By Walter Broeckx
As far as I could find out all the Arsenal players have played their matches for their national teams and weren’t injured! An unseen achievement for Arsenal. Probably Wenger’s fault….
And when looking back at their performances one can say that in general they did rather well.
Jack Wilshere was again voted man of the match I have been told. And I also have been told that this is for the 4th consecutive match. Come on Jack take this form back to Arsenal now and build on it. Jack this produced an assist from which Oxlade-Chamberlain scored with a glancing header. A fine goal and as Welbeck gave the ball to Wilshere for his assist a real English Arsenal goal. Or should that be a real Arsenal English goal?
Anyway, Jack giving assists, Welbeck scoring two against Slovenia, Gibbs playing one complete match and a bit in the second, the Ox playing one match and a bit in the first, and Theo not playing at all I think and that is fine as he then couldn’t get injured. Chambers was not used in the two matches so he could have a good rest and that is maybe what he needed most of all.
So I think nothing but good news from the English camp and I can imagine a few players returning in good spirit. Now let us take that form back to Arsenal and produce the same performances.
Another one that keeps on scoring is Alexis. He scored in both the games he played for Chili. He scored the first goal in their 5-0 win against Venezuela and now again opened the score for his country against Urugay. But Urugay came back to win. But the most important thing is that Alexis just seems able to score in each game he starts. And that is something we must hope he can continue.
The Poland manager of the national team must have been reading Untold. As I asked earlier this week to not play Szczesny in a meaningless friendly and he just did that. Not play him I mean. As a result Poland suddenly let in two goals. So maybe Szczesny will be happy with that after he kept a clean sheet in the qualifying match earlier in this international break.
And in the match between Spain and Germany no Arsenal players were involved. So a few other managers responding to our plea not to play Santi Cazorla or Lukas Podolski. The Untold influence on football matters. Just kidding of course. But nice to see our wish come true.
Another player that will come back in fine mood will be Yaya Sanogo. The French player who has been named captain of the U21 team scored two goals against England to help France to a 3-2 victory. As I had nothing to do when this match took place I decided to watch it on a stream. Well I only could watch the first half and I must say that Sanogo really looked something.
We have heard people saying we should buy Benteke from Aston Villa. Well Sanogo reminded me of him completely. Amazingly strong and good link up play with his team mates. Good holding of the ball and good distribution. Some sharp passes that lead to good chances and then to put some icing on his cake he scored two goals. Two easy tap ins one might say but from seeing his performance all over the pitch he sure is a player that we should keep in mind in the next seasons.
If Giroud is back and fit maybe we could loan him out to a PL team to give him match time. As with other players like Alexis, Giroud, Welbeck, Walcott, Podolski, the chance of Sanogo getting much playing time will be restricted I think. So maybe 6 months of playing time will get him to a higher level, the Arsenal level? I didn’t see the second half of that match as I then had other things to do but did see the third goal from France and if the ball wouldn’t have been taken away from him by a team mate he might have scored a hattrick in that match.
So all what is left now for the Arsenal players is to come back to Arsenal. And get over any jetlag that they might have. As the flying in for some is the hardest part I think. Alexis coming from Chile is not like taking the underground at Kings Cross and get off at Arsenal.
And we have another one flying in for the moment (time checking – yes he is or should be) as Tony Attwood is currently trying to find his way back home from down under. So he will have to adjust his internal clock with some 9 to 11 hours I think and that is not always easy to do. And I also wonder at what moment in time he will start walking back in the English way and no longer walk upside down.
But back to football now. I must say we all did a great job it seems. Taking all our players through without injury in an international break is not the thing we are used too. And so we can slowly loosen our fingers again and get back to a normal position.
Wednesday… only a few days to go before real football starts again. It’s about time.
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The books
- Woolwich Arsenal: The club that changed football – Arsenal’s early years
- Making the Arsenal – how the modern Arsenal was born in 1910
- The Crowd at Woolwich Arsenal
That should mean “new” injuries of course….
Nice writeup Walter. I must say a sigh of relief to see the boys finish International games without injuries…Certainly must be “Wengers fault” 🙂
i am on record …..urging jack to become our derossi/mascherano….i was treated with contempt and that he should play as a traditional ten i.e second striker? shaddow striker? advanced central playmaker? mmmm, no bollocks to all that…
when he is involved forward he gets kicked and loses it and gets trapped….by sitting deeper he has a better view of the game and commmand it better and also he is the one doing the kicking therefore angering the opposition instead of the opposition angering him
also his best game was next to cesc playing similar role and managing to control ( to some extent) xavi…..
wenger and hiodgson are not idiots…nor am i.
Hate to put a spanner in the works, but heard Welbeck took a knock…but hopefully nothing too major….if there is, we have our French U21 scoring sensation. Also doubts on Luke Shaw…which can only be good news, especially if De Gea and Di maria are also injured….but willing to bet all 3 Utd players make it.
Good to get the interlull out of the way until 2015 – I respect the fact that our players get something out of it, and generally want to play but I cannot abide international football. I wish every single one of them would follow Per’s example
I will go with Mandy in that all ‘injuries’ claimed for MU and and that other PL sides (ManC/Chel$ky) will all have their players make miraculous recoveries and be fit to play 90 minutes for their respective club sides!!!
yourself, Roy and Wenger could well be onto something Hunter. Think Jack needs to work on that, and a bit more positional discipline for such a role, but that will come. If we do not sign a DM…or whatever a given observers interpretation of that role is, Jack could well get a few chances, as Arteta sadly seems to get injured everytime he steps onto the pitch at the moment.
Wenger will want a cerebral technical player in such a role, as opposed to the media/WOB clamours for a 6ft 4 beast who can knock the players and ball into row z at will, like the PGMOL protected species that inhabit Chelsea’s MF
Still optimistic with our players slowly coming back from injury and not being replaced on the physio table by others.
Something else…Not sure if this has been linked before…quite funny
http://www.101greatgoals.com/gvideos/lolz/arsenal-stars-wilshere-mertesacker-the-ox-go-face-to-face-with-family-in-comedy-eurocar-ad-video/
Mandy Dodd
November 19, 2014 at 2:55 pm
this demand for the 6ft 4 beast is because we had vieiera who would tackle like an animal and also break zonal marking by penmetrating banks of four with his strength technique and dribbling, then he would shoot and score.
players like that come once every 100 years so now we will use jack to tackle and pass short and start the playmaking from back and ramsey to break the banks of four and zonal marking. and if aaron lets jack stand on his shoulders they can reach patrick’s height and deal with aerial threats too ..
its a pity that due to some stupid employment law we had to let yaya go ukraine
yes, Vieira was a one off. with the Riley refs we get these days, not sure he would ever finish a game without a red…even back in the day, he spent more time than most in the dock, once got two reds in successive games.
I share the concern that Danny Welbeck appeared to have an injury. The commentary referred to him limping for some minutes before his substitution.
Ox lucky not to have been decapitated by the blatant elbow to the neck at the start of the second half. Even a commentator said later that it was probably a red card offence. It seems that the EPL exceptions to the rule when Arsenal players are on the receiving end of serious fouls may have transferred to internationals also.
Jack has looked very good in that role but of course he has been able to play a recycling and attacking game with very little defensive work needed because of the relative weakness of the opposition. I hope he will develop and grow into the position even more because I believe he will become one of the best players in the world if he always has the play in front of him.
We thank God for protecting the Gunners from picking up any injuries during their international outings. And we pray they will all safely return back home. We will know more about Welbeck injury scares when the boss does his press conference probably tomorrow. But I am sure it is only a scare by the Red-Devils to scare the Gunners. Nevertheless, I must caution the Gunners not to pin their hopes of binding the Red-Devils on any Red-Devil injury misfortune. Such a negative thinking could backfire on the Gunners. The Gunners must bear in their minds that, the Red Devils will still be having their archRed-Devil Wayne Rooney and archRed- Devil van Persie available for the epic encounter between them on Saturday evening at the Emirates Stadium. The Gunners should remember that the Red-Devils have been triumphanting over the Gunners with those 2 archRed-devils for quite sometimes now. The availability of the archRed-Devil Higuain and archRed-Devil Falcao will only add more firepower to the Red-Devils attack. Which the Gunners must be fully prepared to quench effectively. Thank God, the Gunners too have some Aces up in their sleeves to bind all the 2 or 4 arch Red-Devils right there on the Emirates Stadium turf, should they dare the Gunners. Ace Gunner-Sanchez, Ace Gunner-Welbeck, Ace Gunner-Wilshere, Ace Gunner-Oxlade, Ace Gunner-Arteta, Ace Gunner-Mertesacker, Ace Gunner-Gibbs and Ace Gunner-Szczesny should be able bind those 2 or 4 Red-Devils to deny them any freedom of movements on the Emirates Stadium field during the epic encounters with them. If the Gunners do this bindings effectively, I am confident of the Gunners taking the Red-Devils to the Emirates Stadium Dungeon to lock them up there for good 90 munites plus.
Apparently Hodgson has said that Welbeck should be available for Saturday.
OT (to injuries)
I gather Wellington Silva scored a nice goal for Brazil U21. Metro has a short article, which apparently has video (and I don’t do video).
https://metro.co.uk/2014/11/19/arsenals-new-neymar-wellington-silva-scores-thumping-goal-for-brazil-under-21s-4954942/
One thing I remember about Wellington, is that since he was signed by Arsenal, his picture in the Academy section always had him wearing this huge winter coat. I think they (Arsenal) finally got him a real picture for this year. 🙂
Hopefully his work permit problems go away soon.
Off topic Rio got three match ban for Twitter and Makay gets a new job @ Wigan for bein racist well done fa
OT (More FIFA Corruption Breaking News)
> Fifa whistleblower Phaedra Al-Majid fears for her safety
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/30122601
While I suspect the “criminal complaint” that FIFA made, relates to England and/or Australia, this could backfire on FIFA. I think that once the complaint was made, the Swiss government can look into whatever criminal activity took place, not just that with respect to the complaint.
So, along comes this information from a whistleblower, or something else, and it could still end up at the end of the day (month, year, …) that we find Sepp Bladder in jail.
In any event, the BBC article is very short, with a “more to follow” notation.
Gord
That incredibly interesting although I would think that with amount money and who knows else of gigantic proportions is at stake and the prospect of some people involved; loosing everything, reputation and their freedom… I would convince many so called whistle blowers to feed for their safety!
**It would convince
If it has come to that… World Football has some real issues…
Anyone else wish Podolski would get more starts?