I Feel Good Now...I think

Yes, I do. Particularly after Man U's game last night. But before I get to that, a little something in response to the overwhelming responses I have received concerning our Bartha match, and my review post.

First, I do admit I may have been slightly harsh and off the mark with some of the assessments, and some faithful Arsewiping readers have pointed out reasonable case in points. On the other hand, though - yet another faithful Arsewiping reader pointed out a perfectly credible reposte which had slipped my mind.

Cast our mind back to 2006. The final v Barcelona of course. After Lehmann's early sending off, this was to be our 10-man team:

Almunia, Eboue, Toure, Campbell, Cole, Gilberto, Cesc, Hleb, Ljungberg, Henry

This was our starting team two nights ago:

Almunia, Sagna, Vermaelen, Silvestre, Clichy, Denilson, Diaby, Walcott, Nasri, Rosicky, Bendtner

Now, if our 10-men of 2006 put on a show worthy of the Arsenal, which till this day I'd not said a word against, one would only have to compare that with our boys' performance against Bartha version 2010. Are Bartha really that much better a team? Was Messi really really really the man who single-handedly ripped us to shreds? Was our 2010 team that much of an inferior version of 2006? Are we going to raise the issue of injuries again? You figure it out.

Rather than conclude that we have gone backwards during the same 2006-10 period where Bartha have gone irreversibly forward, I'd rather say that well, quite a few of our boys just didn't show up. I think that'd be fair.

Here's another way to look at it. Let's put down Messi's first 3 goals to sheer godly brilliance that no team on earth (terrestrial or extra-terrestrial) would be able to defend against. No matter. We're 3-1 down by minute 42. I'm more concerned then, with the performance in the next 46 minutes, till Messi really finishes us off. In that 46 minutes, Messi was, well, absent - more or less. Bartha sat back, looking content to stroke it around. That was the period where I felt we could've made something good of it.

This then, is where I get to the Man U-Bayern game. Bayern totally ripped apart by a rampant Man U in the first 42 minutes or so. 3-0. Dead and buried? Ah, but we know that Bayern need just two goals. Yes, it'll be difficult at Old Trafford, and on the night's performance, there was no way in hell anybody could've expected it. But all you needed was a scrappy, goal-out-of-nothing from Ivica Olic, and suddenly, everything changed. One more moment of magic from Robben, and there we have it.

So I say, shit. In that 46 minutes, especially in the second half - could we not have mustered a few worthy chances to get it to 3-2? If not, then well. I suppose we did try to throw on Eduardo.

All in all, don't get me wrong. I am proud of the boys. But it so gets to me that Bartha aside, we should not be in the company of the likes of Inter, Bayern and Lyon.

So we've got 5 more game left in our season. Let's see where it brings us. Whatever the case, looks like Wenger's read my post of yesterday. He's now gone and finally admitted the obvious:

"We have to add something, for sure, but we have some time to think about that."

"We had six or seven players under 23 in the team and we had plenty of opportunities. We showed we lacked maturity in the weight of the final ball."

For another iteration of what we already know so well, here's another third-party viewpoint.

It hurts, it really hurts - to know that despite everything (despite their belief, despite their ballsy-ness), the depth of our team was nowhere close to being really competitive.