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So now the northern chavs have moved alongside us into second place, I say second because we are top, we have a better goal difference so by virtue of that, we are in fact top, not joint jack shite, but top.

Now I’ve established that we’ll move on. Today the chavs play the spuds, I can only hope for a draw plus a few injuries, not that I would wish ill on anyone, well apart from either of the above, not a nasty one, just one that will contrive to lose them points over the coming months.

You see what we have developing is a top six, now that’s no good because that means too many games become big ones, it also shows where we could be had we signed a few top players, we still can be as well, the teams around us have had their signing fests so I doubt them signing anyone will make a difference, us on the other hand can still make the difference, and as I’ve said before, a few top signings and we are away, there won’t be a top 6, they’ll be a top 1, followed by the rest.

This Blaise Matuidi bloke, if he is the next Makelele then we shouldn’t let him go to Liverpool, if we can’t sign Toulalan then we should sign him, because Denilson is not good enough and we need someone that is. I thought Denilson could have had a Flamini type season, but he clearly won’t, so act now Arsene and we can clear up, we are well placed and still in everything, we need to buy players that aren’t cup tied, so Subotic, Sakho or even one of our own EPL players would fit the bill.

I don’t think the players need firing up for tomorrows game, Evra did the team talk very well, either way and after this game Wenger will know whether we are good enough or whether we need to buy, I’m prepared to shut up, if he’s prepared to buy, should we need to that is!

Tomorrow should be fun, I’m lunching with a Manc, so the pre match fun starts early, this lunch will spill into early evening when he’ll go home as all lightweight mancs do which will leave the evening for me to join my mates in the Borough of Islington at an Arsenal pub to watch us stretch our lead, onwards upwards, tomorrow is the biggest game of the season.

Have a great Sunday grovers, countdown begins!

The boss said Almunia is going nowhere, massive, massive disappointment to me reading that, and I thought Given was coming. So if he’s not going, then why isn’t he playing? He’s either good enough or he isn’t, if Fabianski is deemed our number one, then Almunia is clearly not needed, so why keep him, more of the madness of King George I suspect.

And you know who I really mean!

Not to mention worrying if we have  to suffer a whole season with Fabianski in goal.

Hopefully the Evra outburst will serve to spur our team on to a famous victory at Old Trafford, quite an attack on the team and it’s management, I bet Fergie was pissed off with that statement, still was he right? Well we’ll find out Monday night won’t we, if we win then Wenger is vindicated, if we lose then Evra was right and Wenger will be in the dock.

I have a sneaky feeling we’ll turn them over, if we don’t it will be another season that will go by where we can’t compete with the best because we don’t have good enough players, we will never have a better opportunity, aside from their hammering of Blackburn, they haven’t been that impressive this term.

And the only reason they beat Blackburn was because Allardyce will do anything to please his mentor, fat snivelling creep.

If the spuds and chavs grind out a nil-nil manana then the stage is set, imagine going 4 points clear at this stage of the season? Now that would be some Christmas present eh???

Let’s hope we have Cesc back for this game, he would give this team such a lift, imagine him and Nasri both on Song, no you filthy sods, I mean both on their game! Yuck, perish that thought!

A final thought for Ivan, Ivan Barca just signed a shirt sponsorship deal of £138mil over 5 years with some Qatari charitable foundation, maybe you should be pulling off deals like that, it may be of more use than Edelman’s pathetic £50mil 8 year deal was with Emirates, but I did say that at the time. Still it runs out in what? 3 years.

Have a great day Grovers and sorry for the delay, it wasn’t my fault!

Top fighting talk Theo, and that was said after the Partizan game, well that’s what we all hope, we need our top players to start the rallying cry and Walcott has started the ball rolling, but can we beat the mancs?

We all know they haven’t been at their best this term, but they are still unbeaten and no-one but the Arsenal can go all season unbeaten, it has to happen at some point so why not this Monday?

If we play our best available team and if they chase down every ball, this team can beat anyone, even Nani sees Arsenal as their biggest threat, I know you’re thinking he’s going to say that as we’re next up, but I think we can tear them apart if our boys are on form, all we have to do is keep it tight at the back, and the way to do that would be to protect the back four.

How do we do that then? Well the first thing we have to do is put in a DM, we have two to chose from, my pick is Song, leave Denilson in London. We saw how rubbish we were when he played them both, so I would stick him in front of the back four and flood the midfield with ball winners.

This would be my team.

Fabianski

Sagna Koscielny Song Djourou Clichy

Nasri Cesc Rosicky Arshavin

Robin

Why Koscielny when I’ve been giving him a tough time? Well for me Squillaci is too slow and has not been playing so well, Kozzer is highly rated by our coaching staff and maybe he’ll be more effective with Djourou, why Djourou? He’s the best we have, he wins balls in the air and against the mancs, we need height.

The real key to beating them is to keep the ball and that’s why I would put Rosicky in ahead of leaving Chamakh up front on his own, flood the midfield, if we keep the ball, we can’t be attacked, Robin is showing signs he is back and with his skill, he’s less predictable than Chamakh.

If Song stays back, the backline will have another in the way and the back four will become a back five, so we are almost playing 5-4-1 but when we attack we will be back to 4-3-3, complicated I know, but the team that has the ball will be the team with the threat.

Then we have Theo, Chamakh and Bendtner for impact, so I know I said leave Denilson at home, but on the bench will give us a back up in the hole behind the midfield should Song get injured.

I also expect the mancs to play defensively as they won’t want to lose this one, but we are top of the league and they need to win, if we win, we are proper top and that will send a message to the rest of Europe, yes we get the harder tie in the next round, but so will someone else – us!

A little snippet is that Manuel is off to Spain in the sales, could my Shay Given story be coming true? Wenger did say unless we lose someone we won’t be buying. Rosicky to Villa for £8mil would be good business but I do like Mozart, especially for Monday, we’ll see, but then maybe we’d bring in Toulalan or Inler, hmmmm.

Have a great day grovers, a draw from the Chavs and the northern chavs will be a good result, Theo I hope you are talking it up with the boys and it rubs off, for all my negativity after Belgrade, we can’t be that bad again and I hope Wenger has learned from it, the title is in our hands boys, go and win it for us.

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Well we get to play the easiest game to date so far, we beat them away and if Braga get a result tonight then we can still top the group (I think). We know we can score, so that’s not the issue, we can’t defend though and that makes the whole team nervous, so we have tonight to sort out who we play for the tough Christmas fixtures of the chavs and mancs.

Is it time to throw on Ignasi Miguel as he is playing so well for the rubadubs? Can we do worse? I don’t know much about him other than he is big, mobile and may just click with Djourou, and both can jump, can it get much worse? The trouble with our defence is we panic when the oppo comes at us, it’s not the conceding that bothers me, it’s the goals scored against the chances they get that scares the life out of me.

But as Djourou is out tonight on account Wenger said so in his press conference it’s irrelevant.

When we had decent defences, I never worried when we were attacked, I was massively pissed off when we bought 50 goal Clive Allen from QPR and sold him before the season started, we swapped him with Palace for Kenny Sansom, I thought what on earth is Terry thinking, he said you need to build from the back, you know what? He was right!

I believe that Djourou is our best centre back, Wenger doesn’t, if he did he would play him more, tonight he has no choice as he’s out, but Monday he has, so maybe it’s time to bring in another option and partner him with that other option, just a thought.

The rest of the team are playing great football so tonight this would be my team.

Cheezzer

Sagna Squillaci Koscielny Gibbs

Song (sit back) Nasri Wilshere

RVP Chamkh Arshavin

If Song starts going forward and passing to the opposition then bring on Rosicky and not Denilson, as scoring more than they do will be what we need to do.

Watching the spuds go through topping the group made me want to vomit, I just hope that whoever we get in the next round we beat, and get another crack at them, I also hope that Arsene can see what the whole world can and buys himself another keeper and another centreback, in an ideal world a top defensive midfielder as well, but buying 3 players when it means dissing his favourites is just too much to ask.

So we need to attack from the off and bury them, hope that Braga win and see who we get next, with Nasri on fire and Robin looking sharp again I can only see us hammering them tonight, Partizan wouldn’t be any better than a Championship side so I’m not worried about the result, I just hope we are better than the boring game I last saw against a shocking Wigan.

Come on Arsenal, about time to show Europe we are contenders.

6-1 Arsenal, I’m feeling good, have a great night Grovers, and remember to wrap up, it will be colder out there than in the Adelaide home teams changing room!