Lion Heart

Results

Date	Time	C	Opponent	F	A	R	S
18 Aug	7:45 PM	CL	Celtic (A)	2	0	Win

If I was a Bon Jovi fan, this afternoon's blog would have a rather obvious title. Despite the best efforts of an ex-girlfriend at the beginning of this decade, I'm not a Bon Jovi fan and so the blog title will have to wait.

But didn't the lads do well last night? The talk beforehand was that Celtic Park was going to be an intense, white hot cauldron, too hot for our callow boys to handle. Didn't quite turn out that way, though, did it? As I said yesterday, I was confident that it would be nothing more than they've experienced in the past and so it proved. As the Celtic fans streamed for the exits, the only sound was the sound of a familiar taunt from last season, "Is it a fire drill?"

That this was made possible was down to the superior footballing ability of the Arsenal. It was also down to the work they put in, another sign of lessons learnt from last season. I know that the goals could be said to be lucky, I'll address that further in a bit, but it can't be said that Celtic were unlucky. Gordon Strachan might think they were, but he's biased. Celtic managed one shot of any note in the entire 90 minutes. One shot at home. One shot in their supposed European fortress. Storming a European fortress is fast becoming an Arsenal speciality. The first English team to win in the San Siro? Check. Bernabeu? Check. The Sukru Saracoglu? Been there, done that.

Anyway, the goals. The first one came from a cleverly devised training ground routine. Robin van Persie tapped a free kick to Cesc, awarded for a foul on the Catalan, who fired it towards Artur Boruc in the Celtic goal. William Gallas ran across and diverted the ball off his back, it spun and dropped just inside the far post with Boruc nowhere. Played for and got. Just before half-time, this was a hammer blow Celtic clearly struggled to recover from as the second half began, as RvP, Bendtner and, closest of all, Denilson looked for the second goal.

Removing my tongue from my cheek; the second goal, when it arrived, came from a nice little passing move, Abou Diaby producing a quick shuffle of feet, exploding into the space created, releasing Clichy to cross into the box. His cross was put away beautifully by the Celtic captain, Gary Caldwell. The parallel with a cross that William Gallas had to deal with earlier in the half but had successfully cleared for a corner was obvious. It seems harsh to the neutral perhaps, but I believe we deserved the luck we got. It would have been ridiculous to have come away without a win, such was the gap in class. Especially as Celtic's main priority appeared to be the enforced withdrawal of our Catalan captain.

The importance of strength was clear last night. Alex Song continued to blossom, covering ground in a manner unrecognisable to the player who came on to cruise through the dying embers of the Arsenal- Spurs match last season. One little flick over an opponent reminded me of my favourite ever Arsenal player. And it wasn't just the flick that had me thinking of PV4. He wins the ball so well, though his passing was a touch suspect last night. Well, what to say about Vermaelen's performance? Arsène is certainly impressed, the moment when he sprinted back to make that last gasp challenge in the first half was sensational but everything else he does, he certianly isn't the player Rachid warned me about a few months ago and he seems to have had a really positive effect on the defence. He, himself, talks about the importance of Gallas to his start as an Arsenal player. It strikes me that perhaps these two are feeding off each other in a way. As much as Gallas' experience is helping the Belgian settle in, is Vermaelen's uncompromising, no nonense, attitude to defending a tonic to a player who has had to play with someone resembling a headless chicken for the last 18 months?

At the end, then, of a largely positive blog, I feel I should mention this story. It says that Arsenal have agreed the sale of Cesc Fabregas to Barcelona next summer, for a fee of between €30 million - €35 million. Apparently, no conditions are set on this deal which would apparently have gone through had we failed to qualify for the group stages of the Champions League. Of course, we still might, but it seems a distant possibility now. The implication is that Cesc played himself out of a move last night, putting the team before himself with a lion hearted display. Something doesn't tally here though. It is said that Arsenal are waiting till the Champions League money is guaranteed before they go shopping, but if we were to get knocked out, the sale of Cesc would (a touch simplistic, this) just replace the money lost, wouldn't it? So, it's probably rubbish, but just thought I'd mention it.

There may be no blog tomorrow, if that is the case I will talk to you on Friday.

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