Lazy Arshavin helps us on our way to Wembley.

We're going to Wembley!!

Just in case that hasn't sunk in yet I'll repeat it. We're going to Wembley.


Last nights victory against Ipswich has given us our first shot at some silverware this season and with our potential opponents being Birmingham or West Ham then you have to believe that our long, very public trophy drought is very close to an end.

The guy who stood out last night was our favourite Russian Andrei Arshavin, but not always for the right reasons. Arshavin has become somewhat of a target for many fans who find themselves constantly moaning about how lazy he is, how poor his passing has become, how he has the work rate of a retired sloth or sum it all up by simply pulling a ridiculously scrunched up face and pointlessly screaming "For f**k sake, why are you so s**t".

Now I'm going to put my neck on the line here and try to defend the little meerkat. I am not denying that Arshavin annoys and frustrates the hell out of me, because he does but even if we only go on the evidence of last nights game, people that rush to slate him should stop and re-watch the game. AA23 finished the game with two assists to his name and personally I couldn't fault his work rate, he chased for everything all game until he was eventually substituted. His passing was a bit off admittedly but having set up two goals in a 3-0 win we can surely forgive him.

If we look beyond last night Arshavin has 9 assists in the league this year, only Nani and Brunt have more (11 and 10 respectively) on top of that he has 4 goals and this is only in the league and lets remember that due to a drop in confidence or form, whichever the case may be he hasn't played a lot of football in the last month.

The message is simple, let Wenger deal with Arshavin and get off his back when he does play, he is a world class player and belongs with Arsenal football club, if he were to be forced out of the club by shallow, ignorant 'fans'.

I was going to complain a little bit about Bendtner but after his touch and finish for our first goal I'll leave him be for now.

Another big thing we have learnt from the win is Arsene Wenger's policy for the League Cup has officially completely changed. Le Prof obviously has been told from the higher powers that a trophy - any trophy - is a must this season. Over the last few years even in a game as big as the League Cup semi final we would have seen a group of reserves and youngsters take the field you only have to look at our final season at Highbury when we faced Wigan and suffered a late goal to knock us out of the competition. The importance of picking up the trophy on February 27th is so much more than ending our drought. If we are to go on to lose, confidence will plummet, it will be another trophy that has slipped from our grasp since that penalty shoot out in the FA Cup final against Man Utd in 2005 and I am severally worried about the effect it would have on the squad for the rest of the year especially as we will go into the game as such heavy favourites. However, if we win it, our young squad can start to get an addiction for winning, winning breeds winners and it could really be a springboard to a fantastic period in the clubs history.

Forgive me, I'm getting ahead from myself. The squad need to forget about last night's achievement now and concentrate on the games between now and Wembley, lets not forget we play in three different competitions before then. We start with the FA Cup on Saturday, there are twelve points to fight for in the league and there's a little game against some foreigners called Barcelona so although we are there, the players need to forget about Wembley for now and to use the old cliché take each game as it comes.

I'd like to finish today with a message to Andy Gray after his sacking from sky for his sexist comments............ "Haha, TWAT!!"............. That is all. One really bad thing to come from all of this though is that Jamie Redknapp may be in line for a promotion and we'll be seeing even more of his pointless annoying mug on our TV's.

Till next time,
Goonerfish.

Wenger - Transfer Guru, but what are his plans?

Morning Gooners,

Transfers, transfers everywhere.

6 days left of the transfer window and apart from Dzeko's move to Cash Cows City the premiership has been relatively quiet. One thing we're not short of though is rumours.


Arsene Wenger has a reputation for being tight with his money. Now when I say 'tight' what I mean is careful, calculated and clever. if you argue that fact then just take time to think of our starting line-up against Wigan: Fabianski, Sagna, Kos, Djourou, Clichy, Song, Cesc, Wilshere, Walcott, Nasri and RVP. It's a strong side that would scare many teams in Europe - those players were all signed by Arsene Wenger and cost Arsenal football club a grand total of £46.9 million and that's including £15.8m for Nasri .That's the same as Carrick and half a Hargreaves for Man Utd, a Zhirkov, Ivanovic and Ramires for Chelsea (not even mentioning Schevchenko - £30m), a Milner and Lescott for City or even a Defoe, Bentley and Modric for the spuds, my point is Arsene Wenger has only been able to work with the funds he's been given and more to the point he's done a bloody good job, building a strong squad that can compete in multiple competitions, just look at the facts, we're 2 points off top spot in the league and still going strong in three cup competitions and already a possible 90 minutes of football away from a trip to Wembley.

January is traditionally a quite month overall for transfers and we are always made to believe that no-one big will move during this period but again, if you look through our history then we've had some great players join in the mid season window. Walcott, Ramsey and more recently Arshavin all joined in January so it just proves that you can't be too surprised about our transfer activities, whatever they may be.

Getting to more recent events, in particular this January window. Arsene Wenger's only public target area has been a centre back. We have been linked with many a player this year including Cahill, Jagielka, Campbell (again!!) even Jonathan Woodgate (I'm still laughing a bit over that one) but it seems we've had no real progress on signing a fifth centre back and after seeing the players already at the club secure their fourth consecutive clean sheet in the league Wenger has started to manage expectations in his most recent newsletter saying:

"Defensively we look more and more stable even though we were questioned a lot on that front. Maybe the fact that reporters ask me in every press conference 'do I buy a defender?' has kept our defenders on their toes!

I am open-minded on the idea of buying another defender and if the right opportunity turns up we will take it. We are not desperate, we have Vermaelen who can still play a big part in the end of the season and we have Squillaci who comes back maybe next Sunday. Song can play at the back too."

I won't be overly disappointed if we fail to sign another CB because in all honesty I don't believe we have room for another one. TV5 is obviously everyone's first choice and Djourou and Koscielny are growing stronger every game and are fighting to be Vermaelen's partner and I don't see any point of spending millions of pounds on someone to come in for a short term answer. 


I'm also very happy at the lack of talk from pundits and fans alike calling for a Goalkeeper to be brought in during the window. This is credit to Fabianski and Szczesny who have been almost faultless when they've been called on. That being said, reports have been surfacing that Wenger is looking up north at Rangers keeper Allan McGregor. The stopper has apparently been described as one of Europe's best keepers but I've never heard of him before and considering that Craig Gordon plays ahead of him for Scotland I have to wonder who's making these claims. I think the Scot remains a player I'll research more if the rumours become little stronger, I don't think our boys should be too worried just yet.


Talk is also getting stronger around the transfer of Eden Hazard with Wenger again confirming his interest. Hazard has been a long term target for Wenger but with plenty of time left on his contract he won't be cheap so don't expect any movement at the moment but we may see a bit more activity in the summer.


However, one transfer that is looking ever more likely is that of Southampton youngster Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain. He is being hyped up in the media at present but I haven't personally seen a lot of him so I won't join in, that being said, one bit of footage I have seen was also being watched by representatives of a lot of top teams in the stands including Man Utd, Man City and Liverpool so there must be something about the kid.


Chamberlain's father has described Arsenal as the ideal solution for his son's progress and Wenger has admitted he's in talks with Southampton and a man as careful in the media as Wenger is he must be fairly confident of something happening. All that being said, until the young lad's mug appears on Arsenal.com I won't believe a word.


On the other side of transfer news Carlos Vela is still looking for a club to play with for the rest of the season, Bolton have been front runners for a long time and Wenger would like him to stay in the Premier league but recent reports are suggesting that he may be heading back to Spain to play with Valencia. Personally I hope he stays in England, he'll gain much more playing here than in Spain.


As I said before, 6 days left of the window and as Arsenal fans we all know we will have to wait right until the last second to know how much business Wenger will complete so for now lets all concentrate on the game tonight, if you're at Ashburton Grove, sing your heart out and keep singing all the way to Wembley!!


Till next time,
Goonerfish.


By the way, all credit for transfer stats goes to www.transferleague.co.uk if you want more detail, check them out.

It's all about RVP & yet another clean sheet.

Morning Gooners,

Today is all about one man, the superb brilliance of a man that is Robin Van Persie. Our new number 10 finally seems to have put his injury hit start of the season behind him and is now on his way to proving that if he stays fit he has the ability to be one of the best strikers in the world.

RVP and the rest of the Arsenal players destroyed Wigan at Ashburton Grove yesterday. From the very first minute we attacked as a unit and 10 of the Wigan players couldn't cope with us, unfortunately the one player that seemed as though he was in line for a storming game was Ali Al Habsi, the Wigan keeper. Why is it that distinctly average keepers always, and I mean always seem to have their performance of the season against our front line?

Al Habsi however could only keep us out for so long and RVP's first hat-trick in an Arsenal shirt (even after his penalty miss) gained us the points and for those who didn't manage to see the game, I kid you not it could have been double figures!

Despite Van Persie's deserved headline grabbing from the game I feel the need to give a shout out to the back four. Today saw our fourth consecutive clean sheet in the league. Now for any Arsenal team from the past few years that stat is impressive but include the fact that we're missing our best centre back and have had our 3rd choice keeper between the sticks then it's unbelievable. Djourou in my opinion has come on leaps and bounds this year and is starting to show just how good his all round game is.

Wojciech Szczesny has come into the team of late and has proved he may be ready to take that step into the first team but on top of his solid performance I love this man on twitter, his summing up of the game was this: 

"Did any of you notice that I was acctually playing today? Great result and well done @Persie_Official!"

A very good point, very well made. It will be interesting to see who gets Wenger's vote when Fabianski is fit again. Both keepers have done very, very well when called upon and either will rightfully feel unlucky and hard done by if they lose out as neither has done anything worthy of losing their place.

The only other news (that isn't obvious BS) is the potential transfer of another Southampton youngster in the form of Alex Chamberlain. Some sources are claiming that the deal is as good as done which is the sort of statement that I will only believe when I read it on Arsenal.com but reports on this kid seem to be very promising and any potential move away from the south coast seems that it will be based on his opportunities to develop at the top level and if that is the criteria then I can think of no better place than Arsenal, he'd only have to look to a certain Theo Walcott to see how a player can develop under the careful eye of Arsene Wenger. But as I said, there has been no official confirmation of any bid, I'm not even sure if we've admitted we're looking at him so until Arsenal announce it, don't believe a word you read.

It's a happy time to be a Gooner and now we look forward to Tuesday as we look to book a trip to Wembley at the end of February.

Till next time,
Goonerfish.

Only 1 point but plenty of good news: Man City thoughts.

Morning Gooners,

Man City came, they parked their £200m bus in front of their goal and they played for a 0-0 draw from the first minute to the last and if anybody questions that then you just need to look at Man City's attempts on goal which read as 5 attempts on goal, 0 on target. £200m spent on a group of players that are supposed to be bringing home trophies and they can't even manage a shot on target? It's laughable.

Arsenal lined up, as expected, with the same team that started against Chelsea and continued their good form. We pressed all over the pitch when we didn't have the ball and created chance after chance when we did. Van Persie had a glourious chance in the first few minutes to score after Jack Wilshere fizzed the ball across the goal face but it was just too far in front of him, RVP again came close thumping the ball past Joe Hart only to smash the post and during the game Fabregas and Walcott both followed his example by hitting the woodwork. We did seem to be restricted to long range efforts but when you consider City's mind set that's not really surprising. The best of these efforts was again Robin Van Persie who sent the ball flying towards the top corner late in the game only to see England's number one pull off one of the world class saves he has become so well known for. We saw a good performance from every player on the park last night and although we dropped points, do you know what? I don't care!

When we were losing games against Utd and Chelsea last year my biggest complaint was that our players didn't give their all, they didn't fight for the ball, they didn't show any pride or passion, we simply rolled over and died. This has definitely not been the case this year. I can not fault a single player from last nights game and had we been a little bit more in lady luck's good books or Hart hadn't had such a good game then we would have been celebrating another comfortable victory as we did against Chelsea.

There will be a lot of talk today of how negative Man City played but in my opinion that just shows how much behind us they are. This is a tactic I expect and we have seen on many occasions from a Stoke or a Birmingham or a Wolves or a Hull etc, etc. The point is this is a tactic that the littler teams use against us but at least some of them try to play on the counter, City didn't even seem to be that adventurous.

The game did end on a sour note with Sagna getting sent off for a disagreement with Zabaleta (who was also given his marching orders) You can only imagine that something was said to him as he has been subject to much worse challenges - Bowyer, I'm looking at you - and not reacted. Guess we'll never know, all we do know is that he will now miss at least the Leeds game and depending on how the red card is reported, potentially the visit to Ipswich and the Premier League clash against West Ham.

I can't help but feel positive as an Arsenal fan at the moment, we have always said that if our squad stays fit then we will challenge any team in the world, finally we are getting the opportunity to prove it. We fielded an unchanged side for the first time in God knows how long and we are not over-run with injuries. Really good news is that both Djourou and Van Persie have played two games in a week and still seem to be feeling good which shows they are winning their battles with fitness and also that Wenger feels they are getting to a stage where they don't need to be wrapped in cotton wool anymore.

As we have all had a good night's sleep to get over the disappointment of dropping points I'm hoping that spirits will now remain high among Gooners everywhere. Lets not forget that we'd be waking up in such a worse mood if we were Chelsea fans. Manchester United may be four points clear today but they still have to play Chelsea twice, spurs and Liverpool away, Man City at home and they need to come to Ashburton Grove. They will drop points and we must be ready to pounce when they do.

Attention needs to turn away from the Premier league now as we look forward to games in both domestic cups in the next week, hopefully by the time we reach our next game in the League we will know who we're playing in the fourth round of the FA Cup and be half way to Wembley in the League Cup.

Till next time,
Goonerfish.

It's a bigger game than Chelsea: Man City Preview

Hi Ho Gooners,

So at last we are approaching normality with only two games a week. After a great start to the year at Birmingham we welcome Manchester City and all of it's overpaid 'stars' to Ashburton Grove.

Fly back to the end of October last year and we'll remember thrashing the sky blue mancs 3-0 with goals from Nasri, Song and Bendnter. It was the first point this season that we proved we had grown as a team and could truly compete with the so called 'big boys' especially when you compared it to our defeat at Eastlands last season.

Wenger is expected to follow a similar game plan to the one we used against Chelsea which will see us pressing every Man City player that dares to touch the ball and really putting on the pressure. That combined with the vision of Fabregas and Wilshere, the skill of Nasri and Van Persie and the pace of Walcott we should be able to cause a lot of problems for our opponents.

Man City travel without Silva or Balotelli who have both suffered injuries and I have to say that's good news for Gooners everywhere. Balotelli gives City a very real goal threat and he seems to be coming into a bit of form of late so his absence is much appreciated. Silva is a player that I believe is very much in the Arsenal mould. He has a wonderful eye for a pass and can cause a lot of damage from cutting in from the wing.

As for our line up, just like Wenger will be following a similar game plan to the Chelsea game, I can't see him changing the names on the team sheet. This has now become a bigger game than Chelsea, a win will move us into second, a point clear of City and with a game in hand.

Goonerfish's line-up:

                       Fabianski

Sagna - Koscielny - Djourou - Clichy

                         Song

              Fabregas - Wilshere

Walcott                 -               Nasri

                     Van Persie

Score: Arsenal 3 - 2 Man City

This game ended 0-0 last year but I can see this year's game being really open, City will start on the defensive but if we score an early goal they will have no choice but to attack and that will lead to a great game.

Just wanted to quickly say that it's good to see Gibbs available for selection again, we're at the stage of the season where games now come on overload and Clichy will not be able to perform in them all so Gibbs' services will be needed. Gibbs is an excellent and exciting talent and I hope he can keep fit long enough to really push Clichy for that starting spot next season.

Sorry for the compacted version of a preview today, I'm sat at my desk at work typing this but ssshhhhhhhhhh, don't tell anyone.

Whether you're at the game or watching it on TV, enjoy it.

Till next time,
Goonerfish.

Thoughts from Brum & all change for the new year?

Morning Gooners,

2011 is here so surely the whole world has now changed for the better. Everything that normally bugs us will not happen anymore and the world will be nothing but Rosy for an Arsenal fan..... What? you're questioning the truth in that statement, how very dare you!! Lets look at the evidence shall we, the new year is only one day old and so far Man Utd have played some of the worst, ugliest football I have seen for years...and won a game that in fairness they should have lost, Torres scored in front of the Kop with a Gerrard assist, the media are up in arms about cheating Arsenal whilst almost ignoring several horrible challenges on our players, Spud fans are shouting about how they are now an established team in the top four and the gap between the north London teams is ever shrinking or in some cases Spurs are now the bigger club, Harry 'twitch' Redknapp is talking about another almost retired footballer as though they are the brightest prospect in modern football in the hope he can sell more shirts, or maybe a new DVD and Wayne Rooney still looks like Shrek after losing a cage fight. Ah well, same old shit for another year it is then!!

I need some cheering up, how about a lovely 3-0 win Mr Goonerfish, why thank you very much that'll do nicely.

Arsenal turned up to St Andrews yesterday with less than fond memories of recent visits. In previous years we have experienced the beginning of the end of a title bid with the horror injury that in fairness ended Eduardo's hope of a long and successful Arsenal career followed by Gallas' ridiculous sit in protest. More recently, last year Kevin Phillips scored an injury time equaliser to rob us of our hard earned points.

If our players were not looking forward to the visit then they didn't show it. We were treated to a wonderful team display by the same team that turned out against Chelsea. Fabianski continued to improve his reputation with some fantastic distribution, especially from his throws and added some strong decision making and a top class save from Larsson's first half free kick. Our defence was solid apart from that niggling habit we have of turning to mush when defending set pieces, Brum should have got a goal from such an occasion in the first half when our back line just fell to sleep. Djourou fro me gets better every time I see him, if he can stay fit and keep his run of games going he will be immense for us.

Jack Wilshere had a happy birthday quietly doing what he does and dictating the pace of the game through clever passing and an incredible ability to read the game, still can't believe he's only 19.

RVP should have had a hat-trick in the first half but his lack of match sharpness showed with some poor first touches and decision making. He got a lot of stick for earning the free kick that he scored to put us 1-0 up with his first goal since May. Yes he made a lot of it but there was contact so surely that comes under exaggeration rather than simulation. Bottom line, there WAS a foul, we got a free kick, we scored from that free kick, I don't see where the issue is. Robin then pushed himself into the highlights again with a clear handball in the box which wasn't given but I had to chuckle at McLeish moaning about it in his post match interview considering the fashion of Birmingham's equaliser against the Mancs.

Samir Nasri was epic. He is slowly becoming an absolute legend in an Arsenal shirt he is just the right mix of Freddie and Pires and is another player that is getting better with every game, at the half way spot he is definitely my player of the season so far. Nasri scored our second with a lovely placed shot into the bottom corner and from that point we never looked back. There were some lovely interchanges between Nasri, Fabregas and Van Persie all the way through the game and when you consider Cesc and RVP are still finding their fitness the potential partnerships that could develop between that trio is mouth watering, then add in the skill of Arshavin or the pace of Walcott or the brilliance of Wilshere and you finally get a glimpse of how exciting our future is.

It was a lovely run from Walcott that started the move for out third and ended in Fabregas smashing a shot into Foster's chest which came back out, took a double deflection and somehow ended up back in the net.

You may notice that I have neglected to mention the challenges that our players were subjected to but truth be told, you can read a review of any Birmingham vs Arsenal game and you read the same thing. Bowyer in particular seemed to have an issue with Sagna as he assaulted him on several occasions. The sooner the FA get to the bottom of this problem and really punish challenges that could in some cases seriously injure the opposition the better. I would say it won't happen until someone gets seriously hurt but the names Eduardo and Ramsey come to mind so maybe it won't happen until someone English such as a Lampard, Rooney or Gerrard get seriously hurt.

All in all we got the three points we needed, we saw a solid team performance, we saw a clean sheet and no one got injured so I would have to say it was a good days work.

Thoughts now head to the last game of the hectic festive period against Manchester City. Both teams are in good form so it should be a good game, hopefully ending in an Arsenal victory.

Till next time,
Goonerfish.

Early Transfer round-up and Brum Preview

Firstly Happy New year to all you Gooners out there.

So here we are, a brand new year and with the start of the year we see the annual madness start that is the transfer window.

It's only the first day and already we have Wenger confirming that we have one in and one out. Harvard Nordtviet is on his way to  Borussia Monchengladbach in the next few days without making a single first team appearance since joining us in July 2007 and Japanese forward Ryo Miyaichi is on his way in.

Wenger has also said that he will be happy for Carlos Vela to leave on loan. He said:

"Some offensive players don’t play games like Carlos Vela. If he can get games somewhere else we will loan him out."

"He is a top quality player and at the moment we have too many strikers. He does not get the games he deserves."

It is also confirmed that Ramsey will come back to Arsenal and will not be going back on loan. Wenger has said he hopes for him to be ready for action in February.

Also on the transfer front, good ol' Freddie Ljungburg has returned to Britain completing his loan move to Celtic. Good luck to him.

And lets not forget about the madness that the next 31 days will bring about Cesc Fabregas leaving the club, already reports are flying around that Real Madrid are preparing a £35m bid. Again, lets keep calm Gooners Cesc is not going anywhere (in January at least) so lets not make him come out publicly every other day and stat his commitment to the club.

Now for the real reason for today's blog, our trip to Brum. Wenger made eight changes between the last two games and I expect a fair few today too bringing back some of our stronger players for the third game in six days.

Fabianski has given no reason to lose his place but he will need to be careful if Zigic plays, not because of his quality in the air but just because of his height, when your that tall luck will fall your way and Birmingham have enough poachers to bury the balls that he will be knocking down.

Wenger's first big choice is who to play at centre back. His rotation so far has seen Koscielny and Djourou play against Chelsea and Kos with Squillaci against Wigan. The question is will Wenger now give Koscielny a rest or continue to play who he sees as his best fit defender. My vote goes for the return of a Kos/Djorou partnership.

Fabregas returns from suspension to retake his place in the middle of the park and Jack Wilshere should be right beside him doing what he loves best on his birthday, winning three points for Arsenal.

Robin Van Persie continues to try and find the form we all know he's capable of and his style and skill should suit our game today working in close tight triangles with Cesc, Wilshere, Arshavin and Nasri.

Yesterday I talked about my strongest Arsenal XI and am hoping that we may actually see 10 of those players start the game today.

Goonerfish's line-up:

                      Fabianski

Sagna - Koscielny - Djourou - Clichy

                        Song

            Fabregas - Wilshere

Nasri                   -              Arshavin

                    Van Persie

Score: Birmingham 0 - 2 Arsenal

This game will be close. Only Everton have won at St Andrews this season and Birmingham have the third best home defensive record in the league behind only Chelsea and Manchester United. However, Alex McLeish’s side have only scored nine at home themselves which is the worst record in the premiership.

Last year we saw Kevin Phillips steal an injury time equaliser to make it 1-1 but I think the team have grown a little more over the past year and should have enough to do what Man Utd couldn't and take all three points.

A win today will see seven points earned in less than six days and in comparison to the same fixtures last year an improvement of six points so lets be positive and get behind the boys.

Till next time,
Goonerfish.

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