Archive for February, 2011
February 10th, 2011
Typical: we give England the next Cesc Fabregas, and they try to turn him in to Denilson.
Jack Wilshere made his first start in an England shirt last night. Whilst he acquitted himself well enough, there were signs that he’s not exactly the ‘Makelele’ figure Capello is hoping for. Denmark’s own teenage star, Christian Eriksen, was able to exploit the space between the midfield and back four that Wilshere was intended to guard.
This is no criticism of Jack. He’s a playmaker, not a water carrier. You wouldn’t ask Cesc to play the ‘Gareth Barry’ role. Wilshere is no different.
Yes, he plays deep for Arsenal. But he does so alongside Alex Song – a far more defensive player than his partner last night, Frank Lampard. He also does so as part of a midfield three, where he is granted freedom to roam. The one moment last night when he looked most like himself was when he played a one-two and burst through midfield before almost playing in Darren Bent. It was a flash of the dynamism, flair and creativity he can offer. And almost immediately, England were caught on the break.
As an England fan, I’m pleading with Capello to forget this idea of fielding Wilshere as a defensive player. He’s a square-cut diamond in a grubby round hole. Give him the freedom he needs to show his talent.
Anyway, all that said, Wilshere did typically well to handle the hype and put in an assured 45-minute display – you can catch a brief interview with Jack here. Theo Walcott also put in a good hour shift, managing to provide an assist for Darren Bent despite receiving a cut eye in the process.
It seems that everyone else also came through unscathed – praise be. Hopefully that’ll be confirmed in Arsene’s press conference tomorrow. Till then…
February 9th, 2011
Hello all, and welcome to another interlull. It’s that time of the season when we go through the odd experience of seeing all our players done other colours and pretend to be friends with Frank Lampard. It’s painful but we have to endure it.
Fortunately, there’s a fair sprinkling of news to distract us from the international nonsense, as well as the ever-encroaching inescapability of mortality. You may have noticed some headlines about Barca and Cesc this morning. The deal (or no deal, perhaps) is thus.
Raul Sanehli, the Catalan club’s Director of Football, was asked about Fernando Torres’ recent move to Chelsea:
“It was overpriced. I know Barcelona would not do that signing. We would not even consider it.”
I take his point. £50m is a lot for any player.
But in a market where Darren Bent costs £24m, and Andy Carroll £35m, then Torres’ relative worth is about right. And if an injury prone forward with 9 goals so far this season is worth £50m, then what is a younger midfielder with the same amount of goals and added the capacity to manipulate an entire team’s dynamic from the centre-circle with his conductor’s baton of a right foot worth?
It’s almost impossible to say. To us, Cesc is priceless. Barca found that out when they came calling last summer: he simply wasn’t for sale.
If the Catalans consider £50m for Torres so unreasonable, then I can’t foresee any circumstances in which they’d be able to come up with the cash for Cesc.
There’s one club who could, of course, and The Sun put two and two together to make six with this story yesterday:
Absolute nonsense, of course.
There will be a lot more of this in the coming days, especially as the Barca game approaches. Whilst Barca say their interest is “dead”, I wouldn’t be surprised if their board members talk openly about their admiration for our skipper, like a desperate Blind Date contestant, only with less convoluted innuendos.
It’s worth pointing out at this juncture that whilst we’re discussing a £50m+ value for Cesc, he can be yours for a hell of a lot less. Order in the next couple of days and there’s every chance you’ll have your Cesc We Can shirt in time for the home leg with Barca. What better time to remind them that “We’ve got Cesc Fabregas?”
On to other matters.
England face Denmark tonight and it will be, like the Bendtner/Adebayor scrap at White Hart Lane, something of an Arsenal vs Arsenal affair.
Bendtner himself has made a few headlines for talking quite openly about his future:
“I have a lot of feelings for Arsenal and it means something great to me. I would be sad to leave it, but you have to think about yourself and, with the career goals I have, I cannot be sitting on the bench.
That’s the way it is. I will do my best for Arsenal throughout the season. Hopefully, I will be there next season as well, but we have to wait and see. But, if my situation at Arsenal doesn’t change, I will have to look at it because I want to play football.”
I don’t see anything wrong with these comments. He’s 23 now, and the next 4-7 years are going to define his career. He’s not the sort of guy who will be happy at being on the bench, and if, come the summer, he felt he had to move to get first team football I wouldn’t begrudge him that. In the meantime, however, he’s a useful and valued squad member. I think he’ll give John Terry a tough game tonight.
A lot of the focus in this match will be on Jack Wilshere. Fabio Capello is handing him his first England start in a deep midfield role – so deep that the Italian talked yesterday about Wilshere remaining almost with the centre-backs for large portions of the game. It’s a role he can play, though not one that gets the best out of his incisive attacking play.
Bendtner has warned England that there are lessons to be learnt from the handling of Theo Walcott, who will also start tonight. I think that’s undoubtedly true, though Wilshere seems an entirely different kettle of fish, with a more innate maturity and self-confidence. I think he’ll handle tonight just fine.
Finally, a bit of good news: Johan Djourou’s injury appears to be merely bruising. Any fears of serious damage to the knee have been dismissed by some positive scan results. He could be in contention for the weekend’s game with Wolves – or if not, then certainly Barca.
All together now: We’ve Got Cesc Fabregas…
February 7th, 2011
After writing up the disaster of that 4-4 draw, I promised you my next post would be more positive. So here it is. Get your smiley emoticons at the ready – the sun is coming out.
We’re in a better position than we were at the start of the weekend…
Bizarre though it seems, we’re actually in a better position than we were on Friday. Wolves’ defeat of Manchester United (I always liked that Easter Island shaped prankster, Mick McCarthy) means we’re now just four points off the leaders.
Some fans have been suggesting that United’s defeat only makes our slip-up worse. I’m not sure that’s true – or indeed a valid point. Knowing that they had the opportunity to go seven points clear may have played in to the United players’ minds and put them under more pressure than usual.
Chelsea’s defeat to Liverpool was both funny and timely: a win for them, plus the added momentum of £70m-worth of reinforcements, could have seen them in back in the title race. Man City were the big winners this weekend, but assuming Saturday’s game has no long-term psychological repercussions we didn’t come out of it too badly at all.
The Invincibles remain unique in the modern era…
I think deep down every Arsenal fan will admit to having been a little nervous that United might match our feat of going unbeaten for the season. They’d had so many lucky escapes that you began to fear it might just be possible – or, indeed, that it’d come down to a Cup Final-esque clash at the Emirates on April 30th.
Thank God that they’ve finally lost. I’d never want any team to match our incredibly achievement – like United’s ‘treble’, there is something unique about it that serves as a badge of honour for what was a truly great team – but for this United team to have done it would’ve been so anticlimactic, so unfair, that I’m not sure I could’ve coped.
If you fancy a reminisce about the good old days of The Invincibles, just to crank up the positivity that little bit more, why not check out this piece from Threeandin.
Wojciech Szczesny continues to impress…
Yes, I know he conceded four goals, but two were penalties and I think it’s fair to say that without him we probably would have lost. It’s a huge month for Wojciech – the games against Barcelona and at Wembley could cement him as Arsenal number 1 for a long time to come.
Theo Walcott is having his best season as an Arsenal player…
I find myself talking about Theo a lot less these days. It’s simply because he’s doing exactly what you’d want from a player with his set ofassets. His opener on Saturday was his 11th goal of the season, and he set up RVP’s first too. He’s back in the England set-up, and is finally adding that one thing his game has always lacked: consistency.
Andrey Arshavin’s form is recovering…
Form, they tell us, is temporary. In Arshavin’s case, that’s a blessed relief, as his had been dreadful. Two assists on Saturday, added to the goal against Everton suggest that he is on the way back. With Nasri out injured, it’s just in the nick of time.
And finally…
Robin van Persie and Cesc Fabregas have withdrawn from this week’s round of international fixtures. Good to know they’ve got their priorities in order.
—
There you go. Bet your face aches from all that smiling, eh. In order to keep up the emotional vascillation, tomorrow’s piece will probably be mourning the season of the crocked Johan Djourou*.
*attempted reverse jinx
February 5th, 2011
Newcastle 4 – 4 Arsenal
Highlights | Arsene’s reaction
When Cheick Tiote volleyed home Newcastle’s fourth goal and equaliser, I promised myself I would take 24 hours off from football. 24 hours to recover from the sickening churning in my stomach, provoked by yet another Arsenal collapse.
But, as the existence of this post demonstrates, I can’t. I’ve got too many gripes to air. So, here we go.
Arsene’s post-match comments were relatively tame. The reason for that is he doesn’t want to make today feel any more damaging than it already does. If he comes out fuming and spitting, the press will be able to say that he and his team have “lost itâ€.
If the “it†in question were the Premier League title, they might just be right. Champions do not lose a four goal lead, however circumstances conspire against them.
I understand and agree that the referee was appalling. On twitter, I jokingly suggested that we finally know what Newcastle spent the £35m they received for Andy Carroll on: Phil Dowd. On the subject of bribery, it’s also likely that Cesc’s altercation with the officials in midweek had a part to play – referee’s are known to round on those teams who question their integrity.
Dowd’s list of offences includes ignoring the Joey Barton ‘tackle’ that prompted Abou Diaby’s reaction and sending off, failure to punish Kevin Nolan for grabbing Wojciech Szczesny by the neck, two dubious penalty awards, and the disallowing of a seemingly good goal by Robin van Persie. His decisions were infuriating and often inexplicable. I sincerely hope his performance is reviewed by the powers that be. I sincerely doubt that it will be.
However.
Dowd also denied Leon Best a perfectly good goal. He was also correct to dismiss Diaby. And he only contributed directly to two of Newcastle’s four goals. As much as it hurts, we simply have to look at ourselves. Again.
The fury at the referee is palpable. And understandable. But Dowd was not the referee when we threw away the lead against Wigan. This happens to us far too consistently to put it down to him alone. Arsenal simply did not do enough in the second half. We were unprofessional.
At half-time, Gooners were rightly crowing about a seemingly insurmountable four goal lead. We were clinical going forward, and Newcastle were dreadful at the back. It was easy.
The terrible, unforgivable truth of it is that Newcastle got back in to it as easily as we had seemingly put them out of sight.
There were warning signs in that first-half. Despite our dominance, Laurent Koscielny had to show concentration and awareness to keep Newcastle at bay. We completely failed to heed that warning, and our start to the second half was almost as awful as our opening to the game had been blistering.
Ill-fortune contributed. Losing Johan Djourou to injury was a real blow. There’s no word yet on how serious his injury is – but to be honest, at 4-0 up withdrawing him could well have been merely a precautionary move. Still, it meant the introduction of Sebastien Squillaci, who is looking increasingly like the natural successor to Mikael Silvestre. Worrying indeed.
The second incident that sparked our downfall was the sending off of Abou Diaby. Let’s go through it, shall we? It started with a horrible, dangerous lunge by Joey Barton. The tackle alone was probably worth at least a booking – albeit one that never came.
Diaby jumped up, grabbed Barton by the neck, and shoved him, before pushing the encroaching Kevin Nolan for good measure. He lost the plot. The referee, in my opinion, had no choice but to show him the red card.
It’s easy to see what contributed to the red mist descending over Diaby. After the injuries he has suffered in his career at the hands of ‘footballers’ like Dan Smith and Paul Robinson, he is understandably sensitive to poor challenges.
However, he is a also professional footballer. He is now 24 years old. He will encounter many more bad challenges in his career – some malicious, some mistimed. If he is psychologically unable to cope with being on the receiving end of those tackles, then that is a problem. A big problem.
His actions were thoughtless. Stupid, even. Because Joey Barton got exactly what he wanted. He got Diaby sent off, and brought his team back from the dead, scoring twice in the process. We might think him scum, but Joey Barton probably doesn’t care. The scoreboard certainly doesn’t care. The only way to exact punishment on these thugs is to beat them. At the point Barton leapt in at Diaby, we were 4-0 up. In their home ground. We were humiliating Barton and his team. If Diaby had kept his head he could have helped rub salt in to already gaping wounds.
Instead, he lashed out, and was rightly dismissed. With both Alex Song and Denilson unavailable, it left us incredibly vulnerable. What followed had was horribly predictable, especially with the referee so inclined towards the home team.
I’m furious with Diaby and Dowd. I don’t want to go through each goal we conceded – suffice to say, two were very soft penalties and another a screamer. But we didn’t do enough to win. A football match lasts ninety minutes, not forty-five.
As I write this, it’s too early to say how big an impact on our league position it will have. At half-time, Wolves are currently beating Manchester United by two goals to one.
I almost expect United to claw it back, and secure victory from the jaws of defeat.
That, after all, is what Champions do. Watch and learn, Arsenal.
My next post will be more positive. I promise.
February 4th, 2011
Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them when more experienced Polish goalkeepers are forced to undergo shoulder surgery. Woijciech Szczesny would probably claim to be the first, will hopefully become the second, and, as things stand, is very much the third.
I’ll start by declaring my sympathies for Lukasz Fabianski. It’s easy to forget amid all the excitement over Woijciech that up until his injury Fabianski had acquitted himself rather well this season. Some outstanding displays (his performance at Molineux is still particularly memorable) had seen him establish himself as Arsenal’s number 1. Now a goalkeeper five years his junior looks set to take over as the main man.
I suppose if Szczesny crumbles under the pressure of being first-choice, Fabianski might come straight back in to the role in the summer. But that doesn’t feel remotely likely. To play at the business ends of the football pitch – in goal, or upfront – you need a robust confidence which means that mistakes are forgotten in an instant. Szczesny, like Jens Lehmann before him, has that.
Yes, he’s had a bit of luck in getting his break – at least, let’s hope him causing Fabianski’s injury was luck – but what great player hasn’t. To break through you need an opportunity to seize. So far, Szczesny has lived up to the not inconsiderable hype.
It’s exciting to have a goalkeeper that everyone seems united behind. Szczesny seems to allay fans’ anxiety somwhat. A conceded corner isn’t as much of an invitation to panic. His mere presence relaxes the supporters and subsequently the players. One senses as well that, rightly or wrongly, the fans will be more forgiving of him when the inevitable first mistake happens.
Szczesny will start tomorrow’s game at Newcastle, with Manuel Almunia on bench. Hopefully Almunia is still able to find the momentum to mount a serious challenge to the young Pole. Alex Song will miss out with a thigh problem, but Theo Walcott is fit to play.
In other news, Arsene has made the very valid point that if Cesc Fabregas were guilty of anything in the tunnel against Everton, he would certainly have been charged. I’ve deliberately steered quite clear of the furore surrounding our captain: ultimately, I find it quite boring. People outside the club will always take pot-shots at you – especially when you’re doing well. We should take their bitterness as a compliment. Sometimes I think we worry too much about being ‘loved’ and not enough about winning things.
Finally, congratulations to Laurent Koscielny on his first call-up for France. I was delighted for him to nod home the winner the other night, especially having been involved in the controversial Everton goal. He’s had a funny old first six months in England: he’s look composed, intelligent, and classy; yet he’s also been sent off twice and has contributed to some of our messier defensive moments. However, it looks as if the mistakes are being ironed out and we might have a good player on our hands.
Enjoy your Friday.
Next Posts
Previous Posts
