Author Archives: Michael Roberts

The Good, The Bad & The God Damn Ugly!

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I think last night was one of the worse Arsenal matches I have ever seen! Obviously qualification was vital to both teams but the display was a non-existant. I feel sorry for the Arsenal fans who actually travelled over to Porto!

The good was qualification, the bad was effort from the players and the watching the whole 90 minutes was god damn ugly!

But the main thing is we qualified and finished top of the group.

The match reminded me of the Villarreal match were if we conceded we would have been in real trouble, since we had no attacking momentum whatsoever and it would have been impossible to equalise if Porto actually scored.

Luckily for us Christiano Ronaldo clone Ricardo Quaresma only succeeded in hitting the post. Twice.

The man of the match was surely the referee who blew the whistle at full time!

Luckily Hamburg beat CSKA Moscow 3-2 in Germany anyway so the Arsenal ‘match’ was academic anyway.

But as far as I understand if CSKA actually won then they would have been equal on points as us – so why wouldn’t they qualify ahead of us if they had a better record (a draw and a win) over Arsenal?

Maybe someone can explain that one to me!

Anyway, enough about that now – the sooner I forget about it the better. The possible teams we could face in the last 16 are:

Barcelona, Real Madrid, Inter Milan, Roma, PSV Eindhoven, Celtic and Lille.

Looks like finishing first wasn’t that much of an advantage after all!

Champions League Preview: Porto v Arsenal

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First the injury news. Gallas is still out but should be back for the Chelski game, Tomas Rosicky will miss the match and will probably be out until the new year with a hamstring problem, as willl captain Thierry Henry with his neck problem. Although whether he’s been a pain in the neck for Wenger is another story…

But Arsene and Titi have put the so called ‘row’ behind them, with Wenger saying:

“I just feel that it’s important to reiterate that there’s no problem between us, in fact, we have always had a strong relationship and that remains the case.

“I wanted to clear this up and end any further speculation as it is a pivotal week in our season.”

So hopefully all the speculation and hearsay can stop and we can all focus in the upcoming matches.

With Henry being sidelined for the next few weeks, Wenger has said that he will use Theo Walcott much more than previous months which is a good thing – considering he has the ability to change a game with his fantastic pace.

With both Arsenal and Porto needing just a draw tonight to progress, both teams have said that they are playing for the win which is expected really. What else can they say?

Tonights game will be really tough and I’ve got a feeling Arsenal will need to score a couple of goals to get at least a draw. Porto are at home and although we comfortably beat them at the Emirates earlier this season this game will be totally different.

They are top of the Portuguese league, are unbeaten in 10 games and haven’t lost at home this season – and have won every one of them excluding the goalless draw against CSKA Moscow!

There’s no doubt that without Henry Arsenal play differently and like the games against Spurs and Manchester United I hope the players on the pitch take more responsibility and really perform. With Thierry playing there’s too much expectancy on him to win the game single-handed so Henry’s absence should give Arsenal that edge tonight.

Sky Sports ‘expert’ Phil Thompson has predicted that Arsenal will lose with Porto nicking it with a 1-0 win and therefore knock us out of the Champions League.

I don’t share that view at all – I certainly think Arsenal can score a couple of goals out there but obviously Porto will be dangerous in attack playing in front of their own fans. But Arsenal have performed at their best this season when their backs have been against the wall and I expect exactly the same tonight.

The only questions on the team tonight are in midfield and in defence.

Lehmann, Eboue, Clichy and Toure will be at the back, with Gilberto, Fabregas, Hleb, Van Persie in a 5 man midfield with Adebayor up top by himself. So it will either be Senderos or Djourou to partner Toure and Wenger has several options to complete the midfield 5, including Baptista, Walcott or Mathieu Flamini.

With Van Persie pushing on to support Adebayor I would expect Flamini to play with Gilberto to protect the defence and make sure we don’t concede a goal. But Baptista has strength to impose himself on the game and Walcott offers an outlet on the break if needed. It’ll be interesting to see who plays in that 5th midfield place tonight.

Prediction?

Well I thought we’d beat Manchester United at Old Trafford and even though I might be tempting fate I see the same happening tonight. Porto will be under pressure to attack tonight and I think Arsenal will take advantage of it.

But I don’t think we’ll keep a clean sheet, and Arsenal are likely to give away another stupid goal which is usually against the run of play.

It will be a tough, tough game but I think Arsenal can come out 2-1 winners and qualify for the next stage. Although I would be more than happy with a boring 1-0!

Henry-less Arsenal Spurred On By Captain’s Absence

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What’s The Problem?

Well let’s start with the good. Arsenal easily beat Spurs yesterday with goals from Adebayor and two penalty kicks from stand-in captain Gilberto Silva. All the goals had slight contentious issues but it was about time we had a bit of luck go our way with some of the poor decisions we’ve had in recent weeks.

And the run or either 3-0 wins or 1-1 draws in the league at The Emirates continues!

I’m probably not the only one who thinks this, but with Henry obviously not fully fit this season Arsenal simply play better without him – with the fantastic win at Old Trafford and yesterdays game show.

Now don’t get me wrong, Henry is a phenomenal player – but playing without having a break is effecting his performances. And the guy is under a lot of stress being the captain and seemingly taking responsibility for the entire team – it’s no wonder Arsene wants to give him a few weeks rest.

Who else got to the final of the Champions League and the World Cup?

There are a lot of reports about the ‘Bust Up’ between Henry and Wenger but the official word from Henry is that he is just upset from not being able to play due to injury:

“It is true that yesterday I left the training ground upset.

“There wasn’t any bust-up, but I was simply upset because I am not playing today and I am going to be out for a little while.

“I have been saying since the beginning of the season that I am not fully fit and people didn’t have to know, but now people have to know.”

And with Henry supporting the club yesterday then you can see the media are making up another story to sell their papers.

The fact is Henry is a player who gives everything on the pitch and when he can’t then he’s going to be upset.

But Wenger is doing the right thing and waiting until Henry is ready to return – there’s no point in playing when he isn’t fully fit and the team suffers because of it. And without Henry, the team seem to play with more passion, knowing they don’t have the inspirational Henry to fall back on.

The Chelsea game is going to be very interesting and I have a sneaky feeling we can nick another win there.

After all, we can beat the top teams without any problems – it’s just the rubbish teams we can’t beat!

Why Thierry Henry Will Never Win The ‘World Player of the Year’ Award…

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The simple answer is fancy tricks.

Don’t believe me? Then look at the previous winners of the award:

2005 – Ronaldinho, 2004 – Ronaldinho, 2003 – Zidane,
2002 – Ronaldo,2001 – Luis Figo, 2000 – Zidane,
1999 – Rivaldo, 1998 – Zidane, 1997 – Ronaldo, 1996 – Ronaldo…

And the list goes on.

If you watch this video here you will see what the players who have dominated the award over the last 10 years (Ronaldinho, Zidane & Ronaldo) are all remembered for fancy tricks and skills.

That is part of the game that FIFA and many organisations want to promote to the World – the beautiful game.

Don’t get me wrong, Henry is a skillful player and when in full force is one of the best players in the World to watch – but he doesn’t do stepovers, roulettes or even the flipflap.

Skills and tricks are what win awards – not goals, assists or team play. Otherwise Henry would have won the previous 3 years awards by a country mile.

It’s not for record-breaking goalscoring or consistency.

That’s far too boring…

Aside from tricks another big factor to winning the World Player of the Year Award is winning the World Cup or the European Cup. When Brazil won the World Cup Ronaldo & Rivaldo were credited with being the best and when France won it Zidane got the same recognition.

Henry might have been in both the World Cup and Champions League Finals but without winning them he doesn’t have a hope in picking up the biggest personal award.

If Titi had better luck and came out winners for both of those competitions you wouldn’t even be wondering who would win the Ballon d’Or or the FIFA World Player of the Year.

Fin.

What The Hell Is Going On?

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It’s not a good week for Arsenal fans.

As you would have heard by now, Italian defender Fabio Cannavaro pipped Thierry Henry to the European Player of the Year Award, and even stranger Buffon was ahead of him in second place!

It’s sad that Henry hasn’t really been recognised as the best player over the last few seasons, being behind Ronaldinho in the World Player awards – which Titi should have won easily 3 seasons ago.

With a bit of luck Thierry could have won both the World Cup and Champions League this year and surely would have won the Ballon d’Or in the process.

Henry is a truly unique player – who has a phenomenal scoring rate and an equally impressive assist record. No-one can touch him in those departments and with his skill and tricks he is a very special player.

But we all know that.

And to the game against Bolton on Saturday.

Arsenal AGAIN conceded the first goal – the 11th time this season. If you do that you can’t win the league or have success in Europe.

But why the hell is this happening?

You just expect Arsenal to go a goal down in the first 25 minutes and after that if Arsenal aren’t in top gear they won’t get anything from the game.

If Gallas was playing would it have made any difference?

Probably not.

We effectively have two wingers in the full back positions and while Clichy and Eboue are fantastic going forward, they just don’t seem to be experienced enough to defend well.

For Anelka’s first goal, Eboue let him get onto his right foot!

Surely you should try and force the player wide onto his weaker foot? I’m sure Anelka can’t slam the ball into the net from 30 yards on his left foot. And the worst thing was that forcing Anelka wide would have really reduced his options because he was up on his own – the best we probably would have got is a throw or a corner.

Constantly conceding the first goal is a big problem and I hate to say it but is it because we don’t have a leader at the back like Sol Campbell?

Sol might have been a bit mad but he could organise a defence, as could Keown and Adams before him. But who takes the responsibility now?

When Lauren returns from his long term injury that should hopefully help stop giving away stupid goals but that might be a couple of months away.

If you compare the defence of Dixon, Winterburn, Adams & Bould to Eboue, Clichy, Toure & Gallas it shows no matter how much power, skill and pace you have it can never substitute experience and defensive ability.