Eduardo makes successful return in 2-0 win

Eduardo successfully completed his return from ten months out on the sidelines, playing 45 minutes as Arsenal made light work of Portsmouth reserves, eventually coming through 2-0 winners and dominating the game throughout.

Obviously very rusty, the Croatian striker almost got the dream start to his comeback after just three minutes, a fantastic Wilshere through ball splitting the defence and leaving Eduardo one-on-one with the goalkeeper. He hesitantly turned inside the recovering centre back but went down under a soft challenge before he could apply the finishing touch.

There was plenty of possession for Arsenal, and Eduardo did link play well and made intelligent runs that were nearly picked out on another couple of occasions, but unfortunately the final ball was never perfect for the Brazilian born striker. But he did look very sharp even towards the end of the half, when he received the ball, turned nicely and curving the ball towards the bottom corner of the net, only for the massively framed Pompey goalkeeper to prevent the ideal comeback. The Croatian striker withdrew at half time with a slight strain, but he’ll be pleased with the workout which showed just how sharp he is despite the long lay off.

However, after the break the chances kept coming, and eventually the pressure told when Randall converted a fantastic pass from Fran Merida to take the lead, before Wilshere helped set up Kieran Gibbs for a brilliant drive into the top left corner. Overall a great work out for Eduardo and the fringe players which helped highlight some of the talent we have at the club, Jack Wilshere, Francis Coquelin and Fran Merida all impressing hugely on a good night out for the youngsters.

Football: When logic goes out the window

Being an Arsenal fan is rarely dull, and this season is no different to the rest I have experienced. However, it is probably the worst mix of emotions that I have encountered, and yesterday was no exception.

Arsenal, losers against Stoke City and Fulham already and missing Adebayor and van Persie,  versus Manchester United, European and domestic Champions. Even though it was at home, when I was telling the Man United fans I know that we would rip them apart, I was only really joking.

But such is the inconsistency of this team that even with the obvious weaknesses that we have throughout the side, give us a challenge that we must overcome just to avoid crisis talk, we will do it. And do it we did, with a fantastic performance that bewildered and stunned Arsenal fans in equal measure, defending well enough against some great United movement and offering a constant threat to the champions as well. Bendtner coul have scored twice, but so could United and even though we shaded it we could just as easily have lost if Arsenal hadn’t got the first goal, a good volley by Nasri that was deflected past van der Sar.

We got to half time still in the lead but I was still very nervous of the Ferguson team talk that would surely fire his team up enough to grab at least a share of the points. But surprisingly for me, Arsenal came out the traps second half with great confidence, and soon a second goal beckoned. A fantastic move ended with a fantastic pass to that man Nasri again, the Frenchamn scoring with a thumping finish to send Gunners fans around the world wild. 

Ronaldo should have scored immediately and it could still have been so different, but it wasn’t. Despite a hugely tense finale when Rafael scored a magnificient goal late on, we could have increased our lead even as United sought to end it, and the three points were well deserved. Maybe now we could find consistency… please?

Bischoff continues comeback in style

I have now seen two and a half games of his slow recovery from long term injury, and I am starting to like what I see in him. He was Man of the Match in my book yesterday as a solid reserves outfit beat Fulham 2-0, thanks to a wonderful Bischoff goal in the first half followed by an assist for Fonte to slot home to double the lead.

What you immediately notice about Bischoff is the simplicity with which he plays the game. He is not the biggest and will probably need to toughen up a bit if he is going to play in the Premiership, but he rarely makes contact with other players in any case, with a fluid and simplistic style not unlike Hleb’s in some ways, although Bischoff plays even more one touch football than Hleb did it seems. However, he is still very much finding his feet and it’s a long shot to suggest whether he will ever reach the heights of the former Arsenal winger, though last nights performance suggests if he stays injury free this year there may be a place for him at Arsenal yet..

But certainly with his patient link up play I can see him being a decent option for the bench, certainly he can be a far better option for the wings than Diaby and Eboue in time. And if there was any sign that Bischoff has the talent that is needed to succeed, then it lies in the goal he scored last night. A corner was headed clear by the Fulham defence, falling to Bischoff who controlled it well enough with the first touch and with his second produced a great flick over the onrushing defenders head before half volleying a cracking effort into the net.

He grew with confidence after that and several of his cross field passes and through balls could have resulted in good opportunities. And one of those passes paid off when Bischoff, in space on the right, saw Fonte in space inside the box and picked him out with a great ball, which Fonte chose to chest down before the Portuguese striker finished with aplomb.

Overrall the reserves played slightly within themselves, with some poor performances from the likes of Lansbury, Simpson and Merida not really complimenting the good displays from Rodgers, Bischoff and the Frenchman Coquelin who again proved he has what it takes to be a tough tackling defensive midfielder with the same crunching tackles followed by that loping run while driving forward with the ball that Vieira was famous for. And if the 17 year old can become just a fraction of what Paddy was he’ll be some player.

My Ratings:

Mannone – 7 – Made a couple of good saves, messed up when trying to punch a ball at one stage though. He’s a fantastic shot stopper and sweeper, but hasn’t completely managed to get rid of his nervousness with crosses.

Hoyte – 7 – Decent performance, obviously isn’t very good in the oppositions half but great pace for recovery tackles and intercepted a good few diagonal passes out wide as well. Definitely less of a liability at right back. 

Ayling – 7.5 – Excellent positioning and good interceptions, wouldn’t be very confident about him defending a high ball given his height but a very neat and tidy game.
Rodgers – 8 – We’re slowly pushing Rodgers out of the club it seems and I just don’t understand why. He is a proper defender, exactly the style of defender Arsenal don’t have enough of. No, he isn’t the best ball playing centre half but he does make brilliant tackles and positionally he’s not bad either.
Ogogo – 6 – Out of place at left back in the 1st half, and gives the ball away a bit too much as well.

Bischoff – 8 – Very clever, technically gifted and links up play excellently. Great goal and a good assist.
Coquelin – 8 – Gets stuck in and wins tackles better than I’ve seen any young player at the club do for some time, despite the fact he isn’t actually that big he is very strong for his size.
Merida – 6 – Off and on, as always with Merida for the reserves. Over complicates things sometimes and I am not quite sure whether the determination is really there for the reserves.Lansbury – 5 -  Struggled like he has done a lot this season. Massive talent, will he fulfill it?

Simpson – 6 – Always gets a 10 for effort, he is living the dream playing for Arsenal. Unfortunately doesn’t really seem to have the talent to match the passion.
Fonte – 7 – Great finish for the goal, needs to get involved in play more.

Substitutes:
Sunu – 7 – Strong running, sometimes keeps hold of the ball too long though.
E-Thomas – 6 - Unfortunately played at left back rather than centrally (midfield or defence) so wasn’t as involved as he is for the U18s. 

Frimpong – 6 – Could be a monster in the future when he bulks up more, decent passing range as well.

Arsenal vs Real Madrid – 1st team starting to look promising

I have got to say, the trip to the Emirates yesterday was fantastic. It represented for me the proper return to football after the summer, despite seeing other friendlies on TV, there is no substitute to actually being there to support your team. It also represented a glimpse at what wenger has in mind for the opening match of the season, as bar Cesc Fabregas and Kolo Toure, no-one else will return before the match at West Brom and indeed the Champions League qualifier against the The Wally with a Brolly himself.

The Team:

————————- Almunia ————————-

Sagna ———– Gallas ———— Senderos ——— Clichy

Walcott ———- Diaby ———— Denilson ——— Nasri

—————– van Persie ——————————

—————————– Adebayor ——————

Back to the Real Madrid game and I thought that overall Arsenal played excellently throughout against a fairly rusty Real madrid side, with numerous positives that we can take out of it.

First of all, it was far more like a proper Premiership match than even the two previous friendlies which were higher in tempo. It was very competitive, tackles came in and passing had to be crisp and fast paced. Early on Arsenal got at Real Madrid, with the right flank pairiing of Sagna and Theo Walcott looking far better than anything we have seen so far from Eboue and Sagna all last season. Hopefully Wenger will take note and not hesitate to give Theo a first team place.

Robin van Persie, dropping deep, picked up the ball and played a wonderful exchange of passes between himself and Adebayor before picking out Theo Walcott storming into the box. The young Englishman’s shot was well saved by Dudek, but it proved to be a sign of things to come for Arsenal as they continued to press.

Gael Clichy was played in down the left and he blazed over with a speculative effort, before more wonderful football led to Nasri playing in van Persie with a delightful through ball, only for the Dutchman’s perfect cross being wastefully headed wide by Adebayor. Theo Walcott was next to get a chance, combining with van persie and using his pace and trickery to get enough space to striker at goal. Unfortunately his finishing was wayward on this occcasion. The first half action had not ended yet though and an Arsenal-like mistake from a corner by the La Liga Champions gave Adebayor a looping headed chance that was only just saved by the former Liverpool keeper Jerzy Dudek.

As they came in still level at half time, the most impressive aspect from my point of view was the link up play between the full backs and wingers. Nasri and Clichy, good friends off the field, were combining just as well as Sagna and Walcott were on the opposite flank, and if this trend continues we could once more have the fantastic attacking play we had from Ljungberg and Pires not so many years ago. Not only that, defensively both wingers work very hard, Walcott enjoying a great tussle with Robinho throughout the half. Of course, Sagna and Clichy have already established themselves as majestic attacking and defensive full backs so it should be great to see how these four do this season.

Half Time: Arsenal 0 – 0 Real Madrid

The second half began well for Arsenal, with Real Madrid threatening no more than they did in the first and things got immediately better when van Persie was clattered by Salgado in what was a very stupid foul to give away in a penalty box and something you don’t expect from someone of Salgado’s experience. Nevertheless, the referee pointed to the spot and Adebayor stepped up to blast the ball into the top corner with fantastic technique. The Togolese striker wasn’t finished there either, and after some dubious badge-kissing he set about taking on the entire Real Madrid team and almost came out on top, only just seeing his shot go fractions wide. With more moments like these, Adebayor can start to win back belief by the fans in him.

Before Adebayor made his fine individual run, Denilson, working brilliantly and tirlessly in midfield (unlike his partner in the centre) had forced a comfortable save from Dudek. Less comfortable was Almunia a little later, having to punch the ball away from van Nistlerooy’s shot. But the Spaniard was very rarely troubled in a fairly one-sided game.

The young guns appeared from the bench after this, with Bendtner, Vela, Ramsey and Wilshere coming on to try to impress Wenger in the last quarter of the game or so. And Wilshere did exactly that, bursting down the left and cutting past the depairing attempt of a foul by Javi Garcia, producing a good dinked ball which Bendtner could only direct into the side netting. Had Bendtner been in the middle and not the diminutive Vela, the big Dane could easily have scored from a header from a fantastic cross.

Full Time: Arsenal 1 – 0 Real Madrid

So a very good work out all in all for what looks to be Wenger’s preferred 11 of the players he has available currently. Obviously Fabregas will come in, and judging by performances thus far it will be Denilson and not Diaby that gets the nod as his partner in midfield, barring any signings that Wenger makes. Toure I should think will come back in for Senderos, although it seems to me that the big Swiss deender could form a partnership with Gallas to rival the Toure/Gallas one, particularly against the bigger, physical team that lack the pace to trouble him.

Match ratings:

Manuel Almunia – 6 - Average game, didn’t have to do very much against a bit of a toothless Real Madrid attack. Slightly dodgy for the 50/50 against Raul which could have been given as a penalty, although I’m not sure there was much contact there.

Bacary Sagna – 8 - Fantastic defender, battles with the very best of them and attacks very well. Always an option to pass to and gives a bit of momentum to the side when he comes forward. Having been one of the earlier players to come back in pre-season, he looks fully fit and raring to go.

William Gallas – 7.5 - Composed game from the captain, like the goalkeeper wasn’t overly worked but positionally was excellent and helped out Senderos a couple of times.

Phillippe Senderos – 7 – A couple of mistakes positionally against the wily Raul, but made up for it with commanding headers throughout.

Gael Clichy – 8 - See Sagna. Fantastic full back, and fully fit aftr not playing any internationals in the summer. Thank you Raymond Domenech.

Theo Walcott – 8 - Stunning first half performance, dwindled lightly in the second half but still very impressive. His speed is so dangerous to sides, but his overall passing play is improving a lot, although a couple of telegraphed passes still creep into his game. Another of the players who I would say is fully ready for the season ahead.

Abou Diaby – 4 - Unfortunately looked easily the weakest link in the team. Of course he is behind many of the others in pre-season preparations, but I still expected more from him. I can’t see how defensively he will be able to be Cesc’s partner in midfield, while the amount of unforced errors he makes is inexcusable. But I will wait until the Amsterdam Tournament to really see how he can perform for us this season, as an unfit player does make mistakes of course. Horrible tackle on Sneijder which was a disgrace.

Denilson – 7.5 - Calm, assured in defence, didn’t give away his normal silly fouls in dangerous areas, and he is basically a deep lying playmaker with the ball at his feet. Him and Fabregas will be great against most opposition, but I wonder whether he may be found out against the very best teams defensively?

Samir Nasri – 8 - Very impressed with our new signing.  He is great on the ball, I don’t think I saw him give the ball away once. He is also pretty direct and I expect fairly big things from him this season. I certainly don’t think we will miss Hleb one bit.

Robin van Persie – 7.5 - Very clever as usual, always playing the difficult through ballas and passes with complete ease. But will he stay fit? That is defeinitely the question.

Emmanuel Adebayor – 8 - Such a big unit for defences to handle, and quick with it. Of course he will be a threat for us this season, and hopefully he’ll win us all round once again by scoring a hat trick at White Hart Lane. Just a shame he didn’t just sign a contract at the beginning of the transfer season instead of being ill advised by his agent.

Substitutes:

Emmanuel Eboue – 5 - Didn’t do much bar give the ball away to be honest. I preferred him in the defensive midfield role against Stuttgart! I strongly believe Nasri, Walcott, Rosicky, Vela and even Wilshere are ahead of him in ability on the wing. Despite everyone wanting him out of the club though, he is a decent squad player, and big clubs are always in need of them.

Jack Wilshere – 7.5 - From the short space of time he was in the pitch, he made a very good impact, keeping the ball well, drawing fouls and getting stuck into players who have been there and done it all. Each Wenger press conference has seen the manager give him more and more praise, I think he is very quickly bringing himself into contention for a first team subs place this season. He has the same spark that Fabregas had at his age, and there is no higher compliment than that for a 16 year old.

Carlos Vela – 6 - Quiet but made some good runs behind the Real defence.

Nicklas Bendtner – 6 - Causes trouble for defences and links up well with Vela. Does take a while to get into games though.

Johan Djourou – N/A - On for about 30 seconds…

Arsenal coast past Reading

Football is a strange old game. A month ago we would have considered this a simple three points to carry on in our relentless bid to win the Premiership title. Yesterday morning, I was hoping for a win just to make sure third place was more or less sealed…

And while we did play well enough to beat a poor reading side, I can’t help feeling that the whole match just proved one of our main weaknesses in the past few months – our conversion of chances. We had 68% possession, 20 shots and 12 corners. How many goals did we score? 2. That is simply not good enough for a top four team, and I’m not sure how we can really improve this ratio. Is it just the fact that some teams have better luck? Or is it that we have appalling finsihers up front? I think that certainly van Persie should have scored a couple, but he did hit the bar and the post with one shot, and we had a ball cleared off the line, while Walcott also hit the bar in the match. It is those tiny differences that have caught us out this season, yesterday it was only the difference between 2-0 and 6-0, but at places like Birmingham, Old Trafford and Anfield, it has proved the difference between taking all three points or not, and also the difference between a successful side and a side whose season has finished in April.

Nevertheless, there were other positive things to take out of yesterday’s game. Theo Walcott proved that he can make a difference as a starter, skipping past Reading players and causing them problems. Adebayor showed the doubters once again that he can be a top striker. And Alex Song definitely illustrated what a changed player he has become this season, even in his less favoured position of centre back.

Having pressured for the first half, we found ourselves 2-0 up with goals from Adebnayor and a deflected Gilberto effort at half time, and we never looked like giving up the lead from there. The second half continued in the same fashion throughout the second half as well, with van Persie’s superb free kick that came off the bar and then the post being the closest Arsenal came to a third goal, although as I mentioned earlier, Theo Walcott was played through only for his left foot shot to hit the top of the bar, and when Fabregas was put one-on-one with the goalkeeper for the second time in the match, he too couldn’t convert, with Duberry blocking his shot on the line and leaving Arsenal settle for the 2-0 result.

Alexander Hleb could well be in trouble after he petulantly slapped Graham Murty in the face in an off-the-ball incident, and if he is banned for three games, it is all that he deserves for the blatant stupidty that he showed in doing that. It’s a shame that such a good player feels the need to do that sort of thing with the game won, and he will be punsihed deservedly for it.

Why?!

I really still don’t understand, and its been almost 24 hours since the game began, how we managed to lose that tie. I haven’t got a clue where to begin, but begin I shall.

The match started with only one team in it, with the fantastic atmosphere we can only dream of hearing at the Emirates giving us the impetus it seemed, rather than intimidating the players. This was just as I had thought, and as we ran rings around the far less technical Liverpool players I thought we were in for a fantastic European night for Arsenal. This feeling was strengthened further when Diaby deservedly gave Arsenal the lead, with fantastic one touch build up play leading to Adebayor’s cut back being smothered by Reina, but only as far as Flamini, who expertly controlled and distributed to Fabregas, who passed to Hleb who passsed to Diaby who scored. 1-0 to the Arsenal then, and we didn’t stop there.

Oh no, we started to humiliate our opponents with our sublime range of passing into feet, working the ball wide, working the ball left and creating a couple of decent chances, and with another couple of nearly-chances with the final ball just not appearing. But, just as with Arsenal’s season, as it started to look too good to be true, it was bought crashing down to Earth. Liverpool had a corner swept into the middle to Hyypia, who had somehow outfoxed Senderos to head home completely unmarked, despite Fabregas’ best efforts to block the ball with his head on the line. Flamini then was forced off with an injury, and replaced by Gilberto, making Arsenal seem to have something missing in the midfield, with the mobility of that area of the pitch halved by the Brazilian’s introduction. Liverpool had some possession, and a lot of long balls that were coming back to Liverpool players, but they couldn’t muster a chance between them, and so the half ended all square.

The second period started how the first had ended, plenty of possession for Liverpool with the ball seemingly unable to stick to an Arsenal player for longer than a few seconds at a time. But Liverpool lacked the invention to harm Arsenal and Eboue could and should have made them pay when played into the area by Toure, but for some reason Eboue found himself lacink any footballing intelligence, something which is vital in these situations, and duly shot from an impossible angle rather than cross the ball with reina out of position. Of course, as has been the case in the last month or so, we are inevitably punished for these misses, and when Torres recieved the ball in the area, who then swivelled and shot in to the top corner with barely a hint of movement from either the two Arsenal players with him or the Arsenal keeperit seemed as though we didn’t actually want to stop him from scoring.

But soon we had a chance to equalise. The goal had spurned us on to play better once again, and Adebayor should have scored when a ball towards van Persie ran on into the box to the unmarked Adebayor, who took a hopeful swipe at the ball which, obviously, missed the target hopelessly. But all was not lost (yet) as Walcott had other ideas. Up against the team he supported, he recieved the ball on the edge of his own box, before skipping past one challenge after another, showing lightning pace, before cutting the ball back in the opposite box to which he started the move from, into Adebayor’s path who couldn’t possibly have missed if he had tried. Arsenal should have then closed out the game, Theo Walcott playing on the counter for a killer goal to seal a momentous victory that would have seen the teenager finally hailed for what he is – a potential star of the world game.

But again as with the latter part of this season, nothing ever goes according to plan – within a minute of Theo’s wonderful assist, we were behind again, and there would be no going back this time. Toure was pointlessly jumping around behind Babel when there was a covering Arsenal defender who could have dealt with the situation almost certainly, and Babel, an Arsenal fan, took the decision of falling down. Had this been at the Emirates last week, Babel would have had more chance of a yellow card for diving than a penalty for his fall, but up stepped the referee to deliver the killer blow to Arsenal’s hopes this season.

Gerrard shot and Almunia got absolutely nowhere near a fantastic penalty, and with time running out we were found with all our players in Liverpool’s box bar Fabregas, who was on the right wing just inside his own half, the ball wasplayed through and Babel, despite having a huge advantage over Fabregas in terms of pace, only just managed to get to Almunia to stroke it past him before the young Spaniard arrived to see all Arsenal hopes diminish.

Match ratings: Arsenal 1 – 1 Liverpool

Seems a bit pointless to do a match report for such a half hearted match, so i will instead just post match ratings.

Manuel Almunia - 5 – Did well enough, maybe could have done more with the goal though.
Justin Hoyte – 4 - Just not at it for mst of the match, needs games to improve and while he’s not getting games he won’t improve, so at the very least a loan spell is a must.
Kolo Touré - 4 - Keeps making little mistakes we’re not used to seeing from him.
William Gallas – 6 - Did alright, our most solid defnder easily.
Armand Traore – 5.5 - Terrible first half, much better in the second half. As I write this he is battering Tottenham’s Reserves on the left wing – he needs playing time but has massive potential. 

Gilberto Silva - 6 - Did a tidy job in the second half, far better than he has done in other games he has featured in.
Mathieu Flamini – 6.5 - Tried very hard as ever, didn’t look half as tired as Fabregas did, but didn’t quite cut it going forward.
Cesc Fabregas – 5.5 - Drifted in and out of the game, glimpses of the real Fabregas but generally poor. Must do better on Tuesday.
Emmanuel Eboue – 3 - Terrible yet again – doesn’t protect the defence enough, hasn’t got the quality at the other end either.
Theo Walcott – 6 - Poor first half, but did well in the second half once again.

Nicklas Bendtner – 6.5 - Should have scored two, but held the ball well and a good header for the equaliser.

Subs
Emmanuel Adebayor – 6.5 - Ran and ran, but didn’t really offer that much of an attacking threat.
Gael Clichy – 6 - Not much to say, wasn’t spectacular but wasn’t bad either.
Alexander Hleb – 5 - Vital moment to win the game and is control let him down for once. Typical.

Unlucky Arsenal can’t get around the parked bus

Arsenal were robbed yesterday. We had 58% possession, thirteen shots and six corners to Liverpool’s meagre 42% possession, just four shots and three corners.

Yet we drew the game 1-1.

Yes Liverpool played the game with as much purpose as you see teams have in pre-season friendlies, but we let this style of football beat us by not getting the result that we wanted, and perhaps even needed ahead of next weeks return leg at Anfield. We have simply got to improve our conversion of chances that come our way if we are going to progress, and a little bit of fortune to favour us would be nice after seeing numerous obvious decisions somehow not being noticed in the last month or so.

We started well and van Persie had a couple of shots go close, Adebayor also getting half chances. And with 24 minutes gone it was looking good for the Gunners, having scored our first, first half goal since the game against Blackburn in early February, with Adebayor heading home a great ball from van Persie indirectly from a corner. Another surprising statistic (I’m on a bit of a run with stats today) is that the goal from the corner is the fourth successive game in which we’ve scored from that particular type of set piece, which is an encouraging statistic. Now all we need to do is remember how to score from open play and we’ll be alright….

Unforgiveable sloppiness almost immediately gave back the initiative to Liverpool, three minutes after the opener Toure and Eboue both got clear chances to tackle Steven Gerrard before the Red’s captain entered the penalty area and crossed for Kuyt to bundle the ball home to equalise. Liverpool then put a bit of pressure on Arsenal before half time, although no clear cut chances were made by them really.

The second half belonged to Arsenal with Liverpool retreating so far back into their shell I doubt they will be coming back out again until next weeks match, meaning we’ll get exactly the same situation to deal with on Saturday, which will be more good practice for playing against lower opposition. Walcott had replaced van Persie at half time and showed more reasons why Eboue should be dropped in favour of the young Englishman, out on the left he created several moments of danger including a brilliantly hit drive going narrowly wide.

Then the most controversial part of the match happened. Hleb skipped past the challenges of about half the Liverpool team and was bearing down on goal when Kuyt clearly caught hold of Hleb, bringing the Belurussian to the ground. Clear penalty, but not as the referee saw it, who had decided to keep out of any situation that may force him into action of any kind. He could and should have dished out several cards to Arsenal and Liverpool players but bizarrely didn’t, presumably thinking the game would flow better if there were no cards, but if there was no point to booking playersthen surely Fifa would get rid of cards altogether?

After that Arsenal fizzled out to a large extent, with only one more clear cut chance falling to Fabregas, who duly got the ball beyond Reina but somehow Bendtner managed to stop the ball on the line and was subsequently ruled offside.

So all to do at Anfield, but with the showing yesterday I believe that we have what it takes to score at least one goal there, particularly if the mighty Reds venture out of defence….

Tired Arsenal produce a stunning comeback

 

Yesterday really felt like a do or die game for Arsenal’s season. I know that Bolton are a fairly poor team this year, and that the Premiership is no longer in our hands bar a miraculous turn of events, but like when we finally lost our unbeaten run in 2004, if we’d lost yesterday you could see us losing another four on the trot, with the trio of games against Liverpool followed by the game against Manchester United coming up next.

And at 2-0 down at half time, we looked down and out, despite dominating most of the half. We had spurned several good chances in the first twenty minutes or so, with van Persie looking direct and shooting on site, and Bendtner also getting chances, when Steinsson produced a great cross for the home team, which Taylor headed home having lost Toure at the back post. It got even worse soon, Diaby lunging in desperately in an effort to win possession after a scrappy period of play, but only succeeding  in getting sent off for his crude challenge. And by the time Flamini dwelt on the ball for 5 seconds too long and gave Taylor the opportunity to put Bolton 2-0 up, which he duly did, Arsenal looked tired and forlorn. Even when Flamini was given a fairly straight forward chance to amend for his error which he skied, there seemed little hope of a comeback – Bolton had the game in the bag.

Or so it seemed, especially when they then dominated the possession and threat against the ten men of Arsenal, and with half an hout left to play Wenger went to three at the back, throwing on Adebayor and Walcott in a last attempt to salvage something.

Within a few minutes Fabregas’ good delivery was flicked on by Campo straight to Gallas who made no mistake. Having held the lead comfortably for so long, somehow Bolton managed to self destruct as soon as Gallas’ shot hit the back of the net, and it wasn’t long before the Gunners were level. A lovely backheel from Adebayor set up Flamini whose shot was saved, but came out to the onrushing Hleb who was brought down by Cahill for a penalty. Up stepped van Persie who made absolutely no mistake.

And having got the second, a third seemed like it was destined to come, van Persie going close again and again, once after fantastic work by Walcott which highlighted his immense potential once more. And in the final seconds of normal time, Hleb darted into the area, slipped the ball to Fabregas, who, with the aid of two deflections scored a wondefully scrappy goal against the kings of winning ugly.

That win keeps us fighting in the league, but more importantly gives us belief and confidence ahead of the Liverpool triple header. I just hope that the players’ fitness can hold up with the fixture list, as key players’ absences or fatigue could cost us the season.

Arsenal 1 – 1 Middlesbrough

Four points in twelve games is clearly not title winning form, and when you look at the fixtures that we have had: Birmingham City, Aston Villa, Wigan and on Saturday the 1-1 draw against Boro’, these are all fixtures that we have gone into the match thinking that the most likely outcome would be three points. The fsum total of four points that we have got, then, are more than just disappointing – they are bordering on disaster.

And despite the three previous draws, I still travelled to the Emirates with all the optimism you could possibly want or need – the three points were virtually ours from where I was standing. And in the first ten minutes, we all but blew Boro’ away, with fantastic passing allied to direct running making Middlesbrough cling on to the match desperately. Adebayor had the ball in the net and the goal without a doubt should have stood – how you can be offside having been played through by an opposition player I will never know. Eboue then had a cross hit the crossbar and from that point you could see that luck was not with us.

But with Boro struggling to get out of their half, even with Arsenal’s passing and movement not flowing at its brilliant best we seemed assured of the win. But then we gave away a dubious free kick, which Schwarzer hit long towards the offside Aliadiere and the onside Tuncay, with the Turkish winger latching onto the ball and crossing for the now (apparently) onside Aliadiere to score against us, his former team.

The sighs were audible around the ground, and a familiar story that was repeated every week last season began to take shape as the first half slowly drew to a close.

Arsenal had all the pressure for all the second half, but were somehow kept at bay by Middlesbrough, while the referee showed signs of increasing incompetence. And I am not complaining about the ref because the result went against us – he made some terrible decisions against Boro as well, although as we had all the pressure obviously we had the worst of it. Van Persie came close with a left foot strike from outside the area, Fabregas had a header shave the post but the pressure still didn’t have any effect on the scoreline.

With five minutes remaining we got an undeserved corner as Eboue clearly fouled Young heading towards the by-line, and from the resulting superb delivery that Fabregas gave Toure was there to head in past the obstructed Schwarzer (obstructed by his own player I’d like to add). It was less than Arsenal deserved, but if you can’t take chances you will slip up again and again and we did that on Saturday. One thing is for sure – if we do not rise to the challenge of Chelsea with some effective football, we’ll be found dumped out of the title race before we play Liverpool in the Champions League in three weeks time.