From Matt Emerson: my two pence worth
Myles,
Happy New Year to you and yours.
I hope life continues to treat you all well.
Saturday was my first match at the Emirates this season.
Great atmosphere, considerably helped by the increased allocation of away tickets that the FA Cup provides.
Here are my thoughts about the game: Arteta and both our fullbacks were excellent.
Spurs tried to isolate Adebayor against Sagna by hitting long crossfield balls up to him and then trying to bring the midfield in on the second ball.
But Sagna was simply too good. You could see after five minutes that Ade was demoralised and thus Spurs were playing with 10 men.
Mourinho would have hooked him before half time, but Sherwood is trying to boost his confidence in order to get a run of games out of him. Good luck with that.
Arteta covered the space in front of the back four superbly.
I agree with you about Wilshere. He\’s turning into a slightly more talented version of Dennis Wise. He\’s lost some pace and looks like he needs about three months off, which he won\’t get due to the World Cup. It would be no surprise to see him break down badly in September/October.
I disagree slightly with Rohan in that I thought Dembele was their best player. He never hid and tried to keep going – he bossed Wilshere in my view.
Soldado made intelligent runs all day and was scythed down by Vermaelen in the first half. But he\’s not a hold-up player and needed players to be closer to him. He\’ll go back to Spain at some point.
We\’re a good side, but not a truly great one.
We can win the league, but much will depend on Chelsea & Man City\’s results rather than our ability.
Next season will be much, much harder to win it.