Arsenal America

The Arsenal I grew up with were not the most flamboyant team in the League. They certainly never played the best football but they did compete for every game they played in. The Arsenal of old treated every game as if survival depended on the result. They won games they shouldn’t have and they never gave up trying during a game. The Arsenal of the present era can at times play mesmerizing football that literally takes your breath away. When the team clicks and works as a single unit the style of football is reminiscent of the total football of the fantastic 1970’s Dutch teams.

The most alarming aspect of modern Arsenal is that when one of the cogs of the machine is not working at full capacity the machine breaks down and the result is ugly to the human eye.

Football fans in England migrate to the pub on a Friday night to down a few pints after a hard week and to mingle and discuss the upcoming fixtures at the weekend with the lads. There is rarely any footy on the television on a Friday night. Those with expensive dishes can pick up a French game or a Second Division English game but the big boys of the premiership are usually spared any Friday night games. The money boys of Sky T.V have been arguing for years that Friday night games are good for the sport. The owners of Newcastle do not agree as their team played a UEFA cup game earlier in the week and they wanted an extra days rest or two before playing Arsenal. Sky T.V couldn’t resist the prospect of pubs packed to the rafters all staring at the big screen watching expensive commercials before, during and after the game. They also said it was good for the pubs for them to earn extra revenue. The truth is pubs are packed Friday night regardless of whether football is on or not. It is all about money and spreading out Football to encompass three nights of the weekend.

So Highbury was open for business on a Friday night for the first time that I can remember. We played Liverpool in 1989 in the season finale on a Friday night, but that was at Anfield. Arsenal needed a solid performance free of controversy and most of all we needed three points form a struggling Newcastle team. Arsenal were again in front of the spotlight and the jury was out on our boys to see how they would play and behave following the Old Trafford fiasco. We responded magnificently resembling the Arsenal of old. We fought for every ball. closing down the opposition and the players had the look of a team that really wanted to win. Even the early set back of injuries to key players did not deter us from completing the task. Newcastle played well at times and threatened the Arsenal goal with effective play by Robert and by the annoying Shearer. I must say that the aging Alan Shearer has slowed down somewhat but his number of fouls per minute he commits behind the referees’ back is still at a very high level. He really is a cheating, moaning , fraudulent player who gets away with so much more than any Arsenal player could dream of.

Both of our first two goals were scrappy and born out of defensive errors on the part of Newcastle. The best goal of the game was Newcastle’s second goal which Lehmann could do nothing to prevent. It looked is if we were about to squander another two points at home against a resilient defensive team when we were HANDED the win in a bizarre fracas in the Newcastle penalty area. The golden rule for defending against a set piece in your own penalty area is, when you jump for a header, keep your arms down. Instead Jenas did his best impression of conducting the London Symphony Orchestra during a rendition of (excuse the pun) HANDel’s “Joy to the World.” When Henry converted the penalty and we hung on for a 3-2 win it certainly felt like a joyful world. We battled on with no Vieira, no Cole and 1/3 of a Freddie but it didn’t matter since the Arsenal of Old had come out for a rare appearance on a Friday night . Let’s hope they can stay for a bit and help out.