I need to get a few observations off my chest.

A bit like our boys and the officials, arsenal.com had an off day. They originally did not complete their cut and paste and attributed the 1-1 Boro home game under the previous weekend’s Wigan 0-0 away title. They still had Eduardo as player of the month for January, not February, in the match report. Or am I wrong?

Good old Auntie Beeb, arsenal.com et. al who seem to have missed one of the two most bizarre things I've ever experienced at a football match. But first, let me remind you about the first; I expect you were there. The Swamp, playing the Spuds, on 8th April 2001 in an FA Cup Semi Final. Glenda's first match as manager and, as it turned out, Sol's last game for Spurs. Leading 1-0 (due to a fluke), Campbell fouled Ray Parlour in the 23rd minute, got booked but injured himself so badly that he had to go off, never to return. Now as we all know, fans only sing "You're sh*t, and you know you are" to pathetic opponents who have no chance of coming back from a 3 or 4 goal deficit. Anything else would be tempting fate. Yet that afternoon, trailing 1-0, that's what we Gooners sang. Amazing stuff, probably never to be repeated.

To Saturday. No mention of the incessant time-wasting by anyone, probably as this is now so commonplace at our games. I lost count of the times Halsey almost pleaded with Schwarzer to restart play. A yellow card would have been both appropriate and effective. At the Wigan home game last season, when we'd encountered this for the umpteenth time, Lehmann made his feelings felt by taking the ball to the other side of his six yard box at the first opportunity after we had eventually taken the lead, almost sarcastically gaining revenge by doing same as the opposition's unpunished 'keeper. The referee booked Jens for his first offence. No warning, nothing. It was like watching wrestling on ITV's old World of Sport just before the football scores in a time long gone (thankfully); i.e. a complete joke. I digress.

What got me about Saturday was Middlesbrough's total reluctance to restart the game after Kolo equalised. It was as if the centre circle was land-mined. It was as surreal as the Arsenal supporters' chants at Old Trafford seven years earlier. And when first one, and then two Boro players did step up, Mido knocked the ball out of play deep in the Arsenal half. That just completed the incident for me, which was obviously too much for MOTD2 to feature as one of their "Two good, two bad" pieces on Sunday evening. This reminded me of a game at Highbury, against Sunderland I think, when the opponents were down to nine (?) men and their goalie was kicking the ball out of play on the full. Steve Bould was positioning himself to catch the ball and throw it back in as the 'keeper began his run-up. But at least they had an "excuse" - a numerical deficit. Here it was still 11 v. 11.

The other obvious thought is that if Mido wanted to waste time, why not play the ball back to Schwarzer?! Too much brainpower required, perhaps. And didn't he look overweight when he came on? He'd have had Ramos on a real mission if he'd stayed at SHL. His sending off was ridiculous, of course, and reminded me of RVP's dismissal at Highbury in a European match. Bicycle kicks to be banned by Blatter? Or used by journeymen defenders to get skilful attackers sent off ? The implications do not bear contemplating.

I wonder at the mentality of the traveling Boro fans. They'd just spent over £100 on their ‘day out’: purchasing football ticket, (undergoing) two uncomfortable and long coach journeys and incidentals; they'd seen their side wasting time - playing not football but just anti-football; they'd had one corner and one shot on goal all match, from a free-kick that should never have been given against Adebayor and where the scorer was offside. Yet they were delirious at final whistle. Just think of the ecstasy they'd feel if they supported and watched a team like ours every week; they'd be the happiest lunatics in the asylum. If this is English football outside of what ManYoo and the Chavs pay hundreds of millions for when taking the best English players that their rivals possess, give me Arsene's budget-priced world team any day.

Perhaps for our young guns this is all a little too much, too soon, especially given the abnormal lengthy injury list. But who would have thought in August that we'd have had all the experiences that we've had so far? (Pointless me repeating what you (all) know already.) The Eduardo injury affected the team on the day, at the start of this drawn sequence - at least the football pool punters have been getting three points! But the major decisions at Birmingham (again I'll not list them, you know them well enough), and the two incorrect offside judgments at home on Saturday have cost us four points, and that's not counting the loss of momentum (never talked about enough, in my opinion), the loss of confidence, the added pressure. There is nothing Arsene can do about the officiating; referees are simply not afraid of him and Arsenal in the way that they are of Fergie and his obnoxious bunch.

But Jones of Sunderland caused Chelski as many problems on Saturday as he did us earlier. We can rattle Chelski next weekend and end their unbeaten home run. Foster had to make to splendid saves at relegated Derby. We can win at OT on London Marathon Day.