december 12th
Really very little going on this morning and there’s not much to say that hasn’t already been said. Alan Shearer has hit back at Arsene Wenger’s criticisms of his performance, saying “I wasn’t aware Wenger had been complaining about how physical I was. I don’t mind that. You have to be physical because football is a physical game — I can’t ever remember seeing Vieira pulling out of a challenge.”
Which is all well and good but there’s physical and there’s violent and he obviously didn’t see any of Vieira’s performances in his last 2 seasons with us. However, you have to think that the Arsenal team of two or three seasons ago would not have allowed themselves to be bullied by the likes of Bolton and Newcastle. We really do need to add some physicality to our game, particularly in midfield as, Sol apart, the back four are well capable of getting stuck in. I think this is where January is going to be important. Gilberto is never going to crunch into tackles, it’s just not his game, and while Cesc is always up for it when you think of Freddie, Pires and José their appetite for a physical game is not that high. Every time José is tackled he goes down and it looks like he’s suffered a career threatening injury, Bob rarely gets involved in anything approaching a tackle and Freddie likes to spend a lot of time sitting on his arse waving his hands around. We need more from midfield, no question. We can’t allow ourselves to get pushed around. Even with the players we’ve got we need them to stand up and dish it out a bit when, inevitably, the next team we play tries the exact same thing.
So, Arsene – please sign a big strong bastard who likes to tackle and doesn’t mind a fight and who is really good and not cup tied for the Champions League in the January transfer window.
It’s not much to ask for, eh?
No doubt the hype and build up to the Chelsea game will start in earnest today. You can’t catch Arseblog geting involved in that though, oh no.
ONLY 6 DAYS TO THE CLASH OF THE TITANS – THE GAME THAT WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE!
