A quickie for you this Sunday morning. Yes, I know, it’s the highlight of your week, just lie there and take it.
With Bolton arriving at the Grove today for an FA Cup 4th round tie Arsene Wenger has spoken about his young players and how long term their development would benefit the club despite short term problems, saying:
You need the strength to stand up because you know that when you put them in the team, they will make mistakes and you will get hammered. You can only pay for their education with points that you lose. Tony Adams at 16 made mistakes. At 30, he hardly made any.
Ahead of the game Stewart Robson offers his tactical analysis and says Arsenal must cope the diagonal balls that Bolton will pump into the full back areas for the likes of Kevin Davies who will elbow his way around the pitch all day.
Gael Clichy talks to the Independent and talks about his life at Arsenal so far and his year out of the game with injury while Gilberto Silva says Robbie Savage is a dick (in a roundabout way) but feels sorry for him because he broke his leg.
Amy Lawrence talks to Julio Baptista who, it appears, is becoming increasingly settled and more confident at the club, which can only be a good thing. She notes his willingness to use English when he’s not comfortable yet with the language which, as I mentioned the other day, is a great sign that he’s trying very hard to integrate as much as possible.
And that’s about it. It’s going to be a tough, physical game later on and I’m sure the lads will be well and truly up for it. Bolton players have been going on about Arsenal whinging and moaning and how they put those articles up on their dressing room wall to motivate themselves.
If I was Arsenal manager I’d just have pictures of Allardyce, Diouf and Kevin Davies with the words ‘KILL. DIE. MAIM. SLAUGHTER’ and I’d use electro-shock therapy on the players to get my message across. That said my managerial style is probably a bit different to AW’s.
More tomorrow.
