Old Trafford again, business and ten things

So it's the mancs again, anyone expecting to come away with anything more than zero points put your hands up, I thought so, we're hardly on the crest of the wave at the moment. Arshavin returns but it's the state of our defence that is of real concern, Almunia looks to be out, while Gallas and Clichy remain out, only a mad Arsenal man would be feeling confident going into this one. Amazingly Tomas Rosicky has made a return to full training after many many months out of action, whether he can stay fit and play some games remains to be seen, but good luck Tomas.

At least the boss can see our defence is so very weak, but as well know you defend as a team and it's not as simple as buying one defender, if only it were. Many other bloggers have commented on the sensible comments that we've recently heard from our new CEO Ivan Gazidis, he certainly talks a good game, let's hope the rest of his skills are up to scratch. Arsene certainly felt the heat as he was given a good grilling by shareholders yesterday; although there was possibly a lack of respect shown at times, for example when Silvestre was labelled 'geriatric' by one shareholder, you can't help but feel that Arsene must realise that these people have a point, even if they could express themselves a bit more eloquently at times. The truth is often somewhere in between, some excellent analysise from Arseblogger.

On the transfer front I particularly liked ACLF's take on some of the lazy media banter we've been witness to in recent weeks, unfortunately this appears on the tip of the iceberg, we've a whole summer of it to look forward to. I have to say I disagree strongly with ACLF's defense of Adebayor:

"Cultural differences need to be recognised and less castigation of a man who grew up surrounded by poverty and hardship."

I don't expect to like all Arsenal players as people and I can freely admit that even if Ade had banged in thirty this season, I would still think that he's a wanker, that's just the person he is. It's nothing to do with 'cultural differences' or 'poverty', he's just a wanker, plus this season he's shown himself to be a bit of a lazy wanker at times too. If he was doing the business on the pitch and putting the effort in, then I'd be happy to have him being a wanker in an Arsenal shirt, as it is I'd rather he buggered off elsewhere to languidly stroll around the pitch for his few hundred grand a week. Anyway I'd just thought I'd finish with a list of ten things to do before you become tempted to start speculating about Arsenal transfer targets:

1. Laugh at Tottenham.

2. Laugh at Harry Redknapp's twitch (often a pre-recorded clip on the VCR helps).

3. Tell the Mrs to shut up and stop watching Friends on the TV.

4. Watch a rerun of an old Arsenal victory and pretend the last couple of weeks never happened.

5. Pick out your nasal hair with tweezers.

6. Have a proper beer, none of that fizzy lager piss.

7. Shout some incoherent abuse at the TV.

8. Repeat 6 and then 7 until sufficiently inebriated.

9. Pass out gently on the sofa and dream of title success next season.

10. Wake up with a cracking headache and realise that you cannot quite remember if Arsenal have won a trophy this season, wait a few minutes for the headache to worsen and for the grim reality of our season to hit you hard in the face, now you can consider speculating on future Arsenal transfer targets.