Sign of the Times
I'm not proud of the fact but I read the Times. Not everyday just on Mondays for their football supplement The Game. Last year during our Champions League run they couldn't say enough good things about Arsenal, in hindsight that might have had some thing to do with Arsenal being the only British club left in the competition and with column inches to fill on a slow Wednesday what else could they do. But this week in the game it seems they have run out of things to talk about.
First a short bit in the two Fanny's (sorry Danny's) section. Criticising Wengers comments on international football. It seems the lads don't understand the concept of metaphor, when Wenger likens international managers to car thieves he doesn't actually mean it literally. Still I suppose you can't expect high journalism form a Spurs fan (hasn't seen real football for 15 years plus) or a Millwall fan who's feelings on Arsenal are well known.
The match report was typically useless 4 words about Arsenal and then 400 on yet another team playing 11 behind the ball, no mention of the numerous Arsenal chances including a shot hitting the bar. It seems week in week out the best the Times can manage is a quarter of a page on an Arsenal game yet, Man utd and Spurs regularly get a full page spread.
However there were a couple of small facts later which were worth repeating. Again in a thinly disguised jab at Wenger the fact that Tony Adams played 21 times in Europe and Henry 89, but in the league cup it was 59 and 3 respectfully. Interesting, but as they say lies, damn lies and statistics. Firstly Adams played (in his early career) at a time when English clubs were banned from Europe, European games were straight knockout affairs and of course the League cup was 2 legs all the way to the final. Today football players play a massive amount of games, the league cup is simply lowest on the priority list and all power to Wenger to taking a stand against it, if it brings about a change in the League Cup (like getting rid of it) then all the better in my opinion.
Finally a little fact about our home recorded (still unbeaten), every games has finished either 1-1 or 3-0. Lets hope the next home game can be the latter.
First a short bit in the two Fanny's (sorry Danny's) section. Criticising Wengers comments on international football. It seems the lads don't understand the concept of metaphor, when Wenger likens international managers to car thieves he doesn't actually mean it literally. Still I suppose you can't expect high journalism form a Spurs fan (hasn't seen real football for 15 years plus) or a Millwall fan who's feelings on Arsenal are well known.
The match report was typically useless 4 words about Arsenal and then 400 on yet another team playing 11 behind the ball, no mention of the numerous Arsenal chances including a shot hitting the bar. It seems week in week out the best the Times can manage is a quarter of a page on an Arsenal game yet, Man utd and Spurs regularly get a full page spread.
However there were a couple of small facts later which were worth repeating. Again in a thinly disguised jab at Wenger the fact that Tony Adams played 21 times in Europe and Henry 89, but in the league cup it was 59 and 3 respectfully. Interesting, but as they say lies, damn lies and statistics. Firstly Adams played (in his early career) at a time when English clubs were banned from Europe, European games were straight knockout affairs and of course the League cup was 2 legs all the way to the final. Today football players play a massive amount of games, the league cup is simply lowest on the priority list and all power to Wenger to taking a stand against it, if it brings about a change in the League Cup (like getting rid of it) then all the better in my opinion.
Finally a little fact about our home recorded (still unbeaten), every games has finished either 1-1 or 3-0. Lets hope the next home game can be the latter.
posted by Andrew Gilfrin at 9:34 AM
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