Up For Grabs Now

It’s very difficult to put the size of this evening into words. You all know what it feels like right now. A few hours to kick-off. Dreams and nightmares all morning, then all afternoon. For some reason I decided to wear my yellow away socks all day under my jeans. Pulled right up to the knees. It’s itchy under there, and it’s tense.

People play football all over the world, every single week. Arsenal play most of those weeks. But sometimes football gives certain players, certain teams, certain fans, the chance to achieve something which will never be forgotten.

Much of the British press was this morning presenting the game as essential if Arsenal are to keep their bigger names at the club. Even with a game as big as this, all they’re interested in is transfer gossip. Pathetic. If all they’re interested in is the transfer market, on this of all days, then they need to find themselves a new interest, and get someone who knows and cares about football to write about it.

Tonight isn’t about who stays and who goes, who might be here next season and who might not. Who cares? That stuff will sort itself out, frankly. It’s about Arsenal playing Man Utd for a place in the European Champions’ League Final. And it’s about making sure we win.

Sammy Nasri says that tonight has got to be “like a volcano” and I’d say that’s about right. There aren’t many sides against which I wouldn’t back us hands down to overhaul a slim, single-goal deficit in a home second-leg. But United are a little different, and last week they seemed to have what very, very few teams ever achieve against Arsenal – control.

Bits of tonight will be tense, testy, and all about control. Getting the ball down, keeping it, crafting out decent chances. Playing it patient, tight and waiting for good openings. But knowing Arsenal – and unless things go horribly wrong – we’re likely to see at least a bit of volcano before the night is through. A bit of Champions’ League Night madness where everything goes absolutely crazy.

Let’s hope our boys can stand the heat, and that we come out of that volcano staring at May 27th in Rome.

With RvP back and ready to score the big goals to fire us to the Final, the team will almost certainly by a 4-4-2: Almunia, Sagna, Gibbs, Toure, Silvestre, Nasri, Walcott, Fabregas, Song, Van Persie, Adebayor.

It might be tempting to switch Sagna to left back (where he can easily adapt) and bring in Eboue at right-back for his experience. Others have suggested starting Djourou ahead of Silvestre, which is similarly tempting but would have the opposite effect in terms of experience. An unpopular variation would see some kind of 4-5-1 involving Abou Diaby, perennially chosen for the big games, it seems.

As always, delighted to have your thoughts on who you want to see in, and who you’d rather sit out.

Twenty years ago this month, on May 26th, 1989, Arsenal went to the reigning champions of England needing to win by 2 clear goals to win the League. Our victory that night couldn’t have come any later, and couldn’t have felt any better. It has inspired generations of Gooners since, and always will.

Tonight, of all the nights between that one and this, for Arsenal, it really is Up For Grabs Now.

So it’s Villarreal up next in early April. Crucially the second leg is at the Emirates – that could give us the edge.

Villarreal will be tough opponents, certainly, but if you look across the other teams we could have drawn, you’ve got to be pleased with that one. I always say we play better when given big draws, as our run to the 2006 final bore out, but when it comes down to the draw itself I’m always desperately hoping we avoid the bigger fish.

If we get past Villarreal (and let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves, it will be tough) then we will most probably face Manchester United in the semi-final.

There will be those who will have dreaded such a draw. United are extremely strong, with a mighty squad and a whiff of invincibility. Sure, they lost to Liverpool, but will that result really matter in the final Premier League reckoning?

Better, you might think, for Arsenal not to have to play them at all. Better that if they are to win the European Cup back to back, it should be without having conquered Arsenal along the way. Better for us to be able to pretend we would have beaten them, but never got them in the draw.

You won’t be hearing anything like that from UpForGrabsNow.

I am right now drooling uncontrollably at the prospect of United in the semis (distant as I will try and keep it in my mind). Why?

Because it gives us the chance to be the ones to wreck their season, the season which the pundits have already decided is to end with 5 trophies.

Because it gives us the chance to turn this season – their season – into our season, the season we will always remember as the season when we triumphed over (let’s face it) one of the best English club squads ever assembled when no-one thought we could do it.

Because whatever the hype about them, and however good their players actually are, and however formidable a foe Alex Ferguson will be for Arsene, there is always the fact that WE ARE THE ARSENAL.

There is no team in the world who we cannot meet, beat, and outplay, when we play as well as we can.

Finally, because when we were Invincible, the cheat Wayne Rooney and that sad coward of a referee ended our unbeaten run at Old Trafford and did immense damage to our incredibly talented squad. That defeat cannot be properly avenged without beating United when it really matters, when it really hurts.

We can do that now. We have that chance. And nothing would feel better.

The squad for the game tonight, perhaps predictably, has excluded lots of our big names, names such as Emmanuel Adebayor and Robin van Persie. It has also excluded some of our smaller names, but names nonetheless of important players, for instance Cesc Fabregas and Gael Clichy. The boss has, however, named eleven starters and seven substitutes, so I suppose we can all rest easy on that one.

Set to start are Homer and probably Carl. If only we had a Lenny, we’d be developing an entirely Simpsons-based attack force. If anybody can think of any more Simpsons related Arsenal puns I’d be grateful to hear them. My erstwhile friend Josh has suggested ‘Apubayor’ and ‘Robin van Barney’. How about Rosickentbrockman? (On reflection Robin van Barney sounds like an awesome Dutch footballing/darts playing hybrid victory machine. What a sight that would be. Maybe he’d kick the darts.)

With qualification assured it’s a nice opportunity for people to prove themselves against a side who are no mugs, proven by their ability to win cups (er).

Many will say it’s also an opportunity for Eh?booedhim to win back some confidence and some supporters after he lost on Saturday. Without meaning to cross the line my esteemed colleague drew under the issue yesterday, I want to have the last word so will anyway: the real reason everybody booed on Saturday was not that Eboue was rubbish, but that with every meaningless giveaway of the ball and tackle of his team-mates Eboue was reminding the world that he, and he alone (except for Song) Knows What Arsene Did Last Summer. The boos were, quite contrary to what everyone has been saying, a gesture of solidarity with Arsene – the sound of thousands of people articulating their discomfort at this flagrant Ivorian flaunting of Arsene’s vacation pursuits.

I, for one, say let Arsene’s secret lie. The rest of you feel free to carry on supporting Emmanuel through thick and thin (mostly thick). Judases the lot of you. All I’m saying is the next time the only people who know about your secret from last summer are a couple of West African utility midfielders, don’t come running to me.

Three points tonight please. Ideally a wonder goal. And a squirrel. Been a while since we had a squirrel. I’d post a link but you had to be there, really. But those who were please do join with me mentally in song: ‘Squirrel is a gooner, squirrel is a gooner, tra la la la, tra la la la’. Followed by ‘Lehmann, show us your nuts, Lehmann Lehmann show us your nuts’.

Come on the boys.

Eboo-gate has, I think, rumbled on long enough. Enough mud has been slung across these forums and it has again shown the many fractures and rifts which exist across the Arsenal fan-base, and how quickly these come apart. On these, I share many of the excellent thoughts of Goonerholic. Enforcing labels for groups of fans who may be particularly pro-Arsene or otherwise smacks of a perverse tribalism which can only harm the club as a whole.

And you know who’s really to blame for all this? T*ttenham. No, they didn’t infiltrate the stadium to cause tension, nor (believe it or not) are they paying Eboue on an each-time-he-plays-a-delightful-through-ball-for-the-opposition-midfield basis. No, they caused this whole sorry affair by being really really shit for such a long time. If they had even a scrap of quality you’d soon see the Gooners closing ranks, but as they have been crap for such a long time now, we lack a common foe and those Gooners with aggression to vent are increasingly turning on their own.

Unlike Grabber (see yesterday’s post), I still feel the booing was destructive and pointless. I’m not really interested in arguments about whether your season ticket does or does not entitle you to a few throaty grumbles over the season. The main point for me is that the booing doesn’t help the team, of which Eboue is a part, and so it’s probably a bad plan. It pisses the team off, and when you’re having a difficult season it’s made a whole lot more difficult if there is significant beef between the crowd and the team.

Right. Enough on that, I’m drawing a line under it (so to speak).

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Champions’ League Wednesday ahoy! Despite being one of the most universally poorly punctuated leagues in the world – the League belongs to the many Champions from around Europe, so surely UEFA should enforce the apostrophe with greater rigour – we have generously agreed to contest the competition regardless. Calling it the “Champions League” is confusing for all of us and sounds suspiciously like these “Champions” are a corporate sponsor a la “Barclays Premiership”. Maybe they should call it the “League of Champions” or something to clear up the whole sorry saga.

Undaunted by the governing body’s basic grammatical failings, Arsene’s boys have marched to the top of the prestigious Group G and have 2 points on Porto going into the clash tomorrow. Easy-peasy you cry, we duffed them at the Emirates and we’ll jolly well duff them on their own patch. Hurrah! But what’s this? Arsene says he isn’t going to try because he doesn’t give a hoot if we’re first or second:

It makes a difference to win the group because it makes you feel you have done your job better than to finish second. Does it really make a difference in the outcome of the last 16 tie? I do not know. Maybe there is an advantage to play the second game at home, but if you look at all the groups, there is not a big difference between some teams finishing first or second.

Now, is this really true? Firstly, yes there definitely certainly undoubtedly is an advantage in playing the second leg at home. We’ve seen it time and again. Secondly, if we finish top we are likely to be playing someone like Panathanaikos, Sporting, possibly Atletico, Villareal, one of Bayern or Lyon and Real Madrid. If we unleash the Song/Eboue strikeforce and lose to Porto then we’d be more likely to come up against teams of the calibre of Roma, Inter, Barcelona, Juventus and (again) one of Bayern or Lyon.

So on balance, topping the group would surely be an excellent idea. No points for originality, I’ll admit, but it needs to be said.

Other news: Ade says we need more goals and less pretty fannying about. Of course, more goals sounds like an excellent plan to me, though I am partial to a bit of Goonerish fannying about now and again. I also think this really hasn’t been our problem this year. Very rarely have we played a team off the park but not managed to make our chances count, certainly not as much as we used to, say, last season. Against City, for example, the problem wasn’t that our dashing cut and weave brand of Wengerball was cruelly thwarted by our own penalty-box vanity, it was more that we were utterly utterly mince and got shat on by the better team.

Transfer whisper: I note that the repulsive reptile that is the Daily Mail has linked the similarly tough tackling and reptilian Esteban Cambiasso with a 17 million euro move to Man City. My ingenious plan is that he should reject their vulgar overtures and instead sign for us! Cambiasso is an excellent player and the thought of him sitting selflessly in our midfield egging Captain Cesc on to more box-busting forward runs makes me salivate openly. Like the cheeky bloke who ran that headline yesterday about how Arsenal were going to sign Michael Owen I have no grounds whatever for supposing that Arsene is in any way interested. But at least we’ve got hope.

Grabs

A very good Monday to you all. Not such a good Monday for myself, but there you are. Not really your problem, I suppose.

What is all of our problem is Arsenal’s weekend. That was a weekend that Arsenal needed like I needed another beer at one last night, which was not at all. I, however, can piss out beer, whilst we cannot piss out our defence, much as I wanted to after Saturday’s ironically piss-poor display.

Before this run I was firmly in the ‘Arsene knows’ camp about our transfer policy, but increasingly it looks like it’s just not going to cut it. Aside from anything else, an injection of rock-hard experience in the middle of the park would give everyone else in the team a boost, and perhaps a bit of belief.

For the time being, however, we have to consider how we can get everyone pulling together. The midfield situation is ridiculous. Alex Song is not a Premiership starter, and if he’s ever going to be he’s certainly not going to develop into one over the next two months. Diaby, for all his flashes of greatness, is similarly erratic.

It’s obvious and also sounds stupid, but the way to start winning games is to start winning games. It would be great if this could happen against Fenerbahce on Wednesday, and then even better if it could continue into Saturday. Beating United would be exactly what the team needs – confidence from victories maketh a weak defence strong – remember the 2005 Champions League run. Admittedly there were some older heads, but the back four which conceded two goals before the final featured a much-maligned Senderos in the middle and Flamini at left back. I’d dearly like to see this lot find some of that form in the league. All it needs is a bit of that siege mentality to get everyone working together – look at Hull.

In hindsight you’ve got to say that was as important as any part of Flamini’s departure – he’d been through the fire already, and knew what the team were capable of. Denilson, for all his promise, has not had that kind of baptism. Perhaps something can be forged from the current turmoil. We desperately need to stop teams thinking they’re going to get a result against us – ironic perhaps but this won’t be such an issue against United, who probably always feel they can beat us.

Lots to ponder, anyway. Weekend is the big one but wouldn’t it be nice to polish off the qualifying round at this stage? Particularly with the injuries from the weekend I’m sure Arsene would like to be able to rest the likes of Cesc and Clichy over the next month. Van Persie has rested himself of course, the muppet – a shame, as he was very effective against spurs and seemed to be getting into the kind of form we know he’s capable of.