Well, there isn’t much in the way of interesting news just now surrounding Arsenal. We still haven’t bought a goalkeeper and people are still going mental about it. I think it’s an age thing, the internet being predominantly filled with younger tech savy users who simply don’t remember the Arsenal glory days when we escaped relegation by 4pts. Time and time again I get lambasted by people who say “you’re used to mediocrity” or “you’re conditioned into accepting failure as success”. I’ve said approximately 50,000 times, that of course I want to win trophies, but equally I realise that coming 3rd out of 96 clubs is an achievement in it’s self.
Here’s an analogy. I’d quite like to have sex every night. As long as my cock doesn’t fall off, I’m at least close to winning.
There are 93 worse of positions we could come in, and we as Arsenal fans have fighting for our lives at the bottom of this league before, so we know it’s possible. The only people running around with their hands in the air like their pants are on fire are supporters who have never actually seen the team in a relegation battle or are too narrow to see other clubs fall from grace.
One bad manager and it’s kaput. Look at Liverpool, Houllier was so terrible that for years he managed to make Benetiz (an equally terrible, tactically insane man) look perfectly acceptable. They’ve sold more of their better players over the summer, and appear to be uninterested in the Europa League scraping through qualifying by leaving what remains of the team at home. I have no doubt lovely Roy Hodgson (well he was until he signed up for the mugsmashers anyway, and Fulham were a lovely team until they instilled Brillo head at the top – I tell you, the summer has been far more distressing than us not signing a goalkeeper), blah, anyway, I have no doubt lovely Roy will turn them around into a team of fighters, but will he get them into the top 4 again? Doubtful.
It’s another classic “we haven’t won a trophy for 5 years, the manager has had time enough, sack him now” that just shows how little those people know about football.
I’ve listed Wengers achievements before, I won’t bore you again, but our squads were finalised this week. 7 of our under 21s are full internationals, 3 of those English. Regardless of whether you believe Alan Hansen when he says kids never win anything, or the facts, like United winning the league with a team of kids (Beckham, Giggs and Scholes were young once) the fact remains that Arsene Wenger has built a sustainable model for the club, and each year the talent pool in the reserves increases exponentially.
Goonerholic, who’s blog is nearly always thoughtful and always a well written read pointed out the following in a recent blog:
- In the 70′s the other three of last seasons top 4 were all relegated. That’s Spurs, Chelsea and Manchester United.
- In the 70′s Leeds and Derby won the league, where are they now?
As ‘holic points out, Leeds and Derby especially are great indicators of what financial mismanagement brings to the table. Leeds especially who have yo-yo’d quite a bit including most recently, Champions League to League 1. That’s quite the fall from grace.
Also wanted to point out just how cretinous MOTD is. Well, specifically Alan Shearer and Alan Hansen. Ordinarily I wouldn’t waste my breath, but it’s a quiet time and it bears repeating. Specifically their behaviour over Joey Barton getting kicked up in the air repeatedly against Wolves.
As threeandin points out (picture courtesy of the threeandin team) it’s disgusting that any professional football team go out to wind up and intimidate another player physically, especially in that manner. Some of the ‘challenges’ were straight reds, or should have been if the ref had a pair of balls. It doesn’t matter if you like Joey Barton or not, it’s dangerous and reckless and indicative of the approach teams like Wolves take.
Yet, the two Alan’s laughed their tiny bollocks off. Giggling like children as they showed replay after replay. I thought chest kicking was disgusting and there was no place in the game? That’s what Hansen said after the World Cup final right? But if it’s an English team (Wolves) doing it, to someone they deem unworthy…. that’s OK? Hypocrites and morons the pair of them.
On a totally different note I read Dev’s article about Ade/Robben yesterday with interest. Adebayor really is a total gobshite. Once again he proves the only thing that matters to Adebayor is Adebayor. It’s quite telling the only thing he’s remembered for in a City shirt is running the length of the pitch to celebrate that goal. I remember saying at the time, “milk it you prick because you won’t get many more chances”. He hasn’t and it looks increasingly likely that he will eventually be sold on to another club, maybe as soon as January. Hopefully he’ll end his career in the Alaskan league, telling everybody in Alaska that he’s even better at whaling than them. Moron.
In regards to Rafael Van Der Vart the reason Arsenal didn’t sign him is we didn’t need him. If you count Arshavin and Walcott as forwards, which I do (because obviously attacking wingers are really forwards, how many times do either player track back and make crunching tackles?), then Arsenal have a forward like of RvP, Chamakh, Bendtner, Walcott, Arshavin and Vela. That’s 6 players for at most, 3 positions. It doesn’t get simpler than that.
I echo Dev’s thoughts regarding Spurs. They lost to Wigan directly after taking the Young Boys from behind, and I suspect they’ll lose to Villa after Twente, Everton after Inter, Bolton after Inter, Liverpool after Werder, Chelsea after Twente and maybe they’ll get a draw against Wolves after Werder in a few weeks. The point is, they have little to no experience of playing so many games in a week at such a high level, and now they’ve lost their best defender in Dawson for 8 weeks (yes, I said it, he’s better than Ledley King, because he can play more than one game a year see) I can see them really struggling after each European midweek fixture. I think City will eclipse them this season for that reason alone.
Not a lot else to say today – Houllier looks set to take over Villa, which will be hilarious.
Oh and bottom of the list, is Ryan “Snapper” Shawcross. He’s not happy that Wenger thinks he’s a thug:
He always seems to have a problem with Stoke, our manager and certain players. He’s obviously got something against me. It’s just weird. He brings my name into it.
Aside from him kicking goalkeepers, so far he’s nobbled Walcott, broken Ramsey and managed to kick Adebayor up in the air whilst they weren’t even on the pitch. It’s baffling why Arsene Wenger wouldn’t like him. The fucking cabbage. [edit]Unintentional Shawcross similarities with today’s Arseblog, great minds.[/edit]
