The Moment Sadio Got Injured. Big Vic lands on him
Our Big Gun fixture pile-up
continues with the visit of Arsenal on New Years’ Day. Happy New Year everyone. Arsenal have won both their games over the
Christmas period with unconvincing wins over QPR at home and West Ham
away. A win is a win regardless of the
opposition but it only takes two unconvincing wins for the noises to be coming
out of North London that they haven’t given up on challenging for the title and
all that. It’s ridiculous as they have
no chance regardless of what happens today.
Arsenal fans are a strange
bunch with a massive sense of entitlement.
It’s not enough to have had almost 20 years of unbroken decent football
with a fair smattering of trophies. Yes
they didn’t win anything for 8 years or so but won the FA Cup last year. It’s not enough though and a growing majority
of their fans want Arsene Wenger out.
They’re that fickle though – win two games and the protests go away,
lose one and it’s a crisis and the ‘Wenger out’ brigade all fire up again. I know that time runs out for everyone in the
end but honestly, compared to us mere mortals, the average Arsenal fan wouldn’t
know what a crisis was if it kicked them in the arse.
Having said that – Monsieur
Wenger does seem to be stubborn beyond belief with no sign of submitting to the
view that you do need at least one midfielder who can defend and I wonder if he’s
ever reviewed their training methods as they seem to have a massive injury
list, all the time. I’m still in the car
on the way to the ground as I hear the team news on the radio. The Radio Solent guys are moaning that they
have the 11 names and can’t work out where everyone is going to play or the
formation we’ll be using. Surely it’s a
good thing to have a bit of unpredictability so at least the opposition aren’t
100% sure how we’re going to line up.
Florin Gardos is in for Yoshida which to me suggests that Toby
Alderweireld is at right back and JWP is in for the suspended Morgan
Schneiderlin who of course, didn’t want to play against Arsenal if some
conspiracy theorists are to be believed.
The Arsenal line up has me
firmly believing that we can win this game.
Flamini and Arteta are pretty poor as defensive midfielders for them
anyway but they’re both out so in that area of the team you have Calum Chambers
and François Coquelin. So, one out of
form defender and one 5th choice midfielder. Bang average.
Arsene probably thinks that his attacking 4 of Chamberlain, Rosicky,
Sanchez and Cazorla will be too much for us.
Me, I’m delighted for the absence of Giroud, Welbeck, Ozil and
Podolski. After playing many games with
a makeshift defence, Arsenal are back at full strength there but regardless, Chesney,
Debuchy, Koscielny, Mertesacker and Gibbs isn’t exactly Seaman, Dixon, Adams,
Keown, Winterburn. We can win this if we
believe we can.
Away we go and Arsenal are
zipping the ball about and we’re nice and compact and challenging them to pass
it through us. They have no option to do
anything but with the 5 foot 6 Sanchez up front. On 5 minutes we win a throw on the left and
Bertrand takes it to Tadic who spins round the 6 foot 7 traffic cone in an
Arsenal kit that is Per Mertesacker and hooks a cross over. Graziano is of course not being marked by the
cone and rises above Debuchy and Koscielny and heads down, only to see it skim
off the post and out for a goal kick. The
Big Man will know that he should have scored.
Arsenal’s quality is there
for all to see straight afterwards as they build up through Chamberlain and
Cazorla and Sanchez lets fly from 30 yards but Fraser gets down well to pull
off a decent save as the ball kicked off the turf in front of him. Where there’s a feeling of control over our
defending, there is no such security about Arsenal with Debuchy allowing
Bertrand to get another decent cross in which Pellè got a faint touch to and it
hit Chesney who then kicked it clear from his default position of floundering
about on the ground. Back up the other
end and Sanchez put Rosicky away on the right and his low cross fell perfectly
for Cazorla but he didn’t really get hold of his shot and Fraser got down well
again to save. Chamberlain then hooks
the next chance just wide and we need to get a little bit tighter as they’re
not going to continue to miss. In my
opinion we’re defending too deep and not putting enough pressure on them in
midfield.
Florin Gardos is doing ok at
the back and he gets the perfect opportunity on the half way like to give
Sanchez a bit of a whack and he takes it without picking up a yellow card. Well played that man. He then trundles forward and loses the ball
but Big Vic has his back and he leaves the stadium open mouthed as he pulls off
a spin turn and a drag back and almost puts Mané away but the pass in
intercepted before Big Vic does what he does best and wins the tackle to get it
back again. It might not seem much in the greater scheme of things but it’s the
kind of move that lifts both the crowd and the team.
A minute later we’re in front
as Davis plays a superb 1-2 with Tadic on the left before switching is across
to JWP. His ball into the channel should
be Koscielny’s but he hesitates as Chesney comes out and Mané gets there
first. From about 5 yards out and way
out on the right, Mané turns and curls the ball over the keeper and past the
desperately clumsy lunge of Mertesackofshit to make it 1-0. Brilliant finish from the man in form but he
does appear to have injured himself which was probably not helped by Bic Vic
taking a running jump onto the top of the celebration bundle from 10 yards
away.
There are five minutes to go
to half time and we’re now totally on top.
After a spell of pressure, Mané again cases havoc by running off of
Cazorla who can’t be arsed to track him and picks up a Tadic pass before
pulling a great ball back towards the penalty spot. If you could pick the midfielder you’d least
like to be running onto it, JWP would be the last one you’d pick with only
maybe Steve Davis to rival him but fair play to JWP, he hits his shot well but Chesney
saves with his foot whilst diving the wrong way and Alderweireld gets too much
on the overhead kick from the rebound and puts it over.
Unfortunately, that’s Sadio
Mané’s last contribution as he has to limp off but whilst everyone expected
Shane Long to come on, it was Harrison Reed who was put on to give us some bite
in midfield and someone who was going to bite the ankles of the nippy little
Arsenal players and not give them any time on the ball. Soon after it’s half time and we can
definitely win this.
We must be the only club that
has the ‘Ace of Spades’ played as part of the half time entertainment and today
we get all of it because the two knobs in the zorbs trying to knock the ball
into the Northam End goal are useless at the job they are supposed to be
doing. A bit like Calum Chambers in
midfield.
On with the second half and
the feeling that the next goal will be crucial.
Alexis Sanchez in on a one man mission to try and make sure that Arsenal
get it and he picks up a low cross from Chamberlain inside the penalty area,
gets it onto his right foot and hammers it goalwards only to see Fraser get
down brilliantly and stop it with a strong left hand before falling on the
rebound. Top class goalkeeping.
The value of that save is
fully realised from our next meaningful attack as Big Vic pings a ball over the
top, Steve Davis catches it on his foot on the run and plays it across with his
next touch. As Chesney does his usual and sits on his arse, Debuchy blocks it
and he, the keeper and Mertesacker all watch it before Chesney panics and pokes
it out to Tadic who takes a touch before toe-poking it into the net. The keeper just sits there in the net and has
a drink which was an odd reaction for his second big fuck up of the game. 2-0.
We’re all over them now as we
win it back from the kick off through Steve Davis and Alderweireld looks up and
picks out Tadic in the centre forward position.
He turns Mertesackofshit as easily as you turn any ocean going liner
when it’s on dry land and curls a left footed shot just wide. Arsenal have brought on Theo Walcott for
Chambers who has been shite to be honest but it’s still all Saints with Tadic
again getting down the left wing behind Debuchy and playing in a low
cross. Pellè gets ahead of the Koscielny
at the near post and his effort pings off the post and out. In comes JWP and makes space but his curled
effort is shocking and over the bar. We
miss another glorious chance just afterwards as Koscielny turns blind and hits
an awful back pass to the keeper. Tadic
nips in and wins the ball but Graziano nicks it off him and shoots, only to see
Debuchy get back and head it off the line.
Despite all these near
misses, Arsenal are still dangerous and out of nowhere Sanchez is running at
goal and Gardos comes across and takes him out just outside the box in very
crude fashion. There is no one between
the foul and Fraser and I have no explanation as to why the referee only gives
him a yellow card. It’s more of a red
card than the one he got up at Sheffield United but them’s the breaks I guess. Anyway, Arsenal have a free kick right on the
edge of the box and as Sanchez clips it and Fraser doesn’t move, it looks for
all the world like it’s 2-1 and a nervy finish but it just flicks the top of
the net and we got away with that one.
We’re still a threat though
even though JWP’s attempted header over Chesney was never going in. It was worth a try though as you should never
take it for granted that Chesney won’t be sat on his arse in the net. It’s time to close it down though and Maya
Yoshida comes on at right back with Florin Gardos going off and Toby moving
into the centre.
As the game winds down there
is little or no fight or pressure from Arsenal. Chamberlain has a shot from 30
yards which Fraser picks up and as the game reached 90 minutes I wondered if
Theo Walcott had in fact touched the ball since he came on. Long was on for Tadic for us which was purely
a substitution to run the clock down which we did with ease. A majority of the Arsenal fans had left the
ground but one clown who hadn’t decided to run along the touchline to yell
obscenities at Arsene Wenger. He’s
probably been managing Arsenal since before you were born son. You’ll have plenty of time to think about
that when you’re banned from any football ground for the next 10 years or so.
The final action of the game
is Sanchez getting tackled, falling over and the referee not giving a free kick
which was a bit of a mini-highlight in itself.
Full time, 2-0, Get in!!! Today
illustrated how quickly a game can turn.
When Sanchez had his shot and Fraser Forster pulled out that great save,
it could easily have been 1-1 and then there would have been a real chance we
would have lost. From that we went
straight up and made it 2-0 and then missed 3 good chances to win by three or
four. Am I happy with two… you bet. We were ridiculously unlucky not to get
something up at Arsenal a few weeks ago so we owed them one. We got a bit fortunate today with the Gardos
tackle and him only getting a yellow card but you could easily argue that
Arsenal were lucky to only lose by two.
Enough of Arsenal
though. They’ve had 17 years of
consecutive Champions League income and we still beat them. Again I feel that Ronald Koeman deserves a
huge amount of credit for the tactics today.
The substitutions that he made all had a positive impact. Bringing Reed on for the injured Mané was a
brilliant call as though we were 1-0 up, we weren’t getting in their faces
enough and Reed’s terrier-like bite-yer-ankles approach was ideal against all
Arsenal’s small skilful midfielders.
Yoshida for Gardos was also timely as Florin was one tackle from a red
card and it made no sense to leave him on when we could bring Alderweireld into
the middle. 1-14 worked incredibly hard and we totally deserved the win. If you had to pick a man of the match then
you couldn’t see past Big Vic who was a machine. He got booked after about 20 minutes as well
so to play the last 70 as he did and totally boss the midfield was really quite
something. He was helped though by playing
against Chambers and Coquelin who were just not up to it.
It’s interesting to look at
Chambers. There’s been talk recently
about him being burned out and that’s why he’s lost form etc. It’s ironic that Tadic and Mané for example
have lost form recently but were taken out of the team for a couple of weeks
and are now back firing on all cylinders.
Instead of that and despite all Arsenal’s resources, he got pushed into
an unfamiliar position and struggled like mad.
Good. Serves him right. Do you want
to be the best player you can be or do you want to be the richest?
Next up we have the FA Cup 3rd
Round against Ipswich. I have a feeling
if we’d made it into the League Cup Semi finals then we wouldn’t be taking this
one as seriously but I expect it to be a more or less first choice side in this
game. I can see Jason McCarthy getting a
run out at right back but otherwise I think that it’ll be the opposition who
make more changes than us, competing as they are at the top end of the
Championship. The next League game is
against those shit bags of Manchester United.
Like Arsenal today, we have unfinished business from the first meeting
this season so bring it on, especially the Rooney Vs Big Vic clash in midfield.
Happy New Year Indeed.
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