Well, the big news from yesterday was that Thierry Henry will miss the rest of the season after picking up stomach and groin injuries on Wednesday night. Arsene Wenger said:
Thierry Henry will be out for a minimum of three months. Unfortunately this means he will now miss the rest of this season both domestically and internationally, but we are confident that he will be ready for the start of next season.
It’s not really a surprise to be honest. He has looked like a broken man in recent weeks and he was obviously not fit for Wednesday but he’s the player who can always get you a goal so the manager took a gamble and it backfired.
I said on yesterday’s blog that the best thing to do with Thierry is rest him until he’s 100% fit. He’s never been a player who has suffered a lot from injury but it’s caught up with him sadly and 56 games in 2006 have taken their toll. I think he’s mentally and physically fatigued and every time he comes back from one injury he’s picking up another one. He needs to rest and recover properly and hopefully we’ll see a different Thierry next season.
Now, I know people are going to speculate and I fully expect wild stories of all shapes and sizes. There are people who will say he’s played his last game for Arsenal or that we should let him go now and bring in somebody else but I’m not going along with that at all. He might be a bit precious and he might not be perfect but some of the vitriol launched at him in recent days has been nothing short of pathetic and smacks of bitterness just because Henry proved he was a striker who could get goals.
Let’s look at it this way. If he had wanted to go to Barcelona last summer he would have. Does nobody else remember how spirits were lifted when, after the Champions League final, he announced he was staying? He chose to stay with Arsenal and that’s where his commitment should be judged. Now, there won’t be too many people who would disagree if you said he’d had a poor season but he’s still got 12 goals which is more than Adebayor, more than Baptista, more than anyone apart from Robin van Persie.
By the high standards he’s set it’s poor but it’s the first time in 7 or 8 seasons that he’s had a bad season and I think he deserves more support from Arsenal fans. To slag off our leading scorer, someone who has won countless matches for us season after season, the very first time he struggles and needs our support is very disappointing and horribly fickle in my opinion. To say he doesn’t care is wrong. If he didn’t care he’d have gone to Barcelona. He’s played the majority of this season with niggling injuries and it’s shown in his performances. What we need is to get a fully fit Thierry Henry back on the pitch and if that means waiting until next season then so be it.
You could ask if our elimination from three cup competitions and the fact that we’ve missed the ‘real’ Thierry Henry are connected. Would his goals have papered over the cracks of our goal-shy midfield? Probably. Anyway, I wish him well, I hope he sorts his body out and I look forward to seeing him back in the red and white next season.
Speaking to the Sun Henry says he’s ‘devastated’ but has vowed to be back next year saying this will make him even more determined.
With Robin van Persie unlikely to figure again this season our striker woes were made more woeful by the news that Adebayor got an extra match on his ban for not punching Frank Lampard. Given that he actually was guilty of this particular charge then I don’t suppose we can complain too much. It means more playing time for Baptista, Aliadiere and Theo who are to goalscoring what Michael Hutchence is to having a good time on your own.
Gael Clichy has words of wisdom. He says:
When you want to be a top club you have to win trophies. In two weeks we lost everything and it is hard to take. Against PSV I think we showed again we have great quality but, of course, you can’t say that every week. You have to win games and win trophies.
He’s right. For all our nice football we haven’t won anything and there are no prizes for aesthetics in football. After Liverpool had beaten Barcelona the other night Eamonn Dunphy ripped into Liverpool (Liam Brady wasn’t too far behind him) and they said it was a shame that the beautiful football of Barcelona was out and that Liverpool were in. Would Barcelona have swapped their flowing football for a place in the last 8? Fucking right they would. Everyone loves to see nice passing and movement but not every team can play like that and even if they do it doesn’t give them any more right to win a game against a team who work hard and make life difficult for them.
We have to find a way of being more ruthless. We have to finish a higher percentage of our chances. We have to make it more difficult for the opposition to score against us. Luckily, those are things that can be improved through coaching and bringing in new players. I firmly believe the younger players will feel these disappointments acutely and use them as motivation. They are still improving. That said, some players are at a stage where they’re unlikely to get much better.
I got a lot of emails yesterday about Hleb. Now, first things first, I didn’t say for a second that he cost us the game. I said his foul was stupid, and it was, and that they scored from it meant if you went fingerpointing then he’d be first on your list. However, players make fouls all over the pitch. The only thing you’d hope from an experienced player like Hleb is that he doesn’t give away a foul in such a dangerous area. My main criticism of him is the final ball and for a fantastically skillful player it’s maddening to see him give it away over and over again. Now, he’s 26 years of age, he’s a good but fundamentally flawed player and you have to make a decision about whether or not he’s going to improve or if your squad would be better with a different kind of player. He has been giving the ball away since his first game at the club, it hasn’t changed, it hasn’t got better. Will it ever?
If the manager thinks that Hleb has a place in the squad next season then that’s fine. There have been games this season when he’s been very effective and I like a lot of what he does but if the manager decides that we need a different option in Hleb’s position then, as I said yesterday, I wouldn’t be too unhappy to see him go.
Anyhow, it’s all about opinions. That’s mine. Yours might be different and that’s what makes football and the associated banter so interesting. You just get the chance to email me and call me a cunt for mine!
Right, that’s about that. It’s a boring weekend because we don’t play until Wednesday although Barcelona v Madrid should be interesting tonight as two wounded lions square up after going out of Europe this week. Goals and fights, that’s what I want.
More tomorrow.
