Intro…
Our match previewer of last season – Dom – is sadly unable to write the previews for Untold for 2014/15, and so, upon hearing the news I went out a-searching for a replacement correspondent.
My eye was drawn last week to an advert in the Strand magazine which read thus…
“Demobilised officer and gentleman finding peace incredibly tedious, would welcome diversion. Legitimate, if possible; but crime, if of a comparatively humorous description, no objection. Excitement essential.”
Naturally I contacted the advertiser at once, and after a series of interesting negotiations I am able to present our new previewer: Bulldog Drummond, Gentleman adventurer, as Untold’s new previewer.
And so off we go… over to you Bulldog
—
Where would Man C be without Arsenal?
Probably not in Manchester, because Manchester has issues. Problems you might say. It’s not a place I like to visit – so I tend to read the travel brochures…
In an interview Tevez said “There’s no point in buying here…..it has nothing”, Nasri said “Moving here from London it was a big change – a shock”, and Moura chose PSG over Manchester City United because he said “Manchester was boring”.
But this Nasri fella – now he says some curious things. He’s not quite with it, if you know what I mean. Fine player on his day, of course, but not quite all there up top, if you follow my drift. Needs a glass of beer or two to get things sorted in the brain department if you follow me. Here’s todays quota fresh off the ration book…
“Everything about France squad makes me unhappy” That is in the Guardian.
“I won’t play for France again under Deschamps… there’s always trouble” That from the Independent.
Then in the Telegraph he says… “Arsenal fans are stupid to boo me.”
He also is quoted there with “Playing for France made me sad”
And we must feel for the little blighter. He’s sad, and that’s not a good condition for anyone. Perhaps a slap round the face with a cold fish might help. Meanwhile the season has started with silly people saying silly things. Way down south, beyond the Thames, south even of the land in which our club began, they played yesterday and Ian Holloway condemned “disrespectful” Millwall supporters for speaking of Leeds’ links to Jimmy Savile. So that sets the tone in Le Den for the coming months. And just for old times sake here’s a picture of some northern people playing in an earlier Charity Shield. 
Northerns! Doncha just love em?
But what, I hear you ask, of Arsenal On Tour. The old fellas who skim across the world looking for somewhere to go after Arsenal, People like Nicolas Anelka, Brian Kidd, Sylvinho, Brian Marwood, Alan Ball, David Platt and, of course, Paul Dickov who went their twice… the list is endless! And to prove my point it continues with Joe Mercer, David Rocastle, The Adebayor, Kolo Toure, Gael Clichy, Patrick Vieira , The Nasri . Niall Quinn David Seaman.
Today’s game is indeed “Arsenal players still with us, vs the spirit of Arsenal players that left.” And speaking of spirit, mine’s a glass of port.
There are bits of the club that you can’t help liking of course. Upon becoming Chairman, Lee said “This will be the happiest club in the land. The players will be the best paid and we’ll drink plenty of champagne, celebrate and sing until we’re…”
Or remember that day on 1 May 2007, when it was announced that the deposed Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra had been granted access to the club’s accounts. By 1 September 2008 that the club were so desperate they were in talks with the Abu Dhabi United Group to sell Thaksin’s entire stake, a deal which was agreed later in the day.
Now some people think that Abu Dhabi United Group is connected to the government of Abu Dhabi, but they ain’t. Oh no! They are just people who have so much wealth they buy football clubs for fun. Especially those who buy up ex-Arsenal men.
And they still like to do it their own way – like having two first-choice keepers, according to the Emperor Highly Unlikely, the manager of the club. “I have two number one goalkeepers,” he said.
So on to today’s game.
Now if you want to win a game of football, you need to be a hunter. You need to prowl and use stealth, to move across the greensward without a blade of grass a-russlin’. You also need to be ruthless – to be able to kill a man with your bare hands in a second, to lead the raid alone when need be, to hunt in packs when the situation calls for it.
Great players are able in jujutsu and boxing, as well as being handy at the table should cards be the order of the day. Intellect is not needed, for this is not within the spirit of the English warrior class, but is something reserved for aesthetes.
Nor does one need to participate in the dandy-fied game of cricket. Football! That’s the game!!! And for today’s game against Man City we shall need all our guile and stout English values to overcome our nemesis – the Spirit of Wild Expenditure of Other People’s Money.
To begin, a proper entrance is needed – I have asked Mr Wenger for all the men of our team to be issued with Bentley’s and each will drive his own. There will be no chauffeurs here. But there will be fog – I can smell it even now – and it will sweep down through the Midlands and head south into the Middlesex lands of Wembley.
Now we must also remember that Manchester City are a bunch of hearty roughs from foreign parts. Through their foul tactics and illicit alliances with the referees they have arranged it so that we have only beaten them once in the last eight. The time is now for change.
But now the Gods are with us. The last time we played in this competition in the land of the Middle Sex with its past marred in illegality and anti-charitable behaviour we beat the wilderbeast of Manchester Untidy 2-1. The last time we played the match we lost to the Chels, but that was in foreign lands.
Now much has been said of our ability to let in goals by the load of a shed, and indeed 41% of our total goal intake came in just three games. Avoid those games and we are fine.
But we must be wary of the evil Force Azure (FA) who run the show in its usual state of incompetence, disrespect and disrepute.
Here’s the squad news
The incoming for the Team With Other People’s Money
| PLAYER | FROM | FEE | DATE |
| Fernando | Porto | £12,000,000 | 26 Jun, 2014 |
| Bacary Sagna | Arsenal | Free | 01 Jul, 2014 |
| Wilfredo Caballero | Malaga | £6,000,000 | 08 Jul, 2014 |
Manchester City have also signed of the Argentina Under-20 international Bruno Zuculini, the Argentine side Racing Club, but I know not the cost The outgoing with not so much of Other People’s Money spent as before.
| PLAYER | TO | FEE | DATE |
| Alex Henshall | Ipswich | Free | 27 Jun, 2014 |
| Gareth Barry | Everton | Free | 08 Jul, 2014 |
| Reece Wabara | Doncaster | Free | 01 Aug, 2014 |
| Jack Rodwell | Sunderland | £10,000,000 | 05 Aug, 2014 |
Compare with Arsenal with all expenditure being Arsenal money.
| PLAYER | FROM | FEE | DATE |
| Alexis Sanchez | Barcelona | £30,000,000 | 10 Jul, 2014 |
| Mathieu Debuchy | Newcastle | £12,000,000 | 17 Jul, 2014 |
| David Ospina | Very Nice | £3,000,000 | 27 Jul, 2014 |
| Calum Chambers | Southampton | £16,000,000 | 28 Jul, 2014 |
Arsenal leavers…
| PLAYER | TO | FEE | DATE |
| Bacary Sagna | Man City | Free | 01 Jul, 2014 |
| Zach Fagan | Welling | Free | 01 Jul, 2014 |
| Thomas Eisfeld | Fulham | 23 Jul, 2014 | |
| Nicholas Yennaris | Brentford | 01 Aug, 2014 |
And thus it can be seen by pushing forth the issue of FFP we have done the stuff and forced the evil northerners from the table. Of course it may take a little while for our new team to bed down, but we can hope highly for a favourable outcome against the lower orders and slave traders.
Ahead of the game Arsène Wenger said “Let’s not go overboard,” he said. “We are more comfortable, but we are not Manchester City. The real pressure was to keep the club financially capable to pay back the stadium debt and for that we needed to be in the Champions League every year. “If I write my book one day I will explain why that was the real pressure.”
Shad Forsythe, the American conditioning expert who worked on the World Cup winners will make our players into Super Men, never injured, eternal fighters against borish rich. El Teams, as they say in Spain…
Szczesny
Debuchy Koscielny Chambers Koscielny Gibbs
Arteta Wilshere
Ramsey Cazorla
The Ox Giroud Sanchez
Of course there will be trickery, and when it comes there will be disbelief. If you want to see how that goes just re-read the moment when Untold reported the fact that Man C had been caught in the FFP net and were asked to respond.
Response came there none from the club, the deadline came and went and their supporters who ventured here came with some of the most amazing excuses you will have ever seen. FFP was in the European Court and so nothing would happen. FFP had already been thrown out in Europe as illegal. Uefa had made a mistake. Man C were going to appeal. Man C’s appeal was so strong that Uefa were trying to find a way out. The Premier League were taking Uefa to court. The European Court of Human Rights was involved. Britain was leaving the EU…
It went on for days as the other clubs caught out by FFP settled, but Man C remained sullen. Oh what a chuckle. Just like the old days. And remember, we haven’t got to the Premier League’s FFP yet, which kicks in later this year. But not, seemingly, in Manchester. The Man C team
Rovinoh
Robinho Ronadinho Robertino Ribeno
Rizzlo Roboino Robocopo Robinhoodo
Robinhoodairporto Ronaldowithanoboe
Result: match abandoned due to bad weather.
—–
Footnote…
Tony: I say old chap did you know that you put Kos in our line up twice?
Bulldog: Well, he’s worth it.
We all wanted we her to get usmanov to spend money we didn’t generate a couple of years ago and let’s face it with all our history we’ve won 1 cup in 9 years. We are just spending now like city have but maintain the high ground because we have good housekeeping? If you looked in any depth at city’s finances they too are due to be debt free within a year which when you think would be an astonishing achievement after what they have had to spend to go from also-tans to champions. Then what are we going to say? This is not an excuse for a club that bombed since the invincibles. Do we really want a league where only 4 clubs can ever win it? Allowing proper investment has changed this and it’s far more interesting hence your city obsessed piece. To blame their fans is a joke, hats off to any club pulling in full houses over 30000 in the third tier with a crap team, I doubt our ‘fans’ could repeat this.
Just wanted to add a fairer side as a gooner with closer links to city, up the gunners.
Excellent amusing read. Welcome Bulldog!
Very well said, time things that are true are said, time sky did the same
Adding a few words on the ref.
Michael Oliver. A still rather young ref and our conclusion on his season two seasons ago was http://www.refereedecisions.co.uk/ref-review-201213-michael-oliver-this-doesnt-look-too-clever/ The title says it all
One of his matches with Arsenal that season http://www.refereedecisions.co.uk/match-review-michael-oliver-everton-vs-arsenal-1-1-28112012/
a rather one side affair in the bias departement
Competent? http://www.refereedecisions.co.uk/ref-review-201213-the-referee-competency-league-table/ not that much …
Is he biased? http://www.refereedecisions.co.uk/the-most-unbiased-ref-in-the-pl-201213/ Ouch that doesn’t look good either
So how did he do in total compared to the other refs in that season? http://www.refereedecisions.co.uk/ref-review-201213-the-best-ref-in-the-pl-was/ Blimey…. almost bottom of the referee league
Note that the best ref of them all will be at Wembley today. He will be 4th ref.
Who decides who does this game one could wonder…. It should have been the other way round.
Well another Northern ref but that is something I didn’t need to tell you of course.
Watch out for kicking going unpunished and yellow cards coming out late of the pocket. Unless you are an Arsenal player of course. And penalties… we probably only will get one if it is a draw after 90 minutes
Walter I see you are still standing next to Vermaelen. Are you going to change your picture now?
You forgot to add, you buy them Manchester takes them from you. City or United, Arsenal it’s just a feeder club for up north
Tony,
You said that “sadly” Dom wouldn’t be writing match previews this season.
Hope nothing untoward has happened to him.
Welcome on board Bulldog….i wonder why alot of Arsenal fans dont think like Wenger before making their team selections,Bulldog do u think Wenger will play any game without either Giroud Or Sanogo….if u do then u r not intune with our manager.There is no way he will start with the team u selected.be realistic and not sentimental in team selections.
Not sure that Port is a spirit old chap, it has spirit (brandy) added to it but this makes it a fortified wine.
yours pedantically
Berate that which you fear!
We will let you high flying southerners do all the talking (as usual – you do like the sound of your own voices) and we will quietly continue to stack up the silverware (whilst tipping our flat caps at you as a sign of our deference to you as clearly you are superior beings – being from the South and all)
If only I could pay half a million pound for a 1 bedroom squat next to an underground train station, I’d be the happiest chappie alive. You’re living the dream!
what is the time of the game?.
Very amusing! Guess no penalties for us today then.
And Man City will look beyond the Emirates the momment we start to pay our players close to what they pay their players…that way there wont be much to tempt them with.
Oh Bulldog,
I love this.
Walter
I’ll check the ref reviews once I’m sure I won’t throw up my breakfast.
On the previous thread someone suggested the hurricane at Wembley won’t be Bertha, but at 10:00 in West London, it appears the hurricane IS Bertha. This worries me as the soaked Wembley pitch will be more reason for Man Breaky to apply any leg shattering tactics, unpunished.
Anyways, great article, and I’m looking forward to more of same during the upcoming season.
A more curious and eccentric take on the match preview! I usually prefer a more reliably informative approach. Good write up, please I hope you don’t mind me saying but it was a difficult article to follow. Also match lineup for this sort of game is always tough, very little precedence to guide a choice. However, I can quite confidently say its highly unlikely we will field 13 players. Even if we did I don’t know where we are going to get another Koscielny!! 😛
Oh, and from some weeks back I Was praying Ars would put out a youth team for this match. Arsenal have far more important matches coming up, and this match, like the Ems cup and cup final before it – smacks to me of ref training for how to smash up Arsenal. (Just as the Previous season’s friendly at the Ems was followed by the debacle against Villa, right?)
Nicky – nothing has happened to Dom – writing for Untold, or indeed any other blog, on a very regular basis, as match previews demand, is quite a commitment. I was really grateful to Dom for his year long stint, and fully appreciate he wants to take a break.
Blacksheep – I can tell you something else about port. As part of my work on this year’s Arsenal History Society publication (which you will of course as an honourable member of AISA, receive through the post quite shortly) I re-read George Allison’s autobiography.
In it he tells how he would sip port during his radio commentaries on the BBC. It was, apparently, to stop him getting a sore throat.
Gooner,
No on here our regulars didn’t want any of the Usmanov money. Other websites did but not us.
I remember the days that they said Untold was paid by Arsenal to support them. And they call us conspiracy theorists. 😉
Why is this guy ‘Blueshy’ able to post racist comments like this?????? I thought u had moderation for stuff like this???
Ryan,
he came on here and posted a few stupid comments but I think we let them pass as it was a bit funny how he made himself look like the fool he is.
But now he has exposed himself as a racist also.
So in the oven he goes, or in other words I will ban him.
And yes Tony as soon as I can find back where I installed it I will change my picture again….
Can we please have Blueshy’s horrible comment removed?
Bluesh1t a credit to the club he supports? knuckle dragging Neanderthal
Tony, you need to remove the Racist comment made earlier, it is Race crime and needs to be removed into preventing causing offence to other unsuspecting readers of your fine blog.
Just to get back to the subject at hand – it’s interesting to note that there’s only one club which has taken more players from us than Man City has under Wengers reign and that’s Barcelona. They are, of course, very different sorts of club at very different stages of development. Barcelona have a fine academy with an excellent record of bringing players through and City are, at this stage, exactly the opposite.
Both have come to Arsenal seeking talent with maybe City specifically seeking to undermine a rival in the same league in order to get past them in the pecking order. Generally it’s worked but at an individual player level there have been few long term successes and some very notable failures.
I hope for Vermaelens sake that he’s not one of them.
Update. 12:00
Heavy wind and rain has passed.
Wembley pitch draining system will prevail.
Ref won’t allow kicking of Ars players, beach ball goals, or award phantom fouls. He’ll also not use advantage rule to save ManC from bookings.
All is well.
Whoops. I’ve just read the ref review of the Everton game. Optimism somewhat reduced. I must say, the format on Ref Decisions is rather excellent. I won’t be able to see the match until it’s on ArsPlayer, which is after midnight, so I’ll avoid anything that’ll tell me the score.
Argh. I’ve now found out that a friends daughter is going to Wembley! Through her work. I’ve never seen her even watch a match on TV. I sent her a message wishing her a great experience, adding that Arsenal have lots of good looking players, and she said she’s in row 7.
She’ll be able to touch them. As she lives over the East side, I suggested that once she comes West – if she feels nauseous, she should give me a call and I’ll take her ticket from her. Well, if you don’t ask….
Have a great day, N.
Theo’ll miss TV:
https://mobile.twitter.com/theowalcott/status/498230214196224000?utm_source=fb&utm_content=498230214196224000&utm_campaign=theowalcott&utm_medium=fb
Looking forward to more like this bulldog, keep up the good work!
Amusing read. Sure everyone (with access to a TV, radio, internet, newspaper agent…, etc.)has heard by now how many City players will be out of this game, after countless repetitions in the media. As for how many Arsenal players will be missing….., you guessed it, not even one mention. I guess if we win it’ll be down to City missing their ‘entire first team’. COYG!!
p/s Kickoff is 3PM BST by the way, for those who wanted to know.
COYG!!!
Bulldog, welcome.
Do you know the allotment made to Dennis at Enfield??….
Rantetta says:
“praying Arsenal would put out a youth team for this match”.
I agree, we have far more important matches coming up, especially against Manc again.
I suppose AW will put a mixture of youth and experience, they have to play like that to integrate the youth seamlessly anyway.
If we win, ok the cabinet fills,
not bothered about losing too much.
We’re in business! Get in there!
COYG! Aha and Amen!
I have removed the racist comment from Blueshy now. I was waiting for some MC supporters to distance themselves from it. I didn’t see a MC supporter doing it so far.
Sad….
Half time:
Arsenal 2 – 0 Man City
Come on Gunners!
Wilshere got battered in the lead-up to both goals. Hope he lasts the season…he won’t if he doesn’t get protection.
Giroooooooud!!!!
Should do that more often, we know he’s got a venomous left foot.
Thanks for getting rid of that offensive comment Walter. lets hope we won’t be seeing bluet**t, or whatever his name is, again on these boards.
Feels rather unconfortable, you know. The lads don’t even break a sweat and it’s a one sided 3-0.
Oh well.
We want 6!
owen sounds so sore!
we beat the clasless scum.
Well done lads,nice to go into the season on such a positive note- la!! We’re in business!And long may it last. What a great goal from Giroud!!
COYG! Aha and Amen!
Good performance from our players, victory thoroughly deserved!
COYG
Good win, some great goals and a cs, good day all round.
As for the racist comment, I am sure our oft visitor M18 would have nothing to do with such things, he seems quite a decent chap at least from the posts I have seen from him.
Well done wenger and the boys, Wembley is becoming a happy hunting ground, and that is a good thing! Another one for the cabinet.
Yeaaaaaahhhhh….
We win the ‘oh! That doesn’t count’trophy.
I dunno in all other countries it’s considered the Supercup… anyway it was such a nice game to watch. All the media blabbering “Arsenal has much more to prove than City… bla bla bla”. Well guess what ? We totally owned them.
Great performances by everybody, but in my opinion special praise to Chambers who looked amazingly confident. Yet another great signing.
Was sad to see that, despite being a semi-friendly, we still got 0 protection from the refs. Could’ve ended much worse, with an ankle injury to Gibbs and [insert here] injury to Sczeny.
To top it all – we missed 4 starting-11 players, and it’s been 30+ matches since City got 3 goals against.
COYG!
Looking forward to next season.
WE STILL NEED TO BUY !!!! –
Some granloa.
At least I need to buy some granola I’m out.
Chambers looks so assured. His positional awareness is soooo Mertesackeresque. I just love him.
So the art of defending is not dying after all….
They will say it doesn’t count, but funny how it always did count when they totted up Fergies trophys
Annoyingly, Chambers will be a full England international this season
Nice to see Pat Rice handing out the medals and trophy to a team he dedicated and gave so much to.
Excellent win for the team and a great start for the season. The three new players all looked very good signings – good to keep a clean sheet with a re-jigged defense.
As for Oliver – useless.
Good counterattacks for Arsenal…not really troubled at the back. Good to see Giroud knocking one in from range. Couldln’t believe some of the commentators saying that the only reason Arsenal won was that they wanted it more and that City had played young players. \on second thought not that surprised, eh?
Clean sheet with Monreal-Chambers ending the game!
A defence all in new positions apart from Gibbs.
M.Owen praised Gibbs, but it befuddles me how few football plundits made the observation that England left the best English LB in the PL and CL last season at home this summer! I’m not complaining, as an Arsenal fan the club benefits, but it was such an odd call.
Nice win, from reading a few commentaries. The first commentary I looked at, was the Telegraph. Hardly 2 minutes into the game, and they (commentators) started kicking Arsenal. Fine, I’ll take my reading elsewhere. Goal.com was where I spent the match, but they tend not to say too much. I looked at Daily Mail’s version after the game, and it was worthless.
COYG!
Great result and a vast improvement in so far as all the players looked a lot fitter and sharper compared to last week. Everyone played well to a man. Jack got his usual battering and if I hear one more idiot say he goes down ‘too easily’ I will poke them in the eye with a stick. Chambers is awesome given his age and limited experience and Sanogo is improving with each game.
Match report already on line!!!
Extra extra read all about it 😉
Mick,
Re: Wilshere, talk about blaming the victim!
I think Sanogo once again prove why he should be in this team today.
Whatever anybody says, beating Man City 3-0 is a good thing. It is not definitive but I am looking forward to a good season for Arsenal even more.
This victory and trophy are so sweet.
I have nearkly the same fun as afert winning the FA cup
Well done lads, I hope you give me some more of it this season.
Well, it was worth the wait! 2 trophies in 3 months, that’ll shut up some more foulmouthers. Before the match I had my reservations, but seeing how the things develop, there couldn’t have been any other outcome. My gf said the game was boring – of course, what can you expect when one team totally dominates technically and tactically. The players are like hungry wolves, contrasting with the sufficiency on the round belly blue-ish side. On to the big one!
This slap down on City is disgusting.
Na$ri – Get over him and maybe he will get over you blokes that harass him incessantly. It has been YEARS literally. C’mon let’s move on.
Emperor Highly Unlikely – This is just sad. It is hard to dislike Pellegrini. He gets on his job and don’t wind up everybody. Just leave him alone.
“Problems you might say. It’s not a place I like to visit – so I tend to read the travel brochures…”
Now this final line is just sad. A whole community given the low down over football tribalism. You guys are just as bad as Ali G with his take on Grimsby.
This is Untold Arsenal. You guys are supposed to be classy. Not some reactionary WO, AAA crowd.
Firstly, congratulations on a comprehensive win. I’m not going to make any excuses such as missing players, etc, but I’m not sure how important a barometer this will be for the coming season. We played poorly in the 3-2 CS defeat to United in 2011 but went on to win the title. 12 months later we looked sharp in our CS win over Chelsea but went on to put up a poor defence of the title, eventually losing it by 11 points. As it happens, I already predicted on these pages the other week that Arsenal are a good bet for the title and even if was us that had won 3-0 yesterday I wouldn’t change that view.
As for the racist comment, I’ve not read it but I don’t condone such behaviour in any way whatsoever. I’ve had my fair share of run-ins with some of the posters on here but even so, resorting to that is bang out of order.
M18CTID
Thanks very much.
You sound like a closet Gooner to me.
Stay in touch, your stuff is always worth reading.
oldgroover,
Cheers. Though I’m not sure I’d agree that my stuff is always worth reading mate – I’ve had a fair few meltdowns on here in the past! Must learn to reign it in when something winds me up lol.
I’m not quite a closet Gooner but although there has been a deterioration in relations between the fans of both clubs since we started buying/achieving (delete as you see appropriate ;)) success, I and many City fans have had a soft spot for Arsenal in the past. Michael Thomas gave us the most enjoyable football moment from a neutral’s point of view, Highbury was a favourite London ground for many of us, and when you hammered us 4-0 at Maine Road in 2001 our fans gave your players a deserved standing ovation for one of the best footballing performances many of us had ever witnessed. It didn’t go unnoticed by Wenger either who had some kind words to say about our support.