The unbridled joy after our win against The Spuds on Saturday has subsided a little this morning as the harsh reality of returning to work after having had 3 days off sets in. With our position as North London's number 1 club no longer in any doubt(not that any Arsenal fans doubted it anyway) we can now forget about The Spuds and concentrate on a week that could be very important for us.

First up we have AZ at home on Wednesday night in our Champions league group and a win in that game will mean that they cannot catch us in the group. Olympiacos travel to Liege on the same night and it's a win win situation for us if we can beat AZ. If Olympiakos win or draw we will have qualified but if Liege win we will only need a point at home to them in our next game to qualify and a win in that game would win us the group. After that we travel to Wolverhampton for an evening kick off next Saturday in a game that will see us go 2nd in the league if we win. With the 2 teams ahead of us playing each other on Sunday afternoon it means we will make up ground on 1 or both of them if we can beat Wolves. In fact if Chelsea win it will mean that a we would keep 2nd place ahead of Manure with a game in hand and Chelsea would have a 5 point lead over us with us having that game in hand too.

A few weeks ago I said that 4 wins in a row would have us on top of the table as the next international break kicked in and we have got 2 wins and a draw in the first 3 of those games. A win at Wolves will make it 10 points out of 12 and with all 12 points our worst possible position would have been 3 points behind Chelsea with that game in hand. That draw at West Ham and the manner in which we threw away the 2 points really grates but after Saturday we look to have put it behind us.

So as you can see 2 wins this week will leave us in a real healthy position going into that dreaded interlull and I fully expect us to go out and get those wins. Our ladies beat Keynsham 4-0 yesterday to reach the semi final of the Premier league Cup and continue yet another great start to their season. The reserves have a home match against Portsmouth tonight at 7 and our youths lost 3-1 at West Ham on Saturday with our goal coming from Chuks Aneke. The Carling Cup quarter final trip to Man City has been set for Tuesday December 1st and as of yet it is not scheudled for TV although that might change. As far as I know the TV companies have not picked their live matches for the new year yet but as we're in November I would imagine they will have to do it very soon. I certainly hope so because I want to go to the Everton match which is set for Saturday January 9th but having seen the other fixtures that weekend I have a horrible feeling that our game might be switched to the Sunday. I can still go but the sooner I find out the better as the flights are so cheap at the moment.

On the injury front it seems that Bendtner will be out for at least a month with the groin injury he picked up on Saturday and we are now on top of the physio room injury league table with 9 players out at the moment. Of those 9 players 4 of them are listed as being down for a return next Saturday and we could certainly do with Rosicky in the squad at the moment to put some pressure on Diaby who didn't have the best of games at the weekend. The other 3 due back are Wilshere, Vela and Traore and they will at least increase the options the boss has for the trip to Wolves. Finally for today I read an article yesterday that said the reason that Almunia was out for so long was due to a family tragedy and if it's true my sympathies go out to him and his family. These things can be very hard to cope with and if it effected him a lot the boss was right to wait until he was ready to return. It certainly makes more sense than the "chest infection" story. That's the lot for today.

Here's the highlights from Saturday's victory as I only showed the goals yesterday.

LINK

And here's today's title track from Jah Lion. The boss commented on all of The Spuds claims about being our equals or even betters in some cases by saying that the talking would be done on the pitch and he showed that he was the one with the wisdom and they were full of hot air as we suspected.

LINK

See You Tomorrow.

We have 13 players away on first team international duty today and that doesn't count those that have played at under 21 level already and the season hasn't officially started yet. It must really annoy the manager at this time of year but there is nothing he can do about it. I just hope they all come back safe and sound. One of these players is Carlos Vela and I don't even know if he has been back at the club since Mexico won the Gold Cup. As I said previously the manager must seriously consider whether it's worth signing any Mexican players in future as he never seems available due to internationals and jetlag.

The latest player to be linked with us is Neven Subotic who is a 20 year old, 6'4' centre back who plays for Borussia Dortmund and Ivan Gazidas was supposed to be in Germany on Monday discussing the move with his club. We have also heard from Hangeland's team mate Riise who says the player will leave Fulham if the price is right and I presume we are the favourites to sign him. Djourou has been sent back to the club by his country as he has a knee injury and let's hope he is fit for Saturday as back up for the recovering Vermaelen as otherwise it means you know who could get a run out. With Senderos possibly about to go it makes sense that we will buy one of those 2 centre backs above as we are already struggling due to injuries in that department.

Much to my shock and dismay England's manager has said he will never pick Spaniard Manuel Almunia for England and I know England are a little short on goalkeeping talent at the moment but I don't think Almunia is up to international standard. Speaking of internationals young Jack Wilshere made his England under 21 debut last night as he came on for the last half hour in a 0-0 draw with Holland. Kieran Gibbs played most of the match for England as well with Nacer Barazite playing the whole match for Holland. That's about it for today except for the Fantasy Football link and codes. 

Oleole League code  4383-1847

Oleole Arsenal league code  4383-1835

Oleole head to head league code 4383-1828 (we need 5 more teams to make this league work).

I Know The Score link and code  FC85F-XSC

Here's a clip of one my favourite Arsenal goals ever which completed a hat trick for Kanu

LINK

And to finish here's today's title track from the film O Brother Where Art Thou which I loved. It's for all our players who have flown away on international duty.

LINK

See You Tomorrow.

We play Rangers in an just over an hour and they will have to beat us to stop us regaining the Emirates Cup unless of course either Atletico Madrid or PSG win their match and score a hatful of goals too. We won our match against Atletico Madrid yesterday with 2 goals in the last 5 minutes from Arshavin. In between those 2 goals Atletico managed to score an equaliser after some poor defending from us. Arshavin took his 2 goals well and the second in particular was from a very tight angle after he rounded the keeper after intercepting a back header. The first was from a Cesc cross which he volleyed in but in my opinion their keeper should have saved it as he got both hands behind the ball. Their goal came when we played a very high line and there was no pressure put on the man on the ball so he easily picked out a throuh ball for a one on one with Mannone which was well finished by Pacheco.

It was strange to see Mannone in goals again with Chesney(as Lady Arse calls him) on the bench. I know Fabianski is injured but I thought he was going to be back this weekend and where the hell is Almunia. I know I have been critical of Almunia in the past but he is our best goalkeeper at the moment and we need him in the team as we prepare for the new season. Maybe the manager is playing Mannone & Chesney as one of them will be on the bench for the start of the season and he wants to give them experience. I suppose that all depends on whether Fabianski is fit and available or not.

We played our 4-3-3 formation again yesterday and it has also been described as a 4-3-2-1. It does seem to be the formation of choice for the new season and we have an awful lot of attacking options but I still think our defence and our defensive midfield need a lot of work and some strengthening. I'm sure the team will be changed around a good deal for today's game and Rangers will probably offer us a different style of opponent to Atletico. They will be more like a mid table typically English  Premiership team who will try to pressurise us on and off the ball. From what I saw Wilshere was very good when he came on yesterday and I think the manager is going to be under a lot of pressure to give him a lot more game time this season. I personally think he will get more chances. I think that whatever team starts against Valencia will be our trongest team and it will give us an idea what the manager's feelings are about the first team and it's formation in the new season.

On a negative note it would appear that Kolo has had a few words to say about why he left us. He said that we have failed to replace too many top players who have left such as Henry & Vieira and that he felt it was time to move on in his career. I'm sure that it was our choice to sell him as he is no longer the player he was in the past and we have the potential to become great with Cesc, Arshavin, Eduardo, RVP & Theo among others capable of becoming greats of the future. I suppose Kolo has not said anything bad about us in the style of Adebayor but I still would have prefered if he had said nothing. He clearly has wanted out since he put in his transfer request last January and we decided to sell him at a time that suited the club. 

It also appears that Senderos is on his way to Everton and it's to be expected that we were going to sell him. He only has 1 year left on his contract and he was never going to extend as the boss made it obvious that he was surplus to requirements by loaning him to Milan last season. It adds more money to our transfer kitty and the boss has said that he will bring in 1 or 2 players before the start of the season if he can but if he doesn't he feels we are strong enough anyway. As I said before if we can sign 2 top players it will put us right up there as there are no teams in the top 4 strengthening so far this summer and Liverpool & Manure appear weaker in my opinion. In other transfer news it appears that Traore might be on his way to Birmingham on loan and Fulham are talking about bring Carlos Vela in on loan. These are 2 players with a lot of skill and potential and I would hope that they can get more oppurtunities in our team this season but if I had to choose 1 to stay it would be Vela as I am dying to see him back in an Arsenal jersey again. That's the lot for today. Wherever you're watching today's game I hope you enjoy it and see us winning our first of many trophies this season. 

Here's the highlights from yesterday.

LINK

And to finish here's today's title track from Morrissey. At the moment it seems like everyday is like Sunday as it's a bank holiday weekend and I'm getting to watch Arsenal for the first time this season. I like Sunday's for the moment anyway.

LINK

See You Tomorrow.

ps I must apologise for yesterday's effort and I won't be trying to blog from my phone in future as after the first couple of hundred words I can't see what I'm writing and that just doesn't work.

To the best of my knowledge the majority of the first team squad were back for pre season training yesterday after their summer holidays. I had hoped that the club site would have some pictures of the day's events for all of us news starved fans but as I write this there is still nothing to see. I can only hope that the pictures will arrive later in the day as I want to see if Eduardo & Rosicky are back in full training. From what I have heard Rosicky is fit and raring to go but I have heard nothing of the situation regarding Eduardo and his re adjustment operation at the end of last season. I hope he's going to be back to full match fitness for the start of the season but I have my doubts.

Almunia said yesterday that we need to be focussed from the start of the season as our poor start last season proved very costly overall. Obviously he had been reading my blog where I pointed out the need to make a good start in the league as we have a difficult beginning to the season with 3 hard away trips in our first 4 league games. There's not a lot of other Arsenal news out there today but to me the main news is that Vela has got injured in his first game for Mexico in the Gold Cup. I can't believe that a summer tournament has been scheudled to begin as players are making their way back to their clubs for pre season training but that's FIFA for you. I do believe that Vela has been hampered in his progress at Arsenal by his international committments and I'm sure this latest tournament and injury(although it may not be bad) are not helping the situation.

Derby are appearently interested in taking Mark Randall on a season long loan and, as I have said with various other players in the past, I think the experience can only benefit him. Arshavin was voted into 2nd place in the poll for player of the season which I'm sure means RVP will win the award on the club site. He only joined us at the very end of January but it is my genuine belief that Arshavin was the main reason we qualified for the Champions league. There has been a little more talk concerning Melo, Eboue, Senderos, the 25 & Flamini but I don't think any of it will come to anything. Former Arsenal player Edu has rejoined Corinthians of Brazil and I hope he can stay injury free for the rest of his career as he has had a bad time with injury since he left us. Dave O'Leary was spouting off about becoming assistant manager to our current boss but it's absolute nonsense and he won't get anywhere near the club. There are also reports that the top 4 will earn even more TV money as the contract for the Arab world has changed hands with the winner paying more than the previous holders of the contract. That's about it for today except for the usual links.

Here's a clip of a super goal for us from Edu.

LINK 

And to finish today's title track from The Smiths which is for the club who have not shared the latest on pre season training with us yet.

LINK

See You Tomorrow.

I'm sitting in front of my computer trying to understand what I witnessed last night and what I have come up with is easy for me to digest. We have played in three semi finals this season and we have put up three totally inept performances. We have been found to be physically weak and tactically naive in all three games. The manager has decided to put his faith in youth and when it came to the crunch that youth has come up short on each occasion. If the comments recently attributed to the manager about not needing to strengthen this summer are true then we will have another season similar to this one next season.

We will probably be a bit better against the poorer teams in the league and we will have a chance in the FA Cup too but the Champions league will be beyond us. Last summer the manager said we needed a new centre back and we still don't have that player. What we need is a player in the Vidic or Terry mould in the current game or ideally a Tony Adams style player from our recent past. We will have Arshavin available for all competitions next season and he is an experienced player in his prime but where are the others of that sort in the team. Maybe Toure but he wanted to leave in January or Gallas who probably will leave in the summer or Almunia who in my opinion is not a top class goalkeeper. I heard Graeme Souness saying on the TV tonight that, as a Scotsman, he hopes Almunis becomes England's first choice goalkeeper because he is not a top class keeper.

When young Gibbs slipped tonight and let United in for the first goal he was visibly upset and from what I could see only RVP tried to have a word with him. It was Cesc's job as captain to try to sort his head out but unfortunately he is not a captain in the true mould as a leader of men. We do not appear to have one single really strong character in our squad who can naturally assume the captaincy and it is killing us on the pitch. When things are going well everything is OK but when things start to go wrong then we are found wanting in a big way.

It's hard to legislate for the mistakes that cost us the first 2 goals tonight but the manager decided to throw everything at them from the off and we were always going to be caught on the break by a team with Manure's power and pace. In the first leg at Old Trafford we didn't show up and tonight to be honest after we went behind there was no way back. I predicted a win for Arsenal but in my heart of hearts I feared that something like this might happen as we just seem to be lacking something as a team. I thought he would play a cagey game and hope to get the goal we needed late on but he was out thought by their manager yet again when it mattered most as was the case in the first leg and in the FA Cup semi final.

How he must be regretting not playing Arshavin against Chelsea now as the FA Cup was always going to be our best chance of silverware this season and the Champions league has been proven to be pie in the sky. The manager must address the problems in the squad in the summer or next season will be not much better. Manure showed a desire to fight for every ball tonight that was not as obvious in our team. The help that Rooney & Park gave their full backs was what a full back wants but they also managed to attack as well when the chance arose. I personally want him to buy a world class goalkeeper, central midfielder, central defender & centre forward and if 1 or 2 go I can live with that. There must be money available and he has to use it this summer because the fans are becoming increasingly impatient with his inability to do so. I am not saying for 1 second that I want him out but he has to be realistic about the strength of this squad and invest heavily in the transfer market.

I would like to know the logic of taking Gibbs off at half time and replacing him with Eboue. I hope that he was injured because if it was for any other reason then it goes against all of his principles of giving youth a chance and he never makes substitutions like that at half time. I could go on all day about how badly this defeat has made me feel and how work today will be a nightmare with Manure fans all around me. If we had performed well and lost narrowley then it would be bearable but our performance was terrible to be honest. I am trying to think of 1 player who's performance was up to the standard required and I just can't. At the start of the season I didn't think the semi finals of the Champions league were possible but we got a fairly good draw up to now and just as I was starting to believe in the team our true abilities were shown up by a team that are streets ahead of us in terms of talent, desire, committment & tactics and now we have 3 league games left to play but nothing at all rests upon them. I'll leave it there for now but I'm sure that I will get back to it ad nauseum over the next few days.

This is the only good point about last night except for Manure's red card.

LINK

And to finish today's title track from The Damned which is self explanatory.

LINK

We face a tricky trip to Portsmouth tomorrow and we are short a good few players due to injury yet again. Silvestre & Eduardo can be added to Clichy & RVP who are still out and with the boss looking to rest a few players, I would imagine, it doesn't leave him with too many options. Eduardo & RVP may still make it on Tuesday night, I'm not sure about Silvestre and Clichy is definitely out of that game.

It means our defence is going to have to be the one that finished the game against 'Boro last Sunday unless we bring in a youngster or put Song at centre back. I would imagine Denilson will get a run out along with Bendtner and Eboue & Vela are also possibilities to try to keep some legs fresh for Tuesday. I suppose we can always play Eboue at the back too. I'll preview the game fully tomorrow and make my prediction but to be honest it doesn't seem to matter too much as 4th place is as good as wrapped up and all of our minds are on next Tuesday night and trying to make amends for the poor show on Wednesday last.

Cesc has had a little more to say about Spitgate and his feelings about a possible suspension. Our ladies won 2-0 at Chelsea yesterday to keep their league hopes alive. They have one game left which is away to their main rivals Everton and if they win it they will win the league on goal difference(if it counts) just like our men did in the same city 20 years ago. The game is at 2pm on Sunday May 10th. Good luck girls/ladies! Leicester appearently want to keep young Gilbert for their assault on the Championship next season and it will depend on whether the boss thinks he has a future at Arsenal. Almunia has been fairly honest in his assessment of Wednesday night and he says we cracked under the pressure which is probably right. We can't afford to do that on Tuesday night.

Ferdinand is looking doubtful for United for that game and hopefully they will rotate their squad tomorrow and lose to 'Boro who usually beat 1 of the top teams every season. The dent to their confidence would be great for us and to be honest I'd prefer to see Liverpool win the league at this stage. We are linked with Santa Cruz yet again but to be honest he had a good first season at Blackburn but he hasn't been that great this season and his goal scoring record at Bayern Munich was poor. We are also linked with signing Cannavaro on a Bosmann but the new UK tax rates might put him off in my opinion and I think he will return to Italy. The club have announced their first 2 pre season friendlies for next season. We will play the usual game at Barnet on Satyrday July 18th and we will play an Arsenal 11 versus Lincoln on Monday July 20th. It's a short break this year with the season ending so late.

Here's the goal from our 1-0 victory at home to Portsmouth earlier in the season.

LINK 

And to finish the the title track from The Smiths which describes how I still feel about events last Wednesday night.

LINK

See You Tomorrow.

Our performance last night was not what I was looking for or hoping for from Arsenal. They went into the game full of talk of how we would do this that and the other but to be honest we very rarely troubled them and we were "lucky" to get out with a 1-0 defeat. In my opinion the manager got the tactics & team selection wrong.

We had nobody wide left to attack O'Shea or help out Gibbs when the diver attacked him. Diaby was supposed to be playing in that position but he kept coming inside to a more natural central position for him. Adebayor then decided, as the lone striker, to take up the space that was on the left just like Henry used to do in the past. Unfortunately that is where the comparison ends because when he did get the ball he wasn't capable of running at defenders like Henry and he invariably cut back and passed infield each time. He then stood back and watched his handy work and made no attempt to get into the box. What is the point in a lone striker who doesn't give us a presence in the box. Our other attacking player was Theo but with Rooney doing the job that Diaby wouldn't do for us it meant he had at least 2 men on him every time he got the ball.

There was some suggestion where I was that he should be switched to the other side to put pressure on O'Shea as the diver would be sure not to do the defensive work that Rooney was so willing to do. Unfortunately the boss didn't see it that way and instead he chose to replace Theo with Bendtner. Can somebody tell me please what Bendtner is going to offer us in a wide right position? There were other options available such as Eboue or Vela(was he on the bench) but to put Bendtner out there made no sense. If we were to make a game of it surely it was by playing football and not with 2 big men up front towards the end. When Eduardo came on it was too late but at least we know he is still at the club.

Cesc was playing in a role just behind Adebayor and again it's not his best position as we need him in central midfield controlling our passing game. He got caught in possession too often throughout the match as did a few others in our team. Song and Nasri put in a good shift in my opinion but they had an awful lot to do with United playing 3 central midfielders and they found it hard going.

The defence was nowhere to be seen for United's goal and it reminded me of the goal Roma scored against us as the ball was cut back across the 6 yard box and they had players queueing up to finish it off. As it was O'Shea scored but Almunia almost got to it and to be fair to him he had an excellent game and he was our man of the match without a shadow of a doubt. Our defending away from home in Europe this season has been poor and so has our form been too. Our only away win in the competition proper was at Fenerbahce and that could have ended 10-10 as Almunia was outstanding that night also. Only once last night was Almunia caught flat footed when a ball was played through and that was a pleasent change.

I thought Silvestre had one of his better games for us and Kolo was average except for the goal where he was very poor. I'm not saying Silvestre was great but he wasn't the liability I thought he would be. Sagna did well enough on Rooney and Gibbs did as well as he could considering how little Diaby helped him in the first half in particular. Overall though we didn't play well and we can only perform better at home I hope. I expect a tight game with United trying to hit us on the break but we won't over commit players forward until the last quarter as an away goal would make it very difficult for us. A lot of the players, including Cesc, Almunia & Kolo have been saying on the club site today how we are still in it and it will be different at home. They were all spouting the same stuff out before last night and I wish they would shut up and get on with things.

I expect a much changed team at Portsmouth on Saturday as 4th spot is as good as secured and to finish 3rd we would have to beat Chelsea at home and United away and i can't see us doing both. I'm going to finish now as this is my third attempt to write this as Oleole has been being playing up on me all day.

Here's the divers temper tantrum when he didn't get his free kick last night

LINK

And to finish today's title track from Radiohead.

LINK

After the events of yesterday our quest for 3rd place really only exists in the bosses head and our attempts to secure 4th place are a lot safer. If it were a game of catch we would in fact be stranded in a piggy in the middle fashion. A win today and Everton can only catch us on a mathemathical basis and Villa would have to win all their games and hope we lose all ours which is highly unlikely as they haven't won a game since the turn of the century or something like that. With Liverpool and Chelsea both winning we cannot realistically overtake either of them at this stage. The basis for a title challenge is a minimum of 2 ponts per game and we would have to win every game left to us to achieve that at this stage. So realistically at the moment we are isolated in 4th place with no chance of moving in either direction.

Ahead of the game today there is no extra team news with the possible inclusion of Djourou, Almunia & Adebayor all possibilities at some stage with Wednesday night in mind. United won 5-2 at home to The Spuds testerday after being 2-0 down at the break. They were set on their way with some comical refereeing which gave that a penalty which was clearly not one and after that their right back Corluka put in one of the worst performances I have ever seen. He decided that there was no need to mark Rooney and they paid the penalty by getting thumped. As long as we can concentrate against them on Wednesday night there was nothing to fear in their team yesterday.

If we lose today which is something I can not even contemplate it will send Hull into the bottom 3 and it will really drive Phil Brown up the wall and bring his departure 1 step closer. I can't see it happening though and I am going for a 3-1 win to us with Andrey the giant scoring 1, Cesc getting 1 and Eduardo getting the last goal(if he gets on the pitch at some stage). That should then virtually secure 4th spot and Champions league qualifiers for next season where we can play any other team that will partake in the qualifiers as it is an open draw for a change but we'll worry about that in August. Middlesbrough are deep in the relegation mire and anything they can get from us today would be very welcome but if we can play with tempo and full concentration we should be able to put them away before we prepare ourselves for Wednesday night.

The youths drew 2-2 with The Spuds yesterday after being 2-0 down. They again played a very young side and it shows the depth of talent they have. We can expect The Spuds to release the video on their club site on Monday morning along with one of the defeat to United yesterday where they scuppered our Chapions league hopes by falling apart in the second half. I'm not too sure where I will be watching today's match as if I go to the supporters club for a drink in the middle of the day on a Sunday it could end up in the divorce courts. That's it for today.

 Here's  our 5-3 win against 'Boro a few years ago.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VUfgOnnBds&feature=related

And to finish today's title track from The Cure

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOGVBN3Ph6Y

See You Tomorrow

First of all today the good news is that we might have Almunia, Djourou & Adebayor back for the match against 'Boro on Sunday. The boss said that all 3 are a possibility for Sunday and they should all be available for United on Wednesday next. He did say though that RVP & Clichy will not be available on Sunday or for the first game against United. RVP might be back for Portsmouth next weekend and Clichy is a possibility for the second leg against United but he also said what we all knew already that Gallas & Rosicky will not play again this season.

In other news Arshavin revealed that he doesn't usually swap shirts after a game but he swapped with Torres because he wanted the send the jersey back to his schoolboy coach who collects no. 9 jerseys. We have been linked with Tomas Necid a Czech international striker who plays for CSKA Moscow and certainly looks like a good prospect but half the top teams in Europe are meant to be chasing him too.

We have another huge week coming up for the team with United home and away in the space of a week in the Champions league semi final and 'Boro before that, Portsmouth during it, Chelsea after it and then United again. In fact for our next six matches every second one is against United so it would be a great time to keep up our unbeaten run. The club has obviously taken in extra money from our FA Cup and Champions league runs and the home game against United will generate over £4 million in gate receipts alone. The TV money will also be adding up at this stage and the extra money from Sky too won't go astray either. All of this lovely lolly should go a long way towards addressing the current shortages in the squad come the summer with a top quality centre back the first priority. I'm coming around to Song as our midfield partner for Cesc but we still need someone else of quality in that position to strengten the squad. I also think if  a striker of the quality of Torres came along we should buy him no matter what to complete the team. If this meant 1 or 2 left I could live with that as long as Cesc, Arshavin, Theo, Sagna, Nasri, Clichy & Eduardo stay.

Quite how I managed to get to this point I'm not too sure but I'll finish today on the sory that gave the blog it's title. It's an interview by the BBC with Mathieu Flamini in which he talks about his love for Arsenal among things. I'll link it below and if you go to it remember to read the article as well as viewing the ideo as there is a lot more in the article.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/teams/a/arsenal/8010235.stm

And below is the title track from The Smiths which comes from Flamini and how much he seems to be missing us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBj9AQJ3a6I&feature=related

See You Tomorrow.

Let's start tonight with an apology for the late post but the way work is going at the moment I can either blog on my lunch break(if I'm lucky enough to get one) or when I get home. I suppose I could get up at 6 in the morning to get to work on it but any work I do at that hour would not be worth reading. So I'm faced with trying to put this together while interacting with my wife and 3 teenage kids. Thankfully she goes bowling on a Thursday night and the kids are all wrapped up in the PC, Wii and XBox360 and I have my fairly new paptop to myself. It was money well spent(not by me - it was a gift) as I don't have to book a time on the PC any more. Anyway enough of suburban humdrum and family life and on to the blog.

It appears Adebayor will be fit to play for Togo after all even though he supposedly only travelled to support his fellow countrymen. I can't imagine the club will be too happy if he plays and his injury reappears which leaves him out of our run in for a few weeks. Speaking of Adebayor there are rumours circulating that Milan are preparing a £35 million bid for him in the summer. If that is the case we would be mad to say no. He is not worth that much and we could surely improve the team with that money if the manager could be persuaded to part with it. Speaking of which the boss has said he has been proven right in his decision to keep faith with his young squad and not bring in anyone last summer(except Nasri). Does that mean we are cotent to have progressed to the stage we are in both cup competitions and to have overtaken Villa in the race for 4th spot. At the start of the season the fans would have taken that with the squad we had and it appears the manager shares that view. If he hadn't signed Arshavin in January those goals would be a lot less secure now but he was not part of the plan even though he was available last summer. Imagine where we could be now if we had shelled out for him last summer. In my book that makes the experiment a failure.

Bischoff's agent has been quoted everywhere as saying his client has a lot of offers and it appears he will be gone this summer. What was the point in signing him on a 1 year contract when he was injured and then paying him for a year so that someone else could benefit when he recovered. We got about 10 minutes of first team football out of him which is only slightly less than he has played for his previous clubs. Does loyalty not exist at all any more? Actually I know the answer to that with 99% of players.

In other speculation we have been linked with re-signing Alidiere if 'Boro are relegated. There is no way on earth we will be paying good money for him with the strikers we have at the club. We are also linked with Nene of Nacional in Portugal and Lazio goalkeeper Carrizo but I can't see us signing these guys in the summer.

Our ladies have a league match at Watford tonight and then they are at home to Everton on Sunday in the league again. Both Arsenal & Everton have a 100% record in the league with Arsenal having a vastly superior goal difference and we beat them in the FA Cup semi final last weekend. If the ladies win tonight and on Sunday they will be perfectly set up to win the league again. Mark Randall is rumoured to be considering a loan spell at either Blackpool or QPR and some more first team football would do him no harm. Rene Steer has extended his loan spell at Gillingham by another month and I'm sure the experience of fighting for promotion in league 2 is doing him a lot of good. Finally for today there has been a lot of talk of Almunia getting a British passport and playing for England. While England don't have the wealth of talent in that position that they once had but I still am not too sure about him being our no. 1 never mind trying to get a game for England.

Here's a good clip of some of Freddie's goals from our double winning season of 2002 when he was at his best.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_xPHea_LBg

And to finish today's title track from The Manic Street Preachers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hgVeNjYiGo

See You Tomorrow.