Hurrah, there's football tonight. It seems like so long since we've played that today is a countdown to a huge, enormous game, and not simply an FA Cup 4th round replay against Cardiff (no disrespect to them).

Speaking about how goal-shy we've been in the recent past, Arsene Wenger said:

I still don't think it is completely characteristic of our team. We are used to scoring goals and we will score goals again, don't worry. I am convinced that if we keep working well as a team, playing well as a team, that we will come back quickly.

Tonight's line-up is going to be interesting. Despite the boss saying he's unsure of who he's going to play up front I suspect he'll rest van Persie and the obvious pairing is Nicklas Bendtner and Carlos Vela. Unless he plays Vela on the left hand side of midfield and pushes Nasri over to the right and uses van Persie up front. Of course we do have Eduardo back again but I don't think he'll start.

Midfield is the most interesting area. The right hand side is Eboueless, Arshavinless, sin Walcott, so perhaps we might see Aaron Ramsey start if he's fit. If not the only other option (beyond the Nasri/Vela switcheroo) is Jack Wilshere.

At the back I'd expect Gallas and Djourou to play with Sagna and Clichy, provided his head has closed up, either side. If it were me I think I'd pick the following team:

Fabianski - Sagna - Gallas - Djourou - Clichy - Wilshere - Song - Denilson - Nasri - Bendtner - Vela

That's assuming Ramsey is out and the boss wants to rest Robin.

Anyway, whatever team we put out we should be strong enough to beat Cardiff. That's not playing down their threat, they showed in the first game they're a decent side who have the ability to cause us problems and create chances. But we're at home, we need a good win to get ourselves motoring again, and we should be raring to go. 

Further motivation is provided that we can see our way to the semi-finals very clearly. If we beat Cardiff we have a 5th round game against Burnley, and should we beat them then we'll face either Hull City or Sheffield United in the quarter finals.

We've certainly gone through much more difficult draws in our time and this really is a good opportunity to do well in this competition. Bacary Sagna is up for the cup, saying:

The FA Cup is really important for the fans and for the club and for ourselves. It is one of the competitions we can win, along with the Champions League.

Interesting that there's no mention of the league in the competitions that we can win. A slip of the tongue or an acceptance that it's well and truly beyond us now? Either way he's right about the FA Cup. It might have diminished in importance over the years but it's still got great history and it's a competition Arsenal fans have enjoyed greatly down the years.  

So, fingers crossed we can do the business tonight then we can get ourselves ready to try and make up the ground in the league.

Till tomorrow. 

There's not a huge amount you can say about yesterday's game that's positive - apart from 'well, at least we didn't lose'.

We looked like a team who knew they were playing in the FA Cup and not the league, if that makes sense, and we lived very dangerously in the opening parts of the game. For me we got lucky - the first 15 minutes were all Cardiff. They played some nice football and had some real chances to score. Lucky for us that their finishing wasn't up to scratch because we could easily have found ourselves behind.

I thought Arsene's post-match comment that we started the game very well was so far wide of the mark it might as well have been an Alex Song shot. Gradually though we did get back into it but struggled to create and impose ourselves on the game. Nasri had a good chance but instead of hitting it with his left foot as he did last week he came back on his right and the keeper saved.

When we did show a bit of bite and aggression Kieran Gibbs, one of the few bright spots of the day for me, began a move with a crunching tackle and ended it with a shot that went just wide. Robin van Persie took a free kick which wasn't far away. Eboue was booked for diving then failed to control a simple ball in the box, which pretty much summed up his day.

Aaron Ramsey started the game on his return to Cardiff. Perhaps the occasion got to him but he won't look back on this as one his fondest days but perhaps one when he learned a lot. In the second half he was replaced by Diaby while Adebayor came on for Eboue. The most likely goal threat came from van Persie who had a shot well saved by the Cardiff keeper whose name is too complicated to spell although this is much more time consuming to write, and the miss of the game came when Adebayor, all alone at the back post and certain to score, mis-kicked like a spastic foal. In games like this, when we struggle to create, you need your striker to be more clinical than that.

Jack Wilshere got 4 minutes at the end and I have to wonder about that. What is the point of just giving him 4 minutes? I can understand a late substitution to try and hang on to a lead but when you need a goal what's the point in giving a guy so little time? I don't think he even touched the ball. Cardiff hit the bar with the free kick late on but Fabianski always looked to have it covered. So 0-0 final score, a good result for Cardiff who will enjoy a night out at the Grove on Tuesday week, but disappointing from our point of view.

I'm not that worried about having to play another game but the poor performance, despite it continuing the unbeaten run, was a bit worrisome. Afterwards Arsene was keen to play-up Cardiff's performance, saying:

Cardiff had a good committed game and created some chances. It was the quality of their defending and their commitment that stopped us scoring. Their centre-backs had a great game today and overall I think the whole team had a great day.

Now, while I'm not trying to take anything away from Cardiff, and fair play to them the way they played, I think the manager is a bit too keen to say Cardiff were great because it means he doesn't have to say we were poor. And we were poor. Too many passes went astray, we didn't put enough pressure on them, we defended poorly at times and would have been punished by better teams, we didn't create enough and when we did have a clear cut chance Adebayor blew it. 

But we get a chance to make up for it and should we beat them in the replay then a home game against West Brom or Burnley, the team that knocked us out of the Carling Cup, awaits.

Meanwhile Chairman Peter Hill-Wood has blasted Real Madrid presidential candidate Floretino Perez. With an election in the summer there are going to be all kinds of promises made. Perez has been talking about how he'll bring Wenger and Fabregas to the Bernebeu - and not just that, there are stories in Spain about how he's going to try and bring Messi from Barcelona to Real.

All complete bollocks of course. They promise the sun, moon and stars to get elected - a bit like Laporta promising Beckham to Barcelona before his election, but of we course we have a manager Madrid fans would love to see at their club, not to mention a player or two. Our chairman is having none of it though, saying:

I think it is laughable. It is disrespectful and very rude. It cannot be right to talk in such a way about a manager who is under contract at another club.

And of Cesc, he says:

He is not for sale to Madrid or anybody else. Absolutely not. He is a very sensible young man and he is very happy at Arsenal.

No doubt as the election draws closer we'll get caught in the crossfire a little bit but it's good to know where we stand. As if there were any doubt.

The Daily Mail - at the bottom of this report - brings us the following update about our Owlish friend:

Meanwhile, Andrei Arshavin was close to completing his transfer to Arsenal last night after Zenit St Petersburg abandoned hope of raising £20million from the sale.

Arsenal are understood to have set a deadline of today and Zenit will decide this afternoon.

It seems to tally with something one of the Russian speaking forum members found on a Russian website last night but who knows? There was supposed to be a deadline of Saturday, now there's a deadline of this afternoon, and when that deadline is passed? Who knows? But with the window closing sooner rather than later we'll know for sure soon enough.

Right, have a good start to the week. More tomorrow. 

Good Sunday morning to you,

a feast of football lies ahead. Cardiff v Arsenal, then the Merseyside derby, then a game of 5-a-side. It's a good job Mrs Blogs doesn't read this religiously each morning so she won't know just how exciting her Sunday is going to be ... *cough* ...

Anyway, Cardiff v Arsenal. The FA Cup. I wonder if the FA Cup is the competition which has provided the most shocks in football history. Yesterday saw the holders Portsmouth go out, at home, to Swansea. Poor Tony Adams. You just get the feeling he's not particularly good at this football management thing. On the other hand I reckon Roberto Martinez, the Swansea manager, will find himself a big club soon enough.

But I digress. Today's game is going to be a tough one - Cardiff are a decent outfit and Ninian Park is certainly an atmospheric ground. Although this is the competition we're most likely to get silverware from this season I suspect there'll be some rotation of the squad with Wednesday's league game against Everton coming up.

I wouldn't be too surprised to see Robin van Persie start on the bench and maybe Nasri too. This could mean Diaby starting on the left with Ramsey in the middle or maybe Vela on the left. But they'll be little changes, nothing wholesale. 

It's a game we're certainly capable of winning but, of course, the attitude has to be right. We've ground out some results in the last few weeks and I'd be happy enough to see us do that again. There's been no lack of effort or application and it has shown. Same again today and we should see ourselves through to the 5th round.

Looking around the Sunday papers the News of the World is the one with a couple of Arsenal stories. The first claims that we're going to make a £7m move for Micah Richards from Man City. Seems odd to me that at a time when their defence is in serious need of reinforcement they'd sell one of their best players - despite his form being so poor. And £7m seems a bit cheap in the current climate for a 20 year old England international. When Wilson Palacios is 'worth' £14m you have to wonder why City would sell Richards for £7m.

Plus you'd have to wonder if City would even sell to us, unhappy as they were after the whole Kolo Toure thing. It all sounds a bit madey-up to me. And by 'a bit' I mean 'completely'.

Also in the NotW is a story about Robin van Persie wants £80,000 a week to sign a new contract with Arsenal but he'd be willing to accept less. Well there's some fascinating insight, all right. They also claim contract talks with Theo Walcott are 'imminent'. 

Amy Lawrence writes about Aaraon Ramsey in the Observer. The Arsenal connection of Terry Burton was obviously a big factor in us signing him. I just love the way Burton refers to 'the Arsenal'.  

The People links us with a player called Mohamed Diame. Their website appears to be bollixed at the moment though so a quick Google turns up a 21 year-old French defensive midfielder playing for Rayo Vallecano in the Spanish 2nd division. So it's obvious he's going to be our big transfer window signing - all this talk of Arshavin was just a smokescreen.

Dammit, I nearly got through a whole blog without mentioning him.

And that's about your lot. Here's to a decent game and a good result later on. More tomorrow. 

As the transfer window heads into its final stages there still appears to be an impasse between Arsenal and Zenit over you know who.

Maxim Mitrofanov, the chief executive of Zenit says:

Arsenal received a fax on Friday night last night from Mitrofanov containing the "final offer of my board with a massive discount from the 25 million euros we wanted last summer. I told Arsenal already that we don't accept the £12m and they know it very well.

He goes on to confirm that personal terms between Arsenal and Arshavin are all sorted out but the deal looks more and more unlikely to happen with Arsene Wenger saying:

When you want to buy a player, you go as far as you can and, if you cannot take one step more, you cannot. You have to accept that everybody has a price and when the buyer has a certain amount of money and not more. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work.

There's talk of Arshavin going on strike but I'm not sure what good that would do him. Arsenal's valuation of Arshavin is obviously significantly below what Zenit want and with neither side willing to budge the whole thing seems like a busted flush unless one side caves in - and it's hard to see that happening.

In his interview with Arsenal.com yesterday Arsene was doing his usual thing of talking up the squad he has. He said that even if we didn't get Arshavin he felt we were strong enough to compete on all fronts and, let's not forget, that the injured players coming back would be LNS. I just can't say those words any more, I'm sorry.

Obviously there would be disappointment if Arshavin didn't happen but I'm not sure it would be huge problem. As has been pointed out before he's not match fit, he's coming into a team at the business end of the season trying to get up to speed in a league that normally takes some time to adapt to. But then there's the whole 'even a half fit Russian finding his feet would be better than Eboue' thing. Maybe though, the money would be better spent in the summer.

Ahead of the FA Cup game tomorrow the only piece of team news is that William Gallas is fit again. Stop, stop, I can hear the cheers of joy from here. The manager, referencing the very public issue of Kolo's dislike of Gallas, said:

They get on OK. In football you don’t have to go on holiday together but you can still play together. Kolo and William talk to each other but it is always very difficult to assess how much people are friends or not. What is essential is that, on the pitch, football is most important and they should respect the game.

He says he's still to decide on who will play against Cardiff but the decision is surely one or the other to partner Djourou. Firstly the manager has admitted that as a pairing Kolo and Gallas do not work and secondly the two have no kind of relationship. I know you don't have to be friends to play with someone but when one actively dislikes another to the point where he puts in a transfer request you have to say pairing them in important matches is a huge risk.

The boss has to consider the game against Everton on Wednesday and might be tempted to rest Djourou but he's a young man, he's capable of playing the games. And with Kolo installed as captain, Gallas might find himself spending some time on the bench. I certainly don't want to see Gallas and Kolo as our centre-halves unless there's no other choice.

As for the rest of the team he says there's no room for sentiment in relation to Aaron Ramsey's return to the club he grew up with. He says he'll play him if he thinks he'll help us to win, which is fair enough, I suppose. He also talks about Robin van Persie and talks up Denilson who, he feels doesn't get the credit he deserves.

Denilson is an interesting one. He's played most of our games this season. He's had his good moments and his poor moments, like most of the players. I have to say I think there's potential there and I've always maintained that his presence in the first team has come a bit early for him. While I look at Alex Song and remain baffled as to how he's even near the first team at Arsenal, I can see much more in Denilson.

I think he'd have matured better had he been eased into the team and would have benefited greatly from having more experienced central midfielders to play with. Not every player comes on as quickly as Cesc, for example, and let's remember Cesc had quality experienced players to help him along when he first came into the team. At times this season Denilson has had Diaby and Song as his partners, not exactly players who will give him the kind of guidance he needs.

So while I fully accept he has had his stinkers this season he's not the kind of player who hides on the pitch and hopefully this season and all the football he's played will help him develop. Let's remember, he's just 20 years of age, and to completely write him off as not good enough already is, in my opinion, premature.

The game against Cardiff brings us up against a former Gunner, Jay Bothroyd, who left the club under a cloud some years ago. When substituted in an FA Youth Cup game he threw his shirt at Don Howe and there was no way back after that. He's been fairly well travelled since, playing for Coventry, Blackburn, Charlton, Wolves and even scoring 5 goals in one season for Perugia in Serie A. He talks about his time at Arsenal and more here.

And that's about that. Have yourselves a good Saturday, more tomorrow.

Right, well that's the festivities, drawn out as they might have been, over for another year. 2009 begins in earnest now.

The teacakes are all eaten, I never even had a Christmas pudding so I can't throw out the dried out chunk of it that's left over, and the tree has to come down today. I might just set it on fire out the back to bring some warmth to the local neighbourhood - it's freezing again this morning and one little pine tree burning in the garden is hardly going to make a dent in the environment. 

Now the serious business of winning football matches and trying to win a trophy can get going again. We're through to the 4th round of the FA Cup - an away tie against Cardiff the reward for the win against Plymouth. It could be an interesting day for Aaron Ramsey who could face the club he left in the summertime. That game takes place on the weekend of the 24th/25th January. 

Robin van Persie is a man on a mission. He won the FA Cup in his first full season with the club, scoring one of the penalties in the shoot-out with Manchester United, but has won nothing since. He says:

When I arrived at Arsenal they were winning trophies for fun. They were champions when I arrived and in my first season I won the FA Cup. I was expecting that to carry on but it hasn't really happened like that. But it's not a reason for me to give up, it's a bigger challenge to do it this time. We need to win a trophy as soon as possible. We've been very unlucky with injuries so we want to do something for the club and the fans.

A piece of silverware would go a long, long way at this stage. I know there are those who don't consider the FA Cup a competition of much importance anymore, and perhaps in the era of Champions League its stature has dwindled somewhat, but for me it represents our best chance at winning something this season.

Whatever you might think of the FA Cup itself the confidence it would bring to the team if we won it would be immeasurable. They'd go from being nearly men to men who have won something and it does make a difference.

Anyway, the focus has to go back onto the league right now and the battle for fourth is well and truly on. We've got Bolton at home this Saturday while above us we have to hope that a Villa side which, seems to be getting all the dodgy decisions going their way, finds West Brom more of a struggle than most. Perhaps their UEFA Cup campaign will be a distraction - well, more of a distraction than our Champions League games.

There's nothing new regarding transfers this morning. Arshavin is back on the agenda at £20m, apparently, but there's so much smoke regarding this one it's hard to see if there's any fire. I'm sure we'd be willing to do business but not at that price. You're buying a player from the Russian league, not from one of the top leagues in Europe, and as we've mentioned over the last couple of weeks I think the era of crazy transfer fees is well and truly over for most clubs.

The spectre of Webster looms large over the whole thing as well. At some point a high profile club and a high profile player are going to decide that it's worth all the hassle to push through a move based on the Webster ruling. This means that players can, after a certain protected period, buy out their own contracts and move to another club for the cost of that contract.

I know for a fact that Hleb was considering doing it last summer but for whatever reason it did not transpire. I think at the moment clubs are unwilling to upset other clubs, clubs they may want to do other business with, to make these transfers happen. Players too have to give notice to their current team and I'm sure it's awkward. You need to have some balls to do it. But at some point it's going to happen and after that the floodgates will open, in my opinion. The transfer market will change dramatically.

Still, we've got to operate in the market that exists at this moment in time and if we want players we're going to have to deal with the fact that buying someone like Arshavin is going to be costly. If we buy him, even for £10m, give him a three or four year contract with decent wages, it adds up to a lot of money for a player who will have little or no resale value.

However, you have to add that up against what he, or any other player, might bring to the team. Would signing him and paying all that money be worth it to assure Champions League qualification? Of course it would. No matter what the club might say about not factoring in the CL money it represents somewhere in the region of 12.5% of Arsenal's football revenue (cheers Paul M), so going without would be a massive blow, both financially and footballistically, to use an Arseneism.  

Of course there's no guarantee that signing Arshavin would assure CL qualification, frankly I think there are other areas of the pitch that need more work, and I'm sure the boss is aware of that too. I suspect there'll be some wheeling and dealing this January, not just from Arsenal, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if there was a flurry of activity late in the month when clubs who are desperate to sell now become even more so.

Not much else to tell you, I'm off to burn my tree. More tomorrow.