We had that rarest of things last night, a comfortable victory killed off by an early goal. If the script had been written to give Sparta an early goal and then for us to hang on and miss a lot of chances before, perhaps, sneaking a late one to make the game safe I don’t think anyone would have been too surprised. However, the game was as good as over after 7 minutes. Walcott was put clear on the right, he went past the defender and drilled a low ball across the goal to give Tomas Rosicky the simplest of finishes. At 3-0 on aggregate there was no way back for the Czech side.
There were changes in personnel. Justin Hoyte came in at right back, Senderos was back in the centre of defence, Diaby and Gilberto were in the centre of midfield while Eduardo started up front with Robin van Persie. To be honest it wasn’t much of a game to look at. At 3-0 we were cruising and hardly going to bust a gut while Prague knew the game was over too, despite the odd threat.
It wasn’t until the introduction of Cesc and Denilson that we started ticking again, and both of them got involved. Walcott had been moved up front, where the boss says he’s going to play more in the future, and Eduardo out left. The Crozilian looked lively out there and set up our second goal beautifully with a classic playground push and run past the defender and cut it back for Cesc to smash it home. The Spaniard dedicated his goal to his friend and U21 colleague Antonio Puerta.
In the 90th minute we made it 3-0. Denilson’s good cross from the right was met, inside the 6 yard box, by Eduardo and he scored his first competitive goal for the club. I’m not sure why everyone tried to smother him afterwards but it’s good that he got off the mark. It can be a weight around players necks if they don’t score for a new club early. Look at what happened to Dennis Bergkamp. It took him 10 games and the pressures and headlines back then were bad enough. In this day and age when a player is written off after just a couple of games it’d be even worse. The type of finish shows exactly why he was brought in though. Inside the 6 yard box, brave, attacking the ball. How long has it been since we had a player like that?
So, overall job done, job done well and goals from midfield and a new striker. If you really wanted to be picky and analytical you could say the performance wasn’t brilliant but that’s as much down to the circumstances as anything. The game was over early, there was no point running ourselves into the ground this early in the season and in the overall context of the season it just goes down as a decent win and a confidence builder.
It was good to see Diaby back in the team but his first game of the season was about fitness, not performance. His passing is better than he showed last night, where he did his best impression of Blindy McBlind the Blindest Man in Blindington. Like Adebayor on Saturday the run out will do him good and we need as many bodies fit and ready as possible. The boss was enthused by Theo’s performance as well, and while he did have some very good moments, I’d love to see him go at defenders with a bit more drive and bollocks. We got the goal when he went outside the full back and he’s got the pace to do that every time. But, he is just 18, and that’s another assist to chalk up to him and an encouraging performance rather than a brilliant one.
You can read the manager’s reaction to it all here.
We go into the draw for the CL group stages as one of the seeded teams. You can see the seeding groups here, so there’s the potential for a very tough time or a rather easier time. A Celtic, PSV, Rosenborg group would be rather tasty but it’s unlikely to be that simple. The draw takes place some time later this afternoon with the usual 3 hours of shitetalk and build-up. I think it’s at 5pm GMT.2
In other news Arseblog revealed yesterday that the club are planning on trademarking the word ‘Gooner’ for use on common merchandise like tops, t-shirts, scarves etc. I have to say it doesn’t really sit easy with me. It’s one thing claiming the crest and the name of the club as your intellectual property, there isn’t a person in the world who would argue with that – least of all me, but the word ‘Gooner’ doesn’t belong to the club. It belongs to the fans. The question I would ask is if the trademark application can be extended at any point beyond those limited items (you can see details of them in the link in that article) to affect things like websites and fanzines that have been using the word for a long time.
There’s quite a debate going on about it in the columns section so feel free to join in if you’ve got anything to add. Sadly, ANR does not allow comments so you can’t say a word about this quite pathetic hijack of the story to wheel out some pro-Dein/Kroenke PR. A new low for Myles, that.
Update: He’s removed the offending crap from his article. Typical. Just for the record it said:
Stan Kroenke would never do that in a million years. Stan the Yank is a flexible, accommodating owner who values his fans very highly and understands PR.
Now, off to do my day’s work. More, including an Arsecast, tomorrow.
