Arsenal 1 - 0 WBA
Posted by Kieran - 18/08/08 at 06:08:05 pmEboue. You’ll probably have already read one of my rants about the headless idiot marshalling Arsenals right hand side, I’m the mans harshest critic and was gutted when he stayed at Arsenal - I just didn’t think I could take any more of his ‘interesting’ runs that always resulted in a loss of possesion. However he had one of his best performances in an Arsenal shirt yesterday. He tackled well and didn’t try to overcomplicate anything. He did have 3 wild shots from considerable distance, but credit where credit is due, at least he shot unlike most of the rest of the team.
Adebayor however had a stinker. Its hard to see how he is worth the extra money to be honest this season, and so far since he signed again its hard to see an offer of £30m coming in again. If the noise coming out of the club is correct and that he was willing to sign 6 weeks earlier than he did because Arsenal were shopping around for his sale, it seems the rest of football regained their senses.
Walcott didn’t have a great match but he was man-marked throughout. Sagna got the best out of that though because it left the wing clear for him.
Nasri however - its early days, but could he be the Pires that Arsenal need? A goal four minutes into his league debut seemed a dream start even if it was laid on a plate, and he looked energetic and dangerous throughout. It didn’t result in much at the end of the day but he looked like the kind of player that is always ready to try and with a bit of confidence could be the man Arsenal need to run into the centre a la Ljunberg and Pires in their best periods.
All we’ve got left to do now is buy a defensive midfielder before the transfer window closes.
Huddersfield Town 1 - 2 Arsenal
Posted by Kieran - 07/08/08 at 07:08:28 amI must admit I didn’t quite get the link - Arsenal always play Barnet and I can see the draw of playing Juve/Madrid pre season, its even something of a tradition to play in the Amsterdam Tournement at Ajax. But Huddersfield? Is Wenger beggining to let something slip?
After last weekend’s 180 minutes 1 penalty total football display we assumed this was target paractice - we last played Huddersfield over 10 years ago and they sit two leagues below us (League 1).
However, it was all more dignified than that - Huddersfield once had this fantastic manager called Herbert Chapman who just happened to defect to Arsenal and become our most successful manager since…. the clubs inception. Huddersfield also happened to be marking their centenary and so you see it all came together rather nicely.
Most Gooners would immediately recognise Walcot, Fabianski, new signing Ramsey and precosious wonderkid Jack Wilshire. You might even remember Nassa Barazite or Henri Lansbury. These were the most high profile players however and the average age of the team was 17.6, probably skewed by old men Theo and Fabianski.
In the first half Arsenal comfortably dealt with the Huddersfield first team, who appeared happy to plop eleven men behind the ball - with an average age of 49 its not surprising. At the end of the half they all had to be stretchered off with oxygen. Huddersfield had three golden oppurtunities all of which looked nailed on - I can only imagine they were told to deliberately miss, because I’ve put away tougher chances on a rainy tuesday on a five-a-side pitch.
Huddersfield changed their entire team in the second half and the contest opened out. The Huddersfield reserve/youth team had a lot more about them going forward and with 6 changes for Arsenal the match became a bit more exciting.
A few players shone last night - Lansbury being one of them. His play in the middle of the field was exquisit and like Fabregas he appeared to have great distribution and quick vision to go with it, I’d like to see more of him. Ramsey and Wilshire had a few nice touches but appeared to be muscled out of it by Huddersfield in the first half - they didn’t appear for the second so I can only assume they feature in Wengers plans in the coming weeks, if only as the bones of the Carling Cup team.
Arsenal’s number 12 was great to - rather annoyingly they had no names on their shirts and because some of the lads don’t have squad numbers they were numbered from 1 - 20. So I’ll probably never know who he was, but he was fantastic and made the first goal.
Huddersfield scored a lucky deflection to take the lead, Arsenal pulled two back with 4 minutes to spare and the home supporters started legging it for the door. Shame considering the 19,500 crowd was projected to be the biggest this season and it was their centenary.
They obviously knew something we didn’t - taking over an hour to travel 15 miles away from the ground, Huddersfield have a lovely stadium stuck in the middle of a congested and shitty traffic system. It made me eager to return to the chaos of the Blackwell Tunnel - at least the traffic moves through there.
Arsenal 1 - 0 Real Madrid
Posted by Kieran - 03/08/08 at 08:08:57 pm
Seems like Aaron Ramsey has decided he’s good enough to get in the starting XI against West Brom on the opening day of the season - and why not. He’s played well and put in some nice touches. I’m not sure he’s ahead of Denilson or Diaby to partner Cesc just yet but he’s got bags of experience in lower flight football so maybe Arsene will make the jump?
Anyway, Arsenal managed to beat the champions of Spain today, and looked the deserved winners after more or less dominating play - but we still look hamstrung by our inability to convert domination/possession into goals. It’s so frustrating watching us take teams apart and then not get the three points and today we should have really had 2 or 3, but we just failed to make the most of our chances going forward. Adebayor was unlucky not to score a header after Dudek made a good save but he was also wasteful elsewhere. I still think £30m in the bank would have been good business with Bendtner RVP, Vela, Walcott and Edaurdo floating around but if he’s scores 30 goals again this season i guess he can stay 
European Footballers - Last One I Promise!
Posted by Kieran - 31/07/08 at 07:07:10 amDavid Dein is a legend - he drove Arsenal forward, appointed Arsene Wenger and was instrumental in bringing Dennis Bergkamp to Highbury. However he left under less than pleasent circumstances when he tried to force the board into accepting a Russian and then American takeover. That seemed to signal the end for Dein’s footballing sensibility.
However the man is back on the scene (although not with Arsenal) and has Fifa/Uefa in his sights with their potty foriegners obsession.
“As we stand today, it is illegal under Article 39 of the European Treaty, the freedom of movement of labour,’’ Dein said
I’ve touched on that before but it seems Dein has done his homework, and his most pertinent point is the ridiculousness of blaming foreigners for the decline of the national game:
It’s a cheap shot to blame the foreigners. There were only 11 non-British players in the old First Division [1991-92]. Now there are 450 in the Premiership. But England did not win a tournament since 1966 and there was no influx of foreigners in the 26-year gap to the start of the Premier League.
I’m with David.
Andy Burnham - Secretary For Talking Rubbish
Posted by Kieran - 27/07/08 at 04:07:18 pmOh dear, but really when will politicians learn to leave things alone? Why not concentrate on the rapidly spiralling out of control shambles that is the olympics, rather than getting involved in a debate about football which seems to be doing just fine thanks. Its bad enough that football supporters have to listen to mad man Fergusmoans increasingly incoherent ramblings and digest the Barwick/Platini clusterfuck that controls our beautiful game. Sure everyones got an opinion but just because you are part of the government it doesn’t mean you’re most qualified to decide!
Anyway, Burnham has given this rather long and dull interview in which he speaks about stuff and other stuff most of it boring. Who cares about you’re thoughts on education Andy, its not your job.
Also I’m not sure when the role of border police was added to Burnhams suite of responsibilities, but the man’s getting a bit excited about limiting foriegners in english teams.
His own favourite sport is cricket - “It’s a myth that all I do is football,” he said. Er - well it is all you bang on about fella. After all its football he has his eyes firmly set on again:
Mr Burnham believes that there is a serious problem with the number of foreigners playing in the Premier League. “I’m not xenophobic in any way but I care about the health of English football, the state of the grassroots game, the quality of the competition and the ability to win of the national team,” he said.
1. The health of English football? English football was the highest grossing domestic league in the world last year. It seems pretty healthy, especially when players can pick up £200k a week in wages.
2. The state of the grassroots game? Belonging to two local leagues myself it seems just fine - i even drive past the rec on a weekend and see youth teams battling it out. But even if the grassroots game was dying a swans death - how would limiting highly paid profesionals help?! Its not like every grassroots team has a couple of spanish players? Sure they might have Polish players but Andy your government invited them over here and gave them houses (Note: I do not see this as a bad thing but it illustrates my point).
3. The quality of the competition…. I’m sorry but this seasons finale was spectacular when any one of three teams could have won the trophy with 4 matches to go. Give that 50% of the last 8 teams in Europes premier competition were English as well, you’re an idiot if you think foreign players “damage” the competition. And don’t pretend that you need to spend loads of money to stay up at the top of the table, Spurs/Sunderland/Manchester City all spent 2-3 times as much as arsenal last season and still ended up nowhere, in comparison to Liverpool who’ve spent £100m chasing waterfalls in the league.
4. The national teams winning streak…. Sven Goran Erikson was the countries most successful post-war manager ever. Statistical fact. And we sacked him because like our playes (see Bentley) we’re so arrogant and over confident we think we deserve to win everything. Spain are a perfect example of a great talented team who’ve won the square root of nothing until this seasons European Championships - the difference this season was they had a manager who had a young team and kept them playing together, rather than pandering to the masses and trying to force old players into a team which they didn’t fit - much like England trying to force Fat Frank Lampard and Gerrard to play together. You do realise that it definately isn’t foreign players fault that the FA appointed Steve McClaren as manager of the national side right?
“It was a bitter pill to take not being at Euro 2008. We have to ask some hard questions about whether we are doing enough to give young English players a chance. We need to maximise the home-grown talent for the national team to draw on.” There must, he thinks, be national rules because without them the clubs would all compete to recruit top players from all over the world.
“It is like an arms race, bringing in the best from outside. It would be more healthy to get more home-grown talent and encourage clubs to train and nurture people.”
As i stated yesterday, Arsenal have just signed 6 youngsters on professional contracts - we’ve also got Theo Walcot and given the league the “talent” of David Bentley and Jermaine Pennant. We wouldn’t do that if we didn’t have the money and we wouldn’t have the money if, as Andy suggests, we got hoofed back to the footballing dark ages. I loved Perry Groves and Ray Parlour, but really is it not better for these youngsters to be playing alongside world class players such as Ronaldo, Fabregas or Ballack? The alternative is training with Fat Terry from Plymouth and Big Dick from Stockton.
I see it as the youngsters coming through Arsenals youth team now have massive advantages over those from say Charlton/Wimbledon/Dagenham Redbridge etc - firstly Arsenal have the finances to give them the very best in training facilities. This is paid for in part by the cash flow generated by the foreign players at the club. These players are amongst the best in the world and can pass on knowledge, experience and skills to the youngsters. Ramsey didn’t come to Arsenal from Cardiff because we give him free ice cream.
“I would be quite prepared to go to Europe and say ‘this is our proposal let’s see if we can get clearance for this’. The debate is around applying EU law sensitively.”
Our friend Andy is also accutely aware that it is illegal under European law to ban anybody from work as long as they have the right - its racial discrimination and the goverment have worked hard to introduce free trade and movement for skilled workers. This is to be applauded, but not when the government want to do an about turn and block skilled workers for working for sports teams just because they have the wrong birth certificate. Double standards is still double standards Andy even if you ask nicely.
Now, do us a favour and stop the olympics sliding down the toilet and if you really want to meddle, get rid of that idiot in charge of your party.
Football’s Foreigners
Posted by Kieran - 26/07/08 at 12:07:13 pmJanuary 2008 - Of all the clubs that signed players in the January transfer window and that play in the premier league which club signed only English players? Arsenal.
Now as an Arsenal fan it really begins to great when Arsenal Football Club are used as a yardstick by the English media to prove that English Football is being ruined by the influx of foreigners. Last season Birmingham consistently fielded an English first 11 and they did really well they ended second from bottom. Its hypocrites like Ferguson that don’t help either by perpetuating the myth that ManUre are an english team with homegrown talent. Only Gary Neville and Paul Scholes are currently first team players that came through the youth team system. Giggs is Welsh. Rooney, Hargreaves, Ferdinand, Carrick and Foster all cost in excess of £50m between them. So really what Arsenal are at fault with here is not choosing to spend ridiculous money on english players just because they are English - instead prefering to buy Fabregas, Henry and the like for a great deal less!
Chelsea are exactly the same, £23m for Shaun Wright Phillips? Lampard, Cole, Johnson, Wright-Philips and Bridge all bought in because their previous clubs were desperate for a slice of the Russian pie. If clubs like United and Chelsea insist on buying every English player that performs well at any level at any cost, it doesn’t seem fair to penalise Arsenal for stepping back from bankruptcy and purchasing from more sensible markets…
On that subject Ferguson recently commented that “the English league should limit the number of foreign players to stop them getting out of hand”, clearly refering to Arsenal who fielded a full non-english first team. Good one. Whilst we enforce that lets get rid of foriegn managers shall we? No point having a foreign figurehead for an all english team is there? Thats right Ferguson, pack your bags and fuck off back to the riches of your own league in your own country. Hypocrite!
Football is a worldwide game… Manchester United themselves hope to embark on a pre-season profiteering training trip to India and have already hit Asia, the US and Africa in the last three years. So… what I think Ferguson and his club are saying is that we should take other countries money, and then tell their players to do one? Generate interest in or league and then shut the doors? Nice.
At this point its probably worth mentioning that Ferguson now has good form as a hypocrite.
Ok - remember my first point? It would probably choke Ferguson but Arsenal signed 6 English players recently including the rather fantastic Angela Henri Lansbury (pictured left). 6 of the most hyped young players in the country (15 - 17) who could just be playing for Ferguson’s (and you know thats inevitable despite his protests) 2012 GB team.
And thats where all this gets interesting… Richard Wright, £6m English goalkeeper, punched the ball into his own night and then cried when he got the chance in Europe against Deportivo. You can’t say Arsenal didn’t try. Francis Jeffers made Arsenal a £6.5m loss after signing for £9m and then leaving for £2.5m. Not even as illustrious as Wright I can hardly remember what he looked like but he’s apparently still good friends with Arsenals medical team. Jermaine Pennant? Unfotunately the pissed up car criminal never really fulfilled his early ambition as an Arsenal player and helped Birmingham achieve relagation in 05/06. I’ve even kept media gobshite and all round tosspot David I’m God Bentley for the end. This is a player who believes he is so good, he is better than Arsenal, better than Blackburn and better than England. In reality he’s a jumped up little prick full of his own hype.
Never mind Cashley Hole and Sol “I’m Off To Europe” Campbell.
You see, Arsenal have a history of being burnt by their English purchases. They either fail to live up to their hype and promise, they can’t keep their traps shut or they go on uninsured drink driving sprees. Is it any wonder that Arsenal won’t buy English?! Even Nicolas Anelka was good enough to leave us a profit of £23m after burning down every bridge in North London.
So what the media will decry at every oppurtunity is the fact that Arsenal only buy first team foreign players from abroad - which is correct and unsurprising given the above points. What they don’t tell you is the abundance of youth talent coming through, including tosspots like Pennent who spent 4 years training with Bergkamp and Henry two of the worlds greatest players. Do you think he benefited from that experience? I’d say so.
Players like Bentley could be in Arsenals first team now if they weren’t arrogant and full of themselves, rather than playing at the wrong end of the table.
Much aside from that, you only have to look at the Premier League which is now the most televised football league in the world in contrast to Italy’s Serie A, which is not. Although 80% of the Italian football league is Italian. Which would you prefer? The equivelent of Oxford vs Wimbledon every Sunday or the international drama and skill showcase that Sky currently pipe into your goggleboxes?
The point is we have some of the best footballers in the world playing here in England and forcing them to play alongside David Bentley and Jermaine Pennant along with a bunch of second rate no hopers would see them packing up and queing anxiously at Gatwick/Heathrow.
Trust me, as Arsenal fan who’s seen the likes of Ian Selly, Eddie McGoldrick and Steve Morrow I know what I prefer. Its great when teams produce homegrown talent or manage to assemble largely English teams (Dixon/Adams/Keown/Bould/Winterburn for example being the epitomy of English defence - oh look they played for Arsenal), Ian Wright, Ray Parlour and the like, but lets not force it, please?
We All Live In A Perry Groves World
Posted by Kieran - 25/07/08 at 06:07:06 am
This is the story of Perry’s life from boy to hero and father. Wisely concentrating on the hilarious anecdotes of a proffesional footballer and his scrapes with the law, and other players instead of the “boring family stuff like arguments at xmas that everyone already knows” this is a riot from start to finish.
The style is relaxed and informal and throughout Perry’s story you really get the impression that he’s bemused that he was lucky enough to take these experiences himself, and even luckier to be given the oppurtunity to share them.
Told with good humour, not once does Groves come across as bitter for missing out on todays wages explosion although he does make some wry observations - and you have to ask if anyone in football today has this much fun.
I can’t recommend this enough to anyone who likes football, sports or even just wants to read the exciting story of one man lucky enough to steo into his own dream.
Alex Fergusmoan
Posted by Kieran - 05/11/07 at 02:11:34 pmAlex Ferguson is a shit. Its amazing after 20 years he has still retained the inspiring ability to be completely one sided, and as biased as a lopsided triangle.
Following the (probably fair) 2-2 draw between Arsenal and Manchester United, the demented scotsman couldn’t contain a barage of filth and stupidity. Just take this:
“On our bench, we were getting terrible abuse from people two or three feet away from us. There is a lack of security. It is absolutely disgraceful the abuse you and your staff take. All sorts of things are being shouted and screamed at you and there is an absolute danger here.”
Two things stand out - obviously the united fans who sit behind the dugouts at Old Trafford are carefully vetted to make sure none of them in the heat of a football match would dare shout anything other than sanitised words of encouragement. No wait - there have been more arrests at Old Trafford in the last 12 months than any other premiership ground - which club has a safety issue again?
Perhaps more importantly, Ferguson obviously forgot all about his berating of the fourth official - at one point he was 2mm away from the poor chaps ear, and from the images it certainly looked like he wasn’t being polite. Does the fourth official not deserve the safety and protection from yobbery that Fergusmoan clearly craves? The majority of the insults centered around Furguson being an loudmouthed lunatic anyway. Pretty sure no manager who sits down and only gets up to shout at his players gets more than the odd comment.
Lets not forget, Fergus has form as well - (taken from BBC Sport 2005)
Ferguson reacted angrily to Rennie’s decision not to punish Andy O’Brien for bringing down Ryan Giggs on the edge of the Newcastle area. The United manager kicked a ball away in disgust and remonstrated with fourth official Winter on the sidelines before being dismissed by Rennie. Winter was then subjected to a sustained four-letter tirade from the Scot.
Do to others as you would have done unto you.
Senderos & Arsenal For The Title?
Posted by Kieran - 27/09/07 at 07:09:45 amPhillip is one of the most frustrating players I have seen play at Arsenal - mainly because he can play well, its just the other 20% of the time where he gets caught out and looks awful.
Now i find it hard to argue with the big man Wenger, everything he’s done has been genius - the cole/gallas + £5m swap that left us with Clichey, Henry being shipped off before his pout exploded when a fellow player decided to pass the ball to one of his other 9 teammates etc. But I think the jury’s still out on Senderos. Too often in big matches he makes glaring mistakes.
Sure - look at his performance against Newcastle and he was strident. Even in the Champs League he was solid and made an effective partnership with Toure. But in the Premiership, he just seems out of sorts - is it that opposing teams in the league do their homework better? The ammount of teams I’ve seen trying to go directly through Senderos is on the rise - so it can’t be only me that identifies him as the weak link at the back!
Anyway - the point of this was to say well done (you wouldn’t have thought it) and well played. A much criticised player is Senderos - I just hope he can build on appearances like this and cut those woefull mistakes out of his game.
An interesting thought (606)-
Granted he is strong and ok in the air and does have some moments of genius (e.g. his clerance of the line yesterdy), but every time our defence gets caught out he always seems to be the cause (i.e not marking properly, or getting caught out by a ball over the top), he does not seem to have good ball control skills (terrible passign ability) and he is not the fastest defneder in the world. Indeed his demolition at the hands of Drogba in a previous season shows that against top class forwards he cannot cope.
I think though, as stated in the replies elswehere in that article - Drogba destroyed most centrebacks last season!
I think Senderos is currently a good player, but not great like the rest of the team around him - if he steps up to the plate though, Arsenal have a real chance of causing an upset in the league.
Speaking of which - the one thing that has kept me cautious about Arsenals great start to the season is the possibility of injury to Cesc Fabregas, and the African Nations taking two or three of our first team regulars away. However on the strength of Tuesday night, it appears Arsenal have the depth/strength of squad to cope with that. 9 changes to the weekend, and a team of essentially 2nd string players and we still beat Newcastle - and it wasn’t just the victory but the manor of the victory - the team were still (and did) trying to score in the dying minutes - such was the hunger and the belief.
I can honestly see Bendtner/Edaurdo slotting in for Van Persie/Adeybeyor and there seems to be an entire midfield waiting to burst through to the first team.
And then there is Gallas to cme back from injury…. the futures looking bright in red and white!
The Top Four
Posted by Kieran - 23/09/07 at 09:09:09 pmFrom the Gooner - echoing my sentiments exactly - I’ve been telling people the same thing for weeks….
Let’s get the spuds out of the way to begin with - at the beginning of the season, Tottenham had the best chance out of any team of breaking into the top 4. However, i predicted before the first game of the season, that the same back five as last seasons leakiest defence would hamper the hopes of the rest of the (undeniably it pains me to admit) talented team.
The thing is, Man U fans have been quoted as saying Chelsea are their main rivals. I was really surprised by this, because I though United were going for the title, not 3rd place!
Yeah (possibly prematurely) I’m writing Chelsea off. They are 8 points behind Arsenal, with an unlicensed manager with their two best attacking players injured and the rest who don’t want to play. The real test for Chelsea will be how many stars leave in January. Anything more than the inevitable departure of Drogba and Chelsea’s season is hamstrung. Its poetic justice to see Cole play lackluster football with a team of misfits each week, whilst Clichey helps cement the grin onto Wengers face each week. All i hope for, come November is a 2 - 0 win, Gallas and Clichey to score.
Arsenal are deservedly at the top of the Premiership, as they are at the moment the best team in the Premiership. They have the best midfielder in the world at the moment, and he is guiding them to a strong position in the league. Unfortunately, they have not played anyone of real contention, only Spurs who are now residing in the relegation zone. We’ll see the real Arsenal when a) they play a big team or a hard team away b) when Cesc gets injured. Hopefully, Diaby and Flamini will step up, or Gilberto - there is plenty of strength there, if not quite the class of Fabregas.
Man United have had a poor start to the season. But like a good team, even though they are not playing well, they are winning. Importantly, they take their lucky breaks when they get them, and take their goalscoring chances. They should contend the title indefinitely unless it falls further apart from them - today was the first time they’ve scored more than one goal in a league match since April I think - they picked a great game to break that duck.
Liverpool looked the business in the first 3 games but after the international break, they have struggled. Benitez tried to rest his big-name payers, mainly Torres, and they have failed to score in the Premiership ever since. If they play Torres, the most creative and best of Liverpool strikers, they should regain their winning touch. Either way, they still look better value than Chelsea.
It’s interesting that comparing the four teams against the same four teams last year, they seem to have changed personalities. Chelsea now are playing like Liverpool, losing away games against mediocre teams, losing to United and drawing away from home, as well as ruining their title hopes in the first few weeks. United have been winning without playing, like Chelsea last year. Arsenal are scoring bags of goals and playing beautiful football that wins matches, much like last year’s United. And finally Liverpool are failing to score against small teams, such like Arsenal last year, who failed at Emirates so many times.
Also - check out this article - a great piece of writing highlighting the relatively unproven abilities of “the great one”.
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