It’s Goodnight Vieira as New Romantics Dominate

Celebrate
By Boris Mellor
March 29 2006

Arsenal outfought, out-thought, and outplayed the cynical Old Lady of Turin. Vieira was anonymous in the first half, but at half-time I reminded friends that Paddy became a one half player in his later career, that he might improve for the second half. How wrong I was, he became even worse

Its only half-time

And now there is no more half-time for Paddy. The tie may be only at half time, but Paddy won’t be there to do anything about it. He won’t get the chance to show he can do better. Instead he will only be able to watch the young pretender who stole his crown, and scored the goal when Pires robbed Paddy of the ball.

 

Arsenal dominated the match so entirely that Juve had only two chances all game, and they were off target. Arsenal had 8 chances on target to Juve’s zero, plus the Gunners had 5 more shots off target. As Arsenal went two nil up, and started playing for the third, Juventus imploded. Their fans went very quiet before the second goal, and gave up the ghost. I commented to the person next to me that I thought Juve might lose it. But I did not imagine how big time that would be, and I would have preferred another goal as a reward, rather than the sending off of Mauro Camoranesi and Jonathan Zebina in the final minutes. It was too late to extend the lead.

 

Yet for the first 20 minutes it was if Arsenal were taking a look at Juventus, sizing them up, and having had a good look found them wanting. There was no indication that they were about to put their foot on the gas, but when they did they were incredible, first to the ball and always passing forward.

 

Wenger has discovered that 4-5-1 can be a deadly attacking option, in the hands of lesser teams it can be a deadly bore. But with the right personnel it is an exciting fluid form of football. Again and again the midfield got in the last third alongside Henry. And it was Pires, playing his best game all season, who slide tackled Vieira and passed the ball inside to Henry. With five minutes left of the first-half Thierry found Fabregas slipping into the area, the 18-year-old gave the flat-footed Buffon no chance, putting the ball way beyond him and into the back of the net.

 

The half finished with Juve providing little if any threat. Indeed 2-0 would have been a fairer indication of the overall play. In the second-half Juventus failed to make any noticeable comeback. Arsenal dominated but did not find the net for another 25 minutes. On  the 69th minute, Hleb passed the  ball to Fabregas just outside and he squared to Henry 12 yards out. Henry did not appear to have the ball under control but he managed to hook  the ball into the unguarded net.  Arsenal might have had a third with a little more luck, but there was always the threat of Juve getting an away goal. However they imploded and down to nine men it never looked likely. They had become frustrated by a total Arsenal performance, they couldn’t get past the magnifent defending of Toure and co. They couldn’t win the midfield, and they were terrified of Henry.

 

In the preview Arsenal Times asked “could Vieira rouse himself? “, well we know the answer. The future met the past and the past lost. At the beginning of the game Arsenal fans warmly applauded Paddy, and some even sang the old song. During the game they mainly ignored him but at 2-0 up some couldn’t resist singing “you should have stayed with a big club”. To the Juve fans they asked what is it like to play in front of a crowd.

 

Just as after the Real Madrid  game Highbury was full of celebrating Gunners. They deserved to, having played their part urging the team on from the first whistle to the last. Library?  Your’e having a larf.