Fantastic Four…

I’ve had a day to get over yesterdays game and I still think the performance was absolutely stunning – some of the play was the best I have seen from this Arsenal team this season.

And the additions of William Gallas and Thomas Rosicky this campaign should not be underrated.

Arsenal went with the 4-5-1 formation which played more like a 4-1-4-1 system with Gilberto happy to sit in front of the defence while Van Persie, Rosicky, Fabregas and Hleb all made forward runs to support Thierry Henry.

Reading had no chance!

The brilliant movement of all the attacking midfielders caused all kinds of problems and with only 58 seconds on the clock a fantastic run and pass from Fabregas setup Henry with his 168th Premiership goal in an Arsenal shirt.

And from then on Arsenal proceeded to give a footballing masterclass.

Chelsea and Manchester United had stuggled at the Madejski Stadium in the previous weeks but Arsenal were the ones who displayed the performance of a team who want to be serious title-challengers this season – and why not?

Arsenal got their second goal just before the break, when Hleb and Rosicky combined well on the edge of the box for Hleb to smash the ball into the roof of the net!

And the most amazing thing was Hleb had a shot! Yes, it’s the only option he had left in that position but it was a shot nevertheless…

The Gunners could have been even further ahead if it wasn’t for wastefulness in front of goal from Van Persie but his goal would come.

And after the break Arsenal were still in devestating form as Hleb played a one-two with Henry to set up Van Persie with the third.

Henry stroked in a penalty on 70 minutes to make the final score 4-0, and after that Arsenal took their foot off the gas and saw the rest of the game out.

So a convincing win and a very happy birthday to the man that made it all possible…

People will give Fabregas all the plaudits and rightly so, but I have to say that the attacking 5 – Fabregas, Henry, Hleb, Rosicky and Van Persie combined so well it was frightening. The movement, understanding and combination play was simply outstanding – does anyone else on the planet play better football than we do when we’re on song?

A Tough Night In Moscow…

A more than difficult night in Moscow for Arsenal tonight.

Before the game Arsene Wenger said it would be a hard match with the travelling, jeg-lag and the conditions over in Russia and the pitch proved to be hard for Arsenal to play their slick, quick passing game.

And CSKA Moscow packed the midfield and played deep which didn’t give Arsenal any space in behind and in the first 60 minutes Arsenal were pedestrian at best.

The only (allowed) goal of the game came on 25 minutes when the poor Djourou hauled down Dadu on the edge of the area. CSKA’s Brazilian Carvalho stepped up and smashed the freekick past the wall and straight into the Arsenal goal.

Arsenal had patches of nice passing but didn’t have any sort of threat in front of goal.

The best opening for Arsenal came just before half-time, when Robin Van Persie was released on the right hand side but failed to pick out Kolo Toure or Thierry Henry in the middle and ran straight into the CSKA keeper. Kolo was furious and so were all the Arsenal fans watching!

Cesc and the rest of the midfield finally found their feet with about 25 minutes remaining and Arsenal began to make a few half chances.

The introduction of Gael Clichy gave Arsenal extra impetus and Arsenal’s late pressure seemed to have paid off when Henry coolly controlled a long freekick and slotted into the far corner.

But amazingly the Spanish referee ruled to goal out and gave Henry a yellow card for handball!

Maybe he’s a Barcelona fan but after numerous TV replays it wasn’t clear that the hand was used at all. If anything it just looked like Titi cushioned the ball with his midriff.

What’s The Problem?

Football is fickle at the best of times and exactly 7 days ago you could forgive Arsenal fans for pessimistic for the forthcoming season. We had failed to register a win on the league over mediocre opposition including Man City, Boro and Aston Villa and our next game was at Old Trafford against an inform Manchester United.

But a convincing win over United last weekend and another win over Sheffield United yesterday the season seems to have been given a new lease of life.

United failed to beat Reading, Liverpool have already lost 2 league games and while Chelski beat Fulham they were less than convincing without the colossal John Terry in the heart of the defence.

Meanwhile William Gallas was running his socks off for the Arsenal cause and popped up with our opening goal with a sweet volley into the top corner – looks like Arsenal has pulled off another transfer coup!

It took over an hour for Arsenal to beat the deadlock against a well-organised and well-drilled Sheffield United team, who obviously worked hard to limit Arsenal space and several of their players infact did individual man-marking jobs.

Thierry looks like he still needs a few games to get into his best form but his cute through-ball was controlled by Cesc who left the ball to William Gallas so smash into the roof of the net.

And once the first goal went in Sheffield United were up against it, and on 70 minutes another run from Titi on the left resulted in a cross that was put into his own net by defender Jagielka for 2-0 and the first home win of the new season.

With 10 minutes to go and with Sheffield United looking to grab a goal Arsenal broke with Eboue charging down the right and placing a great cross into Henry’s path to simply head into the United net and finsh the game at 3-0. An amazing goal from Arsenal’s point of view – a Thierry Henry header, and an accurate cross from Eboue! Whatever next…

Lehmann made a great save from Kabba in the final minutes but Arsenal were well on their way to securing the 3 points.

Next are FC Porto on Tuesday night…

Adebayor Joins The Chosen Few…

Well I think I’ve finally recovered from the huge game yesterday – only just mind.

Arsenal and Arsene Wenger in particular can be proud of themselves after the decisive win at Old Trafford yesterday. With Arsenal having their worst ever start to a Premiership season and United having their best, everyone except the Gooners had Arsenal to lose. And lose convincingly.

As I thought, Wenger started with the 4-5-1 formation with Adebayor playing the lone striker role and Hleb, Freddie and Rosicky supporting from midfield.

Even with United in such fine form of late Arsenal arrived at Old Trafford and totally dominated the game from start to finish, with United having their customary good spells.

Adebayor was excellent on his own upfront, making brilliant runs and caused United all kinds of problems and deserved his goal when it came 5 minutes from the end.

Manchester United couldn’t get hold of the ball, but that didn’t mean they didn’t have chances to score – Lehmann used his face to save a rasping Ronaldo effort just before the break and with only 2 minutes left on the clock, the German made one of the best saves I have ever seen from United favourite Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. [video]

Arsenal had numerous chances and almost paid for not scoring them. After only 12 minutes, Adebayor made a darting run and United keeper Kuszcak pulled him down for a blatant penalty – this was the moment we had been waiting for!

But Gilberto Silva slipped as he struck the ball and the stand-in keeper made a comfortable save. And seconds later Adebayor had a header saved and pushed against the post!

Were Arsenal going to rue those missed chances?

But Arsenal dug in throughout the 90 minutes and never gave up. Fabregas tackled Christiano Ronaldo on 84 minutes, kept on running towards the United penalty area and slipped a superb ball into the path of Adebayor, who coolly slotted the ball into the United net. [video]

Once the goal went in I went totally insane! The release of finally taking the lead in such a big game was absolutely immense!

And this goal added Adebayor to Marc Overmars and Sylvain Wiltord as players to score the winning goal at Old Trafford in the process – wins which helped Arsenal to win the league title.

A great game, a great performance and a great 3 points. We’ve just got to make sure we take this form into the rest of the season.

There were so many amazing performances, particularly from Adebayor, Fabragas, Gilberto, Lehmann, Toure, Gallas – in fact the whole team!

It’s amazing how things have changed in one afternoon.

After only 5 games Manchester United, Arsenal and Chelsea have lost a game, and Liverpool have already lost two!

The Premiership is getting closer not just because the top 4 teams are getting better, but because the rest of the league is improving too, and games are much harder.

But not for Portsmouth it seems!

Arsenal have Sheffield United, Charlton, Reading, Everton, Watford and West Ham in the next 6 league games and we have to take the confidence of the United game into these matches and make sure we put the pressure on the other teams at the top.

And after yesterday’s display why not?

How Can Arsenal Change The Way They Play?

In every home game this season Arsenal have conceded the first goal – Aston Villa, Dinamo Zagreb and now Middlesbrough.

Take about making things hard for yourselves!

We drew against Villa, only just beat Zagreb now drawn against Boro – not forgetting the away game against Manchester City.

The problem we have is that in all of the games we have played this season, Arsenal have looked tired and no-where near sharp enough. We play an intricate passing game which doesn’t come off unless every single player is in tune – unfortunately we’re way off that at the moment.

Our excuses will include players being tired from the World Cup, the disruptive International break, fitness and injury worries – but a lot of teams have these problems but still get wins on the board.

When was the last time you saw Arsenal 4th from bottom after 4 games?!

Alright, we have a game in hand but a total of 2 points after 3 games is pretty worrying – especially when our next league game is against the in-form and seemingly devastating Manchester United – at Old Trafford!

In our failings to beat Boro, City and Villa were the same signs – lack of urgency, lack of a Plan B and our fear of actually shooting from distance!

The equalising goal today came from Thierry Henry – via a penalty!

I’ve seen all three league games now and I haven’t felt that we could score a goal. The play in front of teams and all the opposition have to do is play as deep as possible – and unfortunately for us it works.

We don’t seem to have any killer instinct and seem content to pass the ball around waiting for an opening.

And I don’t know how many times Arsenal had the ball in wide positions and how many corners we had, but without the ability to cross the ball we’re never going to score from there!

Bobby Pires would have been perfect this afternoon wide on the left because when he has the ball in that position he has the ability to pick out a killer pass and make things happen.

I am still hopeful for the midweek Champions League game and The Premiership match against Manchester United but things need to change – and quick.