Celine Dion Caught Up In van Persie Goal Drought Horror
Gibbs first prem goal
By Celine Dion
March 25 2012
I like a Saturday afternoon game, because in my view that is when football should be played - men escaping from their wives, for a designated period of about 5 hours, and enjoying them in the company of like minded persons.The enticing roar of the crowd, the heady and familiar whiff of tobacco, cheap beef burgers, and lager. Perhaps a lucky 15 or 31 when nobodies looking. Who knows...? Then jumping onto the 1932 to Southend and back to a life under the thumb, calculating insurance dividends in a monolithic grey concrete office block and blankly wheeling a trolley around Sainsburys.
Hyper Market
The Arsenal marketing department, with all its match day posturing, video montage Thierry Henry slow motion fests, and so on, would like us to think that no match is ordinary at the Emirates - that each is a titanic clash of Premier league legends displaying jaw-dropping skills against the backdrop of an awe struck crowd.
But actually, sometimes, the reality of the 38 game fixture list catches up with us all, and it’s just another Saturday afternoon game, the sort to instantly dissolve into the mists of our collective memories, only to resurface once or twice in the next few decades, perhaps in response to a trivia question, or such like.
Saturday was such a day. There is no getting around it. Arsenals bewildering ascent of the league table, the phenomenal Spurs and Milan home games, then the emotional finish to the Newcastle match, meant that today’s encounter had a very tough act to follow, and frankly it was never going to.
I heard a few people talk it up, as if we might unexpectedly slip. But here was an opposition that had already enjoyed a win here last season, then an improbable 2-0 advantage in the cup two months ago. They had had their excitement, just like we have. Today would go to form, against a team whose fans harbour an intense dislike for their unadventurous manager, who would feature the lumbering non entity Emile Heskey up front, and whose season has already settled into a comfortable snooze, even before ours has.
A forgettable afternoon
And so it proved. I had a quick beer outside Liverpool Street and watched a large group of Leeds fans getting ready for their short journey over the river to the battle zone that is Millwall. Then I had a quick ride on the tube to Arsenal. There seemed to be a higher than usual amount of day trippers at the ground today, people scratching their heads and fumbling around, helplessly trapped in the turnstiles, then standing miserably in the 20 meter queue for the toilets outside block 24 when there is a toilet the size of a small Tesco’s 2 blocks away at block 26.
I caught the end of the Chelsea Spurs game, which Spurs should have won, then took my seat. I could tell it wasn’t going to be a vintage afternoon, from the crowd point of view. The gentleman to the side of me was wearing headphones for the duration of the game, and the support was never out of first gear.
The game was over after about half an hour. Villa were not going to pepper our goal with shots, because they had Emile Heskey up front. So when we raced into a two goal lead, you knew that was it. First Gibbs was played in routinely by Gervinho, and Given (remember him!) made a mess of his straightforward blast inside the near post. The second goal was outstanding, or it seemed it from behind the goal (I’ll admit it looked more routine on Match of the Day).
As Wenger stated in his interview, Song has developed the habit of standing the ball up like Glen Hoddle used to, inch perfect into the path of an onrushing forward, Walcott in this case, but off the radar of the opposition defenders. That is about the fifth or sixth quality assist from Song this season. He is an exceptional player, and anyone who doesn’t think he is needs to clean their glasses.
Drought Horror
Games like this go either way, Arsenal run up a cricket score, or take their foot off the gas and have a rest. In this case, they had a rest, and I don’t blame them given the run they are on. Arteta could have made it 3-0 before the break with a rasping 30 yard strike, but Given made up for his earlier mistake and beat it over the bar. RVP who is going through a worrying scoring drought of approximately 180 minutes without a goal, then failed to capitalise on uncertainty in the Villa ranks, and saw his improvised effort lofted away from goal. RVP then took the rest of the afternoon off, as did most of the rest of our midfield.
I felt for the Villa fans really. They seem to have one very very good player in Mark Albrighton, but I expect they’ll sell him. They always turn up in good numbers and outside the ground they come across as cheerful, happy go lucky types. They like a good sing song, even if most of their actual songs seem to be to the tune of Kum-bye-ah. They showed great humour with their second half invention ‘Emile Heskey he scores when he wants’ But they aren’t really going anywhere are they. Content with being second best, and not doing much to improve on it. Their club has decided what its level of achievement should be, and tailors its playing squad accordingly. Now where have I heard that before?
The second half settled into a gentle slumber, the Ox did his best to awaken us with a rampaging run, then Arteta fully snapped us out of our reverie with an uncanny thirty yard free kick, not a crafty curler you might expect from that distance. He just walked up to the ball and wellied it. He knew it was a great goal, and it is lovely to see him enjoying himself at the club. How nice to see someone with something to prove, who is clearly buzzing with every game he plays, rather than certain sulky characters in his position last year.
This didn’t snap the match out of the routine, however. I left the ground, went for a couple of pints with our esteemed editor Boris, but I had a headache that I couldn’t shake off, so went home for some spaghetti.
Perhaps I sound a bit jaded, but my point is, a 3-0 victory like this seeming a bit of an anti-climax, a bit routine, is a very promising sign. Because just four months ago, ‘routine’ meant a 1-1 draw at home to Wolves or Fulham, or a turgid Van Persie inspired 1-0 win. The bar has been raised now, with players firing from all over the pitch. Whatever happens between now and the end of the season, Wenger has now done enough to prove his critics (including myself) wrong and united the fan base.
But it only means something if he uses this as a platform for something greater. Whether he likes to admit it or not, he has been greatly assisted by the shambolic situations at Chelsea and Liverpool. But those clubs will not remain a shambles forever.
This squad has proven it has it within itself to string significant unbeaten sequences together, twice now, next season it has to do so again, but with the remaining deadwood stripped from the ranks and suitable reinforcements recruited, with the ultimate purpose of winning silverware. Then perhaps, just perhaps, our club can go back to routinely winning trophies, just like it used to.
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2012:03:31:21:24:17 by Padre Pio.
First Prem goal for Gibbs, memorable for him and a nightmare for Givens who had a poor game by his standards.
First time that two English players scored in an Arsenal game since 1997, but I suspect that too will become more frequent.
But a nice result in the Highbury sunshine watching those litte men in red and white, and being able to sit outside in the warm sun in the bank garden drinking cold drinks aint bad.
"When we had to suffer the team is a lion because they suffer together." 4 July 2020 at Wolverhampton Wanderers
Arteta on his team's first away victory at a club above them in the Premiership since September 2015 at Leicester.
i normally dont do articles with more than two paragraphs but good piece celine
CD, enjoyed as always. The crowd looked a very happy bunch on the TV. And that pile-driver from Mikel was only bettered by the Crouch goal, as goal of the round, IMO.Since the end of WW1, 1919, when the FA restarted its 4 tier football league, with Arsenal fc in the 1st div, there’s only ever been one club to have never been relegated from Div 1/ EPL.
Arsenal fc
Let’s keep making history