August 2003 marks a special anniversary for me, as I have now been an Arsenal fan for 15 years. When I first saw the Gunners play in a pre-season tournament at Wembley in 1988 as an unsuspecting 6 year old, I never would have thought then that I was about to profoundly influence my life in such a passionate and emotive way. Looking back at my experiences I get genuinely scared at the thought of what would have happened had I never discovered football. Would my life have been empty all these years? To be honest its not something I wish to dwell upon. Just to get all philosophical for a moment, I should explain something: I do not believe in God and am not a religious person. Simply put I believe the old addage, “your born, you live, you die”, and frankly I do not think there is a wider scheme to things. Now before people start flaming me, let me reiterate that this is just my opinion and if other people feel differently then good for them. Getting back on track, the point of me saying this is that without football I am not sure I would have had a lot in my life. That said maybe I’m wrong, maybe without it I would have had a whole lot more. Ever laugh at someone at school because they followed a whole game on teletext, sitting watching the screen for the whole 90 minutes? Well I did this for Bolton v Arsenal in January 1996! Nonetheless, what done is done and I don’t regret a moment of it. Anyway thats enough soul searching for now, I can’t keep this intellectual debate up too long, after all some Man U fans may be reading and we can’t have them rubbing their brows in an attempt to comprehend it! (Just kidding guys!). So if you are all sitting comfortably let me take you on a journey through memory lane. There was joy, there was fun, there were seasons in the sun but also were moments of dispare, doubt and desperation. On that cautionary note …
[b]A new Gooner is born[/b]
For those of you who have read my articles from the beginning you will know how I became an Arsenal fan. Because of this, and not at all because it pales into insignificance to Nick Hornby’s, I am not going to mention it again here. If you want to know how then go back and read Hot Stuff Edition One. If you don’t … then why are you reading this then? Oh well … Anyway having watched Arsenal mince Spurs’ derriere like burger meat I was ready for the new season and was ready to rock and roll. Well not quite. See for those of you who have just started following football in the post Sky era, you may not be aware of how little information there was about football back then, comparitavely speaking at least. There was no Gillette Soccer Specials with pundits following the games for you on Saturday, let alone 106 live matches shown a season. See ITV only showed one match on a Sunday and had a highlights program the following Saturday (the ever popular “Saint and Greavesy”. The fact that to this day I can still remember its theme tune disturbs me greatly …). But as for Saturday games, the only source of information on the day was the results round up at ten to five, radio and possibly teletext.
Unfortunately for me, my dad did not tell me about any of these, or in fact the season had started, so the first I heard about it was following a game with Southampton four games into the season, when it was mentioned on the news that Paul Davis had assualted Glen Cockerill. To this day I have not seen this incident, but I can only assumed that Davis was provoked and Cockerill was entirely in the wrong. Much how Elvis is still alive. Ahem. The next day I watched my first ever televised match, which was Everton and Manchester United. I don’t remember much about this except that the score was 1-1. Yes my friends, there was a time when Man U were shite!
At the beginning of November I finally got to see Arsenal live on television as we trounced Nottingham Forest 4-1 away. I was also introduced to the cruel world of disallowed goals in this game, as in the first half I saw Arsenal go one-nil up and only after two minutes of jumping around like Van Nistelrooy did my dad finally persuade me that it had not in fact counted. I didn’t know what offside was, but whatever it was it had screwed with me nig time and I didn’t like it! Come 1989 we were top of the league. YESSSSSSSSSSS! Now all we had to do was stay there. This proved to be fairly comfortable when despite a slight dodgy patch in early March, our nearest rivals Norwich City (no I am not taking the piss!) were struggling to keep touch with us. When we met them in early April and hammered them 5-0 the title was as good as ours. I scanned the league table to confirm this and was met with a shock. Sure Norwich seemed to be out of contention, but Liverpool were right behind us! Where the hell had they come from?! Never mind nicking cars, had I known about the Scousers reputation back then I would have assumed they had stolen Concorde! At the time this did not occur to me, but looking back I wonder if, what was essentially a young squad, had thought the same as they started to falter in the league. In fact they had their own Bolton 2003 when leading one-nil against Man U at Old Trafford through an Adams goal, Tony then went and sliced a ball over Lukic’s head into his own net. Two weeks later however would be a defining day for both me and the world of football …
[b]April 15th 1989[/b]
After a year on the periphary as an Arsenal fan I was finally going to become the real deal. For I had tickets to a game at Highbury. Truth be told I don’t remember a whole lot about the pre-game for the match against Newcastle United. I remember getting to my seat with my dad and his friend at 2pm and the hour build up seeming like a life time. But at 3pm and with my camera in hand the game was underway. I knew we would win the game, for one simple reason: whenever Arsenal had a shot on goal I would blind their keeper with my flash. Looking back I probably would have more luck flashing my arse at him. What, this is Arse-Mania after all! Oh wait this article is for Arsenal-Mania … um … you probably should ignore that! Within a few minutes of the game starting something was not right. A lot of the fans around us had radios with them and news was filtering through of an incident at Hillsborough in the FA Cup Semi-Final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest. Apparently too many Liverpool fans had tried to get into the ground at once and a stampede had ensued. As a result of this the match was being abandoned. With details becoming sketchy we concentrated on the game in front of us. Brian Marwood scored to put us one up and offside clearly decided it wanted to make up with me as Newcastle had a goal disallowed in injury time. When we got home the full extent of the disaster hit. First of all my mum returning home from shopping was greated with the news of a football tradegy and the television were showing nothing but red scarfs. Seeing I had taken a red scarf with me naturally she became very worried. Luckily for her after a couple of anxious minutes it was mentioned it had occured in Sheffield. When we found out 96 people had died Arsenal’s win hardly seemed to matter. Subsequently, events that day would shape football for the years ahead. No more terraces, no more “cages”. Seating and safety were in and not a moment too soon. It however affected football in the short term too. Arsenal and Liverpool had supposed to play each other the following Sunday at Anfield in what was in affect the title decider. But with football unsurprisngly suspended in wake of the tradegy, the match was put back to May 26th and would be the last game of the season. It’s funny, but it an odd way this development showed what football was all about. 96 people had died and nothing was bringing them back. But by bringing together the two best teams in the country on the last game of the season with winner taking all not, just the world of football, but the nation as a whole could come together and start to recover from the tradegy. If football does nothing else, it brings people together and never more was it illustrated here.
Sadly for Arsenal there chance had apparently gone. With Liverpool winning game after game, despite a great effort the Gunners just could not match this. They went into the title decider needing to do something that no team had done for over three years. They had to win by two clear goals at Anfield. Now this should be the point where I tell you my version of witnessing the most dramtic event in football’s history. I should tell you about how estatic I was when Thomas scored in the dying seconds. But I can’t. You see while thousands upon thousands of Arsenal fans were celebrating the greatest moments in their lives, I was in Florida frantically looking for a newspaper with the result. Ultimately, I found one, and while I normally wouldn’t read the Daily Mail if you paid me, the £2.50 I paid to get the result was more than worth it. But while I was delighted at the result I knew I had missed something. Something big. Something special. Sure when I got home I immersed myself in it, playing over and over the tape my dad’s friend had made for me. Oh sure, I could (and probably still can to this day) recite Brian Moore’s commentary word for word from “A good ball from Dixon, finding Smith…” through to Arsenal lifting the First Division trophy. But it was not the same. I hadn’t seen it live. I hadn’t felt the emotion and to be honest I had not lived it. Little did I know then that I would have to wait eight years to live the dream fully.
[b]The best sort of attack is defence[/b]
Season 1989-1990 was an odd one. To be honest theres not a lot I can say about it as nothing really struck and emotional note with me. Sure I was disappointed we lost our title to Liverpool so easily, but all in all we still played well. The next season though was an interesting one. For the first time as a fan I was introduced to the transfer system as Seaman, Linighan and Limpar were in, and Lukic was on the way out. The start of the season really could not have got any better. An embarrassing 6-2 home defeat in the league cup apart, we went through to February without losing. As we entered March Liverpool were neck and neck with us. Again the scene was Anfield and again it was a title decider. Oh sure, mathematically we could afford to lose, but physchologically we simply could not. But again Arsenal proved what I had known from the start: when the chips are down, they always come through. Despite an absolute barrage from Liverpool our defence kept them out and Paul Merson kept his cool when through on goal to win the game 1-0 for us. There was still two months to go, but I think the title was won that day. Now with the twenty year anniversay of our double fast approaching, it was time to win it again. We had already overcome a mammoth tie with Leeds, which went to two replays, and seen off a spirited Cambridge United to get to the semi finals. Now Spurs awaited. Just how twenty years early they stood in our way, they formed our barrier to glory again. They had the year ending in one. We were going for the double double. Due to the size of the match the FA broke with tradition and held the semi final at Wembley. This was it. This was the moment that legends were made off. People would be telling their kids how they hitchhiked to North London to see Arsenal take their moment with destiny. With Arsenal fans all over the company wet with anticipation the match began. Five minutes later it was over. Gary Linekar latched onto a cross after two minutes to give Spurs the lead and moments later they got a free kick. Gazza stepped up and we all know what happened. Tottenham 2 Arsenal 0, five minutes gone. Oh no. Oh God no. The match was over. Okay Arsenal did get a goal back on the stroke at half time, but the spirit was broken. Spurs got a third halfway through the second half and they were coming back to Wembley. The dream was over and there was to be no double parade. All Arsenal fans could do would hope the team held their nerve in the league. As it turns out they didn’t need to. With two months of the season to go Kenny Dalglish sensationally stood down as Liverpool’s manager. Graeme Souness was appointed and the media was full of stories about how he was bringing the title home. But the change in manager effected Liverpool and their form lost consistantly. A defeat at Chelsea meant that if they lost again at Nottingham Forest two days later then Arsenal were champions. In the 64th minute Ian Woan scored and Liverpool could not reply in kind. Arsenal were champions once more! Now obviously I was delighted, I would not pretend to have been otherwise. But the defeat to Spurs and the fact that again I had not seen Arsenal win the title took a little bit of a shine off the season. Not a lot mind, but just enough to keep me hungry for more. Three seasons as an Arsenal fan, and two league titles won. Being a Gooner was fun!
We started the next season poorly and by the end of August we had lost more games than the whole of the previous season put together in the league! Arsenal manager George Graham took immediate action and went against his reputation for being ultra defensive by buying a striker, a certain Ian Wright. That said Wrighty struggled to make an impact upon his signing, managing only a paltry four goals in his first two games! By now Arsenal were in the swing of things and apart from a couple of defeats away to West Ham and Nottingham Forest by the time Boxing day came around we were the team to beat once more. Then, inexplicably it all went wrong as we did not win again to the beginning of February and we plummeted to the lower half of the table. It was during this period that FA Cup history was made. In the 3rd round draw fate conspired to pit Arsenal against Fourth Division Wrexham, at their ground the Racehorse Ground. Even without the suspended Ian Wright this should have proved comfortable for us and when we went in at half time at one-nil up it was looking good. With no teletext on our television and not having realised games were broadcast on radio my only source of information for the game was the Half Times on Grandstand and Final Score. As the latter of this started Arsenal were still one up and apparently cruising. But then they frantically cut back to Wales as apparently Wrexham had equalised! They had got a free kick 25 yards out and some jabroni named Mickey Thomas had hammered it in! This was clearly a blow but with 8 minutes to go we could still win the game. Then with only two minutes to go there was another goal! Yes! I knew we would do it! Hang on a second, I don’t remember us having a player called Steve Watkin. And those Welsh fans seem rather pleased about us having scored, you would almost have thought they had taken the lead or someth …oh. Bugger. Yes as im sure you are all aware Wrexham did win the day and in doing so taught me a valuable lesson. You see history will tell how plucky Wrexham took on the mighty Arsenal and against all odds outplayed them and beat them. It will say how they dominated the match and made a mockery of Arsenal’s status as champions. But what it won’t tell you is the truth: Wrexham got lucky. When Match of The Day came on later that night I watched it despite my better judgement and quite frankly we were shafted. We hammered them for 82 mins and it was only because of their keeper that we weren’t threatening to break our away goal scoring record. A bit harsh you may think? Well it gets better, or worse depending how you see it. You know that screamer of a free kick? Sure it was a great goal, but what is not publicised is the fact that the decision to give it was one of the most ridiculous ones I have ever seen. In fact I’m not sure Mike Reily would have given that at Old Trafford if Van Nistelrooy had been the attacker! Then to cap it all off we had a perfectly good equaliser disallowed in injury time. We were screwed! You may think that this is all bad sportsmanship on my behalf and that I should let them have their victory, after all they have not and probably never will match this again and Arsenal have more than made up for it since. But thanks to them I still to this day get twats coming up to me with comical quips about the game. In fact I would go down to Wales and shout foul in person if it wasn’t for the fact they might think I said “fowl” and attempt to shag me … (Apologies to any Welsh readers!). So Wrexham had their place in the sun and it was starting to look like Arsenal may have a place in the Endsleigh league if they did not turn their form around. Thankfully from beating Notts County 2-0 at Highbury in early February 1992 Arsenal went the rest of the season unbeaten, demolishing 3rd place Sheffield Wednesday 7-1 along the way. By the end of the seasons’ 5-1 destruction of Southampton we were back up to fourth and had only missed out on 3rd and a UEFA Cup place by a whisker. In fact we were only 10 points off Leeds at the top of the table and had the season lasted another month I am sure we could have caught them. But our end of season form boded well for the start of the first ever Premier League season.
The name was different, their were two extra teams and the plump round object circling the ground on live match day was now an air blimp as opposed to Jimmy Greaves, but in many ways things were identical to the previous season. Arsenal again started poorly losing their first two games, only to spring back to top the table by the end of November. Sadly, just like the previous year, Arsenal’s league form capitulated and we won just once between then and February. Thankfully though our form stayed true in not just the FA Cup, but the League Cup too. Despite a couple of close calls in the early rounds against First Division opposition Arsenal cruised through to the League Cup final. This may not seem like a big deal but back then the League Cup was worth shouting about. There were no weakened teams, no using it to blood youngsters and while presitige wise it couldn’t match the FA Cup, in terms of its importance it was not that far behind. I had only seen Arsenal play at Wembley twice more since August 1988 and both those ended in defeat (the 1989 Charity Shield which we lost 1-0 to Liverpool and the 1991 FA Cup Semi Final which I saw on TV). This was also the first time I had seen Arsenal reach a cup final and I was excited. Things did not start too well as John Harkes smashed a drive into our net after only 15 minutes. So much for third time lucky. But Paul Merson went up the other end and responded in kind to make the score 1-1 at half time. Then on the hour mark we took the lead through Steve Morrow and in truth we never looked like relinquishing it. With the injury time seeming to take forever the ref finally blew and we had won the League Cup! While I was understandly happy, I had to spare a thought for Morrow who had been injured after some over exhubirant celebration from Tony Adams. Having overcome Leeds in a classic 4th Round FA Cup clash Arsenal were looking primed to repeat this achievement and return to Wembley again. However to do this we would have to exorcise our demons of two years earlier as once again we had Spurs in the Semi-Final. Again it was to be held at Wembley and again we were going for a double. In truth I don’t remember a whole lot about this match, I seem to remember both sides having good penalty shouts turned down and Lee Dixon being sent off after we scored. With 10 minutes remaining we got a free kick on the edge of their area and it was floated towards the back post. In ran Tony Adams and 1991 was long forgotten, and the two years of abuse I had received from Spurs fans ended in an instant. Once again the ref seemed to add on 100 minutes injury time and at one point it looked like by the time it would finish we would have to play the final straight afterwards! But we held on and as fate would have it, went through to face Sheffield Wednesday again in the final. At this point I would like to say the 1993 FA Cup final was a classic but sadly I can’t. In fact, to be honest, it was a really poor game. We took a first half lead through Ian Wright and they equalised through someone or other in the second half. That was it. As was the format in those days, we were not all put out our miseries with a penalty shoot out but instead the game went to a replay the following Wednesday night. Just like on Saturday things seemed to be going our way when Wrighty fired us one up by the break. But despite the game being more entertaining, penalities looked a dead cert when Chris Waddle’s shot deflected off Lee Dixon into the bottom right hand corner of our goal. But there was still time. With 119 minutes showing on the clock we got a corner. The ball was whipped into the centre and Andy Linighan rose to power it towards goal. Chris Woods in the Wednesday goal seemed to have stopped it, but the header was too strong and the ball dropped agonisonally over the goal line. YESSSSSSSSSSSSSS! At this point I was off round the room like a mad man and I don’t think I stopped jumping up and down for several minutes. The preceding 239 mins may have been somewhat dull, but I didn’t care. Thats the way to win a cup final! Nights just don’t get any better than that. Or so I thought.
[b]Next stop Europe[/b]
Theres not a lot that can be said about Arsenal’s domestic performance in season 1993-1994. On the whole we played well in the league, but too often we were too relient on Ian Wright and did not win games we should have. As a result we trailed in 19 points behind Man U in 4th place. We also surrendered our Cups without much of a fight, going out to Aston Villa in the League Cup, and embarrasingly losing 3-1 at home to First Division Bolton in an FA Cup 4th Round replay. However our previous years’ accomplishments had seen us enter the European Cup Winner’s Cup. For those who are unware, this was the competition that all the national cup winners entered and while its reputation was on a bit of a decline, traditionally it was the second most prestigious competiton in Europe after of course the European Cup. After a fairly uncomplicated first few rounds Arsenal found themselves in the Semi-Finals against Paris St Germain. Arsenal played brilliantly in the first leg and took a 1-1 score with an away goal back to Highbury. After eleven minutes Kevin Campbell fired Arsenal 2-1 ahead on aggregate and things were looking good. However, PSG just needed one to tie the match up all square and with players like David Ginola in their team, anything could happen. Between then and the final whistle one good thing happened and one bad thing happened. The good thing was Arsenal held on and made it through to the final in Copenhagen. The bad thing was that Ian Wright had got himself booked and therefore was suspended from the final. This was bad enough in itself but when Italian giants Parma qualified as well it looked like it was a case of so near, yet so far for the Gunners.
In truth Arsenal had no business being in the final, on paper at least. With our best player missing and Parma having big name talents like Bennarivo, Brolin and Asprilla i don’t think many people gave us much hope. Our best hope was our defence which had been statistically the best in Europe that season. The strategy was simple: Keep a clean sheet and hope to scramble a goal from somewhere. However when Brolin hit the inside of the Arsenal post with only a few minutes gone things were looking ominous for us. Spurred on by this Parma pushed everything they had at us clearly looking for a killer early goal. But Arsenal counter attacked and when Minotti mis controlled an Arsenal throw in, Alan Smith reacted like a sniper and half volleyed the ball into the bottom left hand corner of Parma’s goal. Against all odds we were in front! Looking back I have a feeling this killed Parma inside, some of their faces looked like they were in complete shock and despite putting on intense pressure for the rest of the game, David Seaman was not overly troubled. The final whistle went and Arsenal had a European trophy for the first time in over 20 years! Like Anfield in 1989 no one had given us a chance, but once again the lads had come through. Now we could go for the Premiership!
[b]Season 1994-1995 aka Season Horriblus aka How I lost my innocence.[/b]
Where did it all go wrong? On paper we should have been Champions. We had the best defence in the country, arguably the countries best predatory striker and in Stefan Schwarz we seemingly finally had the creative midfielder we so desperately needed. Heck, I even saw Arsenal win their opening fixture of the season for the first time! But something was not right. By October we were languishing in mid table and looked to be lost. This just did not make sense. I knew Arsenal had a tendancy to wobble in the mid season but they ALWAYS had a good first third of the season. They then won 3 matches in a row though and things were looking better. Phew, im glad thats over. But then they did not win again to the middle of December and by then events had taken a serious turn for the worst. First of all Paul Merson admitted to having a cocaine addiction. This quite frankly took me aback as there had been nothing obvious from his performances over the previous couple of seasons to suggest this. Seeing him sitting there in a press conference with tears in his eyes hit me in a way I could not have imagined. This was Paul Merson for goodness sake! He is the magic man! He is a genuis, an idol to millions! If he can get it so wrong then what chance do I have? At this point I stopped thinking of footballers as God’s and started to see them as human beings. In the long run this is for the best, but in the short term the transition can be painful and in my case it was. I saw Merson’s life on the brink of collapse, our Manager alledgely being crooked and the eleven men I had the most faith in the world having rings run them by teams of a lesser ilk. In early January we played Millwall in an FA Cup 3rd round replay and lost 2-0. By now I had discovered radio and had switched on the end of it. I did not catch a lot of the game but from what I could make out we were terrible. Mark Kennedy scored in the 90th minute to seal a 2-0 win for the Lions.And then it happened. I gave up. I know that sounds terrible but I couldn’t take it anymore. Our transition from winning trophies to becoming also rans had happened so quickly and so dramatically I could not cope. So for a month I shunned the world of football and sat back and reflected. However despite my head telling me otherwise, the news of Paul Merson’s return and the signings of Hartson and Kimomya brought me back. Our form was not much better but on Februrary things took a turn for the positive when George Graham was sacked. Don’t get me wrong, he was a fine manager and will go down in history as an Arsenal legend. But his time had gone and he had lost control of the club.That evening we beat Nottingham Forest 1-0 and all was right with the world. We had new signings, a new temporary manager and still had a Cup Winners Cup to retain. My doubt cleared away as I knew while our form may not improve this season domestically, we still had a lot to play for and the outlook looked good. I was back!
Suffice to say Arsenal avoided relegation. At one point we were only 5 points off it but we then hammered Ipswich and Aston Villa in quick succession to put us safe. The last third of the season was all about the Cup Winners Cup and us retaining it. We put ourselves under real pressure when we managed but a 1-1 draw at home to Auxerre in the Quarter Finals. The second leg was to be one of the most heart stopping games of my life. After only 15 minutes Ian Wright scored an absolute peach of goal to put us one up. To this day I have not seen a barrage of attacking play like I saw from Auxerre that evening. In fact, im not sure we got out our penalty area for the remaining 75 minutes. But we held firm thanks to a goalkeeping performance of an outstanding nature from David Seaman, one which in fact is probably the best I have ever seen a keeper make. This put us into the Semis against Sampdoria, and once again we had to defeat a technically superior Italian side. Im not sure what odds you would have got on Arsenal leading 2-0 at half time at Highbury in the first leg, let alone if Steve Bould had scored both goals, but I’m guessing they would have been extremely high. Sampdoria pulled one back to get a crucial away goal but Arsenal responded in kind through Wright and it looked like Arsenal had a decisive lead to take to Italy. Sadly though, the Italians nicked a second away goal to leave the tie poised on a knife edge. From kick off in the 2nd leg Sampdoria came at Arsenal and unsurprisingly took a one-nil lead into the interval. Arsenal had barely been in the game at that point and once again you could see pundits nationwide writing us off. But after about an hour we got a corner and Wright popped in to nick an equaliser! Could we hold out for the impossible? Arsenal repelled attack after attack but Sampdoria was just too much and with 10 minutes to go they made it two one. Arsenal looked physically and mentally gone at this point and a couple of minutes later it was three-one and the tie was over. Well not quite. With only a couple of minutes left Arsenal got a free kick on the edge of thier area. Stefan Schwarz had had a fairly poor first season at the club and we had seen nothing of his supposedly lethal free kicks. In truth this effort was not a whole lot better, but it sneaked through the wall and into the bottom corner. At this point I was on the verge of leaving the room, I was just too gutted to watch. I honestly did not think he would score from it in a million years and it took me a good few seconds to realise what had happened. Then it hit me.
YYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!! GET IN THERE!!!!! The dream was back on. After a tenuous extra time period the game went to penalties. Enter David Seaman. Despite Arsenal missing two of their penalties Seaman produced 3 saves of the highest qualities to win the game for us. Im not sure what the time difference between him saving number 3 and me jumping up and down like a lunatic was but I suspect that if I had been a 100 metre runner I would have been given a false start. My faith in Arsenal was fully restored. the Cup Winners Cup was coming back home!
I knew we would beat Zaragoza in the final. We had to. It all made perfect sense. The bungs, the drugs, the terrible defending, Vince Bartram, it all started to make sense. It was all designed to make the final pay off all the more sweet. Despite all these odds Arsenal were going to once again truimph over adversity and win the gold. What a fool I had been! Before the match a good friend of mine, being a Spurs fan, quipped Nayim was going to score a last minute goal to defeat us. I quipped back that he is a twat.Once again the final was actually a fairly poor affair. Nothing really happened to the 74th minute when Esneidar scored for Zaragoza. Okay this is just a set back, there is till time I told myself. Eight minutes later we equalised and our prophecy was coming true. Again not a lot happened after that and as we entered stoppage time in extra time Brian Moore was talking about Seaman saving penalties and I was anticipating victory. Virtually no one on the pitch was moving as penalties were inevitable and the game was over. Well I say no one was moving because one player had other ideas. In an absolutely extraordinary piece of audacity Nayim attempted to lob David Seaman from just inside the halfway line. Seconds later the ball was in and Seaman was crumpled in a heap in the netting. Oh dear god. If a camera had been placed on me and the film played back I think you could probably pin point the second my world collapsed. Don’t panic im thinking, we can still do it, maybe we will score straight from kick off! But I knew we would not. As I sat there sunk in my chair the cruel reality of football hit me: it does not always come good in the end. This was not supposed to happen! They were supposed to win! While else all that heart ache?! While else all that trauma?! ITS NOT FUCKING FAIR! As I sat there trying to answer questions I had no answer for I felt very naked. It was like the innocence was gone and I was exposed to the harsh reality of the game. I felt cheated, I felt frustrated and to be quite frank I felt used. For me, football would never be the same again.
Now this is probably a good point to pause and take stock. I hope you have enjoyed what you have read so far and it has certainly been interesting revisting these memories. I think it is fitting that the next part should encompass the Wenger years, including the events leading up to his appointment, the highs and the lows and what the future holds. Till then my friends, my name is Alastair Wood, and this has been Hot Stuff!