March 28th
So much of the build up to tonight’s game involves the return of Patrick Vieira. No doubt he’ll get a decent welcome, some smiles and handshakes before the game, maybe a rendition of his song from the stands but then I hope we give him nightmares and he doesn’t enjoy his return to Highbury one little bit. There’s no room for sentiment during the game and I’m sure Cesc Fabregas will be looking to continue his fine run of form against the man whose mantle he’s taken over.
One thing the manager and the player have in common is that neither of them regret the decision to let him leave to Juventus in the summer. Arsene says “When you have a youth policy, the final step is to make room for the players who grow in behind and without that you cannot have a youth policy. Was it right to sell or not is not even a question that bothers me all” while Vieira says “In the nine years it was the best bit of history of Arsenal and I proud to be part of it, but I never regret any decision.”
I hope he regrets trying to find Emerson with a raking pass which is intercepted by Cesc who feeds it to Thierry for the goal which gives us the lead. Maybe that’s just me though.
Of course we know the Thierry connection to Juventus and the Vieira one is obvious but go back in time a bit and you find a man who played for both clubs. Liam Brady, of course, who broke all our hearts when he left us to go to Italy in 1980. Back then there was no comparison to the Arsenal team of today. This team has potential, has won championships and is full of quality players whereas back then Brady stood pretty much head and shoulders above everyone else in a team that lacked investment and struggled all through the 80s in what was a depressing decade for Arsenal until that night at Anfield. He talks today in the Guardian about his time there and the development of youth at Highbury, particulary Cesc who he claims is on his way to becoming a ‘giant of the game’. I love you, Liam.
The boss has still to decide on tactics and I suppose the decision is to whether to go to 4-4-2 with Robin van Persie and Thierry up front or to stick with the 4-5-1 which was so successful against Real Madrid. Personally I’d like to see the former, Freddie Ljungberg’s energy was a big part of why the latter worked so well and he’s out of the game with his calf injury. It’s certainly too early for Walcott to debut and Pires just doesn’t work hard enough. Also out is Sol Campbell who Arsene Wenger said would have been ‘involved’ as he has a bruised toe. Sitting on the bench is ‘involved’, isn’t it?
Whatever team he picks it’s going to be an exciting night and hopefully we can repeat the performance and result of 2001 when Juventus came and went home with a 3-1 spanking. Again we need the work ethic from front to back that we showed against Madrid, we need Gilberto to be strong against Vieira and Emerson and to protect his young partner in the centre and we need Thierry to show Juventus, again, what they missed out on by playing him as wing-back.
Hopefully we can stay solid at the back as well and not concede as we know already how important away goals are in Europe. Right, I’m away, let the fun begin and come on the lads!
