Nine Jimmy Rimmers – Arsenal and Football

Tomorrow we have the chance to really start nailing down Champions League football next season. Our two immediate rivals have to play each other, we lead them by one and six points with nine games to go.

Arsenal & Spurs win = nine point cushion
Arsenal win & they draw = eight point cushion
Arsenal & Chelsea win = six point cushion

If we lose, the margin of error could be back down to one game!

I’m still pinching myself to make sure that’s where we’ve got ourselves back to. Must have checked the league table half a dozen times yesterday.

So who will play against Villa? There are no reports yet of new injuries although there will be the usual update later today from the club. Diaby may make it onto the bench after a run out in the reserves.

There could be some changes to the starting line up though with such a short period from the game on Wednesday. Nothing too radical I would think, given that we don’t have a midweek game ahead and you don’t change a winning team if you don’t need to. I would think he most likely changes revolve around protecting the youthful Gibbs and Oxlade-Chamberlain.

Oxlade-Chamberlain sat out the Everton game and must have a good chance of returning against Villa tomorrow. That would be tough on Gervinho of course but I think it would be the best team selection.

Will Arsene Wenger want to protect Gibbs, given his fragility in the past? I guess he’ll be tempted as he has Santos available now, but I think he will stick rather than twist this time. A big part of our recent run has been the new found solidity at the back and preserving that is likely to take priority.

My guess is just one change:
_______ Szczesny ______
Sagna _ Kos _ Verm _ Gibbs
________ Song ________
__ Arteta ___ Rosicky ___
Walcott ___ RVP ___ AOC

What do you think?

Meanwhile Aston Villa are struggling with some key injuries. Darren Bent is out for the rest of the season and Richard Dunne has a broken collar bone. Ciaran Clark is also out, so that’s three Villa players who have scored against us who will be missing. If Villa do have an advantage though it is because they haven’t played for two weeks. Their scheduled midweek game was against Bolton which got postponed following Fabrice Muamba’s heart attack.

But the truth is that we should out-class Villa tomorrow. The only place Arsenal can lose this is in their heads. If the team can keep that focus that Arsene Wenger has been demanding and ditch any complacency, then we should be at least six points into top four status with another game crossed off.

Come on you Gunners!

Everton, pretty average but every now and then pull off a stunner. Like beating Man City and Chelsea at home. Tomorrow Arsenal must go there and avoid the same fate. Meanwhile, Chelsea are away at Man City so an Arsenal win could open a bigger gap.

Can we get a result against Everton? Yes we can, if we are still on the determined run of form we have shown in the last four games. Though it would be good not to give them a goal start!

Squad news seems pretty positive apart from Diaby. He may get a run out in the reserves tonight and obviously won’t feature tomorrow. Given the run we’re on, there’s a lot to be said for an unchanged team.

Before the last game, Arsene Wenger talked about a cautious approach with Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, but promptly played him from the start.

I also saw a suggestion somewhere that Santos could play further forward on the left than fullback. But I think that’s harsh on Gervinho. He may have been the least impressive player against AC Milan, but to say he is worse than a fullback coming back after three months out is over the top.

But I think Gervinho is far more likely to start the second game of the week against Aston Villa. Everton away is a tough fixture and I would hope to see:

_____ Szczesny ____
Sagna _ Kos _ Verm _ Gibbs
_______ Song _________
___ Arteta ___ Rosicky __
Walcott __ RVP ____ AOC

What do you think?

Sundays are bad enough for football, but I can’t stand this Monday night business.  I just feel cheated out of the traditional weekend highlight.  But I can just about cope if administered a dose Spurs Defeat.  Relieves all manner of mild disappointments!

With Spurs losing three in a row, we can go just one point behind them tonight and probably take Newcastle out of the race for third place as well.  I say probably because Spurs’ sudden loss of their healthy points advantage shows how things can rapidly change.

But if the game goes our way tonight, there will be three teams fighting it out for third who go into the next round of games on 53, 52 and 49 points.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.  We must still beat Newcastle tonight and whilst they have lurched into some calamitous defeats, they have some dangerous attacking players that can hurt unwary opponents.

They rightly gave up Andy Carroll to a ludicrously high offer that any club would have been mad to turn down.  Hard to credit now that Kenny Dalglish shelled out £35million.  They then gambled on Demba Ba where other clubs feared for his fitness and it has paid off massively.  Ba is joint third in the list of Premier League scorers.  With him and Van Persie on the pitch you wouldn’t put money on a goalless draw.

Tiote and Cabaye are two midfielders who can really close up midfield space so Arsenal will need to move the ball quickly and work for each other off the ball in the same way they did against Milan and Spurs.  If we can do that from the start we can the pressure on Newcastle’s relatively weak back four and dominate the game.

Who will play for Arsenal?  Injury news seems to be good with Arteta and Ramsey both available.  Andre Santos is back in full training but obviously somewhat rusty after a few months out.  He may may the bench.  There’s a week before the next game so no big need for rotation.  Winning tonight would be be such a big psychological boost, for so much of this you would have laughed at the idea of us finishing third, so I expect Arsene Wenger will want a full-strength mixture.

He has talked over the weekend of taking care of Oxlade-Chamberlain’s still developing physique, so I expect we will see the Ox starting on the bench. Benayoun is an option out on the left, but my bet would be on Gervinho getting the start. He has been a bit pedestrian recently and some Arsenal bloggers have been on his case, but I think that is far too premature.  Players can go through rough patches and to suggest he is past it or was never really good enough is unfair at this stage.

So I expect us to be watching:

______ Szczesny _______
Sagna _ Kos _ Verm _ Gibbs
________ Song ________
___ Arteta __ Rosicky ___
Walcott _ RVP __ Gervinho

Come on you Gunners!

These are the two big Arsenal stories spread across the media this morning.  Let’s start with the most important.  The Van Persie story is based on comments by Roberto Mancini, responding to media questions.  Mancini has a bit more class than Barcelona types so he says first that he thinks Van Persie will stay at Arsenal.  But, if he didn’t, then of course Manchester City would be interested.  Well who wouldn’t be?

I’m afraid that this type of story, which at the moment all seem driven by the media rather than any particular club, is going to be a regular feature until Robin Van Persie’s contract situation is resolved.  Whether any club will get quite as down and dirty as Barcelona did over Fabregas remains to be seen, but we’re going to have to put up with it for a while.

I think the chances of Van Persie staying are good as long as we stay in the Champions League.  That dictates everything now.  If we stay in, we have more to offer in both finance and prestige.  It also means that the promises to strengthen the squad this summer are more likely to be kept.  If we don’t, then Van Persie is bound to be tempted by big offers for what is likely to be his last major playing contract.

The other big story is that Arsenal are close to nailing down terms to bring Lukas Podolski to the club this summer.  Even the BBC, which generally likes to be fairly certain a story is genuine before publishing, is going with this one.  What we don’t know of course is whether this is also tied to whether we have Champions League football or not.

If the Podolski story is true it is encouraging for two reasons.  First, it means Arsenal are working to get deals sorted out early and avoid getting trapped into the same supermarket dash of last year.  Second, it confirms that Arsene Wenger’s approach has become more pragmatic.  Podolski would be another mature head alongside the developing talent of Oxlade-Chamberlain, Aaron Ramsey, Jack Wilshere and Wojciech Szczesny.

Don’t get me wrong, I really approve of what Arsene Wenger has achieved in bringing in young talent.  If you look at the players we’ve discovered and developed it’s a fantastic record.  But I do wonder whether some of those moments where Arsenal gave choked and blown games might have been different with a a more even blend of youth and experience.

Meanwhile, away from the frothy transfer talk, young Szczesny has been having a bit of a dig at Chelsea.  Unlike some clubs, well Chelsea, he says that Arsenal players know who is boss.  Everyone here is equal, apart from Arsene Wenger – who is most definitely in charge.

A bit unfair on Di Matteo I suppose, but that’s how it is at big school Roberto.  It’s a welcome change to see Arsenal able to put the psychological pressure on its rivals for the first time this season.  We’ve been on the receiving end for so long that for a nano-second or so you might feel sympathetic and disapproving.

Nah!  Go for it.  Let’s have a follow up story tomorrow about how aging stars should be wary of Stoke’s energetic and unrelenting style!  We’ve got to wait until Monday night until our game so some entertainment and dropped points at the Bridge would be just the job to keep the weekend interesting!

Arsenal put on a powerful and stylish performance last night which maintains the momentum of the games against Spurs and Liverpool.  We came so close to pulling it off, but in the end it wasn’t quite enough to overcome the lapse at the San Siro.

Through the first half we could all believe in a miracle as we steadily got to three, playing with such pace and determination.  Thanks to the whole team pressing hard and fast whenever we lost the ball, we were able to play high up the pitch and dominate the game.

In the second half though we couldn’t keep it up.  The players began to tire and Milan worked harder to close the midfield gaps.  Oxlade-Chamberlain and then Walcott picked up injuries and the momentum faltered.  If only we could have had Arteta, Diaby, Ramsey or Wilshere at that point.

So we went out.  But step back from that, we blew this tie back in February, and celebrate the fact that we beat AC Milan 3:0.  Ibrahimovic, Robinho and co came with a four goal advantage and just clung on.

Spurs 5:2, Liverpool 2:1, AC Milan 3:0.  That’s a classy set of results.  Arsenal had lots of stars last night.  In fact Gervinho stood out for being just a bit normal!  Robin Van Persie gets all the coverage at the moment, and he is having the best season of his career, but there are other stars too.

This is the most influential season that Tomas Rosicky has had for Arsenal.  He won our man of the match poll again last night.  His tenacity and determination to get the ball moving forward make a big difference.  Ramsey has a bit more pace and the same intent, but at the moment Rosicky has the experience to be more effective with the ball.

Having Sagna back gives us more attacking options as well, whilst on the other side of the pitch Gibbs is growing up fast.  He has lapses, but he is still very young and shows massive potential.

Song was fantastic last night, continually closing down Milan players and winning the ball back.  He carries it forward too, gaining ground as well as possession.

In the end the fact that our bench lacked the four injured midfielders and a potent alternative forward meant that we didn’t have the right fresh legs to do it.  But what a fantastic effort.

It seems that Arsene Wenger may be in trouble today for criticizing the referee.  He was pretty hopeless.  Quite why he took so long to award the penalty is beyond me and everyone else.  He also missed a deliberate, cynical body check by Mexes that flattened Vermaelen.  No freekick or card and he even urged Vermaelen to go over and shake Mexes hand.

His most comically poor moment was a freekick that obviously hit Song in the wall and went out for what should have been a Milan corner.  But he awarded a goalkick and added insult by booking a Milan player for dissent.  I think that Arsene Wenger was probably complaining about Milan’s time wasting, but in truth we would have done the same.

The likes of Arsene Wenger, Jose Mourinho and Alex Ferguson are frequently in trouble for abusing referees.  They are all bad losers, but they wouldn’t be top managers if losing didn’t burn them so deeply.

Anyway, enough of the referee, well done Arsenal!

All it takes is a bit of self-belief – and for AC Milan to concede five goals!  It could happen and I hope that whoever runs out on the pitch for Arsenal believes that too.  In reality it probably depends on getting a very early goal followed by sustained pressure to inject doubt into Milan minds.  If we can do that there will be the opportunity to play the game in their half and we have a chance.

If we don’t do it, I hope that fans will accept a win for what it is and cheer anyway.  A win, even without progress in the Champions League, confirms the turnaround that Arsenal have pulled off in the last fortnight.  It’s a turnaround that had put us in fourth place with a points advantage over Chelsea and even opens up a possibility of finishing third.

Now if Arsenal go out of the Champions League tonight, most of the media will pile in with demoralising scorn, talking about the end of an era etc etc.  They seem to think it their duty.  But as long as the Arsenal team have demonstrated commitment and passion to succeed, I hope that Arsenal fans won’t pile on the media bandwagon.

We are where we are.  Step back and look at the season as a whole and it does look a mess.  But right now we’re fourth and could go third.  This tie was put on the limits of rescue a fortnight ago before we beat Spurs and Liverpool.

So let’s stay real and stay real fans.

As for the team, well Arsene Wenger didn’t have a lot new to reveal yesterday.  Robin Van Persie is definitely in, Arteta and Benayoun are out, Rosicky and Gibbs 50:50.  We have to hope that Gibbs and Rosicky are good to go today as losing them would make life difficult.

We’re going to need all our attacking options tonight and that starts with having genuine fullbacks so that we have all the channels to move the ball forward.  Playing a central defender as a fullback can keep us secure ok, but we’re already four down and need to score.

Losing Rosicky means losing our in form midfielder and I’m not sure who we would play in his place without Arteta, Benayoun, Wilshere, Diaby or Arshavin.  The only real alternative to having Oxlade-Chamberlain and Rosicky in with Song is to bring in Chamakh and go 4-4-2.

So, let’s hope they both make it and if so, we will have:

_______ Szczesny ______
Sagna _ Kos _ Verm _ Gibbs
________ Song ________
___ Rosicky __ AOC ____
Walcott __ RVP _ Gervinho

That’s a bit more attacking than normal and the front five are going have to keep up an energetic pressing game so that we can play well up the pitch.  If they don’t, the danger is that Song will get pushed deep and be over-run.

Come on you Gunners.  Go out and win.  If you win by five, fantastic.  But any win is a credit and keeps us heading where we need to go from here.

How to play this one? It’s half-time and we’re 4:0 down. Time to cut our losses? On the other hand, since that evening at the San Siro, we’ve built up some welcome momentum that could be damaged by anything that feels humiliating.

Arsenal fans are not of one mind. In the poll we ran yesterday, all three options got significant support:
Go all out for the 5:0 win – 45%
Do enough to maintain momentum – 30%
Rest players and forget the result – 25%

But what does Arsene Wenger think? After the first game he vented his anger, saying we were as good as out. Now he is being slightly more positive. But then he does have to get the squad and fans motivated for some kind of fight.

I’ve got feeling that he will put out a reasonable team. We don’t have to play again until next Monday evening and the key thing is not to damage the momentum that we’ve got going now for the crucial run-in to the league finish.

After the Liverpool game Arsene Wenger commented that the team had been decimated with Arteta, Benayoun, Diaby and Gibbs all picking up injuries. Presumably we will get an update from the club today on how bad those injuries are. Arteta had said that he wants to play and that may be possible. Concussion can be scary but with short-lived effects.

There has been some talk of a more attacking approach, given the shit or bust nature of this game though. So maybe a rest for Arteta and a start for Oxlade-Chamberlain.

Could Arsenal go for two out-and-out strikers (leaving aside caustic comments that we don’t have two such players) and play 4-4-2? That would probably mean Gervinho on the bench and a start for Chamakh. That may not be worthwhile if we don’t have Gibbs to get the ball moving down the left as well as the right though.

I really hope Gibbs is okay, but experience makes you cautious on predicting his return. It has really made a difference to Arsenal to play with genuine fullbacks again. Wenger could go for Jenkinson on the left although a fullback that had to cut inside every time is not as good.

I’m guessing that we might see something like the line up below, unless Gibbs is there to give better balance. In which case Chamakh could start instead of Gervinho.

______ Szczesny ______
Sagna _ Kos _ Verm _ Jenk
________ Song _______
___ Rosicky _ AOC _____
Walcott _ RVP _ Gervinho

What do you think?

Winning the games you don’t deserve.  That’s what it takes to stay at the top end of the league.  In the first half against Liverpool we needed stacks of luck to stay in the game.  We were really clinging on.

The Arsenal team looked knackered and uninspired, particularly in midfield.  We were being over-run.  But we were clinging on and it took a mistake from Koscielny to get Liverpool their goal.

They had already had a chance to go one up by then of course when Suarez went down and Halsey gave a penalty.  Did Szczesny actually make contact with Suarez?  A lot of neutrals are saying yes but I’m still not convinced.  It looks like Szczesny is pulling his leg back away from Suarez when he goes down.  Plus Suarez had already launched himself into space before any contact could have happened anyway.  In the end it didn’t matter as Szczesny pulled off a magnificent double save to keep Kuyt’s penalty out.

That save, and a string of others earned Szczesny most people’s vote in our man of the match poll.

But thanks to Sagna and Van Persie we levelled the score and got to half time.  As Arsene Wenger said, we were lucky not to be two or three down.  It’s great to have Bacary Sagna back, a crucial goal and two assists already.  That’s what we missed having to play central defenders as fullbacks.

In the second half we were better.  Not brilliant, but better.  Suarez didn’t get as much of the ball.  We got fresh legs from Gervinho and Oxlade-Chamberlain.  But the whole team raised their game.

It looked like a draw was the best we could do, and it was more than we deserved.  But then, thanks to two great bits of skill, we took the lot.  A great pass from Alex Song was inch perfect for the running Van Persie, outflanking the Liverpool defence.  He smacked it past Reina first time on the volley.  Great skill, like his goal against Everton.

After the game Van Persie said we didn’t deserve to win, which is exactly why players like him are worth what they are.  Also after the game, Arsene Wenger said the club will do what it needs to in order to keep Robin.  I hope so, but first on the list isn’t the cash, it’s being able to offer Champions League football and that is beginning to look a whole lot more plausible than it did a month ago.

During the game we had a little cameo from Diaby who showed us a little flash of why Arsene Wenger persists in the hope that he can return to full fitness.  n the twenty minutes before his hamstring tightened he showed how he can cover the ground box to box, how he can move off the ball to help a pressurised team-mate find a pass and how he can start attacks.

The potential of the guy is obvious, but after twenty minutes so was the problem.  I wish him good luck, but sometimes staying in the top end of the league has to be a ruthless business and you’ve got to think that Arsenal need to find someone who does what he does without the fragility.

So, Arsenal win ugly.  Even better, Chelsea screw up against West Brom.  So now we are clearly in fourth with three points rather than goal difference or goals scored between us and Chelsea.  Slowly we have taken a better grip on our chance of securing that Champions League spot.

It seems to have come at a cost though.  Arteta, Benayoun, Diaby and Gibbs all got injured.  Who will be fit for Tuesday?  Are just kidding ourselves that it matters?

We’ll see.  Just for now I’ll settle for celebrating fourth place with a bit of breathing space.  Oh, and Kenny Dalgleish having nothing to smile about.  He forfeited that big time over the way he handled the Suarez and racism issue.

Above all, you hope it is going to be a game. Unless we’re slaughtering them of course. Tomorrow I will meet every Spurs fan I know, on the train, at work, all day. Above all, you hope it’s a game. There’s nothing worse than a pitying Spurs fan. Why does it means so much? Don’t know, it just does.

I hope that today the players know it to. If we got another display like the AC Milan game, their lack of will would bite hard.

But enough of the Jaws-like mood music, what of the game? Yesterday Chelsea found a bit of rhythm whilst Bolton got lost. Newcastle let Wolves back in for a draw and have no goal difference at all. So position-wise we will stay fifth whatever. Well not quite, but if we win five-nil or lose fourteen-nil it will be a memorable game indeed. But never mind position, this is going be a tight race and quite apart from it being the Derby, we need three pointsto stay in touch with Chelsea.

Three questions on team selection I think: Gibbs or Vermaelen, Rosicky or Ramsey, Walcott or Oxlade-Chamberlain? The first two will come down to fitness and I expect we will see Vermaelen at leftback and Rosicky in with Arteta and Song. The third choice? Walcott on experience, or AOC for more enthusiasm and variety? Then there’s the question of who will help Sagna more with Bale? Personally I’d go for AOC.

______ Szczesny _____
Sagna _ DJ _ Kos _ Verm
_______ Song _______
___ Arteta __Rosicky __
AOC ___ RVP _ Gervinho

Not long to wait! Come on you Gunners!

So yesterday Arsene Wenger locked the team in to tell them exactly what he thought of the performance on Wednesday night. Probably just the right thing to do, but he must of thought quite hard about how to play it with the next crucial game coming up so soon.

This is a big game now. If we hadn’t been so abysmal on Wednesday we might be discussing a relatively relaxed approach to the FA Cup, firmly of the view that the Premier and Champions League are what we are really about.

But that would be a dangerous approach now. At times like this it’s about momentum. As we found out too painfully last season, if you pick up too much speed running down hill it gets hard to stop. Barring a miracle we went out of the Champions League on Wednesday. Tomorrow we really need to stay in the FA Cup.

If we don’t, we will be in a very bad place mentally for the next game against the best Spurs side in twenty years – defending fourth spot. We are only in fourth on goals scored. Bloody hell this post is getting depressing.

Who should play then? Obviously Koscielny is out and Henry departed, but Gervinho has returned. Will he go straight back in. No-one who played on Wednesday really distinguished themselves although Van Persie saw so little of the ball the he had no real chance.

None of them could complain if they were dropped and some will be, but I’m not sure that this is the moment for wholesale change. It’s more a case of players going out there and restoring their professional reputation. Which is probably why Arsene Wenger decided that letting fly with both barrels was the way to go yesterday.

I’m guessing that Djourou will have to partner Vermaelen in the centre of defence rather than Squillaci or Miquel. The next most likely change is Gervinho for Walcott or Oxlade-Chamberlain. Neither were great on Wednesday, but AOC probably showed the most grit of the two.

The other possible change I guess is to use Coquelin somewhere in midfield.

I not going to predict a team at this stage. This is mainly going to be about mental strength and what Arsene Wenger saw in each of their faces after he told them the facts of life in short easy to understand words.

Can’t help feeling that these next two games are our season now. Come on Arsenal!