Staring at a blank wall. Just looking at the wall. The wall with its imperfections like almost every wall. Some walls are plastered by master plasterers, and appear to be smooth, but even those walls have their flaws. Maybe they’re hard to notice at first, but when you spend time just staring at that wall, that blank wall, with no decoration, no pictures hung, no paintings, no art, no chair rail, no moulding, no cornicing, nothing but wall, you will see them come into focus.
Simple, plain, effective, wall. White. Perhaps magnolia. A beige wall. Who knows what lies on the other side, but you don’t think about that. You only think about the surface of the wall you can see. The one that is in front of you. A barrier to imagination and creativity. It is tall, it is wide, and it is ordinary. An unembellished, stark wall is the only thing you can see. And you sit there and you stare at it, thinking of nothing, inspired by nothing.
You do it in shifts. First forty-five minutes. Just you, a chair – perhaps a stool – and the wall. You stare. It stares back. You take a break. A cup of tea, perhaps a Mint Viscount if you’re lucky enough to have the king of biscuits in your pantry, and then you return. Another forty-five minutes, eyes on the wall, nothing else. You. Wall. That’s it. Cruelly, the arbitrator demands you sit there for some added on time, just because he is inhuman and rotten to his very core.
Finally, it is over. You are now free from the wall. It has been tough and difficult, but you take solace in the fact that it was better than Liverpool v Man United at Anfield last night. Man, I feel like I wasted a part of my life watching that rubbish. United’s squad cost a trillion old pounds – when the pound was worth something – to put together, and they were complete shite. I know, it was what Mourinho wanted blah blah, but let’s not pretend that what Mourinho wants is in any way interesting. I bet his favourite dinner is pasta covered with supermarket brand ketchup.
Liverpool weren’t much better, but at least they tried to do something. The inability of most of their players to control the football was very interesting and if I was so minded I could go back to the opening day of the season and get cross again, but I’m cross enough that I watched that pile of otter sick so I don’t need to annoy myself even further.
Sky had hyped this up as ‘RED MONDAY’. More like Zed Monday, am I right? Zed as is in lots of Zs, like ZZZZZZZzzzzzzz. Gonna hammer this one home, and I make no apologies for it. It got to the point where the only possible entertainment might come from Ryan Giggs saying something outrageously dense, but when that’s what you’re hanging on for, you know you need to do something else. Like, you know, stare at a wall.
Still, I suppose it was a good result from our point of view. Both sides have gained a point, but missed the chance to really close the gap. It’s obviously still quite early in the season, but it does look as if it’s going to be really, really tight. We visit Old Trafford next month, of course. That should be fun. And just in case anyone thinks I’m being serious, no it shouldn’t.
Back in our own little world, an interesting story from the world of grass growing. No, seriously. Arsenal have installed a new kind of pitch at the training ground which, according to the bumph from the people who make it, helps with the rehab of injured players. They say:
AirFibr is the first technology to combine two usually incompatible properties: Presentation of AirFibr technology resistance & shock absorption
AirFibr shock absorption properties reduce up to 40% the risk of injuries among players.
Given that we have been known to have some issues now and again with injury, it’s an interesting idea that a pitch can help aid their recovery when they get out onto the training ground again. It’s hard to know if it’s having any significant impact, but perhaps to make double sure we could carpet Aaron Ramsey’s house with the stuff and see if it brings him back to first team action any quicker.
And if today’s blog wasn’t exciting enough, the club have engaged the services of an Austrian ‘gridlock consultancy firm’ to design a new queuing system which will enable people to get into the ground more quickly and efficiently on match-days. They’ve spent the last 12 months analysing video and data and will apply their revolutionary new biomechanical incentive scheme which they say can ‘Speed up queues by up to 43%, allowing consumers more time to spend inside the commercial areas to purchase merchandise, snacks and beverages’. Oh baby, what a world we live in.
Not a lot else going on this morning, but as we play in the Champions League tomorrow night there’ll be a press conference this morning with team news and the like. Is tomorrow night a chance for the manager to rotate his squad a little, keeping legs fresh and fringe players happy, or will he be more inclined to stick with what works? We should get some hints a bit later on.
For some extra reading this morning, check out this week’s Tactics Column in which Anam looks at the performance of Granit Xhaka against Swansea before the ludicrous red card he was issued that I still can’t believe the club aren’t appealing.
And finally, if you haven’t already, this week’s Arsecast Extra also touches on that sending off, the win at the weekend, lots of listener questions, Gunnerblog getting turned away from the stadium on Saturday, and lots more (including great advice on how to cook your balls). Happy listening.
Download – iTunes – Acast – RSS
We’ll have all the team news on Arseblog News throughout the day. More from me tomorrow here.
Update: Finally finally, the winners of the Wenger Revolution books have been chosen. Well done to Adrian Braune, Sverre Moe, and Karen Kavanagh – I’ll be in touch to get your details and we’ll have the prize sent out to you asap.
