Since taking myself off the market in my personal life on February 4th, it’s been a pretty rough ride Arsenal wise. We drew against Newcastle 4-4 and from there on in, it’s been mostly down hill. We’ve exited 3 competitions and our league form has stuttered worse than King George VI trying to explain to the Queen Mother why he’s got someone elses red lipstick on his shirt collar.
I’ve got to admit, for a moment, I thought I was going to have to can my girlfriend for the good of Arsenal.
Well, yesterday, I shelved that plan for finally we turned over a team in the bottom half of the table and landed a victory.
The big news before the game was that Almunia picked up another injury… this time to his knee. Let’s be honest, the Spaniard has had more fake injuries on his CV than a ‘no win, no fee’ lawyer has on his case book. I didn’t want it to come to this, I love Jens, he’s always been a legend in my eyes, I didn’t want that reputation soured because of poor Arsene Wenger planning. However, I tweeted before the game that I’d rather see a hungry 40-year-old on the pitch over a 33-year-old who’d rather be giving himself a back, sack and crack with a pair of pliers.
The game kicked off at terrific pace. One thing you’ll never find with an Ian Holloway team is a lack of effort. They spray the ball around nicely and they were looking to hit the flanks and whip crosses into the box. This tactic would probably have been formulated based around the assumption we were playing a keeper who couldn’t catch.
Bad luck Blackpool.
The Tangerines had most of the opening possession in the way of corners, but we had the best chances. Arshavin slicing horrendously wide after a kamikaze Kingston clearance. It was notable that our keeper was doing something quite alien in the box… he was organising his backline. Mad eh?
Our opener came when Diaby won the ball in the midfield, laid it onto Cesc, the Spaniard picked out Robin beautifully out wide, he controlled the ball well, slid it across the box where Diaby had made up the ground the slot it past Kingston. We were 1 up against the run of play.
Arsenal were showboating a little too much for my liking. I felt that we were trying to out do anything Blackpool were throwing at us. There were a few too many chipped passes into the box and a far too many silly attempts at goal.
Our 2nd came on twenty minutes when Jack Wilshere and Eboue played a one two, the Ivorian broke into the box and smashed home into the top corner. A lovely goal, a muted celebration from Eboue.
Diaby was playing well… he still managed to bumble an open goal by taking one cut back too many. Arsene Wenger fumed on the touchline, Pat Rice followed suit when he realised he was allowed to match his bosses anger.
Robin had a goal disallowed for offside before half time, things really weren’t dropping for the Dutchman but he was playing well!
It didn’t take long for our advantage to halve. Puncheon slid through DJ Campbell, Eboue completely failed to track his very blatant run, Lehmann flew out and clattered him but Lee Mason waved play on, Fletcher latched onto the ball and slotted home for his deserved goal. Amongst the melee, the ref forgot to book or send off Jens. Good stuff…
Arsenal fell to pieces after that, we totally lost our heads and allowed Blackpool to have a real go at us. It was a typical defensive display and you just felt it needed someone to take the lead and calm everyone down. However, after a month like we’ve had, it was understandable that nerves would jangle.
Kozzer was lucky not to conced a penalty with a lunge in the box. Eboue lost his attacker a few more times to really cement his inability to defend in the mindset of most Gooners.
Diaby then showed his class after picking up the ball from a Squillaci slide tackle he worked his way out of some Blackpool pressure, launched a ball up field, Cesc nodded it onto Theo who bounded into the box, cut it across for Robin who buried it.
Game over. An attack that took 16 seconds.
There was still time for a Clichy to have a Senderos moment when he allowed Blackpool a chance on goal, this time, Jens was there to snuff out the threat.
Conclusion…
We beat Blackpool. A team who are one point above the drop zone. We made hard work of it at times but when you’ve been dining off bread crumbs for 3 weeks, you’ll jump at the chance to wolf down a rivita bar when offered.
Jens Lehmann was a calming influence on the defence. He’s assured, confident, he has safe hands and he’s dominant in his box. You do wonder why we were so hasty to bin him all those years ago? There are many players we’ve sold too early who could have given us a few extra years of service. I think lessons should be learned going forward.
I have to send some praise Diaby’s way. He was superb, he worked hard and he showed off some of that abundant talent. My problem with him? Even if he can consistently show that, what is the point if he can only manage 20 games a season? His fitness needs addressing as it’s holding us back from buying a player who can manage the required 40 games a year for us to sustain a title challenge till the end.
I’m still not sure about our Premiership winning credentials. Our back 4 were opened up by Blackpool on numerous occasions yesterday and I’m just not sure the boys have the nerve to see this one through.
Let’s take the Premiership one game at a time, not jump too ahead of ourselves and cross our fingers for that miracle Danny Fiszman so deserves…
Give it half an hour and the second post will be landing on your doorstep… you know… the one about takeover type stuff!
Follow us on twitter @LeGrove
Follow us on Facebook
Subscribe to our daily e-mail
An important day in Arsenal history
MORNING ALL…..JENS WAS IMMENSE YESTDAY….CHEERS !~!
Two!
1st?
Damn!
Kroenke rapidly losing my support by not disposing of Hill-Wood.
ffs second again
damn..!
1st?
bugger
1st
stan the man….hope so
lol
1st
first?!!!!!!!!!!!!!11111
shit. no first
lehmann should stay in goal….we need the experience
desperate for the second post
should sammy buried all his chances the game would have ended earlier.. good win in the end..
So from now on if the goalkeeper brings someone down in the box we just let the other team score and thus keep our goalkeeper on the pitch!
such a thin line between success and failure, Jens could have easily been the bad-guy after his stupid champions league final-esq challange in the pen box!
What about Kalamity Koscielny giving away a cast-iron penalty with the score at 2-1?
What a twat that guy is.
top post pedro.
thought JW made quite a contribution as well yesterday, as the linchpin he sure put his body on the line on a few occasions.
what a relief to see we are still capable of a 16 second counter meal.
what happened to shava!? oh dear…
I don’t think it was a pen, the guy played the ball, he was not in control of the ball, and koz clattered him 1 second after that.
I know we say it every time Diaby has 1 good game, but when he’s as dominant as he was yesterday you can absolutely see why Wenger persists with him. He’s the one out of the usual suspects that everyone here wants sold that I would give one more season to.
Blackpool on a poor run right now, but its worth remembering the top teams that have gone to Bloomfield Road and NOT won. Even Man U probably deserved to be beaten if decisions had gone the right way…
Hill-Wood will be out in the summer…. (I hope)
Btw, sounded to me like Wenger was hopeful Chezzer might be back for the next game. That would be awesome if it happened…
Diaby is only good when we play “lesser sides”
PHW to stay. grrrrrrrrrr
Got this in my email:
What are the rules regarding penalties and ‘having control of the ball’. Because when Kozzer caught the player, the ball had long been passed to the next blackpool player.
Embarrassed to admit I don’t really know the letter of the law. Obviously elsewhere on the pitch it is a free kick for catching the player late. But commentators do often talk about ‘having control of the ball’ when penalties are being discussed…
If only we had that ref for the Champions League final in 2006, it would have been 11 v 11, and us a goal down from the 20th min. Would also mean no spanish clown to concede twice on the near post in the last 10mins….
Jimbo.
Yup we got lucky on that one, very lucky. but they do even them selves up over the season, we were denied a pen v S’land.
Kos has those challenges in him in every game, someone should pull him aside and tell him to stop lunging in like that, 3 points could had turned into 1
Jens done well he looked up for it. I think thats it for almunia for me this proveshis confidence is totaly shot to pieces. What a crazy situation that rvp would of been our back up keeper should anything have happend to jens. This says everything to me. Its a shambles
albo, pretty sure that, unles the law’s changed, it’s a penalty.
That said, why even give the ref a decision to make? It was unbelievably stupid
Agree, Big Dave, but it’s like Clichy getting caught on the ball – he’s been doing it for years, and STILL gets caught. Why? Why is nobody sorting this kind of basic shit out???
In fairness though Jimbo, everyone has been moaning that we should have bought Luiz and he is every bit as reckless as Kozzer (if not more so)
Jens is still better than Almunia though!
Oh totally agree with you there. Was just wondering what the law was…
I dunno, albo, Luiz makes far fewer of the basic kind of bullshit errors that we’ve seen from Koscielny.
He’s a similar kind of defender though, that’s right – he pushes up, gets stuck in high up the field, and like Koscielny, that often means he gets found out. I don’t think he’s anywhere near as bad as Laurel though…
Clichy, oh my, he dwells on the ball aka Brum away, Spurs home (4-4) he is totally left footed, a better side would had punished us.
yo jimbo u asian by any chance from south london???
yep BD.. most of the attacks were from Clichy’s side.
He gets lost out sometimes, we switched nasri to the left and it still wasn’t enough! we had to bring gibbs on!
Lol YLOOPS – I am neither asian, nor from South London (wank wank wank).
Jimbo – yeah, I actually don’t mind Kozzer in the long term.
I totally agree with your assessment of his weaknesses and I don’t think he’s ready to be the first choice CB of a world class team, but I think he has a lot of very positive aspects to his game that can be built on in the next few seasons.
He’s mobile. He’s great on the ball – composed and able to pick a pass. He’s a great reader of the game and on a good day makes a lot of interceptions. He gets stuck in (the source of the problem we’re discussing, but when tempered with some more experience it will be a good thing). And he’s decent in the air (tho not massively dominant, hence he works better with Djourou than Squill).
if we win nothing AGAIN and dont spend 40-50mil + in summer, there has to be protests by our bone idle fans!!!!!!!
New post!
As part of the Offer KSE, which is a company owned by existing Arsenal Director Stan Kroenke, has committed to continue to operate the Club in line with our existing self-sustaining business model.
Mr Kroenke has a proven track record of successful long-term investment in sport and has confirmed that he has asked the existing Board to remain in place. This includes Mr Peter Hill-Wood as Chairman. Mr Kroenke is also fully supportive of Manager Arsène Wenger whom he has stated is a wonderful manager…..
so what exactly is going to change then?
loool jimbo my bad fort u was someone else!!
Views on the takeover?
I was hoping for Usmanov/Dein
Kroenke aint in it for trophies, he is in it for business. He will be 100% the idea that top 4 is a trophy, all he cares about is revenue.
unfair decisions going to Arsenals way, that sums up the season that we have played. Ref was so biased!
Lehmann should have been sent off, Van Persie was about 5 yards offside
Excellent. For a second there, thought I was d only one who noticed d poor defence. It wld b a travesty to win d league with that defence. Good post pedro.
Eboue really is better going forward than sagna, even after this long, but he is worse now as a defender.
It’s a good question, what will Kroenke change? His socks and underwear maybe.
PEDRO,
hi there, what a great way to win at the end ….
few notes
DIABY wasn’t that superb imo. he still lack the positioning awareness he should have. jack covered him few times there. though he had a goal, great pass for the third & great tackle, still he misses a lot. DID YOU SEE THAT STUPID YELLOW? it is not acceptable at any level. didn’t he learn the lesson from the newcastle game? what a f*** up cunt attitude …. luckely this time it ended with a yellow.
CLICHY, is out of form, totally. he was to blame for the goal we conceded. again, he ruined our offside trap. just like he did against barca in their goal in the 1st leg. add to that his poor defending (only 1 good clearance i could think about). giving the ball stupidly in dangerous positions. unacceptable.
EBOUE, albeit i like the lad, he scored great goal that you will rarely see from sagna, still he was poor. can’t understand those stupid passes to the opposition when he wasn’t under no pressure. can’t be acceptable by any means & under any circumstances.
we could have been widely embarrassed by the faults of those three. lucky us, we played such a poor side so they couldn’t take advantage of our poor display there….
anyway, a win is a win, another 7 like this one, & we just might have a shout on that title. of course, this is nothing to do with my views on our whole season & the need for clear-out in the summer….
now to the take-over that seemed to have took over your gr8 post today …..
Pedro you were asking questions of Wenger as to why he thought Lehmann was not good enough 3 years ago and why he is good now…
You yourself in the very first blog of Le-Grove dated 6th September 2007, said that and I quote: –
” Jens has been a great servant but has of late been a liability at corners and a worry at set pieces, time to go despite your bleating in the press.”
So all I have to say is… people change with time..and so do their opinions…
Jens maybe had become complacent back then..who knows..
the fact is.. Almunia and fabianski have been so bad off late that maybe in comparison Wenger thinks Lehmann is not that bad…