Maddy’s Note: Since our readers seem to be connoisseurs of fine cinema and of a certain Mr. Tarantino I shall continue the trend with my next four posts and adopt a style that he most certainly pioneered.
Chapter 1 – Villains
Vil-lain – [vil-uh n]
Noun – A cruelly malicious person who is involved in or devoted to wickedness or crime; scoundrel.
What bigger crime in the universe than to somehow conspire with the fates to keep a clean sheet against the heroes of North London. The scoundrel of course refers to Martin O’Neill who really should read entire interviews before making outrageous comments about apalling insults.
No, but seriously we could’ve used the three points from last night. It would’ve gone a long way in alleviating some of the pressure piled on us by the Fixture Computer of Doom (FCoD). On the other hand it isn’t the fatal blow that was always heading our way or the death knell sounding on our title aspirations. That is a load of tosh. The title is not going to be decided today, or Sunday, or the Sunday after that, or the Wednesday after the Sunday post this Sunday i.e. while the FCoD might have thrown a curveball our way, missing it is only Strike One. Of course we’d be in a fantastic position if we could get satisfactory results against the Mancs and Chelski.
Only the second third time we’ve not scored this campaign if my memory serves me correctly, the other time being Sunderland away and Chelsea. The funny thing is any other occasion; a point from Villa Park would’ve been an acceptable result. I mean they are a team who’ve beaten everyone of the other Big err Three. Neither Chelsea nor United are going to be able to take more points off Villa than us. That is the thing with perspective see.
An extremely witty observation was made by the excellent Desi Gunner. All our away draws have come against teams sporting claret and blue kits, West Ham, Burnley and now Villa. Food for thought.
While it would be overkill to call ourselves the better team from the game, I don’t think it unfair to state that we fashioned the better chances. You don’t get closer to a goal than when you hit the woodwork. And we did that twice. Cesc and Arshavin showing what excellent mazy runs with insane close body ball control skills can do in opening up defenses, nearly put us ahead twice. Maybe Rosicky should’ve converted and maybe Ramsey shouldn’t have gotten in his way the other time, at least we didn’t go without fashioning a single chance.
Vermaelen’s prognosis is not as bad as it was initially feared; if it were a broken fibula I’d have been hopping mad. I mean think about it, when was the last time any team had ANY player with a broken limb, let alone 3 in quick succession. A record Djibril Cisse would be erm proud of. The boss says he ‘might’ be short for Sunday which is indeed excellent news as we could certainly use him against Chelsea where he can make up for the own goal he scored at the grove. Though I have to say, Big Sol’s performance was heartening and Bendtner who came on for a crocked Eduardo also showed what a difference he makes in terms of a Plan B. Song is back and should track the only threat I can perceive in the United lineup; Shrek Rooney.
On the other hand the thugs from Manchester lost a chief thug in Rio Ferdinand for 4 games after the F.A dismissed his appeal saying it was frivolous. Heh. Everything about that club is frivolous come to think of it.
So there is an aura of quiet optimism for Sunday. Hopefully I’ll be back Monday with Chapter 2: Exorcising the Red Devils and not something like Chapter 2: The Rise of Mephistopheles. Should be a cracker of a game.
Come on ye Gunners
As much I love Arsenal, it will be uphill task in the absence of Vermaelen & Van Persie, unless off course if Fab or/and Arshavin go on fire!
If we are to win the title, we need to win this and win this like we did when Nasri scored two in a the thriller at Emirates a couple of years ago!
Arsenal must get a good replacement for RVP, Walcott, Bentner are simply not in the kind of form a team needs to challenge for the silverware.
I don’t know Gunner. That’s an srgument that has raged for weeks now and it clearly doesn’t look like anyone’s coming in. So like always In Arsene we trust
This time Wenger is in a serious dilemma, he needs a proper target man to make challenge for the title. At the same time we know his long term business model all too well. I think it’s basically up to Bendtner, Vela and the others to step up their game and show that Wenger doesn’t need to bring in a new striker. Also, bringing in a proper striker will bench Eduardo and Bendtner while the return of Van Persie in such a scenario will only cause more confusion.