Another frustrating day at the Grove yesterday as a 1-1 draw was as much as we could muster against what has been, to now, one of the worst teams in the league this season.
Arsene Wenger and some of the players have been talking about how it took some time to feel comfortable at the new ground. Sadly it seems we want to make the opposition feel as at home as possible too by gifting them goals. And always the first goal. And it’s a pain in the arse.
So it was yesterday when Kieron Dyer, of all the cripples, put Newcastle ahead. We had a set-piece up field, they broke and we were left two on two. Clichy and Eboue versus Dyer and Martins (I think). Eboue, being the kind soul he is, said ‘Here you go Dyersy, have all the time in the world to take a touch and curl the ball wherever you want. I won’t make a tackle at all. In fact, I won’t even go near you. I’ll just stand and watch’.
It was shocking by Eboue. I can’t even call it defending because he didn’t do anything. As good as he is going forward the boy still has a lot to learn about defending and moments like yesterday when his brain seemed to switch off do not fill me with confidence. It was like he was waiting for somebody, probably Kolo, to tell him what to do. 1-0 Newcastle and here we go again.
At the end of he first half Robin van Persie picked up a knock which meant Thierry Henry, who should have started the game in my opinion, came on for the second half. And we played better and made chances. Alexander Hleb was excellent and did very well when he moved over to the left. Henry had shots saved, he hit a post, Cesc had a shot deflected just wide and Shay Given showed, yet again, why he would be the perfect replacement for Jens Lehmann with his usual outstanding performance whenever we play Newcastle.
In the end, like Everton, it was a classy free kick that brought us level. Henry was fouled outside their box and curled home a brilliant shot which went in off the crossbar. And to be fair we could have won it after that but it wasn’t to be. Afterwards Arsene Wenger was critical of the defending but insisted the team would learn from the pain of days like today.
It’s just that it’s becoming a bit of a habit now and while we talk about almosts and nearlys the league, realistically, has slipped out of our reach for another season. I know there’s a long way to go and that our results against the big sides have been good so far but if we can’t beat the teams we’re ‘supposed’ to be beat then it’s never going to happen. To have taken 4 points out of 12 from home games against Everton, Newcastle, Villa and Boro is not championship form. We have to start scoring because we won’t score brilliant free kicks every week.
I’m also getting a bit of a pain in the arse with the 4-5-1 formation. I would dearly love us to revert to 4-4-2. Some people might say we don’t have a partner for Henry but in my opinion van Persie is a 15-20 goal a season striker if he gets a run of games. I’ve said it before but I think Henry is wasted in a 4-5-1 and it’s not like we don’t have other strikers at the club although I think this is an area we could certainly improve. Julio Baptista was played in midfield and looked like a man who hasn’t played very much football for the last few months while Adebayor looked, yesterday, like a man who has never played very much football.
As the man from East Lower pointed out it would have been lovely to have had the goal threat of Robert Pires yesterday. For all the great goals he scored people forget the scrappy ones, the tap-ins and rebounds he put away. He was certainly the closest thing to the mythical, legendary fox in the box we’ve ever had. As technical and skillful as the midfield are they lack the goal threat he carried and when you ask a great striker to play on his own up front it’s no wonder we’re struggling to find the net at times which is another reason why I’d like to see us move back to 4-4-2.
With the next league game a traditionally difficult game at Bolton away we’ve got to get back on track and funnily enough I’m confident we can do it. When we need a result we’re more than capable of getting it and there are some scores to be settled this season at the Reebok after the most insipid, horrible performance there last year. It’s finding consistency that’s the main problem with this side as the quality, and again I agree with East Lower here, is more or less there. A bit of tweaking and fiddling under the bonnet and we should be fine. It doesn’t make days like yesterday any less frustrating though.
Finally, a word for the crowd yesterday. It sounded like a great atmosphere, nice and loud and there didn’t seem to be the same exodus there has been in previous games. Whether that’s down to it being a 3pm Saturday kick-off with nobody rushing to get home or people realising that their support can make a difference I don’t know but it was good to see.
We’ve got a massive Champions League game on Tuesday, it really is a must win so let’s hope the players can pick it up, not present the opposition with a cheap goal and we can move onwards and upwards from there.
My head really hurts because of too much beer, red wine, rum and sambuca so I’m going to take some tablets. Mmmm, cyanide extra strength. Till tomorrow.
