I had the weirdest dream this morning, that Thierry Henry killed Gordon Strachan by lifting him up and dropping him on his head on a dark cobbled street. And the street was a football pitch and he didn’t even get a red card. All around people were saying “He’s dead! He’s dead!” and then a bloke came out of some kind of hidden chamber and then it all went a bit crazy.
Anyway, that’s neither here nor there. What’s here and there is tomorrow’s game against Chelsea and the boss had plenty to say yesterday. He believes we can win the title and that the games against Chelsea and United will decide it. He spoke about our consistency, saying:
We have got the strength of character to win the title, believe me. That is my firm belief and at the game on Sunday you will see. I feel that since the beginning of the season we have been the most consistent team. I cannot imagine we will lose the league if we have lost only one game at the end of the season.
It really is now or never stuff. It was April 2004 the last time we beat Chelsea at Stamford Bridge, so we’re certainly due a result, but they’re not out of the title race by any means either. It’s going to be an almighty scrap. And of course there’s the enmity between the two teams. Never the best of friends anyway the Ashley Cole saga, Mourinho’s squalid baiting of Arsene and the fact that the entire Chelsea squad are unspeakable cunts raises the level completely.
Cole came in for criticism during the week for his ‘tackle’ and subsequent behaviour to doormat ref Mike Riley. What’s laughable is Avram Grant lauding Cole for his obviously scripted apology while slamming Emmanuel Eboue for his tackle on John Terry which injured the England captain at the Grove. Now, I’d be the first to castigate Eboue for wrong doing or a dangerous tackle but what happened with Terry wasn’t premeditated or designed to hurt. He went in, eyes closed, to try and block the ball. Terry kicked Eboue’s foot. And, of course, that came not long after Terry’s kung-fu style leap into a prone Cesc Fabregas, a fact which Grant seems to have conveniently overlooked.
If you want to compare what Eboue did with Cole’s shin high, off the ground disgrace of a challenge and his pitiful behaviour afterwards then go right ahead. It just means you’re a fucking clueless knobend who knows little about the game of football. Cole’s reaction to being booked sums up entirely why Chelsea are hated so much. It was arrogant, completely disrespectful and oafish – which is just what you’d expect from an arrogant, disrespectful oaf like Cole and his thick as pigshit colleagues.
Anyway, enough of those cunts and on to other things. The boss says contract talks with Mathieu Flamini are going well and he hopes to have something signed in April. I’ve never quite understood why these things take so long. Player has agent, agent talks to club, club offers deal, negotiate negotiate, player walks into room for 20 seconds to sign name, job done. I hope he stays but I’m not sure I’d bet too much money on it.
Speaking about Gilberto’s situation he said:
It’s too early to say that he will leave, it is more down to Gilberto’s desire because at the moment he does not play. We will sit down together, we are adults, Gilberto is a very strong man with a big personality and he will know what he wants to do at the end of the season. I’m happy if he stays but we’ll sort it out at the end of the season.
I don’t think you need to be a genius to work out how that one is going to end up. There were rumours during the week about Alex Hleb, his agent, Inter Milan and an ice-cream. Normally Arsene stays quiet about things like this but he made his unhappiness quite clear yesterday, without going into too much detail. From that we can assume that the ice-cream story will now become legend, when any player meets another team we can say they were just going for an ice-cream. Anyway, what’s clear is that Hleb owes us some big games between now and the end of the season – starting tomorrow.
Would Hleb have started tomorrow if Rosicky had been fit? Who knows? Nobody it seems as there’s no sign of him returning after seven weeks out with a hamstring injury. The boss says Tomas would come in at 4am and leave at midnight if he was asked to but he’s not responding to treatment at all. Again you have to think his position as a first XI must be in serious doubt. If he gets injured and nobody can fix him then you have to seriously consider his value to the team, which is sad because Tomas seems like a genuine guy and he is a decent player but you can’t carry passengers when you have high ambitions.
And we’ll end with the Strachan killer who thinks that Arsenal have the quality to win the title. TH says:
I have this feeling Arsenal will win The Premier League. They are playing well against the big four and I do think they play the most attractive football, though Manchester United have also played some good stuff. Obviously, I love Arsenal. But that’s not the reason why I think they will win the title. I just feel they have the quality.
Let’s hope he’s right. He also talks about Adebayor and Cesc, calling him the heartbeat of the team.
Right, that’s enough for a Saturday morning. Time for coffee, breakfast and then perhaps a trip into town. Laters.
