Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News. Supporting the Lord Wenger in all he does » 2009 » September
Who owns Arsenal? Just don’t ask!Let me explain that headline. Arsenal, being an open club, all above board, honest and thoroughly middle class, there’s nothing to hide. Unlike some north western clubs we aren’t late with our reporting of our figures, and unlike most clubs we make a profit and don’t hide behind multiple company structures. But that is not how it is elsewhere – although you wouldn’t know if from the fuss made by the fact that Stan Kroenke has increased his stake in Arsenal to 28.7 per cent. You see, we can debate the relative merits of the Hill-Woods, Mr Usmanov, and Mr Kronke, the ousting of a director, the selling of shares, because none of it is secret. We can join the Arsenal Supporters Trust http://www.arsenaltrust.org/ and become part of the share owning supporters world. Which is certainly not the case with Liverpool (notoriously late with the publication of their financials and endlessly involved in bids and the use of money in all sorts of funny ways. Difficult things to build on time, these stadia). Our club activities are in accounts that make sense, which is not the case with Manchester U (profits and losses hidden here and there) and the Tiny Totts (where profits magically emerge each year no matter what goes on). But they are not the main problem. Not at all. The real problem lies in the gross negligence and incompetence of the football authorities in England such as the FA and the League. I’ll explain further. According to league rules, clubs have to be owned by fit and proper persons. Like the ex-prime minister of Thailand. Except in the case of Leeds and Notts C where no one (and that includes the footballing authorities in England, the tax authorities in the UK and my friend Bert who knows stuff) no one knows who owns them. Fit and proper person? As far as we know the owners are currently serving 30 years in an American jail for rape and mass terrorism. Not that I know they are – but I am just making the point. We haven’t got a clue. And here’s the twist – the footballing authorities in England have been quite happy to allow this to happen. “Fit and proper person? Well, its a bit of a gray area you know. When we find them we jump around a bit, but you know, it’s not as if it actually matters…” That’s how it goes – and I’ll prove it. Let’s take Leeds. That wonderful man, Ken Bates, said he made “an error” when he said in January this year that he jointly owned the club. Pesky thing this memory business. As when I was chatting up this lady at the dance club last weekend and I said that I owned the Eiffel Tower, well, yes, it was a bit of “an error”. Don’t quite know how I suggested I was a billionaire. I forgot my overdraft. Hey ho. Mr B told the courts in Jersey (lovely place) that he and Mr Murrin, effectively owned Forward Sports Fund, based in the Cayman Islands, and that they own Leeds. But then Mr B said “wooops” (well he didn’t say that but he might have done) and he said, actually he didn’t own any of Forward at all. Not a bean. Not a sausage. To say he did was (and I quote from his affidavet) “an error on my part”. Château Fiduciaire, financial administrators of Forward, based in Geneva (not far from where the England manager was based when he did things that led to his £6m fine by the Italian Finance Police for tax evasion) said the owners of Leeds will not be revealed. So since no one else wants to ask (because they are all too busy getting excited about Kronke) HOW DID THE FA AND/OR THE LEAGUE DO A FIT AND PROPER PERSON TEST ON LEEDS OWNERS WHEN NO ONE KNOWS WHO THEY ARE? Or put another way, how could the footballing authorities in England have let this slip? Or, having been hoodwinked in this way, WHEN ARE ALL THE FOOTBALLING AUTHORITIES IN ENGLAND GOING TO ADMIT THEY HAVE BEEN DUPED OR BRIBED, AND AS A RESULT RESIGN? Or is the court in Jersey going to do Mr Bates for perjury? But let’s not be too harsh on the footballing authorities in England. Tough job and all that. Happened once at Leeds, but won’t happen again. Except… No one knows who owns the company that owns the company that owns Notts County. Oh my! It looks like those jolly chaps who run football in England have been conned again. We ask, who owns Qadbak who claim they own Notts C and no one says a word. Even the Trust at Notts County that gave (yes gave) away all its shares doesn’t know who it gave them to, or why they couldn’t be paid for them. Or what Qadbak’s investments are (they boast of multibillion dollar investments – but no one knows where or what). OK, so what about the investors in Qadbak: the Shafi family and the Hyat family. What do they do, where do they work, where is their money? Or put another way, “who the f… are they?” Or even where they live? What jobs do they have? What industries are they in? It goes on, and it gets boring, but even little old me, sitting in my sitting room, with no resources other than the internet, recognise that when someone says that these two families have built their empires over 200 years that someone, somewhere would have written something about them. And when I find sweet F.A (to coin a phrase) I think, “hang on a moment… shouldn’t the sweet FA have got there before me? And when I can do this with just my resources how come the football authorities in England get conned? Could anyone be that stupid? Well, yes, I suppose they could. I make no allegation that anyone in the FA or League has been bribed. Not at all. I think they are just idiots. So as far as we know Leeds United and Notts County are owned by Al Qaeda. Or the Salvation Army. And I can say that because no one knows – at least no one associated with football. Maybe the clubs are elaborate money laundering organisations. Maybe they are owned by the Mafia. Or the Conservative Party. This is what should happen now. All the footballing authorities in England should resign at once, recognising that their position is utterly untenable. At best they have been made fools of. At worst they are part of the plot and have been turning a blind eye in return for cash. That I can say with certainty, because they clearly did not do and have not done the ownership tests they should have done on Leeds and Notts County. Second the clubs that are straight and clear in their ownership and accounting, like Arsenal, should avoid being further tainted by association with bodies that are either inept or corrupt (like the footballing authorities in England) and should form a new grouping of clubs run by honest and competent people. Stan Kronke own 28.7% of Arsenal. Fine. Now, would someone tell us all who owns Leeds United and Notts County, and quite how and why the football authorities in England allowed themselves to be duped in this way? I think that is a rather more important question. (c) Tony Attwood 2009 How Arsenal are doing compared with last seasonBy Walter Broeckx We are late in September; the season has been going for some 6 weeks. Time for a first overview. Are we doing better than last year or not? The best way to make a comparison is to see at the games from last year and same games this season. Our opening game this season brought a 1-6 victory on the field of Everton after a true demonstration of Arsenal. Last season against Everton we drew 1-1 and it was a rather terrible match with Robin Van Persie giving us, in overtime, a rather undeserved point. A gain from last year of 2 points and a much better performance. The next game was at home against Portsmouth. This year a very deserved 4-1 victory. Last year we won at home with 1-0 after Gallas headed in, few minutes before the end of the game, a free kick. As many points as last year but a better performance on the field. The next match was away to Old Trafford. We lost 2-1 and even United fans after the game admitted that this result had more to do with luck than with their good play. Last season we played a 0-0 draw against United who just needed a draw for the title. We lose one point in comparison with last year but the performance on the field was better than last season. Followed the international injury week we had to go at Manchester City. A 4-2 defeat was our part. With a ref who had seen what Adebayor did to Van Persie, the course of the game would perhaps have been different. We had enough chances and a draw would have given a better view of the performance which was much better than last season when we were pretty miserable on the day. So no points, just as last season. The next game was against Wigan and was won 4-0. Last year again a narrow 1-0 victory. So as many points, and again a better performance. The game last weekend brought a trip away to Fulham. Last season this was one of our darkest days of the season when we lost 1-0 after a rather weak performance of Arsenal. This weekend was the result reversed and we won with 0-1. Both the Fulham and Wigan performance were better than last year. We could have scored more goals against Fulham but as usual Match Of The Day refused to show our chances towards the end of the game. But and we took three more points compared to last season. Last season we had a total of 8 points after these games out of a possible 18 points and this season we have achieved 12 points in these games. Obviously a gain of 4 points over the same matches last year. But look at the goal scoring: we have scored 18 goals this year instead of just 3 goals last year. Last year, we had only 5 goals against, compared to 8 goals this year so this is slightly less good. Regarding the performance on the field, which of course is subjective, they are usually much better than last season – so I think there is some cause for optimism so far. Walter Broeckx Would you like to write for Untold Arsenal? In September 2009 over 100,000 people read two or more articles on this site. If you’d like to reach this many people and you have sympathy with the Untold Arsenal approach to reality, please do drop a line with your article for an article to Tony (at) Hamilton-house.com Arsenal make billions and Olmpy score minus 1It is interesting that few if any of our so-called journalists are doing a compare and contrast job on Arsenal’s wealth and the abject poverty of football clubs like Liverpool and Manchester U. It is as if saving money, planning, and making money legitimately (rather than through usury) is now bad news in the UK. Arsenal’s turnover to 31 May was £313.3m, which is the largest annual turnover ever by a British football club. That almost needs repeating in full. In fact it does need repeating. So I will repeat it. LARGEST TURNOVER EVER. The previous tops was Manchester IOU with £256.2m in 2007-08. The profit will now be derided as coming from the “millstone” of the property development. So one day they say Arsenal are hampered by the unsellable flats, now the figures aren’t real because they include the flats. Oh yes and the flats are being flogged at below market value. No, in fact, Arsenal are giving them away. In fact, Arsenal are paying property dealers in the City to take the flats off their hands. Back in my world, there’s more, because these Arsenal were figures to May – so this summer’s highly profitable transfer window was not included. Add another £30m. So praise a plenty for good organisation, good planning? No, we never really expected that. It would only be good if we spent it all on players. In reality (not the journalist reality) the situation is getting better since the sale of the rest of Highbury Square will take the venture into profit and that money will become part of Arsenal – and so adding to the vast sums the club has for scouting and youth development – which is exactly where I personally want it to go. Give me another 10 Gilles Grimandi’s and spread them across Europe. Anyway, back to the future, and forward to one year ago – 30 Sept 08 we smashed Porto 4-0. I remember it well.
Main point must be that the defence is better than it was then, so the opposition will score fewer goals, which puts the starting point for the result as Porto minus 1. This remarkable scoreline is achieved when 10 minutes into the game three OlympWimpy defenders are seen with spades digging a big ditch in front of the goal they are defending. The ref looks into it, checks the rule book and then gives a yellow card to Eduardo for falling over a pile of rubble. Arsenal find six stewards who are amazingly not chatting on mobile phones while blocking the gangways of honest season ticket holders who are trying to take their places, and after nine hours the hole is filled in. Song is given a yellow card for having aggressive hair. Interestingly Mannone then scores his first goal for the club (he rushes out of the area to break up an attack, and the resulting clearance hits the remnants of the hole, then the corner flag, takes a huge spin, hits a steward, bounces once and goes into the net.) Just before half time the man at Sky who wrote the rubbish yesterday about Vela is seen hanging around Club Level. Six stewards mistake him for a supporter and he is grabbed and thrown over the edge onto the lower tier. Fortunately he is so fat that he bounces seventeen times before being caught by Gunnersaurus who picks the guy up, and throws him into the net, thus scoring Arsenal’s third. Through a techno error the TV pictures at half time go wrong and instead of showing games from around the Champy League give extended highlights of Barrow against Mansfield in the Conference. It is quite a good match. Adverts show two men from Liverpool holding begging bowls talking to men in white coats, crying, as they realise the chap they want to give the club to is actually the brother in law of the man who owns Portsmouth. In the second half Arsenal bring on Jack Wilshere who beats the entire opposition, his own team, the bench, the opposition bench, the press box, six white horses, a golden elephant, 93 stewards and a kangeroo before scoring the final goal from 250 yards out. The newspapers describe him as “a minor talent of suspect temperament,” and criticse how easily he goes down when 11 Olympy Wimpy players bury him 72 feet below the penalty spot they are defending in the second half. Carlos Vela then scores a hatrick of goals which are missed by the TV cameras who are focussed on the away support, as the commentators tell us how loyal and lively they are, and how it will be impossible to get a meal in a Greek restaurant tonight. So quite clearly Arsenal 6 Olympy-Wimpy -1. I have been offered 2000o to 1 at the bookies on that, and so took a fiver. Simpletons! As if I could be wrong. Meanwhile, please do not forget to buy your HIGHBURY HIGH at tonight’s game. If you are not actually making it to the Ems you can buy the magazine as a subscription line… Here’s the links 6 issue subscription, delivery to UK address (£12.00)… 6 issues, delivered to a Europe address: (£15.00)… Or six issues in the rest of the world (£18.00)… Just in case any link doesn’t work for you, you can go to www.shop.firstandbest.co.uk and you will see the three options there at the top of the selection of new products. The amount in pounds will be translated into your local currency for your credit card bill, which will show in the name Hamilton House. You can also buy with a cheque. Prices are the same… 6 issue subscription £12 (UK), £15 (Europe) or £18 (World) Cheques payable to Highbury High Address: 11 Tannington Terrace, Gillespie Road, London N5 1LE (c) Tony Attwood 2009 Arsenal v Olympiacos: the previewArsenal play host to Olympiacos, the Greek champions, on Tuesday evening. The Greek outfit, who played out a 1-0 victory over the final member of Group H AZ Alkmaar, are managed by Brazilian legend Zico, who has been in the post since mid-September after spells managing in Turkey and Russia. The previous manager was removed from the position after a handful of games in charge, but judging from their league form, they’re hardly lurching from crisis to crisis. Recent form: Arsenal go into the game off a backs-to-the-wall victory over London rivals Fulham, where a slightly off-colour Arsenal eleven came away with a victory largely thanks to an impressive rearguard performance from Reserve goalkeeper Vito Mannone and centrebacks Gallas and Vermaelen. Three consecutive clean sheets in all competitions, as well as five wins on the trot, give the Gunners reason to feel confident in the run up to this tie. Olympiacos head to London full of confidence after a 2-1 away win over rivals AEK Athens. The Greek side lead the Super League by a single point, having started their campaign with four wins and a draw. Crucially for Gunners fans, they’ve taken maximum from their away games this season, including the tricky tie vs. AEK Athens. Injuries: Arsenal fans will definitely see Mannone between the sticks after his excellent performance at Craven Cottage, with Wenger ruling Almunia out in the post-Fulham press conference. Walcott, according to the Sun (I know!) has declared himself fit to start the Olympiacos game, but we are more likely to see him feature from the bench. Long term absentees Fabianksi, Djourou and Nasri are all out as per, joined by Denilson. Men to watch: Robin van Persie, simply because of Eduardo’s injury meaning he’s got a lot of responsibility on his shoulders. Bendtner can come central and perform if needed, but as it stands Robin is our main central striker. After his goal at Fulham, let’s hope he goes and finds the net on Tuesday Arsenal fans should be familiar with former Blackburn player Matt Derbyshire who signed for the Greek side in January, initially on loan. As it stands, it is unclear if the striker, who had an incredible impact on the Greek cup final from the substitute’s bench, will be available for the game. Arsenal predicted lineup: Mannone Sagna vermaelen Gallas Clichy Song Fabregas Rosicky Bendtner Van Persie Arshavin Subs: Szczesny, Silvestre, Gibbs, Eboue, Diaby, Ramsey, Vela Almost the same team as at Craven Cottage, though there is likely to be some rotation given the proximity of the two games. Rosicky should come in for Diaby to help us keep the ball and to improve our build-up play. I’d hope to see Vela get some minutes, with the extent of Eduardo’s injury unknown at the moment it’s important he’s primed to come in if need be. Good strong bench: Eboue to come on to close the game out if need be, perhaps Ramsey for Fabregas/Rosicky if we’re leading with twenty minutes to go for his work rate. Prediction: Olympiacos are a much more intimidating prospect at home, so if we play like we can we should be capable of putting a couple past them. I can’t see the defence suffering from overconfidence after Fulham, Wenger will almost certainly have kept them grounded, but perhaps expect the Greek’s to sneak one past Mannone given the lack of rest we’ve had since the last match. I’m going to go for a reasonably comfortable 3-1 to the Arsenal. As ever, comments below! Phil Gregory Campbell, Vela, Cesc, lies: its “Ask a stupid question day”PS: Yes I know you don’t normally have a PS at the start, but this is a long article and I doubt anyone will get to the end, so here’s the PS. By chance I have a spare ticket for tuesday night’s game, upper tier, north end above Red Action. If you would like to sit next to the editor for Untold Arsenal, it will cost you £46. Call 01536 399 013 between 9am and 5pm or 07714 76 2250 after that up to 8pm. Carlos Vela going to Xerez? September 28 is Ask a Stupid Question Day (honest, put it in Google and see). So I’m just quoting from yesterday’s papers. You may not have heard about Xerez, or indeed may assume that they are a form of 2D photocopier sponsored footballers, as indeed did I until I watched them put up a “plucky” display against Real Mad on TV last week. (Ronaldododododo scored after 3 seconds). They are in the first division in Spain for the first time ever, and given the way they play probably the last time ever. But on Sunday lots of news sites started running this story (the actual text below comes from Yahoo’s sports news, but it is identical to Sky and most of the others.) You will recall that Notts County was a team which was rescued by the fans who took over the club, raised a small fortune to pay off debts, and ran it well. Then they were persuaded to give all their shares away. Give is the key here. And give to very rich people indeed. No reason has ever been given as to why they had to give the shares away rather than sell, but they agreed. They gave them to… well who exactly? No one knows because the company behind the deal remains secret. The League apparently has been given some data, but no one else has, and the club still hasn’t been told that the owners have passed the laughable fit and proper person test. And maybe they won’t because now we find that Russell King, the leading man that we know about in Qadbak, who seem to be the shady characters who own the oldest league club in the world has had £1.9m of his assets frozen by the financial court in Jersey over an unpaid debt. Meanwhile Sven of the Eriksson has acknowledged that part of the deal that took him to Notts C is that he has to work for Swiss Commodity Holding AG, as well as Notts. And would you know it, Sol Campbell was told that as part of his job he had to work for SCH as well. But for this deal to work Swiss Commodity Holding AG has to be floated on the stock market so that everyone who owns shares (Sol, Sven etc) can make a fortune overnight. It was supposed to happen in June – July at the latest. But… oh my what a surprise. It didn’t. Now here’s a funny thing. The Jersey court was told that Russel King was part of a company called Belgravia which tried to buy Newcastle U before going bust. Mr King denies he was involved in any way other than as an investor. And today a spokesbeing has cleared it all up by giving the names of two Indian families who supposed own a bit of a company that owns a bit of a company that someone else owns and which might own a bit of Notts County. And then they suggest that this makes everything all right. And here we are again. I don’t really know about Carlos, or Sol and of course I don’t know what the hell is going on with Notts County, but as sure as anything it can’t be dismissed by running nasty stories about the state of Sol Campbell’s mind. What connects such stories with Carlos Vela and Cesc? There is one thing. It too is rather nasty, but one has to mention it sometimes. Football Journalism. Except of course that I found some of these bits (such as the stuff about what happened in Jersey) in a paper. Written by journalists. Rather buggers up my argument that. Ah well, just go and enjoy “ask a stupid question day”. (c) Tony Attwood 2009. Highbury High can now be ordered on lineIf you think that Untold Arsenal is a load of old twaddle, the best thing to do is to stop reading. But if you think Untold Arsenal is rather jolly, then you really ought to be reading HIGHBURY HIGH as well – the only fan magazine that totally reflects the positive and rejects the negative. Now you can get HIGHBURY HIGH in three different ways. First, if you can’t get to games and want to order on line with a Visa or Mastercard, you can do this via the new on-line facility. Here’s the links 6 issue subscription, delivery to UK address (£12.00)… 6 issues, delivered to a Europe address: (£15.00)… Or six issues in the rest of the world (£18.00)… Just in case any link doesn’t work for you, you can go to www.shop.firstandbest.co.uk and you will see the three options there at the top of the selection of new products. The amount in pounds will be translated into your local currency for your credit card bill, which will show in the name Hamilton House. Second you can buy with a cheque. Prices are the same… 6 issue subscription £12 (UK), £15 (Europe) or £18 (World) Cheques payable to Highbury High Address: 11 Tannington Terrace, Gillespie Road, London N5 1LE Finally, if you get to the match, just bulldoze your way to the front of the queue of the guys selling the fan magazines near the ground and demand your HIGHBURY HIGH. The magazine seller will at once recognise a person of quality and substance and call you sir (or madam) and congratulate you on the quality of your choice. I thoroughly recommend the publication and that is not just because there’s a bit by me in it. Tony Attwood Fulham v Arsenal: a somewhat more serious analysisBy Phil Gregory Fulham, Arsenal’s opponents in the late kick off today are managed by the likeable Roy Hodgson and the well-travelled Fulham manager is highly regarded by Wenger, who hailed him as being “the best English manager” in a recent press conference (Mark Hughes take note). Indeed, the ex-Malmo boss has overseen an enormous change in fortunes at Craven Cottage, leading a team that were previously seen as being bottom six material into Europe. Much of this success can be attributed to an ability to get the most out of his players – nine times-capped Danny Murphy springs to mind – as well as good use of his knowledge of the Scandinavian market with the transfer of the imperious Hangeland. With Arsenal the proud owners of what is more or less a fully fit first eleven, the match at Craven Cottage promises to be a scorcher with both teams liking to play football. Recent form: Arsenal come into this game with a rested first team, after the U12s (careful Phil, I do the jokes – Editor) beat West Brom in the Carling Cup. Wins over Standard Liege and Wigan will have done much to heal the pain of coming away from Manchester with zero points, but Arsenal have got much to do to convince neutrals they have what it takes to win what is surely the most open Premier League for years. Fulham reserves emerged from the Carling Cup tie away to City with a very credible 2-1 loss so like Arsenal, will have a fully rested first eleven. They go into the game off the back of some indifferent recent form. At home, where they were so strong last season, Hodgson has seen his team beat Everton but lose to Chelsea. Over their last few Premier League games, they’ve lost to Wolves and Villa away, and beaten Everton at home, placing them fourteenth in the Premier League, between Everton and Wigan. Many attribute this to a small squad and the pressures of Europe but really, Fulham’s first eleven have barely played in Europe so this can’t be a factor in their mixed start. More likely, it’s just the ebbs and flows of form – Fulham won’t have expected to be where they were last season, and will be more than content with a solid midtable finish this season. Injuries: The usual suspects are amongst the long-term absentees: Fabianksi, Nasri and Djourou are all out for the immediate future, with Walcott lacking match fitness but likely capable of a cameo from the bench. Arshavin is “expected to be involved”, while Van Persie will have undergone a late fitness test by the time you read this blog. Denilson will still be out with a back complaint, while Almunia’s continued chest infection has got Arsenal conspiracy theorist’s tongues wagging. Fulham entertain the Gunners without long-term absentees Konchesky and Kallio who are out with knee and Achilles issues respectively. Key men: Arsenal will need to be defensively solid at a tough away ground with an inexperienced keeper between the sticks, so let’s hope Gallas and Vermaelen continue their recent solid displays. Tomas Rosicky will be looking to take up some of the creative burden in midfield, with Danny Murphy likely to attempt to limit Cesc Fabregas’ ability to influence the game. With question marks over the fitness of Robin Van Persie at the time of writing, Eduardo Da Silva could well be given an opportunity to play as the central striker and will be hoping to overturn Vermaelen’s position of top Arsenal scorer. Fulham will, as ever rely on a solid performance from central players. As mentioned, Danny Murphy will no doubt be the bane of our midfielders’ lives, working hard to disrupt our rhythm. That is not to discredit his ability to play the game though, Murphy is not purely about hard work; certainly a good player to watch. Hangeland will no doubt want to show Arsenal what they could’ve signed amidst all the Vermaelen hype, and given the general trend this season towards set-piece goals, Brede will no doubt hope to nod one in from a corner. With question marks over Vermaelen’s ability to cope with a pacey striker, Andy Johnson will pose a good test: lets hope the Verminator can help the back five to another clean sheet. Arsenal expected lineup: Mannone Sagna Vermaelen Gallas Clichy Song Rosicky Fabregas Bendtner Eduardo Arshavin Subs: Szcznesy, Gibbs, Ramsey, Walcott, Van Persie, Eboue, Wilshere A small element of guesswork required here – the goalkeeper’s jersey appears up for grabs after Wenger failed to confirm Mannone would be in goal when asked in a press conference. Even if Mannone is tipped to start, it says a lot that Szcznesy’s performance in the Carling Cup created this debate in Wenger’s mind. Eduardo is up front in the event of Robin not being risked, though it could just as likely be Eduardo on the left, Arshavin on the right and Bendtner central if Wenger decides to stick with the policy of “the lone forward still functions as a link man” idea. It’d be great to see Rosicky complete 90 minutes, but there are bench options if needed. I’m unsure Vela will be considered for the bench after a single brief (though impressive) cameo appearance on Tuesday night, though I’d be more than happy to see him included, but at who’s expense? Prediction: Fulham are organised, hard to break down and possess some quality players, not all who are household names. That said, Arsenal are simply a better side, who look capable of scoring given the incredible array of creative talent at our disposal. I’d expect us to concede, so perhaps 1-2 or 1-3 to us. I’d love another clean sheet, but Fulham have been strong at home in recent years and we’ve got a 3rd or 4th choice goalkeeper between the sticks. Three points please, let’s keep up the momentum. Comments, as ever, below. Until next time! Phil Gregory Fulham Arsenal: full report and score, hours before it happensAnd so it is Fulham who come under the spotlight of “All Tomorrow’s Parties” – the historic (not to say hysterical) analysis of future events named after a Velvet Underground hit. (Exciting isn’t it?) Fulham: who last season caused all the posts of, “This is exactly what I feared would happen” from the people who only see one game at a time, and never look to the future. Or so I argued at this moment one year ago just before we played Hull Spitty (or Hull City as they were known in those days) on 27 September 2008… A victory would have taken us top of the league. And we lost 1-2. I was at a school re-union in Poole in Dorset, and so watched it on TV in the local pub, and couldn’t quite believe it. (Actually I couldn’t quite believe how old all the other guys who I had been at school with, now look – a bit like a team of Tiny Totts.). Our team against the Spit one year ago was
Average age 24 years 3 months, as opposed to the old timers we faced who were averaging 28. On shots we won 17 to 8, which showed how we dominated. Hull had two shots on target – obviously both went in. The Guardian said, “Corners are to Arsenal what kryptonite is to Superman” which actually I thought was rather clever, although I didn’t admit it at the time. So where are we now, one year on, as we prepare to visit Fulham… Arshavin is back, Theo is on his way back and could be on the bench now or on Tuesday, Almunia is another week away, and Denilson and Nasri are making slow recoveries. Djourou is out of contention until the Sun does a report in five months calling him “The forgotten man of Arsenal” Who have I missed? There must be more injuries. There are always more injuries. Must be because we haven’t had any internationals this week. Anyway, the back line compared with last year is plus one or even plus two in terms of quality ratings – we have Vermaelen, and that seems to be liberating Gallas. Plus three maybe compared with a year ago. Middle three are also of a higher calibre than the middle four of a year ago – Song (who was benched a year ago) is the obvious additional benefit. We’ll have Song, Fabregas, Eboue or maybe Rosicky (although perhaps he’ll be the sub). Front three will be plus one or two as compared with a year ago: Van Persie or Bendtner, Eduardo, Arshavin. The bench looks good too – last year we had Song, Ramsey, Bendtner, Djourou, Silvestre. This year Ramsey is there, looking very promising, Wilshere looking very Wilshere, maybe Theo looking quite like an English F1 driver, maybe Rosicky Mozart if he doesn’t start. Maybe Vela wearing his Mexican Hat ready for another little cameo. Presumably the centre halfs, plus Gibbsy-wibbsy (sorry this is getting a bit childish). So, one year ago we lost two one, this year we are at least four players better… perm any from this group, and allow for the fact that Denilson and Theo are not there but then counter that with the fact that Vermaelen is worth seven of any other player. Our ups are…
So on that basis I would say, we lost 2-1, but here we get another four, so its another 5-2 from me. Four from Vermaelen, and the fifth an own goal from the ref who was still trotting back to the half way line after the fourth. Hits him on the knee, bounces onto Gallas’ bum, back onto the ref’s head, and into the net. 5-1 with 17 minutes of injury time left. 27,874 Arsenal supporters are fished out of the Thames half an hour before kick off and spend the whole match singing “Number one is Perry Groves, number two is Perry Groves” etc, (an entertaining ditty which the Beatles nicked and turned into Yellow Aircraft Carrier – a number one hit in Argentina in 1934.) (Sorry there might be an error there). Mr Al Fayhed springs a surprise in the second half by leaping down from his box, running to the bench, taking off his goalkeeper, and bringing on a Prince Phillip lookalike, while inviting Arshavin to “do a KGB on the bastard”. An interesting event totally missed by the Radio 5 commentators, who continue to stress that “Fulham look strong” even at 5-1 down, The Hull Spitty manager also makes a surprise appearance on the pitch, celebrating the anniversary of the last time his team won a match. He (the Hull manager, not Mr Al Fayhed who is an awfully nice gent and has very sound views on the royal family) is arrested for being a prat. Three water rats are later found on the pitch, and are returned to their spiritual home down the Lane. Quite a jolly day all round. “The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom” – William Blake (c) Tony Attwood 2009 Liverpool: the financial collapse and what the papers did not sayYesterday the stories about Liverpool flowed around like a dark murky flowing thing you would not want to put your hand in. We knew that the owners were trying in utter desperation to do something, anything, that would allow them to refinance the £350.5m of debts six months ago. We now know from leaked papers obtained by Bloomberg that they even thought about taking on the insane PIK loan which would have been so expensive they would have added another £100m to the debt! So out of the RBS can of £350 worms, into something far more horrible. In now turns out that in March there was a dead secret offer of a rights issue run by Rothschild and Merrill Lynch. £50m for a minority stake in a beaten up old club that hasn’t won the league in 20 years. Yesterday the big story was that Liverpool’s annual throw-away on over-priced players was being cut to £20m a year – which most of the papers and broadcast media ran with. But with RBS demanding £65m a year repayment, and only a tiny fraction of this raised with a new sponsorship deal, where is that £20m coming from? But everyone ran the story, and so on the basis that if you say something enough it ends up being true, it became true. At least yesterday. However a little prodding shows there is something else utterly nasty lurking at the bottom of the sink, or given the state of Liverpool’s finance, the sewer. Because somehow, at one money they were so desperate they would go for PIK funding and then they not only don’t need it, they also talk of Benitez having £20m a year – infinitely more than the Lord Wenger of course (who makes a profit on transfers most years). Even more oddly, other plans were dropped too. An 8% rise increase in ticket prices went out the window. And a plan gradually to convert cheap seats into corporate areas vanished. These plans are not dead – they sit their like a crab looking at the boiling water, ready to snip your fingers. (Actually that is a fairly ludicrous simile, but I’ve left it in because I think it is funny). They are still playing with the ludicrous “Liverpool brand” academies, still looking for yet more secondary sponsors, and oh, you will love this one, they are going to improve the catering facilities to increase commercial revenue from £59m to £111.4m in the next five years. Oh yes. Last time we heard stuff like that it was from Leeds. A few days back I ran this little analysis of the net outflow of funds at Liverpool in terms of transfer fees year on year in Pounds Sterling.
Now ask the question: is Liverpool is to be restricted to £20m a year, would that make any difference? In fact not, because many years Liverpool don’t spend £20m. So, let’s summarise. 1. We now know that Liverpool were on the edge of borrowing the most expensive money in the universe to try and meet the repayment from the bank. They were also ready to hand over part of the ownership, for more money. 2. They also had plans to up the price of the tickets and have insane schemes to raise millions from selling pies. 3. Meanwhile they continue to pay back RBS £60m a year. 4. Suddenly, just when we start asking these difficult questions they announce that the manager can waste £20m a year on players – which they announce as a cut but which is more or less business as usual. 5. We still don’t know where this money to pay RBS is coming from. 6. The owners swore blind that they were not going to do a Manchester U and were never going to use the clubs own money to buy the club. Absolutely, they wouldn’t. And then they did. The conclusion can now only be that they have got a plan to get their money out but this scheme involves something so stinky lurking in the background it is going to be worse than the time they found a whole load of corpses in the garden of one of the terrace houses that backs onto the ground. Yesterday’s story was far too convenient, and far too unlikely, to be true. The situation is far, far, far worse than that. The notion that “Liverpool is the new Leeds” is about to look optimistic. I’d say Liverpool is the new Chester. (c) Tony Attwood 2009 Lord Wenger for PresidentSo having spent a day arguing about when people were signed and the value of our youth system, the Lord Wenger now tells us it is all going to be pulled to bits by the new FIFA plans to limit transfers of players under 18. Our Great Leader pointed out that we have the “90-minutes” rule (which seemingly encourages families to buy fast cars to get the kids to the ground) and the “home-grown players” rule (which encourages parents to buy more manure I suppose). I guess next we will have a rule that stops us signing players before they are born, and if that comes in, where will we be? The Lord Wenger says, “it’s vital that this under-18 transfer rule is not implemented because English clubs would have a domestic limitation and a foreign limitation, making it harder to produce home-grown players… We can only pray that somebody next to London Colney is as gifted as Maradona and says, ‘Please can I play for you.’” Meanwhile the minister of sporty things and fake expenses has said that the Sweet FA is in need of immediate reform. He says that the recommendations of the Burns four years ago must be implemented in full or face a £25m cut in grassroots funding and the withdrawal of political support. So as if the arguments about the under 18s and the mileage rule were not enough we now are going to get a load of other changes to the FA, who spend all their time mucking about with things that they are utterly unable to comprehend or deal with. These are, let us not forget, the people (along with their foreign counterparts) who take our players, injure them, hand them back, and then do it again. They connive with FIFA to scupper meaningful schedules, playing friendlies just before the season opens, and then a week later stopping the season here there and everywhere for their own silly ends. Minister Sutcliffe also told the FA to work with the EPL more closely, which is a bit like telling my cat to set up a co-operative committee with the dog next door. The FA is a shambles and a half – it can’t even decide whether the people who own Notts County are fit and proper, probably because it still can’t work out who they are. That might seem a trivial point from an Arsenal perspective, but just think – Notts County have been taken over by an unknown bunch of people hiding behind a Swiss company and they could be anyone. Supposing they are not accepted by the FA – that presumably ends the existence of the oldest league club in the world. Nice one. How long does it take to see if a guy is a crook or not? Presumably quite a while if Switzerland is involved – I suppose they are still thinking about the England manager and all his fake accountancy and that fine of £6m he got for taxation matters while living with the Swiss. Difficult thing, money. Or lets consider the Women’s League. We were supposed to have a summer league starting next year to encourage the game. The FA said it would be on, and then said, oh no and at a moment’s notice, they stopped it. This is the same FA who allowed league clubs for 70 years to ban women’s football from their clubs. So one might think, anything could be better than the FA – until we think oh, its the government. That awfully nice bunch of people who, on seeing that the bankers destroyed our economy decided to give a load of money to the bankers without any restrictions on what they did with it. So now the bankers are doing it all again. Nope, I don’t think I would trust the bank infested government to be any better than the FA. Who is to lead us then? Who will get us out of this mess? There is of course only one solution. If the Lord Wenger became grand president of the Universe, we would probably be safe. LORD WENGER FOR PRESIDENT. That should sort it. (c) Tony Attwood 2009 The world has fallen out of love with our kidsAs Adam Smith pointed out yesterday, you couldn’t watch last night’s game on any sort of TV system anywhere south of Pluto. In fact if you tried BBC radio you would have found that in the summary half hour from 10 to 10.30 (when a couple of extra times were going on) the match actually didn’t exist. At around 10.40 they gave some results and ended, “and there were also victories for…. Arsenal.” Meanwhile there were some snide jibes about how wonderful it was that Manchester City and Liverpool are not “disrespecting” the competition – Man Arab will be playing billions of pounds worth of players since if they don’t these guys don’t get a game. And Liverpool put out some £60m worth to sneak their little victory against a 3rd division team. So times have now changed. A year ago we were on TV and it was the Arsenal Dream Machine that would take on the world. Now, playing the youth team against the team top of the 2nd division is “disrespectful” There was also a very interesting email that appeared in our columns yesterday about the youth policy which basically said it didn’t function. So, has the world fallen out of love with our youth policy? Come to that, what is a youth policy? Have we, without noticing, been following the ‘buy, buy, buy’ policy that many posters on other sites have demanded? If we look at last night’s team consider for example Szczesny, he signed aged 17. Few goalkeepers appear in top class games at that age, so we have been training him up? Is he part of the youth policy? Gibbs joined us from Wimbledon aged 18. Is that part of our youth policy? If we move away from there to the recognised first teamers, think of Cesc. He joined us aged 15. Is that young enough – or is the fact that he was with Barca before that mean that he is not in our youth policy? The fact is that prior to Wenger we were in the doldrums for a few years with our youth policy. He sorted it out and as we know most of the double winning youth team from last year had been together since the age of 11. So, as we can clearly see, it took the Lord Wenger four or five years to get the youth scouting system sorted, and then we were able to bring in the first bunch of mega kids, who are now coming through aged 18 and 19. That’s one part of the story – it is too soon to see all the wonderful results from the development of locally produced youngsters turning up in the first team – because we started with them seven years ago aged 11. But the other part of the story takes us back to the current squad. We might look at how many were brought in as the finished product, and how many were brought in still needing development. If we take Ramsey and Walcott, they came in from other clubs – at a very young age, and were certainly not ready immediately for regular first team places. We also had Vela – is he part of the youth set up? Joined at 19 – too old maybe. Certainly some players in the first team were ready to play from the off. I’ll leave out the keepers because they mature later, but we would all agree that Sagna, Vermaelen, Gallas, Silvestre, Rosicky, Nasri, Arshavin, Eduardo came in ready to play. I make that 8. Song, Djourou, Senderos, Clichy, Diaby, Eboue, Fabregas, Denilson, Ramsey, Wilshere, Merida, Vela, Walcott, Bendtner, Ramsey were not ready to play and needing bringing through. Indeed some said Song should never play for Arsenal again after one particular game. I make that 14. (Actually Eboue like Toure is very interesting – coming from Breveren. Was that a youth policy? Seemed like it to me). (Sorry if I spelled Breveren wrong). I am fully recognising that we paid money for many of these players rather than getting them from school. But that’s my point. The first generation of wonder kids from school joined at 11 and won the double last year. They are not quite ready yet. But the interim group who joined at later stages in their teams, who were then nurtured and developed so that they were ready to play regularly for Arsenal have come through, and represent the majority of our first team. Which is why so many people call for Wenger to spend. We are in fact a mix of experience and youth, of bought in players and those brought through. It seems a fair old mix to me. (c) Tony Attwood 2009 Arsenal v The Wobbleyous. The result before it happensThis is it: the big one for the little one’s. Or “le grand un pour les petits” as they don’t say in foreign parts. Who can ever forget one year ago? There was the memory of the fact that our little guys (with one or two biggies) had a year before smashed Liverpool at their downtrodden home 3-6, revealing for all to see just how impoverished junior football north of Watford actually is. And the came along came 23 September 2008. A day when the rest of the footballing world started to realise that Arsenal really were developing something that had never been seen before in the history of the western spiral arm of the galaxy. Arsenal Kiddies 6 Sheffield Untidy 0 Oh joy. Oh memories. Oh ****ing incredible (as we say in the East Midlands). Average age about 3 and a half (actually 19 years 5 months compared with 27 years for Sheffield Saturday). Average height (for readers of the Sun) 5 feet 11 inches which is about 24 litres in metric. We played
Oh it was incredible. It was unbelievable. And as for Carlos Vela, the story that he was about to become the greatest Mexican player ever, and ever, and ever, was finally revealed to be true. Where are they now?
So to replace the injured and those who have moved on to a higher plane we have Szczesnyxyzcsxzynz the Unpronouceable in goal. Senderos the Milanese is back, and Traore the Disappeared will play with Gibbs on the left. (Actually the last part of that sentence is ambiguous, but I mean both will be on the pitch on the left hand side.) If you don’t follow Arsenal Reserves (how could you not, they are bloody brilliant this year) you won’t know that they have played three, won three scored eight and let in none. (Incidentally you also might not be fully conversant with the fact that the all powerful, all forward looking, all monied Tiny Totts are in such a staggeringly brilliantly organised situation that this year they suddenly pulled out of the reserve league about a week before kick off. I wrote to them and suggested that if they don’t have any players who can stand up against our 3 year olds they could play a brown paper bag, but they didn’t reply to my letter). If you read Highbury High you will know (when you pick up a copy tonight) that I have Coquelin down as one of my players to make it – watch him – he looks ungainly with that movement of his, but ever since he suddenly turned up at the Austrian camp a year ago, he has been amazing everyone. Phil Gregory, in his excellent analysis of the game, has a forward line of Barazite, Watt, Wilshere, and believe me (if you don’t watch the little ones) that is some forward line. Writing later than Phil I now know that Carlos the Hat is playing. And I also want to include Sunu – although he didn’t play in the last reserve game so maybe he’s injured – but he scored two in the second reserves game of the season and is superb. (He is also Thierry Henry II but don’t tell anyone). In fact no one corresponding on Phil’s article included Sunu. What’s going on? Anyway, back to the future. What happens? Kick off is delayed by 25 minutes following a fight in the special guests section as 268 visiting managers, scouts and coaches jostle for position, waving loan documentation and bribes at our players, our support staff, and Gunnersaurus. Manchester Arab sign the mascot. There is then a second delay as it is discovered that five of the team are caught up outside the ground where over-zealous stewards are trying to charge them £5 to get in. Two are arrested for being out after dark on their own. There are further problems at half time where five of the squad are promptly marched off by their mothers who announce that it is way past their bedtime. Commentators from the “media” (the so called “journalists”) spend most of the game saying that Wenger has lost the plot as last year’s side (the youngest ever to represent Arsenal in a competitive match since the club was founded in 1886) was younger than this year’s. “Has Wenger lost the plot?” screams the Sun, but fortunately no one listens. Arsenal win 18-0. “At times it was hard to believe what was happening. A side with an average age of less than 20 containing one 16 year old and four players making first starts, played through their more experienced opponents as if they were ghosts, only pausing to catch breath or to celebrate the stream of goals.” The Guardian, 24 September 2008. It is fashionable to say “I nearly cried” at such events. That would be wrong. I cried. I couldn’t believe how wonderful it was. Everything that I believe in, in football, served up in one game. I just raised my hands to the Lord Wenger and said “thank you for this”. More of the same would go down rather well chez Attwood. (c) Tony Attwood 2009. Arsenal v WBA: the style, approach, players, predictionBy Phil Gregory West Brom, managed by Roberto Di Matteo (formerly of MK Dons) are Arsenal’s opponents in the Carling Cup on Tuesday. They will undoubtedly be coming into this match on a wave of confidence, having beaten Middlesborough 5-0 at the Riverside, and holding a one point lead over Newcastle at the top of the Championship. West Brom were my tip to storm the Championship this season, with their attractive brand of football all the stronger for a season of Premier League football. The defection of Tony Mowbray to Celtic threatened to rock the boat, but their season has started off well, with a draw against Newcastle and then three successive away wins. WBA are unbeaten this season, though needed extra time to get a 4-3 win at home to Rotherham in the previous round. Injuries: Arsenal have been knocked off top spot of the Premier League injury table, but still have eight players out. Denilson is expected to be out for a couple more weeks with a back injury, Almunia is back fit after a chest infection, as is Theo Walcott. Andrei Arshavin and Vela are expected to be short for Tuesday, while long term absentees Djourou, Nasri and Fabianksi are also out. Other absentees who would otherwise be considered for this game are Lansbury and Emmanuel–Thomas (on loan at Watford and Blackpool respectively) along with Fran Merida and Gavin Hoyte ( away on U20 internationals). West Brom are missing Marek Cech with a twisted ankle and Ismael Miller (who suffered a recurrence of a cruciate injury in pre-season). Injury news for West Brom is somewhat lacking at this moment in time, I’ll try and post more in a comment once they release a pre-match statement. Arsenal predicted team: Szczesny Gilbert Silvestre Senderos Gibbs Coquelin Randall Ramsey Barazite Watt Wilshere Subs: Mannone, Bartley, Deacon, Murphy, Ozyakup, Freeman, Boateng If it wasn’t for our injuries, Mannone would likely be between the sticks for us, but Szczesny seems likely to get a chance after some very promising displays at reserve level. Senderos and Silvestre both need game time so are likely to get the nod ahead of promising Reserves skipper Kyle Bartley. Coquelin seems likely to make his Carling Cup bow this season, with Ramsey and the ever-present Randall partnering him in midfield. Barazite is likely to play in attack after an impressive loan spell at Derby last season, with Watt up front and Wilshere completing the attack on the left. Key Men: Arsenal’s midfield three should be up to the task of dealing with the Championship leader’s midfield – Ramsey has acquitted himself well at the Emirates in bigger competitions than the Carling Cup, Randall could almost be called experienced at this level and Coquelin made a name for himself with some stellar performances for the second string last season. Expect Ramsey and Coquelin in particular to shine. Jack Wilshere will hope a good performance will put him into the reckoning for more Premier League action given the injuries to players ahead of him in the pecking order. Much will be expected of Kieran Gibbs after his breakthrough season last year as well as being one of the top performers in last year’s Carling Cup. West Brom’s Marek Cech is a big loss for them, though Czech Roman Bednar’s pace may trouble the cumbersome pairing of Senderos and Silvestre. Graham Dorrans, the Scottish midfielder, has been in good form and tops the Championship assist charts this season. Prediction: Tricky one to call. I’d normally confidently back our young Guns against anyone at home, but we are missing some big players in Lansbury and Merida. The defence should be up the task of keeping them out, especially our experienced central defence partnership. The midfield too has all the tools to dominate the middle of the park, with Ramsey’s eye for a pass well allied to Coquelin’s all-action physical style. Jack Wilshere can be relied on to light up the left hand flank, though we must take into account West Brom’s excellent form this season. If they put out a first team, it’ll be tight, 1-0 or 2-1 to the Arsenal. If they rest players with an eye on the league we should coast it 3-0. As ever, comments below and I’ll do my best to reply. See you on Friday for the Fulham preview! When the FA hand a corruption file over to FIFA you know football is out of controlThere are sounds and signs around that things are improving – but, beware the false dawn. Since I started wandering around the by-ways of football in this blog I’ve been moaning about rotational fouling (Wigan are the latest to adopt it), and it is cheery to note that the Great Lord Wenger is now “set” (as they always say in the strange linguistic jungle inhabited by journalists) to “tackle” (ditto) the FA on “tactical fouls”. Actually I can’t claim any credit (not that I ever would where the Lord Wenger is concerned) but the tactical foul is different from the rotational foul. Tactical fouling just breaks up play and stops free flowing football – we saw it all the way through the Wigan game, and it was undoubtedly why Cesc was looking so miserable by the end of the match. Adding the rotational element allows players not to be punished since a different player commits each foul. This report to the FA by our great and glorious leaders comes just as the FA revealed that it has handed over to FIFA 15 cases which involve dodgy transfer deals between English and overseas clubs since January last year. The problem with such a report is that one has no faith in the FA (and their “Quest” group who “audit transfers”) even to be able to spell Tottenham Hotspur let alone get the facts right. As for FIFA, an organisation riddled throughout its history with corruption and dubious dealings, – how can such an organisation investigate anything? (Mind you it will probably find the FA guilty and ban them for three matches, which would at least be amusing). The FA are about to tell us what they will do about the fact that fans from all three sides of the West Iceland pitch invaded during the match, and they are still trying to decide if the big fellow who wanders around a bit for Manchester Arab should be hung drawn and quartered for goading Arsenal fans. And they still won’t explain why they refuse to act on the same man’s attack on Cesc in the Arab / Arsenal game. Meanwhile, not wanting to be left out, UEFA have now warned the Premier League that it must “face up to its financial responsibilities” whatever that means. It seems the accumulated losses of the league are too high after it came out that a third of the teams had losses of at least 20% of their income. That means we are not as bad as Romania, Ukraine, the Czech Republic and Poland. On this measure (profit or loss as a percentage of income) France and Germany do well. The average income per club in the EPL seems to be £122m, while in Germany, Italy and Spain the average is around £75m. Put another way our clubs are bigger and make a bigger cock up of it all. I think we knew that. UEFA now says clubs must break even on football business by 2012 or be thrown out of something (presumably the Champions League and Europa Cup). The EPL have agreed that any club that gets into a financial mess (which presumably means 80% of them) will be taken over by the EPL and refused the right to buy any players or raise salaries. Of course this won’t affect the clubs who are owned by individuals who will simply put more money in, temporarily, around the check-up date of March 31, and then take it out again. It is a bit like not getting boozed out of your mind on the night before you see the GP for a check up. Doing so just makes it harder to pretend that you only drink half a glass of wine a night with your meal. Of course if they did make this really take effect then it would be more interesting… Here’s a list of just how much Liverpool lost year on year in the transfer market (all figures are pounds sterling)
Now during the course of this spend-spend-spend policy the club were bought by the Americans, and the £350m borrowed from the banks for the purpose of building a new stadium, was immediately used to fund the purchase. But as we can see that event made no difference to the spending. Indeed the culture of the club in its attempt to win the league for the first time in 20 years is based on this endless waste of money. We know the banks are demanding £65m a year back. So how will Liverpool survive in the EPL if the owners don’t pump more money in? In 2009 for the first time this century the club actually earned money in transfers – £7m to be precise. It is a start – but not quite enough to keep the EPL happy.
Errrr….. No. Sorry, this is football we’re talking about here. HIGHBURY HIGH will be available at the league cup game this week, with a stunning and amazing new article on this year of anniversaries by, well, modesty forbids. 6 game subscription £12 (UK), £15 (Europe) or £18 (World) Cheques payable to Highbury High Address: 11 Tannington Terrace, Gillespie Road, London N5 1LE (c) Tony Attwood 2009 Wenger’s new tactics represent a revolutionI think I might be getting too old for this football commentary lark, because it is only now that the magnitude of the Lord Wenger’s achievement is starting to hit me in the face. I should have had faith in what I saw at the Celtic game – but I got no further than, “I wonder if…” Now after watching three home games in person I’m sure. This is one hell of a revolution that is going on. 4-3-3 is what it is all about. But 4-3-3 of the type Wenger is playing is in fact 4-3-3 Variation, ( which I shall call 4-3-3 V, first because it is shorter and second because I am pompous and the opportunity to name something myself is never one I throw away lightly). But it is not just a simple change of format from the old 4-4-2: it is much more than that. What I saw at the Ems yesterday was a three man forward line of Eboué on the right, Van Persie in the middle, and Eduardo on the left. I am not sure the rest of the world saw it that way – certainly the BBC commentators had Eboué playing midfield, but as I watched the game it just didn’t look like that at all. What we had was the two wingers (Eboué and Eduardo) sticking to their channels like wingers from 50 years ago, and Van Persie holding the centre. Now when I first saw Van Persie put out to play the old “number 9″ position I thought it was just an oddity – like Rosicky playing centre forward at Barnet, pre-season. This is the man who the Lord Wenger described as Bergkamp II and we know where Dennis scored from – about half way up the pitch. But in fact what happens is that Van Persie slips back as the “wingers” move in from the sides to take up the more established centre forward positions. It sounds obvious when described (although not so obvious when one of the wingers is Eboué, in that you just don’t expect him to be there). Yet it is not that obvious to play against. You go out onto the pitch as a defender to mark Bendtner and you find him playing on the wing – so you start tracking him back and forth, only to find the bugger has moved into the centre and Van Persie has dropped back. Most confusing. Meanwhile all sorts of rotations are happening in the middle. The classic midfield that we have is, for me: Denilson, Cesc, Song. That trio is something else again. Cesc can do everything, Song can tackle, track back, tackle, recover, and Denilson is the utter master of knowing how and where the ball will be as it bounces off a tackle into space. So you have those three rotating as play moves, and the front three rotating as play moves. Meanwhile the back four are now playing a different game. I’ve read all the stuff about Clichy being off form this season, and I was starting to get suckered into it, but I am not sure this is true. What the full backs are doing is far less of the overlap, tearing down the wings stuff, more of the traditional left and right back defending behind that rotating midfield of three. Of course it is not like this all the time, and you can see examples of moments when the players slip back into their old systems – which is even more confusing for the opposition (and unfortunately occasionally difficult for us). But what is so utterly remarkable is how fast the players have got the hang of this and are making it work, despite huge numbers of injuries. Yesterday (if you accept my analysis rather than the BBC’s) Eboué was a forward, and we had our 3rd choice keeper, no Denilson, no Theo, no Arshavin, no Vela, and only 50% Rosicky. I am not saying they would all have played if fit, but there would have been some presence from that lot, and an even more exciting bench. As a defender if you are 3-0 down and Rosicky comes on, you probably don’t think too much about it, because you don’t remember too much about him. But if Theo comes on, fresh and ready to tear into you, or Arshavin comes on… you’ll probably start looking at the clock. So, if this is all so wonderful, and 4-3-3 V is such a staggering innovation, how come we lost twice in Manchester and had a dodgy start in Belgium? Especially when the system was working so well from the off? I am going to stick out my neck a long way and say it was three things
The answer to this is that you can excuse anything – and the fact is that as I write this two clubs have 100% records and are not suffering freakish events and dodgy refereeing (or if they are the refereeing is in their favour). That’s true. Those two clubs also have huge amounts of money. But that does not mean that where they are today is where they will be tomorrow. Manchester Arab are proclaiming that their future is to be built on a youth development system and the players they have got. Exactly as the KGB in Fulham have repeatedly said that their system is to be built on youth… and then look what happens. Suddenly even the corrupt and meandering UEFA and FIFA catch up with them. Making changes takes time. The rich who steal the wealth of the poor are used to ordering change and seeing it happen – but it doesn’t happen in football. (Remember the kid who stayed at Charlton and refused to go to Chelsea because “no youth player at Chelsea ever makes it into the first team.”) Three weeks ago the Guardian called the Chelsea youth development programme “as productive as a one-armed paperhanger in recent years”. Actually that article on 5th September about a Chelsea reserve game really is worth reading There will be fits and starts but what we have with 4-3-3 V is a stunning development in football, not just because it confuses the opposition, but also because it is a decent way of overcoming rotational fouling (Wigan committed over 20 fouls to Arsenal’s six yesterday) and the “team bus” approach which we saw in Belgium after the fifth minute, and which Wigan looked to achieve before the first goal went in. And this is what it has all been about. The four years of waiting have been waiting for the evolution of the new system, and the players to make it work. I don’t think you get the full picture watching it on TV – although of course if I am right then in the coming weeks all journalists will be saying “as I have been predicting for some time…” as they ask for wider shots and chalkboards to show the rotation of the two groups of three players. But believe me, sitting in the ground, it smashes you in the face. This is something utterly different. And I think it is going to work. (c) Tony Attwood 2009 Arsenal/Wigan on “Talk like a Pirate Day”If you have not come across “Talk like a pirate day” before, or indeed if you are not resident in England, it may come as a bit of a shock that there is such a thing. But there is, and it has been around for about 10 years – go to http://www.talklikeapirate.com/piratehome.html if you don’t believe a word I am saying. I appreciate that the characters on the site (Cap’n Slappy, Ol’ Chumbucket and Mad Sally) sound like the Tottenham midfield, but it is all true – it is “Talk like a pirate day”. Meanwhile back on planet Zonk it is SUPERKID DAY – yes the magnificent moment when one of our youngsters STEPS UP and PLAYS A BLINDER (actually you don’t hear that one so much these days), and is DISCOVERED. Who is it to be? Mannone, who makes a string of two saves to keep us in the game at 6-1? Perhaps. But maybe today is Wilshere Day. Or Ramsey Day? One or t’other me hearties. (If English is not your first language that last sentence will be incomprehensible – it is pirate talk – as is “Why is a pirate called a pirate?” “Because they Arghhhhhhhhh”.) Yes, well… One year ago we had played home games against West Bromwich Wobbleyou and beaten them 1-0, FC Twenty two and a third, 4-0, Newcastle Zebras 3-0, and so it was time for an away game at Notlob, the most backwards team in the galaxy, on 20 September. Our team was
We won the game 3-1 (Eboue, Bendtner, Denilson) and so were top of the league having won 4 lost 1, scored 11 let in 2. So it might seem we are not doing so well, but let us remember we had played WBA (who went down) the Zebras (who went down), Bolton (who were fairly awful) and Fulham (who surprised everyone). We’d drawn our Champs League game in the seaside holiday town of Kiev. It’s a tougher start this year, and the injuries just keep on coming, day by day by day by day by… And this is what happens… In this game Wenger surprises everyone by nominating Pat Rice to play as team mascot, while making Jack Wilshere walk the plank. Wilshere scores 20 seconds before kick off. Theo, anxious that his image as the sparky youngster should not be replaced, fights his way out of the team seats, screams abuse at the Lord Wenger, rushes across the pitch, knocks out Mannone, takes his jersey, and taunts the six plucky away fans who made the journey south from the land of the Pier. (George Orwell reference). Now compare this year with last year… with rather obviously the replacements in caps. Sagna, Toure VERMAELEN, Gallas, Clichy Denilson DIABY, Fabregas, Song, Eboue WILSHERE/ROSICKY Bendtner; some tall geezer who strolled around the pitch VAN PERSIE/EDUARDO Is this an improvement? The players who have improved vis a vis their equivalent last season are
So even with us still playing half a reserve team every game, we are still better off. And this must be the moment when Diaby (who seems to be staggeringly brilliant or staggering) shakes off the shackles, does something to the mainbrace (pirate reference) and takes on the role he did against Portsmouth (nautical reference). As to Wilshere (Wilshere reference): he is going to win the world cup for England. (I am not a God-fearing man but apparently it says so in Revelations). So he obviously is better than anyone and should play for all 234 minutes. Don’t forget, HIGHBURY HIGH comes out next week. If
then you must obviously subscribe.
Ahoy you landlubbers (meaningless gibberish reference). Oh yes, we win 6-1. (Score reference). (c) Tony Attwood 2009 Arsenal / Wigan: team news, tactics, prognosisArsenal vs Wigan: team news, injuries, tactics, prognosis By Phil Gregory Wigan Athletic, Arsenal’s opponents on Saturday, arrive at the Emirates Stadium on the back of their first home win of the season against West Ham. Roberto Martinez, Wigan’s manager since the departure of Steve Bruce to Sunderland, has undertaken wholesale changes at the club. Valencia and Cattermole departed, along with hardworking central midfielder Michael Brown. P layers such as Gomez (a product of the Barcelona academy) and Jason Scotland, both of whom spent time with Martinez when he was Swansea manager last season, arrived to replace them. Other summer arrivals included Scott Sinclair (on loan from Chelsea) and highly-rated James McCarthy. Recent form: Since an impressive 2-0 opening day win at Aston Villa, Wigan have fallen to away defeats against Blackpool in the League Cup and a struggling Everton side. Arsenal, weakened by the ever-present spate of injuries, nonetheless have their confidence restored after an impressive comeback away to Standard Liege. Arsenal’s free-scoring home form has been impressive, with wins recorded in all games, though we have to go back to Rangers in the Emirates Cup for a clean sheet at home this season. Injuries: Arsenal are without long-term absentees Nasri, Fabianksi, Djourou and Vela, while Almunia is expected to miss the game too. Report emerged after the Liege game that Denilson will be out for “a few weeks” with a back problem and Andrei Arshavin is rated as being unlikely to be fit. Realistically Arshavin’s unlikely to be risked for what should be a comfortable home win, but he will be a welcome face on the bench. As of yet, it isn’t known whether Walcott is fit to be involved, but Wenger has said that Van Persie could well recover in time. Wigan are at the other end of the spectrum, with only Olivier Kapo ruled out with a knee ligament injury. Key men: Arsenal will be looking to Cesc Fabregas and Tomas Rosicky to shoulder the creative burden in the absence of Arshavin and Nasri. William Gallas will be looking to atone for the (albeit soft) penalty given against him at Liege and help the team to a clean sheet. Niklas Bendtner will be hoping to continue his recent good form, and I’m tipping him to score at the Emirates on Saturday after an excellent performance in Liege was deservedly capped with a tidy finish. For Wigan, ex Newcastle winger N’Zogbia and former Welsh international Koumas have both looked lively during the season’s opening games but haven’t had much in the way of goals to show for it. Hugo Rodallega has two Premier League strikes to his name this season and can be expected to provide most of the threat from an otherwise goal-shy Wigan Athletic side. Arsenal expected lineup: Mannone Sagna Vermaelen Gallas Clichy Song Fabregas Diaby Bendtner Eduardo Rosicky Subs: Szczseny, Silvestre, Eboue, Van Persie, Ramsey, Watt, Wilshere Defence and goalkeeper pick themselves. Its unlikely Wenger will want to play Rosicky as frequently as he has, but injuries are forcing his hand. Rosicky could play at CM, with Diaby wide, though personally I think this system is the better use of the players. Eduardo can play as the centre forward if Van Persie isn’t risked: I really can’t see the need in rushing Robin back for what should be a fairly comfortable home win, being an option to come on should suffice for him. The bench is weak, but with nine first team players injured it is to be expected. I think we’re all hoping Jack will get some minutes, I’d imagine he’s in with an outside chance of a start if Wenger decides to be cautious with Rosicky. Given the paucity of bench options, I’m wondering why Traore isn’t included. Prediction: I was pleased to be almost on target with my prediction for the Liege game (narrow away win it most certainly was!) and this time . I’m going to go for a comfortable 3-0 home win. Given our injuries, I’d take 1-0, but Wigan just aren’t gelling as a team yet, and their form has been unimpressive. They’re struggling to score goals, but Arsenal have looked unsteady at the back too. It’s a great opportunity for the Gooners to celebrate a clean sheet at home, and a decent performance from the back four should see us through. Even with the spate of injuries, that team is more than enough to beat a Wigan side still very much a work in progress. See you all on Monday for the Carling Cup Preview! The preview of this match from Alternative Universe No 7 will appear Saturday morning. CORRUPTION FILES 3: WHU close to Iceland fraud?Two financial stories turned up last week – both affecting the EPL but neither making it onto the football pages. The new story concerns our old chums, West Iceland United (4 stops from Barking), and it furthered rumours that have been circulating for months and months. First the background. When Icelandic banks went bust the UK government used the Anti-Terrorism legislation to seize Icelandic assets. That was not just bizarre, it was a total abuse of power. Iceland might be a lot of things (like bloody cold) but it is not a terrorist haven nor a base for any religious fundamental groups. It is in fact the country that is more free from religious involvement in its legislation and social life than virtually any other country in the world. Using Anti-Terror against Iceland was an absolute abuse of authority by the UK government, but something interesting did comes out of it. As a result of this abuse, the Serious Fraud Offiice in the UK rummaged through a load of Icelandic financial stuff and started to reach the conclusion that there was something very nasty in the woodpile. Icelandic legal authorities (including special prosecutor Olafur Hauksson) were tipped off and in return for no longer classifying Iceland as a Terror Suspect, they were encouraged by the British to dig deeper into what happened in October 2008. The word coming out from both sides of that bit of the fish pond that separates the UK from Iceland is that a) there was not just mismanagement and greedy over-expansion of the banks, there was fraud. b) “a lot of roads lead to the UK”. Now what does this have to do with our mates in the East End? WHU was bought out by one of the banking giants, Bjorgolfur Gudmundsson (who is incidentally being sued by former chairman Eggert Magnusson for breach of contract, Sheffield United over some football transfer or other, former chairman Terry Brown, Kia Joorabchian and Alan Curbishley. (Actually to be fair not every case has started, but everyone on that list has either sued, threatened to sue, or settled a claim with WHU). So West Ham’s owner is already involved in a lot of disputes, but one question has never been resolved: why on earth should Bjorgolfur Gudmundsson, giant of the financial world, buy a second rate East End football club? Was there something fishy going on (fish – Iceland geddit?) Of course I have no evidence of fraud, money laundering or anything else at West Ham, and as far as I know it is a perfectly legit and well-run business, that just happened to be associated with a man who orchestrated the biggest financial collapse of any western country ever, and which has now utterly and totally run out of money. Special Prosecutor Hauksson says he expects there to be around 70 cases of fraud to be brought relating to the British ends of Icelandic loan fraud, market manipulation, document fraud, embezzlement and bank fraud. Which pretty much covers the whole list of possible frauds. Except money laundering. Cut that one from the list. Can’t imagine that. So what happened? Iceland had banks for Icelanders. But then at the turn of the century they started to expand into other countries, offering rates of interest that no one else could match. The banks (Glitnir, Landsbanki and Kaupthing) grew at impossible rates until they had turnovers that were nearly ten times the gross domestic product of Iceland itself. These banks then lent money (which banks do of course) – but some of the loans were huge, and some were to people who owned the banks, which really isn’t allowed, because of the obvious corruption issues. And they did it in such a way that rather like Notts County or Leeds United, it was impossible to find out who owned what (not that those august clubs are involved in fraud). And lurking right in the middle is the owner of West Ham. Apparently the serious fraud office is going to go to Reykjavik – which will be fun if they leave it much longer – it starts getting cold at this time of year. But still the same question remains – why on earth did and Icelandic banker who was involved in such things as loan fraud, market manipulation, document fraud, embezzlement and bank fraud (if he was – he has not been tried so we don’t know, but given the Eduardo scenario I think we can now call anyone in football upon whom suspicion arises, guilty before they are charged):- why did this banker buy West Ham? He was seemingly (and that is seemingly to me, not to the SFO) doing financial stuff, moving money, borrowing money, lending it to himself. Why muck about with a little EPL team going nowhere fast? I’d love to know. Wouldn’t you? Especially if all the fraud roads point to England. But just to stress – what I am doing here is take the chain of events in Iceland over the past 11 months, and mixing them with the fact that one man at the centre is a) being sued by people and b) is the man who inexplicably bought West Ham, and c) while West Ham is being sued by all sorts of people. I have no proof that anything is linked and that awfully nice Bjorgolfur Gudmundsson might have done nothing wrong whatsoever. And what has this got to do with Arsenal? The fact is that a lot of clubs have gone down funny financial routes these past few years. Manchester IOU owning over half a billion pounds, Liverpool owning £350m, KGB Fulham, Manchester Arab, Portsmouth, Fulham and others being dependent on the largess and interest of one person… These are all dodgy financial models. At the moment the Arsenal model looks rather pure in comparison. Dead straight, open, no oddities, no Iceland. Seems the best approach to me. Being in Liège: the pitch side viewBeing in Liège yesterday it was a great result for us. By Walter Broeckx The trip from the Benelux gooners took us the “hot city”. The stadium is situated next to the river Meuse and looks nice from the outside but the seats reserved for the visitors have never been cleaned since the Euro 2000 championship. So have to take my pants to the cleaners today. We gave away the two goals Tony predicted in an awful way. Our passes wasn’t up to our usual standard. It took us a while before we could feel the running of the grass and most of our passes where to short or didn’t have the speed on the ball that we normally do. The way we gave the goals away… was just like in a nightmare. Okay we don’t like to see the ball kicked in the Meuse to much over there but to try a back heal in a game like that in a position like that wasn’t the most clever thing Eduardo could do. The way Eboue miscontrolled and gave the ball to Jovanovic was also not very clever. I can tell you that after 10 minutes all the England gooners around me knew every Flemish swearword you can find in a book. I tried to wake myself up out of this nightmare but every time I woke up we had the same score line. The first half we played football which could make you sick at times. A poor young goonergirl had the same opinion and she threw up everything she had eaten since leaving England. It was a rather sour first 30 minutes. You could see the doubt in the players mind, after the two recent defeats, creeping in. People over here, my colleagues at work that is, were impressed by Bendtner. He worked his socks off and my colleagues over here thought he was far more impressive then Mbokani the Standard centre forward. And Super Nick, encouraged by the Denmark Gooners, did what he had to do by scoring our first goal and giving us a lifeline. Also Rosicky had a very good game and when you look at him in the stadium his running off the ball is superb but his teammates didn’t noticed him at times when he was in good positions. If there is a God somewhere: please help to keep him fit. Arsene Wenger had some work in the dressing room at half time and so did we by helping the father of the sick girl to talk to the stewards to clean up the mess so we all could resume play in a better way. Meanwhile have to say that the home support really made it the ‘hell of sclessin” as it is known in Belgium. Because of the construction of the stadium it is difficult for the away fans to get there atmosphere going. You sit/stand in two separate levels and you don’t hear what the down level is signing so at times I think every level started a chant so it must have looked at times the fans were out of tune, like the players for most of the first half. Came the second half and Standard parked the bus in front of their goal. We almost started the second half like the first by handing Standard the ball and a good opportunity to score again. Luckily they didn’t. Standard made it very difficult for us. But thanks to the Bendtner’s goal you could feel that we could pull something out of the hat. The pressure mounted and Standard couldn’t get the ball in our half so Manone almost didn’t have to do anything for most of the game. The second goal was a very strange goal from where we sat. It looked like Song made a save on the line and then it took ages before Vermaelen put it in the net. We couldn’t see who scored at the time but we really didn’t care for it. It was delirium in our part of the stadium. And you could feel that de Standard fans who had been very impressive until that moment began to wonder if there dream debut in the CL would turn into a nightmare. From that moment on we gooners knew that if there was going to be a winner it would be Arsenal. And so Eduardo did what we had to do by scoring another strange goal by poaching the ball with his knee past the goalkeeper. I think he was the most relieved man in the ground because it was his mistake that could have cost us dearly. Standard tried to pull one back but we got the best chances to score another goal. Meanwhile the away gooners finally out sang the home fans and we dragged our team over the finish line. Actually they did it themselves but it felt we gave them a little hand. The father of the girl, who was feeling better after the final whistle – what a result can do, gave us a good hug and thanked us for the assistance but being a fan is about team work, in fact we do the same like the players on the pitch: try to work together to get the result. It was blood, sweat and tears during the game and luckily it was tears of joy at the end. We all went home feeling happy with the win but we knew it was a narrow escape. Not because of Standard posing that threat going forward but because we made life difficult for ourselves. According to our Benelux gooners the best player on the pitch was Rosicky, followed by Vermaelen, Gallas and Bendtner. According to my colleagues Rosicky and Bendtner caught the eye. So a happy gooner coming home at 2 in the morning and still a very happy gooner when the alarm clock woke me up this morning. I think this game will do the players good. I can imagine that Arsene Wenger will not be to pleased with some things he saw yesterday but we showed character and never gave up and this is the attitude we want to see from our players on the days that we struggle in a game. A last note to the fans who follow and travel our Gunners all over the world: It has been a great privilege for me to have been with you. Must say that the behaviour of you lot was great and no incidents took place Disgusting, disgraceful, appalling, shamefulDisgusting, disgraceful, appalling, shameful: I speak of course of the coverage on Sky Sports last night. There was a moment of amusement before the game when Redknapp-the-Younger started to talk about why UEFA was so biased (in this case against English clubs) and the chairbeing nearly fell off his chair, chuffling like a steam train, grinning like a cat from south west of Liverpool, with the camera unsure where to go… But from the Sky point of view that was it – you have had your moment of high drama, they clearly thought, we are certainly never going to talk about THAT subject again, because the topic of the evening is… Arsenal are useless. If someone tried a clever cross-field pass of 30 yards which was intercepted Arsenal “have give the ball away again”. It was like that all the time – until after 15 minutes I turned the commentary off. I did try again with commentary in the second half, and that was even more amazing, bizarre, eccentric and just plain weird. When the second Arsenal goal went in, the commentators (including once again the incredibly anti-Arsenal ex-Arsenal Alan Smith who these days seems to want to talk more about his past glories rather than today’s team) were so busy chuntering amongst themselves about how terrible Arsenal were, they didn’t even know a goal was scored. They really did keep on chatting until suddenly one of the turnips said, “Oh Arsenal have scored”. And the goal wasn’t that hard to see. Radio 5 re-ran the commentary by Alan “What do you mean I am a bully” Green and for once he wasn’t talking about the pies or the ref, but was actually there, talking about the game and, like the rest of the world, could see that a goal had been scored. But not Sky Sports. Oh no – it was as if they had read my piece yesterday evening and taken it to be an indication that one should actually travel to another universe to see this match, rather than understand that it was supposed to be a piece of mild whimsy. And yet, let us not forget (as if I would let you) that I was not too far off with that score prediction. I gave it 2-5 and we got 2-3 – and with the way the shots were piling in at the end we could have had 2-5. What’s more, while the rest of the British teams in Europe have struggled to score one – yes a whole “one” – Arsenal gave us a great game and knocked in three. And did it without most of the team. Wonderful to see Rosicky back, of course, but we should save our thoughts for our fallen comrades… No Theo, No Arshavin, No Van Persie, No 1st choice keeper, No 2nd choice keeper, No Denilson, No Vela, No Nasri. And we still won 13-3 on shots. So once again we get close to predicting the correct score: we’ve played seven and predicted five correct results, often with a score that is not so far off. By the way – do you remember that time when Song was booed by Arsenal “supporters”, and we were told that he should never ever play for the club again? (c) Tony Attwood 2009 My sitting room is a bit of a mess after that game what with me throwing the furniture around and all. I’d better go and tidy up. And if anyone happens to find my voice could I have it back please? Royal Standard de Liège: the result before it happensAs usual Phil has done an excellent, well-researched piece which tells us all we need to know (see last post if you haven’t read it – you really can’t watch the match without it). Which naturally allows me a chance to do my usual jink around the fringes of reality and consider the delicate matter of 22 players, 3 turnips, John Terry’s mother and a blade of grass, and the leading issues from various alternative universes. Last season we started our journey to the semis with a trip to the holiday resort of Kiev where ace scorer William Gallas gave us a goal in the 145th minute (or so it felt) to get a 1-1 victory. We played with
Ramsey, Djourou, Wilshere were the unused outfield subs. As we know everyone and his rat-catcher is ill with swine flu, injured or learning Arabic, so no need to argue with Phil’s selection except over the Van Persie issue, wherein Phil wrote his piece before VP went down with the plague. So, could it just possibly be that the Walcott character, famed for the bench-induced-injury (caused by man of the dodgy tax return and memory loss when asked his own address – see earlier post on corruption), might play leaving Diaby in midfield? According to the Lord Wenger, no, but what does he know? So the alternative is to put Diaby as one of the front triangle, and play Eboue or Ramsey in midfield depending on how you are feeling. Of course there is no need for me to enter the world of caution (or come to that reality) and I am going for a 5-2 victory to the Arsenal, with one each for Gallas, Vermaelen (he speaks the language let us not forget), Eduardo (showing us now what he can really do after all that falling over stuff), Ramsey (maybe on as a sub) and Rosicky (ditto). A further goal from late sub Wilshere is disallowed after the touch judge (or so he must have been given his decision making) flagged for an under inflated ball. The ref, mishearing, sends off the non-present Theo for having an under inflated ego. UEFA announce immediately that under-inflated egos are utterly not allowed and that doesn’t Theo know that Wine Rooney is the role model and exemplar of all good sporting ethics? At a strangely already-prepared hearing in Edinburgh, Theo is tried in his absence (“can’t have players coming in, speaking in their own defence – it could alter the whole course of the kangeroo court system”) and given a 12 match ban. Eboue, who actually never makes it on the pitch, then gets sent off for diving off the bench (his defence is that he fell over laughing), while Mannone gets a yellow for being too young to be a goalkeeper. Royal Standard de Liège have four men sent off for not knowing the words of the national anthem, while the fourth official is inexplicably turned into a toad by a group of passing hieroglyphs. Jack Wilshire then takes over as linesman and immediately heads a goal from the corner flag only to find that a FIFA commission sitting thirty minutes later rules that headed goals are illegal. Finding themselves in the wrong universe the Arsenal team grab a passing hyper bus and return before the game has started, whereupon they settle down in the airport to watch the match on Sky Sports 19 with D Duck as commentator. They are surprised to see themselves win 5-2 with one each for Gallas, Vermaelen (he speaks the language let us not forget), Eduardo (showing us now what he can really do after all that falling over stuff), Theo and Rosicky. A further goal from late sub Wilshere was disallowed after the touch judge (or so he must have been given his decision making) flagged for an under inflated ball. The ref, mishearing… Ah, yes, well… Just another episode of All Tomorrow’s Parties. (Blame the Velvet Underground). Don’t forget if you can’t get to the games and for some inexplicable reason feel that there are other matters going on which are not covered here, you will then feel the need to subscribe to the only fanzine that is as positive as Untold Arsenal: viz, to wit, and op cit, HIGHBURY HIGH. You can get it delivered to the door (or wherever your post is delivered to) 6 game subscription £12 (UK), £15 (Europe) or £18 (World) Cheques payable to Highbury High Address: 11 Tannington Terrace, Gillespie Road, London N5 1LE (c) Tony Attwood, Universe number 5, wherein the year is 1789 and the mobs are preparing to take to the streets. In football, Arsenal under 6′s have surrounded the England manager waving tax returns in his face while… Standard Liege v Arsenal: form, injuries, key players, line-upsEditor’s note: this article was forwarded by Phil to Untold Arsenal yesterday, before the extent of the injury list was fully known. Since the article was written we’ve heard that Van Persie is out injured. Standard Liege v Arsenal: form, injuries, key players, line-ups By Phil Gregory. Standard Liege, Belgian champions for the last two seasons, are Arsenal’s first opponents in Group H. Many disregard Standard as a credible threat, but they were arguably the strongest team in pot four after German champions Wolfsburg. Anybody still holding perceptions of a walkover should cast their mind back thirteen months to when Standard were held to a draw at home against Liverpool despite dominating. Fellaini hit the inside of the post early on, and Liege had a penalty saved after a Dossena handball. Liverpool ultimately scraped through with a Kuyt winner in extra time at Anfield, but fans and pundits alike agreed Standard were the better side over the two legs of the qualifying tie. If you followed the Confederations Cup during the summer you will be pleased to know that US international Oguchi Onyewu no longer plays for Standard, having signed for Milan on a free during the summer. Recent form: Ten points from six games in the Jupiler league, including four draws, is an unimpressive start though it would be a mistake to underestimate Standard. No doubt they themselves will be citing two consecutive Arsenal losses as a reason to be confident. Injuries: Club captain and star player Steven Defour is out injured for the entire group stage, though Axel Witsel is likely to feature as his ban only covers domestic matches. Key men: Our leaky defence, which hasn’t kept a clean sheet since Celtic away, will be up against Serbian international Milan Jovanovic who boasts five goals already this season. Jovanovic put in a stellar performance against Everton during last season’s UEFA cup, with Standard winning 2-1 at home after Everton grabbed a 2-2 draw with a late goal at Goodison. Eduardo’s successful appeal will mean he is likely to be playing against Axel Witsel, recipient of an eight match ban for a horror tackle on Polish right back Marcin Wasilewski. Witsel, who has been heavily linked with the star clubs of Europe, is likely to play a holding role for Standard. Arsenal predicted lineup: Mannone Sagna Vermaelen Gallas Clichy Song Fabregas Diaby Bendtner Van Persie Eduardo Subs: Szczseny, Silvestre, Eboue, Rosicky, Ramsey, Watt, Wilshere. I genuinely can’t see Wenger wanting to make as many changes as he has been forced to. Despite recent criticism, Almunia is clearly our best goalkeeper and is a big loss. Diaby will most likely slot back into midfield as Denilson’s replacement, with doubts remaining over Ramsey’s ability to cope with the pressure of big away games. Rosicky is unlikely to be risked as a starter but expect another cameo appearance from the Czech playmaker if we need a goal. Eduardo will likely slot in wide if Wenger decides to stick to 433. Another option of course is switching back to 442, with a midfield of Bendtner wide right, Song and Fabregas in the middle and Diaby wide left as we saw at times last season, as the 433 could be argued to be a little light defensively for a tricky away game. Prediction: Tricky. I’m going to be optimistic and plump for 2-1 to the Arsenal. It’s not convincing by any means, but I think this is a harder game than United’s at Besiktas I don’t feel confident in us keeping a clean sheet, though they are going to find it harder to create without Defour. Hopefully with Song having been substituted last game he’ll be fit to put in a hardworking 90 minutes which will be key. The bench offers options offensively, so don’t panic if we’re still level as the game goes on. We are all very keen to see a reaction after the recent forays to Manchester, but we’re more likely to see that against poor old Wigan at home. An alternative version of events by the attendants at All Tomorrow’s Parties will appear on Wednesday afternoon (UK time). Wenger’s genius revealed as clubs face new “home grown” ruleStarting next season all EPL clubs will have to name 25 players over 21 before the season begins as their registered players list. Eight of those players must have been developed for at least three years by an English or Welsh club before their 21st birthday. The clubs can also have a limitless list of players under 21. Both lists can be resubmitted at the end of the January transfer window. At the moment the issue of transfers concluded during the summer transfer window but after the start of the EPL season (ie mid-August to September 1) has not been resolved. As things stand they would not be able to play in the EPL – but clearly that rule will be changed. So who can we count in our eight players developed for at least three years by an English or Welsh club before their 21st birthday? I have not done detailed research on this, so I need some help on birthdates and checking dates of joining the club, but here’s a guess…
So we needed eight and we got 15 – which means even if some of my data is wrong, we are safely there. That may seem easy – but if we take Liverpool I think they have a significant problem, if for no reason other than the fact that they have over 50 registered pros in the club. What will in fact happen is that some clubs will now have to change their approach radically to have a squad of 25 including the eight “home grown” players. And they will be trying to do it in a rush. Of course the clubs can fill up the numbers will all sorts of kiddies, under the under 21 rule, but then they are focussing on a squad of maybe 20 – which as we know, given the way injuries are much more common now than in the past, is not enough. Put another way, while Liverpool and Manchester IOU already have transfer problems, and while KGB Fulham might do as well (depending on their appeal against their transfer ban) Arsenal’s current policy has clearly been designed with this development in mind. If you have any insights into how other clubs can cope with this development I’d be glad to read it. My gut feeling is that KGB Fulham are going to struggle – because their youth development policy has been such a disaster (which is why they keep getting caught in tapping up offences). I can’t see how Manchester Arab will adapt to this – but maybe I don’t know the pedigree of some of their players. Wright-Phillips and a few others will qualify as home grown – but only a few. The Tiny Totts under Arry are going to struggle to, since all he does is buy and sell brown envelopes (sorry players). And this is the point: it stops Manchester Arabs, the KGB, Appy Arry and others just running riot and buying everything that moves. The get-out clause for clubs (name as many under 21s as you like) won’t help much either, since few (if any clubs) have such an array of under 21s as we have. Take a look at last night’s team in the reserves (who have played 3 won 3 this year). Szczesnv, Gilbert, Bartley, Eastmond, Randall, Murphy, Watt, Barazite, Luke Freeman… these are all players who quite possibly could do a Gibbs and burst into the first team when needed and who would be on the under 21s list. Several will be knocking on the door next season – all under 21. I have no idea how long the Lord Wenger has really been plotting this approach in relation to this rule but it is a real boost to Arsenal that we are just going to adopt it without the slightest change to our playing approach, while many of our rivals will have to adjust – just at the moment when adjustment is the last thing they want to do. Postscript: As I mentioned last time, the new HIGHBURY HIGH is due out for the league cup game. Great article in it on the history of Arsenal and the year of anniversaries. (Well I think it’s great, but then I wrote it). If you can’t get to Arsenal matches you can subscribe… 6 game subscription £12 (UK), £15 (Europe) or £18 (World) Cheques payable to Highbury High CORRPUTION FILES 2: Capello, tax evasion, perjury etcSo, yesterday the Corruption Files took a sneak look at the governing bodies. Now we move on to someone they employ. When Fabio Capello turned up in England he was known as a man with a bit of a murky financial history. Not quite on Icelandic levels, but still, a little bit racey, if you know what I mean. So one of the first questions the Englanders asked the Italian was “is there anything nasty that we ought to know about? Any odd religious stance? Strange use of umbrellas? Inability to speak the lingo?” And he said, as one would, no all is fine. (Except he said it in Foreign). Unfortunately that might, maybe, perhaps, just might, not be quite right. Nothing on the umbrella front to be sure, but public prosecutors in Italy are starting to get their teeth into a tasty case of perjury. It seems last time he gave evidence in a trial (and Mr C does seem to get a bit close to legal issues, it must be said), it is suggested that some of his answers to questions about agents (pesky blighters) he was a little bit evasive. Given that the Italian authorities know all about him and his history of tax evasion, and an ability to have more off-shore tax accounts than Tottenham Hotspur,they seem to reckon he is worth going after. After all, he has just paid a £6m fine to the financial police in Italy (thoughtfully funded by the FA in fact). The trouble with Mr Capello is where he lives. He is known for saying that he lives in Campione d’Italia, which sounds well, Italian, but is in fact actually sort of in Switzerland. But it has tax rates so low that by and large if you make money the authorities pay you, rather than the reverse. Of course he doesn’t actually live there – bit of a slip of the tongue that, but hey we all forget where we live sometime. So he got fined for, well, lying. Now he doesn’t just not live in funny places with funny names, he also has funny companies that sell Fabio Capello fragrances. And these companies can be given huge sums of money by… football clubs like Roma. Curious that. Nothing wrong of course, it is just curious. And then the company that owns the scents and the like turns out to be part of the Capello Family Trust, which is based in Guernsey. I’ve mentioned Guernsey before. I like Guernsey. I’ve spent a lot of time there. Part of my mum’s family come from there. That awfully nice Mr Bates seems to have to spend quite a bit of time in court there. They have a bit of a funny financial system that’s all. (Including the Sark Lark, Sark being part of Guernsey, but having a different financial system. That’s odd too). At this point it gets a bit off, so I am going to hand over to Espresso Republica This august journal says, “Crates full of “Fabio Capello” perfume were kept in deposit for two long years. But then, since no one showed up to claim them, Customs officers proceeded to destroy them. Not one of them survived…. It’s also a shame for his former team, Roma, since it had purchased all those bottles of cologne, along with scarves and other objects designed by Don Fabio at a very expensive price: over 2-million Euro paid directly to Sport 3000 – a company set up in Luxembourg by the most elegant football coach in the world. “The agreement also provided for more orders, but the Sensi family contested the contract as soon as Capello moved to the Juventus bench: it would have been difficult to place products bearing the brand name of someone who was considered nothing less than a “traitor” by Roma Football team fans. But the eau de toilette that has never been splashed upon anyone’s cheeks has proven to be a stroke of luck for Inland Revenue: by following its scent, Revenue inspectors successfully outlined the financial boundaries of the soccer team manager’s empire, digging into the folds of trusts and offshore companies. Subsequently coming upon tax evasion equal to Euro 16-million (including fines) and obliging the coach from Friuli to pay over Euro 5-million in due taxes and administrative sanctions. Crushing proof was collected against the companies owned by Capello and his family members. “The outcome of criminal investigations are now being expected, which was shifted in December from Turin to Rome: having complied with the assessment, the defendants (amounting to about a dozen – other than Capello, the notice of indictment was served to his two children, his wife and a few business experts) might get off by paying a fine. ” So there we are. A good role model for young English footballers I suppose. Maybe the chant in South Africa should be “Mon-ey Mon-ey” rather than “Eng-er-land.” Personally I don’t think the FA are very good at this appointment lark. Everyone is welcome to comment on articles in Untold Arsenal, but they must be at least roughly on topic. If you want, for example, to comment on Arsenal’s performance against Man City and the role of the manager, this is best done under the article of a couple of days back, “Humble words of apology”. It is just a common courtesy to put comments in the right place, and comments that are totally off topic, will be deleted. (c) Tony Attwood 2009 The CORRUPTION FILES: 1 – The LeagueThe organisation running the top league in English football has a long history of corruption – dating back at least to 1919 when Manchester United and Liverpool, who had been found guilty of match fixing in the final pre-war season were allowed to go unpunished and continue unhindered. Arsenal benefitted from the final outcome of that particular scandal, by being given a place in the new expanded First Division in the re-organised league, but that was due to what was effectively a vote of thanks from other clubs who were so pleased to find a team that would stand up to the corruption of the north west teams. That protest against the corruption in football was led by Henry Norris, the Arsenal chairman and owner, who brought Arsenal to Highbury, and who brought in Chapman as manager. But the authorities never forgave his campaign, and they eventually got their own back when he was banned from football for life for… having the club pay for his chauffeur for the drive to an away match. Clearly a balanced response. On May 6, 1991, Arsenal won the League, but not before the League itself had docked Arsenal two points for the behaviour of its players on the pitch in the game earlier in the season at Old Trafford. There’s no denying that something like 18 of the 22 players on the pitch squared up to each or protested to the ref – but players squaring up to each other was nothing new and had never been punished before. No punches were thrown, no one was pushed to the ground. No club has before or since been deducted two points for general player demenour – these days there is a set of rules about paying a fine if several players get booked – but then there was no rule. The League made it up for the occasion. Manchester United were docked one point but that was irrelevant because they were never challenging for the title. Arsenal were. This season, the League obviously were not the prime motivators in getting Eduardo banned for two games in the Champs Knockabout – that all happened because of the Scottish FA, who hold a dominant position in UEFA (especially in the case of Gordon Smith who was prominent in this case). But the League, who could see the injustice of the situation, kept very quiet. Now the application of the post-match charge of Article 10 (1c) of the disciplinary regulations (saying that a player can be suspended “for acting with the obvious intent to cause any match official to make an incorrect decision or supporting his error of judgment”) the world has changed. Eduardo, it is said, did this by diving with intent (remembering that under the new rule the officials decide what is in the player’s mind). Adebayor therefore did the same by intending to rake his studs all over Van Persie’s face and then claiming it was an accident. (No one can know what is in the mind of Adebayor – any more than Eduardo, but since the Eduardo case that is not the question – it is assumed you can know). Van Persie is in no doubt. He says, on the Arsenal site… “I am sad and disappointed by my former team-mate Emmanuel Adebayor’s mindless and malicious stamp on me during today’s match…. He set out to hurt me today. “I knew he was aiming for a collision because he changed the angle of his body to allow contact to be made. He moved backwards when his natural momentum would have taken him forward… “I do feel lucky that I have not suffered a greater injury. The contact was only centimetres from my eye. I have not received an apology from him, there were no words exchanged afterwards…” Now we know that Eduardo got a two game ban for diving. That did not affect the outcome of the game, and did not hurt anyone. So a deliberate attempt to disfigure a player for life presumably is a little more than a two game ban. In November 2007 a rugby player Rhys Garfield from near Bridgend was jailed for 15 months for stamping on the head of an opponent during a match. Garfield cause greater injury than Adebayor, but it shows that such issues can be taken seriously. So here we have the two ends of the spectrum. Two match ban for falling over, or 15 months in prison for stamping on a player’s head. Given that the injury Van Persie suffered was not substantial it doesn’t seem relevant to talk of prison, but certainly a long ban from football would seem in order. Anything less than half a season’s ban for deliberate contact between boot and head would seem ludicrous given the precedent set by two games for falling over. Anything less than half that (ie ten game ban) would (again given the context of Eduardo’s two game ban) seem like corruption once again. We wait and see, but if you do accept that the League is a corrupt body in the way it hands out uneven punishment then the question is why? Why should club a) get away with it and club z) not? The answer undoubtedly come down to money and who pays whom, how and when. Just the same as in the match fixing days before the First World War. At least Arsenal are at last standing up to bent authorities, and I really do welcome this. The strong statement made on the web site in the Eduardo case was welcome, and the way the club has handled its comments about Adebayor is also welcome. Long may that continue – we’ve been pushed around by the nutters who run football for nearly 100 years, and it is time this stopped. PS – the link in the banner at the top is not working as I write this (monday AM) but will be soon — it leads to www.woolwicharsenal.co.uk Coming next in the Corruption Files: Fabio Capello (c) Tony Attwood 2009 |
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