Don't show us your Summer wish-lists just yet!

Don't show us your Summer wish-lists just yet!

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Date Time C Opponent F A R S
06 Apr 7:45 PM CL Barcelona (A) 1 4 Lost

A lot of gooners are planning the ins and outs for next season already, even though there are five big names that would've made useful additions to the squad yesterday, and they're already at the club.

As I expected, an early Arsenal goal proved to be their own undoing at the Nou Camp on Tuesday.

Arsenal are bad at adding to early leads, and even worse at hanging onto them, and that's just against the weaker teams in the Premier League, never mind Barcelona.

Bendtner's goal woke Barca up. It would have been harder for them to wake up if they'd gone behind after 60 or 70 minutes of being comfortable. I know it sounds like a lot, expecting a side to intricately plan when to score their goals, but the best teams can do it. Arsenal are always too impatient. Every time they get the ball they move forward too quickly, like they can't wait to score. Ironically, this usually means they end up moving the ball around high up the pitch in crowded areas, which often slows their game down.

Strangely enough, it happened to Man United last night. They stormed into a 2-0 lead, which made Bayern's task obvious, and even at 3-0 the task was basically the same.

It's a shame Arsenal aren't through to a semi-final draw that doesn't involve Chelsea or United, but I guess I overestimated our chances against any team of a superior level to someone like Aston Villa or Liverpool. This team has got far this season through sheer determination, fighting for late goals against hard-working opposition, but they have been beaten convincingly every time by the big teams.

Injuries haven't helped, but there are still too many first choice players who aren't fit to play the big games. Almunia, Diaby, Clichy and Nasri are certainly NOT back-up players, but have all at times looked well out of their depth against quality opposition, so I can understand why a lot of bloggers have already started talking about summer transfer targets and building for next season.

Still, I feel that's a bit harsh on what is essentially a pretty limited team, fighting against ricidulous amounts of injuries that still, somehow, has a perfectly good shot at the title. We may be crap against the big teams, but we won't be playing any more of them now, and the determination and focus can be solely on beating the teams we know we can beat, in order to win the title. This season is far from over.

So don't put too much energy into wishing for some new players, and just pray that Nicklas Bendtner doesn't get an injury any time from now until the end of the season! I said on March 18th that Arsenal's most important players were Fabregas, Arshavin and Bendtner. Well, two of them are out now, so we have to keep hoping for more big moments from big Nick.

It must be said, he's done brilliantly so far, and was unlucky with that header that hit Valdes' post. He's a great header of the ball and has the potential to be a much better target man than Adebayor ever was. Wenger should play to his strengths and get Clichy, Eboue and Walcott to cross the ball into the box more, and in the summer sign him some proper wingers to play with.

But like I said, there'll be time to think about summer transfer targets, and that'll hopefully be after at least a few weeks of celebrating our title win.

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Written by Mark Brus on Thursday, April 8, 2010

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Related Information

Club Profiles

Match Statistics
Statistic Barca Arsenal
Possession 68% 32%
Shots (on target) 14 (8) 6 (2)
Fouls 16 19
Corners 3 2
Saves 1 4
Offside 1 3
Booked 0 3
Sent-off 0 0
Player Statistics
No Player Name Gls Yel Red Sub
1 Manuel Almunia
2 Abou Diaby
3 Bacary Sagna
5 Thomas Vermaelen
7 Tomas Rosicky Yellow cards
8 Samir Nasri
9 Eduardo Substitute
14 Theo Walcott
15 Denilson Yellow cards
18 Mikael Silvestre
22 Gaël Clichy
27 Emmanuel Eboue Yellow cards Substitute
52 Nicklas Bendtner

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