So Johan Djourou has injured his knee, this is concerning given the major knee surgery he had not that ago. Essentially I think he had a bit of the knee joint lining replaced (probably autologous chondrocytes) and the big concern will be that this repair has failed and dislodged into the joint, meaning the knee has become swollen and painful. It may turn out to be nothing much, however I am sure we will know more after an MRI scan, it's simply impossible to know the gravity of the situation now.
Apart from Newcastle fans and a few standard Arsenal haters, the general consensus of opinion is that Dowd played a massive part in Newcastle's comeback yesterday. The fact that Nolan stayed on the pitch and the second penalty were clear errors, even Graham Poll has backed Jack Wilshere's assertions of inconsistency. The commentators started laughing at Dowd's decisions on the stream that I was watching and this said it all for me.
The strange news this evening that has been breaking is from France and it concerns the Arsenal-Newcastle game. Personally I have no idea whether this has any truth to it or not, but the fact that French TV are reporting that Interpol are fishing around the Arsenal-Newcastle game is more than just a dodgy rumour on some individual's blog. The original news source is here, this appeared before the TV footage.
Maybe this will turn out to be absolutely sod all, maybe not, but there may be something to it if a reputable French TV channel is reporting it. They must be reasonably sure of their sources as they would be very open to litigation if there is no substance to it. Either way I'm just reporting what they are reporting, the fact that it is gathering such momentum says a lot about the refereeing performance we saw yesterday, it was so biased that only a Geordie would try to pretend that it was not primarily Phil Dowd that got them their point from the game.
9 comments:
Mike Ashley and a brown paper bag.
now we know why they need that £35 million
i think this was payback by this ref. for the incinuation made by our captain, that the linesman @ Everton game was on the take... Cesc should have presented his case differantly & without sarcasim.... thank you david moyes... now we have a monkey on our backs, too... in addition to all other else.... thanks for blabing about things left private,,, heat of the battle things.... maybe they got their revage and will let us be.... & judge the game only on merits..... i was really starting to enjoy johan game.... super assured & confident .... hope he wont be out too long, same for vermalen,, miss his passion on the field and his defensive skills... up the GUNS.... Goonerkam
if any match-fixing is going on it will be the refs.
You don't seriously believe this do you? Do you also think that 911 was carried out by US insiders?
What an amazing coincidence that the ref was bribed and that at the very same time Diaby was stupid enough to start grabbing people round the neck twice within a minute... What would have happened if Diaby had not lost his rag?
Also a little odd that a ref who had been bribed to allow a newcastle comeback actually disallowed a perfectly good Newcastle goal. Some of you need to get out more and take a perfectly fair result on the chin.
Apparently there were some irregular betting patterns. Couple that with an extremely biased and shocking reffing performance and thus the investigation.
I hope Phil Dowd ends up in jail.
Of all the things that pissed me off about that game, the biggest one was the announcers saying, "Arsenal let it slip away... "
Yeah, Arsenal let it slip away like Poland let the corridor slip away in September 1939. With a knife in its back, and no one willing to come to its rescue.
Football365 offered this stat on Phil Dowd:
"In the four Arsenal matches he has refereed this season, the Gunners have conceded four penalties and had two players dismissed. In the other 17 top-flight games Dowd has taken charge of this term, three penalties have been awarded and five players dismissed."
Not for one moment do I absolve our players and manager of responsibility for Saturday's debacle - Diaby should be fined by the club as far as I'm concerned, no matter how much sympathy I have with what he's gone thru and how he must feel. And I won't even get into AW's pathetic subs and Cesc's total lack of leadership.
All that said, Dowd most definitely has some responsibility--his bizarre decisions helped to unsettle our players and made them confused as to how to act and react. And it wasn't only in the 2nd half-5 mins in RVP was sandwiched between 2 opponents & RVP got booked! Barton's brutal unbooked foul on Arshavin, Barton's unbooked stamp on Diaby just before the sending off incident, Barton's unbooked tackle that was identical to Shawcross on Ramsey and deJong on Ben Arfa, booking Sczezny for rightly taking the ball for a goal kick after being knocked down by Nolan - and the TOTALLY BIZARRE 2nd penalty!
The strangest ref performance I've seen.
I didn't know where else to post this, but Tomas Rosicky has scored for the Czech Republic, making his scoring form for us even more scathing. I love Tomas as a player, but he really knows how to add insult to injury.
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