I think Eduardo’s time on the bench has served him well. He’s seen how Arsenal play and has had time to “practice” with the Carling Cup squad and is ready to apply his skill in the first team. The skill was always there and it was just a matter of him learning how to position himself in order to receive service and learn the tendencies of the midfield players. Now that he’s learned how to play with Fabregas and Rosicky he’s timing his runs to perfection and the goals are coming at a rapid rate. Obviously he’s not going to keep scoring three goals every couple games but it’s evident that the chemistry that was earlier missing is now there to stay.

Eduardo’s finishing at Dinamo Zagreb and with the international team has been clinical and he’s starting to reproduce that ability with Arsenal. The most impressive part about him to me is his composure when he receives the ball in the box, he knows exactly what he wants to do and goes about doing it like a pro. The transition from the softer Croatian league to the trenches of the Premier League seems to be on its way to completion. With Adebayor in form and Eduardo picking up the slack, RVP can take all the time he wants to recover knowing that when he comes back there will be competition for the 2 in the 4-4-2. Hopefully we’ll never see that blasted 4-5-1 Arsene Wenger used earlier in the year, we’re the classic 4-4-2 team and should stick with it through feast or famine.

The Gunners stay on top and start the year in style. Adebayor’s dance is also back, see the video below and form an opinion of it.

Update: Link to exactly what I’m talking about.

Here’s the match report. Be sure to grab the feed. Arsene Wenger and Alan Curbishley’s post-match interviews can be heard in the BBC’s match report.

Eduardo ’2 Download

[livevideo id=4F17650E4ED04440B17A508C019FE28E]

Adebayor ’18 Download

[livevideo id=2A0ADF2FC92640EDBC42D35256AE13FF]

MOTD Highlights

[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=1951160640472196530]

Big it up for The ‘Munia. Keane, eat that shit and Berbatov, you can just go back to sleeping with teenage boys just like you were. The scum think they can get points on us, eh Chimbonda? The fucker was actually “confident” before the game, doesn’t he know what the history here is? Doesn’t he watch TV?

Anyway, this game was on Canadian TV so no need to watch it on a 4 inch screen on Sopcast, but I’ve searched long and hard on the internets (yes, all of them) and have found something:

Match Report.

Arsene Wenger Post-Match Interview

Adebayor ’48

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ShuxbvdP3Q]

Berbatov ’64

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74PuV-mZEEI]

Bendtner ’75

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QR5Evw7TJg]

Manuel Almunia Penalty Save on Robby Keane

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW8RbSQ3t64]

We mustered a draw away to Slavia Prague and dropped all three points against Sevilla in Spain. We needed to be punished for those indiscretions and the sentence was handed out today. Instead of facing the likes of Fenerbahce, Schalke 04 and Celtic we were drawn up against European giants like AC Milan, Barcelona and Real Madrid with the only silver-lining being a chance to draw FC Porto.

So it’s current Champions League holders AC Milan that we’ll have to tackle first and Arsenal are fully capable of beating the Italian side that is currently struggling in Serie A with the balance of power in Milan being shifted from red to blue. AC Milan’s domestic form has been very poor and they’ve become a mid-table club with an 11th place league standing. However, their dominance in Europe has continued from last year as they collected 13 points with a 4-1-1 record in Group D.

Going into the draw it was obvious that the team you wanted to play to advance to the quarter finals was FC Porto but if such wasn’t the case, I’d rather the Gunners faced Barcelona and end up going head-to-head with Henry with the chance of paying back the Frenchman for his off-season indiscretion. But that’s not the case and we have to arguably play the greatest European club of all-time. Get pumped.

Here’s the video of the Champions League Draw:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grcYvzdzzNk]

Arsenal Managing Director Keith Edelman summed up the Arsenal reaction:

“We’ve only played them once in a competitive tie. We drew at Highbury in 1994 and lost 2-0 at San Siro. Hopefully we can turn it around this time. We would probably have preferred an easier one at this stage but this is a great match, everyone will look forward to it tremendously. Arsene has built a great squad and we are confident. We’re playing good football. We’re doing well off the pitch as well as on it and we’re looking forward to a very exciting end to the season.”

Here are some predictions for the first knockout stage of the Champions League:

Arsenal v AC Milan: This is Arsenal’s year to return the Champions League final and AC Milan’s European competition hasn’t been terribly challenging with Celtic being the only “good” team they’ve faced. Expect their poor domestic form to show up in the group stages. Arsenal 3-1 on aggregate.

Celtic v Barcelona: Celtic’s nice run in the group stage is bound to come to a screeching halt at the first opportunity against a stacked Barcelona team. Samuel Eto’o and Thierry Henry are simply too much to handle for the Celtic back-four and don’t look for them to be scoring much against Marques and Co. Barcelona 5-1 on aggregate.

Lyon v Manchester United: Lyon’s resurgence in the latter stages of the group stages was impressive and the win against Rangers at Ibrox was impressive at all levels. The French champions will battle Manchester United but unless they score a goal or two at Old Trafford, it’ll be hard for to progress. Manchester United 4-2 on aggregate.

Liverpool v Inter Milan: Liverpool is read to implode. Inter Milan is in super-form and there’s no reason to believe Hyppia and Carragher can contain Crespo and Ibrahimovic. Getting any goals in Italy is out of the question and unless a highly unlikely dominant home performance surfaces for Liverpool, Inter will progress. Inter Milan 3-1 on aggregate.

Roma v Real Madrid: This might be the tightest matchup of them all. Madrid is leading La Liga but has issues from the left-back position all the way to the top and Roma have shown that their a fiesty club, after last year’s embarrassment at the hands of United, they’ll be ready and will know how to play. Roma on away goals: 2-2.

Fenerbahce v FC Sevilla: Sevilla looked good in winning the group but so did Fenerbahce in mustering up 11 points against a group which had Inter Milan, PSV Eindhoven and CSKA Moscow. Fenerbahce plays with grit while Sevilla plays with style and although as a Gunners fan I think the edge will always go to style, I’ll pick Fenerbahce to display a tight performance in Spain and eek this one out. Fenerbahce 3-1 on aggregate.

Olympiacos v Chelsea: I haven’t seen Olympiacos play much. At least I’m being honest. Olympiacos did finish tied in points with Real Madrid Group C so there’s something to be said there. Chelsea bulled it’s way through in Group B and by all accounts this should be a tight one but one must favor Chelsea and their experience: Chelsea 2-1 on aggregate.

Schalke 04 v FC Porto: I did not watch a single game of either team in the group stages and cannot comment but you’d think FC Porto would move on.

We’re getting used to playing a good first half followed by a very mediocre one. Abou Diaby who according to some might be out of his way from Arsenal put us ahead with a left-footed strike. Soon after Eduardo provided a clinical finish on a through ball to put us up 2-0 prompting me to believe that this might be one of those Slavia Prague type games. But then we regressed and our youth got caught up trying to do things that were a little too intricate, in other words we lost focus and Blackburn capitalized albeit on a clearly offside goal. Things got from bad to worse when Santa Cruz latched on to a freekick from outside the area conceded by the too eager Mark Randall and equalized for the Rovers.

And that’s when the match turned into a feisty affair where the play of Alexandre Song, Philippe Senderos and Armand Traore kept the attacking Rovers at bay. Wave after wave of Blackburn raids were turned back by the young Arsenal backs and once we got possession we looked threatening with Eduardo and Bendtner unable to find that last bit of space needed to put this one away. Denilson was given a harsh straight-red on his attempted tackle on 90 minutes which meant that the Gunners would be a man down for extra time. But fear not, we are the Gunners. It was only a matter of time before 10-man Arsenal unlocked the Blackburn back four and it was a forward run by Song that found Eduardo who applied a finish typical of the Croatian striker – precise, clinical and accurate. Game Over.

Any team that thinks they can play a physical game against the Gunners in hopes of intimidating us and throwing us of our rhythm needs to check themselves again. Maybe this was true last year but definitely not anymore. It doesn’t matter who’s playing, 17 year olds or 28 year olds, we simply don’t back down and unrelentingly adhere to what makes us successful: a patient approach when we have possession that is bound to unlock the most miserly of defenses. The young backs have a lot to learn but today they showed that they’re up to the task by turning away McCarthy and Santa Cruz’s runs in the second half and extra time. Job well done.

Embedded Vids:

About Diaby 1-0

[livevideo id=21E0F8A60ED74FA7A98AC9CA6C9DBF1D]

Eduardo 3-2

[livevideo id=B7DED0BB4259414DB10957F5F9B3AA1C]

Eduardo Winner

[livevideo id=EEF248E3AEEF48A99873CF4244A04B0C]

Grab the feed and check out the Arsenal.com match report. Check out the first half highlights, I’ve cut it off at the exact point where you can see the offside on the Blackburn goal.

First Half Highlights including all three goals Download or Alternate Link, Diaby Goal HQ, Eduardo’s first goal HQ

Santa Cruz 2-2 + Foul which led to the freekick which led to the Blackburn equalizer: Download or Alternate Link

Fran Merida takes forever to get dressed! Download or Alternate Link

Eduardo Goal 3-2!!! Download HQ

The impressive defensive stand in the second half showed the true mettle of this Arsenal team. Chelsea did everything they could to get that elusive equalizer but we were up to the task, from Almunia to Adebayor we did enough to keep them at bay and still manage to produce counter-attacks that deserved much better finishing. But the bottom line is we rose to the challenge of Grand Slam Sunday and got a pressure win knowing that anything less would result in a reverse in the standings. As almost expected, Captain William Gallas provided the needed score in typical Gallas fashion – on a header in traffic. I don’t know why the commentators (clearly very big cunts) kept attributing the goal to a Petr Czech “mistake” rather than a rising Gallas who read the cross perfectly. I don’t know much about English commentators but they don’t seem to be as friendly towards Arsenal as they are towards the other members of the big four – maybe because of our foreign content?

It was good to see Arsenal play their game and not get lulled into a boring ping-pong match which Chelsea wanted to play. Sure, they disrupted our midifield’s passing at times but it didn’t stop us from mounting enough pressure that Chelsea was entirely content to play in their half and get whatever they can on semi-counters. Hleb, Flamini and Fabregas all looked rusty but that was to be expected and it wasn’t surprising to see some off-color passing on the part of Flamini and Fabregas. Gallas and Toure were clearing any danger that Chelsea presented while on the other end of the pitch Adebayor was playing the role of playmaker rather than target-man which doesn’t suit him well and the real attacking was done by Flamini and Hleb with Eboue/Sagna having their say by supplying through balls from the sides. Aside from being a little too elaborate on certain runs, the Arsenal attack performed well in the fist half and was punctuated by a Gallas header off a Fabregas corner which in itself came about after a determined run by Rosicky.

We had two goals disallowed, a phantom Adebayor foul and a questionable offside decision. Aside from those two we missed about three sitters and by sitters I mean SITTERS. Luckily for us it didn’t come back to bite us. This post is devoid of any mention of Cuntley (except this one) because him and his face-punching ass doesn’t deserve any ink, even in a Canadian blog. I’m just ecstatic that we have Gallas and they have the biggest dog-turd on the planet.

Any Chelsea attacks were the result of unforced giveaways in midfield which doesn’t concern me much because it was mostly due to the players coming back. In short, we played our game in the first half and deservedly got a score out of a well executed set-piece. In the second half, Chelsea expectedly came attacking and we showed our defensive mettle. It looks to be a two-horse race in the Premiership. Richard Jolly figures Liverpool is done. Robin van Persie’s introduction brought an immediate threat to our counter attacks and quantified just exactly what we were missing against Sevilla, Newcastle and Middlesbrough. The race is on and the Gooners seem to be back in prime form. Third Gen’s comprehensive match report covers it all. Feed.

Match Report.

MOTD Highlights

Gallas ’45: Download

[livevideo id=57659DBEFB404C3C849228D10537576D]

Arsenal Chances

Alex Mistake (Min 12)
Click Here for Video
van Persie Chance (Min 75)
Click Here for Video
Arsenal Disallowed Goal (Min 85)
Click Here for Video
Arsenal Disallowed Goal (Min 89)
Click Here for Video

Chelsea Chances

Wright-Phillips Shoot (Min 13)
Click Here for Video
Shevchenko Shoot (Min 37)
Click Here for Video
Terry Injury
Click Here for Video
Wright-Phillips Miss (Min 75)
Click Here for Video
Shevchenko FreeKick (Min 92)
Click Here for Video

Match Report.

Extended Highlights

Highlight Pack Download

[vimeo 430769]

Click here to thank the guy who made the goal videos.

Diaby ’8 1-0: Download

[vimeo 430751]

Bendtner ’42 2-0: Download

[vimeo 430755]

Zaharia ’69 2-1: Download

[vimeo 430781]

The 4-4-2 with Eduardo and Adebayor just didn’t work. Many felt that paired up with Adebayor might’ve been the best thing for the Arsenal attack but we were all wrong. Eduardo was anonymous in an Arsenal reverse that sees them hang on to a single point lead at the top of the table – still something I suppose. We’ve been hit hard by injuries with van Perise, Fabregas, Flamini and Hleb and have been struggling our last few games in the Premiership and Champions League, this is not a coincidence. We played really bad today and spent most of our possession trying to pass the ball between our back four and midfield which is struggling without the vision and creativity of Fabregas.

Just like Wigan, Boro played extremely well and pressured us from the beginning and got full support from both their fans in the stands. Kolo Toure made a play that was an anomaly for him and ended up bringing down Aliadiere after Almunia came out to defend for no reason. There was no way Aliadiere could’ve scored (he just doesn’t know how) as he was moving away from the net but Almunia made it difficult for Toure to maintain his pressure and forced a bad tackle out of him. The penalty probably should’ve been saved, see video below.

We were a little better after Walcott, Denilson and Bendtner came on but even then never looked like scoring a goal. There was more hoping for a Boro mistake than an Arsenal moment. Fabregas is the linchpin that holds Arsenal together and transitions the game from Kolo to Adebayor and without him there just isn’t a way to build a proper attack. Missing a playmaker like Hleb hurts in these games where we’re being pressured in midfield and seem to do nothing about it. No matter how much Sagna tries to go forward and for all the creativity of Rosicky, it’s befitting of them to try to create for the strikers on a regular basis.

Adebayor’s finishing has always been questionable and RVP can do much better, but that’s not why I miss RVP the most – it’s the freekicks, we are just dreadful on set plays and often just smash it right into the wall. The crossing from Eboue, Sagna and Rosicky was also poor today so Ade never really got any chances to score or waste. He probably should’ve done better in the first half on a semi-free header but managed to smash it wide.

Arsenal lose. Let’s get our players back and pour it on from there. Here’s the match report. More later…

Penalty Decision + Downing Goal (Goes under Almunia, WTF?) ’4: Download

[vimeo 424289]

Tuncay ’72 Download

[vimeo 424349]

Rosicky ’90 Download

[vimeo 424376]

I didn’t watch this game due to a horribly scheduled meeting at work. Very disappointing to see the Gunners not take an opportunity to go up by 6 points in the league, but 4 isn’t that bad really. According to the Soccernet report, it sounds like it was a pretty hard fought game. Check out the FootyTube videos before they’re taken down for copyright infringement.

Adebayor ’4:

[vimeo 418815]

Taylor ’60:

[vimeo 418817]

Grab the feed.

I had to catch the game on a crappy TVU feed and the highlights I recorded don’t deserve to be broadcast (thanks Mrs. Arsenalist). Here’s some highlights I found at Verden’s Vevet. I vimeo’d them so they’re embedded.

First Half Good. Second Half Bad. Needed to gut this one out as Villa poured it on reminding me a little of Sevilla less than a week ago. This time however we didn’t make any defensive mistakes in the second half and despite a banged up midfield missing Hleb and Fabregas, Diarra and Flamini managed to hold off Villa for just long enough. The pouring rain didn’t help matters and made for sloppy passes that were very un-Arsenal-like, Villa was dangerous crossing the ball into the middle but credit goes to Kolo and Co. for heading away tempting cross after tempting cross throughout the second half. Gritty Arsenal performance led in the midfield by Flamini who deserves a new contract right now.

The first half had that 4-1 feel to it and even after Gardner snuck one in on us it wasn’t panic time. Flamini responded after an Eboue run and cross and sprayed the ball right at his feet. Adebayor soon headed home the second after some nice Sagna/Eboue/Hleb passing. At the time the goal was scored I thought Arsenal were destined to score at least three more but the rain and Aston Villa changed that.

It’s time to bring back Jens Lehmann, Almunia’s been good for us but let’s face it, Lehmann is the better goalie. I’m not saying Lehmann would’ve stopped the first goal, I’m saying if we’re going to win any trophies we’re going to need a better goalie than Almunia. His positioning has been questionable and he’s slower to react than Lehmann – nobody can deny that. Yes, Jens is crazy but I think he’s learned his lesson. We’re going to lose some players to the ACN and one can’t expect Almunia to hold the fort down, I say bring back Lehmann or get a new goalie (Green still available?). I don’t want to go to the knockout stages of the Champions League with Almunia as Arsenal’s #1 goalie, that does not bode well.

Check out the match report and if you haven’t already, get the feed. Aston Villa boss Martin O’Neill’s post-match interview is part of the BBC’s match report.

Here are the individual goals followed by the MOTD highlights:

14′ Gardner: Download

[vimeo 411499]

23′ Flamini: Download

[vimeo 411527]

36′ Adebayor: Download

[vimeo 411513]

You need to get VLC to watch the videos.

A bad, bad game by Arsenal. We didn’t need to win this game but even so this was a performance which stunk of careless passes, missed defensive assignments and even laziness. Eduardo put us up early and after that we simply switched off and expected Sevilla to run away with their tails between their legs. That didn’t happen. You could look at our first loss of the season as a burden being lifted, it’s better to lose here when there’s little at stake than concede valuable ground in the league table. However, it’s not the loss that bugs you so much (even though the prospect of finishing second isn’t great), it’s the way we lost.

A weakened side which featured the return of Philippe Senderos was presented and Senderos was back up to his old tricks, giving away balls, letting headers go over his head and scrambling to make up for his undoings – the first Sevilla goal a direct result of his carelessness (video below). Senderos never had the quality of a first team Arsenal player and today was further confirmation of that. The Arsenal defense were worked heavily all game and the midfield’s inability to maintain any possession had a lot to do with that. It got so bad that Wenger brought in Rosicky to inject some sanity into a midfield which was giving away balls for fun. Cesc Fabregas was talking out as a precaution after a slight hamstring pull.

Gilberto’s best days appear to be behind him and I’m doubting that he’ll even get a charity contract from Wenger. It’s completely apparent now why Arsene Wenger chose Gallas as captain over Gilberto but in all fairness to the Brazillian, he hasn’t really gotten any playing time this year where he could establish a rhythm. Asking him to perform against a motivated and determined Sevilla attack might’ve been a bit much, same goes for Senderos. Denilson stepped in at midfield and although he’s a fine player his control just wasn’t there today. The communication between him and Traore was often poor resulting in Sevilla to easily pick off passes between the two.

There weren’t any bright spots except perhaps the play of Eduardo and Bendtner, unfortunately our midfield failed to supply any sort of ammunition to our two strikers. Well, I should say one striker because we had the 4-5-1 deployed with Bendtner up front, a formation that hasn’t yielded much success and should by all accounts be ditched in favor of a traditional 4-4-2. Packing the midfield never was our thing.

It’s best to forget a performance like this and attribute it to severe levity. Arsenal are now two points behind Sevilla and if the status quo remains, we’ll be playing a group winner in the Round of 16. And you just know it’s going to be Barcelona.

Check out the match report and make sure to latch on the feed. The BBC match report has the post-match interview with Arsenal captain Kolo Toure who praises Sevilla. It also mentions something about Arsene being sent to the stands, pretty mundane stuff, let’s just move on.

Eduardo 1-0 ’11: Download

[vimeo 405766]

Keita 1-1 ’24: Download

[vimeo 405799]

Fabiano 1-2 ’34 (plus phantom freekick): Download

[vimeo 405805]

Kanoute 1-3 (foul + penalty) ’89: Download

[vimeo 405910]