Morning all.
It’s quiet, a tension inside each and every Arsenal fan I’m sure. We’re so close but not yet close enough to feel overly confident. At least I’m not. Hopeful of course but tomorrow’s opponents have hurt us before.
Can Brentford achieve something special later today I wonder? Unlikely perhaps but with European football still a possibility for the London club, I’m pretty sure they will try.
This is often a strange time in the season as the campaign draws to a close. Recent seasons have offered hope for a Premier League title only to see that hope crash and burn before the end of May. The domestic cups have bought no joy either, not since Mikel Arteta’s first season so to be into the second week of May.
Perhaps the years of League disappointment have conditioned me into expecting nothing as not even now, with three League games to go and holding a two point advantage, do I truly believe we’ll get over the line. Perhaps it’s just a simple case of self preservation.
West Ham are a funny old club. Since the turn of the year they’ve have a mixed bag of results. They’ve suffered defeat at the hands of Chelsea, Wolves and Nottingham Forest, yet they’ve also taken a point off of both Manchester Club and Bournemouth whilst beating Everton in their last home game. Admittedly, Brentford battered them last weekend at the Gtech Stadium but the Hammers are better playing in front of their home fans. Yes, that’s what concerns me.
Our last two performances have been little short of brilliant albeit in different ways. Having swept away Fulham with consummate ease on Saturday evening, we won a difficult game on Tuesday against Atletico Madrid, the club which previously dumped Barcelona out of the Champions League.
Four more performances like either in those two fixtures is what’s needed now and yes, if the victories do come, celebrate them as you, I or the players wish. The celebration police can take a long walk off a very short pier as far as I’m concerned. Something Mikel Arteta alluded to in his press conference yesterday.
A factoid for both West Ham and Arsenal fans. Ron Greenwood has been at both clubs. Not as a player but as a coach, a role he took up after retiring from the playing side of the game.
After coaching at what I would call smaller clubs in the game, he was picked up by England in 1957. Not only England though as he’d joined the coaching team at Arsenal before becoming assistant manager under George Swindin. Four years later, he moved to West Ham and became their manager. Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Martin Peters – no wonder Greenwood enjoyed success. The FA Cup in 1964 and the European Cup Winners’ Cup in 1965 – the first two major trophies of their history. Ironically, Greenwood’s final season with West Ham saw them finish 18th, one point off of relegation. Perhaps six points from the final two fixtures will see them safe too.
Having managed England, Greenwood retired from football after the 1982 World Cup when he was replaced by the late, great Bobby Robson, but Greenwood made history by selecting the first black player for England – Viv Anderson, in 1978. Greenwood stated: “Yellow, purple or black – if they’re good enough, I’ll pick them”.
Viv Anderson was certainly good enough, so good Arsenal signed him six years later…
Catch up in the comments.
Good morning Rico, bright, sunny and warm today, even though there is a hint of chilliness creeping in when thinking about the final run in. We’re not quite in the home straight yet.
I enjoyed the post, thank you.
Ps, Potter check my last comment on yesterday’s post re 1971.
Morning Cicero, thanks.
Very warm and sunny here but feels like a storm could be lurking. A day gardening for me..
Arsenal Women two nil up away to Aston Villa after 38 mins. Three point today guarantees Champions League football for our girls next season.
Viv Anderson. Nice to remember.
Have a nice day!
3 – 0 to the Arsenal, Champions League guaranteed for next sea so with two games to spare. 🔔🔔🔔 and another clean sheet.
Rugby Union now, it’s over to the Women’s Six Nations England vs Italy
It seems everyone has gone to the beach. 😎
It’s that time of the season Cicero…
Well I didn’t expect Everton to do us any favours last week and I was wrong, they took two points off them. I can only hope that Brentford do something similar this evening.
Ditto…
0 – 0 half-time, so far so good as the bloke who fell off the twenty story building was heard to say as he passed the fifteenth floor.
Everything that goes to VAR in favor of M.city is validated.
Thanks Rico. A nice honouring of Ron Greenwood. Great photo’s of the legends that are Eddie Hapgood and George Male, and “Spider”. I recall his long legs in those short shorts eating up the Highbury turf.
Brentford have done well but at 0-2 with five to go I can’t see a favour eventuating.
Cicero, you’ll have to tell us more about your trip to the Lane in ’71. I recall reading GN5’s memories of the occasion and have watched the grainy black and white film so many times, but I love first hand accounts.
Cicero , Yes I was on the shelf when Kennedy got the header. It was chaos outside the ground and I along with many others jumped the turnstile as the bell rang.
A story you might enjoy , my wife worked for a Spurs supporter in a firm in Radlett. I asked him if she could leave an hour early so that I could go to the match. He said no , and she worked until 5 pm . When I picked her up to drive to our flat in St Albans she said that he had left at 4 and was going. It took about 20 minutes to get there and I jumped on my Triumph motor bike and just made it in time. The bike was able to get through the traffic but his car ( a Rolls Royce) couldn’t and he did not get in .
Karma at it’s best
I have to add my wife left his company a few weeks later.
Ha! That’s brilliant, Potter. The Triumph trumps the Rolls. Where was your flat in St Albans? Mine was a maisonette in Heritage Close.
Potter, that was awesome. It made me chuckle. I was imagining you weaving around cars while he was stuck. Serves him right. I hope Arsenal won that day. But the thought of the Triumph triumphing over a Rolls is quite something.
Good evening Rico and all.
Lovely post Rico. Thanks for giving us an overview of how we get along with WHU. Hopefully we win and increase our GD
City won 3-0. And in spite of all the doomers we are still top with plus 2 points and with a plus 1 goal difference.
Potter, 1971 (exclusive HH):
😉
If we win every remaining game it doesnt matter what City do. We are our own answer. Can we handle the pressure?? This time destiny is in our hands. The refs cannot carry them (although I am not holding my breath) for every remaining game like they have done today. Two occasions at 0-0 where the last man fouled a player clean on goal.
Win tomorrow against WHU. City have to play three games in 8 days although the final itself will be a walkover imo. They will batter them.
Marshalswick Stuart , moved to Sandridge a bit later and had many a drink in the Wicked Lady
I was just looking through Google at several of the lists they have of Arsenal blogs, Highbury Library is one example and Highbury House I’m afraid was notable by its complete absence, it’s almost as if we’re now pretty much ignored, cancelled even?
Yet there are many many blogs named that have closed down years ago included and others that aren’t really blogs at all. It’s all rather strange and quite selective even, you know it’s as if our faces don’t fit…
Anyway, feck ‘em….
We were in the centre of town for the most part but did have a happy year with a family in Sandpit Lane before I got married. In the summer we’d frequent The Fighting Cocks or The Six Bells, winter we’d tuck up in the White Swan. Astonishing the house prices there, now…
Smells of conspiracy, Kev. Not too much wrong with being the best kept secret, tho’.
test
Morning all.
I didn’t realise that Kev. Not sure why HH isn’t on google, it should be..
New post up now.
Stuart Noel Angus, hi, how long ago did you live in St. Albans? There’s a good chance we may have bumped into each other. Until 10 years ago a lived in London Conley my entire life (since 1980) and apart for a few years away at uni, worked mainly in St. Albans Pubs and restaurants and, if you were there at the time, was a manager at the big Blockbuster on London Rd. When I read High Fidelity I was weirded out by how many places I seemed to know that Nick Hornby described… Until a learned he was from Watford🤷 it’s easy to forget how local a club Arsenal is especially now we can speak to so many fans internationally.😊