In our best performance this year we humiliated a struggling Blackburn Rovers with our superior attacking display.
The beginning of this article was written before our win over Blackburn Rovers yesterday.
Here we are, now our fourth game without another win in the Premier league, and the best we could do was a nil-nil draw.
Except for a couple of near misses by van Persie, it was a dismal game that has just added to my sorrows. A 0-0 draw against a team that is almost certain for relegation is not good enough for a side like Arsenal.
I was reading on twitter the comments from other Gooners, and except for one poor soul who said “come on stop the moaning let’s get behind the team.”
I thought to myself what team, we are not a team, just a bunch of individuals trying to do their best and not screw up.
We are a ship afloat without a rudder, or even better we are like the Costa Concordia being steered by our manager Arsene Wenger closer to the rocks as each game passes, and he still thinks we can finish in fourth place.
This is what Le professor had to say after our latest display:
“Of course I am confident of a top four finish,” he said. “There is a long way to go. I’m confident we can come back. We have come through a difficult period. We lost three league games but could have won them as well.
“We are confident but I believe we have to produce our form game by game. For us, every game in the championship now is a cup final. We go into a period now playing in the FA Cup, playing in the Champions League and, combined, those three will be difficult.”
We are now sitting seven points below Chelsea who are in that all-important fourth spot, and along with Liverpool have aspirations of playing in the Champions league next season.
Prior to the match against Blackburn Rovers, some angry fans had threatened to put black bin liners over the backs of empty seats to demonstrate how we were losing fans due to the terrible performances this season.
Here we are now match day, and I am watching the game from a friend’s house in a very snowy town close to Bristol.
While the threatened bin bags failed to materialize the number of empty seats was quite noticeable, but partly to blame was the weather, as it was bloody cold outside.
Sixty nine seconds into the game, and bang!!! Our flamboyant Dutch striker puts us one up. The lead was short lived, though, as Blackburn put themselves level after a well-taken free kick from Pedersen.
RVP then scored again to put us on top, which was followed by our amazing young starlet Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain who scored his first Premier League goal, which was then followed up with another later in the match.
Let’s hope that Fabio Capello was watching, and that we get to see our youngster playing for England in this summer’s Euro’s.
Gael Givet was then sent off for a lunging two-footed tackle on Robin van Persie, following which the flood gates were open, and Arsenal went on to demolish the ten-man Rovers.
This is what Scotsman and Blackburn Rovers manager Steve Kean had to say following the match:
“It was a tough afternoon. When you come here and try to compete against Arsenal with 11 men its tough enough,” he said.
“The two things that had the biggest bearing on the game was the early goal and us going down to 10 men.
The ref didn’t have a tough decision to make. We all know the rules now, if you leave the ground with two feet that type of challenge will not be accepted any longer. That made it very difficult for us.”
RVP got his hat trick, his 121st goal for Arsenal, which moved him into the top ten all-time goal scorers above Gunners favourite Dennis Bergkamp.
The final goal of the afternoon came from substitute Thierry Henry, when an unselfish RVP passed the ball to Henry, allowing the King to slot home our seventh of the afternoon.
Our embattled manager Arsene Wenger had this to say in what for him was a much happier news conference:
“I do not give much importance to the seven goals, it is just we won and played well,” said the Arsenal manager.
“I felt that recently we had quite good performances but did not get the results.
“Today we got the performance and the result, which is ideally what you want.
“We remained serious and were guided by the way we want to play football and not by any extravagant individualism.
“We were mature and serious, we played together until the end.”
So finally a good feeling after the last few weeks of misery, and even now I am not giving up hope on our chance of a top four finish.
It is however, going to be tough with Chelsea still two points ahead of us on 42 with Newcastle and Liverpool snapping at our heels.
This afternoon I will be cheering on United, and hope for a Villa victory over Newcastle.
We are still involved in the Champions League and the FA Cup, and after yesterday’s win which is bound to give the team some confidence don’t write us off just yet.
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