Match Reports
News of the World: Nicklas Bendtner fires up the Young Gunners
Match Video
I would link to News of the World, they claim to be #1 for video, but territorial restrictions prevent us Americans from seeing their video. As it turns out the only videos I can watch on their site are videos of scantily clad women. Go figure.
Man of the Match
Aaron Ramsey… I KEED, I KEED! Arshavin was brilliant in the roles that Cesc is currently playing on the team; as captain and as the player “in the hole” behind the strikers. I’m not taking anything away from Cesc, but Arshavin showed everyone how that position was supposed to be played yesterday. Everytime I watch him play he impresses me more, his long passes, his short passes, his vision, his understanding of the game, his shooting, his dribbling, basically he’s the complete player.
Basically, Arsenal sold Hleb, who scored a grand total of 7 league goals for Arsenal and who demanded to be played in the spot that Arshavin occupied yesterday for £12m and used that money to buy an actual football player.
The Good
Bendtner scored… Arsenal kept a clean sheet… undefeated now 21 in a row… 4th place secured… 3rd place still within reach… no one was injured… it was a good day!
YAY!
The Bad
Everyone is hailing Ramsey as having a great game but the stats just don’t add up: he only won 1 challenge all day and his passing percentage was below average for an Arsenal central midfielder. In addition, I felt like Wenger subbed him out because by the 60th minute he was looking jaded. Yes, he’s young and he certainly shows flashed of brilliance, but yesterday was not his best game.
Also, Pompey should have gotten at least one goal.
The Ugly
Real Madrid were mauled by Barcelona yesterday and promptly made Arsene Wenger a huge offer, according to News of the World. Also according to NotW, Wenger promptly told them to piss off. This isn’t a surprise because Wenger is under contract and has said time and again that he will honor his contract.
Injury Report
No new injury news, Arsene Wenger is saying that Robin van Persie is a late test for Tuesday but that if he’s not 100% fit, he won’t be played.
We don’t know if Van Persie will be available, if he is 100 per cent fit he has a very good chance, if he is not he will not play in a game of that stature, that is for sure.
That’s a bit of a strange thing to say. I mean, it’s not like we’ll have anything left to play for if we don’t win on Tuesday. Moreover, we need to win 2-0 to go through outright so scoring is crucial. So I can’t see the logic of reserving one of Arsenal’s most prolific scorers, unless the player doesn’t want to play, or… if maybe you think you’ll have to remove him too early.
The rest of the team remains as reported on Friday: Gallas, Dudu and Rosicky are out for the season, Clichy is out for several more weeks (read “the rest of the season unless we play in the Champions League final”), and Silvestre is “short” for Tuesday with a groin pull.
So that’s about it for today, see you tomorrow.
P.S. Newcuntsle lost to Liverpool and are now pretty much assured of going down. I feel bad for the supporters but that’s what you get when you have a team with more criminals and lawbreakers that the Bush administration.
Newcastle may employ a bunch of god awful cheats, but I would rather see Hull and Blackburn go down.
Nice – Newcastle finished with 10 players thanks to the now traditional Joey Barton red card. What a hack…
I wish Newcastle and Boro could take Hull, Sunderland, Blackburn and Bolton with them down into the Championship. I really like West Brom, they play some good football but have a terrible defense – I thought they could have stayed up but selling Kevin Phillips was a horrible move on their part – the man is a goal scorer.
As long as Hull and Mr. fancy suit Brown goes down I’ll be happy.
so 4th place is ours rightfuly claimed but i wonder if it is best if we go to the final you have to say barca are already in the final and knowing they scored 6 against madrid with our defence i would happily concede 7 goals only lol c’mon arsenal win that cl
by the way ramsey didn’t play that well but a real plus will be amaury bishof regardless of the un spellable name he was brilliant how come no body noticed him also eboue should play instead of gibbs
good call on Bischoff, sems, i was pleasantly surprised by his brief appearance. of course, I am biased toward players who work hard.
In other news, Birmingham won automatic promotion today, which means, barring a transfer, Martin Taylor is back in the EPL next season.
Awesome.
Time for an Amaury Bischoff song:
When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie,
That’s Amaury,
When the world seems to shine like you’ve had too much wine,
That’s Amaury…
(Sing it like Dean Martin)
Thing I don’t understand – how can a manager under contract be approached by a rival club, but a player under contract can’t be? Surely the club would have to talk to the other club first.