Getting What’s Coming to You

In the wake of the Birmingham game on Saturday, spirits have been high among gooners. Looking back on our last three fixtures (Chelsea, Wigan, Birmingham), it’s certainly a positive to say we came out of the Christmas season with 7 out of a possible 9 league points. We may not have gained all of those points in fixtures we hadexpected to win, but they are welcome results nonetheless.

The club’s performance during this period does, in fact, seem to have sealed the fate of one Manuel Almunia, who has all but disappeared from media attention. A couple of months ago gooners were complaining about the keeper and his (in)ability to put in a solid performance that would help keep us in the title race this season. The lamentations were many and well-justified at times. Though Almunia put in a couple decent shows this season he was still struggling to instill confidence in the fans of the club (I too wanted to give him a fair chance, but it seems he just wasn’t up to it). The defense situation at Arsenal is touchy, as we know, and in such a situation a solid, dependable keeper is necessary. Almunia has been off and injured for the last while and new reports say he has an ankle injury putting him out of performance for another while still. He hasn’t played for Arsenal in months now, giving Fabianski a shot at prove he’s able to be the club’s #1, for which the pole has, thus far, staked a compelling claim. Even Szczesny has gotten an extra match or two in showing that he, though young, can get the job done competently. It seems issues have conspired to see Almunia out as soon as possible, assuming clubs like Atletico Madrid are still interested.

In other news, Lee Bowyer, the Birmingham midfielder who stomped on Bacary Sagna’s leg during the weekend game with us, has been given a three-match ban by the FA for his thoughtless behaviour. It seems Bowyer and Alex McLeish, the club manager, have accepted the ban, but not without drumming up some controversy in the process. McLeish says that occurrences of this nature occur from time to time and players have to accept the consequences, but claims also that the big clubs get away with it while those comparable to Birmingham get punished.

But as soon as one of our players is involved, then there is a big furore and Bowyer’s got to be punished. I don’t want to see people tried by television. But if we are going to go through it, everyone should.

A valid point that fairness should be exercised in all these cases, but to imply that the big clubs get away with this sort of thing all the time is a bit much. Jack Wilshere received a red card for a bad tackle against the same side back in October. Laurent Koscielny has been carded five times this season, two of those being reds. The difference remains, perhaps, with the severity of the incident and the manner in which these poor decisions on the pitch play out. Wilshere immediately apologized and was served his ban in-game; I don’t recall Bowyer doing likewise and the decision on his fate came in retrospect after the game. At least Bowyer has been reprimanded for his actions, as any player should be, and perhaps the greatest part of this incident remains the fact that Sagna isn’t injured.

Anyway, tomorrow we take on Man City at home. This is a crucial match for Arsenal since City are currently second in the league and we are right behind them. If we take 3 points from them and send them on their way we’ll make some ground in the table and be one step closer to having a fighting chance in the league. We did well with a 3-0 win early in the season when we played them in Manchester and that kind of victory at home tomorrow will go a long way towards improving our home game record, just as our win against Chelsea did in December. We need these points, so let’s go and get them.

Cheers.