The real football returns today as Arsenal make a trip to Steve Bruce's Sunderland as we get our league campaign up and running again. With RVP & Gibbs injured we are at least able to welcome back Theo, Denilson, Traore, Wilshere & Vela and within the week we should have Fabianski, Diaby and Gibbs available too. As I said before it's going to leave the boss with a few headaches when it comes to team selection and a few players may not be happy at being omitted. I'm sure with 2 games a week from here until just before Christmas that most of the players will get a fair crack of the whip and it's up to them to grab their chance when they get it.

With that in mind I think the team for today will be Almunia, Sagna, Traore, Gallas, The Verminator, Song, Cesc, Rosicky, Arshavin, Nasri & Eduardo with Don Vito, Silvestre, Theo, Eboue, Ramsey, Vela & Denilson on the bench. I could be wrong and the 2 players most likely to get into the team from my suggested bench are Ramsey and Eboue with Silvestre also a posibility at left back. The boss has hinted that Sagna and Gallas may be rested after playing 120 minutes for France on Wednesday night and Arshavin may be rested too after a long journey and a bitter disappointment with his country. My team is what I see as the ideal team and I would hope if we rest our 2 French defenders that Silvestre will not replace either of them. I suppose Eboue and Senderos could play but I think it's dangerous to make so many changes in the defence.

Hopefully we can get right back into the rhythm that we were in before the international break and bring our game to Sunderland. We may have more injuries than most teams in the league but Sunderland will find it difficult without Jones and Cattermole in their team. Luckily for us Jones got himself a straight red card a couple of games ago and he's serving a 3 match ban and Cattermole is out injured. We will get to see exactly how good Cana is as we were heavily linked with him last summer but the boss decided that Song was the man for him in that position. Bent has been in good goalscoring form since he left The Spuds but he will find it harder without Jones to help him. If things aren't working out up front at least we have Vela and Theo on the bench to give us options.

There was an interesting stat on the club site about us not having scored a goal in the first 15 minutes of a game yet this season despite having scored 55 goals in 19 matches and an early goal today would be very welcome. Even if we don't get that early goal I think we have more than enough to beat Sunderland as long as we give the game everything we have and don't take them for granted. I'm predicting a 2-1 win for Arsenal with Eduardo and Cesc scoring the goals that help to keep the pressure on Chelsea before they visit The Emirates next Sunday. They are having injury problems of their own too with Lampard reportedly getting a bit of RVP style placenta fluid therapy for his injury. Drogba has a broken rib or 2 thanks to Johnny Evans too and I'd love to play them without those 2 players but we'll see if Drogba returns and Lampard seems certain to miss the game.

The match is live on the radio in Ireland but I imagine I will try to get a stream and watch the game live. I'll be checking Twitter before the game as I find there's no better place to find a stream and the chat among fellow Gooners during the game is always enjoyable. I won't be visiting the supporters club for the match either as it's not live on the TV as far as I know and I'm also going to miss the Champions league group game on Tuesday night as it's my 20th wedding anniversary. I will however get to meet up with all my fellow Wicklow Gunners for the Chelsea game and I'm really looking forward to it as I haven't been able to watch a game out there since the 4-1 win against AZ on November 4th.

In other Arsenal news the boss seems happy that the qualifiers for Euro 2012 can be played on Friday and Tuesday instead of Saturday and Wednesday and he thinks that it will catch on and give players 1 extra game to recouperate after their international committments. Wojceich Szczesny has joined Brentford on loan for a month which probably means that Don Vito will play against City in the Carling Cup unless the boss feels Fabianski needs a run out after his recovery from his injury which he received against Liverpool in the last round. Our ladies have drawn the holders FCR 2001 Duisburg of Germany in the quarter finals of the ladies Champions league and if they can win that very tough tie they will have Potsdam of Germany or Roa of Norway in the semi finals. The games will be played on March 10th and 17th and I wish the ladies good luck as they will need it.

Congratulations to Lady Arse who won a football signed by the first team squad on Arsenal TV last night and hopefully we'll get to see a picture of it when it's delivered. The boss has had his say on the whole Thierry Henry/France/Ireland affair and he thinks the game should be replayed to be fair to Ireland. I agree with him but I can't see it happening with FIFA in charge. Incidentally did anyone hear a single word about the whole thing from Platini yet? The boss has also called for the introduction of video technology to ensure that we don't get these ridiculous decisions in the future and again that's up to FIFA and they are dead set against it. That's it for today.

Here's the Arsenal fund raising day advert in case you haven't seen it.

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And to finish today's title track from The Clash. It's for Eduardo who has his chance today to answer the call up that he has wanted since his horriffic injury last season.

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See You Tomorrow.

Good Morning fellow Arsenal fans from a damp and cold Dublin. Sorry for the late blog today but circumstances which I can't go into here have conspired to delay me and I must now try to work and blog at the same time which isn't always easy. First things first and I must change the trousers I'm wearing as they're soaked through but luckily as I work in the rag trade there's always a sample pair to change into lying around somewhere although the fact that the sample legs are 4 inches too long doesn't help a lot. Anyway enough of my petty problems and on to all things Arsenal.

Our injury troubles continued last night as our second choice left back, Kieran Gibbs, went off with a foot injury after only 21 minutes og England's under 21 match in Lituania. There's nothing on the club site as usual but we'll probably find out later how serious it is. He was taken to hospital for x-rays which would indicate that something or other is broken but I hope it's not too serious. It leaves us with Traore as the only fit left back at the club and I think he's just back from an injury too. If he hasn't recovered the next options would be Gallas, The Verminator or Silvestre who can all play there although I wouldn't like to break up the central defensive partnership which would leave Silvestre as the next choice. I hope it doesn't come to that as it scares me when he is in the team. It's a pity for Gibbs as he deserved a chance to show what he could do in the first team and stake a claim to make that position his own. I'm sure that given the same oppurtunity Traore will feel that maybe he can stake a claim too. He has a lot of ability and speed going forward and a very good shot too but it's his defensive game that has been called into question in the past.

According to reports in the papers today RVP's placenta fluid specialist has treated other Premier league players before and he's the first one to openly admit it. The thought of having placenta fluid rubbed on parts of me to make me heal quicker doesn't exactly appeal to me but needs must I suppose for RVP and I can only hope that it works. As it stands the manager is without his first 2 choices in the pivotal role of his attack and at left back also as November's shadow begins to lurk over us as per usual. Also I read today that Sir shits his pants a lot reckons that the race for the title will be a 2 horse race between Manure and Chelsea. Let him underestimate us all he wants but in my opinion he knows we are better than them and he is trying to disguise the fact by writing us off. We should have beaten them at Old Trafford, without Cesc, and we are ahead of them in the league with a game in hand on them. I'll have to leave things there or there will be no blog at all today. Hopefully, for me anyway, Ireland can overcome France tonight and progress to the World cup but most importantly of all hopefully Arsenal won't get any more players injured tonight.

Here's a clip of the long unbeaten run we went on last season. The same again with a few more wins would be very nice.

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And to finish today's title track from Eastwood and Saint(not Queen). We have suffered yet another injury on international duty but at least there are no more internationals for a few months and we can concentrate on Arsenal.

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See You Tomorrow.

It's Saturday morning and the mind numbing boredom of the interlull is well and truly upon us. To say there is nothing happening is an understatement but I'll do my best to report the little bit I can find. It's going to be brief due to the obvious lack of news and a very busy day ahead of me.

The Barcelona president has said that Cesc is their type of player but they must respect Arsenal. How many times do Barcelona have to spout out about our captain before they are taken to task by FIFA or UEFA? Cesc is contracted to us and we do not want to entertain any approaches for him as he is the best player in the world on current form. If he continues with his current form we have the capability to sweep all before us as he is ably supported by the likes of RVP, Arshavin, Rosicky, Gallas, The Verminator and Song.

Ahead of our home match against Chelsea at the end of the month it has emerged that Drogba, Lampard, Boswinga, Tweedey & Terry are all injured and the first 3 of them all look certain to miss the game. It makes a pleasent change for them to have a few of the injury problems we have and the longer it continues the better our prospects of beating them and winning the league. All we want is for Richard Dunne to kick Anelka up and down Croke Park tonight and add him to that list for it to become a striker crisis for them.

It emerged that the driver that Cudicini had his crash with is an Arsenal fan but for the papers to be reporting this it just shows how slow things are today. I have no grudge against Cudicini despite him being a Spyd and I wouldn't wish 2 broken wrists and a broken pelvis on anybody never mind a goalkeeper.  Fran Merida has said he is committed to Arsenal and he is happy at a club who play fantastic football. He said the boss has involved him more in the first team but I don't think he has signed the new contract offered to him yet.

I'll be watching Ireland against France tonight as they attempt to make it to the World Cup next year but they are severe underdogs and I am not overly hopefull of them making it. The biblical style deluge we have had over the past few days may be a leveller and I'm sure Ireland will play a style of football that is not exactly attractive to say the least but if they make it the party next summer will be phenomenal. That's it for today.

Here's a clip of some recent goals from Arshavin.

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And to finish today's title track from Suede. For a change tonight a team other than Arsenal will be getting my full support.

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See You tomorrow.

ps I just saw David Beckham on the TV and he's obviously supporting Jedward in that dreadful programme X Factor as he has adopted an attempt at their hair style.

I thought there was nothing happening in the world of Arsenal yesterday but I was mistaken as there is absolutely nothing happening today. The only news of any interest at all that I could find was that the boss said that he will continue his policy of giving fringe players and youngsters a chance away to Man City in the last 8 of the Carling Cup on my birthday next month. I have been given a present of a trip to a comedy club that night and it probably means I'll miss the game but worse things have happened at sea I suppose. Arsenal are also playing on my 20th wedding anniversary against Liege in the Champions league and I don't imagine I'll see that game either.

Getting back to the Carling Cup I would imagine the boss's policy is playing a different 11 players to the ones that will have played against Chelsea 3 days earlier as we have Stoke at home 3 days later. We could have a team consisting of Fabianski, Traore, Eboue, Senderos, Silvestre, Wilshere, Denilson, Nasri, Diaby, Vela & Eduardo and with City playing their best possible team it would be a tough task for us to reach the semis. However it hasn't escaped my notice that since Richard Dunne left City and Lescott & Toure came in their defence has become decidedly dodgy and we are capable of scoring against any team with the talent we have and the system we play. I'll leave it for now until nearer to the day but I will say that City will underestimate our kids at their peril.

I said I would have a look at players to transfer in to your fantasy team today and also some tactics too so here goes. In the next gamesweek 4 teams have an extra game and players from those clubs will obviously score twice in 1 week if they're in your team. This can move your team up a lot if you get the right players and they manage to score well. The 4 teams in question in the next round are Hull, Everton, Fulham and Blackburn and among them there are a few players worth having. In my opinion David Dunn is the best bet with 4 goals, 1 assist and 11 bonus points in the equivalent of 7 and a half games. However he has missed games through swine flu and injury and both of Blackburn's games are away from home where their record has been far from good recently. He's available at a very good price of 5.8 million at the moment. I honestly don't think Blackburn have any other players that are worth transfering in but if I'm wrong I'll be the first to admit it.

Hull haven't exactly being scoring hatfulls of goals this season but if they do anything good it would seem Stephen Hunt or Giovanni are behind it in some way or other. At 5.1 million and 5.8 million respectively they are well priced and Hull have 2 home games against West Ham and Everton so if you fancy taking a chance you could do worse. The Hull defender Zayatte is doing very well points wise too and he has managed to miss 3 games in which they conceded 13 goals. I don't know if that's chance or if he genuinely makes a difference but personally I won't be putting a Hull defender in my team.

From a Fulham perspective Dempsey would seem to be the best buy and Duff and Murphy are fairly handy too although they both are quite injury prone. Zamora has done well recently too although Football Guy would say you would be mad to buy him. At 6.4 million Dempsey is a little bit expensive but he might well be worth it. As for Everton it would seem that the only 2 possible buys are Baines and Saha but Saha is very injury prone and Everton's defence is dodgy too. With trips to Manure and Hull I think a fit Saha could do well but again it's a risk.

Overall it would seem that no particular goalkeeper is standing out and I would say that if you have an expensive keeper you might be better off selling him and banking the money after buying the likes of Jensen, Sorensen or Hart. Richard Dunne is again at the top of the defenders chart and there isn't a better defender for getting bonus points which gives him an edge. His price continues to climb even though Villa aren't keeping clean sheets at the moment. Alexander of Burnley is doing well thanks mainly to his penalty taking and to be honest I wouldn't touch him as Burnley ship a lot of goals although his price is very low. In midfield if you don't have Cesc as your captain you are losing ground every week as he continues to excel. His nearest challenger is Lampard who has 19 points less and has played 250 minutes more. Gerrard is so injury prone that he's not worth the huge price but Lampard is as consistent as ever and if you have money to spare he's worth it. Andy Reid of Sunderland and Etherington of Stoke are both available at a good price and doing very well at the moment which makes them worth a punt too. As strikers go it's hard to look past Drogba although RVP is scoring very well at the moment and Torres despite doing well is, like Gerrard, too injury prone. At a lower price Bent and Rodallega are good buys and Saha isn't too bad as I said earlier except for the injuries. Bent and Jones have struck up a good partnership at Sunderland and Bent is suffering a little with Jones suspended at the moment. Thankfully from an Arsenal perspective Jones still has a couple of games to go in his suspension and we won't have to face him in our next match.

It's also worth remembering that due to Europa league committments Fulham and Everton will miss a league game in gamesweek 17 and Hull and Stoke will be the teams that miss out with them. Fulham and Stoke manage to get their game back in during gamesweek 20 in early January but I'm looking too far ahead at this stage. If you transfer in players with an extra game don't forget to drop them or at least sub them when they have no game. That's it for today.

Here's a great goal from the seemingly forgotten man at Arsenal.

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And to finish today's title track from Bob Marley and The Wailers. If you follow my advice it will help your fantasy team to become one of the top ranking teams.

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See You Tomorrow.

This time next week we'll be waiting anxiously for news of all our players who have played either 1 or 2 games for their countries and hoping that they have all come through them intact. I'll know if Ireland have managed to overcome the odds and qualify for the World Cup by beating France over 2 legs no matter how unlikely that may seem. I read a statistic that France had 47 players playing in the last round of Champions league games and Ireland had John O'Shea and no body else. To be honest I have some interest in the games and I will watch the Saturday night match with a few beers but if they don't make it I won't be too upset. The up side of Ireland qualifying would be a summer off for Clichy, Sagna, Gallas(if he stays with us), Diaby and Nasri and it would mean we have some important players properly rested unlike players who have been to the World Cup.

One player who will be at the World Cup is Cesc and he has won the club's player of the month award for October with RVP coming in second and Song third. The form shown by those 3 players combined with The Verminator and Gallas has been the backbone of our team so far this season and hopefully it will continue right up to the end of the season. Another player on his way to South Africa is Bendtner who apparently has a 5 year plan for world domination which includes becoming 1 of the best strikers in the world and scoring 25 goals in a season for Arsenal. It also includes making himself a permanent fixture in the Arsenal team and he has started a high percentage of games this season when he has been fit but I wouldn't say that he would be part of our ideal starting 11. He does add a certain physicality and ariel ability when he is in the team that we are sometimes missing without him but his touch isn't quite at the level of the very best players we have in my opinion. I don't doubt his workrate or his committment but I think he looks lost on the right wing at times.

The meaning of Eduardo's message on his t-shirt on Saturday has been revealed to be about gang warfare in his old neighbourhood in Brazil and he was lucky the referee didn't book him at the time as that sort of celebration is supposed to be an automatic yellow card. Young Jack Wilshere(he will always be young to me as my son is older than him) has spoken about his hope to be fit for the Man City game in the Carling Cup on December 2nd and how it was frustrating to miss the Liverpool game because of his injury. He hopes City play a full team and he thinks we can beat them and that the competition will be wide open and we can go all the way and win it. Our ladies managed a 2-0 win at home to Sparta Prague in their last 16 game in the ladies Champions league which gave them a 5-0 aggregate victory. They will learn who their opponents in the last 8 will be when the draw is made on Friday.

Finally for today as promised I'll have a brief look at the fantasy football standings and how I'm doing in my own Oleole leagues as well as a few other ones. My overall position is 12,613 out of over 2.1 million teams which isn't too bad but I'm hoping to improve. If I'm going to improve I'll have to catch IAWWT first as he currently stands 17 points and 7,00 places ahead of me. I'm third in the Oleole league with IAWWT 2nd and Football Guy's friend Amer still 1st as he has been from day 1. He's 34 points ahead of me and in the top 2,000 overall but I am catching slowly but surely. I'm back on top of the Oleole head to head league with 11 wins in 12 matches but IAWWT is breathing down my neck with 10 wins and 1 draw so he is only 2 points behind. A narrow victory over Lady arse last week helped me to regain top spot as the previous leader(my wife) slipped to a heavy defeat. Speaking of Lady arse I'm currently 3rd in her league too and IAWWT is at the summit of that. I think if I manage to pass him I'll be well on the way to my best finish ever. Tomorrow I'll give my updates on what players are doing well and what ones aren't and my tips for transfers and tactics over the coming weeks. That's it for today.

Here's a bit of Bendtner doing what he does best.

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And to finish today's title track from The Ramones. I Wanna live a normal life again and that will only happen when the interlull is over.

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See You Tomorrow.

The interlull continues today at an ever decreasing pace as the amount of news to report begins to lessen by the hour. What we are going to do for the next week and a bit is anybody's guess but at least it takes up 2 weeks of November which has been a bad month for us at certain times in the past. It means we have only 3 games left in November and with 2 wins under our belt already we are off to a very good start. After the interlull we have a tough trip to Sunderland in the league, with Liege following the Champions league and then Chelsea pay a visit to us in the league to finish off the month. That game is already being built up as a huge game for us as we look to keep Chelsea in our sights this early in the season. At times they have looked very good but in their defeat at Wigan they were very poor and when they lost to Villa they were poor also but they were thwarted by a great performance by Brad Friedel also. He's a goalkeeper that I have always rated and I wish we had signed him a few years ago as I think he's far better than our current options in that position.

The boss spoke about our trials in November in the past and he said that a lot of it was down to injuries which tend to kick in at this stage of the season. This season the injuries have been there from day 1 and his hope is that the interlull will improve matters if all our players come back in good shape and a few of the injured players come back into the squad at their projected return dates. We'll see what team we're able to put out against Sunderland on Saturday week and who is sitting on our bench that afternoon too. Maybe it will be a pointer to how the rest of the season will go. We should have won our game away to them last season but in the end we were rescued by an injury time header from a corner by Cesc.

Nicklas Bendtner has been voted the Danish player of 2009 and he also won the award for the best goal for his country in 2009 when he scored against Portugal for Denmark to help them on the way to the World Cup. The news on his groin injury is that he has undergone his surgery and he will be out for 3-4 weeks according to the club. With our record that could of course mean anything from 3 weeks to 3 months but hopefully it will be the former. Speaking of Nicks the author of my favourite football book ever, Nick Hornby, has said that Arsenal fans are spoiled by the success that the boss has brought to the club and he has a point. We have seen and are seeing the best football that I can remember in my 39 years of supporting Arsenal and during that time there have been far worse barren spells without trophies. We won trophies for a long time while opponents fans sang "boring, boring Arsenal" and they were justified in singing that. At the moment we are widely recognised as the best footballing team in Europe and despite the high prices to get in to The Emirates I don't think that we aren't getting value for money. Of course it would be great to add a trophy to that football and at the moment it looks like we are really close to doing that and if we continue to play the way we are now I genuinely believe we will end that drought this season. That's it for today. I will write about the current state of the fantasy football tomorrow and maybe preview the upcoming games and choice of players to put in your teams.

Here's a clip of the goal Bendtner scored against Portugal.

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And to finish today's title track from Morrissey. November has been the month that has spawned the monster of failure for us in the past but hopefully it will be different this season.

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See You Tomorrow.

We have officially entered the interlull and for the next 11 days the amount of club football news available will be at a premium as we all search for a few scraps of information on our beloved Arsenal to report. I will attempt to make this time as interesting as possible for anyone brave enough to keep reading as I run through our season so far and all the current standings in the fantasy football. I'll also keep an eye on our players as they ply their trade for their countries and we all hope that they come back in 1 piece.

Speaking of our players we have 15 of them away on international duty although only 5 of those players have truly competitive games to play as they attempt to qualify for the World cup. The other 10 have friendlies or in the case of Eboue they are playing a qualifier having already made it to the finals. If it wasn't for our glut of injuries we would have a lot more players away this week but I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. Anyway it would seem that Wacott, Wilshere & Fabianski will be back when the interlull is over and Denilson and Clichy should follow soon afterwards. Bendtner however looks like he will have to have an operation on his groin injury and the length of his absence isn't certain yet. I can't find anything telling me how long Vela will be out and he isn't reported as being away with his country on the club site either. Is it just me or is he fast becoming the forgotten man at Arsenal.

Our captain has spoken about the players' fear of our fantastic goalscoring run coming to an end at some stage and he says that the fear of that is what is keeping the players focussed as they know they must keep it up to win the title that they want. A lot has been made of all the goals we're scoring at the moment and how they are being shared around the team. It is great that we have a threat from almost any player in the team(with the possible exception of the goalkeeper and the full backs) and it makes it harder for our opponents to defend against us. No team has ever scored 100 Premier league goals since it's inception in 1992 but at our current rate we will blow that completely away. However as our captain says that could dry up as it did last winter when we had that terrible run of 0-0 draws in a row but we were missing him at the time and playing without any confidence.

There's plenty of talk about Darren Fletcher saying that our boss has made him a marked man by referees and his manager is again blaming referees on their defeat to Chelsea. It's funny that Manure are a little upset by losing 2nd spot in the league to us and in my opinion Fletcher is getting what he deserves. How he ever got away with the challenge on Arshavin at Old Trafford without giving away a penalty is still a mystery to me and I'm sure any referee who saw it will have taken note of it and also his miopic manager claiming it was a fair tackle afterwards. They may have had some decisions go against them recently but these things tend to balance out over a season and we haven't had a penalty, that I know of, since Eduardo's "dive" against Celtic but I don't hear our manager complaining. As long as Manure continue to fade we will hear more and more from their manager complaining about all and sundry. Long may it continue. That's it for today.

Here's a little bit of our Russian maestro.

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And to finish today's title track from The Cure. No matter how many goals we score it's never enough as I always want more.

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See You Tomorrow.

It's Monday morning again and unfortunately the weekend is over yet again. As the mornings get darker and the nights get longer the thing that can cheer us all up is the form of our favourite football team. Luckily I'm an Arsenal supporter and we are playing the sort of football at the moment that would cheer up anybody watching it. That's the good news but the bad news is that after tonight's game between Liverpool and Birmingham the dreaded interlull returns for almost a fortnight and we will find ourselves with very little Arsenal news to report. During that time I'll try to keep an eye on the Arsenal players as they play for their countries and give my own particular twist on any news that there is. I'll also have a look at the fantasy football and see how I'm doing in all the Oleole leagues that I've set up and others too.

Having missed most of the football over the weekend I managed to play catch up last night and see all the goals on MOTD 2 as we ran out handsome winners over Wolves on Saturday to move us up to what turned out to be a second place we kept as Chelsea beat Manure yesterday. There was very little mention made of us overtaking Manure for 2nd spot with a game in hand but I would expect no more fron the BBC. I did notice in the highlights of The Spuds v Sunderland game that Darren Bent won a penalty when he was caught by the keeper but it turned out that he was on the way down before there was any contact and the commentator said that The Spuds were hard done by. It looked quite similar to how Shrek won his penalty against us at Old Trafford but if I remember on that occasion Shrek was "very intelligent" in what he did unlike Bent who of course is not a current England international. I also wonder if poor old Drogba will get his yellow card recinded after he was booked for diving against Manure. Karma is a strange thing and it was funny to see his reaction to being the sinned against for a change. I also wonder will the Manure player who purposely kicked him in the chest get his just deserts from the FA. The challenge was very similar to the one which earned Eboue a red card against Manure at Old Trafford a couple of seasons ago and if there's any consistency from the FA Evans(I think it was him) will get a 3 game ban from the FA. Knowing what the FA are like I would imagine that he will get off scot free for fear of offending their manager.

Our performance against Wolves on Saturday wasn't the greatest but the fact that we ran out 4-1 winners was a testament to how our attitude seems to be a bit better recently. The manager picked the defence I expected him to pick and he also had the expected choices of Cesc, RVP & Arshavin in the team but I was surprised to see Diaby play the role that Song has made his own this season in defensive midfield. I can only imagine that it was the boss trying to see if Diaby can fill that role when Song is away on ACN duty early in 2010. With Ramsey eventually getting a start in midfield the other attacking spot was taken by Eduardo.

From what I have seen and read it would appear that we were under the cosh early on as Diaby showed that he's not as adept as Song at playing in the defensive midfield role. However Diaby got injured after 24 minutes and he was replaced by Song which immediatly gave the team more balance. Not long afterwards we took the lead when a corner from Cesc was deflected into the Wolves net by a defender under pressure from Eduardo for an own goal to put us 1-0 up. Seven minutes later it was 2-0 couttesy of another own goal from Wolves as we broke quickly. Ramsey played a ball just behind Eduardo and as he attempted a return pass it was deflected home by 1 of their defenders to give us a comfortable lead as half time approached. At that stage I was standing in the supporters club in Bray as I sneaked out of the wedding I was at between courses. Unfortunately I only stayed a couple of minutes which meant that I missed Cesc's goal on the stroke of half time which gave us a commanding lead.

The move that led to Cesc's goal was a thing of beauty as Cesc played the ball to Sagna in our half and then continued to move quickly forward. When Sagna played the ball in to the feet of RVP he immediatly laid it off to the unrushing Cesc and Cesc managed to finish easily from close in with only the keeper to beat. It was halfway through the second half when Arshavin added the 4th and final goal, for us, of the afternoon when a corner was cleared out to him and he volleyed it through  a sea of legs and into the bottom corner. In the last minute we managed to concede our usual goal with a header from a corner but the result was no longer in doubt at that stage.  With 55 goals to our name so far this season we are certainly guilty of playing some very attractive football and we are a joy to watch in my opinion.

The boss was happy with the result and he said that he rested Song but as I said earlier I think he was experimrnting and he may not like the outcome of the experiment. He thought that after the early part of the game we dominated procedings and we could have had more goals if our finishing was a bit better. It was a good result and with Chelsea to come to The Emirates soon after the interlull we find ourselves in a position where we can genuinely challenge for the title. The feeling among Arsenal fans is that this could well be our season to regain our league title after a gap of what will be 6 years next summer. I'm still in the "hoping we can sustain" our challenge camp but if we don't I certainly won't be saying I told you so. Our youth team managed a 6-0 win on Saturday morning at home to Charlton with Deacon(2), Freeman(2), Henderson & Yennaris scoring the goals to keep them on top of the league. Our ladies managed a 3-2 win at Chelsea yesterday to remain unbeaten in all copmpetitions so far this season.  I'll leave it there for today as I have a lot of reading to do to catch up on all the blogs I've missed in the last 2 days.

Here's the highlights from Saturday again.

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And to finish today's title track from Gregory Isaacs. I may be too late with my match review but I think my excuse is acceptable.

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See You Tomorrow.

RVP reckons the players are having fun at the moment and who can blame them as they have won all 10 home games this season and 4 of their 8 away games as well. When I think about it that means I have got my prediction about Arsenal's games right 14 out of 18 times this season as any regular readers will know that I always forecast an Arsenal win. In fact we should have won our 2 drawn away games and possibly our 2 lost games as well but that's water under the bridge and I'm drifting away from all the fun the players are having. It's obvious that they are enjoying their football at the moment as the goals are coming thick and fast and only Notts County can match our haul in league goals in England and they have played 5 goals more. Besides the goals though we are also playing some beautiful football and the so called experts are changing their minds about our chances of winning a trophy at a rate of knots.

We all know how fickle these so called experts are and when I hear Eamonn Dunphy on Irish television saying that we are better than Barcelona and we will win the Champions league I realise how stupid they are too. I'm not saying we won't win it but there's a long way to go and anything can happen between now and Saturday May 22nd when the final is played. There are bound to be disappointments between now and then and the strength of the team will be judged on how we react to those disappointments in my opinion. We bounced back from our defeats in Manchester with 6 wins in a row and after our slight dip with the successive draws we easily beat The Spuds and then played exceptionally well against AZ on Wednesday night. 

The boss has spoken about how good Cesc is and how good he can become too. At only 22 years of age there is not a better player in English football at the moment and he has just won the PFA player of the month for October. The boss believes there is a lot more to come from him as long as he keeps the attitude that he has now. I know that means that Barcelona will be sniffing around more than ever and in his present form he's better than Iniesta and Xavi so let's hope that he can realise all of his footballing desires at Arsenal. He also said that the Merida deal is ready to be signed and there is a verbal agreement with the player but certain clubs are trying to destabilise him as they know he is on a free transfer in the summer and he can agree a move in January. He also said that he is not tempted to rotate his centre backs which is good news as it keeps Silvestre out of the team. The understanding that Gallas and The Verminator have developed is very good and the boss realises how important it is to keep them together. The only thing that will break up the partnership is injury or suspension but let's hope that neither thing happens.

Yesterday Stan Kroenke increased his stake in the club to 29.9% and he only needs 0.09% more before he has to make a bid for all the other shareholders' stakes but I don't thik they're obligated to sell unless his stake reaches a fairly high percentage. Peter Hill-Wood sold him 100 of the 200 shares he bought which shows the current board are happy with the possibility of him taking control of the club. As it approaches I find myself not too sure if it is the right thing for the club but I do think it is the lesser of 2 evils with Usmanov as the option that I would not like to see anywhere near the club. I just hope if Kroenke takes over that he doesn't do what the Glaziers did at Manure and basically use the club as a tool to buy itself and leave him with no debt and the club with a huge debt. The rumours are that he doesn't intend taking over just yet but it does look like it's a matter of when and not if any longer.

Here's Cesc's goal against The Spuds last Saturday again and he certainly seemed to be having fun.

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And to finish here's today's title track from The Fun Boy Three. According to RVP the players are having all the fun. As a dedicated life long fan I'm enjoying it too.

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See You Tomorrow.

The hoodoo that Koeman held over us was well and truly despatched last night as we beat AZ 4-1 at The Emirates to put ourselves on the cusp of qualification for the last 16 of the Champions league. With Liege beating Olympiacos we have not quite qualified as both of those teams can still theoretically overhaul us if results go their way. However with both of them having to beat us the chances of that are minimal to say the least. The next game for us in the Champions league is at home to Liege on November 24th and if we beat them we will win the group which is supposed to make our draw in the last 16 a little easier but you never know who will be the runners up in the other groups with the likes of Barcelona, Real Madrid, Inter Milan & AC Milan all possibilities. One thing is for sure though and that is that I won't get to see the game as it's on my 20th wedding anniversary and if I go out to watch the game I won't reach the 21st.

The game itself was easier than I thought it would be and despite pulling a goal back late on AZ never really gave us too much trouble. The boss played Eboue at right back again as he has in 3 of our 4 group matches now and Nasri came back into the first team after his long injury lay off. With Gibbs in for the injured Clichy as well it showed the quality that we have in reserve as Sagna, Eduardo, Ramsey & Rosicky were all on the bench and we still have a long list of players out injured. Our first goal came when Gallas got forward and layed the ball off to Cesc who came back inside and put his shot between the defender's legs and it beat the keeper at the near post as he seemed unsighted. Then just before half time Arshavin played a lovely ball to Nasri outside the box and he turned his man before advancing and finishing it off beautifully. That left Koeman's side in a lot of trouble at half time as they had to try to play.

The second half started as the first half finished with Arsenal dominating again and AZ trying to hump the ball into our box at every oppurtunity. It wasn't long before the 3rd goal came and it was Cesc who got it again as he was played in on the left by Arshavin and feigned to shoot to the far post but instead buried at the near post as the keeper went the other way. We were now cruising and my 3-0 prediction looked like it would be left far behind. The boss took Cesc and RVP off to rest them with 25 minutes left and replaced them with Ramsey and Eduardo which gave the 2 of them a longer run out than usual. Not too long afterwards we got our 4th as the ball was played to Eduardo on the half way line and he back heeled it into the path of the running Arshavin who brought it to the edge of the box and laid it off for the advancing Diaby. He took it under control and finished well with only the keeper to beat.

At that stage it looked like any score might be possible but we weren't to score again and in fact AZ even managed to pull a goal back. We had a corner and when the ball dropped in the box an AZ player appeared to handle it but the referee played on and they broke quickly. Gibbs lost out on the half way line as he challenged his man and as he broke forward Ramsey couldn't tackle him without risking a red card. As he closed in on the box a far post shot seemed his best option and it seems Almunia thought so too as he got his feet wrong and was beaten at the near post without actually moving for the shot. Somehow we had managed to get caught on the break when we were 4-0 up but in the great scheme of things it didn't matter. Almunia did manage a very good save when the score was 3-0 as he reacted quickly to turn a point blank shot on to the bar and besides the goal he did have a good game.

I only managed to catch the second half live as I was playing football myself and I made my way out to the supporters club in Bray for that second half to watch it in the company of some fellow Gooners. I had my Arsenal jersey on and underneath it I had my new t-shirt that I received in the post when I got home from work yesterday. It's a Lady Arse special and she was good enough to send me a programme from the Spuds match on Saturday with it. I'll be putting a photo of me in the t-shirt in my gallery and I have to say that it was well worth the money. She has loads more designs and it's well worth checking them out. Here's what the t-shirt looks like.

After the game the boss said he was delighted with a brilliant victory and he talked up the quality of our players and our attacking options that are available. He gave a lot of praise to Arshavin and when asked about him and The Verminator he said that our policy is to develop our own players and add players of special quality and those 2 are good examples of that. Speaking after the game Cesc said that we are not definitely through yet and even if we were we would still go for a win in each of our last 2 matches. He said it's too early for trophies to be handed out no matter how well we are playing and he will feel it is something special when we win something. That's what we want to hear from our captain and star player and if he continues to play like he is at the moment and with that attitude we might just get 1 of those trophies that we crave. We have already passed the 50 goal mark for the season with only 18 games played and we have done that without ever having had all of our players available to choose from. Finally for today our ladies won 3-0 away to Sparta Prague in the first leg of their last 16 Ladies Champions league game and the return game is next Wednesday night.

Here's the highlights from last night.

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And to finish today's title track from UB40. Little by little the experts are starting to think we have achance this season after they all wrote us off initially.

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See You Tomorrow.