Okay after drinking way too much wine at the Basel Weinmesse yesterday (as well as spending way too much money as a result!) means that the extra hour didn't really give me that much of a great sleep - it was too restless because of the alcohol. I hope it was for that reason and not because of the game today but there is a little cause for concern regarding today's match. Mostly it stems from the almost unanimous opinion of the pundits that we should easily win at a side who haven't won since the first day if the season and are second from bottom. However, Liverpool had no chance without Gerrard having lost 4 on the spin and playing against United and look what happened there.

Realisitcally we have the players to win this game and West Ham do try and play football so we won't be kicked off the park but..

A team at the bottom, fighting for a badly needed three points, a home crowd up for the game, our inability to defend set pieces (and with Cole/Upson they will fancy their chances) and a poor(ish) display in midweek all mean that we have to be at the very top of our game AND, most importantly, TAKE any chances that come our way (and they will). I'll settle for a repeat of last year here but I wouldn't be surprised if the game develops a little like our Fulham game earlier this season.

Come on you Gunners!!

In the early 80s I went to University in the East End (QMC) and lived for two years within spitting distance of Upton Park. It happened to coincide with the best season West Ham ever had in the 1st Division, they finished 3rd mainly due to the strike force of Tony Cottee and Frank McAvennie (wonder what happened to him !!) so it was not good being a) a student and b) an Arsenal fan in the locality.

I think I went to see Arsenal around 8/9 times at Upton Park and it was never a favourite place, either due to the intimidatory nature of the place (especially when trying to get out of the police escort as you lived near by), the results when we go there or standing on the North Bank whilst we lost 3-1! What has always amazed me is how West Ham are seen as such a lovely family club when in the 80s (thankfully to a lot lesser extent now despite the Millwall game) they were a club of violent and racist fans (Bulldog was openly sold outside the gates) fans. Yes they produced a stream of good football players and played football the way it should be played - it's just the local family were the Krays!

However, my favourite memory of Upton Park was a game when Arsenal were not involved. My house mate was a Newcastle fan and we went to the West Ham v Newcastle game when the Hammers won 8-1!! It was the fact that Alvin Martin scored a hat trick and Peter Beardsley ended up in goal as well as the major piss taking that remains a great memory till today.

Did you know that only two managers have won the Champions League when aged over 60, Sir Awex and Raymond Goethals (see this article), so it may be a challenge but it seems to be one Arsene intends to succeed in! Hopefully, he might just take the example of Chelsea and spend some time on the training ground looking at how to defend free-kicks hoofed into our box from the opposition's half. It's hard to say it was a one off lack of concentration when it happened in identical fashion against Blackburn and Alkmaar. However, we wouldn't be the modern Arsenal without a "Arsenal miss loads of chances and concede soft goal" shocker.

I also need to hold my hands up over the inherent dullness of the CL group stages as this week has been full of shocks. It doesn't stop me from thinking that the same old teams will qualify but they are just making it hard for themselves. However, if a team that is a 46-1 (that's the actual odds for Rubin and Barcelona were still 3-10 at half time when losing 0-1 at home) shot can win then maybe anything is possible.

One other point is that do any other Arsenal fans see some similarities regarding the press reaction this week to Liverpool's "crisis" and us at a similar stage last season. Both clubs had a good previous season that ultimately failed and have slumped to too many early defeats. Immediately in this blog obsessed, news hungry world it means the club is in "meltdown" and will implode at any moment. I don't give two hoots whether Liverpool get better or not but a win against United would just shut the media up and maybe they could actually try and find other stories, e.g. the fact that Chester are likely to go bust this week. Surelythe players and employees of that club, albeit much smaller, deserve the attention.

Also - here's a great list of Wenger's top 60 quotes - what's your favourite? I particularly liked:

"I tried to watch the Tottenham match on television in my hotel yesterday, but I fell asleep." 

"At some clubs success is accidental. At Arsenal it is compulsory." 

Of course it's so much better to be playing Champions League football this week and not staring at a blank grey wall of Interlullness (is that a word? If we agree on Interlull then I presume we can extend this to any derivative!) but there is always a but...

We have six weeks of fairly tedious and reasonably predictable games that, despite the success of Zurich in Milan, will, in all likelihood, end up with pretty much all of the usual suspects in the last 16. There may well be one or two casualties and as I look at the net today it seems all the car-crash rubber neckers are heading to Anfield to see if Rafa's men completely lose it against Lyon. Even if they do fall at this stage it's only because they have the one group that had one predicting 2 from 3 rather than the normal definitive 2 in the rest of the groups.

We face, on paper at least, a decent side in the current Dutch champions and a team managed by a man who has tactically stifled us in the past. Whether the "park the bus" tactics will be employed is anybody's guess but it wouldn't be a surprise despite the fact that our defence must be worth a shot at! Let's just see if we can get through the first 5 minutes without conceding 2 goals.

Other news of an increasingly depressive nature is the fact that Sepp Blatter thinks he deserves another term as head of FIFA! After all he has done such a f##king good job so far, hasn't he...

I think I'm going to come back to this one..

I know we all try and ignore much of what is reported in the media and that much of it has less to do with the truth and more to do with the need for ratings but....

Sometimes you just hear something and wonder what the hell they are all on when they either open their mouths or put pen to paper (sorry tap on a keyboard). I listened to some supposedly decent journalists in that excuse for a programme on Sky on Sunday mornings all agree that old Sir Awex is somehow being hounded by the poor referees. Apparently he should get off scot free for his comments regarding Alan Wiley (as well as his four letter tirade with the fourth official during the same game) as he's "done so much for the game" and "referees seem to want the attention". Along with some ludicrous comments regarding pretty much every other team in the Premier League that they will back track on in two weeks time it made me ask the question as to how they ever get the gig.

The requisites to be a journalist seem to be that you must not piss off Ferguson,  go with every bandwagon that is around, ignore any dive by an English player and rant about any from a "dirty, cheating foreigner", go on and on about how important International football is, deplore any fan not supporting other English clubs in Europe and well I could go on or maybe you'ld like to add your own.

I find the only paper that manages to actually not go down this path all the time is the Guardian and its excellent |Football Weekly podcast - I disagree with them sometimes but they don't seem so hell bent on being part of the football media herd!

It seems remarkably quiet (too quiet?) today and the media seem to struggling to understand that the International matches have ended as stories abound regarding injuries to (oh what a surprise) England players coming back from their pointless games. For once it seems that we (touch wood) have survived with only Eduardo, Clichy & Diaby on the physio table though allowing for a sudden outbreak of swine flu that has mutated with the black death at our training ground we will probably suffer a few more injuries/fatalities before tomorrow's kick off. Actually it looks as though it's the scousers who are suffering with the whole team injured, i.e. Stevie Me and Torres are both out.....shame it wasn't then play us!

I've no idea what the weather is where you live but this week Switzerland (and much of Europe) seems to have decided that Winter has arrived and it's fecking cold - I hope you're all warmer than I am.

It tells you all you really need to know about International breaks (or as we now know them - the dreaded Interlulls - a sort of void between two real footballing galaxies apparently) that Birmingham at home this weekend is a game we eagerly anticipate! I saw a little of the games last night and is it just me or do hardly any "real" fans go to England games at Wembley. It seemed that it was just like a pop concert or film premier with flash photography all game and 90% of the audience just waiting to see David Beckham appear so that they could scream wildly. Steve Bruce was obviously being ironic, wasn't he, please tell he was when he gave DB7 (I probably have to pay to say that don't I) the MOTM award. Brings back memories of the old song in the 80s to Bryan "Man of the Match" Robson as all he had to do was kick one ball in the 90 minutes to be rewarded with the Champagne.

What struck me about the whole World Cup qualifying is that when you look at the teams that qualified and  the teams in the play-offs that there are very few real shocks or surprises. Okay so a Slovakia got in ahead of a Sweden and Portugal/France have to beat the might of Bosnia or Ukraineto to get to South Africa. Like the Champions League group stages it all seems a lot of effort for very little excitement - how many groups went down to the wire and produced real finales! The whole press coverage of Argentina summed it up - it was the only story in town. I know we have to do it this way but it's so tedious. I suggest a giant "It's A Knockout" style event in each continent to determine the qualifiers in one weekend and so avoid all this Interlull dullness! Imagine John Terry and Rooney doing this against Ballack and co - I'm sure we'd get less injuries anyway.

As it's Interlull and the only stories are those relating to International football I thought I better talk about the two biggest local stories. Switzerland are playing Israel tonight in Basel and only need a draw to ensure that they win the group. I think that they can lose and still would be in the play-offs but Greece are hoping for a Isrsael win so they can get the winners spot! St Jakob Stadium was getting ready at lunch time as I went past (after my Gym session) and despite the FIFA ruling of no beer in the stadium I think the fans will manage to get enough before and after the game!

Over the border in France they are relieved to be in the play offs and L'Equipe reported yesterday (here's an English report) that Ligue 1 will be postponed for the 11th round in October, The odd fact is that the games are on the 28th October - well in advance of the play off games in November (14th / 18th) so it really seems a little strange.

Despite the Interlull I am quite looking forward to staying up late and watching the Uruguay - Argentina game tonight.

I do remember that we bought our own little Super Swede from an Italian club, Cremonese, but I had no idea that he actually also played for that strangest of named clubs, Young Boys of Bern. In fact, at the time of playing in Switzerland (88-89) it was a very cosmopolitan league with some half decent players, even if many had seen their best days. It was so competitive that the mighty (okay imagine it if you can) clubs like FC Basel and FC Zurich were in the second division. Ottmar Hizfeld even cut his managerial teeth here before moving on to win Champions Leagues and returning to manage the Swiss national side this year. All of this came from WSC273 - so get it for a read and ignore the normal football media during the Interlull.

At the very least it got me thinking of one of my all time favourite Arsenal goals....

Really Dull,

The Interlull is really Dull,

It's Dull, Dull and Dull

The Interlull is really Dull..

repeat ad nauseum

Now that song is out of my head I can concentrate on surviving week II, the return of the Interlull.

Have fun