In my pre match midweek blog I focussed on Aaron’s performance against Sunderland. I was able to do this because I had studied the game after the event with a particular eye for our Welsh Wonder and his contribution to the cause. I’ve long held the view that the heat of battle is not the time to asses either individual or team performances with too critical an eye, a fact emphasised by our very own Arsenal Andrew on Thursday morning after the Greek triumph.
Certainly there is nothing wrong with excited reactions to a moment of magic or a goal – shared joy is joy enhanced and shared pleasure is magnified and that surely is why we all come here. However if you were defending a castle against the besieging barbarian hordes in fear for your pigs, chickens and your husband’s life you probably wouldn’t be in the best frame of mind to judge how well your archers were aiming their bows. Every wasted arrow would seem like a disaster, each drop of hot tar which failed to land on the bonce of the bloke on the ladder a hugely wasted opportunity.
Only after the event could you see how, in the scheme of things, the flying arrows and the pouring pitch all helped to dissuade the enemy and actually a few of the defenders on the walls put in some fearless and life saving performances with both sword and shield.
Don’t rush to judgement when your blood is up. That’s all I’m saying. Wait until the result is known and the dust has settled and have a look in calm sober earnest at what actually happened. You’ll find that when you’re able to sit at the back of the armchair rather than the edge of it that perhaps we weren’t in quite as much danger as you originally thought. That maybe the lads were playing with steady professionalism and not a lack of verve, or that the luck we rode so perilously in fact amounted to no more than our opponents badly missing a couple of half chances.
If today Petr Čech makes a fine save after we are outflanked or a penetrating pass splits our defence, he’s doing his job so why not applaud him? Why bother wasting your breath saying how ‘a better team would have scored there’ why turn what is in effect a positive into a negative? All you do is show yourself up and waste your equanimity on unnecessary anxiety.
Please don’t misunderstand me I get just as jittery as the rest of you when the match is in full swing. I too exaggerate the importance of each missed pass or lack of control, each attack snuffed out by an opposition boot. I just don’t see the point in sharing that lack of faith or parading my mental weakness.
Imagine, if you will, our players shared such a tendency to rush to judge themselves. On Wednesday Mesut attempted several through balls which either fell short or were read by defenders. What if he’d let his head drop with disappointment, decided he just wasn’t up to the job because things hadn’t worked out for him. I am much happier that he just kept on doing his thing, knowing that over the entire game only good could come from his persistent harrying of the Olympiacos defence, continually testing them and pushing them onto the back foot.
I don’t know how the manager prepares his players to maintain their belief to the very last kick no matter what. Is it down to his work on the training ground or does he recognise mental strength in the players he buys and nurtures? Do they even care about the armchair managers and twitter experts? Do they hear the groans, read the bullshit? If so does it anger them or do they simply shrug it off as so much pointless white noise?
It is a human trait to believe we know more than the people actually doing the job. I’ve experienced this in my own life on more than one occasion as I’m sure have you. Back when I was a labourer mixing muck for a couple of stone masons, we’d sometimes have customers come onto the scaffolding making ill informed criticisms of the work in progress. One even picked up a spirit level and tested the upright on a door frame. It hadn’t even been secured in place but that didn’t stop this chinless buffoon from pontificating on the out of centre position of the bubble. I recall the builder I was labouring for, without hesitation, dead-panning a reply, “Oh that’s a broken level mate. We only use it as a straight edge.”
I learned then the best answer to theses so called experts is contempt. When I ran my own bar, which I’d done with varying degrees of success for thirteen years, I learned to cope with the ‘experts’ on the other side of the counter who loved to tell me where I was going wrong. In the early years any sentence beginning “You know what you ought to do Stew…” would drive me to fury. One night I even invited the bloke to come round behind the bar throwing my keys at him “Go on then, show me how it should be done” In time I just learned that it’s easy to sit on the outside and peer through a crack in the curtains seeing the flaws in a small part of the scene within. Better surely to accept we know so little of what goes on and simply revel in the good bits, non?
I intend to revel in everything that goes well today. Enjoy the adrenaline of the occasion and reserve deeper judgements for when the buzzards are feeding and the corpses are being robbed on the battlefield. Like everyone else I’m subject to the preconceptions that because Villa have had a poor start to their season and we have been flirting with the number one spot we ought to put them to the sword in no uncertain fashion. I am, on the other hand, fifty two years old and have seen enough football in those years to know that is bollocks.
There is no must, or ought, or should, or will about a sporting encounter. There is too much human nature involved when twenty two blokes (twenty five counting the all too significant officials) take to a rectangle of turf and play out a game of skill and chance. I’m happy to say we have enough to beat them. That seems uncontentious. We have enough players. We have enough experience. We have enough nous in the management team. We enough skill, talent, ability call it what you will. Then, we had enough of all that against West Brom. Bayern had enough of all that when they visited the Emirates and look how that worked out.
Let’s not allow ourselves to get hung up on predictions any more than knee jerk reactions during the game. Why not just enjoy the match as it unfolds? You don’t pick up a book and spout off to your mates how it’s bound to be a brilliant read with an exciting denouement and some great characters do you? You read the bloody thing first and then make up your mind.
Now, I know what you’re thinking . What the Sam Hill was George thinking of giving the match previews to a man who won’t make sweeping predictions? To someone who uses tea bags and cannot therefore even read the leaves in the bottom of his cup? Well, all I can say is we like to do things differently around here.
The closest I’ve been to prophesy in recent times was when I told you all how good I thought Joel Campbell might be and how concerned I was that he might not get enough games to show it. After his Bergkamp like cool in the Olympiacos area to bring down the high ball hold it up with quick feet as he waited for a runner and then slide rule a reverse pass of such sublime beauty that I dribbled my camomile tea down my frock shirt, I might have been excused for feeling a little smug. Of course I didn’t because predictions can just as easily go wrong as right.
The only man I listen to when it comes to reading the bones is Mel O’Reilly who has correctly intuited more final scores in advance of the match than he’s had celebrities in the back of his cab. The rest of us mere mortals are not possessed of his gifts and should content ourselves with gathering our chickens into their little wooden crates and cheering on the blokes on the battlements.
Positively Arsenal 
Like watching Ali ahead on points just covering up on the ropes letting the other guy wear himself out with a hopeless flurry of weak punches. Just waiting for the inevitable knock-out blow.
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villa with another good effort on goal, just over the bar
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COYG!!!
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Fresh legs. I’m guessing at just the right time.
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Gibbs and Oxlade-Chamberlain on for Campbell and Walcott, 63 minutes gone
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Good to see Theo get another hour under his belt on the road to recovery. Nice having experience and speed from the bench too.
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Hutton now abusing the linesman too. Still not caution.
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I think the officials have taken a collective view of Hutton that he is to be pitied rather than scolded.
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4 corners in a row for villa
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Nice bit of corner practise for the defence. Yawn.
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looks like Arsenal are getting Chambers ready to bring on
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15 minutes to go
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Sanchez makes the mistake of getting too physical with Olivier and bounces his baddy chin off the Frenchman’s shoulder. Bloody uncomfortable I should think.
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Still the hapless challenger flaps weak punches against Ali’s gloves. The great man just covers up and waits for his opening.
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a spell of controlled football from Arsenal
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85 minutes, Chambers on for Ozil
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Thought the Ox was about to provide the final punch but just denied by a last gasp tackle. What a perfect display of contained, controlled energy management this half has been.
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the arsenal have been in control since they took the lead.
Of course the home team tried to rally, you’d hope or their sakes that they would, but now with Chambo twice going close the fresh legs have allowed AFC to go move out of cruise control and back into 3rd
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4 minutes of stoppage time to be played
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What fins said
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James Olley @JamesOlley 6m6 minutes ago
Ozil heads down the tunnel after being substituted. A Villa fan gives him an earful of abuse. Ozil looks at him and blows a kiss.
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Jingle balls! That will do nicely! Clean sheet 169 for Cech . Top of the league!
Hoh Hoh Hoh!
COYG!
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FT: Aston Villa 0-2 Arsenal
Giroud with his 50th BPL goal for AFC
Ozil with his 13th BPL assist of the season
Ramsey with another goal
Top of the league
Does this mean Arsenal are trying to win the BPL
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Clean sheets
Three points
Whoop whoop!
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Nice work. Third goal would have been cherry on the cake but after the Greek odyssey and with Christmas coming up can’t blame the lads for sitting back like that.
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David Moyes before the game
“jury still out on Ozil”
explains why he failed at Man Utd and in Spain. wouldn’t know talent if it hit him in the face
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Ozil really gave Guzan and Lescott the eyes on the second goal, really shaped up like he was shooting and just slotted it sideways for Ramsey to bang home
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Josh James @JoshJJames78 11m11 minutes ago
Arsenal’s win rate so far in 2015 is 67.3% – the highest for any calendar year in the club’s history
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Giroud’s 50th BPL goal in 91+22 games
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Moyes and his one-man jury.
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ed, can you get the data for those 22 sub games im wondering if they add up to nine full games. obviously the goal ratio may look even better.
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Red and white baubles for the xmas tree.
I watched that game with my phone out of sight. My were clear from the online poison. What a joy to watch.
We are Arsenal and we are slowly just going about our business.
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top of the league at last..after about 4 attempts i think when results have gone our way!
A. draw for Leicester and we stay…
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a_o_b as we know Wenger does not bring on subs before 70 minutes so that is 22 games of 20 minutes max, is 440 minutes, which is under 5 full 90 minutes games, so safe to say Giroud is a one in two game striker for AFC in his time here.
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Leicester City v Chelsea is a win win game for Arsenal, no matter the result Gooners can be happy about it
Leicester win means we see CFC lose again – win
Leicester lose means AFC stay top of the league – win
Leicester draw means AFC stay top of the league and CFC stay in relegation battle – win
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Good start to Sunday
Now Haway the lads
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Eduardo is our very own stato…
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Firstly, I was very happy to see that Arsène didn’t mess around with rotating just because it was against the bottom team.
Secondly, Ramsey is amazing.
Thirdly, I think an analysis of Joel’s defensive qualities and work rate alone will indicate that he is entitled to hold his place in the team, quite apart from his contribution up front..
Fourthly, Mesut is amazing.
Fifthly, apart from a flap by Čech and a dodgy moment from Per (both of which are completely OK with me), the deee-fence was solid again. Flamini was very quietly going about his job of ball winning and plugging holes – showing his wealth of experience. Anyone noticed that Coquelin is missing?
Sixthly, Giroud is amazing.
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Monday is a big day. Around lunchtime we find out our opponents in the CL in February. (If we get Barca, I’m going to make a doll of that prick at UEFA and start sticking pins in it.)
And in the evening we get to see if we stay top.
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I do like Collocini….
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2-0 is a very controlled, disciplined display of steel at a tricky away game.
A job very well done.
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Our GD is now actually better than City’s by +1.
The defensive stats are looking a lot smarter too.
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Well done the Geordies bastards…..
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HAWAYYY!!!!
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Shambles at the Lane as Toon snatch an equaliser
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Come on Toon – they’re knackered
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North London’s second club top 4 credentials examined and found to be forged – mid table mediocrity beckons
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Lloris at fault for both NUFC goals, especially the winner – let’s see if Pochettino has the balls to drop him
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Well, isn’t that just the icing on the cake?
Spurs big chance to go 4th and they fluffed it.
Mind you, we fluffed a few chances in November too, so mustn’t crow too loud.
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Well what a nice weekend….
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