The goals kept coming, Portsmouth hit for four and then Celtic hit for three in the return tie but not everything was perfect. Careless goals were being conceded. Individual mistakes at the back and goalkeeper were an all to familiar story.
Part 1
I promised myself that I would not treat this years end of season review as a thesis like I wrote last year, but trying to trim down a whole season into one article have proved a little too tricky for me.
The season is full of so many up’s and down’s so many sub stories that it is quite easy to get carried away so I have broken down this article into two parts which I will submit over the next few days.
Arsenal went into the new season with a new facelift, two out and one in during the summer of 2009.
It was no surprise that Emmanuel Adebayor sought pastures new or rather pushed in the direction of a fresh start. His absence from the final matches of the season along with his BBC interview all but sealed his fate. Manchester City clearly had too much money to look after decided to ease their bulging wallets by giving us a rather tasty £25 million for the Togolese front man. City didn’t stop there and threw in a cool £16 million for an out of sorts Kolo Toure who was finding life alongside William Gallas just too difficult to handle. A fans favourite but a player who was clearly tumbling down the rocky hill of decline.
Thomas ‘who?’ Vermaelen came in from Ajax, a young Belgian defender who was judged as too small by Tony Adams and a section of Arsenal fans who already set a reserve of 6ft6 as the height limit. Arsene tried to bring in Bordeaux striker Marouane Chamakh but his club didn’t want to lower the asking price regardless of the player being in his final year of his existing contract. No more signings were made but long term injured players Tomas Rosicky and Eduardo were on course to join the Arsenal squad again.
I was fairly happy with the squad in place as surely the end of season injury plague cannot strike twice, surely.
Our formation was a hot topic over the summer, would Arsene switch to a 4-3-3 after tinkering with various systems in the latter stages of the season. We got a glimpse in pre season how the team would shape up. We played in Germany against Hannover 96 and Cesc was given licence to roam in a midfield three, I was very impressed. He scored the only goal in a 1-0 victory if I remember rightly.
Injuries have been a problem for Arsenal over the last few years and the curse had struck just as the new season was approaching. Samir Nasri suffered a fractured leg in training and would be out for three months.
Goodison Park is never an easy place to go to, especially when the players were not match sharp. Everton away is usually a tough start for anyone. I cannot imagine many thought that the result would end up the way it did. Van Persie as a lone forward, Bendtner on the right with Arshavin on the left. Alex Song the new defensive midfielder after all and sundry wrote him off as not good enough to wear the shirt. We were fantastic on that sunny day, scoring six great goals along with some slick attacking football. It was something else that stood out for me that day.
Extract from Everton Match Review 16.08.09:
This Arsenal team looked hungry, strong and committed. Tomas Vermaelen was an instant hit alongside William Gallas in the heart of the defence. Scoring a powerful header following a Van Persie curling free kick. Alex Song was a powerhouse just ahead of the defence, continuing on from an outstanding second half from the season before. We did let in a last gasp consolation goal to Louis Saha but surely that was just a blip that would never rear its ugly head again. Right?
Arsenal had been consigned to the dustbin by pundits up and down the country, favourites to finish outside the top four even outside Europe by some. Clearly the team had other ideas.
Champions League qualification was not yet sealed, we had a small matter of Celtic to overcome in a two legged tie. With the first game taking place in Parkhead, the team would have to show some more of the strength and fight that was visible at Goodison park. I was not let down, another powerful performance from this new look Arsenal side. Thomas Vermaelen looked like a pillar of strength at the back yet again, slotting into the Arsenal side as if he has been there for years. William Gallas looked comfortable alongside him and once again Alex Song was the protection that the team lacked in parts the season before.
A deflected Cesc strike off the back of William Gallas just before half time and then a late own goal after great work from Diaby and Clichy was enough to allow Arsenal the chance to stick one foot firmly into the Champions League proper.
The goals kept coming, Portsmouth hit for four and then Celtic hit for three in the return tie but not everything was perfect. Careless goals were being conceded. Individual mistakes at the back and goalkeeper were an all to familiar story. I hoped that this was something that would correct itself as the season went on but that just didn’t happen. The Celtic victory was not just a routine victory, another story had developed. One that potentially could have destroyed an Arsenal player’s season, or perhaps contribute to the end of his Arsenal career. Did he or didn’t he dive? An outrageous over reaction from the media had turned Eduardo into a criminal. UEFA had attempted to ban Eduardo, but Arsenal were able to show proof that Eduardo actually had contact from the Celtic goalkeeper.
We have seen the likes of Rooney, Gerrard, Drogba, Ronaldo dive week in, week out domestically and on the European stage yet the only time that action is taken is when an Arsenal player is involved. I still have not read or heard a suitable explanation from the powers that be about that decision.
All of a sudden spot kicks were no longer given to Arsenal, make of that what you will. But I struggle to believe that countless penalties have been waved away purely by coincidence.
We had a good opportunity to test ourselves against the current Premier League holders, a trip to Old Trafford was on the horizon followed by the short trip across to big spending Manchester City the following week. The first big test of the season for the new look Arsenal.
We were without our inspirational skipper Cesc Fabregas at Old Trafford so it was down to Diaby, Denilson and Song to control the midfield and that is what they did. Manchester United were outplayed through out the game. Andrey Arshavin who had a stonewall penalty turned down (obviously) shortly before he let fly from 25 yards to score a thunderbolt out of the blue. Moments of inspirational magic was the reason why we made Andrey Arshavin our record signing. Those moments were not as frequent as we would have liked. Unfortunately we couldn’t score the second goal which would have surely wrapped up the points, Ben Foster’s legs put a stop to that when Van Persie struck goalwards just after the break. Almunia brought down Wayne Rooney in the box when the forward was going away from goal, Rooney dusted himself down to fire Manchester United level and then Abou Diaby who had a fabulous game undone his hard work by scoring the freakish of freak own goals, heading past Almunia with no Manchester United player near him.
It was difficult to take defeat li
ke that but at the same time I was full of confidence given our performance at Old Trafford, especially it being without Cesc Fabregas. Our defensive shortcomings were on full show a week later at the City of Manchester. Robin Van Persie had levelled the game at 1-1, we were in control of the game and were the better side but our huge gaps were exploited by the cunning City who counter attacked us to death. The game will be remembered for former Arsenal forward Emmanuel Adebayor catapulting himself above Ashley Cole as the most despicable human being known to man, at least in the world of football. His goal and celebration was one thing but his kick to Van Persie’s face was something that will stick along with me for the foreseeable future.
Arsenal had bounced back from their back to back defeats by brushing aside everyone in their path in all competitions through the month of September. Manuel Almunia who had been going through a difficult time on and off the pitch, picked up a chest infection whilst Lukasz Fabianski was injured. Vito Mannone got his chance and had an up and down time as Arsenal number 1. This high point was a man of the match display against Fulham and his low was the 2-2 draw at West Ham where one of his blunders cost the Gunners a goal after being in a comfortable 2-0 lead, that wouldn’t be the last slip from a two goal head start away from home.
Arsenal had a fine end of October and beginning of November, beating our north London rivals 3-0. Cesc’s goal from the restart after Van Persie had opened the scoring will always be one of the best memories of this merry go round campaign. Eight goals in the next two games against AZ Alkmaar and Wolves showed that the team meant business. The blips in Manchester had been just that, a blip. Robin Van Persie had adapted quite marvelously to his central striking role after a slow start. He had been scoring or assisting practically every game he played in.
Then came the moment that our season took a massive hammer to the face. Robin Van Persie had played in a meaningless friendly for his country, Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini took out Van Persie and his ankle to boot. To make matters even worse was the fact that his first diagnosis was incorrect, giving us all the hope that he would be back in the matter of weeks, instead our star forward had no part to play for seven months of the season and even animal placenta wouldn’t be enough to change that.
Eduardo was selected to take Van Persie’s place, a great chance for the Crozilian to cement a place in the Arsenal first team but unfortunately for him and for the club, he couldn’t take on the job. He was lost at Sunderland which was coincidentally our first defeat in 13 games. Chelsea came to the Emirates a week later and did a professional job on the blunt Gunners. A 3-0 defeat that really knocked the stuffing out of the Arsenal along with the realisation that potentially the best forward in the Premier League at that moment would not be around for most of the season. Arsenal were written off by most, out of the title race in November. Chelsea had opened up a healthy lead but you do not know what will happen with six months left of the season.
Injuries continued to haunt Arsene Wenger’s squad, it seemed as if we couldn’t get through a game without someone picking up a tweak, strain or illness. But the team continued to battle on, little Arshavin was given the job of replacing Van Persie. assumedly Wenger felt that the lone striker role wasn’t best suited to Eduardo.
Incredibly the team kept going, kept picking up results and clawed themselves back into contention. 5 victories and 1 draw in December was responsible for that. Chelsea and Manchester United could not find any consistency and dropped points, as Arsene said they would. A 4-2 victory against Bolton at the Emirates put the Gunners top of the league which gave the squad the belief that they could go on and win the league if the consistency continued.
Then came the fixtures of death, Aston Villa (a), Manchester United (h), Chelsea (a) and Liverpool (h) smack bang in the middle of the season. As we know it did not go well and looking back that moment could have been the deciding factor. We should have beaten Villa but the woodwork had denied us the victory. The defensive weaknesses were found out against our biggest rivals, conceding six in those two games showed that they were just not ready defensively. I refuse to believe that we were outplayed in any of the games against Manchester United and Chelsea this season, the difference was that they were street smart or pitch smart and we simply were naive.
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