november 25th
08.47 – I’m already thinking about tomorrow.
HOORAY HENRY – LATE THIERRY GOAL KEEPS ARSENAL INTER CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
PASCAN’T – OWN GOAL HAT-TRICK MEANS GUNNERS GO OUT….AGAIN!
PASTA WAY TO EDU IT – BRAZILIAN MAGIC KEEPS ARSENAL HOPES ALIVE
SYLVAIN SINKS SORRY ARSENAL – HE’S NOT EVEN ON THE PITCH BUT IT’S HIS FAULT
Who knows eh? Arsene Wenger reckons Arsenal have to go out and attack. Although it is possible for us to draw and still have a chance of going through, the lads have got to go out and win this one. In a quite candid pre-match interview AW said “We attack when we can and try to win everywhere we play. After we beat Roma 3-1 away last season, I never imagined we would have to wait a year to win again in Europe. I have to accept that we have not been doing it in Europe. That is true and I have to accept the criticism.”
But the Arsenal team will not be short of belief according to the manager who said “We gave cheap goals away against Inter, goals that we don’t usually give away. But we had 20 shots on goal, missed a penalty and had 15 corners. I don’t deny that we made mistakes but from the games we have lost you can take the belief that we can beat those teams.”
It seems like we say this every year, but surely this is the most important European game since…erm…we were on the brink of elimination last year. I sincerely hope they can do it, but too often we’ve been in must win situations in Europe and come up short. We can do it at home, in the league, in the FA cup, but Europe is different. I’m not going to say our luck has to change, it’s too twee, but surely, surely this team is capable of a PSV away or a Roma away style performance after so long. Ray Parlour, says “We can’t play with any fear or we will be out. We learned our lesson from the first game against Inter when they scored with their first two shots.”
Probable line-up: Lehmann, Toure, Sol, Cygan, Cole, Ljungberg, Parlour, Edu, PIres, Kanu, Henry.
Even if we don’t qualify, AW doesn’t think it’ll be a disaster. He says “We have a team of good young players and I feel the future is very bright because I have never seen so many good youngsters at the club.”
More speculation about Jermaine Defoe as West Ham sign Marlon Harewood from Nottingham Forest. Can’t say I’m too excited about the thoughts of him joining. He’s always struck me as greedy, lightweight and given his behaviour after West Ham were relegated last season, he has the loyalty of a Palace butler. More on the Latvian fella here, too.
Fingers, toes, spleen, everything crossed for tonight. More later.
