I can't quit you, baby

It's been a tough old ten days in Goonerland, hasn't it? Thinking of titles for today's blog, the one that immediately sprang to mind was that of another Led Zeppelin song, "How Many More Times", I think you can work out the connotations of that one for yourselves. Also pinging itself to the front of my brain was the scene in High Fidelity when John Cusack's character is preparing to make what we suppose is his latest mix tape of seduction for a journalist he's met, before ripping those headphones of and exclaiming, "When is this going to stop?". But I figure there's enough negativity out there already and those who would have the Arsenal manager castrated, hung, drawn, quartered and left in pieces outside the entrance to Club Level, at the stadium he helped build, need no further fuel added to their fires.

So, today, we are going to try and accentuate the positives. The positives, I hear you say, what could be positive about losing to Chelsea? What could be positive about one point from nine and no goals in 270 minutes football? Well, stick around and we'll try to find something, we will. I promise.

I just wrote a massive paragraph decrying Manuel Almunia's latest impersonation of a top flight goalkeeper, but then I realised that not only has it all been said before, repeatedly, but it doesn't fit in with my need to be positive this afternoon. So let me just say this; the passivity, the slow reactions, the panicky distribution have all been seen before. Hopefully the final nail in the coffin of his Arsenal career will be the way he watched Didier Drogba's free kick sail past him, before crashing off the bar and coming back past him, Almunia was as much of a spectator to that as someone waiting at the airport for a loved one's flight to take off might be. So, if this proves to be the end of the zombie's Arsenal career, then that is very much a positive.

What might also pass for positivity is the fact that the boss know nows, and I'm having the strangest sense of deja vu as I type this- is it strange? No, not really- what is required at the top level. And I mean the top level, not the level we're at.

He now knows, as if he didn't already, that taking on the likes of Chelsea and Manchester United is hard enough without a goalkeeper, but without a centre forward worth the name it's akin to going all in when you have a two and and a seven in your hand. It's frustrating that we've had to take two beatings when Paul Merson, helpfully I thought, pointed this out before the Portsmouth game. Graeme Souness put it very simply, if Didier Drogba was in an Arsenal shirt yesterday, the result would have been reversed. Perhaps that's a bit simplistic, but I don't think it's far from the truth. That's a positive. Kind of.

We can look at how the ten outfield players did between the first and second goals and after that second goal and take heart from the way the team played, that for me was a huge positive, especially when compared with the surrender monkeys on the field last week. It's a shame though that that speed of thought in midfield was blunted by the lack of cutting edge up front and negated by the derelictions of duty in our defence, not that it wasn't entirely predictable. I also have the slightest inkling that, as at the Grove last November, Chelsea allowed us so much of the ball in midfield because they knew we couldn't hurt them in the final third.

I read some stuff in the Football365 Mailbox this afternoon that I found pretty bizarre. I'm not suggesting that Andrei Arshavin's undoubted talent gives him a right to shirk, but I do think - cut the guy a break. He is 5"4 or whatever it is and for the last few weeks, he's been asked to play a role he's clearly unsuited to. He tried last week and got nowhere and it was he who came so close to rescuing us yesterday. I'm sure nine times out of ten, his finish from Cesc's through ball at 1-0 would have resulted in a goal. I'm sure that that would be 10/10 in training as he faces a goalkeeper who's forgotten how to make saves. I personally can't wait for Bendtner to come back, not just because I believe he is a good footballer, but because his return will free up Arshavin to do what Arshavin does best. That, I think you can agree, will be positive.

It is because I am trying to stay positive this evening that I will not dwell on Theo Walcott jumping up and down and waving his arms around like a kid wanting his mum to buy him an ice cream, thereby distracting Samir Nasri as he strode through unopposed and one on one with Petr Cech, which of course led to the Frenchman doing nothing. It is also because I am trying to stay positive that I will not dwell on Arsène Wenger's ludicrous claim that what Chelsea offered was not a "demonstration of football". No, apparently scoring goals and then defending the lead you have earnt does not count in the eyes of the football purist. Anyway, Carlo Ancelotti (who told us, equally helpfully, exactly how he was going to play this on Friday) answered that claim rather excellently himself saying,

"Maybe they had more possession than us but this is not football. Football is attack, defence and results also. We deserved to win".

Also, to be fair to the boss, he recognised where the difference was and does not need beating with a big stick today of all days, I have no doubt he's hurting as much as we all are.

I seem to have rambled off the track somewhat, haven't I? Positivity is what we're after, isn't it? Well, we won't have to play Manchester United or Chelsea again this season, unless we come across them in the Champions League at any rate. In which case, of course, God help us. Anyway, league business with them is concluded and that's a positive. Also a positive is the fact that really, and I know there are some of you out there losing faith with the boss' ability to spot the problems and resolve them, but the problems we do have are not so big that the squad needs overhauling. We're not (and I may live to regret this statement) Liverpool and nor are we a Tottenham. That's positive. Tottenham, as we all know, would love to be us.

And whilst the "Wenger out" dissenters grow louder in voice, remember this. Chelsea have spent and spent and spent to get where they are. Watching them yesterday reminded me of a feeling I had about them under Mourinho, this; that Chelsea team is pretty much our perfect nemesis. It's as if they were put together with the sole intention of beating Arsenal time and time again, epitomised, natch, by the hold Didier Drogba has exerted over us since his arrival in English football. But it's taken an obscene amount of money for them to get there. Likewise, compared to the spending power of the Manchester clubs, Arsène is fighting, to borrow a few words from an old friend of his, with both hands tied behind his back. The sooner the Arsenal board make it clear to him that it doesn't have to, indeed shouldn't be, that way the better for all of us and then we can really talk positively.

We will be back. Count on it.

Missed Paul on Arsenal TV Online?

Paul Williams made an appearance on Arsenal TV's Fans' Forum, joining host Tom Watt and guests Iyare Igiehon and Daniel King from Mail on Sunday.

Filmed live at the Emirates every Friday night, 8.15-10 PM, the Fans' Forum is one of the best ways to have your say on everything Arsenal.

Watch the video below!

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