Will
This user hasn't shared any biographical information
Homepage: http://arsenally.com
Posts by Will
West Brom v Arsenal Preview & Odds.
Mar 18th
There’s a strange mix of good and bad news before this West Brom game. Some bookies have us favourites to lift the title, with ManUre preoccupied in other competitions. We have a better run in to the end of the season than that Northern lot. We have a game in hand, albeit against Sp*rs.
That’s the good news. The bad news is that we’ll miss two defenders and two goalkeepers until the end of the season. Szczesny may return right at the end, but it’s unlikely. Djourou is out till September, despite the best attempts of the Swiss FA to defy reason.
The really bad bit of all that really bad news is that Thomas Vermaelen will not feature for us until next season. And even that, by the sound of it, is not certain at all:
I relapsed six times. Every time I had a goal to come back, but that was then broken again and again. At first they said I would need four or six weeks after the operation. But it soon became apparent that it would last longer.
I feel no trouble in the Achilles tendon itself, but the muscles around it still need to be made stronger. I do not know when I will be back.
That’s bad news. Really bad news. He suffers from the same problem that Owen Hargreaves has. Need I say more? There’s a real possibility that he will not play for us again in any meaningful way.
That terrible news is made even worse by the fact that the player who has stepped into the breach, showed his qualities and begun to perform at the level we all hoped for, Johann Djourou, is also out for the season with a dislocated shoulder. Our season now rests squarely on Squillaci’s shoulders. And that does not fill me with confidence.
But before we can even consider thinking about the end of the season and titles, there are some baby steps to take in the form of West Brom away. Baby steps? Hardly. I respect Roy Hodgson hugely, and I reckon we’ll be in for a tough afternoon at the Hawthorns. Apart from the back five, we’ll be without Song, Fabregas, and Walcott.
Regular readers will know that I’m not a big fan of Rosicky, certainly not this season anyway. We’ll need him to put in a big performance alongside Diaby and Wilshere in midfield. Up front we have Bendtner back – err… hooray? – but much more importantly, v Persie will be leading the line. I expect:
Almunia; Clichy – Koscielny – Squillaci – Sagna; Diaby – Wilshere – Rosicky; Arshavin – v Persie – Nasri.
As long as Diaby and Rosicky have fair-to-middling games, then the combination of our front three and Wilshere should ensure that we create and convert chances. We must prevail. Our season depends on it.
The emergency goal-keeper signing was a bit of a surprise. At 41, no one can say that Lehmann doesn’t have experience. I can only speculate about how the dressing room will be affected by his relationship with Almunia, which we all know was about as sour as it can get in football.
The German is a complete nutter, but in his prime, a great keeper. He’d make sure that the opposition strikeres knew he was there, all right, usually by standing on the toes, if not, with the occasional karate kick.
I hope he turns out to be a positive influence on the squad. They could learn a thing or two about getting underneath an opponent’s skin. To celebrate his return, here’s a video of his finest moments:
Odds
The bookies seem to think that we’ll recover our form and beat the Baggies, with us at 17/20 and them at 4/1 for the win. I’m aware that I’m well down for the season, and so I’ve plumped for 2-0 to the Arsenal at 9/1 with Unibet. BoyleSport had 4-3 to us at 150/1 so that got a few pennies.
As for goalscorers, v Persie to hit the net first at 4/1 with Coral was too good to miss, as was Squillaci to get one anytime at 14/1 with Bet365.
Tomorrow, ManUre are at home but without several key players against Bolton. I’ll have my fingers crossed that Owen Coyle does us a favour.
It’s not an exaggeration to say that this game defines our season. If we play to our potential, then we should walk it, and send a message out to United that we’ll be chasing them all the way. We need confidence, and we need it now. A good win, even a scrappy win on the back of a good performance, and we’re in with a chance at the only title that matters.
Arsenally yours,
Will
Man Utd 2 Arsenal 0 – Review.
Mar 13th
In my preview I wrote of what impact of a win would have on our confidence, the rest of our season, and the race to the Premiership title. I also wrote that a draw would also give us belief, and that we’d likely beat ManUre at the Grove to progress in the cup.
Well, we lost, going out of the third cup competition in the space of just two weeks. We didn’t collapse at Old Trafford; we didn’t play terribly badly. We had much more possession than United; we had several shots on target. We just didn’t have enough composure in front of goal, and United were able to catch us on the break.
The team looked jaded. In fact, they didn’t look much like a team at all. There didn’t seem to be a lot of mental strength, and the injury to Djourou robbed us of whatever resilience and fighting spirit we had at the start of the game.
Not again!
The manager attributed our lack of oomph to the crushing defeat at the Nou Camp:
Subconsciously I feel the disappointment of Tuesday [against Barcelona] played a part in the game. You could see something has gone, not in our effort or attitude, but confidence-wise.
But I don’t feel like the season is slipping away. I believe we can do it. It is a good test for us now to show we can regroup and show the mental strength and togetherness quickly.
We will have to answer this kind of question in the next two or three weeks. We have to show we have an answer.
Whether or not we do find an answer, whether or not we fight for the title, and whether or not this season ends up like the previous five – trophyless and disappointing – depends very much on our back five.
According to the official site, Djourou will miss the rest of the season after suffering a dislocated shoulder against ManUre. He will be sorely missed. His performances this season have shown that he has come a long way, and has become the defender that we’d previously only seen in glimpses in seasons past. He’s been solid, and formed a great partnership with Koscielny at the back in Vermaelen’s absence.
Speaking of whom, where is he? I’d been given the impression here on the official site that he’d play for the reserves before the end of February. That hasn’t happened.
Even if Cesc and Robin stay fit, they still need support in the form of a good reliable keeper, a strong defence, and good defensive players in the middle of the park. Assuming Song returns, that’s the latter sorted. But if Vermaelen doesn’t return soon, we’ll be relying on the services of Ignasi Miquel. With the greatest respect to him, I don’t know that he’s up to the job at such a tender age, and with so little first team experience.
Although Almunia played well against Barcelona, he flapped when Rooney scored, and I don’t think he has the confidence and backing of either the team or the manager. Our goalkeeping Poles, both threatening to establish themselves with the No. 1 jersey when they got themselves injured, will be missed. Will James Shea stay on the bench till the end of the season? That doesn’t inspire me with confidence.
Wenger now has a chance to really earn his wages. He must motivate a deeply disappointed squad. He must find an emergency keeper. In short, he must inspire his team to fight for what remains of the season.
We were in a good position at the end of last season. We could have won the title, but defeats to Sp*rs and Wigan allowed Chelski to lift the title as we collapsed with a distinct lack of confidence. It may not feel like we’re doing well, but in terms of the most important competition, we certainly are. Wenger must make the players realise how much we can still achieve. Only 3 points separate us from the league leaders, and we have a game in hand.
We can still win something this season. The title, the most important prize of all.
Arsenally still believing,
Will
Man Utd vs Arsenal in the FA Cup – Preview and Odds
Mar 12th
The result today is not just about the FA Cup. Success today will lift the players’ spirits, and show that we can beat United in their own back yard, and catch them up in the race to the Premiership title. Not having a replay would also give our title campaign a boost, while other teams in the League will take heart that ManUre can be beated, even at home.
Draw, and our confidence will still be lifted. We’ll show ourselves, and other teams in the top flight that United aren’t invincible at home. We’ll have the upper hand in the tie, and we’ll face West Brom next week with renewed optimism and determination to beat anyone.
Lose, and I would be concerned for the rest of our season. That would mean we’d have gone out of three cups in a fortnight. ManUre would still be difficult to beat in our minds, and their Premiership campaign would be given a boost, not ours.
So which will happen. I’m not full of confidence in a win, as much as I’d like us to thrash them, and see Ferguson’s face turn into a chewing beetroot. A feel a draw may well be on the cards. It seems obligatory for us to have cup replays this season.
We have to consider that a wounded ManUre is a dangerous, smelly beast. Having been not so much beaten as humiliated by Liverpool and given the league’s chasing pack a boost, I imagine a strong response from them in a competition that means much to the red-faced Scot. They haven’t won it since 2004. We’ve even won it since then, in 2005.
In terms of who starts for us, we’ll be without our captain Fabregas, Alex Song and Theo Walcott. Szczesny will be out for about six weeks, so James Shea will understudy Almunia, while the hunt for an emergency keeper goes on. I have concerns about the midfield, and if Rosicky starts then it’s crucial he has a good game. Diaby played well against Barcelona and I espect him to continue in Song’s absence.
So I expect:
Almunia; Clichy – Koscielny – Djourou – Sagna; Wilshere – Rosicky – Diaby; Arshavin – v Persie – Nasri
Odds
The bookies have the home team as firm favourites at odds only slightly better than Evens. We’re 11/4 with most bookies, which has got a few Arsenally pennies. In terms of correct score, I think the game will be close and the scoreline will reflect that. We’re 12/1 for 2-1 and 40/1 for 3-2 with Coral. The half-time/full time split gives good value on the comeback, with ManUre/Arsenal 39/1 with Unibet. I might go for a line on 2-1 with the half time/full time split as above. I’ll update you when I discover what odds I can get on that.
As for goalscorers, I’m down for Nasri to score first, widely available at 9s. We’ve been fairly effective from set-pieces; Djourou is available at 20/1 with Bet365.
Let’s book our place in the semi-finals. Let’s stay in one cup this fortnight. Let’s regain our confidence and beat the league leaders. Let’s take this season by the scruff of the neck before it threatens to run away from us.
COME ON YOU GOONERS!!!!!
Arsenally Yours,
Will
Barcelona 3 Arsenal 1 – Review, Wailing, and Gnashing of teeth
Mar 9th
I didn’t blog last night because I was just too angry. But sorry folks, I’m still angry. Furious, livid, enraged, indignant, even splenetic. That’s not going to change for a long time.
At work, even my Luton-supporting line manager sympathised thought the refereeing decision was dreadful. Even my Chelski-loving boss and colleagues agreed it was wrong. And even the ManUre fan thought it was harsh.
What they all said was that Arsenal would have lost anyway. I disagree. They quoted stats like the fact that we didn’t have a shot on target the entire game, that Barcelona had 73% possession and completed 900 passes. All true, undeniably so.
But that doesn’t paint the whole picture. In two previous games against Barça we’d struggled for the first half. In both those games, however, we grew into the matches, drawing one 2-2 and winning the other 2-1. Diaby was becoming more of a presence. The defence was growing in confidence, and Wilshere was beginning to make his extraordinary talent shine in the middle of the park.
Then we lost v Persie to a second yellow. Not for kicking the ball away at a free kick, but for taking a strike at goal one second after the whistle had gone for a marginal offside decision. I’ve never seen anything like it. There are situations where refs dish out mandatory yellow cards, such as celebrating a goal by taking off a shirt. Always gets a card, no exceptions.
Yellows are rarely given, in the Premiership at least, for kicking the ball away. If it’s an obvious time-wasting tactic when a free kick is awarded, then yes, you do sometimes see a yellow. But if it comes a matter of seconds after the whistle blows for offside, and it would be a player’s second yellow, how often have you seen that before? I haven’t ever.
Which is why I’m perfectly happy to bring up the possibility of a bung. Referee’s are always given some latitude to allow the game to flow. They are encouraged to keep all the players on the pitch if they can legitimately justify it. To dish a yellow out like that to our most in-form striker was taking advantage of the rules to get the player off the pitch. Disgraceful.
AW was far less slanderous than I just was in his comments after the game:
It’s not a surprise the referee didn’t book a single Barcelona player. I just spoke to [the] Uefa people. They are shocked as well. He killed a promising, fantastic football match. What for? If it’s a bad tackle it’s a second bookable offence but the way he did it it’s embarrassing, if you love the game. If you have played football at a certain level you cannot understand that decision. It’s impossible.
Robin van Persie was more blunt:
In my opinion it was a total joke, the sending‑off. How can I hear his whistle with 95,000 people jumping up. How can I hear that, for God’s sake? Please explain me that.
I sincerely hope that Busacca is found to have taken a bribe from Guardiola, Xavi and Dani Alves, and they all receive the punishment they deserve, nothing less than public flogging, before being forced to march naked through the streets of Islington.
Cheating, bribe-taking incompetent fool
Of course we’re the ones who’ll be punished for this debacle. According to the official site, AW and Samir Nasri face UEFA charges of being honest improper conduct, and will face the UEFA Control and Disciplinary Body on Thursday 17th March.
All that said, there were points where we didn’t help ourselves. It was Cesc’s ridiculous back-heel that gave Iniesta the ball to feed Messi for their first. Overall, our club captain hardly set the world on fire. Koscielny’s trip on Pedro gave the Catalunians a penalty. Bendtner should have won it for us at the end.
Bendtner’s chance is another example of how the game would have been different with v Persie on the field. The Dutchman would have slammed it home; the Dane fluffed it.
And to top it all off, the promising young Pole Szczesny, who had played excellently since getting his place in the side, is out for the season with a hand injury. With Fabianski also out till August, that leaves Almunia. It must be said that the Spaniard did play well in the Nou Camp. Let’s hope he can keep that up as we challenge for domestic titles.
Let’s pick ourselves up, dust ourselves down, and destroy ManUre on Saturday.
Just to make life even better, I must bring you the distressing news that Sp*rs have qualified for the last eight, drawing 0-0 to AC Milan. Watching the game, I couldn’t help but think that Arsenal would have destroyed either side with ease. Not much comfort now, but that is an encouraging thought.
To end with and to cheer you up:
A man walked into a costume shop and asked for a Dracula costume. The shopkeeper said “You need to go to the Spurs shop over the road”. The man replied, ” You misunderstood. I said I wanted to look like a count.”
Arsenally Yours,
Will
Orient Preview & Odds (injury nightmare)
Mar 1st
Chelski’s win against the Premiership leaders tonight puts us right back in the title race. But before league hostilities are resumed, we’ve got smaller fish to fry in the shape of Leyton Orient. Win, and then we can fry the massive dogfish that is ManUre in the FA Cup as well as the league. Bring it on!
The curse of the dodgy internet connection struck again so apologies for the lack of a review to the Carling Cup Final, but then again, it would have been a meaningless drunken rant if I’d done it on Sunday night. I tried last night but to no avail. Here’s what I would have said in a nutshell:
We didn’t play all that badly, apart from Rosicky and Bendtner.
I hate all Brummies
If in doubt, kick it out. When did that stop being taught at school?
Why didn’t we play Nasri in midfield?
Here’s hoping that Koscielny and the rest of the squad can rise like a phoenix from the ashes of our Carling Cup Campaign and destroy all opponents for the rest of time the season this week.
Our first opponent is Leyton Orient, whom we must beat to set up a juicy tie against ManUre in the FA Cup. I hope – against bitter experience – that this set-back is only temporary and we beat them by a few goals, as we should.
But first, more bad news. v Persie is out for “a minimum of 3 weeks” after a scan on his knee revealed it to be made of cheese bad news. Obviously he’ll miss more than just the Barcelona game, but that’s where we’ll miss him the most. Fabregas may well be back for the Camp Nou but only just. To miss both of them would be two huge nails in the coffin of the CL tie. With Fabregas? Maybe, just maybe. But let’s think about that nearer the time
Also missing the Orient game are Song and Koscielny. Fantastic. We may be wounded animal ready to pounce, but we’ll be missing the spine of the team. Diaby wasn’t even in the squad for Wembley but will surely play against the O’s. Up front we’ll have a couple of strikers who couldn’t hit a barn door with a banjo, score in a brothel, etc etc ad nauseam.
I feel able to make light of the injury / poor finishing situation because it’s only a League 1 side we face tomorrow night, but in all truth, I’m a little bit scared. Chamakh has hardly played since the start of the season, and the odd thing is, there’s no good reason why. Any ideas, Arsenally-intrigued readers? Bendtner’s current form is pretty poor to be honest. The only players who have been playing well and who will face Orient are Wilshere and Djourou. And I wouldn’t be surprised if the young Englishman is rested, as he’s been playing twice a week for a while now.
We may well see one or both of Gibbs and Eboue at left/right back. I’d like to see more of Gibbs, partly because I believe he’s got a real future, but also partly because Clichy still has his moments of serious defensive retardation.
So I expect:
Almunia; Sagna – Squillaci – Djourou – Clichy; Diaby – Denilson/Wilshere – Rosicky; Nasri – Chamakh – Bendtner
Odds
As for the odds, I’m torn between hopeless pessimism and ridiculous optimism. Then I remember the injury list and it’s pessimism all the way. But I’ll never back anyone but the Arsenal so there you go.
There’s no value in the 1/5 generally offered for a home win, so I’m going for 33/1 with Ladbrokes on Orient ahead at the interval and Arsenal up at the end. The optimist in me put a few pennies on 4-0 with Unibet at an attractive 23/2. “We’ll score one or two, then Orient will have to come forward and we’ll score more,” he said. Possibly.
Denilson is an interesting 20/1 with Ladbrokes to score first, though that only gets some Arsenally small change, while Arshavin is my main tip for first goalscorer at 9/2 with BlueSq.
I can’t bear any more of the relentless p*ss-taking I’ve encountered at work so please, please Arsenal, let’s beat the O’s. Then we can wipe the smile off the faces of all those ManUre fans at Old Trafford.
Come on the Arsenal!!!!!
Arsenally Yours
Will
Carling Cup Final Preview & Odds
Feb 26th
Profuse apologies to my legions of couple of followers. My broadband has been down for the last week or so and all the phone calls in the world couldn’t persuade my landlady to pull her finger out. Anyway, I’m back, and have now put in some measures to ensure I can blog from other locations.
I didn’t miss much, only our only victory against Barcelona in my lifetime… no use crying over spilt internet connections. What a game it was. We hardly dominated – they passed the ball twice as many times as we did, but the win puts us in a fantastic position when we travel to the Nou Camp.
Oh and I missed the game against Stoke, which was notable only for the injuries to our captain and to Theo Walcott. According to the Sun Cesc demanded a meeting with AW to persuade him to let him play in the Carling Cup Final tomorrow, but firstly I don’t believe anything I read in the Sun, and secondly, we’d be stupid to risk losing him for the Barça rematch. Thankfully, according to the Offical Site, it looks like Cesc will miss the Final and the FA Cup replay against Orient. Theo, or the “Bovingdon Bullet” as we say here in Hemel, is less fortunate and will be on the sidelines for a couple of weeks minimum, which will see him miss the second leg against the Catalunians, but possibly feature against ManUre in the FA Cup, assuming we beat Orient at home.
What we need tomorrow is for the squad players to replace Theo and Cesc and play their socks off, something we didn’t see when we faced Orient at Brisbane Road. Our ‘B’ team’s collective failure to beat the East Londoners gives us a yet another replay in an already congested fixture schedule.
So which of them will line up against the Brutal Brummies at Wembley? Diaby, Koscielny and v Persie are back after injury, and I think all three will start. I for one hope that we do see Diaby rather than Rosicky replacing the captain; the little Czech has been rather poor this season.
Cesc’s absence means an extra burden on the young shoulders of Jack Wilshere to step up and provide the creativity. That doesn’t concern me. As the boss says:
He’s had very good games. His confidence has grown, his responsibility has grown, certainly. Our game goes naturally through Fabregas. When he’s not there, it will go more through Wilshere. The way of the game is simple: it goes always through the team’s strong points. So that the game goes through Wilshere is a good thing for him because it means the players around him have confidence in him. He will enjoy this game.
I hope he does enjoy the game, and I’m looking forward to seeing hi sleft-footed passes out to Nasri on the right flank, but how he copes with Lee Bowyer is what concerns me. Bowyer will niggle, leave the boot in, go in hard in 50:50s and generally make life difficult for the young man. It takes a great deal of maturity to rise above such things, and the guy’s only 19. Keeping 11 men on the pitch may be more tricky than usual, especially when you add the giant Zigic into the equation.
So the team I expect is:
Szczesny; Clichy – Koscielny – Djourou – Sagna; Diaby – Song – Wilshere; Arshavin – v Persie – Nasri
Odds
The bookies have Arsenal as clear favourites, with the odds of us claiming our first piece of silverware in five years a mere 4/7 at best. I’ve gone for a 3-1 Arsenal win at 12/1 with William Hill. 4-2 to us at 66/1 with Stan James was very tempting, but my Arsenally long shot is 4-3 at 150-1 with Victor Chandler. 7/2 on any player getting their marching orders was too tempting to pass up.
As for goalscorers, you’ve got to go for v Persie to score first, haven’t you? Well I did, at 15/4 with Bet365. The odds of Jack the lad finding the net at anytime are 5/1 and that got a few pennies as well.
So – can we lift the first bit of silverware since the FA Cup in ’05? Of course we can. Will we? The answer to that question depends very much on a mature performance from a very young man.
COME ON YOU GOONERS!!!!
Arsenal 2 Wolves 0 Review – A Good Spanking
Feb 13th
Beating Wolves was never going to be too tricky – they hadn’t won at our ground in 35 years or so – but the way we played was most encouraging. Sadly, the stream I was watching on was reduced to a trickle by a dodgy internet connection, so all I’ve seen is the highlights on MoTD.
That said, it seemed like a fine team performance. Wilshere particularly impressed me, was did v Persie’s right foot with which he scored the first goal after a great pass from the captain. It’s good to see him score with his weaker foot, or as he likes to call it, his chocolate leg.
Big Mick McCarthy was impressed:
They murdered us. From one to 11 they were better than us, stronger than us and quicker than us. I have to admire their class and the way they play. And for us to get better we have to admit we got turned over – we were completely spanked. We had a slapping.
They certainly did, and it would have be a mauling, a romp, an orgy of goals, a battering (no… can’t think of any more quasi-sexual, faux-violent descriptions) were it not for a fine performance by Hennessey in goal for Wolves. And excluding a bump to v Persie’s knee courtesy of Zubar, we came away unscathed! Nothing short of miraculous.
Sadly Citeh didn’t do us a favour and beat the current Premiership leaders. Rooney scored a fantastic overhead goal flukey goal to win ManUre the game 2-1. They face Chelski in Fulham and Liverpool away at the start of next month, here’s hoping they drop a few points then. Le Boss had this to say about the title race after the game:
The title race is very much on. We want to give it our best shot to win the league and we are in a good position. If we keep playing like that we have a very good chance.
We certainly are in the hunt, especially when you consider how long is left of the season. And we host the scum from Manchester ourselves at the end of April. Ancelotti’s concession that Chelsea are out of the race is misinformation. There’s still a long way to go.
Nasri will have a fitness test on Tuesday to decide if he can play against Barça. I’d hesitate to throw a player just recovered from injury straight back onto the pitch, but if he can play on Wednesday at anything like level of form we saw before his injury, then I for one would like to see him against the Catalunians.
Another first-teamer returning is Vermaelen. According to AW on the official site, he’ll run out for the reserves in a couple of weeks:
When he [Vermaelen] is fit certainly we’ll play him in the Reserve team. But not before two or three weeks. You never know until he is completely fit to play again but we are hopeful [he is progressing well]. He feels he is over the problem but he played his last game in September and we are in February so it will take some time to come back to match fitness.
Good news indeed. Fingers crossed on that front. Full Barça preview soon.
Arsenally Yours,
Will
Arsenal vs Wolves Preview and Odds
Feb 12th
It’s very hard to concentrate on the Wolves game, and not to think of anything else. There’s the small matter of the Barçelona game on Wednesday; there’s also a game in Mansheikster at lunchtime. However, AW is focussed on the task at hand:
There is no Barcelona in mind. There is Wolverhampton in mind… [And the Manchester derby] will not influence us.
He might well say that, but one thing’s for certain – all the players will have one or both of those matches in mind when they take to the field tomorrow afternoon. I hope and pray that Citeh win, with Berbatov and Tevez colliding in a freak accident that sees both of them out for the season with broken heads, shoulders, knees and toes. If ManUre drop points, I want the players to be thinking of the ground we can make up; I want them to have the passion to get a result, see it out to the end, and close the gap on the league leaders.
What I don’t want is the Barça game on anyone’s mind. Yes, of course, a certain Catalunian club captain may be looking forward to entertaining his boyhood hero Guardiola and his international team-mates Iniesta and Xavi more than he’s looking forward to the company of Karl Henry and Mick McCarthy, but the Premiership title is still up for grabs, and there’s a job to be done against the bruisers from the Black Country.
And a bruising game is what I expect to see tomorrow. It must be noted that Wolves are the ultimate giant-killers this season, marking victories over ManUre, Chelski and Liverpool. I hope our hunger for the top spot in the league and desire to put right what went so badly wrong against Newcastle prevail in the face of the European distraction on Wednesday night.
While Song and Djourou are potentially available, I suspect they may be granted further time to recuperate. Diaby is injured and suspended so Denilson will be in, while v Persie and Fabregas return from their mystery sickness, and “will be playing” according to the AW on official site. Rosicky is out after a groin strain he picked up on his way back from the bookies the Czech Republic.
So I expect something like:
Szczesny; Sagna – Squillaci – Koscielny – Clichy; Denilson – Fabregas – Wilshere; Arshavin – v Persie – Walcott
I’d very much like to see Chamakh get a start alongside v Persie. We really haven’t seen very much of the Moroccan since RvP came back from injury. Bendtner is also fit but will more likely than not warm the bench. He really works hard to earn all that money, doesn’t he? Please just don’t ever speak again, Nicklas. Every time he opens his mouth he endears himself less and less to me. I’d rather he did this more often, and had his mouth sewn together to prevent any more foot-in-mouth situations.
As for the odds, it’s hard to find value with the best odds on a home win little over 1/5, reflecting the view of my Chelski-supporting work colleague who thinks we’ll “romp away with it”. But I fear for Wolves’ physicality and our players having half a mind on Wednesday night. And I fear for complacency in our ranks. We’ve also conceded far too much at set pieces this term and I can see that trend continuing, especially if Squillaci partners Koscielny at the back. No, I’m not a fan. Being fair, he should only now be completely used to the Premiership. Anyway, I’ve plumped for a 3-1 win at 21/2 with Unibet, but I put a few sly pennies on 6-0 with William Hill at 50/1. As for first goalscorer, I’m going for our bonkers little Russian at 6s with Bet365.
At 1pm tomorrow I’ll be praying for Citeh and their over-priced, money-grabbing w*nkers to get one over their neighbours. At 3pm, I’ll be praying that the team have got Citeh’s 4-0 mauling of ManUre firmly in the front of their minds. Sorry Arsène.
Come on you gooners!
Arsenally Yours,
Will