Sounds like a war film. “Eight phases to glory” is about a 57 year old man who last week before the Chelsea v Man U game (trust me fellow Gooners I did this before the Mancs and the Chavs played) scribbled down on a scrap of paper a “what if” scenario and decided not to just hope and pray but to structure this remote and outrageous idea.

Phase one: Chelsea beat Man Utd… Affirmative.

Phase two: Arsenal beat Derby… Affirmative.

Now the tough part…

Phase three: ManU lose or fail to beat West Ham… To be decided

Phase four: Arsenal beat Everton… TBD

Phase five: Chelsea fail to beat Newcastle… TBD

If we accomplish phase five we are, as they say “in the madhouse”

Phase six: Chelsea lose or draw to Bolton… TBD

Phase seven: Mancs somehow lose to Wigan… TBD

Phase eight: We beat a Sunderland team with nothing to play for!

OK it is not going to happen but if I can tick off each phase in a sane business like manner my hopes are not built too high, and as we have already cleared the first two phases and have taken the season into its final month it delays my disappointments of a season that promised so much and this lunacy certainly eases the pain of what might have been.

I believe our often brilliant football deserves the outside chance to make it through to the final matchday of the season and if ManU and Chelsea have the same bad luck we have suffered recently (yes coupled with poor defending) in these final games we could still be in the mix on that final Sunday.

Yours barking and deluded

Adrian Wagenaar