Kevin Whitcher
It was the classic game of two halves yesterday. Arsenal seem to play a lot of those these days. The distinction tends to be whether they start poorly and come good after the interval, or establish a winning position, only to see it fall apart in the second half.
Against Bolton, the first half was no great shakes. Little fluidity in the play, a couple of panicky moments, but even so, at least some half decent chances fashioned. The opposition were nothing special and there seemed no excuse not to overcome them somehow. Thankfully, the first goal before many had taken their seats for the second half changed things completely, and the subsequent red card for David Wheater ensured that Arsene Wenger’s team would finish the job and claim three very welcome points.
The enigma of Theo Walcott continued. Setting up the second goal and forcing Wheater’s shirt pull that saw Bolton reduced to ten men. Key moments in the game. And yet, the notion that he should be tried in a Michael Owen role, one I myself wanted to see in practice on the basis that the talent he does possess could be utilized more effectively, took one hell of a dent when, one-on-one and all alone in the middle, he shot tamely at the Bolton keeper. I have to admit that my frustration with the player is such that when he pulled up with what appeared to be a hamstring injury, my heart did not sink too much. There were plenty of ‘Oh Theo’ moments yesterday, and yet the law of averages does produce enough decent ones to win matches like those against Bolton. Question is, would it be better with another player? Mikael Arteta gave him a bollocking at one point, and maybe the nicey-niceyness of the Arsenal dressing room means that does not happen enough.
I sat next to the Highbury Spy to watch the game, and he shocked me with the stat that in Arsenal’s previous eight home Premier League matches, the team had failed to score more than a single goal on any occasion. Surely a run that you would have to go back a long way to match. Maybe it happened under George Graham, you would kind of expect it to, but I will leave that one to the historians to dig out. Fortunately the run came to an end with three fine goals, as the second half saw Arsenal play as we know they are capable of. It was a far more enjoyable 45 minutes after the relatively turgid first half.
And the victory was much needed ahead of the derby game next weekend. Gunners fans were already fearing the worst, and failure to beat Bolton at home would have set up the team like lambs to the slaughter at the Lane. As it is, there are visions of an Adebayor goal, but a clean sheet and some converted chances at least lifts some of the gloom that has enveloped the club after the reverses to Liverpool, United and Blackburn. An unlikely victory at Spurs would do wonders for the confidence of this season’s squad.
I know there are many that want a change of manager, and it would get boring if I repeated my own view on that every time I did a piece after a match. I have accepted that nothing is going to change very soon unless fans organize and make the manager’s position untenable, but that will only happen with more repeated failure on the pitch. Much as I want change, I do not have it in me to wish the team will lose to achieve it. Others may be different, but I am more pro-Arsenal than anti-Wenger. I would be delighted if the manager could prove myself and many others wrong by returning the club to glory, even if I just cannot see how without a radical change in his ways.
The decline since early 2011 has been entirely predictable, because it is obvious that things have gone stale. How much the new arrivals will shake things up remains to be seen, but if Arteta and the other newbies with some semblance of authority are prepared to makes waves by pulling up some of their colleagues for doing something wrong, then I am all for it. Gallas used to do it, Lehmann used to do it, and Arshavin – before he gave up and lost interest – had a go. But there were not enough voices to ensure standards did not slip, and things returned to the cosy world of the Arsenal dressing room where voices are rarely raised. In fairness to the departed Cesc Fabregas, can you imagine him rollocking anybody? That idea certainly needs to change if the club are to live up to the marketing and move ‘forward’.
Finally, sone housekeeping. Remember this? Ian Henry writes…
Thanks to the dozens (!) of you who entered the “guess what Arsene will do in the transfer market this summer” competition. Suffice to say, no one predicted any of the late arrivals. No one incidentally predicted Nasri would leave, nor JET; in fact nearly half of the entrants predicted Jay would be one of the young kids promoted to the first team squad; almost as popular for promotion was dear old Henri “The Hammer” Lansbury. Almost three quarters of entrants correctly predicted that Emmanuel Frimpong would be promoted to the first team squad – and our winner even backed this up with a statement that the manager would not bring in a holding midfielder, for which an extra mark was awarded. Anyway, the winner is Russell James, the only entrant moreover to predict the departure of Armand Traore. Russell correctly predicted the departures of Clichy, Traore, Denilson, Bendtner and Vela, the arrival of Gervniho and Oxlade-Chamberlain. Honourable mentions too to Mike Jeffrey and Mark Allen (the only person to predict the promotion of Ryo Miyaichi incidentally). For January, your challenge is to predict who we will sign in the last few hours of window, and where will Messrs Squillaci and Almunia end up.
We will be in touch with Russell shortly to arrange his prize.
The current issue of the Gooner will be on sale at the Olympiacos match and can also be bought online here
Kevin Whitcher’s newly updated version of the book co-written with Alex Fynn, ‘Arsènal: The Making of a Modern Superclub’ is available in paperback from publishers Vision Sports for a reduced price of £6.99 including postage if you use the promo code ‘Gooner’ on the page that appears after you click ‘buy now’. Click here to order.
