You know, there’s nothing worse than a smart-arsed, told you so, blogger. Yesterday I said:
Last time Porto came to the Grove they got a 4-0 spanking. I don’t see that happening again.
How right I was. I don’t take any great pleasure in being right, under the circumstances. No, hang on. I do, because that was fucking great fun. I got to watch the first half hour before going out to play a match (don’t ask) and then came back afterwards to have a beer and watch the rest.
I thought it would be more difficult, I have to admit, but despite their win in the first leg you can’t escape the fact it was handed to them on a plate. Last night they got their arses handed to them on a plate instead.
We opened the scoring early by our standards. I think it’s the first time we’ve scored inside the first 15 minutes this season. Nasri’s through ball almost found Arshavin but the defender and keeper got their first. Sadly for them they got there at the same time, the ball rebounded off the keeper’s bollocks and rolled into the path of Nicklas Bendtner who prodded it home to make it 1-0. On Saturday I had money on Bendnter for first goalscorer. Yesterday I decided not to jinx him and look what happens. It was just what he needed after his Burnley horror show.
Diaby then had a chance from a corner, Arshavin flashed a cross straight across goal and when Porto got forward we dealt with it well, Vermaelen in particular throwing himself around the place to block shots. It was Bendnter who put us two up. Porto were sloppy in possession around their own area, it fell to Arshavin who bundled his way through a couple of challenges, squared it across the box and the big Dane was there to tap it home. On Saturday he’d have tapped that over the bar and possibly out of the stadium.
Arshavin really should have made it 3-0 when he was faced with an open goal but his miss showed that pretty much anyone can have one of those days, or at least one of those moments. He cleared the bar by some distance. Bendtner had another effort saved by Helton John and Porto’s occasional dangerous moments via Hulk and Mark Falco were few and far between.
At 2-0 we were in good shape but clearly aware that just one goal would see Porto right back in it and I think that preyed on our minds a bit as the second half began. We struggled to find the fluency of the first and although Porto really weren’t good enough to take advantage it was a bit worrying all the same. At times like that you need someone to drag you back into the game. So many times this season it has been Cesc Fabregas but in his absence Samir Nasri stepped up. We had the ball out on our right, he twisted and turned and feinted and dropped the shoulder, went past the defenders and cracked a shot in off the far post. One of the best individual goals I have seen in a long, long time. When you consider he’d been nursing his hamstring since the first half too, it was a thing of real beauty.
I think we’re beginning to see the Nasri we had all hoped for. The player with all the potential and the one with the £13m price tag. He’s been excellent in recent games and the goal was top class. I think Porto knew the game was up at that point. If not then, when the fourth went in a couple of minutes later. They had a corner, it was cleared and it looked as if the Porto player would retain it easily. Arshavin had other ideas, winning it back, driving forward and then playing a beautifully weighted pass into the path of Emmanuel Eboue who rounded the keeper and slotted it home with his left foot. A classic counter attacking goal and it was nice to see Eboue score. After his trials last season he’s got his head down, worked hard, responded and become a better a player. Fair play to him.
There was still time for another. Bendtner got the first senior hat-trick of his career after Eboue was brought down in the box. Maybe it’s just me but does the opposition keeper nearly always seem to go the right way when we have a penalty? It made no difference as he nestled it into the bottom corner and his redemption was complete. To have a game like he did against Burnley and then score a hat-trick in the Champions League in the next deserves great credit. You can’t fault his attitude either. After the game he said:
Every time I play a game I put it behind me as soon as it’s finished and that happened after Saturday. Sometimes it’s one of those days and against Porto I put it right. I’m happy with my hat-trick but tomorrow we move on.
There will be no resting on his laurels but it was great to see a reaction like that from him. To be fair the majority of stick was coming from outside the club, some of the ‘great’ pundits whose names need no airing ridiculing him and writing him off, but even still his response was fantastic. And it’s worth wondering if he’d have been that good if he hadn’t had the very vocal support of the Arsenal fans when he came off on Saturday.
Overall what can you say? It was a fantastic performance, a brilliant result and it showed that despite what some people might say we are not a one man team. The captain looked on from the sidelines and watched his mates destroy Porto. Arsenal are in the quarter finals of the Champions League and we deserve to be there. Afterwards Arsene said:
We did what we like to do; we won with style and we were always going forward in a convincing way. If you look at history, the statistics were against us. But tonight just shows that historical statistics don’t mean a lot if you have a good team on the pitch who believes they can win the game.
There’s already a lot of talk about who we get in the next round. It could be Chelsea. It could be Man United. It could be Barcelona. The bottom line though is that when you get down to the last eight in Europe the chances are you’re going to playing a very good team. At the moment the only other side through are Bayern Munich. We’ll see United play Milan tonight and Real Madrid try to overturn a one goal deficit at home to Lyon. Then next week the final round of games takes place so we’ve got some time before we start to savour what’s next, from a European perspective.
Now though, the job is to get the players ready and focussed for a trip to Hull and our old pal Philomena Brown. The job is done in Europe, we’ve still got plenty of work to do at home.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to watch the highlights one more time. Till tomorrow.
