Liverpool came and went, then the Udinese return. Yet still I was in the midst of this out-of-body experience. Even the Man Utd game, which should have left me feeling like I'd spent a night dressed as a sow in the woods of Deliverance, couldn't raise me. It was a waking slumber from which I could not awake, no matter how many street parties they had on the streets of Guildford
Arsene Wenger is right when he says, confidence goes quickly and is slow to build up. The team are refinding their feet and has to do so with new personnel as well as missing first team players. This Arsenal team are still stuck in first gear, there is plenty of internal scope to improve upon and that will come. The most important thing right now was to get points on the board and we got that, we also have a clean sheet to pin to the wall. Alex Song and Gervinho will add defensive and offensive quality
Mikel Arteta has had much more time as he was not called up for Spain and has trained on a few occasions since his £10m move on transfer deadline day. Arteta will be an almost guaranteed starter today but his role in the team is yet to be known to Gooners. I am interested to know if we will go
The new season has just begun, we are yet to see Jack Wilshere and Diaby play. Few days ago it was confirmed that Jack would be out for 2 - 3 months. Jack was outstanding last season and to be without him for 12weeks is damn too long. He is a natural born fighter who would surely help our
Obviously a few of the lesser known lights have left the club this year - Samantha Nasri, Frank Fabregas and Gary Cliche in particular – and we should really give them a tiny mention and wish them at least average luck at their new clubs. Their departures really weren’t planned but in the end we just had to burn some of the dead wood and those three were the last against the school fence when AOC and Ryo were picking teams. Sorry guys! Also, because this is Arsenal, there was just time at the end of the summer for the club to spring one more surprise on us. As mentioned above Jackie Lad had won the annual tombola but in light of recent success the club decided to hold a second prize draw on the eve of the new season. Tommy V was the lucky winner this time around and will be joining Jack at the
A few seasons back Arsenal moved away from the 4-4-2 formation, after experiencing limited success with the lightweight Fabregas and Flamini occupying the two central defensive midfield roles. To accommodate the growing number of less physical but highly technical central attacking midfielders in the squad at the time, Arsenal appeared to change their formation to a 4-1-3-2 setup. In that particular season, Flamini took on the lone central defensive midfield role with Rosicky (left), Fabregas (central) and Hleb (right) operating in central