Blackburn, Transfers and Goalkeepers

I have missed my match review completely, so I’m going to keep this short and sweet as I want to embark on other subjects as we all know the transfer windows was firmly shut at 18:00 UK time yesterday. The Blackburn game on Saturday was a very tough away fixture especially when we play any of Fat Sam’s teams we always seem to struggle and loose vital points. The lads did me proud in every way, yes we seemed very nervous in the first half, we knew what happened there last season so perhaps we were too cautious to begin with.

Blackburn did put the pressure on with their towel throw-ins and keeper directed corners but we defended well and to me Almunia had a very decent game, let’s hope he can use it to boost his confidence even further. In the 20^thminute Arshavin found Van Persie in the middle who with a lovely through ball fed running Theo on the right wing who slotted the ball past Robinson into the far post. Few minutes later Koscielny got caught cold, Diouf took advantage of our new CB and muscled him out the way brought the ball to the by-line and with a nice pass found his team mate Mame Diouf who slotted into an empty net. He will need to make sure this doesn’t happen again, it was a rather cheap goal to give away. Another blow came few minutes later as Robin Van Persie got injured yet again, received his first treatment but with his second there was no way back for him into this game, he was replaced with Chamakh.

It looked apparent that Arsene had a good team talk at half time as Arsenal came back to life and searched for the winning goal. It certainly didn’t take too long, in the 6^thminute Bacary Sanga galloped down the right flank crossed the ball into the box. The ball found Fabreags who fired a shot straight at Theo in the six yard box, luckily Arshavin got on a rebound picked his spot and buried the ball through a rather congested area. The rest is history now, there were some nervy moments towards the end but we stood our ground and made sure three points were secure in the bag. It was good revenge for what we suffered there last season and a well deserved win.

With the transfer window now shut there is a great deal of negativity amongst us Gooners at least in the blog sphere, most blogs have expressed disappointment that Le Boss did not stregthen the squad with a world class goalkeeper and a cover for Alex Song in the DM position. To me this comes as no suprise, we have now four goalkeepers on the books, bringing one in would mean letting someone go. Perhaps all the hype about Schwarzer was just a mind game to give Almunia a kick in the bollocks and show him he needs to fight for that number one place, everyone is scared at the thought of Fabianski in goal but this guy is still very young for a keeper and will learn going forward. This brings me to a point raised by many that none of our keepers have had the support they really deserved and felt like the fans are behind them all the way, we have what we have and we need to get behind them I say.

In my eyes Schwarzer is no better than Almunia, we all saw his blunder at the Emirates against Fulham last season, also I do however remember the game against Barca at home and if it wasn’t for Almunia we would have nothing to play for in the second leg. Either way I will sing his name, cheer him on and get behind him all the way, the same goes for Fabianski, perhaps that will give them the confidence they need.

COME ON YOU REDS….

Slow start but ended in a feast

Before the kick off I never expected for the score line to be so high, Blackpool give them a lot of credit because they came to The Emirates to play football and football they played until the sending off of Evatt. I don’t think we can argue here but he deserved a red as he was the last defender. We can argue the fact that it was outside the penalty area but sometimes these are given and this was certainly the case yesterday. Wenger did say after the game it was harsh but I believe a red card was a correct decision after all these are the rules.

Even after going down to 10 man  Ian Holloway’s men tried to play real football they passed the ball well and if it wasn’t for the sending off we would have witnessed a different outcome, I’m sure. They never hoofed the ball forward expecting a good fortune bounce to get on the score sheet, this is the first team I have seen that tried to play football the correct way and because of that I have tons of respect for  Ian Holloway and Blackpool. It goes without saying as the man himself said that Le Boss is a magician and just goes to show that we are lucky enough to have him for years to come. I wouldn’t have any other way, would you?

We started of slow you have to admit, we needed a goal to get going and we did just that. I’m not going to go through the goals scored we all seen them hundred times I did anyway, they quite simply awesome. Theo at last got his first hat-trick, Arshavin got one so did Diaby and Chamakh to finish off the afternoon. It was a job well done and I hope this is just a beginning for Walcott and by no means it’s a just a one game display, God only knows how much I want him to succeed, he never really showed any progress last season so it’s important for him to grow into the team and score more of those hat-tricks.

The transfer market is still open and Wenger promised at least one more signing if not two, I’m sure it’s damn hard to find some decent enough for our club without spending millions on top. Let’s hope we will get them soon enough or more like on the deadline which is usually the case. I think another CB and DM would be welcome by every Arsenal fan, come on Arsene don’t make us wait too long. That’s it from me fellow Gooners, till next time.

Theo…Theo…Theo…

ATG Rant: If You Hate Barca, Stand Up…

Afternoon fellow Gooners,

The title really says it all doesn’t it? I have really come to HATE the famous Tap Up Barcelona FC, as it happened previously with Viera we all started to think the same way about Real Madrid. This time is no different but we move onto another club from another Spanish city. I have always valued Barca as a club but I feel disappointed with the way they go about their business off the pitch!

Perhaps we should make it into a song during The Emirates Cup? Can you imagine 60.000 people singing it? I can only imagine one individual not liking any of it but I doubt he will be there to witness it, if he stays that is as he will be recovering from the World Cup.

Anyway let’s move on closer to what has been happening around our Almighty Arsenal. We have finally heard what we wanted to hear for all these weeks with the Cesc saga taking twists and turns day in day out. Arsenal have confirmed a formal bid from Tap Up Barcelona and with a smile on my face we threw it back in their dirty faces, for some time we stood up and didn’t allow them to bully us:

“Arsenal captain Cesc Fabregas is under contract with the Club until the summer of 2015. He is a highly-valued member of the team and part of our future plans.

“We have followed recent speculation linking Cesc with a move away from the Club but as there has never been any official approach for him, only two informal exchanges, in which we made it abundantly clear that we have no interest in transferring Cesc, we have refrained from publicly passing comment. However, yesterday evening we received an offer from Barcelona for Cesc and in response, we immediately and resolutely told them once again that we have no intention of selling our captain.

“To be clear, we will not make any kind of counterproposal or enter into any discussion. Barcelona have publicly stated that they will respect our position and we expect that they will keep their word.”

Now if they have any decency, respect and class left they will read between those lines above and get the gist of things. You would think they would act accordingly, however I get the feeling this is far from over and it didn’t really last long as they are already preparing a second bid for our skipper, I don’t get which part of ” To be clear, we will not make any kind of counterproposal or enter into any discussion” they don’t fucking understand?

Their dirty tactics continue to go unpunished their vice-president Rafael Yuste said:

“I’m optimistic that he’ll be able to sign for Barça as soon as possible and it’s clear that everybody here will give him a warm welcome,”

“We’ll do nothing that might make it more difficult for him to come here and we won’t rush things. But we won’t stop, either.”

I think the only to way stop this bullshit getting out of hand and spreading further we should lodge a formal complaint to FIFA that they are constantly trying to Tap Up a player who is under contract with us, Come on we are The Arsenal and we fear no one on and off the pitch.

Rant over, bloody Scumbags! Ok I’m fine now… Piles of shit…

Moving on swiftly everyone is probably now aware of Walcott not going to the upcoming World Cup in South Africa with the England squad which to me was no suprise. I have a mixed feeling about this  one side of me thinks he was over used last year and now they have ditched him the other is saying he didn’t step forward this season so it’s fairy deserved. I think Goonerholic has covered this inside out with his as per usual very good article.

I will leave you with the latest Joe Cole news as this seems to be the topic of the week, Joe Cole is a very good player and I do rate him but would he really choose Arsenal over other clubs and would we be prepared to pay him those high wages he demands? Something tells me NOT, but we have heard those stories before haven’t we now?

Up the Arsenal, until the next time, enjoy the weather.

We gave our best, it wasn’t enough for the Ref

Having just watched the game I have mixed feeling about the tie, number one was the Ref. He gave all the free kicks to Barca to my liking in the first half it never looked we were going to win this one anyway we made some tackles and the German Referee has always seen the bad boys in our squad. I have not been counting but we must have got at least two yellows in the first 45 minutes.

There are plenty of things to talk about, there is no doubt that Barca were the better side after we scored our first goal….the pass from Walcott was sloppy but Bendy managed to get himself up in time and convert his chance. Few second later we had yet another brilliant scoring opportunity to be 2 nil up, but it wasn’t meant to be, Diaby took the wrong option and since that we were pretty much spineless. Nasri was not there at all I thought he would be up to the job for me. Diaby had the best game of his life, then again people like Rosicky and Nasri have let him down with poor positioning. Don’t get me wrong I think both of them tried and tried but Barce is Barca, good game plan, best player in the world and here we are, what esle could we do?

We allowed them to read us and we thought we could out fox them after the first goal we pushed higher up the pitch and Messi did the damage in the first half, I did think there was a way of coming back, however Guardiola got his tactics 100% spot on on the night. They never gave it full on counter to destroy us, however I think our lads should have done the same tonight, it’s easier said than done I know that especially with 7 main squad players missing. I honestly thing Barca would be an avarage team if it wasn’t for Messi.

Having said what has happened on the pitch I think the Ref and His Almighty Linesman did their job really well, they didn’t flatter at booking us and they seemed to have a real flavour at Barca coming through tonight, Rosicky played one of a beauty pass to Bendtner who was onside but the linesman flagged it offside…even Mr Gray which is very rare disagreed.

It does hurt tonight, we all hurt tonight, I wish we could have a go at them with our full time squad, I wonder how they would respond then. It was certainly a footballing lesson and I’m sure the lads and Arsene will learn from this. Don’t get your head down people we still have a glimmer of hope for the Priemier League, starting with a visit to Three Point Lane and I’m sure we’ll be back in the Champions League next year.

Arsenal for life!

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