Tomas Rosicky looked at home in the middle of the park and it should come as no surprise – it is the one he assumes for his country and the one in which he rose to prominence with Borussia Dortmund

Match Review – Arsenal 2 Atletico Madrid 1 – Emirates Cup

If the 1979 FA Cup final between Arsenal and Manchester United was labelled the “five-minute final”, then this was surely the “five-minute friendly”. A fairly even pre-season game looked to be petering out to a scoreless draw before the Emirates’ resident owl struck either side of an Atletico equaliser to send Arsenal to the summit of the league and potentially one victory away from lifting a trophy. Sounds good, eh?

I’m not gonna lie by saying I was even remotely interested in the first game. Rangers and PSG could have served up a classic but it wouldn’t budge me from my comfy chair near the Club Level bar. Having missed out on the chance to enjoy all its trappings prior to the game thanks to the inevitable public transport problems, the only thing that could entice me from my stupor was the sight of the red and white and Elvis Presley’s dulcet tones. As the post-match song said: The Boys Are Back In Town.

Much talk across the interweb this summer has centred around tactics. I always enjoy a good tactical debate as it provides a refreshing break from the usual transfer rumours crap. Having deployed it in all pre-seasons games thus far except Barnet, the 4-3-3 is very much en vogue in N5. As I saw the lineup, I automatically assumed it’d be a 4-4-2 given that the first XI contained two natural centre midfielders (Ramsey and Denilson), two wide midfielders (Eboue and the returning Tomas Rosicky), and two centre-forwards (Bendtner and RvP, who captained the side in Cesc’s absence). How wrong I was, as Eboue took up a very advanced role alongside the two strikers whilst Rosicky acted as the midfield conductor – very much living up to his “Little Mozart” nickname. The biggest point I learnt from this is that Le Boss is not afraid to put Tomas in a central role, and as the season progresses I think this may be the position that him and Samir Nasri duke it out for.

The visitors nearly took the lead early on as our old failing to deal with set-pieces reared its ugly head. A corner was flicked on at the near post but the Atletico player following up at the back stick could only head it against the woodwork.

Indeed, Atletico’s set-pieces always carried a threat, largely due to the quality of the delivery. And who took all of their free-kicks and corners? None other than Jose Antonio Reyes, formerly of Gooner persuasion. He gladly accepted role of the pantomime villain as his every touch was jeered for reasons unbeknownst to me. His departure was far from acrimonious – so much so that we got Julio Baptista in return – therefore I was slightly disappointed to see him receive so many boos, but I guess that is the unforgiving nature of a football fan these days. I hope the same fate will not befall Kolo Toure when he returns to the Emirates with his Man City side, although I’m fairly certain the Adebayor will have plenty of vitriol hurled in his direction.

Tomas Rosicky looked at home in the middle of the park and it should come as no surprise – it is the one he assumes for his country and the one in which he rose to prominence with Borussia Dortmund. He shone early on and displayed some neat touches and fine dribbling. His shooting was none too shabby either as he was played through on goal before unleashing a screamer into the top corner. Fantastic. But his joy was short-lived as the linesman deemed him to be marginally offside. Our Czech mate had received a rapturous ovation prior to the game and had a decent run-out overall.

The rest of the half was nothing to write home about with both sides probing but not penetrating. Atletico’s biggest threat continued to be Reyes’ cultured left foot from dead-ball situations, whilst our neat possession play couldn’t manufacture any clear-cut chances. Robin van Persie volleyed wide when he could have done better from a Ramsey cross, whilst Traore overlapped to good effect and put in one especially dangerous ball that was scrambled away. Defensively Traore was caught out of position a few times but used his considerable pace to recover. I do believe that he will “do an Eboue” and be deployed further forward given that Clichy and presumably Kieran Gibbs are ahead of him in the left-back pecking order. Speaking of Eboue, he was the usual mixture of direct running and versatility as he popped up all over the pitch. His first-touch sometimes failed him and his end-product was not great, but our Goal Machine produced a decent save from the Atletico keeper towards the end of the period with a fierce shot having cut in from the left.

The half-time break arrived and as the first XI trudged off the substitutes came onto the pitch to warm up. Clichy, Wilshere and Fran Merida remained on the pitch and came on for Traore, Eboue and Rosicky; whilst the likes of Cesc, Andrey and Eduardo were saved for later.

And although the weather got worse, the game perked up – primarily thanks to the presence of Jack Wilshere. Having lit up this tournament last year and giving us one magical moment when he outmuscled Michel Salgado, the young lad is fast making the Emirates Cup his personal stamping ground as he produced a man-of-the-match display in his 45-minute cameo. Every time he received the ball the crowd roared in unison: GO ON JACK. And he didn’t disappoint as he ran the Atletico full-back ragged from his right-wing position.

Where Traore had endeavoured in the first period, Sagna did the same on the opposite flank in the second. Numerous times the intelligence and timing of young master Wilshere’s passing set the French full-back free to maraud. The half was barely three minutes old when he did just that but RvP’s cheeky flick from the cut-back was cleared off the line. Wilshere showed that he was equally adept at long-range passes as he found Nicklas Bendtner at the back-post. The big Dane controlled well but couldn’t keep his shot down. To be fair, the ball had bounced pretty high. I sensed a slight underbelly of frustration at his miss and I hope he gets off the mark quickly at the Emirates this season to silence the doubters.

As a Mexcian wave began doing the rounds, more fine play from Wilshere on the right resulted in a chance, this time Ramsey striking it straight at the keeper. Just a quick point: I HATE MEXICAN WAVES. It’s not that I’m a grouch (okay maybe a little…), but I feel it is disrespectful to the players. I can imagine Cesc looking up and thinking “Wow, look at all these disinterested fuckers.” We need to focus all our energies on supporting them, but I suppose it is only pre-season so maybe I’m being too pedantic.

A raft of changes midway through the half saw Eduardo, Cesc and Arshavin replace RvP, Ramsey and Bendtner. All three put in decent shifts, although I would have liked to see Bendtner get a more central role. For the visitors, Jose Reyes departed to a mixture of cheers and jeers. Not me though, I gave the lad a standing ovation. It may not have worked out for him here, but he hasn’t badmouthed the Club since his departure and seems like an affable guy.

A side containing Fabregas, Wilshere and Arshavin was a purist’s dream. Fran Merida did not look out of place either in such esteemed company. Our relative dominance had seen Atletico reduced to efforts from distance. With the rules of the tournament now having shots on target as a potential tie-breaker, this may have been a cheap ploy by them to register as many as possible(!), although they did sting the hands of Vito Mannone a few times – on one occasion the ball trickling agonisingly wide of the post. Our defence had adopted a high line and caught Atletico offside as they tried to attack, although Djourou covered well to avert danger once the line was breached.

And with five minutes remaining, the deadlock was broken. Fabregas had taken an advanced midfield role since he came on and his lofted ball from the right-wing was met by Arshavin, who did well to keep his shot down and direct it goalwards. The keeper got a touch and could have done better, but the 50,000-odd inside the ground weren’t complaining.

The Emirates faithful were given further reason to be cheerful as Jack Wilshere was proclaimed as the man-of-the-match. This coincided with Atletico sub German Pacheco springing the Gunners’ offside trap and finishing coolly with his left-foot a la Eduardo. Yet another goal conceded immediately after taking the lead – just like at Barnet. I hope this does not manifest into a serious mental flaw in the side.

So just as it looked like we’d thrown a certain victory away, our generous visitors gifted us a golden opportunity to reclaim the lead. A header back to the keeper fell marginally short of its intended target and Arshavin pounced, poking the ball past the onrushing Asenjo and squeezing it home from a nigh-on impossible angle. It looked like a strong first-touch had left Russian with too much to do and that a pull-back on the stretch to Eduardo was the only option, but the man confounded even himself. Whilst his first goal was celebrated with the traditional finger-to-the-lips celebration, this one was marked with a nonchalant shrug. How he did it? He don’t know. How he did it? He don’t care. All we know is he had sent us to the top of the table.

A quick point about the winner and 4-3-3. If we had lined up in a 4-4-2 with Andrey left-midfield, do you think he would have been on hand to score that goal? Or would he have been stationed somewhere on the halfway line ready to resist the next wave of Atletico’s attack? Food for thought.

So a win plus two goals saw us overhaul Rangers, the team we face later today. Assuming the other match isn’t a goal-fest, a win against our opponents from north of the border should see us pick up some silverware. Yes it’s only pre-season and yes the opposition aren’t exactly Barcelona, but getting our hands on a trophy should instil some belief in our young starlets. It happened in 2007 and we got off to a flier in the league, so hopefully we can repeat history this time round.

Squid Boy

P.S. with Wilshere understandably taking the plaudits, one player that quietly impressed me was Fran Merida, who had a sound game as he allied passing with finesse and an ability to dribble out of trouble. Monsieur Wenger once described him a “technically perfect” and it’d be mighty interesting to see if he can flourish against a more ‘domesticated’ outfit such as Rangers.