Right, well the countdown is well and truly on for tomorrow night and the game against United is unquestionably the biggest game of the season so far.
A Champions League semi-final first leg at Old Trafford against the holders. Blimey, and such. The manager is very much aware of how important an away goal is and has promised to be ‘audacious’ tomorrow night. That does sound a little bit cavalier, I have to say, but I’m sure the boss is stressing the need for defensive stability too.
Kolo Toure says Arsenal aren’t afraid of anyone and that the pressure’s on United. He says:
United are the ones who won it last season, but for us we are going there to do the best we can playing free and passing the ball. The team that will win will be the one which defends the best. It is going to be a really big fight.
You do worry if defending best is going to be the key because that hasn’t exactly been our forte this season. The Liverpool game is still giving me the sweats if I think about it and the lessons from that night have to be learned if we’re to go through. The idea of Kieran Gibbs vs the man with no underarm hair (I mean, it’s not like he’s a swimmer and needs to be more aerodynamic or anything, so why does he shave his underarm hair?) might worry some but Toure thinks the young left-back is good enough to cope.
The Captain is very aware of how small the margins might be in this game, saying:
In games like these, each goal is very, very important and the smallest mistake can count.
He also believes that he who defends best goes through so this is obviously some kind of training ground mantra at the moment. He goes on to say:
We just want to be in the final again. To be in two Champions League finals in four years could be one of the best things in the history of the club and we’re determined to make that happen.
With newly crowned player of the year Ryan Giggs promising to celebrate like he did in the FA Cup semi in 1999 someone needs to sit down the current crop and make them watch that goal to make sure it doesn’t happen again. If he gets it and starts running, chop him down on halfway. Better safe than sorry.
It is going to be an incredible spectacle though, I think. The games served up by the English clubs facing each other in Europe haven’t always been brilliant. It took five years to get one watchable match between Chelsea and Liverpool but I suspect the two legs of this particular tie are going to be something a bit special.
We know about the rivalry between Wenger and Ferguson and that seems to have grown into something approaching mutual respect in recent years. Perhaps that’s because they’ve matured (a weird thing to say about middle-aged men), perhaps because they were united, if you’ll pardon the phrase, when a huge twat like Mourinho came along, but, as others have pointed out, it’s more down to the fact that Arsenal haven’t been a threat to United in recent seasons.
Ferguson is nice when he sees you as unthreatening to his team. We haven’t been challenging in the league and while personnel at the clubs have changed I think the fact we’ve struggled in recent seasons has more to do with their alleged friendship than anything else.
Do you really think that if there’s some kind of contentious issue tomorrow night, or in the return leg, that Ferguson won’t blow up like he did in days gone by? Of course he will. Arsene says their respect will survive the two encounters but given the history and how strained the relationship has been at times it might very well be tested and I for one would enjoy seeing him go spastic and purple on the sideline.
What is for certain though is that we’re going to see two teams whose philosophy is to attack and win games. Arsenal’s best form of defence is attack, United never sit back, it’s going to be massive.
With the pre-match press conferences taking place later today we should get a better idea of team news ahead of tomorrow. There’s a doubt over Sylvester while we’ll find out if Eduardo, a man I think could be vital if fit, will make it in time or not.
So, more on this game tomorrow but I can feel the nerves tingling, the butterflies butterflying already. You?
