Kevin Whitcher
It was no great surprise that something in the region of 25% of the ticket holders for this sold out game decided not to come. This is the way it is going to be for the remainder of Arsenal’s home Premier League fixtures this season, unless there is an announcement that Arsene Wenger will be stepping down. That would certainly see a full house against Burnley to see him off and would probably increase the numbers for the Southampton and West Ham matches.
Unfortunately, the nature of the team’s performance for much of the game might have given rise to the idea that those who did attend might have enjoyed their Easter Sunday more is they had chosen to spend more time with the family. Still, there was some hunger for the game amongst those who have seen less of Arsenal than your writer. The 16-year-old son of a friend had been promised a spare for the game, but was let down on Saturday. He’d spent Good Friday watching videos of Arsenal’s wins this season. Through The Gooner’s Twittter account, we were able to find a seat for him and another teenager, as the holder had a pair they could not use due to a family event and even better, did not require payment for it. (We’ve arranged a subscription to The Gooner next season by way of thanks - more on that later).
As for the game itself, Stoke played in a committed, organized fashion, harrying Arsenal down and evidently motivated by Paul Lambert to do so. There was a sense of humourous inevitability among their travelling fans before the game, singing about returning to the Championship. On the pitch, the selection of Elneny for Arsenal and Sobhi for Stoke led to this text from sometime contributor Ian Henry: This weekend being both Passover and Easter, it is very gratifying to see Mohammed v Ramadan in the Arsenal v Stoke game. Divine”
Moving swiftly on, Shaquiri had an effort go just wide of the post from distance for the visitors and Aaron Ramsey had a looping shot that hit the crossbar. That was the excitement for the first half, which led to some booing at the interval. I might be wrong, but I am not even certain they bothered with the highlights of the first 45 minutes on the big screens.
At least in the second, Arsenal produced more, with Ozil becoming more influential. There were excellent chances for Aubameyang and Chambers which should have been converted. With Thursday in mind (which saw Mkhitaryan, Xhaka and Koscielny on the bench) it was unfortunate that Danny Welbeck had a poor game. However, the introduction of Lacazette to replace him in the second half seemed to perk things up. Aubameyang moved over to the left and there seemed nothing to suggest that the two expensive signings could not perform in the same side.
The deadlock was broken by a very dubious penalty, but hey, we’ll take it. Ozil had the ball poked away from him as he swung his leg against Martins Indi. Aubameyang converted the spot-kick and followed it up a few minutes later with a nicely converted volley from a corner. It was a very generous gesture to then allow Lacazette to take a late penalty after the latter was shoved over in the box. He sacrificed a hat-trick, an indication of good team spirit.
So 3-0 put something of a gloss on a performance that was, against a team in the relegation zone, nothing to write home about. Still, psychologically, it will do no harm with regard to the team’s confidence going into the match against CSKA Moscow on Thursday.
Now onto another matter that is understandably of interest to many who will be reading this, and the significant announcement from us that the print version of The Gooner will continue next season as we have met our target of 1,000 subscribers. The deadline to do this was the end of today, and we’ve made it. However, as a result there is now no cut-off time for any further subscription orders if you have not got around to it yet. We owe a lot of thanks to everyone that has signed up with their £30s (or £42s if you are abroad) and especially to all those that have helped us to spread the awareness, especially Arseblog, ArsenalFanTV, Goonerholic, Arsenal News Review, Le Grove, The Highbury Librarian, Just Arsenal, The Gunners Pub, the Matchday Store, Piebury Corner, The Arsenal Supporters Trust, Layth Yousif and the many who have retweeted the various tweets we have done about the campaign. The power of the internet and social media has, ironically, saved a printed institution which was a formative part of the phenomenon of fans expressing their views on their team to a wider audience. I’ll write more about the campaign and the communications I received in a week or so, but I’ve been genuinely moved by the goodwill shown towards us. I honestly thought this would our final season, and we only kept the fanzine going for 2017-18 because we felt it would be nice to celebrate our 30th anniversary before bowing out.
I’ll leave it there as I have to get the final issue of this season to press (which, printer allowing, should be delivered in time for the CSKA Moscow game on Thursday).
In case you have missed it, the campaign to keep The Gooner going beyond the end of the current season was launched at the start of 2018. As stated above, it’s proved a success, but there is now no longer a deadline for subscriptions, with all details on this form which you can download and print out if need be, or hit the links if you are viewing it on your computer or smartphone.
The current issue of The Gooner can be bought online here for £3.60 including postage. The price is higher if you are outside the UK due to the extra postage costs. As stated, there is a new issue (271) out for Thursday. If you wish to purchase that in advance for mailing to you, you can do so here
Alternatively, you can simply pay £3.60 (postage included) for either issue 270 or 271 (or both for £6) via online bank transfer to –
Account name: The Gooner
Sort Code: 20-76-90
Account Number: 03004112
Please follow up the payment with an email to [email protected] stating your name and address, ideally with proof of payment such as a screen grab or pdf, or at least the reference that you used for payment (e.g. 270Smith, 271Smith or 270271Smith).
You also can bypass the online store by simply making a PayPal payment to the email address [email protected]. Pay either £3.60 (or £6 for a both issue 270 and 271). If doing this, please make your payment a 'friends and family' / personal gift payment – this helps keep our costs down. (Overseas buyers add £2 per individual issue for Europe or £3 per issue for the rest of the world. Two issue subscription costs are £10 for Europe and £12 for the rest of the world).
Finally, you can pay by cheque made payable to ‘The Gooner’ to the address below, for either an individual issue (UK £3.60) or a two issue subscription (UK £6) (see above for overseas prices)…
The Gooner
12 Buxton Court
Hanbury Drive
London
E11 1GB
DIGITAL ISSUES
The Gooner is also available in digital form, through The Gooner App on iPhones and iPads, the Exactly App for Android devices and now Kindle Fire owners can also get their fix by searching the Amazon App Store for The Gooner.
You can also subscribe at www.exacteditions.com and read it through your internet browser as well as receiving a code which will enable you to access issues on all the above devices.
