|
1999/00 First League Bit 14.9.99 Fiorentina 0 Arsenal 0 19.10.99 Arsenal 2 Barcelona 4
UEFA CUP 9.12.99 Nantes 3 Arsenal 3 (Arsenal win 6-3 on aggregate) 2.3.00 Arsenal 5 Deportivo La Coruna 1 9.3.00 Deportivo 2 Arsenal 1 (Arsenal win 6-3 on aggregate) 16.3.00 Arsenal 2 Werder Bremen 0 23.3.00 Werder Bremen 2 Arsenal 4 (Arsenal win 6-2 on aggregate) 20.4.00 Lens 1 Arsenal 2 (Arsenal win 3-1 on aggregate) Final 17.5.00 Arsenal 0 Galatasaray 0
Fiorentina 0 Arsenal 0 If you go up to anyone in the street in Florence and ask them for directions I bet they’ll fall over and hold various parts of their bodies, keeping one cheating eye open for anyone official looking. Certainly there were enough whizzy camera angles on the new ( C ) ON Digital broadcast to show an alarming amount of clear daylight between any Arsenal player you care to name and any of the conning, cheating Florentines. (Yeah, De Livio, we admire your low fat olive spread but as an honest footballer you are a complete disgrace.) Fiorentina, aided by a fleshy teutonic sack of half digested sauerkraut, masquerading as a referee, took every advantage of a man who might as well had ‘homer’ tattooed on his empty head. Certainly, Arsenal should have had a penalty in the first half when Bergkamp was sliced to the ground. But nothing happened and Dennis was left wondering whether the 20 hour car journey from Blighty was really worth it. It wasn’t until late in the second half when the referee, a typical German, in complete denial of an empirical reality, finally awarded Arsenal a penalty for the Italian keeper’s blatant felling of our Fred. For once Kanu’s lazy spot kick really did look lazy and the keeper smothered the feeble strike with the ease of man suffocating a hamster. On the whole, Arsenal played well. Decent control and lots of possession but an inability to progress up the football evolutionary ladder. The same old story. Ljungberg and his counterweight on the other wing, Overmars were a stunning, shifting running machine of some complexity. Indeed, it was Overmar’s penetrating early run down the left wing that led to a sweet cross that found Ljungberg clear through on the Fiorentina goal. A snap shot and a good reflex stop by the Italian keeper saw the ball turned around the post. Most of out hearts went with it. Up the other end, Batistuta belied his innocent Jesus looks by taking on Keown at freestyle elbowing, and, just about winning. We’ve seen a lot of Batistuta in the last couple of seasons and he may be a niggling git but the bloke on his day would be in Heaven’s First XI. Keown did a great job on keeping him down. Fiorentina one big chance came from a Batistuta knockdown that Alex Manninger heroically claimed. Grimandi and Vieira gradually claimed the midfield in the second half and made the game really one sided. In terms of possession it was just Arsenal and Arsenal. But once again any smidgen of luck was completely absent. It’s been so long since we’ve had the run of any game. Well before last season’s FA Cup semi, in fact. The best chance in the second half (apart from Adam’s flick/poke over the bar) was a Kanu dribble into the area topped with an orgasmic drag back and a rolling shot that rolled across the face of the area and into the darkness. Still, if anyone had said, go to Florence and nick a point, before the game, we would have been happy boys. But it should have been much, much more. A nice cathartic thrashing of Southampton will go some way to making us all feel better, but Kanu’s penalty would have been so much sweeter. Man of the Match: Freddy Ljungberg.
Arsenal 3 AIK Solna 1 The omens weren’t good. First God dumped about a million tons of water on us and tried to destroy London with some fairly random lightning bolts. Then the Underground people tried to asphyxiate and broil us in their disgusting trains and then the mass food poisoners of Wembley foisted their usual fare of severed dog dick frankfurters in a used tampax bun and cow’s udder burgers onto us. And we were told in no uncertain terms to get to Wembley ‘two hours before kick-off’ to avoid the rush and to avail ourselves of the suspiciously named ‘pre-match entertainment’ which seemed to consist of a fat bloke treating the Arsenal fans like fucking performing seals. But as we walked up Wembley Way, the skies cleared, and quite amazingly a real rainbow appeared. We know enough about primitive physics to know that a rainbow has no end, but to us it looked like it was illuminating Wembley, or at the very least as someone pointed out, Dollis Hill. Still any little ray of light is better than none. No-one, apart from David Dein, was happy about the return to Wembley. This year we had the delightful broken wooden seats, designed for midget arses and eighteen inch legs, with a view of the Olympic Gallery’s nether plumbing regions. Still, apart from Wembley’s famous obscuring pillars, we could see something a small green rhombus dotted with red and white ants. Despite all this there was a terrific sweaty, feverish atmosphere. Quite frankly, for the first 45 minutes Solna were a wonderful advertisement for Sweden; well organised, unimaginative and sterile. Arsenal, and in particular Overmars, took great delight in tearing large chunks out of their defence again and again, but to surprising little effect. Wide shots, high shots and then midway through the first half Bergkamp, surrounded by Swedes, fed a delightful ball through to a rampaging Ljungberg who skillfully toed the ball to the right of the advancing keeper. Neat, slide rule goal. So much for the Swedes being unimaginative and sterile. The second half, however, was a ..er completely different half. Arsenal were caught completely cold by the Swedes first attack. A bit of clever ball play that cleaved the defence and left Nutty playing everyone onside and the ball was slipped past the sliding Manninger. Bugger. You could have heard an ant scratching its balls, if it had any. To make things worse the bloody Solna supporters started chanting, ‘Vor not singering any more.’ Cheek. Arsenal then did their usual self destruction thing of hitting bars (Keown header) hitting back stanchions (Bergkamp) and completely missing the obvious sitter (Henry). So, twenty minutes to go and Wenger pulls off Overmars and Ljungberg and brings on Kanu and Terry Henry. We are faced then with that rarest of Arsenal beasts; a team with five strikers. You could almost smell the fear. Suddenly the ninety minutes were up. A bloke in a deeply unfashionable car coat held up a spotty thing that said that there were four minutes extra left. Meanwhile people were leaving in droves. Almost immediately Winterburn picked up a ball on the left wing, just outside his own area and digging deep, remembering his old Wimbledon training, hoofed the bastard upfield. Kanu pulled it down and was immediately pounced on by half a dozen Swedes. Falling to the ground, under the mass of bodies, he stuck out a long leg and flicked the ball into the only bit of space that wasn’t swarming with Scandinavians. Henry picked the ball up and lashed it across the keeper and across the goal. Really, it was a more difficult shoot than any of his earlier misses, but he put it away with a sweetness that we can, even now, still taste. Wembley went absolutely ballistic. The whole crowd (apart from one of my mates who had a dickie back) arose as one. Mere seconds later and the Swedes forced a corner. We could see Pat Rice down on the bench doing his pieces. And we all knew that the Swedes would score. We knew it. The ball went up and in; bobbled about a bit and was cleared to Bergkamp at the rear of the attacking pack of Solna players. He ran like the wind, outdistanced a whole retreating team (couldn’t have done that last season) and passed the ball to the running Henry. Into the area, a little side pass to Suker and a simple tap in made it 3-1. The noise when that one went in was so loud it was dangerous. We all turned as one to the Swedish supporters and informed them, in so many words, that they ‘weren’t singing anymore.’ What a little bit of magic that was. Somewhere in all the excitement, a little whistle went and the Arsenal players punched the night air and roared. We all had a bit of an impromptu knees-up and messy untuneful singalong. Marvellous. What a night. What a let off. Even being caught in the worse downpour outside of a Hammer horror film down Wembley Way on the journey home did nothing to put out the little fires burning in all of us. Magic night. Man of the Match: The one man midfield. Vieira. (All right, he did have Silvinho helping him.)
Barcelona 1 Arsenal 1 Ask any Arsenal fan who their second team is and they’d probably mutter, Barnet or Leyton Orient at a push. Ask any Arsenal fan who their favourite team abroad is and invariably you’ll get one answer; Barcelona. If you’ve ever been to the Catalan capital you’ll know that the people are absolutely mental about football. I remember being there about ten years ago and people were decorating the streets with flags and bunting in Barca colours. Now my Spanish is nearly as bad as my English, and Catalan with its amazing collection of Q’s U’s and X’s is just about impenetrable, but I asked a bloke up a ladder trying to tie a large eagle flag to a pole if this was all for a special match. "?Que." a)
Playing a team we’ve never heard of. (Their equivalent of the League
Cup, or something.) Which is why the only football shirt I own apart from my Arsenal collection is a Barcelona one. Which is why the result tonight is absolutely phenomenal. When the team ran out wearing that horrible hybrid third strip, the one with the yellow shirts and those disgusting white shorts, that looks like a cross between a primary school PE kit and Y-fronts, we all thought: Shit. We even look like the poor relatives. And in the first half we played exactly liked we looked. Dixon kicked an early shot off the line after Manninger froze under the Nou Camp glare, Keown and Adams worked like Trojans and tackled like demons and Vieira did his one man midfield act with considerable aplomb. About twenty minutes in a fierce Barca shot was fluffed by Manninger and popped out to Vieira. We’re all allowed a mistake now and again and Pat pissed around with the ball in his own box, attempting to juggle it onto his good foot and only succeeded in losing it completely to one of the burgundy and blue blokes who whacked it past the flailing Manninger. Shit, shit, shit. Arsenal, peculiarly soporific, wandered around the rest of the half, soaking up terrible pressure, yet hardly threatening at all. God knows what Wenger and Adams did at half time, but when they came out it was a completely different team. Still wearing the big pig pants, though. The second half was blinding. Don’t believe me. Get hold of a video or listen to a radio transcription. Arsenal were a marvel. Suddenly the most talented team on the planet started to look like Derby. Arsenal, though one down, were easing themselves back into the game. Then Grimandi got sent off for elbowing. In truth, the Barcelona players did make a right two veg and meat of anything that looked vaguely physical, but Grimandi, alas, just got caught. Que sera, que sera. We were all thinking it was getting a little late when Suker caught a ball just outside the area and let fly through a scrambling defensive screen. The shot was too hard for the keeper who parried it clumsily. It bounced back to the superb Kanu, who actually mis-hit it, albeit quite hard and straight. It went wide of the keeper and flew into the net. Christ, I felt like weeping. Everything after that was a blur. Which is kind of why this report is so knobbing late. Euphoria doesn’t include sitting down at a keyboard and trying to be reasonable or even spell things in a way that another human being can actually read. What a night. This competition is getting so hot. Three weeks time at Wembley can’t come soon enough. Man of the Match: One of his best games ever. Take a bow Mr Tony Adams.
Arsenal 2 Barcelona 4 When you play a team of giants on a giant-sized pitch, the one inviolate law of the universe is that you’re going to be stamped on. Big kids versus little kids. Cricket size scores and the losers feeling worthless to the pit of their stomachs. You think that feeling will last for the rest of your life. Still, Bergkamp’s goal was good. Man of the Match: Dennis Bergkamp. Class. (Let’s not mention some of the other players who didn’t quite do themselves justice, eh?)
Arsenal 0 Wembley 1 That's it. That's your lot. Now go home.
AIK Solna 2 Arsenal 3 An honourable little game, with a good line-up and two tasty goals from Marc Overmars. The first, an edge of the boot volley, was particularly satisfying. His second, a classic Overmars burst of speed, culminating in a fast one on one with the keeper, was a throw back to a couple of seasons ago, when the flying Dutchman was doing this sort of thing regularly. Suker, popping up on the far post for the third, was simply a case of arriving at the right moment for Kanu’s cut back. A little poacher’s cameo. Even Andersson for Solna scored a peach of a goal. It was a nice, pointless match; a testimonial, but with a face-saving dimension. Passion, if you were looking for it, was buried on the wide acres of Wembley the week before. Arsenal’s European season is now in the two-bob UEFA cup, along side such great winners as Newcastle. It’s probably all we deserve. Man of the Match: Marc Overmars. Now do it where it matters.
UEFA CUP (Yes, we know this should be on a separate page, but bone idleness looms large at the moment. We'll sort it out later. Maybe.)
Arsenal 3 Nantes 0 Well, in one respect Wembley was far superior. European matches usually start with everyone waving a piece of red or white cardboard that is left on the seat so you can create a bit of a spectacle. That lasts about thirty seconds and then everyone folds them into aeroplanes and chucks them at the pitch. At Wembley this was a genuine thing of beauty watching the planes spiral and drift. However, at Highbury it’s a dangerous rain of pointed missiles; blokes in anoraks with paper exocets sticking out of bleeding earholes, people looking under the seats for where their displaced eyes have rolled. You get the picture. It was also made me laugh so much I ached. I bet if there’s another home European match they’ll elbow all the paper ammo. The thing is most people felt uneasy about being in Europe at all. When you’re out, you’re out. That seems fair. This new Champions’ League get out of jail free card was frowned upon by most of the purists. Still, at least we went in as Spurs went out. Karmic balance restored. Indeed, most of the players looked a little sheepish when they ran out onto the pitch. Marc Overmars described it well when he said they all felt like ‘they had been relegated.’ Nantes, wearing an old Norwich kit, occupied a slot somewhere between Derby and Leicester; a combative midfield with speedy journeymen up front and back four of positively pygmy proportions. I’ve had boils bigger than their keeper. Ultimately, this was a pretty dire game. Petit got slower and slower and finally went off limping, Vieira gave the ball away frequently and Grimandi, overwhelmed by all the French people on the pitch, wanted to give the ball to as many of them as possible. Arsenal’s first goal was from that rarest of beasts; a penalty. Kanu was felled in the box and Overmars stepped up and only just got the ball into the right side netting; Nantes Mini-Me in goal got a tiny hand to it. Half time was mainly for blokes with paper darts sticking out of their heads to sort out other guffawing geezers who had chucked them. Absolutely first class half time entertainment. Early on in the half Nantes went down to ten men. Somebody scythed Overmars, someone else shoved the ref and someone walked the long walk. Bugger knows who, but he had a yellow shirt on. The rest of the half was one of those sterile affairs full of the misplaced pass and the pointless run. Knowing my luck, when I’m laying there on my deathbed, that’ll be the half I’ll remember. Seven minutes from time a squared ball found Nigel Winterburn on the left wing facing the North Bank. One step, then another and then whammo. A thirty yard diagonal special that smashed into the right inside side netting. Terrific goal and one to replace Nutty’s special against Chelsea in the pre match videos. First class strike. Still, I wish he wouldn’t smile; it frightens the kids and makes the animals twitchy. With only a couple of minutes left Bergkamp got the ball in the area, watched the advancing keeper, shot and bent the ball into the far side of the net. Simple goal, that looked sensational in the replay. A curious night, boring, but ultimately a decent score. Goodnight, I’m off to catch a plane in the side the head. Man of the Match: Nigel Winterburn. (And England have a problem on the left side…)
Nantes 3 Arsenal 3 (Arsenal win 6-3 on aggregate) You’d have thought, reading the match reports in the Daily toilet papers, that Arsenal were a bit lucky to scrape this one. But having seen the game, Arsenal at one point were 6-1 up on aggregate, sitting on three away goals, we can tell you that the Arsenal team in the second half, were as about effective as a bag of chocolate tools. Well, would you be arsed? It’s true that Nantes early goal from a free kick did cause a few collies to wobble, but Arsenal’s demolition in the next half hour was the most complete rout seen in that region since the Germans fancied an outing in 1940 or when the last time the local farmers protested over the fact that Brussels was sick of subsidising their medieval agricultural methods. Goals from Henry and Overmars sealed it, but it was the first goal that caused many eyebrows to be raised in North London; the sight of Grimandi beating an offside trap to score had many of us staring into half empty Guinness glasses strongly suspecting that someone had slipped us a tab of acid. Mental. A serviceable win and a forty five minute performance from everyone except Manninger. Onwards and upwards. Man of the Match: Manninger.
Arsenal 5 Deportivo La Coruna 1 See, if you hang around for long enough, not one bus comes along but a whole convoy of them. This, in anybody’s reality, even Harry Harris of the Daily Mirror, was an awesome performance. Deportivo, currently leading the Spanish league by six clear points, are on current form, one of the strongest sides in Europe. Certainly, they are far superior to the Marseilles side that saw off the geriatric Chelsea in the Champions’ league and the tidy but uninspiring Bordeaux that Man United made such heavy weather of despatching. With a midfield loaded with Brazilian and Argentines it was with some trepidation that we listened to Wenger’s team selection: Adams on the bench along with Parlour and Vieira suspended. Luzhny and Grimandi look good on paper, but less so on grass. So what happened then? Try veritable goal fest and the most complete, satisfying game of the whole season. Being of a lazy disposition and the fact that it’s two in the morning and I’ve at least got to string a couple of coherent sentences together tomorrow at work, I’ll take the liberty and luxury of listing the goals one by one. Goal 1. Five minutes gone and Arsenal are pressing like their lives depended on it. A smashing cross from the left by a sprinting Henry finds the head of the Arsenal captain who bullets the ball into the net past the Cameroony (is that right?) ‘keeper. The only glitch in this reality is that the Arsenal captain happens to be Lee Dixon. I had no idea that he actually had a head, but a small brain cell in the spongy part of my head undamaged by Guinness, informs me that Lee got a goal a couple of seasons ago with his noggin against Newcastle. This one was better. Thank you kindly young cell. Goal 2. Overmars on the right crosses and Henry meets it cleanly and powers the ball into the net. Loads of other beautiful stuff including a Bergkamp run, Bergkamp falling over, imperiously rising, still in control, beating players, then shooting. Marvellous. Half time. Deportivo, stung, lashed and abashed, start the second half well. Someone finally marks Bergkamp and a nippy little Brazilian squirms into the Arsenal box, touches nobody but still manages to tumble under a phantom Ljungberg challenge and con a penalty. Another Brazilian takes the penalty and makes Seaman look like a right dick with a cheeky lob/chip or what the marshmallowed brained Ron Atkinson would refer to ‘as a bit of an eyebrow.’ (He used that one in the United game against Bordeaux. Nobody I talked to has the foggiest.) Grimandi scythes down the Deportivo scorer who pretends to hit Gilles, who in turn pretends to be hurt. The ref pretends to send off the Spanish player, but refs don’t pretend and the Brazilian finally walks off to us lot of trogs waving and singing, ‘adios, adios.’ Goal 3. Kanu comes on, falls over just outside the area. Petit takes a looping free kick that goes right across the front of the goal. At the very last minute Henry glides in and heads the ball back across the goal and into the interior of the far side netting. Yeah. Fat people dance and old people jump up and down in that painful way that only old people can manage. Joyous bedlam. Goal 4. The pick of a gobsmacking bunch. Kanu gets a long ball that he runs onto; he heads it down to his feet which are about a million miles away from his head. He runs, loses the defenders, goes to the side of the goalkeeper, waits for the ‘keeper to commit himself, he then STOPS TIME, makes subatomic particles freeze in space, rounds the upturned turtle of a ‘keeper and nonchalantly slots the ball home. Beg, borrow or actually purchase a vid of this gem. Watch the pause before the stroked goal. You can keep your wandering lonely as clouds; this was pure poetry. Goal 5. Kanu gets crocked. Bergkamp takes a free kick, outside of the area. It hits the outside bloke of the wall, the ball soars sidewise and up and of course cannons into the net. Bergkamp does that rarest of things and actually laughs his head off and then is substituted to applause so loud my ears were still ringing in the pub an hour later. Wow. Let’s be honest we’re not going to lose 4-0 in Coruna, not unless someone tampers with the aeroplane. Big night and the high point of a stop/start season. Are you watching Tottenham? Men of the Match: Henry, Bergkamp, Ljungberg, Kanu and Lee Dixon, for a pukka captain’s role.
Deportivo 2 Arsenal 1 Well, what did you expect? The first leg was so magnificent that this one was reduced to the simple mantra: ‘Don’t piss around and don’t lose 4-0.’ As it stood, Henry scored first for the Arse, Deportivo replied and then snuck another bang on the 90 minutes. That’s it. Couple of San Miguels, plate of Paella and catch the first flight back to Luton. Job done. Man of the Match: All looked half a kip to me and playing with zero centre backs made us look like a team made of red and white jelly. OK, Henry then for the onion bagger.
Arsenal 2 Werder Bremen 0 The sight of massed ranks of Germans all pointing in unison does nothing for my general well being. The fact that they were all pointing with green and white sausage shaped balloons did little to lessen the effect. Some of the balloons were even ribbed; obviously for extra pleasure. True to archetype the Germans were well drilled, tidy and hunted in packs. They were also narcoleptically boring, managing a grand total of exactly nil shots over ninety minutes. They were not without skill, but bereft of any flare, their one tactic seemed to be to catch Arsenal on the hop. So we were treated to a choppy sterile game where nobody seemed to get going except the little bald referee, who enjoyed himself immensely. Good ref, too. And we don’t say that too often. Most of the early balls appeared to fall to Ray Parlour, who, in the middle of his ‘couldn’t kick fresh air’ phase, was a right royal liability. Petit was missing and a pushed forward Grimandi, somewhat bizarrely, deputised for him. The big buzz around Highbury was the return of Captain Tone. Indeed, midway through the first half, Adams had a splendid volley blocked at the near post by the Werder ‘keeper. Nothing much appeared to be happening when Vieira, just outside his own area, launched a ball deep into the Werder half. Henry, beating the strung out Maginot line of the Germans, ran with the ball, went one on one with the ‘keeper and tucked it away with aplomb that was a bit of a peach. (Say it quick it’ll make more sense.) Nothing at all happened in the second half apart from the arrival of Overmars, Sukor and Kanu for Parlour (poor) Henry (terrific) and Bergkamp (big drippy poo squirting pants.) Well, we’re all allowed a bad night. At one point Kanu decided to lay down and die. In the process a completely guileless ball squirted to Ljungberg who rolled the ball in the vague direction of the goal and miraculously found a gap that the German goalkeeper had overlooked. 2-0. And that was it. Boring as Bonn as clinical as Cologne and definitely not a Werder original. Next week should be better. Man of the Match: Tony Adams, though Vieira was cool too.
Werder Bremen 2 Arsenal 4 Over the years we’ve all learnt the dubious skill of being able to cheer the impassive glass of a television screen as if it were a living footballing vista. Tonight, down at the Gunners’ pub the adulation towards the glass teat in the corner reached fever pitch. Which leads me nicely to Nick Hornby. This evening we spent the whole of the match standing next to the famous Arsenal one. He’s much shorter than his paperback photos, his ears stick out enough for small boys to make fun of them, and, if the truth be known, he’s a bit on the posh side. Along with his shiny head and FA Cup handle ears he was with a couple of mates and a dreadful dark-haired woman in a red suit who just reeked of ‘media’. Indeed, when she went up to the bar to you could almost hear her shitting herself as she ordered a round, surrounded as she was by the bottom most flotsam of Arsenal supporters. And her whole round consisted of halves. Honest. And the match? Absolute magic. Maybe that wheel of fate has finally turned. For the first ten minutes it was all Werder. Transformed from the Teutonic automatons of the first leg they ripped into the Gunners like a team oblivious to the score of the first leg. Arsenal, standing around like red pegs, seemed mesmerised by the Germans fluidity. That was until Kanu got the ball on the left wing deep in the Werder half. He pushed a nothing ball to Ray Parlour, who stuck out on the bi-line, swung his foot back, in a classic bit of hit and hope. Even when the ball was nearing the end of its flight we had no idea that the leather pellet was going to go beyond the ‘keeper, bend, hit the post and end up in the net. Pandemonium is not an unusual emotion in pub ties, but the complete delirious surprise that enveloped the pub was a new one on me. 0-1, and 3-0 on aggregate. After that Kanu brought things back to reality by having a solid strike saved and we all got another pint in waiting for the war of attrition to kick in. Scant minutes later Ray Parlour received a ball in exactly the same place and we all sniggered into out Guinesses saying that another goal was one. It’s called sarcasm for any of our American cousins reading this. Ray ran the ball in (we’ve seen this a million times before, there’s not actually much point in watching) he beat one man, (nah, over the bar, side netting, we know this one) beat another (oooh, that’s different) side stepped a third (this, is an acid flashback we figured) and bent the ball around the ‘keeper and banged the ball off the same post as the first goal for the second. There is a God. The thing Ray Parlour has been threatening for his whole life has finally come to pass. Satori, my son, I think it’s called. This is where we lose the plot. Hyper Estacticism + Guinness + Confined Spaces + A score you dream about = drunken blissful forgetfulness. Arsenal’s third was made by…Ray Parlour, who did all the running, then at the last moment squared it to Thierry Henry for the simplest of goals. Bremen scored two, my mate Chris bought another brace of pints and so it went. The German’s goals were good, but the beers were better. And the last goal? A break from midfield and an Arsenal player one on one with the German goalkeeper. And that player was? Ray Parlour. Hit it beautifully to one side of the committed goalkeeper to claim his first ever Arsenal hat trick. Stupendous. There you have the biggest European night since that last one (Parma final, we reckon) marred only by the inexplicable sending off of Henry for a tackle that would have struggled to make yellow in the Premiership and the snapping groin of Tony Adams. Sometimes it’s just good to breathe that red and white air. Man of the Match: Ray Parlour. A career best.
Arsenal 1 Lens 0 We know that a lot of people who read this stuff reside in all sorts of exotic climes far away from the hallowed halls of Highbury. And we know how much some of you miss the local nights out, the camaraderie, the blush of the floodlights from the top of Avenall Road, the shouting conga of supporters winding its way down the hill. We know you can get all misty eyed about home matches when you can’t actually make it; when half the curve of the planet separates you from Highbury. We know how you feel. But really, tonight, count yourself lucky. This was a game that refused to rise above the abysmal. Arsenal were one ahead as early as the 90th second when a through ball found Bergkamp in space, who taking his time, lobbed the ball past the encroaching ‘keeper for a perfectly placed goal. And that, as they say, was that. Lens, a team of talentless triers, looked like Tottenham on a bad day and Sheffield Wednesday on a good one; a pissing awful mess of journeymen and first division sloggers. And, to be fair, Arsenal matched them player for player in terms of mundanity and ineptitude. God, what a long night. Aided by an Austrian referee who demonstrated that short, dark Austrians who point a lot are nobbin’ bad news, the game, four and half hours long, by my watch, was as interesting as a gland condition. Indeed, the only higlight of the night, was a discussion that Austria, as a country, deserves to be expunged from the map of Europe for all time. What have they ever given us? Pastry, the deeply suspect Waltz, fussy architecture and the highly killable Von Trapp family. Take then all out, I say. A poor, poor game. Tedious, cold and interminable. A bit like Austria. Man of the Match: Absolutely nobody.
Lens 1 Arsenal 2 The thing about European competition is that you get to see how good British policeman are (with the notable exception of the Met and the South Yorkshire constabulary). Well, maybe ‘good’ is a little strong, but you realise how reasonable the English boys in blue can be compared to their continental equivalents. We’ve had it straight from the horse’s mouth that with ten minutes to go to kick-off the French old Bill were blockading Arsenal fans, stopping them from entering the ground, even though they had tickets. After a few polite queries (in French, I may add- not everyone is a little Englander) the Gallic plod decided that détente was now at an end and decided to open a few English skulls and see just how far the dreaded BSE had actually penetrated. Same old story. I thought the Cup Winners Cup final in Paris was bad enough with the police confiscating everybody’s loose change, explaining that the coins were an ‘offensive weapon’. Well, it’s your bleedin’ currency Pascal. Same old story. God knows what Copenhagen will be like. In the ground were 35,000 Lee Dixon haters and about 5,000 bludgeoned gooners. Honestly, Lee Dixon may be a lot of things, but cheat isn’t one of them. (Wembley, last year, for the terminally confused).You’d think the French could come up with a better villain than a bloke who used to play for Crewe who has a penchant for knocking people’s glasses off in Row Z of the North Bank with his over exuberant shooting. For the first twenty minutes Lens stronged it. A muscular side, they bossed the middle of the park and surprisingly managed to confuse Adams on a couple of occasions, one of which, only a timely Keown interception stopped our hearts, which were firmly in our mouths, from attacking us. After that the Arsenal found that magical second gear that have been developing for the last couple of seasons and slowly asserted themselves to such a degree that it was embarrassing. Bergkamp, Vieira and Silvinho particularly impressed, whilst Petit’s personal stock continued to dive like an over subscribed dot com. He’s developing Michael Thomas syndrome before our very eyes. Indeed, at one point, Petit through on goal only had to put either side of the French ‘keeper, but suddenly turned into a less mobile version of Stephen Hawking and put the ball into a passing cirrus cloud formation. Quite the worse miss of the season. By now, Arsenal’s superiority was getting a bit uncomfortable. As half time crept up, a nothing ball found Henry near the edge of the area surrounded by Lens players. He turned, whacked the ball and it seemed like twenty minutes later that we all caught up with fact that the ball, quite impossibly was billowing out of the back of the net. Astonishing goal. In the second half Arsenal continued with their exhibition; putting it wide, putting it over, putting it just in reach of the Lens ‘keeper, making him look better than he actually was; it went on and on, but with no real result. And then Lens scored. For a few minutes life looked a little rocky. And then Lens missed a sitter that made Petit’s look difficult and you could sense the northern French wind turn direction again. Then Overmars made a typical bandy legged run, slipped the ball to the running Kanu, who stroked it into the Lens goal. Game over. So, we’re in final that we don’t deserve to be in, in a competition we shouldn’t have been in in the first place against another team in exactly the same boat. And I’ll tell you this; it’s going to be great. After all, a tearful Man United fan phoned me on Thursday and said tongue in cheek, ‘do you think they’d let Man U in the UEFA cup now?’ No way. You’re not good enough. Man of the Match: Vieira.
Arsenal 0 Galatasaray 0 Turks win on penalties (Saw that one coming, didn’t we?) It’s hard to write about disappointment. Especially on a night when Arsenal came up against an average Galatasaray side and matched them every step of the way in terms of mediocrity and banality. Despite the crowing of the pundits, this one was always going to be close. Arsenal hit bars and posts, the Turks hit the Arsenal and ultimately it was in the suspect arena of the penalty shoot out that let us down once again. Sukor pranged the post and Vieira wobbled the bar and half of Copenhagen exploded. Because we were watching the game in Green Lanes, most of that went skyward as well. It’s a very odd feeling watching squads of riot police steaming into little gaggles of gooners whilst the local Turkish population do what they do they best; make a lot of noise and drive cars dangerously. Even walking up by the Arsenal ground at two in the morning, it was amazing the amount of caved in shop fronts, broken glass and soft, suspicious debris that was strewn everywhere. The only winners tonight were those 21st century equivalents of the vulture; the 24 hour glaziers. A disappointing season and a shitty day. Goodnight. See you in August. Maybe.
I Current Season I Match Archives I Mail us I Links I Home I
|
