Lack Of Depth Means Lack Of Width

from the factory floor

BARCLAYS PREMIER LEAGUE

Ashburton Grove

Referee: Mike Dean

Arsenal 1-2 Manchester United     22 January 2012
Van Persie [71]                  Valencia [45] 
                                       Welbeck[81]

Arrival at the Factory was early for this one, necessitated by the overwhelming majority of United supporters that frequent the place, and I was greeted by a pair of them at the door. The banter started there, but in generally good spirits from Mark. Billy however seemed a bit ‘ready.’ More on that later.

Went downstairs to a half full bar, found Clint there and got some beers. Soon enough we were joined by Barry, Steven, Carissa and Chandler, then eventually Jack. A solid core of NY Gooners to fight the massive United turn-out. Other Gooners were dispersed in small pockets around the place but we braved it in our grumpy clump from just about center stage. The side effect of this is that we're right amongst the enemy, but that is unavoidable for these matches. So, having just chided me about not engaging Jason too much, Steven proceeded to chat with Oro for the entire match. The fucker who Keowned me the last time I was there for Arsenal-United. We are a popular lot for being a bunch of grouchy old men [apologies to Chandler and Carissa].

Trepidation was pretty much the tone thus far. It wasn’t buoyed much by the 2002 footage on FSC of our triumph at Old Trafford. Steven and I agreed that our injury problems/squad weaknesses were worse than theirs, and worse still, played immediately to their strengths. You don’t need Rio and Vidic to shackle Van Persie when there is no midfield to supply him. No Arteta, and what little shape we have goes out the window.

The match started, we got a round of paddywhack from the Manc faithful, and the usual nervy opening 10 minutes ensued. United predictably targeted Djourou, and Nani looked like doing something there until it became clear to us and to the Mancs that he was in poor form. Steven pointed out that they look at him like we look at Walcott. Poor bastards. Theo was equally useless. Poor us.

It appeared the one use Walcott showed was having too much pace for Phil Jones, who caught his boot in the turf when tracking him and went down with what looked like a bad injury. We had the decency to not applaud the injury of an opponent. We wouldn’t get the same respect  from our counterparts. Shameful, but not surprising. The shift from Nevada’s to the Factory meant people made choices and in my view the Factory suffered a little in this regard.

Inevitably Djourou’s weakness was ultimately exposed when Giggs shifted over to exploit the huge chasm of space in the right corner and sent over a perfectly flighted ball to the back post for Valencia to head home. One nil down on our patch to our greatest rivals, in a game where they exploited our squad weakness and injury situation with well thought out tactics. It’s almost like they watched film of us recently, developed a plan of attack, trained on that plan, and then executed it. If that sounds obvious, it’s because it is. The other obvious thing is that we didn’t do the same to prevent it happening.

On a side note regarding Giggs, when on one of the few occasions the Mancs did sing something in the first half, we gave them a bit of ‘Giggs, Giggs will sleep with your wife, again’ only for them to come back with ‘he’ll shag who he wants’ and ‘we’re Man United, we’ll shag who we want.’ Except you’re a bunch of pasty, polyester-blend shirt-wearing grown men in a bar at 11am on a Sunday singing to a television screen. Not what you’d call shag-inducing behavior. Funny how complete arrogance and a total lack of self-awareness can go hand in hand. 

Halftime saw the change that was obvious to all of us. Wenger switched Yennaris in at right back, and while United tried him on in the same manner as the first half on Djouroops, they got little change from him and it was apparent to us that having a proper fullback on, even if third choice, is better than a 4^th choice center back shunted out of position. Go figure.

Yennaris gave us attacking width as well and for a period we were right on top of United. It should be said that up to this point our best player was Oxlade-Chamberlain. Steven and I wondered about his inclusion based on some early headless chicken type scrambling, until he nicked the ball, drove right into the penalty area, and squared a well weighted pass right across the six yard box towards RVP that was intercepted a few yards from its intended recipient.

The Ox switched sides freely with Theo, and on one occasion simply drifted over to the right to double up on Evra, worked himself some space and laid it off to a wide open Walcott who failed to hit the target from inside the penalty area. I don’t think either of them covered themselves in glory defensively, but it was clear who was having a better influence on our attack.

Usually the Mancs are rather full of themselves and in good voice but such was the showing we had in the second half that the only thing we heard from them was cheering whenever one of our players went down injured. On three occasions an Arsenal player went down to ridicule from the mouth breathing twats down there.  Again, not the respect we gave Phil Jones, but then again, a lot of them are cunts.

So when Kos stuffed one of their lot clean in the penalty area sent the ball forward via Rosicky and Chamberlain for RVP to level, it was with great satisfaction that we celebrated that goal. Jason aka Burritos aka Nacho Cheese tried to give it back and I for one was not having it. He took it in stride, but at this point Billy decided to have a go at me. I turned around to see why and he was positively frothing. I bought him a drink of his choice [vodka and red bull] and left it at that. One-one, game on and it looked like not only would we rescue a point but might just go on to take all three.

That is, of course until Wenger decided the Ox was beat and took him out for Arshavin. Absolutely none of us understood this move. Walcott was less effective all day, and Ramsey was obviously spent. So who comes off? Our best player. His pass just minutes early for Van Persie’s  goal was the ball of the match. It’s a decision that still confounds a day later. Barry and I had made a bet about Wenger not making the necessary change in our attack until it was too late. Barry thought on 60 minutes, I said not before 70. I was half right. Chamberlain came off around two minutes after we scored, on 74 minutes. This was the ‘late’ sub I expected, but it came too early for the Ox, if that makes sense.

I would feel for Arshavin after the ‘reception’ he got coming on, but I’m afraid that is a bed he made for himself with about a year of abject performances. I don’t care if he tries a bunch of clever passes and they don’t come off. When that happens, you put your head down and do the small things right. Like work hard, make simple passes, and contain your counterpart when defending. He didn’t do that, got pulled too far out wide, and Valencia drove past him. His recovery run was weak, he didn’t get goalside, and Valencia cut the ball back for Welbeck to lash home. It was a poor goal to concede and another one where United profited from an obvious tactical plan exploiting our blatant deficiencies out wide.

Not to worry though, because we still had Park on the bench. He changed the game when he came on, it’s safe to say. Instead of finishing with eleven footballers on the pitch we finished with ten plus a passenger. Well two, if you count Theo, which I most certainly do. And still we were still in it enough that the usual 'Alex Ferguson's Red Devil army' at the end never really got traction.

After the match I congratulated the Mancs that I do know and like, and even a few I don’t. For the most part they were all right, although several of them took a pop at the badge on our home kit. Lame. Then Andres tried to convince us how good Messi is. Seriously this guy is up the manc’s asses all day then gets uppity when we don’t drool over a Barca player minutes after we just lost a tightly contested match? We reminded him of the similarities of La Liga and the Scottish Premier League. He conceded that and then pointed to their European triumphs. Against 10 men every time Andres? Red cards for offside? He fucked off.

My conclusion on the day, and still, is that you can’t lose the plot over a great football match that ended in a narrow defeat. The thing that does rankle though is that we seemed to have clawed our way back into the match, with Wenger making a much needed substitution at half time, only to give up the impetus with the second change. Not only did he take off our best player, but he did so before two obviously less influential ones in Walcott and Ramsey, and he brought on a player who would not only fail to offer anything in attack, but who would ultimately contribute to conceding the goal that beat us. Overall I’m proud of the performance of most of the team. If Chamberlain can kick on and we get some players back, there are points out there to be had, and maybe a top four finish isn’t out of reach just yet. Could still do with another striker though. Over to you Wenger.


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