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August 1997 23.8.97 Southampton 1 Arsenal 3
Leeds 1 Arsenal 1 Have you ever been to Leeds? I've got this theory that when the rest of the country is fed-up with its old bird-crapped, exhaust-blackened Victorian buildings that they ship them off to Leeds, much the same as they do to roundabouts in Harlow. Certainly, sending old, knackered things to Leeds seems to be a policy that the management at Elland Road have gleefully embraced over the last few years; I mean, really, I wouldn't feed Ian Rush to my dog. However, old crafty George has bought extremely well in the close season; Bowyer was a real steal and Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink should be the secret weapon in everybody's fantasy league side. Last season in the Portuguese league he managed to score nearly as many goals as the entire Leeds side managed in the Premier League. So, it was a bit daunting when Hasselbaink ran out with just the word 'Jimmy' on the back of his shirt. Rather like Schwarzenegger just having 'Arnie'. Arsenal, fresh from completely flattening Norwich a few days before, didn't look bad on paper: Seaman, Winterburn, Vieira, Bould, Wright, Bergkamp, Overmars, Parlour (!) Petit, Grimandi and Garde. Maybe, Wenger is saving Hughes, Anelka and Boa Morte for Coventry on Monday, I don't know. In truth, we did look a bit light at the back; a Keown or an Adams or even a huffing and puffing Dixon could have made the difference, particularly with their goal, in the second half, when Wallace was given free reign to cross for 'Jimmy' to nail it past Seaman. Wrighty could have had a hat-trick in the first half. He fluffed at the end of a blinding bit of play between Overmars and Petit and had one saved by Martyn. Funnily, his goal was the most difficult of the lot. He ran past Radebe and shot from that angle we all know is impossible (put the dog in goal and try it in the back garden; you'll be there all night.) Martyn nearly had it, but it was a sweet goal. Leeds surprised everybody by exhibiting the beginnings of a fledgling midfield; Bowyer had a good game. And George, canny George, well he got someone to man mark Vieira and that dried up our midfield wellspring. It reminded me of those finals against Sheffield Wednesday when Graham had Sheridan marked so tightly that he couldn't supply Waddle. Smart Georgie, well smart. Arsenal are going to need time to gel. The Frenchies all got booked, basically for looking a bit continental. Wrighty is going like a rocket at the moment, but we all know that rockets have a tendency to explode, let's hope he can hang on to his nut. Man of the Match: Ian Wright. (Four to go.) Postscript 1: Kevin Campbell scored again (only a year after his hat trick.) Postscript 2: George Graham has also tipped the Arse to win the league, saying that Leeds would be 'satisfied with a top six spot.' Yeah, reckon. Remember, George, we know you. Postscript 3: My mate's excuse to his missus that it would be 'great to see the National Armoury in Leeds this weekend' ended in tears when she found out she was going to see a load of old rusty swords with the kids whilst he was going to 'just pop out' for a couple of hours to see the Gunners. Crap blag of the year, I reckon.
Arsenal 2 Coventry 0 Don’t let anyone convince you that playing games in the summer is a good idea. 37,000 people sweating in unison, all looking like they’d been licked by a large dog, is not my idea of fun. Humid didn’t even begin to describe the conditions. Melting inside an Arsenal replica shirt (what were they trying to replicate? building the fucking Burma railway?) drinking a hot cup of tea, whilst various winged and legged things crawled all over your face, it made me wistful for those ball achingly cold days of deep winter when stout English journeymen and yeomanry kicked a pig’s bladder between two distant hamlets. Ah, but that was the old Arsenal, today we are Noveau Arse or ‘Francenal’ as my mate has dubbed them and to keep our coterie of foreign exiles happy it seems that we must have their weather as well. (Incidentally, has anyone noticed how the British have ‘weather’ but everyone else in the world has a ‘climate’?) Probably because of all the water hanging in the air but it seemed to me that the pitch looked a bit turquoise, rather like a big swimming pool. I mentioned this to some bloke who looked at me as if I were stark staring mad. I think the heat must have been giving me the bends. The situation was only hastily retrieved by firstly the arrival of the teams and secondly by the dropped jaws of disbelief prompted by my mates noticing that the geezer sitting in front of us had a big, fluffy car coat on. Come to Highbury and rub shoulders with the mentally ill. Outstanding. Again, most of the defence was absent. Adams and Dixon should be back for the next game against Southampton, Keown maybe a little later. The big surprise was the absence of Bould; Seaman filled in as captain, whilst Marshall took the centre back spot. With the exception of Anelka all the French Connection played. We spent most of the first half wondering if this was the same Coventry side that put three past Chelsea on Saturday. Predominantly one footed, one sided and over reliant on the breakaway, they looked like they had been assembled from a show of hands of lorry drivers in a Little Chef. Chelsea must reek if they lost to this bunch of nonces. Still, we didn’t have it all own way. Our defence; Winterburn, Parlour (flying wing back!) Garde, Marshall, Grimandi and a floating supplemental Petit made a lot of stretched leg interceptions that had a few of us sweating even more if that was possible. The midfield, predominantly Petit and Vieira, but supplemented (that word again) by Essex’s favourite son, young Ray parlour, saw a lot of the ball in the first half. Vieira was outstanding and Petit, baring the few occasions he was caught in possession, showed enough flashes of brilliance to get us all up and shouting. One crossfield ball to Parlour was breathtaking. Upfront, Bergkamp carried on from where he left off last season. His highlights included a lob on the volley that only just went over the bar and a crouching directed header that just went wide. We could have watched him all night. Of the new boys Petit will be the one to watch. He roams the pitch at will and appears to able to put the ball down on a sixpence. When he adjusts to the headless chicken pace, he’ll be brilliant. Wright’s first goal came from a bit of sustained pressure that started with Marshall hitting the post, a dodgy clearance, a fierce Vieira shot that Oggi couldn’t hold and Mr Wright popping up to slot the rebound in. That took us to half time. We all did our melting lolly impersonations and it was while we were still mopping up our liquid flesh that Wrighty ran down Richard Shaw who fluffed a back pass badly. Even with Oggi lumbering towards Wright looking like something Hammer films ran up in a workshop, you knew that there was only ever going to one outcome. Ian slotted it sweetly into the far inside netting. What a satisfying bulge. Petit immediately came off, obviously for a knock or tap and Platt came on. Now, I’m no fan of David Platt but the people who booed him when he came on should be ashamed of themselves. We’re not Spurs supporters, we’re better than that pinheaded, flash git mentality. If you want to moan all the time, then fuck off to White Hart Lane. If anything Platt held the midfield together extremely well. At the end of ninety minutes Coventry had the grand total of two shots on goal registering on the Jumbotron. All in all a good, promising performance. Overmars, who Coventry seemed shit scared of, had two men on him at all times and really didn’t shine. I thought he was playing too wide; somewhere near the chip shop in Gillespie Road, I reckoned. His time will come. With the mathematical madness that comes from only playing two games it appears that we are top of the league. Guess which mob from the other end of Seven Sisters is bottom? I know it’s bollocks, but I love it anyway. Man of the Match: Patrick Vieira. (Wrighty needs one to tie, two to fly.)
Southampton 1 Arsenal 3 You just knew with all the attention on Wrighty this week that he was bound not to score. Despite what a couple of the national newspapers reported it seemed pretty clear to us that Southampton were fairly keen to keep on top of him; Monkou being the obvious shadow. However, gone are the days when sitting on Wrighty would cause the rest of the team to go to sleep. It’s a bit like trying to put a fat bloke in a pair of size 28 Levi’s; it goes in all right one way but squirts out the other side. Arsenal are difficult to contain now. With the Praetorian guard shepherding Mr Wright this was going to be the day of Overmars and Bergkamp. Certainly, early on, Overmars played a terrific one-two with Wright on the left wing, received it back, beat two Southampton defenders and smashed it past the ‘keeper. Of course, Southampton promptly equalised with a good cross that took a wobbly deflection before it was put away. After that, Southampton demonstrated that they are a side that are not going to be rolled over too much this season. We saw them against Man Utd the other week and they looked far the better side. Their new signing, Kevin Davies looks a lad to watch out for. He went close and Seaman was forced to make a dodgy catch that he held but seemed to stumble over the line with. Honestly, if the boot was on the other foot, you’d have to say it was a goal. However, the rest of the game was really the Dennis Bergkamp show. His first goal, a run from the halfway line, where the Southampton defence parted like germs avoiding penicillin, was quite astonishing. After he had left the Saints’ trailing, his shot, fierce and low, rasped across the face of the goal. A definite goal of the year. His second, another blaster, came from a tussle with Benali, where shirts, elbows and phone numbers were exchanged before Dennis tore away, ran like the wind, stabbed and gave the net another good billowing. Not much else happened. The Dell is still a complete scrapyard; an outside toilet with seats. A kind of horrible mutated MFI project with not enough wood or screws. However, a small inconvenience considering the quality of the game. The talk of the weekend will be Vialli’s four against Barnsley, but the cognoscenti will be studying those action replays of Den’s goals. Brilliant. Man of the Match: Dennis Bergkamp.
Leicester 3 Arsenal 3 Right, let’s get the ruck out of the way first. After 8 minutes of injury time which saw the score go from 1-2 to 3-3 the Arsenal, led by the surprising figure of Dennis Bergkamp, surrounded the chronologically challenged referee, Mr Graham Barber and demanded, in the best tradition of a milling mob, an explanation for the mini match he saw fit to tag onto the main game. During this melee, Ian Wright came off the bench to add his sixpence worth of opinion. Steve Walsh, the Leicester captain, decided to say a few words (ie. take the piss) and wind Wrighty up even more. We then had the bizarre spectacle of Walsh (six feet plus and built like a bungalow) offering to punch Wright (five plus and built like a bulimic greyhound) all around Filbert Street. Walsh, the aggressor, clearly asked Wright to ‘come and have a go’. Wright surrounded by various people including Pat Rice and Gary Lewin just glared a bit and that was that. Ipso facto, Wright, Vieira (wot he do?) and Walsh are now up before the FA. Wright will probably cop the big one (£20,000 fine, six match ban) Vieira, probably a two matcher (we’re talking ‘examples’ here) and a violent git like Walsh (sent off 13 times in his career) will probably be given a six inch ruler across the knuckles and a Chinese burn. Obviously, Wright should have left his skinny ass warming the bench and let the other lads sort it out. But the reason we love him is because of his passion; you can’t just turn it on and off like a tap. (Try doing it at home and see how your missus likes it). Wright will go down for this one. Let’s hope he drags Walsh with him. Before we attract the ire of the Filbert Street Firm and all wake up with fox’s heads in our beds or something, let’s just say a few nice things about Leicester. Firstly, they played the game like a cup final. Their unyielding attitude reminded us of Arsenal 1991-94. Never give up, never beaten until the final whistle goes, even if it is on different day from when the game started. Their goals came out of muscle, sweat and willpower. Not pretty, but bloody effective. George Graham would have been proud of them. Enough of the vegetables, let’s talk about the meat. Dennis Bergkamp. Vialli may have got four against Barnsley, but apart from his first can anybody remember the others? This was the classiest Arsenal hat trick, probably ever. The first, a short corner from Overmars to Dennis, who moved his leg back as if it were sprung and hit a twenty yard dipper over the defence and into the far box of the goal before Keller could even breath. The passage of the ball was so perfect, its momentum so precise, that it was hard to believe it had actually gone in. Keller was so dumbstruck and static that you wondered if it was Helen in goal, not Kasey. His second, a run through from a lashing, diving midfield, struck Keller before ballooning skyward and landing sweetly in the goal. The third, reminiscent of his goal against Spurs last year, was a long, high pass that he controlled on the edge of the penalty area, juggled twice in the air, flicked it around Elliot and whacked it in. Honestly, no matter what I write, it can’t do justice to the vision, movement and skill of Bergkamp. You’ll just have to wait for the video. On the down side, the defence creaked at times. All of Leicester’s goals came from Arsenal players ball watching, not ball playing. Strap up Adams’ rib and get him on the park, for God’s sake. What a mixed bag of a game: a sublime hat trick that you’ll be boring your great grandchildren with and a soppy ruck that’ll keep Wrighty indoors until Christmas. Every match now is an event. Exciting times. Bring on the wingless cockerels. Man of the Match: Guess. Go on, have a bash.
Arsenal 0 Tottenham 0 Well, if you ignored the different coloured shirts this game looked a lot like that ad where the two cloned teams play one another. In this case Arsenal ‘97 versus Arsenal ‘92. Our Arsenal, the 97 mob, played with flair, vision and more than a little swagger. The other Arsenal, played with their backs against the wall, their noses to the grindstone, their shoulders to the wheel and their cocks on the block. To be fair, Mabbutt and particularly Sol Campbell were quite magnificent. To be unfair, (after all, that’s why you read this drivel) Spurs were jammy, lucky and had the whiff of a team that might be playing Port Vale a couple of times next season. Let’s have a look at a couple facts and figures. Arsenal had 27 stabs at goal, 13 corners, hit the bar three times in the first half and the post once. The Scum also were down to 10 men by half time owing to the enthusiasm of Justin Edinburgh; a player so dirty that an early bath was essential. Overmars hit the bar in the first half with a cracking shot that wobbled the wood. Walker probably still hasn’t seen it. Wright did likewise; his angle was only a couple of degrees out, just enough for all the scumbag journos to start whittering on about Bastin’s sodding record. Earlier, the peculiar looking David Howells (am I the only one who thinks he looks like something out of a Dr Seuss book?) nearly put through his own net and Arsenal generally had a lively time in the Tottenham penalty area. If the first half was the Dambusters then the second was the Alamo. Wrighty went close with a dazzling overhead kick and that really was the highlight. Spurs, by that time had shut up shop with Scales, Mabbutt, Neilson and bloody Campbell. That was that. There was always the danger of Spurs running up the park and banging one in, but Ferdinand looked so doggy he didn’t look like he could score in an Essex disco. A peculiar game; frustrating and a little lacking in passion for a local derby. The Spurs fans were ecstatic, ‘Ten men, we only had ten men." It looked to me if that only had one and quite unbelievably his name was Campbell. Man of the Match: Patrick Vieira. (Well, I’m not going to nominate anyone from Spurs am I?)
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