Arsenal didn’t have a striker.
Another competent striker is badly needed.
Wenger played 4-4-0 and lost the game 1-0.
But his team out-passed Man City for most of the game.
Oxlade and Coquelin were good and Koscielny was Arsenal’s best player by two kilometres.
But City killed them with a sublime breakaway goal in 83 minutes.
If Arsenal had scored that match-winning goal with four passes from box to box, Gooners would have been raving about the beauty of it for months.
City were defending a right wing corner, De Jong blocked the dipping ball in the six-yard box, Dzeko carried it to the halfway line, played his lovely pass into the diagonal run of Adam Johnson, who was tracked by Frimpong.
Johnson was cute and his clever flick set up Kun Aguero, who slotted with fine aplomb, beating Fabianski comfortably. No set-up touch, just a sweet side-foot shot by a world class sharpshooter. A touch of class by a tiny predator who had done nothing up till that moment.
A football team is a machine for scoring goals at one end and stopping them at the other end.
Arsenal failed to do the first or the second. Without Van Persie, Arsenal couldn’t score. Park and Chamfart were clueless, limp, pathetic. Gervinho came on, looked fast but not incisive.
A Wenger team is a machine that can pass the ball very well, Coquelin is coming on a treat, Oxlade is a two-footed menace who could develop into a far better footballer to Walcott or Gervinho.
First half, I thought Arsenal were sure to win.
But Dzeko was playing well in various parts of the pitch and six foot eight Romanian keeper Costil Pantilmon made a couple of impressive saves.
“We played the football, they scored the goals. “
I started hearing that from schoolboy footballers when I was 16 and I heard it for the next five years, right through university in Manchester. I was the reporter for the student paper and I’d be in the dressing room with the players after every match and I’d hear that every few weeks. And sometimes it was true : We had played the football, but they had scored the goals.
Arsenal were the better side but punchless.
It was 4-4-0.
Park and Chamfart are two tossers from the French league who should go back there ASAP. Powderpuff passengers, an insult to the shirt.
I hope Oxlade will be a fantastic player for Arsenal. I think he will be. But nobody really knows how a teenage footballer will develop. We can only say : he has ALL the equipment.
Liverpool won 2-0 at Chelsea, where Craig Bellamy was in tears before the game, following the tribute to his friend Gary Speed.
Rising above his grief, the sparky striker laid on both goals.
A cross from Bellamy to Maxi for 1-0, again, just like the league game 10 days ago. Then Bellamy\’s free-kick was headed in by Martin Kelly.
Bad news for Dalglish: Lucas carried off on a stretcher with a knee injury. He had tried an ambitious tackle on Mata and hurt himself. Big blow for Liverpool if it\’s serious. Lucas will have a scan today.
In Chelsea’s fifth defeat in nine games, Torres was pitiful. Is he finished?
Liverpool are in the semi-finals with Citeh, Cardiff and, probably, Manchester United. United should beat Crystal Palace tonight in the other quarter-final.
In Spain the Clasico is coming up on Saturday, December 10.
Barcelona can’t afford to lose this one.
Because Marcelo is such a bold gladiator, I have been thinking about how Pep Guardiola will deal with him.
Marcelo is one of those Brazilian left backs who comes forward a lot and really fancies himself. He’s fast, aggressive and makes things happen. For that reason I think Pep has always hoped to play Alexis Sanchez, who is the most combative winger I\’ve seen since Pavel Nedved.
Sanchez, the former Udinese player, is back after missing 11 games with a torn hamstring. He scored the first two goals against Rayo Vallecano last night and Barca won 4-0.
Right now, Real Madrid have a team of warriors.
That’s why I think Pep will deploy Sanchez in the biggest match of the season. A game like that is a series of duels and if anybody can hold his own in a duel with the dynamic Marcelo, Sanchez can . Two very good players who might cancel each other out. And if they do cancel each other out, neither Sanchez nor Marcelo will get a mention because there will be bigger stars twinkling at the Bernabeu that night.
PS. I just saw a comment from Pep after the game :
“Alexis isn’t only a forward, he also does a job which helps the team a lot.”
He’s only saying what we can all see. But I’d take that as a signal that Sanchez, if fit, will start in Madrid.
In that drama every Barcelona player will need to help the team a lot.