So here we go again.
The good thing about this time of the season is that games come so quickly you don’t have too much time to dwell on the disappointments. It’s West Brom tonight, a team at the foot of the table, but one which caused us some problems on the first day of the season.
We won 1-0 back then, Samir Nasri scoring after 4 minutes and the 86 goalless ones that followed were, in hindsight, something of a taste to come. I don’t really have anything to say about this, the implications of tonight’s game. I think we all know. Win and we’re 3 points behind Villa who play Man City tomorrow night. Anything else just doesn’t bear thinking about.
The manager has, in his usual style, been talking up his team in public. I know it’s probably designed to boost their confidence and belief but at the moment I wish he’d do in private. He says some things which are kind of hard to digest. Speaking about Manchester United, the runaway league leaders, he says:
It’s a fine line [between winning games 1-0 and drawing]. I have watched Man United get an opening here and there and they are a great side. But I don’t feel they dominate the games like we do.
That’s staggering, it really is. Up there with the ‘were only 1 or 2% away from dominating the league’ comment earlier in the season. I didn’t see us dominate Fulham, or Sunderland, or the 5 games we lost this season so it’s hard to make sense of that. At a time when fans are frustrated it’d be nice if he was a little more circumspect in what he was saying. Maybe that’s just me though.
In team news the only injury is William Gallas who has an ankle problem. The manager reckons he has a ‘bright future‘ at the club. Personally, I think he’ll be off in the summer and even if his form, which is probably as good as its ever been at Arsenal, is due to him putting himself in the shop window then I’m more than happy to accept that in the short-term. If it helps us achieve our goals this season then I can live with it.
Johan Djourou will come in for Gallas and I’d expect there to be a little bit of rotation in midfield. I think Eboue will probably start ahead of Arshavin and Bendtner will come back in for Vela. I watched West Brom against Everton at the weekend and defensively they are poor, the first goal they conceded was absolutely comical. They probably won’t be as generous tonight but it’s an area we can still take advantage of.
One thing we have to be aware of is players coming from midfield and shooting from range. They had a few good chances against Everton like that and they have a couple of handy midfielders, the Spaniard Valero is one we need to keep an eye out for.
Bottom line though is that if we can’t beat the bottom team then it’s hard to say we deserve to be anywhere near the top 4. Arsene knows we have to take advantage of the favour Stoke did us on Sunday, saying:
I think that Villa have lost a big opportunity to put us eight points behind and we want to take advantage of that. We have to put performances in to make us come back as quickly as possible.
And what will the Villa players be feeling if we win tonight? The pressure is on then. Instead of being 8 clear the gap is just 3, they then have to play Man City who are more than capable of beating Villa (sadly though just as capable of losing 4-0).
It’s down to us. We’ve got to start scoring goals, tonight is where it must start again or the little lifeline we’ve been thrown will be snatched away again.
Samir Nasri is feeling positive while Andrei Arshavin talks about how the 90 minutes against Fulham were a real challenge for him physically. He says:
Even before the end of the first half I felt as if I had spat my lungs out. It was a hard match for me. In the second half my legs simply refused to serve me.
I am not physically strong enough yet to play the whole of the match. But I think with each coming game I play it will be easier in this sense.
There’s no doubt the 90 minutes will have done him the world of good but it’ll take him some time to adjust to the pace of English football. I think tonight he’ll be used from the bench, perhaps to take advantage of tired West Brom legs in the final half an hour. He’s obviously the best player we have for his position, I just don’t see the manager starting him twice in 3 days this early in his Premier League career.
The manager is happy with him though, saying:
I’m convinced he will soon have a tremendous influence on our game because he has a quick brain and is many steps ahead of the game. Even on Saturday he set up two great chances for Robin van Persie. They were two great passes and he had two great opportunities too.
When you can have that kind of impact on a game, it is very positive.
Add to that the impressive first half against Sunderland and it’ll be very interesting to see what he can do when fully fit.
And there you go. All the stock phrases at the end of the blog to encourage the team appear to have little or no effect. Their mojo has run out. We need a new one.
Fingers cro … no. Come on you …. nah. Kill them to … nope.
Just fucking win.
That’ll do.
