Morning all.
Nobody that day, not the referee, the fans, nor Arsene Wenger himself, just why he was sent off late in the game. Turned out it was for kicking a water bottle after RvP had what would have been an equalising goal ruled out for offside. No seats available, so Arsene Wenger took to the stands and stood tall and the above photograph soon hit all the back pages to become famous for all sorts of reasons. As Arsene Wenger said just recently, it was funny, but would have been funnier had it not been him in the picture. I thought it was great, back then and still today.
The decision to send him off though was ridiculous and soon after the game the League Managers Association chief executive Richard Bevan made this statement:
“I’ve spoken to (PGMOB chief) Keith Hackett and he fully recognises the situation was an error and an apology will follow to Arsene Wenger.
“Lee Probert totally failed to manage the situation and created a needless pressure point taking the focus away from the pitch in a big event with only a minute to go.”
And the referee was – Mike Dean who probably couldn’t wait to act on Hacketts advice. The man who over the years has really been a thorn in Wenger’s side, Arsenal’s side because seldom did he miss an opportunity to influence a game to go against us. Kevin Friend has the privilege to officiate the last ever battle between Utd and Arsenal under Wenger later today.
I say battle but I doubt it will be as the days of us and them doing battle are long gone. The last being the infamous ‘Battle of the Buffet’ back in October 2004. Mike Riley, the now orchestrator of Dean and co, was the man who’d spent hours before kickoff climbing out of Fergies back pocket. Clearly he didn’t quite make it as he overlooked bad tackles including Rio Ferdinand on Fredrik Ljungberg in the 19th minute and Ruud van Nistelrooy’s studs-up challenge on Ashley Cole but couldn’t wait to point to the penalty spot after Wayne Rooney tumbled over Sol Campbell’s leg. Van Nistelrooy converted the penalty kick and before the end, Rooney scored for 2–0 and our 49-match unbeaten run was over. It shouldn’t have been.
Looking back, that’s kind of when Arsene Wenger’s successful days were at the beginning of the end. The following season we beat Utd in the FA Cup which to this day still makes me smile when I think of Scholes penalty miss.
Anyway, I doubt today will see the usual feisty touchline exchanges between Wenger and Mourinho. Utd will want to win in order to secure second place in the league but for Arsenal, it’s all about Thursday evening in Spain.
Arsene Wenger has already hinted that he’ll rotate his players ahead of that tie with Atlético and who could blame him. No injuries is all what matters today, although it would be great to see Wenger leave OT with three points in his very deep pockets and have the last word in what’s been a lengthy and frosty spat with Mourinho…
Have a good Sunday guys…
It seems that Ozil, Ramsey , Lacazette , Mustafi , Koscielny and Wilshere were not on the train to Manchester. So it looks like a day for giving our yoof some p[ractice and hopefully not a hangover that they will never get over. Wenger has always had tendency when playing understrength teams to over do it. Mourinho and his baying hoardes are just the ones to take advantage and make Wenger’s last trip quite memorable.
Not neccessarily for the right reasons.
Arsene Wenger has included five youngsters in his travelling squad for tomorrow’s game at Manchester United, with right-back Jordi Osei-Tutu amongst those included.
Konstantinos Mavropanos, Joe Willock, Reiss Nelson and Eddie Nketiah have also made the trip.
Jorge Bird.
Should still be a few experienced players in there with the younger ones. Perhaps Mourinho will go easy on us on this one occasion. Lol
Morning all. Match day is here again.
Assuming manure win today, it will be against a team of children and not so important adults. Any success for the northern hordes will surely be no more than a Pyrrhic victory. The little one may try to turn it into something more crucial than the result, what ever it is. Or, he may be conciliatory given our second leg away at AL, he will be empathising with the old chap’s selection dilemma! I have noticed that since some of the moronic one’s derogatory public comments about other managers and their teams, that he has fallen rather silent on the criticism front. I suspect he has been muzzled by the manure board, and a good thing too.
I think the best we can hope for today, is that the team that is put out plays some decent football. A bit of one and two touch football would not come amiss. And we might even have a bit of a window into the future of some of the more talented youngsters. Here’s hoping.
On balance a draw would be an excellent outcome but, I fear that will be the best we can hope for.
The future is bright. The future is the resurrection of the Arsenal Football Club!
Gloomy and threatening black rain filled clouds here. Just waiting for the heavens to open……again!
hello there!
Arsenal second or third team. No surprise.
A.M play at Alavés (Vitória). Important game for be 2nd in La Liga and straigth ahead in the Champions next season
Good afternoon all. This is typical Wenger. Passes up opportunities to slowly blood the young players and then throws them in the deep end.
One or even two can be carried a bit to get their feet at the top level. Four or five is just not fair on either the players themselves (young and old) or the fans paying out good money to go and support the team. I can understand why he wants to rest players obviously but we have had a lot of meaningless games to give a the kids a bit more experience. Let’s hope they don’t get traumatised.
Afternoon all, certainly is an interesting team selection. Surprised Mikki is starting though, off the bench yes but.. hope he’s 100% fit…
Just like Thursday. Clear foul ignored leads to a goal. Referees are a joke
And denied a penalty again.
I can only remember us getting one penalty up there in my lifetime and Gilberto missed it!
Bergkamp? FA Cup semi final…
Oops, Villa Park…
So Xhaka gets booked but not one Utd player does despite their continual fouling..
How many fouls before Young gets booked.xhaka gets one
They didn’t deserve that
Good effort by the youngsters. .
Miki played well I thought, and good to go for Thursday. .
Ospina, Bellend, auba, xhaka underwhelming performance. .
Sanchez was really shit too. .lol
I guess the game had that end of the season feel.
Relieved we didn’t get spanked
I`m also relieved we didn`t get spanked, a sort of moral victory in a way…………………….
Thanks for post Rico.
I thought the team did well, especially the younger players…
Me too, rico
However, old Arsenal still there…
Why we not shoot?
Funeral today , typical weather for it.
catch up later.
Sorry to hear that Potter, hope the rain stays away..
Morning to you and all..
Morning Rico and all.
Odd how these last few games, since the announcement of his retirement, have been a condensed version of Arsene’s latter years. Dominating Athletico, failing to take enough chances and then getting mugged by a late goal through sloppiness. Then taking a very young team to a pedestrian Man Utd, playing the dour, attritional football Mourinho has made his own and losing to an injury time header from one of a series of high balls pumped into the box to Fellaini, whose first action had been to smash is renowned elbow into Ospina’s ribs. Throw in the sort of refereeing performance we have suffered up there for years with the missed foul in the build-up to their first goal and a couple of penalty shouts, the second of which looked a pen to me and the whole melodrama is almost complete.
This time it has been flavoured with the rather nauseating Mourinho trying to be nice and respectful yet looking pathetic while explaining how brilliant he is and how he has orchestrated the presentation before the game, the presence of Ferguson and of course the victory. Yuk.
I imagine that he had been told by the MU board that any of his usual sociopathic bile and general unpleasantness would reflect badly on his club.
Anyway, I thought the team played very well and it looks like we have some good players coming through.
Morning Adam.
Nicely put and spot on.
New post up now.
Morning All
Morning Rico and very well put Adam.
Match of the Day did their usual sanitising job on the highlights yesterday, even the radio commentary, who are traditionally anti-Arsenal mentioned incidents that MotD airbrushed from their highlights as Arsenal got roughed up, so good to see Xhaka and Mavrapanos giving some back to those northern wankers.
Wenger is a soft touch now, nobody has seen him as a threat for over 10 years so it’s easy to be all nicey nicey in those circumstances.
Andy Cole summed it up yesterday by basically hinting that the Man U crowd were taking the piss out of Wenger, United as a club whilst being massive financially are an empty vessel.
Anyone who has been to Old Trafford will know what I mean about them, a classless bunch of Northern inbreds, bereft of any culture and class.
Mourinho was made for them…