D-Day began with none of the excitement of the previous day where we virtually sealed deals for Santos and Mertesacker completely out of the blue. In terms of paperwork etc, I’m sure the Club wanted to get these rubber-stamped before the search for a midfielder or two began in earnest. And so Santos and Mertesacker were announced at 3pm and 4pm respectively, leaving a good seven hours
The injuries were unfortunate and are largely unavoidable, especially with Vermaelen and Sagna missing out late on. But blame can also lie at the feet (and hands) of those who were suspended, especially Alex Song. Remember his second-half against Udinese last Wednesday where he protected the back four so expertly? We sorely needed that on Sunday, but ill-discipline
I may be wrong but I really believe and rightly so in my opinion that Wenger see's Koscielny and Vermaelen as his first choice partnership. He wants those two to develop an understanding and remain at the heart of our defence for many years to come. A player in the mould of Cahill, Jagielka would compliment those two and cover for injuries, suspensions and games against the usual. I don't need to
For the first time in a long time it feels like there is a chink of light amongst the clouds of doom, that a semblance of happiness echoes around the Club and the fanbase. How long exactly? Since the before the Carling Cup final, and maybe even stretching back a few more weeks to the famous home win ove
There was a particularly poignant moment when he instigated a passage of play, trotted over to take the subsequent corner, received a round of applause from the North Bank and applauded them back. Heck, his song even got an airing too. I was mighty proud of the Emirates faithful on Saturday for a number of reasons – including a defiant chant of “We love you Arsenal”
Alex Song you silly, silly boy. We really could have done with you right about now. Alex Song and Emmanuel Frimpong love it up em in a cold, windy, rainy, slightly cloudy, mildly frosty night in Stoke and they would have given our team a nice strong defensive platform to build on, instead we are clearly a man down. I dread to think what will happen if we suffer any midfield injuries tomorrow. Manuel
I remember the hoo-hah surrounding Phil Jones when it broke that we had missed out on him. The abuse Arsene got was terrible – and I’d venture to say that this was from folk who had hardly seen Jones play. Then it appeared we had been mighty unlucky not to secure his services, having matched Man Utd’s offer for him and apparently offered a higher wage. In his case, the lad simply wanted to stay in the north-west of the country, and there was little we could do about that. The reason we
On this season’s evidence we need something along those lines more than ever. As has been pointed out, it’s fair to say, by nearly every Arsenal fan on this rocky, water-covered ball, our squad at the moment is clearly a) anorexic and b) riddled with injuries and this combination does not bode well for the immediate future. We’ve had parts one and two of our ‘MegaMonth’ (C) and unless something is sorted out soon I fear we won’t get to the end of it with smiley face emoticons still ‘lighting up’ our
A Cesc-less team may be doubt-inducing for some but it’s what we have to work with, and every important win chips away at that doubt like a tiny grinning woodpecker. So if you ever feel the doubt coming back just picture the woodpecker chipping away and picture the doubt as John Terry’s eyes and you’ll find yourself smiling and humming a fabulous little ditty in no time at
I’m certainly not saying that there is no basis for the chants and boos. Far from it. While I didn’t particularly enjoy the angry cacophony that day at the Emirates Cup, I understood and even defended the rationale behind them. They weren’t directed at our inability to win our “own” trophy. They were directed at the lack of evidence that we had improved, that we had not learnt from our previous