Ugh!

Work is really ruining my desire (and willingness) to write on a very regular basis. Last night, after coming home at 11:00PM, watching the match till 2, all I wanted to do was go to sleep for the next 6 hours before going back to work. Do you know what's interesting about indenture of mortgage documents? Nothing, nothing at all. Plus tomorrow I'm going to be assigned to a new matter, and while the client involved is huge (and famous), I can't divulge the name on account of confidentiality even though there's a good chance that I'm going to be in office till pretty late.

Okay, enough whining about being a lawyer (it's actually pretty cool. Not Suits cool, but definitely cooler than being an accountant or something), and onto things Arsenal. The match last night made me yawn a little, drive some insects out of my room, and every so often curse Giroud on twitter. I like our HFB, but he's neither match fit, nor has he ever been clinical. Not that the rest of the team was much better. Nor was Besiktas' team for that matter. 

Ba missed the chances that he did get, and was owned by Chambers for large parts of the game. Our very own Giroud missed a fair number of chances, and kept flicking the ball into oblivion. Look, we all enjoyed the goal against Norwich, it was great. But it's been a year, get over it and pass like a human again. Sanchez offered plenty of drive and seemed most likely to create a goal, but there was still some end product missing from his game. Though it has to be said that it was a huge step up from the match against Crystal Palace and he seems to be growing from match to match. Santi Cazorla had another very, very poor match. I don't know what's wrong with our little Spaniard, but for the past two matches he's been a peripheral figure, only seen when there's a free kick to be taken or something. On the basis of his recent performances, I'd rather play Chamberlain. He of course wasn't the only guilty player and Aaron Ramsey's red card in the 80th minute seemed to sum up our attacking performance.

For the past two games, we've somewhat lacked creativity and the ability to create chances. Our goals against Crystal Palace came from set pieces, and the last night's match had barely a handful of chances. Which makes me glad that Ozil is going to be returning soon (hopefully against Everton). For all the shtick that he got last season, he still is one of the few players in the team that can literally create a chance out of nothing. With him on the team, Sanchez could possibly concentrate on scoring rather than creating, and we wouldn't be as dependent on Giroud's finishing ability (which is wildly inconsistent).

It wasn't really a dull match though. Not hugely entertaining, but not boring either. Defensively we were pretty sound, and Chambers really does seem to have a wise old head on his shoulders. Other than a slip which allowed Ba to go past him, he was solid for most of the game. Considering he's 19 years old and has never played in the Champions League ever before, it was a really great performance. Definitely worthy of the Man of the Match. While I'd be a little cautious in pronouncing him as the next great defender, he does seem like an astute buy from Wenger, and definitely worth the 16 million we paid for him. 

In the end, the match doesn't really put us a terrible position, it does leave us slightly uncomfortable in terms of where we want to be. We're going to be worrying about the away goal rule, which is never really nice, and it would have been that much more simpler if we'd just scored one or two goals. The team looks as if it's still gelling from an attacking point of view, which is rather strange considering that Alexis is the only new player to join the first team. Hopefully, we'll have learnt the lessons from last night and shall put them to good use against Everton, which is no easy feat even without Ross Barkley. In all likelihood, we'll also get to see our Germans for the first time this season. Maybe they can spur our team into action again? There's nothing that cannot be solved by a good ole BFG yelling. 

That's it for now. I'll try writing sooner next time, work permitting of course. 

Cheers

Arsene Wenger Signs Da Ting - That's a Good Thing

And in the most unsurprising news of this transfer season, Arsene Wenger has signed a contract extension for another 3 years, till 2017 when he's at the ripe old age of 67. I suppose there was never any doubt about this, except till the 80th minute at Wembley in the FA Cup Semi-finals and in those wretched, torturous, agonizing opening 9 minutes of the finals. Other than those two moments, I suppose we all have known for sometime that Wenger is going to retire at Arsenal, barring some unexpected tragedy. 

Of course, when the news broke out yesterday there was the usual nonsense about '4th place' and trophy drought on twitter and other social media, about Wenger not having done enough to justify the contract written by writers attempting to write for 'actual media' (the inverted commas for the sole reason that hardly anyone regards Eurosport as actual media). Minority opinion I suppose, but an opinion nonetheless. The 'Wenger Out' preceded by a hashtag has been a common sight in the past few years, and there are of course some people who'll never be happy. At the beginning of the season, these were the ones who pointed at Tottenham's spending and said we'd drop out of top 4, then as the season progressed they said we'd only get the 4th place trophy and nothing else, and finally when we did win the FA Cup they said we didn't win the league. Hashtag Wenger Out. 

I don't get some people, really. Of course Wenger has made mistakes in the past few years, including last season. The way our title challenge fell away last season, our humiliating away performances, all of it was quite embarrassing. But at the end of the season, we still won the FA Cup, qualified for Champions League and have a summer ahead to consolidate and improve with the new Emirates and Puma deals kicking in. That's an additional 30 million a year from each of these deals. While I highly doubt all of it will be used in transfers, there is the expectation that a fair bit will be utilized to improve the squad. 

As far as the team is concerned, it's at that stage where it's perhaps ready to go forward. We have a frighteningly good base, with most of our positions filled with players who can compete with the best in the league. Our keeper tied with Cech for the highest number of clean sheets, our defense, despite the odd lapse, is one of the best in the league, our midfield riches are well documented, and in Aaron Ramsey we have a player on the verge of superstardom. A few signings (not the massive bulkload of crap that Tottenham signed last season) maybe enough for a sustained title push.

Wenger of course is the man to do that. No doubt about it. With the FA Cup win, he got that trophy drought monkey off his back, and seems ready to push onward (is it just me or has he been looking younger as well). This was reflected in his reply to the question as to whether fans should expect a big summer: 
'Yes they should expect that. What I can promise is that we work very hard on a market that is very, very congested with many people who have a lot of money. But we have a big advantage, players want to join us and if we find the right quality I'm sure we can strengthen the team.'

Last summer Wenger showed that he was willing to shell out money on a marquee signing, and there's no reason why this summer can't be the same (subject to player availability of course). And objectively speaking, isn't the better position to be in is the one where we're looking for a new striker rather than a new manager. If nothing else, Arsene Wenger brought consistency in a period of financial restrictions. Last season, the consistency was maintained and a trophy was added. As I've stated above, this is a time for consolidation, not structural changes. I think we all recognize we're not too far away from the top. And hopefully Arsene Wenger is the man to lead us there yet again. With the new contract, he has three more years to work towards that, and we have three more years of stability (insert mandatory Chelsea, Tottenham and United joke).

A Fond Goodbye to our No. 2, Lukasz

The transfer season has begun and Arsenal has lost another star. No wait, it's our FA Cup, Semi-final hero, Lukasz Fabianski. As reported earlier today, Fabianski has entered into a pre-contract agreement with Swansea, and will join them when his Arsenal contract expires in June. 

A little shortsightedness might prompt you to state that our best keeper is leaving, his penalty shootout heroics against Wigan are what got us into the FA Cup finals in the first place. And he's been the keeper for all the matches which lead to our first trophy in 9 years. But I suppose a little more perspective is required. Lukasz Fabianski has made 78 Arsenal appearances in seven seasons at Arsenal. That's quite low, even without considering the fact that he was competing with Almunia. For the longest time he was the talented, but error prone second in command to Almunia (who can forget this howler), receiving the unfortunate nickname of Flappyanski. 

He's always been a talented keeper, and has made some fine saves, but for the longest time he was simply too error prone and too inconsistent to ever be a No. 1 keeper for a club like Arsenal. A brilliant save, followed by a howler was the order of the day. A lot of times, it simply seemed that the pressure got to him. That day in 2010, when we lost 1-0 to Manchester United, a young fellow pole, Wojciech Szczesny made his Premier League debut on account of Fabianski and Almunia being injured. His heroics continued to earn him a spot in the first team, culminating in him being the first choice keeper, and Fabianski being consigned to being his backup. 

Our collective opinion of Fabianski began to change when Wenger decided he had enough of Szczesny's poor form, and dumped him in the away match against eventual Champions League winners, Bayern Munich. We all know what happened next. A clean sheet against one of the best strike forces in Europe, eventual treble winners, and it seemed as if Fabianski was once again the club No. 1. Unfortunately for him, he got injured, Szczesny returned with a vengeance, accumulating clean sheet after clean sheet, and is the undisputed No. 1 at the club. 

Of course, this season Fabianski has played every FA Cup match, including the final, made a couple of great saves along the way, and possibly his most memorable night came in the form of a penalty shootout against Wigan in the semis. He was man of the match in that game for me, and his two penalty saves secured a berth to the final. Wenger took the more emotional decision to start Fabianski in the finals, and while the entire team deserves the blame for a terrible start, it can be argued that Fabianski didn't have world's greatest 9 minutes. Hadn't we staged a blazing comeback, the critical brickbats that Fabianski might have received are impossible to fathom. 

At the end of the day, Fabianski is a fairly decent goalkeeper, a nice chap, and a thorough professional. Never one to mourn, or talk about playing time, he's always put his head down, worked hard, and this season done quite a stellar job most of the times when called upon. While Szczesny is our undisputed No. 1, Fabianski was a quality backup, and after several years he's really grown this season. That being said, Szczesny is one of the best keepers in the league and his performances this season have been criminally underrated (mostly on account of those traumatising multi-goal away losses). Fabianski would never be a permanent No.1 at Arsenal, and fairplay to him for leaving in search of first team opportunities. I'd of course prefer that he had moved to a different country, but it's also nice knowing that despite all the criticism about Arsenal keepers, we've provided the Premier League with two decent keepers in the form of Vito Mannone and Lukasz Fabianski. 

All this of course means that we need a new backup keeper. Whether we look outside (John Ruddy has been mentioned) or inwards at a younger player like Martinez is a decision which the manager has to take. The slightly alarming aspect of this is that we now need a keeper and a right back since Sagna has announced that he's leaving, essentially replacing before we can actually strengthen. It's going to be a long transfer season. 

Anyway, good luck to Lukasz Fabianski, our semi-final hero.