Barca, Fergie the racist and general pondering

The Barca dust has settled and frankly I haven't changed my mind that much about the mechanism of our defeat. Goodplaya summed things up nicely with an article titled 'Neither humiliated or heroic', also the majority of Gooner comments here were pretty sensible and balanced, most people seemed to be fairly pragmatic in defeat. Barca played well, Messi was outstanding, our injuries played a part, the lads who came in did pretty well, it was a pretty tight contest despite the 4-1 scoreline, undoubtedly the Barca theatrics and systematic fouling also played a big part. Having said that we took the lead, surrendered it with some poor defending, and then had some excellent chances to get back in the game at 3-1, if one of these had been taken then Barca would have been made to sweat.

In truth the absence of Gallas and Song was probably key, Silvestre is past it and struggled throughout, it also meant that Vermaelen had to play out of position on the right of the centre backs which didn't play to his strengths. The lack of defensive cover in the midfield meant Song was badly missed, Diaby played well, as did Denilson, but neither are defensive midfielders and never will be. Even with a full strength defensive line up, it would have been tough, Messi appears unplayable at times, his pace and close control are something to admire. Overall it was perverse that we lost this game 4-1, the team performance was far better than in the first leg. We should learn from our defensive failings in this game, if we can then with a stronger side I could see us beating Barca next year, we really weren't that far off.

Alex Ferguson's recent comments in defeat have been truly pathetic and demonstrative of what an unpleasant bully this man is. Firstly he chose to blame the Chelsea defeat on the referee when in truth the big decisions went both ways and the offside goal was balanced out by Manu's clear hand ball goal. Then after losing to a very average Bayern side he chose to blame this on the 'Germans' in a unacceptably xenophobic manner which was very close to being overtly racist. The reason Manu lost was because Rafael is a stupid temperamental fool, his second booking had to be given, it was a cynical shirt tug when Ribery was breaking in a dangerous area of the pitch. The silence from the mainstream media has been deafening, Ferguson has sunk to new depths with his inability to take defeat, while his comments about Germans are beneath contempt. Has Sir Alex ever seen Manu players surround the referee or dive on the football field? Strange how he seems to encourage some things from his team but criticise it when it happens against his side.

Finally it seems that a few long term absentees are close to returns, Gibbs, Djourou and RVP may have vital roles to play in the final weeks of the season. This clip highlighted to me by a reader shows that the scum who goes by the name of Karl Henry was lucky not be sent off much earlier in last week's game against Wolves. Interestingly it's funny how some people seem so incensed by Arsenal's reaction to Karl 'clogger' Henry's appalling tackle on Tomas Rosicky, certain teams such as Manu and Chelsea have made a habit of intimidating and surrounding referees. It's fine to call for some consistency but Tony Pulis' words are nothing but stupid, there's a big difference between intimidating referees and complaining to the ref that yet another of your players has almost had his leg broken.

Stop rolling around please Messi et al

Fine, Barca are a very fine side, Messi is a fantastic player, but the way in which the eleven men of Barca have cheated in the first half has been beyond a joke. The Barca training routine probably involves a few forward rolls every time that one of their players feels the air of an opponent brush in their general direction. I can now empathise with Chelsea, it is that bad.

Wedid far better than in last week's first half, we took the lead when Walcott broke clear, he elected to sqaure to Bendtner whose inital effort was well saved, the young Dane reacted speadily and poked home the rebound, one nil to the Arsenal. It didn't last long and this may well be the massive regret for tonight's game, Messi pounded a brilliant twenty yarder past Almunia into the top corner. Messi then scored twice more and the defence was caught napping, Abidal looked a marginal offside for the second, there was no excuse for the third, we were caught badly out of position and Messi took full advantage.

What can you say about Messi? Well he's shown why he's such a great talent and such a cheating little piece of shit in one half. His goals were phenomenal, but his rolling when Denilson tackled him fairly was embarrassing to say the least. The theatrics of several other Barca players really took the piss, even their centre backs were diving to get our players booked. Rosicky and Denilson were booked very very hasrhly, while Milito was allowed a reckless over the top leg breaker on Nasri and Marquez was allowed a leg breaker on Rosicky, the ref also inexplicably kept his cards in his pocket as Busquets cynically chopped down Walcott on the break.

Given the number of players we've got out tonight, we've generally done all right, the frustration is that you simply cannot give the ball away in such dangerous aweas as we have done tonight, some of it has been too naive by far. Barca are a good side, but they are eminently beatable, as has been shown by the fact that we look like scoring whenever we break on them, I just hope we can give ourselves a small chance in the second half. There's no doubt that a lot of Barca's success is down to their persistent crowding and fouling in the midfield, combined with their cheating to win free kicks whenever an opposition player dares to try to win the ball back. I will never respect Barca as a great side because of this, they make Chelsea appear an ethical and moral team.

The second half saw a very even game and some good moments pass. Bendtner miscontrolled when the goal was at his mercy, Rosicky and Clichy fired high and wide from good positions, a couple of close offsides went against us. The Barca cheating continued, the worst being Eboue's booking as he was tugged back by Busquets who then feigned a non existent facial injury. Messi rubbed salt into our wounds with a calamitous fourth, the 4-1 score flattering Barca as the 2-2 score from the first leg had flattered us.

Overall we were too many men short against a very efficient Barca side. Our defence never looked right with Silvestre's inclusion meaning Vermaelen had to play on the right side where he never looked at home. There were just too many absentees to make up for, even so if we could have just taken one of those key chances it could have all been so different. Van Persie, Gallas, Campbell, Song, Cesc, Van Persie would have all added something tonight but it was not to be. We can learn from this in many ways, we need a bit more depth in certain areas, we must work a bit harder off the ball, we must be more clinical in the final third. Perversely tonight the players fought hard and didn't deserve to go down 4-1, at least they can look in the mirror and see faces not as ugly and cheating as that of Messi.

Karl Henry: you are the disgrace

Having read certain comments in the media from the Wolves captain Karl Henry, I can't help but feel that this is yet another example of just what is wrong with the English game and what is holding back English football from developing technically. Henry seems to want to deflect attention away from his own lack of skill and his appalling tackle on Tomas Rosicky:

“We love Arsenal’s great football but when they are rolling around, getting people sent off, it makes you not want to see them do so well......I’ve nicked the ball, and Vermaelen and whoever else has come flying in, trying to get me sent off."

Karl Henry should watch the video above and have a long hard think about his own lack of self control. Karl Henry got himself sent off, he has no one else to blame but himself, it was an extremely reckless and dangerous challenge from behind. Rosicky had a decent gash to his calf as a result of the tackle, to accuse him of play acting is beyond a joke, Marriner's decision to give a red was no 'joke' as Henry claims, it was a decision that has been vindicated by the video replays. You simply cannot tackle from behind in the modern game, when you tackle from behind in a sliding out of control manner with studs up then you leave yourself open to being dismissed from the field of play.

The way in which the media have given Henry's comments such uncritical exposure basically condones violence, as a result the media have blood on their hands again in my opinion. It is not long since the media made Shawcross the victim after he brutally and violently ended Ramsey's season, Ramsey's sensible comments since have been spun by the media in a way which makes him appear unreasonable for daring to suggest that Shawcross was at all to blame for breaking his leg.

Imagine if William Gallas did a Karl Henry tackle on Wayne Rooney, would we get the same reaction from the media suggesting that Rooney was faking injury despite a decent bloody gash in his calf? Would we see Manu players criticised for surrounding the referee to protest against the violence of the tackle? I very much doubt it, our media are a disgrace and so is Karl Henry. One only has to cast one's mind back to Gallas' tackle on Mark Davies against Bolton, a very mild foul compared to Henry's, yet the media hounded Gallas, strange how Henry gets such a free ride. Double standards by the media, never.

Domenech the joke, Ramsey and pre-Barca return

Firstly to comments from the moron that is known by the name of Raymond Domenech. The buffoon had the nerve to call Arsene Wenger and Arsenal 'irresponsible and outrageous', what utter hogwash from this man who couldn't manage his way out of a paper bag. Arsene has quite rightly responded and pointed out the ludicrous nature of Domenech's logic.

Arsenal pay William Gallas' wages, William Gallas had declared himself fit, the medical staff had declared him fit. Even taking all this into account there is always a chance that an injury can recur, as it did in Gallas' case, so for Domenech to criticise Arsene or Arsenal is completely out of line. When Domenech's criticism is seen in the context of Arsenal players repeatedly returning from French international duty with injuries sustained in meaningless friendlies then this criticism appears even more stupid, when one also realises that the National Federations pay nothing for the players to turn up for their countries then Domenech appears a moron of the highest order. Add in to this equation the fact that Domenech is a very poor football manager who has consistently manager to make the French national team add up to less than the sum of their parts, then this makes Domenech nothing other than an ignorant c*nt.

Aaron Ramsey has had some very fair and sensible things to say about Ryan Shawcross' violent tackle:

"I don't believe he [Shawcross] wanted to break my leg, but I think he wanted to go through both the ball and me - to take me out and make sure I felt the tackle. "He was caught out of position a little, but he could definitely have changed his mind before making the tackle, realising that he wasn't going to get there and so not committing. If I was tackling and I saw that there wasn't a chance of getting to the ball cleanly I wouldn't make the tackle - and I don't think there was a chance of him getting there."

And who of sound mind could disagree with that? Obviously there are certain cloggers in the media who think that what Shawcross did was part of the game, these cloggers need to wake up to the reality of what violent play can result in on the pitch, needless serious injury is the result and it must be stamped out of the game. As Ramsey says Shawcross deliberately went it very hard and aggressively when he knew he wasn't going to get the ball, he could have pulled out of the tackle, but he did not, this makes Shawcross' actions violent and reckless. The media may try to justify what Shawcross did, but really there is no justification for this kind of thuggery. Henry's tackle yesterday was symptomatic of this kind of thuggery, hard, late and dangerous with no intention of playing the ball.

Elsewhere it has been reported that Zlatan Ibrahimovich is out of Tuesday's game with a torn calf muscle. There will therefore be no Pique, Puyol, Iniesta (I think) or Ibrahimoich. Still we are hardly devoid of injuries, Gallas, Arshavin and Cesc are all out for a few weeks. Rosicky must have made a strong case for a start aftr an excellent performance against Wolves, whether Walcott starts will be an interesting poser, is he more effective to have on the bench, or should be stretch Barca with his pace from the first minute. I'd be inclined to line up with Almunia; Sagna, Campbell, Vermaelen, Clichy; Diaby, Song, Nasri; Walcott, Bendtner, Rosicky. I don't think you can go to the Camp Nou and try to defend, we need to attack them from the off, if this means we may get hammered then so be it, I think our best chance is to take the game to Barca and stretch their patched up defense.

Just when you thought..............

Crikey. I am sure that a lot of us had given up any hope of the title by the time Nic Bendtner powered home that header with just over a minute of injury time left. It is that kind of moment that can change a season, after having two points stolen at the death last week, we stole all three at the death from Wolves.

Chelsea taking all three points at Old Trafford was not ideal, a draw would have been better, although a Manu win would have been worse. Fergie and the arrogant Manu fans pinned all the blame on the linesman for Drogba's offside second, they would do better to realise that Cec barely had a save to make and that their solitary goal was a clear deliberate handball.

Arsene made several changes to the side that had drawn against Barca. Wolves rode their luck in the first half hour, some excellent chances came and went, Eduardo was particularly culpable with some poor finishing. The first half seemed to die a bit of a premature death with Wolves looking more and more comfortable as the half wore on.

The second half saw more and more Arsenal domination, more chances came and went, Wolves picked up several cards for some rather cynical stuff including a red for an overly aggressive tackle by Henry. Then just as our hopes were fading, just as we contemplated being cut adrift from the top two, Bendtner's thunderous late header kept our hopes alive. It's still a slightly outside shot, but if we can win our last five games then that might just make us top of the pile.

Cesc probably broke his leg against Birmingham

There have been reports in the media since Wednesday's game claiming that Cesc's leg was broken by Craig Gardner against Birmingham, the weekend before the Barca game. Arsene has now come out to deny these claims that Cesc's leg was broken before the Barca game. I have to say that in my opinion Arsene is likely to be wrong and it is highly probable that the media rumours are right.

Craig Gardner's appalling tackle was violent and aggressive, despite what the clogger says himself, it was clear that there was no need for him to follow through with his non tackling leg, this aspect of the tackle was vindictive and malicious. Arsene said in his statement:

"The injury is in exactly the place where he got kicked against Birmingham and he has a crack on his bone."

This makes it likely that Cesc's leg was actually broken by Gardner, it was simply that it was such a subtle break that it was not detectable on the X-Rays, as some fractures are. He has been in a lot of pain since the Birmingham game and was only 40% to start, he then never looked fit against Barca and was labouring throughout, it is unlikely that bruising would have done this. Cesc probably had a small crack in his fibula that was more obvious on the X-Rays after the Barca game. The Puyol tackle was innocuous and low energy, I find it hard to believe that this cracked the bone.

The fact that this break was probably missed doesn't matter to Cesc, it is a stable injury that won't affect him in the future, it will simply be too painful to play on with the pain. It also doesn't reflect badly upon the medical staff, these things happen in medicine, X-Rays aren't perfect, nothing in medicine is, that's life, unavoidable error is everywhere. This 'missed leg break' story shouldn't be hyped up into something it is not, the fact that the injury was missed is really not a particularly interesting story if one has a bit of an understanding of legs.

Too artisan, unfit and not as good as Barca

Having had a couple of days to reflect upon the performance against Barca I am somewhat depressed. There was no doubt that the final result of 2-2 flattered us. Overall the biggest frustration for me was that we did not do ourselves justice, the fact that we did not have eleven fit players on the pitch meant we were never going to be able to press and compete with Barca as we should have, the whole of Europe were watching and we did not show them what we can do.

Cesc must have fractured his fibula against Birmingham thanks to that appalling Gardner tackle, and although he papered over the cracks with the late penalty, he was clearly not fit enough to be starting the game, he wasn't moving freely from the first whistle and given Barca's work rate and pressing game you need to have all hands at the pump. The gamble to start with Gallas was also wrong, he hasn't played a game for weeks, this backfired badly and resulted in Alex Song, who was having a decent game in midfield, being played out of position at centre back. It was no coincidence that Song was caught well out of position for both Barca goals in the second half, he is no centre back and will be caught out like this when playing out of position.

Fundamentally we didn't have eleven fit players on the pitch and even the fit ones didn't work hard enough to close down Barca, the way Barca hunted in packs and pressed in groups was the way we needed to play but didn't. Arshavin hasn't looked himself for a few weeks, I suspect he's been carrying injuries, for whatever reason he didn't track back enough before his calf injury ended his game prematurely. Starting the game with two players of dubious fitness was not clever and Arsene must surely regret this decision in retrospect.

The first half hour or so was as one sided a game as you will ever see, we couldn't keep the ball and Barca tore us apart time and time again, luckily Manuel was on fire and thanks to some truly outstanding saves we somehow managed to stay in the game. Barca had far too much time and space on the ball, only Song was closing people down, our full backs were left exposed as our wide players failed to track back, it was poor for the first half hour.

After this first half hour we did come into the game and for the rest of the match Barca never looked as dangerous as they did for the first thirty minutes. We cut them open several times with some nice moves, Bendtner almost scored when offside, Nasri beat the keeper but was narrowly wide, while a couple of dangerous cut backs were only thwarted by last ditch defensive lunges. It was perverse that Barca scored twice in the second half, as they didn't really threaten all that much, twice long balls saw Song far too far away from Ibrahimovich, the big nosed tosser finished well to be fair to the cockhead.

The referee was utter gash, he made it very easy for Barca by giving them free kicks whenever they dived to ground after minimal contact, while he let them shirt tug and trip with impunity to win the ball back, Messi was constantly fouling but the ugly little bastard was allowed to do what he wanted because he is the golden boy of world football at the moment. The ref booked several of our players for nothing and Cesc's booking for a clean tackle beggared belief. One decision to give Barca a free kick when Song toed the ball away from Ibrahimovich cleanly as the Swede backed into him was demonstrative of just how incompetent this wanker of a referee actually was.

Strangely several of our much maligned players were our best players against Barca. Almunia kept us in the match, Clichy was excellent in my opinion, Nasri did well offensively, Bendtner worked hard up front, then there was Theo. It was a great moment for the young man, his brilliant cameo for the final twenty minutes or so will do his confidence no end of good, his goal was well taken and his pace gave Barca so much trouble that they were panicked into a defensive substitution in order to hand on to the 2-2 draw.

So my overall summary would be that we were not fit enough or good enough on the day, Barca were great and the ref was useless. However somehow we are still in this tie and Barca have both their centre backs out of the second leg, stranger things have happened, but we will have to score at the Camp Nou. Generally I think the match showed up a few problems that have been evident in our squad all season, our squad is not strong enough in certain positions, we do not have enough battling midfielders and we do not work hard enough as a team in pressing the opposition. Quite simply if you are going to line up as a 4-3-3 against Barca then you need all eleven players to be fully fit, you need both wide front players to work extremely hard defensively in complementing the midfield, and then you may well still be outplayed, if you don't do the aforementioned then you do not have a chance of competing.

Cesc is now out for the season, Gallas probably too, while Arshavin will miss a few weeks. Attention turns to Wolves and this will be no walk in the park, we need to turn up and fight for every point between now and the end of the season, we cannot afford any more first halves like Wednesday's against Barca.