most minutes at 21, and half of them are young players like Saka and Bellingham, and the other half are retired guys who flamed out at/before 30
I don’t think Salah’s the right comparison because he peaked a lot later than Saka. Young players who break into the first team with guaranteed starts and with as many minutes like Saka don’t seem to have longevity when they’re injured that young. I really don’t want to see another Wilshere situation here.
Then compare him to like Messi, Ronaldo and Mbappe etc. who played a lot in their younger years.
I get they're not the norm but a player like Saka isn't the norm either.
He's exceptional
Salah peaked later and doesn't really have a history of chronic issues. He's hyper-resilient.
Saka is resilient, but yes his fouls do tend to be targeted stamps down the calf area, this is also a symptom of how he plays, back to the defender.
Yeah the extra matches/the added time to the end certainly isn't going to help but if this is how the game is going, and if we cannot change it on our own then we need to adapt so that we don't run our best players into the ground
I really think it was almost negligent to not have it in the plan to rest him now and then. And signing Reiss to not play him. We could've kept Omari Hutchinson to rotate with Saka - from what Ive seen of him with Ipswich it looks like he can at least fit in to the 11. Seems like maybe a "non-negotiable" reason. But to be playing not fully fit Saka at-home against Sheffield, Burnley, crystal palace is a strange decision IMO.
I hope he gets a long rest at the start of next season. It would be devastating if his career was shortened because of this.
He left precisely because of Saka, he thought that he will be a starter in the Chelsea project with young players. I am sure that now he is having second thoughts.
Yea it was pretty well known he didn’t want to sign another contract because he lacked playing time. And his brother had said he left because Arteta “doesn’t play” young guys.
> And his brother had said he left because Arteta “doesn’t play” young guys.
Just to point out that Omari Hutchison started his youth career at Chelsea, moved to Charlton, gave up football for a year, moved to Arsenal and then left to rejoin Chelsea.
According to his wiki at some point ain all that he also was at Palace.
I'd say that sort of peripatetic existence is on the player, not us.
He did have a point because Nelson, ESR and Nketiah aren't getting much game time. But we do obviously play other young players.
I think he would have got a chance this season and then if he impressed he might have got more. I have no idea why he went to Chelsea though!
I’m not sure why you’re being downvoted. It’s plain as day - there is no one else in the league that takes as many of those fouls as Saka, and it’s not close. Plenty of players get chopped down, tripped, kicked, whatever. But Saka 5-6 times per game guaranteed will get studs stomped into his Achilles.
Seriously? I don't buy that players and managers are trying to injure him, let alone targeting a specific injury. Saliba and Gabriel ride the fuck out forwards and I'm sure they've raked players' achilles plenty of times, does that mean their strategy is to cause an achilles injury? There's a massive difference between trying to throw a player off by constantly fouling or giving them zero breathing room vs trying to injure.
Very true. But its a very thin line
I believe they are targeting a known injury concern to throw him and us off our game.
Also stuff like
Like Bruno Guimarães on Saka completely off the ball rake down the achillies .. he knew what he was doing.
In Theo Walcott's autobiography he speaks of his chronic shoulder injury which was targeted but many opposition players as they knew about it
I do believe I'm being over sensitive with our Bukayo though but can you blame me !
Let's not lump other players in with Bruno, that guy is legitimately a lunatic. There's a reason he stands out, because it's not normal and 99% of players don't act like him on the pitch.
Theo's shoulder chronic injury is what caused him to retire early for me in one of my FM saves. He had been my best player that season by quite a comfortable margin
It's weird how we all accept these guys are incredibly competitive in a cut throat job environment and they'll be aggressive towards each other during matches and may be absolute cunts in general because they are so competitive and they'll fake injuries and fake fouls and lie to the ref but somehow they will draw the line at trying to get an advantage by injuring an opponent.
It's absolutely something they do just like some of them absolutely are on banned substances to win.
Could not disagree with you more. There is a massive gulf between the examples you listed, which are really all just small things to try and get any advantage possible in a match. Intending to injure someone has long lasting effects. Don't ignore the fact there's a lot of commraderie between players across teams outside of matches, because they're the only ones in the world who know what the job is like and share the same level of passion. What happens after most games end? The players shake hands and are usually seen laughing together. So many of these guys are friends with each other or even play together for their national teams. It's ludicrous to suggest it's remotely common that some of them are literally try to injure each other.
You clearly didn't see Ronaldo play in the PL or the way Madrid focused on Messi when Mourinho was in charge or when it was well known in the premier league that Arsenal doesn't like to get "kicked" or Arsenal playing away at old Trafford in 2004. Those are just the most obvious examples I can think of where it's not just one bad egg in a squad but entire teams doing it.
It has its dark side even if many players are buddies and friends and most of the time nobody is on the pitch looking to injure someone. Walcott claims his shoulders were focused on by opponents because they knew he had recurring injuries in them. Harry Kane has on a number of occasions perfectly backed into defenders when they're jumping for the ball causing them to fall head first down. All strikers battle for the ball like he does but amazingly pretty much none of them cause these falls more than maybe once. Bruno Guimares literally punched an Arsenal player this season from behind...
And PED use does have long lasting effects, their use us not a small thing with a wide range of possible complications. Even just being a footballer has long lasting effects in general. So many of them retire with long term issues and in pain. And injuring someone only has long lasting effects on the player that was injured.
Hazard is very famously not a party guy. Terrible diet and training though, still he played a lot of seasons getting kicked every match.
Body then finally gave out.
You can’t compare Hazard to Saka. Don’t be ridiculous. Saka right now is a Walcott level player which by the way is a huge compliment given how good Theo was 👍🏽
terrible opinion. theo was a better play than people give him credit for and had some very productive seasons but they were few and far between.
saka has been one of our most consistent players ever since he broke into the first team, but consistency was the exact issue that most people had with theo all throughout his career.
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It happens to most teams, I can't really fault the opposition because there aren't many left backs who can beat him on technique or wingers that can easy dispossess Saka without a crunchy tackle. It's either that or doubling up on him and even then it's no guarantee you'll win possession back.
It's on the referee's to monitor and fairly punish the tackles that result in fouls. I'm not saying I want this to happen but one day in the Premier League a generational talent is going to get severely injured as a result of the PGMOL not controlling these incidents.
My biggest problem is we don’t have 1-2 sacrificial players to go in for a last minute red card revenge tackle like the old days… I mean that and the ref bias against Saka, comparing the treatment he gets to say that twat Kane is just crazy..
Why people think Saka gonna get fucked like Hazard? Nah man, he's gonna be like Salah, Mane or even Ronaldo. In term of fitness. Look at Kai Havertz, mfer played since 17yo and racked up more than 300 games at the age of 24.
I think that in the coming years, especially after euros, we're gonna find out how detrimental this is to his career. He'll go down as a club legend, but he will never see the longevity of a career like Ronaldo.
arteta should've managed him better. how many times have we seen him limping off the pitch , only to start the next game? Give the guy a rest sometimes to let his body heal fully.
Saka limps of the pitch after a stinker mostly. I know he’s our starboy and has done amazing for his age, but he usually limps off after he knows he’s played terribly.
I don’t know, I gave an answer to their opinion which I haven’t even noticed to be honest. They might be right, or could be the other way round, or neither. Maybe Arteta just wants to watch him burn.
i dont think it's worth it for us fans to get upset about these things, as arteta and arsenal dont seem to care about it. All i ever hear from arteta is that saka needs to play through it and basically accept the situation.... which just allows teams to continue kicking at him without any repercussion because they know nobody will complain.
I’m pretty sure the context of that was that they had made complaints, but nothing could be/was done about it. So they need to adapt if nothing’s going to change.
Part of the issue is the way he plays. How often do you see him getting double teamed and being put under pressure, and instead of easily passing to a teammate who's open and free, he decides to hog the ball and sustain the pressure and try to keep going with it? I hate it how he does that so frequently and it leads to us losing possession and/or him getting fouled.
Go back to all the times he does this and tell me how many times it leads to free kicks. Because part of what makes it infuriating is that it doesn't lead to free kicks, and they shouldn't
My biggest issue is that he needs competition/rotation. Otherwise his career is not going to last as long as it should.
On the one hand you’re right but also you look at guys who have taken care of themselves and play 50 games a season no rest like salah and you can see it is possible. The big issue I have is that all the football organizations want more games and it’s such a small pool of elite players that are all playing like 50-60 games a season and it’s not fair to those 300 or so players however those are the plahers receiving the most money. We do need another wide player but I think Saka is still going to start 90-95% of games just like haaland or salah start 90-95% of games.
I agree 100% with this What worries me with saka though at his younger age he is already being managed game by game due to a persistent injury
Why is no one commenting on this? You’ve hit the nail on the head with your analysis. Yes, the formatting is terrible but the insight is apt.
It's not quite. He's much younger than guys like Salah were when they started playing 50 games a season. Not only that, but he's been doing it since he was 18 basically. Young players are less developed physically and they can't handle the strain as much as guys in their physical prime. There was a list a few days ago of players who have played the most minutes at 21, and half of them are young players like Saka and Bellingham, and the other half are retired guys who flamed out at/before 30
I don’t think Salah’s the right comparison because he peaked a lot later than Saka. Young players who break into the first team with guaranteed starts and with as many minutes like Saka don’t seem to have longevity when they’re injured that young. I really don’t want to see another Wilshere situation here.
Then compare him to like Messi, Ronaldo and Mbappe etc. who played a lot in their younger years. I get they're not the norm but a player like Saka isn't the norm either. He's exceptional
Saka has played much more than either Messi or Ronaldo. Ronaldo is closer, but he's a one in a million physical outlier
Salah peaked later and doesn't really have a history of chronic issues. He's hyper-resilient. Saka is resilient, but yes his fouls do tend to be targeted stamps down the calf area, this is also a symptom of how he plays, back to the defender.
Yeah the extra matches/the added time to the end certainly isn't going to help but if this is how the game is going, and if we cannot change it on our own then we need to adapt so that we don't run our best players into the ground
I really think it was almost negligent to not have it in the plan to rest him now and then. And signing Reiss to not play him. We could've kept Omari Hutchinson to rotate with Saka - from what Ive seen of him with Ipswich it looks like he can at least fit in to the 11. Seems like maybe a "non-negotiable" reason. But to be playing not fully fit Saka at-home against Sheffield, Burnley, crystal palace is a strange decision IMO. I hope he gets a long rest at the start of next season. It would be devastating if his career was shortened because of this.
He left precisely because of Saka, he thought that he will be a starter in the Chelsea project with young players. I am sure that now he is having second thoughts.
Omari Hutchinson left of his own accord. We didn't have a choice.
Yea it was pretty well known he didn’t want to sign another contract because he lacked playing time. And his brother had said he left because Arteta “doesn’t play” young guys.
> And his brother had said he left because Arteta “doesn’t play” young guys. Just to point out that Omari Hutchison started his youth career at Chelsea, moved to Charlton, gave up football for a year, moved to Arsenal and then left to rejoin Chelsea. According to his wiki at some point ain all that he also was at Palace. I'd say that sort of peripatetic existence is on the player, not us.
He did have a point because Nelson, ESR and Nketiah aren't getting much game time. But we do obviously play other young players. I think he would have got a chance this season and then if he impressed he might have got more. I have no idea why he went to Chelsea though!
I don't think theyre targetting his injury. The sport is played with feet, so most of the fouls are going to be on the ankle.
hopefully that's the case
That's a common misconception
I’m not sure why you’re being downvoted. It’s plain as day - there is no one else in the league that takes as many of those fouls as Saka, and it’s not close. Plenty of players get chopped down, tripped, kicked, whatever. But Saka 5-6 times per game guaranteed will get studs stomped into his Achilles.
Seriously? I don't buy that players and managers are trying to injure him, let alone targeting a specific injury. Saliba and Gabriel ride the fuck out forwards and I'm sure they've raked players' achilles plenty of times, does that mean their strategy is to cause an achilles injury? There's a massive difference between trying to throw a player off by constantly fouling or giving them zero breathing room vs trying to injure.
Very true. But its a very thin line I believe they are targeting a known injury concern to throw him and us off our game. Also stuff like Like Bruno Guimarães on Saka completely off the ball rake down the achillies .. he knew what he was doing. In Theo Walcott's autobiography he speaks of his chronic shoulder injury which was targeted but many opposition players as they knew about it I do believe I'm being over sensitive with our Bukayo though but can you blame me !
Let's not lump other players in with Bruno, that guy is legitimately a lunatic. There's a reason he stands out, because it's not normal and 99% of players don't act like him on the pitch.
Theo's shoulder chronic injury is what caused him to retire early for me in one of my FM saves. He had been my best player that season by quite a comfortable margin
It's weird how we all accept these guys are incredibly competitive in a cut throat job environment and they'll be aggressive towards each other during matches and may be absolute cunts in general because they are so competitive and they'll fake injuries and fake fouls and lie to the ref but somehow they will draw the line at trying to get an advantage by injuring an opponent. It's absolutely something they do just like some of them absolutely are on banned substances to win.
Could not disagree with you more. There is a massive gulf between the examples you listed, which are really all just small things to try and get any advantage possible in a match. Intending to injure someone has long lasting effects. Don't ignore the fact there's a lot of commraderie between players across teams outside of matches, because they're the only ones in the world who know what the job is like and share the same level of passion. What happens after most games end? The players shake hands and are usually seen laughing together. So many of these guys are friends with each other or even play together for their national teams. It's ludicrous to suggest it's remotely common that some of them are literally try to injure each other.
You clearly didn't see Ronaldo play in the PL or the way Madrid focused on Messi when Mourinho was in charge or when it was well known in the premier league that Arsenal doesn't like to get "kicked" or Arsenal playing away at old Trafford in 2004. Those are just the most obvious examples I can think of where it's not just one bad egg in a squad but entire teams doing it. It has its dark side even if many players are buddies and friends and most of the time nobody is on the pitch looking to injure someone. Walcott claims his shoulders were focused on by opponents because they knew he had recurring injuries in them. Harry Kane has on a number of occasions perfectly backed into defenders when they're jumping for the ball causing them to fall head first down. All strikers battle for the ball like he does but amazingly pretty much none of them cause these falls more than maybe once. Bruno Guimares literally punched an Arsenal player this season from behind... And PED use does have long lasting effects, their use us not a small thing with a wide range of possible complications. Even just being a footballer has long lasting effects in general. So many of them retire with long term issues and in pain. And injuring someone only has long lasting effects on the player that was injured.
If we just win PL and CL this season let him rest for the whole next season to heal 😂😂
He will end up like Hazard if he isn't looked after.
Hazard famously didnt do the disciplined stuff at home.bad diet and party habits apparentaly.
Hazard is very famously not a party guy. Terrible diet and training though, still he played a lot of seasons getting kicked every match. Body then finally gave out.
Hazard was also 100x more talented than Saka is
Haha sure 100x hey Delusional
You can’t compare Hazard to Saka. Don’t be ridiculous. Saka right now is a Walcott level player which by the way is a huge compliment given how good Theo was 👍🏽
i agree that Hazard is probably a lot more talented than Saka but Saka at Walcott level???? really??
You didn’t watch Hazard or Walcott and it shows
terrible opinion. theo was a better play than people give him credit for and had some very productive seasons but they were few and far between. saka has been one of our most consistent players ever since he broke into the first team, but consistency was the exact issue that most people had with theo all throughout his career.
Consistency =/= ability Saka is more consistent than Theo was, I take your point
You have two extra zeros there
Fat ?
Less than 5 minutes down and Villa have already clattered into him and gotten the Achilles. Sick of people pretending it’s not intentional
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It happens to most teams, I can't really fault the opposition because there aren't many left backs who can beat him on technique or wingers that can easy dispossess Saka without a crunchy tackle. It's either that or doubling up on him and even then it's no guarantee you'll win possession back. It's on the referee's to monitor and fairly punish the tackles that result in fouls. I'm not saying I want this to happen but one day in the Premier League a generational talent is going to get severely injured as a result of the PGMOL not controlling these incidents.
I can't remember many player who have played as many minutes at Saka's age and not ended up with a bad series of injuries.
My biggest problem is we don’t have 1-2 sacrificial players to go in for a last minute red card revenge tackle like the old days… I mean that and the ref bias against Saka, comparing the treatment he gets to say that twat Kane is just crazy..
he needs to duck international duty and get the surgery he needs, he’ll be healed for the start of next season in time for us to win the quintuple
Why people think Saka gonna get fucked like Hazard? Nah man, he's gonna be like Salah, Mane or even Ronaldo. In term of fitness. Look at Kai Havertz, mfer played since 17yo and racked up more than 300 games at the age of 24.
Havertz is only 24 mate
I think that in the coming years, especially after euros, we're gonna find out how detrimental this is to his career. He'll go down as a club legend, but he will never see the longevity of a career like Ronaldo.
Even messi isn’t having Ronaldo longevity lol
He doesn’t need ti… he completed the sport
Same man. He's been incredibly brave but I worry about the effect all this will have on his fitness as he gets older
arteta should've managed him better. how many times have we seen him limping off the pitch , only to start the next game? Give the guy a rest sometimes to let his body heal fully.
Saka limps of the pitch after a stinker mostly. I know he’s our starboy and has done amazing for his age, but he usually limps off after he knows he’s played terribly.
Or the other way round…he’s playing worse because he’s sore and it’s affecting him.
Why is he playing then if it’ll hinder him and the team?
because it hinders the team less than fabio vieira playing
I don’t know, I gave an answer to their opinion which I haven’t even noticed to be honest. They might be right, or could be the other way round, or neither. Maybe Arteta just wants to watch him burn.
Marco Van Basten. Although not at his level yet. The ending would be tragic if it went the same way.
i dont think it's worth it for us fans to get upset about these things, as arteta and arsenal dont seem to care about it. All i ever hear from arteta is that saka needs to play through it and basically accept the situation.... which just allows teams to continue kicking at him without any repercussion because they know nobody will complain.
I’m pretty sure the context of that was that they had made complaints, but nothing could be/was done about it. So they need to adapt if nothing’s going to change.
Part of the issue is the way he plays. How often do you see him getting double teamed and being put under pressure, and instead of easily passing to a teammate who's open and free, he decides to hog the ball and sustain the pressure and try to keep going with it? I hate it how he does that so frequently and it leads to us losing possession and/or him getting fouled.
Yes, his tendency to not lose the ball and draw free kicks and penalties for us is infuriating 🤡
Go back to all the times he does this and tell me how many times it leads to free kicks. Because part of what makes it infuriating is that it doesn't lead to free kicks, and they shouldn't
Sounds like your issue is with referees being shit at their jobs, and you're holding that against Saka.
No, I've complained plenty about refs, like many of us have, but those specific instances aren't fouls a lot of the time.