Just another FootballUnited.com weblog

This blog joined Football United in March 2010 and has enjoyed plenty of ups and downs along the way. The collapse against Wigan last season, the fantasically enormous debate between Arsenal and Tottenham fans after we knocked them out of the cup, drawing Barcelona in the Champions League a-flipping-gain, AGWLTG winning its first trophy in the form of my lovely little NOPA… I hope we’ve all enjoyed it.

However, now we have come to the end of our rainbow and A Girl who Loves the Gunners will no longer be found here. She’s moving house!

The new address is http://ibelieveinarsenal.arseblog.com/, so if you wish to keep reading, please bear it in mind! I’m sure you’ve heard of the new home, I hear it’s rather popular.

Thanks for reading and make sure you check out the Arsenal section of Football United to keep keeping yourself up to date with all the brilliant Gooner-made blogs it has to offer.

Finally, thank you to the Football United team, especially Sam, for everything.

~~

Siany x

If you haven’t yet heard, our old geezer Arsene Wenger has been announced as Coach of the Decade by the IFFHS (International Football Federation of History and Statistics… it says here). Apparently they’re endorsed by FIFA, but we’ll forget about that for now.

Anyway apparently it was all worked out by totting up the results of the past decade’s Manager of the Year award rankings. Wenger came first, Sir Alex Ferguson second, with Jose Mourinho in at number three.

I have to admit I was a tad baffled at first. I mean we all think the sun shines out of our Arsene, but I was pleasantly surprised to discover others do too. At first glance you might question why Jose Mourinho (who’s won a lot of stuff) isn’t there picking it up for the things he has done with Inter Milan and Chelsea. Or maybe Srrrralex, the longest serving manager in the Premiership (right?)

Probably most Gooners, even as Gooners, wondered for a moment. I myself have only been an Arsenal fan since 1997. I was aware that, by birth, Arsenal were my team prior to this, but I didn’t actually know anything about them. Emmanuel Petit was “the one with the girly hair”, to me.

I have only ever known of one manager of the club so for me Arsene Wenger IS Arsenal Football Club as it currently is. A wise man (Ian Holloway) once said:

“The bloke is a genius… He’s even got his name in their name – Arsene, Arsenal – maybe I should change my name to Black or something.”

I remember watching Wenger being interviewed on Match of the Day when I was just a wee lass, watching his name come up along with ‘Arsenal Manager’ and thinking “Wow, Arsene, Arsenal. WenGER, ManaGER… maybe he made Arsenal?” I didn’t associate the team I was watching with the team I knew my mum and my dad had been watching for years before I’d been born. And Wenger had only really just arrived at the club then and had yet to win us our first double since 1971, so he was still unproven.

Since the decade began, Wenger has won us the Premiership twice, the FA Cup three times and got us as far as the Champions League final once, in 2006. You may argue that other managers have won more. Maybe they have. But can you think of a man who, with one club, has been as consistently competitive as Wenger? A man who has never once given up the principles he feels are important to the game? Who hasn’t chopped and changed teams and spent a bundle in doing so?

He’s a stubborn old git at times, our manager. When everyone else is telling him he’s wrong, he sticks by what he believes, for better and for worse. He doesn’t see things. He plays players we think are rubbish. He’s tight as a duck’s backside. He is, simply, infuriatingly Arsene at times.

But he loves his club and knows his club more than any of the rest of us will ever be able to. On a tour of the Emirates last year, Sammy Nelson couldn’t speak highly enough of him. In his words, not mine, what Wenger is creating at the club is a “legacy”. Which’ll do nicely, thank you very much.

Let’s not forget, either, that he is a quote machine. Whether it’s asking whether an apology sent by Ferguson was sent by horse, telling us he fell asleep watching Tottenham or telling Theo Walcott he should have pushed Lionel Messi on the stairs, it’s memorable. And I love his compulsory start to every sentence (“Wellllll”), his key words in ANY interview (“spirit”, “determination”, “belief”) and his “CongratuLAtion” to the winner of the lucky match programme at every home match.

It’s worth remembering that Wenger speaks to all media. No matter how arsey they can be with him, he speaks to them all. Sometimes I wish he wouldn’t, but he does.

The man is a genius. A big, French, lanky, bad-coat-wearing, bottle-kicking, genius.

Arsene who indeed!

Arsenal had been knocked out of the FA Cup by March last year, which is when I started blogging, so this is my first FA Cup post ever! Applause, confetti, party hats, streamers, etc!

Pity it was a draw then. Boo, hiss, veils, organ music, etc!

Wenger said that of all the outcomes we could have had against Leeds at the Emirates on Saturday, a draw was the second worst result we could have ended up with, obviously behind a straight forward knock-out. I fear he was merely underestimating the terrible consequences we could have faced in the event of a natural disaster or the reappearance of King Kong and his bitey ways, but whatever.

Given it was a draw with no goals from open play, it was actually a bloody sight more interesting than the last match we played against Manchester Bus. Our strongest side was not played, with Jack Wilshere and Samir Nasri rested (or is he injured too?) and Bacary Sagna, of course, suspended. We still started with Chamakh, Bendtner and Arshavin though, so you would have thought we’d have been a little less frustrating than we were.

But oh my goodness gracious me, were we ever frustrating.

We, once again, dominated play early on and made some good attempts on goal but nothing to really worry any of the travelling 9,000 fans. Who were great, by the way. Really loud, but at times a bit difficult to understand given the clash in accent…. a problem we’re not used to when playing the likes ot Chelsea, Tottenham, Fulham or Manchester United.

Oh no she didn’t!

Before the match I’d been told we were supposed to hate Leeds United. I only really remember them from around the 2000 mark and beyond, when the likes of Mark Viduka and Robbie Keane were playing for them, but I hear we have a long history against them or something. This is when being a 21-year-old blogger has its difficulties you see. Anyway, I was born up there somewhere, so have always thought fondly of both them and Harrogate Town and thus hate them I did not.

Was a bit bloody annoyed with them when they kept playing well though. Leeds are currently fifth in the Championship and in with a shout of a play-off place or more, so they weren’t a side to be underestimated. Nevertheless we arrived at half time with a deadlock, with Arsenal probably just about edging it.

Unfortunately, in the 54th minute Denilson broke that deadlock by gifting Leeds a penalty which Robert Snodgrass put away in spite of Wooja-Wooja Shush-nush getting a touch to it. With thirty-five minutes left to play, Arsenal needed to make some changes or risk being slung out of the FA Cup in the first match we’d played in. Eek.

Less than five minutes later Cescito replaced Alex Song, who is currently channeling his inner Abel Xavier, and immediately made a difference. It must be said that after Leeds’s penalty the only one I saw on the pitch trying to keep spirits up was Szczesny, the 20-year-old goalkeeper who stands up the end of the pitch away from play most of the time. I love Cesc to the power of a thousand but if he ever leaves us we can rest safe in the knowledge that along with Thomas Vermaelen and Jack Wilshere, we have one hell of a future captain in the form of Szczesny.

With Cesc on board the good ship Try-To-Win, we looked a lot better with lots of great football going on but still not very much goal action. It’s fair to say our striking force was still in bed yesterday. Arshavin had a pretty bad day, but none of them were exactly brilliant.

Bendtner had a great first half, especially being played out of position on the wing, and I noticed he was defending more than usual, no? In the second half he wasn’t good and missed plenty of chances, he and Arshavin failing to link up more often than not.

Anyway, it looked like we were going out of the cup as quickly as the teabag of a person who likes their tea weak, before we were finally awarded a penalty in the 89th minute. Cesc stepped up to take it in the same goal he took the one against Barcelona and banged it right home. We’d had an earlier call for a penalty where Theo went down in the box, which he later admitted was a dive. This may have been a silly thing to say and I don’t quite know why he did it but at least he’s English, so should get away with it just fine!

So it ended 1-1 and with a replay scheduled for the 18th January at Elland Road. Not ideal, given our already clogged schedule, but better that than being knocked out.

UPDATED: Whoops, no it isn’t! Leeds United vs Arsenal will now be played Weds 19th January (still 2011 though). KO 8pm GMT, ITV1.

No one was exceptionally good yesterday, except Johan Djourou who bafflingly got rated a six in today’s Sunday Mirror versus the rest of the team’s seven. I do think it’s unfair to lay all of the blame at only one member of the team’s door, though. Not least because Nick’s door would have to be about four foot taller than Arshavin’s. And it’s difficult to make doors unless you have any door-making knowledge, you see.

I know we all have our favourites. I could almost run the Nicklas Bendtner Fan Club single-handedly, while others think Arshavin can do no wrong. Sometimes, though, we allow our love of individual players to cloud our vision.

Nicklas missed a lot of chances yesterday, but those calling for him to be sold are bang out of order. Chamakh also started yesterday, and I thought he was utterly anonymous for the most part. Yet, I saw no criticism for him, whilst Nicklas was absolutely battered.

Fellow Twitterer @bonjourtani made some excellent points in her mini-rant about the double-standards of many Arsenal fans yesterday. So often are we fast to over-criticise one player, while letting others get away with murder. 

Here are some of her examples:

“Nicky plays shit, he has to be sold. Cham plays like shit, oh it’s okay he’s new.”

“Samir isn’t active in the game, oh it’s an off day. Shava doing the same, he should be sold that lazy Russian.”

“Clichy has bad performance, talks of him being sold is high. Clichy has a good performance, nothing said.”

They’re all completely true. ”Oh, but Chamakh is new!”… er, new to football? “But Nicklas should shut up and stop blowing his own trumpet”… how many of you read headlines and don’t bother to watch his interviews? Many of you, I’ll bet. He’s confident, big tragedy. Would you prefer a cowering, kitten-like striker up-front? Or someone who didn’t keep going throughout the match in spite of missing more than a couple of good chances? Then those blasting Bendtner for being over-confident go on to defend Arshavin for lacking the confidence to be effective at the moment.

Are you making a “Duh!” noise right now as well? I refuse to criticise one player alone because if anyone can learn anything from this sport it is that a team performance is lasting, while an individual performance is more often than not a one-off. Arshavin was off the pace yesterday, but his assists this season show you how much he does for the team. If he is lacking confidence, the only thing I can see that will fix it is more playing time. And if you watch Arsenal you know that he is one of those players who can suddenly turn a game no matter how badly he appears to have been playing.

Bendtner was Barn-Door Bendtner yesterday but his head didn’t drop at any point. Last season he kept us in so many games, he’s been out injured a lot this season and is currently being played out of position. And yesterday, Chamakh was no better, in my opinion. And I love Chamakh, I just don’t see why Bendtner should have to shoulder more of the blame than anyone else.

So, we have another match to play. It’s rubbish, but you gotta do whatcha gotta do. We have Ipswich Town on Wednesday, West Ham the following Saturday, then Leeds again and finally another home match in Wigan Athletic.

We are also the only side in England who could still go on to win the FA Cup, the Premiership, the Carling Cup and the Champions League. Some may say those of us who believe this are deluded, I say we just believe in the team (yes, TEAM) that we have.

Well done to Leeds and well done to Sanchez Watt for not celebrating Leeds’s goal yesterday. See you up north!

Last night Arsenal were at their typical Arsenal best. We dominated posession and play and skills and crafty little one-twos, sneaky little backpasses and more than our fair share of “Ooooooh that was tasty!” moments.

And of course we had next to no end product. We hit the post twice, hit the crossbar once and forced Joe Hart into making an excellent save in the second half. If a win was based on how well the team had actually performed last night then we battered City but unfortunately no, it’s based on goals and goals were something a little out of our reach yesterday.

Describing City as a team last night would be a little bit misleading. I’d say they were more a wall of muscle with an allegedly homesick gargoyle up front. Which is a bit mean because I actually really like Tevez, the big old wind-up merchant. But that was a nicely flowing sentence, so I’m going with it.

I’m not going to complain about our performance at all, except to say that I didn’t think RvP was very good last night. I thought our midfield worked brilliantly, Koscielny was on form once again and, well, had Manchester City actually tried to get anywhere near the goal, I’m sure Fabianski would have been standing there catching everything that came his way and screaming at them ”All day long, ALL DAY LONG.” In my head, Fabianski is a cockney.

I came out of the stadium absolutely steaming that a team of players had come to a match in January, in a league they are not at the top of, and settled for a draw. Joe Hart, whom I love (Gooner), was wasting time from about 40 minutes in. They didn’t have a single shot on goal. Any enjoyable action on the field last night came from Arsenal and Arsenal alone. But I’m over it because thanks be to Jesus, I don’t have to watch them ever again this season.

The argument in defence of City’s defence is “Well, going to a place like the Emirates and salvaging a draw is a good thing”… which is frankly bollocks. Salvaging a draw is a great thing if you’re in April and desperately trying to keep your side up. What do City plan to do, draw their way to glory?

Another thing that made me laugh last night was all the ‘neutrals’ having a go at Arsenal for being insulted that Manchester City had brought with them a game of utter toss. “Defending is what they do, and if that made it an ugly game, Arsenal should be blamed for not breaking them down.”

Hang on a minute, Amnesio. Were you not exactly the same crowd complaining that the referee had made the match at their stadium (near a big Asda, so it is), dull and one-sided by (rightly) sending off a player early on when we played them in October? So you were wishing to complain that your jolly exciting afternoon of football had been wrecked by the referee then but perfectly happy to to enjoy the fact that last night City ruined what could have been an excellent game by parking their fat-arsed bus in front of goal for ninety-four minutes? For those defending how well City carried out their masterplan last night, weren’t you the ones complaining about how dull the World Cup was? Would you enjoy it if every side in the Top Six adopted this attitude?

Planks.

If this way of football works for Manchester City, then good for them. It does work so far. In the early 90s Arsenal were the ones booed off to chants of “Boring boring Arsenal” (not that I remember, I was crawling)… so we can surely see where they’re coming from. But the difference is that world-class players weren’t queuing up to get their hands on a contract with us, knowing they’d be on a wage that could build castles. If City aren’t going to use their strikers, why bother with them? Keep with this theory of football, cool. But what’s the point paying all that money to all those strikers if they’re going to do sod all? 

But anyway, we stuck at it. Our crime was indeed the inability to break them down, but my God we played right until the end. At one point the referee actually had a go at Clichy for trying to play the advantage given to Arsenal as quickly as he could in about the 87th minute. Meanwhile City players were gesturing for the whistle as soon as 90 minutes were up and got away with dawdling on and off the pitch when substitutions were made. The guy on the tannoy even accompanied one subsitution announcement with “… eventually”.

The other talking point of the game was the sending offs for Bacary Sagna and Someone-or-other Zabaleta. They did indeed look like fighting rhinos, and Bacary’s face was actually a bit scary. What I don’t understand is how a man who got stood on last week and didn’t react at all, reacted so angrily this time. Bowyer got his punishment, so it’s not like keeping quiet about it means they get away with it. My belief is that Zabaleta said something nasty to him but we’ll never know as I don’t think Bac would ever come out and say it. I can imagine many players on our team reacting like he did yesterday… except Bac. I’m sure Jack, Cesc, Song, Nasri or RvP would have reacted as badly as Bac did. But I never would have put Bac on that list, so it’s a bit odd.

I have so many tales of how lovely Bacary is, and know so many other people who have similar ones, so it’s even odder. But anyway, that’s three games out for him now, and given that he’s played in everything for us recently, that’s no bad thing.

We have Leeds at home on Saturday. Even though Arsenal have been accused of not giving the competition the recognition it deserves, I’ve always loved the FA Cup. The first match I ever remember watching from start to finish while dressed in red and white was from the FA Cup in 1998. Apparently he-of-the-greatest-name-in-the-squad Sanchez Watt has been OKed to play for Leeds even though he’s on loan from us at the moment. You Watt, you Watt, you Watt you f***in’ Watt? Hope it doesn’t prove to be a dodgy decision and that it’s a good game.

Anyway, with loads of teams dropping points last night, the bore-fest that was our match turned out to not be the worst thing in the world. ONWARD.

*wipes egg off face*

OK, so perhaps sacrificing eight players from our Chelsea win for the Wigan match might have paid off a bit. Birmingham played the same team they put out against Manchester United and it showed, while our fresh-legged lot ran rings around them. When all’s said and done, seven points out of a possible nine is not something to be ashamed of, though if we’d have been told that at 7pm on the 27th there’s no way you’d have thought the dropped points would have come against Wigan.

Yesterday’s win at St Andrews showed us back to nearly our best against a team who’ve often provided us with problems in the past. While there was plenty of nice football on display, there was also a lot of controversy, which I’ll get to later. Overall though, it was a win that was much needed after the disappointment of our midweek match at the DW Stadium. As we have Moneybags City coming up next, the last thing we needed was to go into it with two draws or a loss and a draw under our belts.

The match started off slowly with us creating plenty of chances that we, surprise surprise, couldn’t put away. There was a bit of nastiness early on when Johnson went in a bit lungey and looney on Fabregas, getting him right in the front of the leg. I agree that as Arsenal fans we sometimes throw a little bit too much of a wobbly when one of our players is tackled, but the yellow card Johnson received was about right. Plus Cesc would later go on to boss the match, so BOTHERED.

Our first goal came in the 13th minute from a RvP freekick won by RvP. Now. The Dive Debate. I DO think he ‘made the most’ of it. I DO think he could have stayed on his feet. In the last blog I said how there should be a refereeing league for bad decisions. I still think that’s true. But if we were punished in the week by N’Zogbia with his blatant dive in the sort-of penalty area, this week we pulled one back. And it wasn’t anywhere near as blatant as his. Obviously though, ours got more attention. But of course.

Birmingham’s only real chance came from a Sebastian Larsson (remember him?) free kick, which Lukasz saved very well. I don’t know what the boy has to do to show he is worthy of his starting place in the team this year. Next bit of controversy came from good old Robster once more. Handball in the penalty area. While I’ll say he was maybe guilty of a spot of Tom Daleyism for the free kick that led to a goal, I fail to see how anyone can say the handball was intentional. If it had happened down the other end I’m sure we’d have been hollering and hooting very Alex McLeishily but we’d have also got on with it and carried on playing our own game instead of crying about it for the next hour. Plus, Birmingham are hardly averse to getting a bit handsy with the ball are they? Ah, the hypocrisy of the footballing world. We all do it. Before I get any complaints from Birmingham fans saying that I would say that because I’m biased… the clue’s in the URL and the blog name, petal.

If we were alright in the first half, we were great in the second. As you’ll all know as Gooners, 0-1 is not a safe scoreline for us this season. Nor’s 0-2 really. Even so, Nasri doubled our lead in the 58th with a beauty of a strike. Here’s where I insert a tweet from SI.com’s Jen Chang:

‘Nasri tremendous again. Mind you, I’d like to see a foreigner like him do it on a cold wet day in Prem at somewhere like Birmingham. Oh.’

Lolsome. That was his 13th of the season. What a beaut from the edge of the area. You’d like to say Birmingham were dead and buried at this point but no, we’re Arsenal, so a third was still needed. Thankfully we didn’t have to wait long as a mere five-sixish minutes later we created, yet didn’t actually score, a brilliant third goal. It was Nazzerazoo and Cescito joining up once again for the latter to smash it into Ben Foster who blocked it into the path of not one but two of his team-mates. A lovely goal, even if it was an own.

I think finally we could say we were looking likely to win it. Overall a great performance against a team who have the capability to do us damage (and I mean in the points-takey sort of way, not the bone-breaky sort of way… I’m not THAT sort of dwelly Arsenal fan). God, I need to stop inventing words to suit my own agenda.

I don’t think a match report of that match is complete without a spot of Bacary/Bowyer stand-off however. If you think Robster’s dive was blatant, then Bowyer’s stamp on Bac was as blatant as his foot having come through your telly and broken your nose before insulting your mum. Entirely unnecessary and just a bit stupid. But he’s an horrendous plonker and we all know that, so I think instead props must be given to Bacary for just getting on with it. Whinging Arsenal? Not archangel Bac. Bear in mind also that he played against Chelsea, against Wigan and now against Birmingham too. If he can do it, I don’t see what anyone else’s excuse is. The FA will apparently review the stamp as no action was taken. I just hope Bac’s legs of steel hurt Bowyer’s foot, to be honest.

Final point to be mentioned is how great the away fans were, again. Birmingham’s crowd, or lack of, was pathetic and they were pretty much outsung throughout. Apparently we had 4,000 fans travel up there which, given it was New Year’s Day, is brilliant. I’d love to know where the myth of us never singing comes from when we’ve been louder than the home support in 90% of away matches I’ve seen. Are our away fans really good or is everyone else’s home support just as shit as they claim ours is?

I get the royal hump with fans, particularly fans overseas who tweet so often about how bad our home support is, when I am part of that home support. Yes, we have some regulars who leave before the end like the numpties they are, but I’d hazard a guess that the reason our support seems so weak is that the crowd is interspersed with so many Day-Tripping Dereks. People who come along because they’ve got their hands on a ticket and happened to be nearby, or who fancied seeing an Arsenal game, or who’ve brought along the other half who sits there playing Doodlejump throughout. Arsenal can’t vet all the fans we get through the door, and while we do have Red Action, the proper Gooners are maybe too spread apart to be able to get the noise going as much as at Highbury. If we didn’t care, we wouldn’t go and believe you me, our last home match showed that the regulars really, really, really do care. I can’t have been the only one in tears when Theo slammed home our third!

Any road, we’ve got the other Mancs at home next. Our last Emirates encounter with them was a bit of a dishcloth but neither team will be after a draw this time round.

Jack, meet Mario. Mario, Jack…

On Monday night there was no way you could imagine that team dropping points against Wigan away on Wednesday night. As it turned out, that team didn’t drop points against Wigan away on Wednesday night because that team didn’t even play on Wednesday night. EIGHT changes were made to the starting line-up, the most we have made in a Premiership match since May 1998 (thanks to @Orbinho for that stat). Yes, we won the double that year, but that’s really not the point.

Wenger knows, sure. But Wenger ain’t half bloody stubborn. The start was absolutely dire but the fact I was watching on ridiculously useless streams was probably not helping my view of events. I am reliably informed, however, that we were indeed pathetic.

Speaking of pathetic, referee Lee Probert put Wigan one-nil up after awarding N’Zogbia for his dive in the 16th minute. Sure as eggs are eggs, the penalty was scored and Arsenal looked like birds without wings trying to fly. Like penguins, you might say.

Then, my stream died completely and it was left to Sky Sports News to tell me that in the 39th minute, Arshavin (who’d been crap) had scored a sublime overhead goal to level the scores. Shortly after that Nicklas made me a proud supportive mum again by doubling our score to send us into half time 2-1.

We were much better in the second half but couldn’t put any goals in. The first highlight was N’Zogbia getting sent off for headbutting Jack Wilshere. Which was unnecessary and knobbish of him. It didn’t seem to matter though, as it became 2-2 when Squillaci scored an own goal in the 80-somethingth minute of time. We should have had a penalty later on when a freekick of ours was handballed in the area but nothing was given*. Two huge decisions against us.

2-2 was how it finished and we were all very, very pissed off. Rotation was necessary, we heard! Two games in three days is hard going, we heard! Yes it is, but they’re professional bloody footballers. If they’re playing in England, the little darlings should expect to have to have it a bit hard sometimes.

I don’t understand Wenger’s reasoning behind the team selection. I get that we couldn’t play the exact same team, but was SUCH a difference really required? Much like we looked at the teamsheet on Monday and thought “Get in!”, in this one we thought “Oh God”.

I also don’t get why we had no subs made until after it was 2-2 again. Wenger’s always late to make any substitutions but really, that was as late as The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson.

It was a flat performance but one that was expected from that team, to be honest. You know by now how much I love Wenger but my GOD he really must have fallen out of bed and onto his head this morning no? Yeah he might have been resting them for against Birmingham but bugger Birmingham, this match was up first!

So yeah, two points dropped, basically. If the same team plays against Birmingham… well, the same team can’t play against Birmingham and that’s the end of that.

If you want to look at it in a positive light I suppose at least this was CLEARLY not our best side. We lost there last year. With a referee who wasn’t a knob we might have not gone 1-0 down at all. Wilshere was good. Our players are rested for Birmingham.

But no match in this league is a given. Birmingham is no more important than Wigan especially given we’ve now dropped two points against Wigan. I mean, it IS more important because we now have to win even more but it isn’t at the same time, because we didn’t win at Wigan. So Wigan should have been treated to a performance from our real side. (this paragraph might not make sense, but it’s bloody late).

So some blame must be laid at Wenger’s door. But he can’t be blamed for it all. They’re not kids. He doesn’t make the team, wind their little cogs up and let them go. They all have brains (so we’re told). That team should have been able to beat this Wigan side, who weren’t even really at home since no bugger had even showed up to support them. Disappointing is the only way to sum it up.

I’m also a bit pissed off because, at 1-2 when we were playing much better than them, I was all ready to blog a little rant on referees not being punished for getting decisions wrong. I couldn’t be accused of “You’re only saying that because you lost” because we weren’t, at that point, losing. But if I say it now, I’ll be accused of sour grapes. Honestly though, if I ruled the world I’d have a league for the useless buggers. Every decision made correctly gains them points; every decision made incorrectly loses them points. End of the season, those with the least points don’t get to referee the big matches for the coming season (or in that season at all) and those with the most get rewarded.

I don’t rule the world though, so don’t have a go at me for being unrealistic. I think it’s a brilliant idea.

As we speak I’ve not seen Wenger’s post-match interview, but I’ll be interested to see what he says. Either way I’m disappointed, and I think the boys should be bloody gutted. Except for Jack who played like his life depended on it once more.

A point is better than no points at all though, which is what we were treated to last season. And surely to God Fabianski would have had every right to have had the heebie-jeebies getting in goal in this match after last year. And we’re still third. And both our goals were great while theirs were a penalty and an own goal courtesy of us. So sod ‘em.

Anyway now I’m still a bit annoyed and also boiling hot because my laptop is overheating, so I’m going to end it here. We need to get our act together before the trip to Birmingham. Everyone, that is. Win as a team, lose as a team, draw as a team. Even if that team has had eight changes made to it.

*Writing this 10 minutes after full-time, no match reports up yet and the quality of my stream was crap. I think I was watching Arsenal.

“Arsenal weren’t that good, Chelsea were just that bad…” “They mustn’t get carried away, they have Wigan on Wednesday…” “Two of the goals came from Chelsea error rather than Arsenal brilliance…”

Blah dee blah blah blah-blah blah. All the above statements might well have an element of truth to them, but I don’t care about any of it. I don’t care what any former average-at-best-but-with-a-big-gob player-turned-pundit has to say. I don’t care that we have another game coming up so soon after last night’s. Because last night I saw my team do what we’ve failed to do for much of the season. What we’ve failed to do against the ‘Big Four’ sides for years. We won, we won well and we didn’t look for a minute like we were going to settle for anything else.

Wenger’s starting XI was a bit on the old funky side, but certainly a line-up that had fans going “Oooooh that’s tasty/brave/harsh/pacey!” It could have bombed spectacularly, but it didn’t. Djourou stepped into the team after lots of matches this season in which he’s been benched despite great performances. I reckon he nicked Wenger’s sarnies from the fridge once. Arshavin was left out while fellow oompa-loompa Theo came in and Chamakh was able to rest on the bench with his little Arsenal blanket across his knees.

Speaking of the bench, did you see Gilberto sat behind it next to Kieran? That man just makes me “Awww”. He tweeted me once. A simple electronic giggle (“hehe!”), but it’s favourited all the same.

Anyway, to the match. Chelsea looked fairly cuddly and old while we, in spite of a bit of early cross-eyedness in front of goal, were dominant. There were no real highlights in the first half. Oh, except for Song’s goal. A bit of tippedy-tappedy in the box before Cesc was brought down, Song collected the ball from his floored captain and fired it straight past Petr Cech and his hat.

A brilliant time to score, particularly given we tend to arse it up when we go ahead any earlier, and given that time is usually the time Chelsea like to score against us. Off they traipsed into the dressing rooms at half time, Arsenal boys beaming, Chelsea boys creaking.

Daft and obvious and Garth Crooks as it sounds, it was a match that would be decided in the second half. We knew the score wouldn’t remain at 1-0. Either we’d concede or we’d bash a few more past them. As it happened, both happened!

Michael Essien made a backpass to Theo Walcott who bombed up with Cesc racing alongside him before making a cheeky little pass to Captain Slow (Theo’s right, how DID he keep up with him?) who smacked it straight into the back of the net.

See, he hates Chelsea too.

Just three minutes later (remember those days? Those days of goals coming at a rate of almost per-minute?!) Theo nicked it off Malouda before Cescito returned the assisting favour, setting Theo up to slam our third and final goal home in the 53rd.

Chelsea scored too, in the 57th courtesy of Ivanovic from a Drogba freekick. Standard. Moving on.

Cesc was awarded Man of the Match, though he felt Theo deserved it so the celebratory Champagne poses a bit of a conundrum. Perhaps they’ll get a couple of straws. Personally, my shining light throughout the match was actually Johan Djourou. He was solid as solid can be and made Drogba look a bit useless. I might be making this up, but didn’t Djourou win MOTM against them a few years back? Maybe from now on instead of the yawnsome joke that “That Drogba loves to score against Arsenal don’t he?”, it shall be “That Djourou, he loves to be good, don’t he!”

Yes, it’s only another three points and yes we’ve still a long way to go but last night proved that we CAN do it when we play at our best. None of this “Just not strong enough” malarkey. We really can.

As this blog has found its little feet I’ve tried to become a little less biased. I mean, still obviously blatantly biased towards Arsenal, but a little less biased all the same. But sod that for today. I really don’t like Chelsea, and I can’t and won’t deny it. I’m sure there are good ones, but all the fans I’ve ever met have been total twunts. They were utterly vile when we played them at Wembley in 2009. Worse than Tottenham fans I’m talking. Their captain is an atrocious human being, their fans were singing their favourite Wenger song before the match and they’ve about as much history as a tamagotchi. Plus blue is a bit of a shit colour.

So it was nice to beat them. ‘Ave that, you ugly rich horrors.

Back to the Arsenal and we now have to play Wigan tomorrow. On paper, it should be an easy win, but let’s not forget what happened there last season. The memories still make me shudder. Surely to God at this point they understand that complacency is their kryptonite, but if they don’t, FOR GOD’S SAKE BOYS, COMPLACENCY IS YOUR KRYPTONITE! GOT IT? UNDERSTAND IT?DO NOT BE COMPLACENT. COMPLACENCY KILLS.

I really really would like to believe that yesterday was a massive three points for us. A win tomorrow would confirm it, a loss would be a pisser. We have to play Man City at home shortly after, which should be a test BUT I think that if we win tomorrow, we will go on to beat them too.

We’re second in the table now. Sod the rest of the teams, let them twat about as they will. All that matters is that the Arsenal focus on themselves, focus on each match as it comes and focus on what could be if they play like they did last night.

Bloody brilliant, boys, well done.

We’ve been here before. This time though, it’s personal. Had a really strong feeling we were going to draw Real Madrid and am a bit gutted we didn’t but never mind, we can just get them when we beat Barca and they overcome Lyon can’t we!

OK I’ll stop with the confidence. Clearly our tie is going to be the most difficult of the round, and is a direct result of us dropping serious points against Braga and Shakhtar Donetsk in the group stage. What is making me laugh, however, is the reaction to it: “Arsenal only have themselves to blame… they blew it in the group stage… it’s all their own doing.”

Yes. Yes it is.

But this is the UEFA Champions League, people. You ain’t getting Barnsley no matter how hard you wish it. There are people arguing that we haven’t a chance against them, and reminding other people of how we’ve slipped up against easy sides this season. Then, bafflingly, in the same breath they’re saying “If we’d have finished top, we’d have got an easy side!”

We lost to Braga. We lost to Shakhtar Donetsk. We lost to Newcastle. We lost to West Bromwich Albion. Your theory, which you back up with the fact we lost to these easy sides, is that if we played an easy side, we’d win.

See? That’s just numpty logic.

If we had played an easy side and lost, we’d not only have lost, but we’d have played nothing-special sides throughout the tournament. If we’d have won, the competition would have only got tougher. I understand people being scared of Barcelona – they’re bloody good. But on our day, so are we.

Given that this season we’ve been more inconsistent than I can remember recently, February/March will provide us with worrying months. We have 10 weeks until then, however, during which time it is believed (kind of like a folk tale, really) that Thomas Vermaelen will be back. Thomas Vermaelen, the razor-cheeked, laser-eyed heart of our defence. If he isn’t… well, shite. But if he is, I’ll be a lot more confident about our chances.

All the hullaballoo about Barcelona being fabulous stemmed from them beating Real Madrid last month, right? Yes, it was an emphatic win. But it was against a brand new, very young side. It’s not like they murdered a team who’d been together for donkey’s years. There’s no doubt Barcelona are brilliant. But they’re not THAT good. Everyone has a bit of crappery about them some days. Recently promoted Hercules (who’ve been missing from la Liga for something like 13 years), beat them. So let us arrive at the Camp Nou with the spirit of Hercules. Both the one in the story about the strong man and the one that’s the little team from Alicante.

There is also the fact we’re undeniable underdogs. And that’s a great thing. You often feel with Arsenal we get complacent or lose our nerve. What is there to fear against Barcelona? That we’ll lose. Well, we’ve lost to vastly shitter sides this season.

We also have a bit of history with them. While Real Madrid would have been an entirely unknown quantity, we’ve played this lot before. We held them to a draw at our gaff. Messi was a bit useless. We then showed up round theirs with half a team, cobbled together like the little old shoe-maker used to cobble. And Messi was brilliant, the git.

We have 10 weeks to improve, they have 10 weeks to fall to bits. Stranger things have happened. Yeah, maybe we’ll lose. But I won’t be dwelling on those stupid points we lost in the group stage. That’s the past. Did you hear about the girl who dwelled on the past for too long?

She died.

So while this blog may be a little here, there and everywhere, my general message is “Oh bollocks, we’ve got Barcelona. But we might win! As long as we try our little socks off and don’t pillock it up in a really annoying easy way, I’ll be OK with it.”

And while I don’t want to get your hopes up, just take a second to imagine what it’d be like if we won. Good, innit?

Finally, the NOPAs were held this week and guess what? I WON. Well, this blog won. Still not entirely sure how and if anyone is interested, I’ll do a proper blog about it. Thanks to everyone at the do who made sure it was such a great night, everyone there was brilliant (and also a bit drunk, but that usually makes people brillianter in my eyes). Thanks also to Natasha for being the best company ever, to Kay for making me believe I can do whatever I want (yes, even win an award for my football blog even though I’m a girl!) and to my family for giving me Arsenal genes.

And thanks to Arsenal for being infuriating, pathetic, wonderful, perfect and always entertaining.

Thanks for reading

Just as I am getting a bit fed up writing the same things about mentality and desire and blah-blah-blah, so must poor Jack Wilshere be getting sick to the back teeth of tweeting the same kind of things. It’s getting a bit tiresome now.

We lost 1-0, we deserved to lose 1-0 (and no more than that), and Manchester United knew exactly how we were going to play. Again. They weren’t good either, but they edged us. In terms of football on the whole, what a w*** season this is turning out to be. It’s like South Africa, Summer 2010. Only in England. Autumn/Winter 2010.

Even Cesc and RvP, brought in well into the second half, could do little to help us out. It’s not like we faced an onslaught from the Mancs, we just didn’t try to put anything up their end at all. It was a bit… toothless. Again. There is little point highlighting good or bad performances because nothing really stood out as the match on the whole was about as flat as Mrs Doubtfire’s face when the lorry runs over it, remember that bit?

I’m not a Premiership manager, nor do I have any experience of playing that computer game thing where you get to be a footballer manager… Football Manager, it’s called? I think? You see, if I did, I’d obviously be an expert, as everyone who plays it is, and knows everything, and therefore has the freedom to tell everyone exactly what managers are doing wrong. Hey, their computer game statistics don’t lie, you know?

If it was me, I’d sit them down and go “Look, donkeys. You wanna win? Listen to your critics. Plenty of them are on the idiot side of moron, but plenty others have a point. Clich’, you’re fast but you’re not that fast. Stop acting as though your opposite number has BO and stay with him. Arshavin, run a bit more. Everyone, stop stroking the ball as opposed to actually booting the bugger netwards. Finally, how about looking a bit pissed off when it’s all going wrong? Now go outside and do laps.”

The “Woe is us” look on some of their faces time and time again is beginning to grate. You’re losing, because you’re not playing as well as you should be.

While last year everyone was so quick to point the finger at Almunia/Fabianski, it seems this year Gael Clichy is the fall guy. No doubt he’s not what he was, but yesterday his poor performance was amplified by the lack of protection he was provided with by anyone else. And the penalty he gave them, the first for him since Birmingham in 2008, was a stupid-arsed penalty decision anyway. It did provide a moment of comedy when the balding little moneyminded chavbag that is Wayne Rooney sky-rocketed the ball a mile over the crossbar however. Well, a moment of comedy for us watching anyway.

Just spare a thought for poor little Michael in Harrogate, whose lovingly crafted snowman managed to last an entire week before having its block knocked off by that Rooney-launched ball as it came crashing down into his garden about 20 minutes after that whistle for the penalty was blown.

So, we’re still second in the league, level on points with Chelsea but with a better goal difference. We’re lucky to be where we are, given some of the grim performances we’ve put on so far this season. You keep hoping there’ll be a turning point. It’d be excellent if that turning point could come this week since we play Stoke and then Chelsea and would sooner eat our own eyes than get beaten by that pair.

We’ll see. What will be will be. Congratulations to Wojciech Szczesny who put on a good performance in his first Premiership start for us. And what a match to start it in. Also a big well done to our travelling fans who outsung the Mancs throughout the match. The only song I heard the home fans sing all match was “Same old Arsenal, always cheating.” What about “Same old Fletcher, always getting in a tizzy and shoving the ref and not getting punished for it”? No? Not a fan? At least its original.

We need to keep that kind of support up at the Emirates this weekend. The atmosphere was utterly dire at Partizan Belgrade and, while it is a two-way street - play like you mean it, we’ll sing loud, play like you don’t care, don’t expect the stadium to be vibrating with noise -  it really is a better match when it’s loud and buzzing. Bzzzz.

So, Stoke next. Joy.

So, we qualified for the next round of the Champions League on Wednesday… as if there was ever any doubt. The performance was well below par and Partizan equalising was not at all a part of the plan given that we needed to win our match to be sure of anything. 3-1 was the eventual result, two great goals and a penalty, job done. Gibbalicious also picked up an injury. Poor Gibbward. He deserves better luck than he’s been treated to so far.

Now, we wait. Next Friday the draw of who we get to play next will be made. We could get Bayern Munich, Schalke, Barcelona or Real Madrid. And I say bring it on! This is the Champions League, when all is said and done. You want an easy route to the final? Wrong competition mate. There’s no room for complacency in this tournament (though we’ve managed to squeeze enough in so far), and I don’t think we’d be complacent against any of those teams.

Obviously it’d be nice to draw Barcelona again. It’d be like a part two to last year, only a little bit more hatey. They do look unstoppable but they’re not unbeaten in their league. I’ve had this horrible feeling we’ll draw Real Madrid at some point in the tournament since August, so I kinda sorta think we’re getting them. Which would be a bit crap, because they’re a bit good. But THEY’RE not unbeaten either. In fact they got even more badly twatted at the Camp Nou than we did, and they didn’t show up with side consisting of half team half Casualty waiting room.

Bayern Munich got to the final last year, but they lost 2-0 to Schalke last week. So it’s all a bit oo-er really. Concerning both sides’ league form… er, I don’t watch the Bundesliga.

Whoever it is we end up with, brilliant. The next matches are not until February when *drum roll* *angels wings flapping* *trumpets* THOMAS VERMAELEN SHOULD BE BACK. I say should be, and not will be, because we’re all Arsenal fans here. We know all about empty injury promises and broken injury dreams. But until next Friday there is nothing we can do. Except wait.

Back in the here and now, we play Manchester United on Monday. I know, crap day to play. There’s no point kidding ourselves, if we play against them the way we played against Partizan, we’ll deserve nothing more than to come home with our tails between our legs. I think one of the most important things is that if we get scored on, heads must not drop. That’s been one of the repeated sins the players have commited this season and frankly it’s getting a little old.

It is by no means a season definer, but waking up on Tuesday morning four points clear as opposed to one would be lovely jubbly indeed. I should dedicate a bit of time to the case of constant verbal diarrhoea that is Patrice Evra seeing as everyone else is but… well, he’s a arse so why would I care what he thinks of my team?

We still don’t know whether Cesc will be back or not yet but I don’t think we’ll miss him too much if he’s not, what with Super Sam still firing on all cylinders. Hopefully Djourou will be back too, and Jack won’t be just a bench-warmer for this match. I still live in hope Wenger will bring Bendtner on at some point as well. In spite of recent events, he’d be well up for this match.

Come on you boys in (presumably) yellow and burgundy!