Sunday, February 26, 2012

Arsenal Schizophrenia

34 minutes into the North London derby today, Tottenham led 2-0, the Gunners looked terrible and I was screaming internally for the club to sell Walcott this summer, wondering what Arsenal in Europa would feel like. Then the team woke up, Sagna put in a nice header to make it 2-1, Van Persie followed with a beautiful left footed corker into the corner and we went to half time level, and with all the momentum. The second half started with Arsenal in the ascendancy but a nervous feel in the air, given our defensive frailties all season. But arguably the man of the match, Rosicky, had a lovely finish to give us the lead and two Walcott goals followed to keep us in fourth and hopefully give us serious inspiration to keep that spot until the end of the season.

Walcott looked terrible throughout the first half, with terrible touches, worse passes and no ability to take advantage of strong positions. Then he suddenly emerged from a rather long spell of bad form with two strong finishes to put the match out of reach and hopefully restore his confidence. There is no question that he is one of our most inconsistent players, but when he is on, he is always a danger (though more often providing service to Van Persie). But one has to ask, if we are really going to go after Hazard, whether this summer is the time to cash in on him. For those who read my commentary, they know my disappointment with his failure to develop over the past few seasons, but the reality is this -- Oxlade is arguably already a better player than Walcott and brings a lot more energy to  the pitch, Gervinho is also more consistent that Theo and Ryo Miyachi looks like a star in the making (based on his form at Bolton the past two  games). If we add another winger, why keep Walcott? We can sell him for a tidy sum and use it to shore up our defense, maybe try for M'Villa again and bring in the creative midfielder and second striker we need to really compete at the top of the league again.

However, this game does show the genius that is Wenger, even as his transfer policy has put us in this position. He picked a squad that has not played together all season, a formation that I don't remember them using and it paid off in the end (though most of the goals came after they switched back to this year's more common 4-3-3 formation -- or  maybe 4-2-1-3 to be more accurate). In any case, after a rather auspicious start, Vermaelen and Kosielny settled in, Sagna looked good on both ends of the pitch, Gibbs was average but adequate, Jenkinson better, Arteta good as usual (though I'd still like to see him push the ball through to van Persie more often), Song strong defensively and decent going forward, Rosicky excellent with his movement, passing and persistent approach to defense and Benayoun average. After the Sagna goal, the entire team looked stronger, with a more solid defensive showing, particularly in the box, nice control of the middle of the pitch, very good passing and, of course, nice finishing. This game reminded me of the Chelsea game and one hopes it augurs a strong finish to the season -- something Gooners have been waiting for for years.

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