Elan. I like things to be done with it. I enjoy it when a certain flair, a superfluous decoration lifts an otherwise mundane event. Only this morning as I stumbled, eyes half closed with all too recent sleep, to buy my morning loaf (not, I’m sorry to report, from a ancient rustic baker up at four thirty am grinding the grains and proving the dough in his age old way, but rather from L & F Jones Convenience Store. It is that at least. Convenient, I mean) I passed a woman, disheveled of aspect looking as if she may have spent a cold and uncomfortable night on a park bench or indeed in the doorway of L & F Jones’ small and conveniently situated retail outlet. This is a sartorial effect affected by many of the good folk of Radstock and the surrounded motley of desirable hamlets and disreputable villages so I wasn’t in any way put out by her frankly startling appearance. Instead I threw back the gate through which I had recently passed and, with exaggerated politeness, a beaming smile and – was that the merest hint of a bow? – gestured her through in a manner more commonly associated with those Italian policemen one sees on travel programmes performing an elaborately serene white gloved ballet while precariously positioned at the centre of an apparently terrifying twenty four lane traffic intersection.
It was only as I made my way back clutching my wholemeal sliced that it occurred to me just how delighted the lady had seemed at either the minor kindness I had done her or the extravagant nature with which I had carried it off. I prefer to dwell upon the latter. Sometimes in life my silliness, my exaggeration, my deliberate unnecessary show-boating has brought me nothing but frowning incomprehension, and sadly has occasioned more than a furrowed brow, indeed I have even experienced naked aggression from those creatures (and we have all met them) for whom evolution has remained nothing more than a theory. These people seem to pass through life leaving knuckle trails of discontent as they glower and snarl at perceived threats and challenges to their dreary status quo. They rhyme arty with farty, believe what they read, judge books by their covers and mistake honesty for rudeness. I have little time for these folks for whom leaving the oceans was mistake, never mind coming down from the trees. I prefer the spontaneous passing pleasure exhibited by the discomposed and very possibly still inebriated lady as she lurched through a gate held open for her by a mildly insane and extravagantly overweight balding middle aged buffoon in a Yosemite Sam T-shirt. In these brief moments can we sprinkle the glitter of human happiness.
Which is of course why I am such a huge fan of Olivier Giroud. I know there is a whole heap of chatter about which player people would rather see leading the line today from the diminutive and untried Joel Campbell to the non existent striker who we haven’t even bought yet with honourable mentions for just about everyone else in between. However, once Olivier, or Larry if you prefer, has regained his match fitness there is only one man for me. Even in his current out of condition condition he has still managed to prove his worth. Look at the towering, muscular header in the dying moments of the opening fixture, special not only because he won the ball by the application of brutal athletic determination by out jumping some huge defenders but then to have the wit and ability to ensure the ball dropped perfectly to Mathieu Debuchy (who was extremely unlucky not to grab the winner and his first goal for Arsenal) displayed great calm, perfect footballistic instincts.
My love for Larry has nothing to do with injury time knock downs against a tiring team no matter how much I can appreciate their worth. My love for Larry comes into full fruit in moments like that in the game against West Ham on January the twenty third of last year. He stands in the D on the edge of the West Ham area facing away from the goal, receives a square pass from Podolski who lopes into the box. Larry, takes no controlling touch, doesn’t think about making room for a shot, instead, with a deft chopping action of his left foot lifts an instant and perfectly measured pass over three defenders and into the path of the on-rushing Podolski who, despite possessing a shot that could pass through a Soviet T34 Model 1942 medium battle tank and being clean through on goal elects to pass to Santi who is in a position to pull off a much more difficult but wonderfully improvised finish, this is after all the Arsenal way.
Then there was the game against the same opponents in April of this year. Fifty four minutes gone and the scores are level. West Ham have cleared a corner. Vermaelen picks up the ball near the half way line and lofts a huge high one diagonally into the area to where our man Larry is lurking near the apex of the six yard box. Does he control it on his chest – by far the safest, most reliable technique – or does he stick his head on it as you’d expect any centre forward to do? Not a bit of it. In an audacious piece of skill that made me laugh out loud when first I saw it he elects to catch the ball on his left foot as it descends at about a hundred and fifty five mph from the edges of deep space and then crash it into the net with his right. It was quite simply as good as anything you’d expect from Dennis Bergkamp and that tells you everything you need to know. I was going to mention his part in the best team goal ever scored in competitive football on this and any other planet – yes that one against Norwich – but I assumed that particular feast of one touch skill and audacity ought really to go without saying.
These are the things I like about footballers and they are the options instinctively taken by Olivier and other players like him. To do the thing with élan, with flair, grace, deftness and invention. Not to settle for the prosaic, the ordinary. In a world sometimes blighted by the mundane we turn to our showmen to ignite the powder of creative genius so that in those brief explosive moments of joy we are lifted up, we experience the transcendent vicarious thrill that is the holy grail of all football fans. This is why I hope we see our number twelve take his rightful place in the starting line up against Everton this afternoon. Not because we have no other options or I don’t think others can do the job but because if Arsène starts him it means he is ready, he has gained the fitness he lost during the long hot summer and will once again become that vital cog in our free flowing beautifully polished machine.
We have apparently been grinding out results of late, winning and drawing ugly is the mantra du jour and if there is some truth in this (and even I must reluctantly admit this is somewhat the case in the last two matches) then part of the reason for it is our fulcrum, the man who’s one touch passes and flicks and lays off provide the vital fluidity which sets us apart as a footballing side, has lacked his usual sharpness. He huffs and puffs where we need him to glide. Play him I say. Play Larry until he gets back to his imperious best and then you’ll really see something. I’m not a betting man but I’d happily wager that Sanchez and Ramsey will both start scoring freely once the main man is back on his game.
Of course I’m well aware that writing a piece about one particular player on the morning of match day is as good a way as any of guaranteeing that Arsène doesn’t even name him on the substitutes’ bench, but you see the difference between me and all the other bloggers out there is I don’t pretend to know the future. But I do know this, it’ll be brighter with Larry in the team than without him.
[ED] Thanks for that Stew, It was a real treat.
Positively Arsenal 
ARSENE has just said Larry has stretched his ankle …..nightmare looks like the injury curse is still on.
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I thought after the world cup our preparations would be hampered and the start looked difficult so get through Wednesday and we’ve done very well. Maybe we might not hit top form till later but for now we just need to keep improving
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I will take playing below par and picking up late late points for now!
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Join the debate at #bbcfootball
Kashi Ogunwolu: I think there’s too much criticism of this Arsenal squad. Character was shown tonight and credit should be given to the team.
————-
Ya fink?
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PG @ 7:57pm – I will echo you as I mostly do, the anti-support on twitter is horrible. The loudest voices with multitude of followers have been engaged in a full blown anti-Giroud camapaign all transfer window rising to a crescendo last. Their stupidity is astounding. Thousands of fantasy football formations posted on twitter without Giroud as CF have been the order of the day. Today they were ecstatic that Sanchez was was playing CF instead of Giroud because it seemed their fantasies were coming true. As the 1st half wore on they refused to admit the experiment was a failure. It was obvious that Giroud’s hold-up play and passing made us tick. Went into full meltdown when the substitution was made at half-time. Refused to be contrite when Giroud completely transformed our attacking play with 5 attempts at goal compared to zeo by Sanchez. They are now hiding behing behind mealy mouth statements that we must Giroud is not perfect. Begs the question, who the fuck is perfect?
Thank heavens, AW does not listen to Talk Radio or do social media. No wonder he is a genius at what he does.
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Well that final score line shut up a few assholes I hope.
So very Giroudesque.
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PG @7:57
Cough – but you were on the Flamini is a liability bandwagon this morning yourself.
I suggest a few minutes of sitting on the naughty step for you to reconsider your momentary loss of faith.
Lets hope it was a once-off, eh?
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Huge fucking result. A come from behind, dodgy foal reversing draw at Goodison Park after having played Besiktas in Istanbul last Tuesday and with the Germans making their first league starts. But, of course, this means nothing because it’s just Everton. The game of the evening was the tight 2-0 Chelsea squeaked out at Stamford Bridge against European hopefuls Leicester. Did you guys see Roman? It’s like he ate a PCP laced lollypop. He was bouncing and carrying on as if he heard Putin had been shot.
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DC his tackling is a liability.ANOTHER yellow today btw
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@8:36 pm: He did a job George, perfect back-up to Mikel.
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Trying to get george to admit when he’s wrong?
Good luck with that!
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dodgy goal
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I’m your Huckleberry https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8OWNspU_yE
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This whole anti-Giroud nonsense, which I bet will soon metastasize into an anti-Ozil scapegoating, if TalkSpite gets its way, reminds of what I hated most at EndOFAnEra.com, the glorification of anti-support and its patent stupidity. Steww’s blog is like vaccine to this mindless nonsense. Just like Wenger was vindicated, in the long run despite the doubts culminating with him being benched came through as top, top quality
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the meltdown from some fans sha… na wa
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And Giroud’s not even in form yet.
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Top post Shotts, top post.
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Has it occurred to the moaning cunts that we have a game on Wednesday and that we made all those changes in order to have a team that can compete against Besiktas?
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Giroud did his ankle?
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Gainsy – that’s what I’m hearing. ‘Stretched’ it during injury time.
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@Gains
At this point in time, the league isn’t the priority, getting through the CL qualifiers is. I’d rather drop points at this stage than face the prospect of playing against Metalist Whatever somewhere deep in Eastern Europe
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@team spirit. Na real wa o.
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Today was another battle honour won by ‘PA’ battery, the honourable and loyal regiment of Gooner artillary (Duke George’s Own) in the face of insurmountable odds, when many other gooners fled the battle for the last 10 minutes, and the enemy seditionists within the ranks were spewing their vilest appeasement propaganda.
The battle was turned when we had to aim our own guns on the treasonous and seditionist targets within our own cannonfodder and threaten them with double canister shot unless they faced back to the enemy and fought to the last.
Victory Through Harmony!
Or let the cowards face our wrath. Never desert the cannons!
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Well done team. Onwards and upwards. Hopefully we will keep improving as we go along.
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To quote an old golf book, football (like life) is not a game of perfect. That is the one fact the twitter fans can’t understand, because all they really know are Youtube compilations or glamourised memories with all the shit bits edited out. Chelsea will look brilliant on Match of the Day, but I bet for much of the real game they played they were pretty average. Just like us at times.
It was a poor performance first half, with everyone seemingly waiting for someone else to take responsibility. Much, much better in the second half, partly to Giroud, but also partly to the emerging influence of Ozil who ended up having a good last 15 minutes. We began to look something like our old selves even when we were still two goals down, and in the end we got our due reward.
And close watchers of the SkySports coverage would have also been treated to Arsene saying the timewasting was “fucking ridiculous” which even before we equalized made the afternoon for me.
But we are on the way back: the Wembley adventures are over now, as is the World Cup. We know we can’t relay on Alexis to do it all for us, so the players will start to combine with him properly. Slowly but surely we will start to play some frightening football, and we will win far more than we lose. but all the players will have to work for it now.
And they will.
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Negatives: –
I thought the Everton Goals were savable, even if the second one looked offside. Why the sticks are out for Giroud, I don’t really understand (I remember the similar words spoken about Judas RVP). I know this team can play a lot better and should be.
We missed Kos – As is his MO, he would of grabbed us the winner if he was on the pitch!
Positives: –
Coming from 2 goals down to level the game against a strong side is a psychological boost for our players.
This team doesn’t seem to know when its beaten and is being rewarded, as it is definitely a point gained or more if you see this Everton team as outside contenders. Or even top four material.
The away fans turned up as usual and stuck with the players and can give themselves a pat on the back for their part in salvaging something from this game.
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The battle was saved when Capt. Black OBE VC discharged himself from his convalescence home where the Arsenal medical team said he would never return to action from wounds suffered during last year’s viscous battles in the Gooner Civil Wars to take over ‘G’ gun in the heat of battle with many of his fellows wounded and unable to stand the opposition fire and retarget the mighty French Adamantine made gun back at the vulnerable toffee nets in the last few minutes.
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George
Sgt. Flamini was exceptionally disciplined throughout today’s actions.
He faced several blood curdling charges from The Kilted Hun Devil and stood his ground, only resorting in hand to hand combat with the enemy when hope of relief was within sight in the last 15 minutes. Threw himself onto a grenade more than once to save his teammates.
Mentioned in Dispatches.
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Watching this team slowly come up to speed, I’m reminded of AW’s comments last season re: lots of new faces in your team. Our game demands almost telepathic understanding between players sometimes. It takes a while for that to gel. Some of that “wayward passing” looked to me like players just not reading each other’s minds as well as they usually do. Two new defenders, a new forward, and two seasoned players who were just back for their first game (neither playing in his accustomed place, mind you)? I thought we did damned well. Not surprised it took bringing one familiar face back to gel it up a little. No worries. We’ll get there. Although my blood pressure could use fewer of these last minute snatching of points, please boys.
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I’m so glad I watched the match alone in my living room. Mayb I could have commited battery if I watched with the so many senseless Arsenal “FANS” around.
I can’t imagine a “FAN” asking for Arsene to be sacked just because we were 2 nil down at half time and Giroud had to replace Alexis. The most unfortunate thing is that none of these “FANS” held up their hands at the end of the match.
I love this TEAM and their attitude. Can’t wait for us to get into our stride.
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Do I have to do the write up?
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DC: Speak of self-serving propoganda. Ha, Ha, Ha:
“The battle was turned when we had to aim our own guns on the treasonous and seditionist targets within our own cannonfodder and threaten them with DOUBLE CANISTER shot unless they faced back to the enemy and fought to the last.”
Well said but I have one correction. Captain Black was never sick. He led us well, bravely and honorably, in previous battles but took a leave of absence with our full blessing. Even the best generals need their batteries recharged.
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George I am thinking of an Ode to Giroud but I can’t feel the vibes.
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Evil, this draw was a massive result given the circumstances. And the worst thing about it is, we were only 2-0 behind because of a shit lino.
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Stew,I think my mate Chuba might get a sniff on Wednesday if Larry & YaYa are out. Kelly,good luck with the Magic City Supporters club,it’s the start of something beautiful.
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foreverheady: “To quote an old golf book, football (like life) is not a game of perfect. That is the one fact the twitter fans can’t understand.”
As long as I’ve watched sports, the loudest, most negative fans are always the chubby, non-athletic guys who took up watching football later in life and were never any good at the sport to begin with. Think Piers Morgan and Adrian Durham. Do you think a person like Adrian Durham can begin to imagine how fine the margins are in football? This is why I stay away from other blogs, Twitter etc., and only come here.
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Shotta, it is no discredit to even the bravest of General Wenger’s officers to have been
Psychologically tired of, or even injured and appalled at the terrible self-inflicted atrocities that were perpetuated during the Gooner civil war.
As a commissar for doctrinal positivism purity, I can assure our more gentile readers that that the fight for pure beautiful socialistic Wengerball goes on, even in the darkest recesses of the internet.
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@ Goonerwife… glad another naija dey area… had posted b4 i asked myself if anyone would understand but it just was how exasperated i felt. lol
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team spirit,
No be only you and Goonerwife o.
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Gains 10:51pm
That’s a great quote, and post.
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Well said. I love this blog and this post especially sums up how I feel about Arsenal. Thank you.
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Gainsy:
“the loudest, most negative fans are always the chubby, non-athletic guys who took up watching football later in life and were never any good at the sport to begin with”
Oi!
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Hearing reports that Giroud is injured. We clearly saw the difference he made. We didnt look like scoring in the first half. Going to be a big loss. Sanogo probably the closest back-up. Maybe podolski can do a job on Wednesday.
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Following on from the “not a game of perfect” idea, the best book about life as a professional footballer (and what it is really like to play week in, week out – and often not very well) is Left Foot Forward by Gary Nelson. Although written about the 1995 season I would wager much still remains true today. It certainly corresponds with my experience in pro cricket.
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Think the odds are in favour of Campbell or even Alexis again to play CF ahead of my punt Chuba on Weds if OG an Sanogo are no go.
A little early to throw Alexis into the centre but I was expecting some rotation (gains- the Groaners didn’t read my preview!), so not a total surprise. Some stuttering, unsure of who was going to follow Rambo’s runs, to be expected so early on, Ozil warming up as the game progressed…another big game coming up, Ramsey will be fresh of the next league game. Hoping to see some Rosicky soon. Sort it out Vengar!
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Özil didn’t do much.
First game in 2 months and in an experimental position with Alexis.
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Unbelievable nonsense on twitter:
Some gobshite is blaming Giround for celbrating his goal.
Honestly, some of our so called supporters make me want to cry.
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‘Everton’s second appeared to be off-side’
Appeared? Wtf ???
If we had scored that
‘Lucky gunners get away with murder. An illegal goal rpbs magnificent everton/martinez of a well deserved win. F.a panel to investigate wenger post match comments for failing to apologise’
Metal giroud solid huh… up theirs!!
‘This is what happens Larry’ (walter sobchak)
Flamini=warrior.
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Cazorla too. Asterix
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Dc 12.09. Cry? Why? Laugh at them. Mock them. Youll feel much better. I stopped letting it get me in 09..10..thereabouts.
Truth be told…watching wenger reactions and facial expressions in 1st half..he must have shouted at them all…boss
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