Liverpool 1 Arsenal 1
N’gog 46, Reina o.g 94
What a feeble, forgettable game !
It was like a pre-season game. Luckily, I’d been building down to an anti-climax all week, so I wasn’t disappointed.
Arsenal were powderpuff. Not good enough to win, not bad enough to lose.
Arshavin didn’t graft and didn’t produce. He’s wasted out wide. If Fabregas isn’t playing, play Arshavin behind the striker, revive him, let him score a goal and get motivated again. Coaching is commonsense, not voodoo, as top managers would have us believe.
Typical Wenger, always give the big roles to his French boys. Although there were more crosses, Chamakh got no good service, while, as always, Diaby produced moments of huge athletic power and then spoiled it by doing the wrong thing.
In first half injury time, Joe Cole made a red card tackle on Koscielny and ref Martin Atkinson sent him off. The defender looked badly injured but recovered and came out for the second half.
Wenger’s wonders had 63% possession against 10 men and never looked like scoring.
Then Pepe Reina handed them a fluke goal at the death.
Reina had a terrible day at the office.
He showed that even a top custodian can suffer from what I’ve always called August goalkeeping. He just trained at the World Cup and then watched Spain’s seven games. On holiday, keepers don’t have to jump into a ruck of bodies and hold a fast-moving ball. In training, they don’t regain their nerve, and in friendly games they often don’t regain it either. And goalkeepers go onto the field every time knowing that any mistake might make headlines.
Reina saved a Walcott free-kick that was going wide, which was a warning sign.Then he did well to tip over a Rosicky shot that would have been a very fine goal. When Rosicky whipped in a cross to the near post, Chamakh jumped towards a ball which went past him and hit Reina, who then fumbled the ball into his own net for 1-1 in the 94th minute.
I thought Fabregas would start and play for an hour. But Jack Wilshere played for an hour and did some good things and some young things and was slightly involved in the goal Arsenal conceded in 46 minutes.
Arshavin was in the left back position and played a sharp pass infield to Wilshere near the corner of the penalty area. Wilshere was unbalanced, not quite expecting the risky pass, Mascherano pushed the loose ball straight behind Kosciely, who was coming out, allowing David N’gog to fire a shot past Almunia at his near-post.
Almunia doesn’t know where his posts are. Never has, never will.
After 46 minutes, it was 1-0 to the ten men.
N’gog had been harassing the Arsenal defence but Liverpool started to lose the game when N’gog was replaced by Fernando Torres, who has lost his pace. He looks as if he’s running in quicksand, as if he’s expecting his hamstring to pop.
Koscielny played very well and was unlucky to get a second yellow in injury time. It was ball-to-hand, a free kick, never a red card. Ridiculous.
What about Saturday’s games?
Clearly, the belligerent artistry of Carlos Tevez is wasted at Man City. He drops off, gets the ball, beats his man, then can’t do anything. He’s one of the ten best players in the world but Carlos needs fast, sparky players who can make a run for his passes, like Craig Bellamy and Stephen Ireland.
Looking at his severe new haircut, Roberto Mancini has lost the plot. His voluminous, sculptured hair has been a star of Italian football for 25 years. Now he looks like a cross between Mark Hughes and Brian Kidd.
If Mancini is sacked in November, I’m going to apply for his job. I can still do ANR from my office at the training ground. It will be nice to live in Manchester again. But it won’t be like the Sixties because I won’t be able to go to discotheques four nights a week.
I’m not wholly convinced that Harry Redknapp rates Robbie Keane as highly as I do. If he did, he would have played Robbie in the first half, when Spurs were on top, and the Irish sparkler would have scored, and Spurs might have won 1-0.
But 0-0 isn’t a terrible result for Tottenham. Obviously, Young Boys on a plastic pitch in Berne tomorrow night is a far more important game for Spurs than Citeh. Don’t lose 2-0 in Berne!
Daniel Levy, a studious accountant, won’t buy till Spurs have qualified, while restless Harry wants three players now to kick on. I’ve heard that Harry was embarrassed when Daniel offered Joe Cole £30,000 less than he was on at Chelsea.
I’m told that Craig Bellamy to Spurs was sorted out before Mark Hughes went to Fulham. But City won’t sell to a rival.
Harry’s trying to unload Jenas but who would buy a player so unproductive? He’s not a playmaker or a holding player or a goalscorer. So what’s Jenas for?
Malouda looked good again in Chelsea’s 6-0 demolition of West Brom.
Everton wore pink shirts and lost 1-0.
Aston Villa missed Martin O’Neill so much that they beat West Ham 3-0.
To be honest, I’m a bit fed up already.
I want to see an exciting player. I really want to see an exciting player. Sunday’s game had the same problem as the Spurs-Man City game: just as Tevez needed runners at the Lane, so Nasri needed runners at Anfield. Where are the runners? Where are the Ian Wrights and Freddie Ljungbergs who will make a run for your pass?
Today’s footballers are all posers who want it to feet. You can only make a real pass if somebody makes a run. If you have seven in midfield and no runners, you just pass the ball across the field and that puts me to sleep.
Maybe the electric, two-footed Javier Hernandez will start my season tonight by making a run behind the Newcastle defence. If the Mexican makes a run, he can get a pass and score a goal.
If I had a time-machine, I’d go back to 1986 and watch Frank McAvennie and Tony Cottee making runs. Those two were real strikers who knew where you had to be to score a goal.
Watching Arsenal at Liverpool, it didn’t feel like a new season.
It was just more of the same, a one-dimensional outfit that doesn’t excite me. It was laughable. Clichy can’t cross a ball, so you’re wasting a six foot four centre forward who is good in the air. Let’s hope Gibbs will replace Clichy soon and cross better balls.
Will Nasri ever be 50% of Robert Pires? His ball retention was good but, as I say, he had no runners.
Not a lot has changed. Arsenal can’t play without Fabregas or win without Fabregas.
As I said last week, and the week before, I want to see the first ten games. But I think the next 9 games will be like this, and the next 50 games will be like this, and the next four years will be like this.
LIVERPOOL ( 4-2-3-1): Reina; Johnson, Carragher, Skrtel, Agger; Gerrard, Mascherano (Lucas, 79); Kuyt, J Cole, Jovanovic (Rodriguez, 66); Ngog (Torres, 74). Subs not used Cavalieri (gk), Aurelio, Kelly, Babel.
ARSENAL (4-3-3) : Almunia; Sagna, Vermaelen, Koscielny, Clichy; Eboué (Walcott, 60), Diaby (Van Persie, 76), Wilshere (Rosicky, 60); Nasri, Chamakh, Arshavin. Subs not used Vela, Song, Fabianski (gk), Gibbs.