Good morning Afternoon Positivistas, though only just.
A mood of fear was abroad among the Baggies fans on the way to the game, anticipating a bit of a drubbing. “Best football team we played last season” was muttered, through clenched teeth as they thought back to their demolition at the Ems last May. Greying skies as the afternoon wore on, floodlights on, Winter football. They had much to contemplate. We, other other hand, I felt had much to look foward to. Top of the table by 5pm perhaps ? It certainly looked do-able.
And we did not disappoint the locals for the opening half hour. Though our game was not quite its clockwork best we probed and pushed, and penned them back until the inevitable opener. The landslide was on its way. The locals began to head for the meat pie and Bovril counters to avoid the half time rush. Le Coq’s departure was an unpleasant jolt though my first expectation on seeing the incident in real time was for Clattenberg to pull out a red card for our combative Frenchman. A wild tackle with, apparently, unfortunate consequences. Arteta on though, safe pair of hands, or legs anyway.
And then five minutes of nonsense in which we gave away a soft first goal, then contrived to knock in a second own goal in a combination human movement that was bizarre. I shall not dwell. I will give MacLean a tip of my hat as he had a good game and made a couple of chances. There is indeed no purpose in my dwelling because you have seen then far more often than I. I was surprised, the locals were stunned, I kid you not.
I was not however, even for a moment, concerned. We had more than a half of football to retrieve the situation. Immediately we started the second half with more purpose. Mikel was immediately pointing to the bench to be taken off and Mattieu was quickly into the action.
We began to fizz and buzz. We were faster and sharper. Ozil really had his A game in action. WBA fell back, stretched, trembled, relied on the long out ball to relieve pressure temporarily. They did not however break and the equalizer would not come. A very rare Baggies chance saw our goal frame shaken but Clattenburg unmoved on about 70 minutes after which for the last 25 minutes it was solid, relentless Arsenal, attack v defence. Sanchez was tireless, he ran, he turned, he dribbled, he leapt. I cannot recall ever seeing any attacking player put so much energy into a game as the Chilean yesterday.
The home crowd were by this stage on the edge of hysteria, finally raised from their collective stupor, Clattenburg was receiving terrible abuse every time he called a foul of gave a decision in our favour.
And then the penalty, and my goodness it was a deserved penalty (if there is such a thing). The point was at least saved, and with ten minutes to go or more maybe the full set would be pocketed after all. I have exclusive edited 4 whole seconds of footage of what happened next, courtesy of Number One son.
I say edited because after the ball disappeared toward the M6 the next shots are of wildly celebrating locals. You will just hear the start of “Yeee…” I know we have no use for such undignified monkey business.
Undoubtedly any one who watched the game on the TV will have seen a lot more than me. From what I did see we controlled it to the first goal, lost our concentration for five minutes and paid a price. Then faced a durable and motivated home side, who defended well and had a little bit of luck to escape with the win. A good day out in the West Midlands spoiled only by the result of the game.
Word of thanks to Baggies’ fan Sam Foord for providing the seats and the barge trip. Have a Banthams on me.
Positively Arsenal 
some reports that Ramsey will not play tomorrow, that Wenger has said he is not ready(fit enough) yet
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Premier League @premierleague Nov 21
RECORD @MesutOzil1088 now has an assist in seven #BPL matches in a row – the best-ever sequence in League history
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8 injured players, 4 impact injuries and 4 soft muscle injuries – Ramsey it seems is taking a full part in training today
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Darren @DarrenArsenal1 3h3 hours ago
So Im in the line for a Russian visa and 2 people behind me, Liam Brady and Ken Friar.Wonder why they are getting Russian Visas and for who?
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am I right in thinking that a 1-0 or better win for AFC tomorrow means at least EL spot confirmed
My predicted line up and subs
Cech
Bellerin Gabriel Koscielny Monreal
Flamini Cazorla
Campbell Ozil Alexis
Giroud
subs: Ospina, Debuchy, Mertesacker, Chambers, Gibbs, Reine-Adelaide, Iwobi
oh woe is me, a massive injury crisis and that is our likely squad, lack of squad depth my Arsenal
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Wenger’s press conference about to start, I will post any updates I see
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Rumors that Benitez had been sacked by Real Madrid, and replaced by Zidane, press conference set for 7.30 today
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“At least two months ? ! ”
Right Matty – no late nights for you
Any thoughts on Hayden back from Hull ?
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Wenger –
Ramsey back in the squad, no decision yet on if he will start, it would be a risk
Coquelin is out for at least two months, still waiting on scan results
Arteta out too, everyone else from saturday available
flamini and Chambers are two of the options we have to replace Coquelin
No decision yet on if a midfielder will be signed in Jan, its a difficult transfer market in jan
Real Madrid have not contacted him to replace Benitez, and RM should support Rafa
Chamberlain should be back for Norwich, Walcott next in line to return, the rest are all long term
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even if we wanted to sign a midfielder now, we can not, market not open till Jan 1st, but we have lots of good options in the squad now, and more on way back from injury
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Wenger said that the drug rules are wrong, but that we accept that the rules are the rules and nothing we can do about the Zagreb player failing the drug test.
My own view is that the rules are an ass, you actually can have the scenario where a result of a game can be overturned cos two unused subs fail the drug test – any two players in the match day squad can be tested, they do not have to have played in the game- yet in another game a player who scores a hattrick in a 3-2 win fails the drug test, but the result can not be overturned.
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Big scrap between brahn Bayern and blue Schalke “fans”at the weekend, just to add to the nice peaceful world we live in. Its always interesting to watch strangers kicking the crepe out of each other because they support different teams kicking a bit of leather abaht. Still better amongst themselves than finding some scapegoat shurley?
And moving on to other news,heres a quick twittering flash:
However,dont worry because next week starts “celebrity rabbit droppings”. A new tv 24hr/365 show where the rabbit turds hack it out to see who can either get back to the warren report or attach themselves to a flip flop of a passer by and make it to the big city and become as success.Bets are on “sloppy” 2-1 to win, and “rock solid” 4-2 plus “big daddy” 5-3 and outsider 100-1 “mini floater “.Sure to be a big hit with idepth interviews and speciality magazine coverage.Over on ITV is “Celebrity paint drying”. Yes celebrities sit around watching paint drying! hosted by James Cordroy.On Skie is “Captain P.Morgan:this is your celebrity life” the famous pirate and all the other channels cookery.
Breaking news:Classical music has now been banned as it “w*nk” and Mozart, “well anyone can facking do that ” said Odo Stevens aged 16 fan of his iphone, porn,and You tube and burgers and potential celebrity. “Im mean, who wants to listen to that crap when youre eatin crispy pancakes and watching celbrity juiciness?”
Who indeed Odo?!
And some new breaking news, the Magaloofer brain has taken over the world, and it is compulsory to be a puppet for the next drum beater.
Plus Chef Jamie Oligarchy opens up another 20,000 restaurants in London and celebrity Chef Gordon Ramsbutton is giving more people a bollocking because he knows it all and animals deserve to lay down their lives for some body to scoff,plus those animals need a bollocking before they die and so do humans that dont do as he says! Gordon has been linked with Arsène Wengers job at Arsenal.
Also an unknown celebrity showed of a bit of nipple this week, as we’ve never seen that before, and yet still seems to get people exited despite the plethora of pornographic material made available to anyone these days.Apparently the nipple was shown to garner more fame, which as we know, being famous “for nothing” really pushes humanity towards harmony and well being and doesnt make people wish to live on Pluto. Mars has already been designated for unknown celebrities so Pluto is already taking booking.Only 9.99!
And finally, its not a small piece on a dancing skunk in suspenders that sings “moon river” forced by its insane owner whose never even seen a film pre 1998, but a message from YT football fan tv:
“Hi My names Jeff Halitosis, and I cant believe that Arsenal lost,I mean WBA, who the F are they? they were all over us! Im mean that Arteta is sh*t, Ozzle is sh*t,Gibbo is sh*t,Bellend is sh*t, Djourou is sh’t,Cazorlas penalty! my gwandmuvver could have scored that, erm, everyone sh*t especially that Wenger and hes foreign”.”We need Owen Coyle, or maybe even me, Jeff Halitosis, i mean how come I always win on my kids football manager game? I mean how hard is this?”.
Not as hard as your penis obviously Jeff.
Next week luminary Jeff Halitosis will give his interetsing views on racial integration and stretches to the world of Euro politik and which is his favourite type of frozen mini Kiev.
Thanks Jeff.
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Alex Iwobi, Chris Willock, Julio Pleguezuelo, Donyell Malen and Jeff Reine-Adélaïde trained with the first-team today.
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Ha Ha Ha, Wenger condemns doping in football so UEFA’s response is to randomly test 10 Arsenal players at training last Friday.
This about sums up everything that is wrong with those in charge of the game and why all the ills of the game continue unabated.
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we want a six footer DM the twitterati demand – Callum Chambers is suggested by Wenger – feck no, he is useless say the twitterati
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Am I right in thinking Saturdays defeat was the first ever ARSENAL have Suffered in the gold shirt.
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I think you could well be right there Ian about the Old Gold
Not like the Abominable Blue !
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Mossy with the whistle at Carrow Road
Pulling out all the stops there Arsene
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Former D**Mer pin ups include those calendar favourites Melo and Inler. Yes that’s right, two players who have been completely outclassed opposite Flamini in recent seasons when playing against the Arsenal.
It’s worth remembering that the club made the right decision in letting very likely future first team squad members like Hayden and Niles (both can play in CM) go on loan for all the right reasons. Hayden was in the first team squad last year but, yup, injured! Which makes the call to send him on loan fairly obvious.
The two CMs who secured the famous 1-1 at Newcastle was Ramsey behind Chamberlain. If both are back fit for the next league game it’d be helpful!
Chambers is the break the glass emergency CM. And he has been capped by England (he probably should’ve been tested at that particular moment uncle Roy!) though not in his future role of CB. Played in CM against his old club and their nature midfield was not easy. If he has to play in CM against the desperate dopers from Zagreb it should be ok.
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just realized who Brady and Friar are going to Russia for, there can be no doubt that we are bringing back Frimpong, now wouldn’t that be a laugh.
Frimpong on loan during the mid season winter break in the Russian league, mid December to mid March, then Coquelin back fit. Ha ha ha Sorted.
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Ten tests on Friday? No. Not surprised.
Stand Up Platini is probably dropping some sweeties from dr.feelgood to the Zagreb hotel at this very moment.
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we should have signed Carvalho during the summer,
whats that you say, he has only played 2 games this season due to injury
we should have signed Kondogbia during the summer
whats that you say, he has recently been voted one of the worst buys in Italy this season
its not my job to know who we should have signed, that is what Wenger gets paid £16M a year to do, but he should sign who I want signed all the same.
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I think Frimpong is in the jungle at the moment pretending to be Chris Eubank so won’t be available for a few weeks.
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Scottie Parker – I will hear no objections
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FK² @fkhanage 2h2 hours ago
Chelsea recorded a loss of £23.1m for the year ending 30.06.15. Be interesting to see what happens should they miss out on Champions League.
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Check out @Arsenal’s @UEFAYouthLeague stars in our latest skill school…
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Samwise Allerdici’s Sunderland get the win.
Gazprom now five points clear of Sunderland and twelve behind Arsenal.
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If fit the Jeff could also be another option on the bench against Zagreb.
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Very enjoyable game, great result, fucking relief……
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