Every Oak Tree Started Life as an Acorn....

..or something along those lines.

I think many Arsenal fans struggled to get through last night's game, it was an odd one indeed. From the continuing coverage on Arsenal's very own "The Truman Show" that is "The Billy Show" to the 59,500 (cough, cough) pairs of eyes watching the new captain take to the stage plus the various side shows - it was an "interesting" evening.

In essence we struggled, unsurprisingly, to play with any fluency or pace and it looked, from the first 5 minutes, that this was always go to be a long evening. During the 90 minutes there were little flashes of potential equally mixed with minor scares but sometimes it seemed that it was like watching an Arsenal game on a dodgy internet stream. Our passages of play never quite got into focus and the players seemed, somehow, to be out of sync with each other on numerous occasions. 

However, for all our flaws in our play last night there was (just) enough effort and concentration to make up for the lack of confidence and experience. That and, for once this season, a little bit of lady luck saw us go through after one real alarm (yet more thanks to Almunia) when Cesc made the most of a (rightly) uncontested drop ball (It WASN'T a free kick Mr. Pleat!!!) to put our own Puss in Pink Boots through to score with a superb finish.

So, as the boss remarked afterwards, we got through and we can hope the recovery has started though with our injuries and a game at Stamford Bridge this weekend we need to hold on to some of any luck going. The Champions League can be left out of our minds until February and we ask our new guy from the Soccer League to sort out one or two additions in January. BUT....

You know what I will take from last night's game, not the sight of Cesc in charge or Willie Gallas's face after he nearly let them into score but the 10 minutes or so of Jack Wilshere. 16 years old and as composed a European début since a young Spaniard probably! He looks too young to be on the pitch with the big boys but that his very appearance is what makes Arsene who he is and what he stands for. Whilst the world of football tries to eat itself with money grabbing agents and even more greedy players there still is an innocence of a young kid wanting to just play. It may not last but the memory will still be there.