Review: Manchester City 0 -Arsenal 3

So this is late. But I blame it entirely on me being extremely drunk on the intoxicating fumes of sweet victory.

This is the kind of review that I've wanted to write for a long long time - a review of a victory where it counted most, against one of the top teams, when a defeat would've been an unthinkable option. We started the game in 6th - behind not just Man U, but even Spurs and West Brom. Lose, and we'd have finished the weekend just above Sunderland and Bolton.

To say I had my trepidations would be understating it.

But hey, just as we'd flopped in games with the big boys, so too would Manciti on the day. Less than 5 minutes in, and they did what we've been prone to ourselves. Self destruct. Yes, Mancini's gone and said that if it was 11 v 11, they'd have won; Cesc has said that even if they had 15, we'd have won.

Who bloody cares. We won. 3-0. Can't get as obvious as that. Could've beens, should've beens. Hey, if Lehmann hadn't been sent off early one night in Paris in 2006, we might've been European Champions, and we probably won't even be talking about this as a key game.

So. Anyways. The game.

Manciti started like a house on fire, and we had (surprise!) Fabianski to thank for a great early safe after a minute or so from Silva. Then the sending off. But even then, Manciti pressed, and didn't at that stage play like they had 11. They still played to win...to their credit, and to our benefit.

Just as we'd been guilty of not being efficient enough with our chances, tonight it was Manciti. And tonight, we would make them pay. Excellent move, Nasri-Arsh-Nasri, and emphatic finish to make it 1-0. The man's on fire, and would continue to blaze for the rest of the game.

Then a gift. But we never really like gifts in the Premier League. We took them pretty well with Shakhtar, bur spurned the gift horse this time round. Silly challenge, up stepped Cesc, and he telegraphed the penalty just as Hart had predicted. Just great. The shit looked like it would hit the fan. "Just get it in to half time at 1-0" was my cry, and once we did, it looked increasingly safe.

Second half - We begin to exert ourselves, and once Tevez limped off, so too did Manciti's energy. Sure they hade Adebayor, but it's Adebayor after all. Another nice move, and Song finishes with aplomb. Nice one that. Even nicer was Wayne Bridge's assist.

What would put the icing on the cake than for Bent Nick to finish off a cool move from yet another sublime assist from Nasri. That's the way you do it. One chance, one goal. Oh yeah, throw in a couple of great saves from Fabianski, and we've got our first away clean sheet since...forgot when.

All in all, our best win of the season. No doubt. The pressure was on, the game was big, but after a nervy start, we all stepped up. Yes 10 v 11 changed the game. But nobody's ever sympathised with us, so why start? Winning the big games is as much about scoring goals than it is about not doing anything stupid. With the yellows piling up for us in the first half, it was also a very composed performance that saw no chance of a sending off for a player in red.

Sweet it was. Much as West Brom taught us one lesson, so too did Chelski teach us another. Bring on Newcastle next, and West Ham next week. The Arsewiper will be at the Emirates for that one, so goddamn, gimme a goal fest man!

Player ratings? Why not?

Fabianski 7.5 - Never put a foot or finger wrong. You can just see him getting more and more confident with every game. It started with Partizan. It continued today. We may see WS (that's what I'll call him) start on Wednesday, so I'm betting on another clean sheet Saturday.

Sagna 7 - Solid performance too. Some nice runs, but in honesty, some suspect crosses and decisions. Should've put Chamakh clean through on one occasion, but dawdled.

Squillaci 6.5 - Probably the better of the two in the middle. Not the most convincing, but did enough.

Djourou 6 - Not good enough, really. Got the run around too often by Tevez, and was caught too slow too.

Clichy 7 - No hint of his usual suspect-ness, so I'll be glad for that.

Song 6.5 - He's been off it of late, I'll say. Let a few get by him too easily, and when he didn't, it was plainly and simply, a clumsy foul. But, like he is prone to do these days, he scores...

Cesc 6.5 - An off day by his standards. A few slide rule passes, but a few off as well. Granted, he's still off the pace, but by his own high standards... Even that penalty miss. Woeful.

Nasri 8.5 - Man on fire indeed. Did little wrong. One goal, one assist, involved in everything good. Goals galore too, so let's pray he keeps fit. Unlike a few of his team-mates, though, prone to get fit faster than expected.

Arsh 6.5 - Not his best (as usual), but still managed a sublime assist. We did look tons better with Rosicky on the pitch.

Denilson 7 - Ain't a Wilshere, but did little wrong on the day. Efficient without the frills.

Chamakh 7 - Did his best holding up play, didn't have too many clear cut chances, and when he did, he skied one over. Put in a good shift for the team though.

Highly satisfying, to say the least. Springboard going forward? Why not? We've got a decent run of games through November, and it's not until 13 December that we face Man U. Let's get to it then. West Brom and Chelski lessons learnt; no more excuses.

The Arsewiper on Marxism

Or thereabouts.

But I was thinking. There must be two definitions to the so-called "classless society". We know one version, of the Marxist, communist, utopic vision. There has, however, to be another. Centred around Salford, Manchester. But "classless" here, would probably be more accurately conveyed as "totally lacking in class". Which just about sums up the whole episode with Manchester United, Sir Alex Ferguson, the owners, and of course, Wayne Rooney. It's all pretty sad, and for once, I actually do feel sorry for people who think themselves to be Manchester United fans.

The depths to which the "crisis" fell, the he said, she said, he wants out, he's had enough, the lack of ambition (and basically slagging off every single member of your team), and the rapidity in the turn around was the stuff of utter repulsiveness. And I don't even like Man U!

So after he's gone and done what he's done, he says sorry and gets his five-year contract, and probably a hefty pay rise. If there's anybody out there who thinks there isn't something seriously wrong with the world of professional English football, please, put up your hand.

Thank god for Arsenal.

But, my dear Watson. There may just be another angle to this. Indeed, it may all have been a remarkable sleight of hand, a PR move of utter genius.

For in the media frenzy over the lovers' quarrel, the speculation on possible clubs (including bloody Perth, for gods' sakes!), the lingering issue of Rooney's horny dalliances, his marriage and his personal life have...all but vanished into thin air. They are but no more, and Rooney has been re-born, the born-again saviour of Manchester United and its ambitions of the highest order.

Freakin' brilliant, if that were the intention.

But that would be stretching it, and stretching the limits of Rooney's intelligence.

All in all, as I've said before. Well, you Man U fans deserve every minute of this!

Elsewhere, there've been a few things happening on the Champions League front too. And most obviously: that Inter and Rafa are really, going to be anything but champions again. 4-0 against a 10-man Spurs at half-time, and there I was, hoping for something REALLY nice, and what does Inter do? Let Gareth Bale get it back to 4-3.

You can be sure Jose would never have let that happen. We've all just seen what Rafa has done, and we at the Emirates can be glad that there's at least one less serious competitor this season.

On the Arsenal front - there's absolutely no news out there. Which is exactly how we like it, what with you-know-what going on.

On to Sunday. And Manciti would've had two days less of a rest after Europe. Let's get to it.

Review: Arsenal 5 - Shockin' Shakhtar Donutz 1

A really really very strange (but still nice) evening it was.

Arsenal, determined not to get out of 2nd gear for about 60-70 minutes of the game;

Shakhtar, determined not to do anything besides pass the ball sideways just outside their box;

Arsenal, probably affected by the sheer abject-ness of it all, struggled to get any real pace into the game; and

Shakhtar, who were so bad and lacking in anything that I thought some shady underworld Asian-Ukrainian betting syndicate might have something to do with it.

I mean, it's totally poetic that our first goal should come from nothing, following zero attempts at goal, and from an absolute howler from the goalie. Don't teams normally score against US like that? Weeeirrd, man.

Totally strange too, that the dude who would score, and then set up the second would be Song. Who was probably on paper, the worst performing player in a red shirt last night. Stray passes, slip ups, even his goal was the result of a deflected, slipped up, stray attempt. Real twilight zone stuff.

It gets better. Even the third, which killed off the game, was another gift-wrapped wonder.

The Shockin' Donutz must've figured that besides their goalie dropping a howler, the next easiest way to give us a goal would be to just haul someone down in the box - after the ref had just warned them not to do it.

I mean, even when we didn't really want to score, we scored. Cue Chamakh. Nice little floated ball over the top from Nasri, one on one with their goalie, and the dude decides...nah...I must be offiside. Let me check. Ooops. I'm not. Ah, I'll just kick it against their keeper. Ooops. It went in.

So that's three out of the five goals. And the sixth? To make it 5-1? Just to make it really really out of this world? Eduardo. With a terrific ball out wide, and a real Eduardo-esque left-footed finish. The stadium cheered, everybody laughed, and all I could say was: Shit. A clean sheet would've been nice.

Thank god then, for Nasri and especially Wilshere's goals. Those were nice, Arsenal goals. On any other night, and against some real Premiership opponents, this would probably have been a 2-2 draw or a West Brom, but hey - we got Shockin' Donutz, and I'm not complaining.

As for the player ratings:

Fabianski 7 - Hey. He even looked pretty confident. Weird eh? And for once, he could laugh at the other dude on the the side of the pitch.

Eboue 7 - Not bad too. Not that he had much to do, actually. But oh well. He did do a good job giving Nasri a piggy-back after his goal.

Squid 6 - Oh you poor damp squib. What kind of attempt was that in dealing with the cross that led to Ed's goal? Did you mean it? That was weak man. Tevez'd kick you in the bollocks if you tried that on Sunday. So much for full concentration for 90 minutes. Even at 5-0.

Djourou 7.5 - An easy night out, had little to deal with, did it well, and "earned" us that penalty. If Koscielny was back, I'd say we go Koscielny-Djourou.

Clichy 7 - Not bad too, but I'm beginning to think it's getting weird having to assess defenders for their work going forward.

Wilshere 8 - Yum. Methinks he's better than Cesc at 18. What say? I think he's got a lower centre of gravity, is probably faster, definitely stronger, just as visionary, and can (probably) tackle.

Song 6.5 - Looked the part tonight. As a bleached bozo the clown. Never really punished for all the stray passes et al. Wake up boy. Manciti won't be as kind.

Cesc 7 - Did as well as anyone could expect him to. He get 0.5 points more for doing that "mama" thing on his shirt after scoring. That got Mrs Arsewiper's attention, and for that, you get your 7/10.

Nasri 8 - My MOTM. He's been immense every time he's on the pitch, and last night was no different. It was almost un-French, how he could run and run and run, and still be creative.

Rosicky 7.5 - A different league from the Arshavin shows we've been seeing. Thought he should start, and he showed why he should on Sunday as well. (NB: Arshavin would eventually come on, and again remind us why Rosicky should start).

Chamakh 7 - The offside look-see was rather dumb. But arrogance can sometimes breed dumb-ness, so I'll half forgive him.

So there we are. Tuesday game, Sunday kick off, and let's hope Manciti gets a harder run out on Thursday. In two weeks' time, it's Shockin' Donutz at home. Just a scrappy, 1-0 win will do. Don't expect them to be so donuty this time.

Elsewhere, I'm just dying to get in Rooneygate. It's even more twilight zonish than anyone could care imagine. More later, but a word now for some friends out there:

Hey. You deserve it. What would you expect from an ugly, fat, bald, in-bred...whatever? You buy a piece of #$!%, you expect it to smell after a while.

But look on the bright side. He's leaving.

Now, Man U can get back to being a vaguely respectable club with (some) class.

Ciao.

Manchester (Dis)United

Note to the Arseblogger's #1 reader: Yeah, sorry. Haven't written in a while. The combination of yet another inter-lull, plus the collective trauma of Sunderland, West Brom and Chelski were just too much for my soul. But I try...

And I'm rewarded by some rather spiffy news from Manchester.

Looks like ole Wayne wants out. Yessiree. I've heard it said that fact is oftentimes stranger than fiction, and who can disagree. The carnal misadventures, the distractions, the boss getting pissed off, the abject form, the mysterious ankle injury, and now the news that he wants out - AND that Manchester City is a possible destination.

I mean, I'm thankful. Just when Arsenal's going through a dodgy patch, what better than Liverpool and Man U imploding in their own way just to keep things amusing. Cheers, mates.

So it seems Naughty Wayne and Sir have fallen out. Sounds like an "irreconcilable differences" kinda argument. You know, something like:

"Wayne. You horny piece of s__t. I thought we made it clear. After you f__ed around with that whore all those years ago..."

"F off, Alex."

"It's Sir to you."

"F off, Sir."

"Keep your thing in your jock strap, your boots on your feet, and play some bloody proper football once in a while, eh?"

"F off, Sir."

"What the hell's wrong with you? Can't bloody play any proper football without first getting it off for 50 quid? Bloody piece of..."

"F off, Sir."

"You're injured; and get out of my sight."

"No I'm not."

"Yes you are."

"No I'm not, and I'm off to Eastlands. You, my wife, all you shits the same...what's bloody wrong with a screw for 20 quid now and then? It's not like I'm stealing. And what do you care what I do after training?? Now piss off."

So endeth that beautiful thing that existed between England's boy wonder, that boyhood Everton fan, in England's #1 team. All in a steaming pile of turd. I suppose we should be glad all we ever had to deal with was Adebayor. And Barca. I say to all me Man U-supporting friends. Just be glad. He was too damn ugly for the Man U shirt anyways. Damn Shrek should not be playing football too.

All said and done, he'll probably stay through the season.

Who the hell's gonna pay top dollar for a cup-tied, fat, ugly, balding Englishman? Especially when they've got Ronaldo - that steamy, dreamy, bulgy-6 packed toy-boy from Madeira?

Oh yeah, I forgot. Manciti.

On the Arse front, looks like Birmingham are crying over getting bullied at the playground. Ah. Whatever. Get over it, why don't you. Let's see you really cry when you get to Ewood Park or Molineux. Twits.

News too is that poor ole Vito's off to Hull on loan till January. Must hurt falling back in line behind Fabianski, Almunia and Szcecscesccszny. But I think it'll do him good. You see, this is what's gonna happen: (a) Fabianski's going to have a decent so-so run of games, (b) Almunia will fall back to #2 and warm his hands in the Carling and FA Cups, and (c) Szcecscesccszny starts complaining to the Polish press and any damn lousy blog (like this) which will listen.

End of season, and Almunia leaves. Fabianski creeps up the pecking order, and Szcecscesccszny gets pissed off too, and leaves. Which leaves Vito. Comes back from Hull. Watches Fabianski start mucking it up again. And there he is. Last man standing. Don Mannone. He's taken care of the competition.

Alright then. Going to head back off to the second half of Blackburn-Sunderland. I must say, compared to England-Montenegro, France-Luxembourg, blah blah blah, it's really riveting stuff!

Ciao.

Review: Arsenal 2 - Birmingham 1

I can't say I saw too much of the game - in between the lousy jumpy stream on the net, and the times when it stopped altogether.

But what I did see was, for the most part, rather typical. Nice start, great pissy-passing, and the away team getting the first goal. It's a sad indictment that eight games on, the only clean sheet we've had so far was against a dismal 10-man Blackpool. So it came from the head of the tallest player ever to play in the Premier League, but you sorta expect our opponents to score from their most obvious outlets. Oh yeah, of course, given that we had a very very marginal offisde decision against us, I'd figured it would be a matter of time before the combination of arse luck, over-elaborate passing and the lack of any killer instinct would do us in.

Till the inevitable goal, Wilshere was, as he has been, the best player for us on the pitch. And Arshavin was beginning to look like he has for the last 8 games: totally out of it.

Having gone a goal down, and nearly letting a second one in, we were rather thankfully gifted a second through an admittedly iffy penalty. Scott Dann may or may not have touched Chamakh, and it may have been slight if he did. But hey, Chamakh's fall was convincing enough for me. Penalty dispatched with sufficient confidence from Nasri.

Half time then, and I was thankfully able to get through the 15 minutes in an acceptably decent mood for the rest of the family. Didn't take long for it to get before. Less than two minutes into the half, and Chamakh twirls his way round the defence and Scott Carson before slipping a nice one into the net. Nice...Chamakh scores one, earned the second...and I had to think about just how many of our goals this season he's actually scored, earned or assisted in. Quite a few methinks.

Along that line too, was of course Wilshere's assist. The boy's a wonder.

The rest of the half was either non-existent for me, save for the last 10 minutes. We held on, looked better with Arsh off and Rosicky on, and could even bring on Bent Nick for a little run in.

2-1. Hard won, but three points. Honestly, after our last two (or even three) results, anything less than 3 points would really have killed the team, so to grind out the points today was nice.

As for Wilshere, well. Red card too, eh? I'm glad he came out thereafter with a mea culpa, and Wenger said what he said too. All in all, the boy was in need of a good rest too, so having to sit out Manciti, Newcastle in the Carling Cup and then West Ham should be fine. The boss should give him a little bit of another run on Tuesday with Shakhtar, then let Rosicky do the rest.

It's been a tough couple of weeks for us. And next weekend's another crunch match. 2nd vs 3rd, and if muck up the lines again at the City of Manchester Stadium, shit...we lose and it'll be 6 points behind them, forget Chelski. So I'll take one point there, and anything more would one hell of a bonus.

Elsewhere, Man Utd are getting really entertaining methinks. Giving leads away, doing cool Fabianki impersonations, fuelling rumours of a Fergie-Rooney rift, the works man. Keep it up! Pool's just as entertaining, no? One off the bottom courtesy of a better GD than West Ham. Classic. You can't be blaming the whole ownership on their crapness. That'd be just too convenient. They're just too damn mediocre. Apart from Torres (who's doing his best to be crap) and Gerrard (who half the time looks pissed off), there's nobody on that team who looks vaguely competent.

What was it Joe Cole said about why he chose Liverpool, when he signed?? The fool...

It's nice to be back to normal football. Saturday, Sunday, Monday (even if it's Sunderland and Blackburn) and then European Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

Toodle-oo then. Wonder if Koscielny's going to get over his "injury" by Tuesday.

Learning

You know, there is one word which I think I have grown to really really detest.

And that is "learn". We should learn, lessons to be learnt, must learn, etc etc etc. Latest is Sagna. Yes, learn from mistakes, learn from defeats. But screw it. Learning is vastly over-rated. It's code for we didn't cut it. You're in 3rd grade. You can't ever learn fast enough to get to 6th. You are, or you aren't. Screw this learning nonsense. The time for learning is over, the time for doing is now.

Which...was actually what we've been saying for the last 2-3 seasons. (In different ways, maybe).

Oh well.

Maybe we should come up with a new term. New to football anyway, but rather established in educational settings: learning difficulties. Do we suffer from a particular learning difficulty? Just a bit slow? What?

Or do we just have a teacher stuck with outdated teaching techniques? One that allows us to express ourselves, do great work when it doesn't really matter, but always flunking the major exams? How do you "learn" not to do that?

Maybe what Sagna means is to have ourselves keep repeating: "I shall not flunk, I shall not flunk, I shall not flunk", and write it on the board as well. Maybe that's learning.

So. Enough of this learning crap.

A rather irate Arsewiping reader has been in touch, and he's asked why I did not make reference to a text conversation we had after the Chelski game.

I said I'd apologise. He asked if I'd be writing an obituary for the year.

So I've been thinking. Would it be an obituary? Maybe not quite yet. There's still the Carling Cup. Hooray! A few games in the Champions League. Hooray! The matter of a less irrelevant FA Cup. Hooray! And finishing above Manciti (and Spurs). Hooray!

Yes, we may have to consider an obituary for our league chances. But that's kinda moot, I fear. The table now already makes for scary reading. Level with West Brom, and another loss away from hanging round the likes of Wigan. Yikes.

Elsewhere, there news of Bobby Pires keeping fit at London Colney. Much like Sol. It's nice innit? Why not give the man a couple thousand quid a week, have him sit on the bench, and have a run out at a few Carling Cup, FA Cup and even Champions League games? Hey, anything that raises our spirits, man!

Review: Chelsea 2 - Arsenal 0

I am, strange as it may seem, at peace. I thought we would lose, and sure enough, we did.

Peace comes when you finally realise you just weren't good enough, and perhaps just not good enough. Period. While the home capitulation to West Brom might have been at that time, incomprehensible, unacceptable, irretrievable, today's game and its lesssons were mind-numbingly simple. Yes, we might have made a better meal of it if we had Cesc, RVP, Walcott and Vermaelen, but hell, winning the big games - or at least making a meal of it - is as much an exercise in testing your best 11 as it is the competencies of your second stringers.

True to Wenger's philosophy, we had a great start, put together better moves than Chelski, and seemed for most of the first half, as much of a contender for the top as the team in blue. But as I sat there, I told Arsewiper Jr to just watch. They need just one chance, and they'll take it. Unlike us - missing an open goal header in the first minute. So it was the Frogba. Hats off, he's one shit good helluva of a striker. What can you do? Chances mean shit, efficiency and taking your chances are the stuff of champions.

Second half, and the same. We're pretty good, actually. Put together a few good things, but always betraying that offensive and defensive naivete. As the minutes ticked, I told Arsewiper Jr to watch again. They'll score a second. And they did.

All in all, a rather comfortable day out for Chelski, and our cluelessness and total lack of ideas and options showed when Wenger put on Vela at 2-0 down, with 2 minutes to go. Moment of genius that.

I suppose it's the brilliant irony of football that in the lead up to the game, much had been made of Fabianski and how he'd hold up. Well, he held up pretty up in the end. Shame the team as a whole did not.

If football had a scoring system like in boxing, we might have done ourselves and our chances some justice. But in the real world, in the world of real champions, this is it. Chances. Goals. Done.

As it stands, we're seven off the pace after seven. Season over? Probably. But let's just ask ourselves, hands on hearts, just how many of us thought we were real contenders for the title. We weren't. We aren't. Let's just hope for a good run in the Champions League, more Champions League next season, and look to finish above Manciti and Spurs. We'll see what happens when everyone comes back from injury. If they come back.

Shall I do a little player rating? Well, let's see...without the actual scores:

Fabianski - Pretty decent. Nothing more anyone could ask of him.

Sagna - Okay too, I suppose. Seemed one of the very few people who would at least not get blown over by Frogba's drift.

Squid/Koscielny - Pretty good, if you're Aston Villa. Not if you're pretending to challenge Chelski.

Clichy - Ditto.

Song - Ah Song. Just what has happened? Provided absolutely no cover. None. Provided nothing offensively, and left Squid and Koscielny exposed too often.

Wilshere - The one bright spark. Wonder when the rumours of a Wilshere move are going to start.

Diaby - At least seemed to care a little bit more, but on the day, looked way out of his league, an unware that this was Chelski, not training.

Nasri - Placed for some reason on the wings. I blame Wenger. The source of all promising things, but was always out of position.

Arshavin - Out of position? Being on the pitch would've been out of position. Don't know if it was me, but what was he doing? Playing in Song's place? Bewildering. But for one shot on goal, you might be forgiven if you didn't realise he was on the pitch. The damn munchkin fell asleep (as usual) for Alex's goal too, I'd say.

Chamakh - Started like he meant business with a great header, and after that, simply suffered from the lack of service. Missed a couple of good chances with his head too, which was odd.

I wish I could've said the entire team sucked. But they didn't. It's just a case of not being nearly good enough, and we'll have two weeks to stew on that.

As we sat at the dinner table, Arsewiper Jr #2 asked how I'd react if she changed teams. This is what happened.

What?? You can't do that!

Why?

Well, you can't just change teams. Like, if you behaved badly one day, would I change daughters? If mum made me angry, would I change wives? Yes, sometimes, it's nice, sometimes it's not. You can't just change teams.

OK...

That's what it's about. It's called loyalty.

OK Dad. But, let's say I didn't support Arsenal from the start. What if I supported Wigan? What would you do?

I'd try to make you change.

But you said you're not supposed to change!!!

Oh yeah. OK.

So what?

Well, then, we'd just laugh at you all the time. But that's just it. We're a family. That's why it's fun, that's why we support the same team. We feel happy together, we feel sad together. But at least we do it together, right?

And remember. No matter how bad you thing we're doing, there's always someone else worse. Well, not always, but more or less...

Silence.

I suppose she believed some of it.

I do. Things are shite now. Really shite. But hey, we went through some good times, we've been through some really bad, and in time, we'll see some good.

I'm sure of it. It's a matter of time. Even if it's a long time.

I'll take the next two weeks, and just be fucking glad I'm not a Liverpool supporter.

Good night. This, at least, is how I make myself feel better.