Morning all.
Times are not good for William Gallas. By his own admission his recent form has been poor and I don’t think there’s an Arsenal fan in the world who would disagree with him. He says:
I would close my eyes if I would say I am strong. That would mean I don’t recognise I did have a few bad performances – as recently with my club against Hull City. Maybe I feel a little tired.
Do I experience the most difficult period since I joined Arsenal? We could say yes. Above all I miss consistency. One match is good, the other one is not so good. However, I am doing everything to get to my best again.
To be honest, and being as fair as I can as I’m not much of a Gallas fan (I know, this is a shock to many of you), I don’t think he’s ever shown the kind of form people expected from him. Despite some important goals the defensive side of his game has been pretty underwhelming since he joined from Chelsea.
He’s cost us goals and points this season and as captain he has to take responsibility for that. On the plus side it’s good that he’s aware of his lack of form and isn’t trying to brush it under the carpet but as I’ve mentioned before I think there’s an element of complacency in his game. He knows he’s going to play every week no matter how badly he plays the week before.
However, you could also say that we’re not set up to get the best out of Gallas, or Toure for that matter. Both of them prefer to play alongside a more traditional, physical centre-half and I don’t think it’s any coincidence that Gallas’s best form at the club coincided with a run in the team beside Philippe Senderos. We’ve seen Kolo thrive beside both Senderos and Sol Campbell and Gallas at Chelsea was better at centre half because he had Terry as his partner.
To me that’s the fundamental issue and until we do something about it we’re always going to be vulnerable at the back.
To compound his woes this week PSG midfielder Jerome Rothen has written a book in which Gallas is called ‘Mr Bean’, accused of stealing from a teammate and being somewhat slow academically. Here’s a sample:
At school he was a right wally – he would sit at the back of the class as far away from the blackboard as possible. One day the maths teacher gave us a test – she knew that William understood nothing about maths, so she allowed him to use the textbook. But even with the book under his nose he still only got four out of 20!
Rothen refers to Gallas a ‘lovely guy’ but as you might expect the Arsenal captain isn’t too pleased about it and wants to go on TV to explain. It does seem a bit spiteful. I mean, he’s hardly the first footballer to struggle academically and I think everyone of us would have stories we don’t want aired in public about our school days. Like the bloke in my French class who begged to be allowed go to the doctor but the teacher wouldn’t let him and when he stopped whimpering and passed out and was taken to hospital it was discovered he’d twisted his testicles and needed 26 stitches in his ballbag.
Anyway, there’s an old French saying which seems to fit Gallas’s situation. I just don’t know what that saying is in French. In English we say C’est la vie.
Robin van Persie is out of the Dutch squad with a hamstring injury. Splendid, it was in this very international break last year that van Persie picked up an injury that would keep him out for most of the season. At least that happened in a game. This time it was in training. There’s no news of how long he’ll be out for but a hammy is usually 2-3 weeks for a regular strain. Of course Robin has probably Rosickyed his and will be out until infinity.
Rio Ferdinand says Manuel Almunia shouldn’t be picked for England. This is weird. That’s twice inside 24 hours I’ve found myself agreeing with Ferdinand (first here) and it’s making me feel all funny. Bleurgh. He should make like David Byrne and stop making sense.
Right, not much else happening so I’ll leave it there. More with an Arsecast, of sorts, tomorrow.
Till then.
