HAVING snuffed out Riquelme, Arsenal now have to deal with Robbie Keane .
Gilberto may need to play another blinder
Keane has been red hot since he became captain of Ireland, and since he signed a new contract at Spurs.
Without Ledley King last week, I knew that Spurs could not beat Manchester United and if Arsenal had not played midweek I would be sure that Spurs could not draw at Highbury.
The hype about Tottenham having “a wonderful season” is somewhat exaggerated, in my view. It’s tosh. If Spurs were having a wonderful season they would be ten points above Arsenal, at least.
HOWEVER, I’M A BIG FAN of Robbie Keane and remained a fan during his unprolific patches.
Will Mido play?
It looks to me as if Mido knows he will not be offered a new deal and is sulking. That scenario has been wholly denied by Martin Jol, of course. I like Jol and the football he plays and he’s got Aron Lennon playing well on the wing now. Arsenal reject Paul Robinson is a good keeper who wants to learn and wants to improve. Ian Walker thought he knew it all.
If you have been reading this page for eight years, and some of you have, you know that I thought Arsene should have sighed Robbie Keane.
Football is about players. And it’s about opinions. As Brian Clough said, “It’s only opinion. It makes the world go round.”
THIS IS WHAT I WROTE in The Professor about Robbie Keane when he was at Coventry :
Aston Villa boss John Gregory had offered Wolves £5 million for Keane, but Gordon Strachan, who had just raised £10 million by selling Boateng and Huckerby, signed him for £6 million.
Arsenal started the match feebly, Petit misplacing passes and overhitting corners, Kanu sleepwalking, and Belgian loan striker Roussel winning balls in the air against Keown, who had just come back after seven weeks out.
Then McAllister hit a thirty-yarder which deflected in off Keown’s back for 1-0 after six minutes, and Coventry made it 2-0 when their Moroccan international Mustapha Hadji curled a right-foot shot just inside the post. Seaman thought the shot was going wide and embarrassed himself by not going for it straight away, then panicked and ran along his line. Kanu and Overmars had stinkers, but Ljungberg managed to get a goal back for Arsenal.
Then Robbie Keane scored an extraordinary goal to make it 3-1. There was a long free-kick, Carlton Palmer won the header against Petit, nodded the ball to Roussel, who headed down past the rusty Keown, and Keane was on the ball in a flash, flicking it sharply up and across Seaman so that it looped in by the far post. Very few players in Britain could have reached that ball as quickly as Keane did, and none could have flicked it so early, so hard and so accurately. He instinctively did the only thing he could have done to score from where he was.
It was a goal made in the womb. As the Republic of Ireland manager Mick McCarthy says, `Footballers are made by their mums and dads.’
Then Suker, just onside, collected a long diagonal pass from Petit, left Telfer on his backside, swerved inside Breen and scored with a left-foot toe-poke across Hedman.The Keane strike had been the highlight of Coventry’s 3-2 win.
We all knew that Wenger had wanted Robbie Fowler, who was not for sale, but Robbie Keane had been available – a cheeky dribbler with lightning feet and exceptional movement, an agile volleyer, an aggressive competitor and an electric poacher, very smart at gliding down the channels and bending his runs to stay onside. He can also head the ball and is a natural finisher.
Strachan had effectively signed a £14 million player for only £6 million and left Leeds, Chelsea and Arsenal looking stupid. For Wenger, the most annoying thing of all was that Robbie Keane would have been dynamite alongside Overmars and Bergkamp because he is sparky and they are cool.
The chemistry would have been perfect. He would have been exactly the right player to replace Anelka, but Arsenal blew it, big-time.
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For link to The Professor, click Home below.