On this date Eduardo and the rest of his Arsenal colleagues will return to the scene where he, along with our title challenge, was critically wounded. On that fateful day in February 2008, Eduardo’s leg/ankle was snapped in two by Martin Taylor. The affect it had on the team that day was too much for them to bear. They cracked and never recovered and it’s taken two years for them to get back on track.

At the start of the game we were five points clear at the top of the Premier League. Gallas was captain and Adebayor in top goal scoring form. Eduardo had started to knock them in and was looking vital to our run-in with Van Persie being out injured. Our young players went into shock, horrified at the sight of Eduardo’s ankle. Players holding their heads in their hands shouting, Adebayor ran to the other side of the pitch screaming. I don’t recall who comforted the prostrate Eduardo.

In those circumstances whatever a visibly shaken Arsene Wenger said to the players at half time should go down as one of the greatest half time talks ever. Trailing by one goal thanks to dubious free kick, Arsenal came out flying with a mission. It was to be Theo Walcott who stepped forward and score his first league goals early in the second half to put Arsenal back in control. I don’t believe he was given the credit he deserved for stepping up and being counted when more experienced professionals were floundering.

Once back in control we had chances to take the three points that would have seen us stay ahead of United. Notably, it was Adebayor, whose refusal to cross to the player he had head-butted earlier in the season at Spurs, Nicklas Bendtner, led to him selfishly wasting the best opportunity to win the game from an acute angle, a miss that changed the match and our season. As we know, an in-form Clichy conceded a stupid penalty in the last minute from which Birmingham scored. Our captain had what can only be described as an emotional breakdown, his actions derided by all the pundits and commentators. Our season essentially ended at the final whistle.

Returning to St Andrew’s for the first time since that day, we once again find ourselves challenging for the title. Gallas is no longer captain. Clichy and Eduardo have not produced anything like the form they showed going into the game since. Adebayor is no longer at the club. After a similar incident that befell young Aaron Ramsey at Stoke, the players pulled together and produced a vital win. For me this shows that this team has matured and are mentally tougher than two years ago. They are also much more tightly bonded as a group.

Birmingham will not be fighting relegation after a successful return to the top flight. The importance of this game to our title aspirations is probably greater than those against both Chelsea and United, in which we were soundly beaten. I would imagine that Gael Clichy would look to this as a chance to redeem himself. Eduardo may look to this game to get his Arsenal career back on track by finding some sort of closure to his greatest professional nightmare. Gallas and Adebayor will not have the opportunity to right their wrongs.

A win on the Saturday 27th March for Arsenal may only be three vital points but for those that played there in 2008 there would be a great feeling of justice finally being delivered. And it would give us the belief that we can pick up where we left off and win the league title that we should have won two seasons ago.