Liverpool 1-1 Arsenal

Hello everyone, I know it's been a couple days but I've been extremely busy. My Under 12's team that I coach is undefeated and we had two games over the weekend so I just couldn't be arsed to do much else.

So a point at Anfield and a valuable one. Manchester United went top of the league on Saturday with I think their 8th consecutive win so it was important for us to keep the momentum and jump back to the top against the scousers. The press and critics everywhere were saying this game would be our first real test. I don't really buy that because we have beaten City, Sevilla, Sp*rs, etc but they still labeled this as our first real challenge, and you have to say we passed. Arsene Wenger and the rest of the team say so too.

The game didn't start especially well for us, with Gerrard scoring on a free kick from about twenty five yards in the seventh minute. It was a real cannon of a goal but it left me wondering who had moved out of their place in the wall because it went right through it.

Almunia, who I thought had a very good game, saved efforts from Crouch, Gerrard and Riise and again consigned Lehmann to the bench. He's having a great year and he deserves his starting place.

So we pressed for an equalizer, much more in the second half than the first, and had a good chance when Eboue hit the post and Cesc missed on the rebound. It really should have been a goal but I find it hard to fault Cesc "The f'ing brilliant magician" Fabregas about much.

But the breakthrough did finally come, through who else but Cesc? Hleb (brilliant this season) received the ball on the left and held up play while players made runs forward. He finally saw the one he wanted though and lifted it in to Fabregas with touch that many great great players could not have displayed. It really was brilliant and Fabregas only had to toe-poke it into the net. Reina maybe could have done better but of course we're happy he didn't.

Cesc had another chance just a minute after but his effort hit the post and you could tell we really wanted the three points, but it wasn't to come. The match ended 1-1 and we remained unbeated. I'll take a point at Anfield any day.

Man of the Match: Alexander Hleb

Needs Work: The walls on our free kick defending

Several players reacted to the game afterwards. Gael Clichy says we played well enough to win but the team knows that it is still a good result at Anfield and that now we must be considered title challengers.

"Since the start of the season people have never stopped saying Arsenal are playing well but they have not played any of the big teams yet. Now we have.

"We passed out first test successfully. Next Saturday, we play Manchester United and if we get three points nobody can say Arsenal are not ready to win the title."

Robert Pires talked about how Wenger is full of magic and he is the best coach around.

Also we have William Gallas talking about how Cesc can be the best in the Premier League. I thought he was already but I guess that's just me.

You can see all the goals from the last match here.

And that's all I have for today. Have a good Monday.

Beckenbauer Tells Jens To Shut Up, Season Highlights

Hello everyone, not too much going on today but we'll cover it nonetheless. I've been informed that I should add more pictures so I'll try to start doing that when I have time to. Also, another thing, I'm taking donations to get a subscription to Arsenal TV Online so I can post the videos. If you think it's a worthwhile venture consider donating a dollar or two. Link is in the top right corner.

So on to the news, first off is Franz Beckenbauer, who is hoping Jens Lehmann shuts his fat yap because he won't win a war of words with Arsene Wenger.

"Lehmann must not make the mistake and start a confrontation with Wenger because he will not win it," Beckenbauer told Premiere TV.

"Wenger is a fair coach who does not immediately take out a player when he has a bad day. Jens Lehmann needs to be patient until he gets his chance, but he will get it.

"Lehmann will be playing for a different club by winter because Wenger will not accept that [a confrontation]."

And he is of course right. I don't know that Lehmann will ever play for Arsenal again, barring an injury to Almunia.

Manuel Almunia says in response that he has been unaffected by Jens' cuntiness. He said that he has waited three years for this chance to play in the league and now he's getting his chance and is playing well, so nothing is going to affect him. I think he's been great this year and made every save that you'd expect from him. Cmon Manuel don't listen to Jens just keep up the good saves!

Robin van Persie again spoke to the press about how wonderful the current team is playing, calling them "The best he has ever played with." Let's hope his injury heals up properly so we can get him back soon.

Theo Walcott says his patience has payed off and that his two goals against Slavia Prague "lifted a weight off of his shoulders." He had one hell of a game against Prague and I would like to see him start against Liverpool. He's had more experience in the Arsenal team than Eduardo has and I just feel like his pace would cause the slow hubcap thieves some problems.

Cheers everyone. As promised, here's a video I saw that has all the highlights for the season so far.

Arsenal 7-0 Slavia Prague

Well bloody hell. What an amazing performance we had last night. I was entirely expecting us to win the match but never in my wildest dreams did I foresee it being a scoreline like this one. You can watch all seven goals here. We really played football like you don't see anywhere else. Our one-touch passing was remarkable, under control and fluid, with pace and accuracy. If we played like this every match no team in the world could beat us. Now I know Slavia Prague aren't exactly Barcelona (who drew with Rangers yesterday so they really aren't looking good at the moment), but the performance was still so good that it really would have topped any other team in the world.

The scoring started off right away, just as I turned on the match as a matter of fact. Hleb was playing on the left and had two defenders come over to meet him. He used a bit of trickery then sent the ball back to the edge of the box for Cesc Fabregas who took a touch and then sent a curling effort right into the far corner. Really an unstoppable shot and we were off to a wonderful start.

The next goal came off of a corner kick. Cesc sent in the kick and it took a bounce or two and then was partially cleared. Hleb came and met it with power and it deflected off of a defender and into the net. I thought it should have counted for Hleb but they scored it as an own goal.

The last goal of the half looked like Slavia had Mad Jens of this year in goal. A long back pass to him was mis kicked and fell right to the feet of Lord Theo. The keeper charged at him of course and Theo did well to side step him and fire in between two defenders and into the back of the net. This was his first Champion's League goal and only his second Arsenal goal so it was good to see him get on the score sheet, especially as this was his first game really at striker.

So at halftime the score was 3-0 to the Arsenal and we really were on cruise control.

But it wouldn't stop there.

Not twenty more minutes into the second half and we were up 6-0.

The next one came courtesy of Hleb who actually got his name on the score sheet this time after not getting the credit on his first. Cesc made the assist getting it out to him charging the box from the left. He beat the defender and looked like he was shooting far post to feint the keeper but he went near post with no trouble and it was 4-0.

Goal number five was Theo's second of the day and it was right after the fourth. Hleb played him in down the left channel and Walcott produced the most Thierry Henry-like finish we've seen this season. He just tapped it with the outside of his right foot to the far post and it went off the post and in. Great finish and really a great touch by Theo.

Number six was just after that and it was also a beauty. Prague had a corner kick which we cleared and Hleb took the ball and dribbled for about half a mile before centering for Adebayor, who turned and fed Theo who sent Cesc into the box through the defense and he finished it perfectly. It was a marvelous goal and one you can watch over and over again. It was pure Arsenal and I couldn't help but cheer.

Soon after that up 6-0 Gilberto, Rosicky, and Bendtner came into the match and it kind of slowed us up for a bit. We seemed to lose that flow that we had had but it didn't matter much at this point. We still managed to get another goal though. Bendtner played a one-two with Eboue who back-heeled it back to the charging Bendtner who forced it across the line. It's good to see him get a goal and hopefully he'll be happy he got to play for a bit because I can't see him playing against Man U or Liverpool over the next week.

So the final was 7-0 to the Arsenal which tied a Champion's League record set by match fixing Juventus so it was very impressive. An all around great performance and one I will be watching again today. Fantastic.

Man of the Match: Alexander Hleb. He was just fantastic all around. He got into space, made all the passes and got on the score sheet. He should have had two and if we can get more performances from him like this one he'll be one of the players of the year.

Needs Work: What can you really say needs work after a performance like this?

If you missed this match, find it and watch it. You can see all the goals at the link at the top of the page.

Up the Gunners.

Scousers preview to come.

Arsene's B-Day, Toure Speaks, Diarra Complains

Well, Arsenal won this weekend. It hasn't stopped happening yet this year and I keep thinking it's going to be the game we slip up and every time we somehow find a way to get through it still keeping the streak alive. Now that might have jinxed us there so I knocked on wood just now and maybe you all should too just to be safe. But yeah, Arsenal beat Bolton 2-0 over the weekend which is always a tough one on the fixture list. They don't play football, they play a form of some sort of violent battle where they all line up and try to hack at as many players as they can. Yet even though we generally have a tough time, and in the first half we did, we still managed to pop in two goals to their none and I really don't think they had a shot on goal in the whole game. In fact if you look at the match stats, Almunia had zero saves. So a good win for us and we have a big week coming up. We play in the Champion's League mid-week and we go play the Scousers this weekend. Hopefully we can stay injury free.

Toure seems to be the fill in captain now that Gallas has been out, and even now when Gallas is back he is still acting the part. He is again saying that we need to avoid any complacency after this great start and that we have to keep our focus in every game.

"Last season was a really strange season because we did really well against the big teams but we slipped up against the teams that people expect us to beat," Toure told the club's official website.

"That is why this season we have to concentrate on the games in front of us - never mind if it's Liverpool or Manchester United.

"We have to keep the same focus for each game and also hope that we get a bit lucky in games and keep winning.'

Toure has been quite the leader this year and I like it because he really is the rock of our team. He's always in the lineup and always organizing the team and playing well. I'd love him to get the armband someday but we'll just have to see how it goes. Right now though, he's right, we do need to keep our focus for every game and stay on track because as we have seen in recent seasons, the teams that get off to a fast start in the league are the ones that you have to watch for in the end.

Lasagna Diarra is pissed off a lil bit, because he isn't getting to play as much as he thought he would. Did anyone really think he would get to play a lot in our midfield? He has Gilberto, Flamini, Denilson, and Diaby ahead of him as well as the irreplaceable Cesc, so he should have known that opportunities would be limited, but apparently he's had enough already. He says if he doesn't get to play more, he will look for a new club in December. Honestly i can't say that I care. He barely plays now so how could we possibly miss him? Yes I do wish some of our younger players got into the squad sometimes but we want to keep winning and right now what we are doing is working. Diarra is frustrated because he sat the bench at Chelsea and now is sitting the bench here. Well there has to be a reason for that. Maybe he should look at moving to a little bit smaller club where he can start every game. He's only 22 and could still move to a big club again but it's annoying to have him been complaining at Chelsea and now to start the same thing at Arsenal. Work hard in training and try to get a place or just move somewhere else but quit telling the press about it.

Couple more things, Denilson signed a new contract which is good news. I like him and hope to see him play more soon. And the last bit, today is Arsene Wenger's 58th birthday, so everyone wish him a happy birthday and have a pint for the greatest manager in Arsenal history. Cheers!

Arsenal AGM Meeting, Wenger for Chairman

We'll start right off with some good news. The Arsenal Board has agreed to an extension to the lock down agreement with regard to selling shares of the club. The deal they signed says that they cannot sell to any persons outside of their immediate family until the end of April 2009 and after that they have to give the other board members first option on any shares they wish to sell. This part of the deal runs until 2012 with an option to cancel in 2010. This is good news for us as it keeps Usmanov and his meat-pie demolishing self away from our club. Yes he owns 23 percent of the club now but he clearly wants more and now we know he won't get any more from the current board for at least 2 years and most likely for five. I think PHW really can't stand Usmanov and Dein and will do anything to keep him out so if one of the other board members wants to sell up their stake I think Old Petey would probably try to buy it first.

Hill-Wood continued with a message to the fans saying that the club is based on being self sufficient and they will continue to resist a takeover and will continue to have a successful business model for Arsenal.

Strangely enough, Petey went on to talk about the replacement for himself, and he thinks that the next chairman of the club should be Arsene Wenger. Peter is 71 years old and knows he won't be around forever but thinks that the greatest manager of all time should take over his place. I think this would be a great thing for the club if he decided to do it. Arsene has said in recent years that he doesn't think he will manage all that much longer, and I think by the time PHW steps down he might seriously consider the position. He's a genius when it comes to managing a team, and I think we can handle the risk of letting him run the club.

Robin van Persie is hurt. He suffered a knee injury yesterday while playing for Holland and nobody really knows how bad it is or how long he will be out. Hopefully not long because he is playing great football at the moment and he and Adebayor are really becoming a strong partnership. I think he has something like 5 goals in the last 4 matches or something which is quite a run so let's hope it isn't bad.

Kerrea Gilbert is being a bit of a prick. He's on loan at Southend and he's apparently gotten into it with his manager. He had a problem like this last year at Cardiff and never played for them again. Well now he's finding it hard to get first team football at Southend as well, and hasn't played since September 8th for the first team. He can't even start for Southend and yet he has started games for Arsenal before. This guy must be a real knob.

Thierry Henry scored two goals last night to beat Platini's goal scoring record for France. Congratulations to him.

Jens Lehmann is also stealing the spotlight once again for stupid shite, pretty much saying that he is the best human on Earth, and no other humans can ever hope to achieve what he is capable of.

"The positive for me is I am an all-around talent. I have no weakness."

Yes Jens that would be good, but theh problem is you have been complete shite this year and maybe you really just aren't that good anymore.

Jens is pissing me off. That's all I have for today. Bolton this weekend. I hate Bolton.

Bollocks About Cesc and More

So the Cesc Fabregas rumors have started up yet again. It seems like we just got done with summer transfer season and now Barca are once again going after our young Spaniard. Cesc's agent has done quite a job of letting Barca know that Cesc might be interested in a way that doesn't get anyone into trouble. As we know from the Cashley Cunt case, you are not allowed to talk directly to a player while he is under contract with another club, but Cesc's agent decided to fuel the fire with this:

"Neither the player nor I have considered the news, really, and all we're thinking about is the match against Denmark. What will be, will be," Diaz told Radio Marca.

"But if we do hear of an offer from Barcelona, the club that taught him so much, then that would be a real compliment to Cesc."

Now this is obviously all horse piss because Barcelona didn't teach Cesc anything. We know that, Arsenal knows that, Barcelona knows that, and Cesc and his agent know that. He learned everything while he was at Arsenal, when he got into the first team like he never would have at Barca.

So now Barcelona have responded to this cuntery by Cesc's agent by saying they'd love to have Cesc but they don't want to pay big money. Ok then Barca, piss off then because you aren't going to get a Thierry Henry 16.1 million deal for him. Some twat that works for Barca named Txiki had this to say:

"He is a great player but the circumstances of his departure make things very difficult," Beguiristain told Avui.

"We cannot pay a great quantity for a homegrown player that decided to leave us.

"To start with he would have to show his desire to return."

That's the most ludicrous statement I've ever heard. Do they think because Cesc is from there that we'll just pitch him off there for 5 million pounds or something? We don't care where he's from, you aren't getting our little magician for cheap.

If these stories don't get you mad then I don't know what will. Once again Barcelona is using the press to talk to our players indirectly because they think they can do anything they want. It's bollocks and hopefully Cesc will honor his 10 year contract that he just signed last year.

So now that I've ranted on about that for a while it's time to talk about Jens Lehmann. He played for Germany this weekend which shows that he is fully fit and he's told the press that he expects Arsene to play him this weekend against Bolton. Now I really think Mad Jens has lost his mind and won't be playing much for Arsenal any longer. He's always been quite a nutter but he used to keep it mostly in his comments but this season in his two matches he had two quite easy plays turn into goals. I think Almunia will still be in the match against Bolton.

To add to the drama, the German National Team manager has added fuel to the fire by saying if Jens won't be first choice he needs to move in January. There have been reports that Man City will pay 1 million for him, and I say we take it. We can bring in another keeper if Wenger isn't happy with only Fabianski and Almunia and get rid of Jens. He is only causing problems by talking bad about Almunia every day and it may be time to see the back of him.

We've been linked with Sporting Lisbon centre mid Miguel Veloso while Gilberto Silva has been linked again with a move to Juventus.

Fran Merida spoke to Arsenal.com about how great it was to play for two minutes against the Newcastle first team. Surely it's all rubbish about him not being quick enough to play in the Premiership? I don't think Wenger would play him in the Carling Cup at age 17 if he didn't think he would ever make it.

That's about all I have today. Comment if you will. Later

The Battle of the Enchanted Forest

So there was this one time like, I'd say maybe 3 years ago, me and two of my best mates Kevin and Patrick were riding our Magical Unicorns through the Emerald Enchanted Forest. So we're just trotting along, laughing a frolicking in this meadow, when we go around this corner, around this grove of trees, and there is this huge Kreyt Dragon there, spitting fire. Not only that, but he had lasers that could shoot out of his eyes. Of course we're all terrified. So Patrick is like, "Oh god, Im gonna burn this mother down!" And Kevin said "You better not, You better not!" And we're all thinkin, will some white knight please come and save us!? But there was no white knight to be found, because it's an enchanted forest, and the disfigured trolls patrol the borders, and the white knights arent allowed in, of course. It's mostly for your sprites, your faeries... creatures of the night, if you will, so of course the knights arent allowed in.

So we are really scared for our lives of course at this point because the dragon had just lit a tree on fire next to us with his fiery breath. Patrick and Kevin didn't know what to do, so I had to come up with a plan fast. So I say, "Dont worry, i'll save us." So I charge up on my unicorn, because I knew the dragon's weak spot, it was his heart, because he doesn't have a heart. I saw a hollow a few meters away and snatched a branch off of the tree and sharpened it with my teeth real fast, and I galloped up and I said, "A foul upon thee dragon!!", and I thrust the branch into his heart, and I actually, slayed the dragon. And to this day, if you ask Kevin or Patrick, they'll be like, "God man, he saved my life."

Toure and Adebayor Speak

So we beat Sunderland Sunday 3-2 after blowing a two goal lead when we went up two to nil. Two goals by Van Persie who is now on quite a hot streak himself. I think that's 5 goals in 4 matches for him. Anyways, Sunderland got a red card in the 90th minute because of Paul McShane's tackle on Alexander Hleb, who had already gotten badly fouled by Mark Noble last week. Well Kolo Toure has not taken very kindly to this.

"When I saw that on the replay, I thought the intention was bad."

"He did not get to Hleb and I think sometimes it is better to relax (when a player is coming towards you).

"It can make something worse happen. The referee did well to send him off.

"I spoke to Alex afterwards and I said 'they want to kill you' - but I was just joking.

"Alex is such a great player. He is okay, all right."

Toure is filling in as captain and it's good to see him standing up for his team mates when they are attacked like that. He also spoke about winning the title, saying they don't think about it right now, but that we are playing well and want to keep it up. Confidence is sky high and if they can continue this magnificent run then the title could truly be a possibility.

Next up is Adebayor, who spoke about his strike partner, Robin Van Persie. He talked about how Van Persie's skills perfectly match his own and I have to agree. Where Robin has better skill on the ball and a better shot, Adebayor has the work rate and the size and strength that Robin lacks. Together they have eleven goals this season which is fantastic for this point in the season. He said they have built up an "automatic understanding" where they both know exactly where the other wants the ball played. Hopefully both forwards can stay healthy and continue this dominant run.

Here's some remarks from cunty United players Tevez and Evra saying how they can beat Arsenal to the title. Big words from a team who lost to us twice last season.

Micah Richards restated his desire to play for Arsenal one day. I think he's a great player and he should come in to the team after Gallas is deemed too old or too injured. Maybe sooner because Wenger has that 70 million quid war chest.

Well that's about all I have, remember if you like reading the ArseNole you can subscribe in the top right corner of this page either by email or by feed. It's quite convenient so if you read a lot try it out. Over this international break, tell me in the comments the first match you went to and the result. I like hearing about them.

ArseNole

Injury Setback for El Capitano Gallas

Hey everyone it's another day and another injury for William Gallas. He has to be the most injuredest player the ever exist. That's right, I said injuredist. Arsene Wenger said that Gallas had fully recovered and although would not be selected for the Sunderland match, he would be resuming full training along with Lehmann, Song, and Rosicky. Now Gallas has suffered another injury setback and re-injured his groin. Wenger says he probably won't be back until the end of this month.

So it's another injury for our captain and Gallas seems to be a player that if he hurts his pinky finger he's out for about 3 months. Maybe this isn't a horrible thing for us though. We have not conceded a goal while Senderos has partnered Kolo at the back. Not a single one. Gallas has shown over and over that not only does he not partner Kolo well, but he is not reliable to stay in the side as he is so injury prone. I'll probably get a lot of stick for this but maybe we should get rid of Gallas? He hasn't really contributed to the side since he has been here and we do have Djourou on loan and Gilberto and Song that can play at center back. Wenger won't sell him though, but these injuries are really becoming a problem.

Meanwhile, a story about a player who won't be leaving anytime soon. Alex Hleb says he wants to finish his career at Arsenal. I don't know about you but it always makes me like a player more when he says things like this. It shows commitment and that he really loves his team. Alex has been much improved this season, able to score goals and make passes. He's always been able to dribble well he just needed to improve other areas of his game and it looks like he has done that now.

Craig Gordon, Sunderland keeper, says it would be really nice to beat Arsenal. Unfortunately for him it won't happen. Wishful thinking though Craig.

I know it's been a short one today but there isn't much news. Good day all.

Remember to post your Sunderland predictions in the comments.

Board Meets With Kroenke, Gilberto Not Happy

Hello all, finally stopped raining here in Florida so that's good news. There isn't a lot of news today but I'll try to cover every bit of news I can find.

The Board held another meeting yesterday with ex-enemy Stan Kroenke. It's looking more and more like Old Stanley is becoming our ally against the porky prisoner from Russia. He seems to be just fine with his 12.2% and with functioning with the board instead of against them. If he pledges with the other board members not to sell his shares that will be good news for us.

The club released an official statement on the meeting saying this: "The Board of Arsenal Holdings wish to confirm that a positive meeting was held in London on October 3rd (yesterday) with Stan Kroenke.

"The meeting falls in line with the club's intention to maintain an open dialogue with large shareholders of Arsenal Football Club."

So we'll see how it goes with old Stanley. Anything to keep the Obese Oligarch out of our club.

The other potentially big bit of news today involves Gilberto Silva, who is not happy about losing his starting place to Mathieu Flamini. Gilberto has only started four games for us this year and I think two of those were at central defense so he really hasn't gotten the games that he normally gets. Flamini has been playing quite well though so it's very hard to drop a player in such good form.

Gilberto I think could leave in January. He's getting up in years and our central midfield is absolutely packed. If you think about it we have Cesc, Flamini, Diaby, Denilson, Gilberto all vying for two spots every game and it just won't work out that everyone is getting the playing time they want. Now Diaby and Denilson both get the Carling Cup and some Premiership games but they are young and won't expect as many, but Gilberto is used to playing every game so this is rough for him and he may want out. Just a thought.

That's about all I have today. I know it's short but there isn't much else. I'm still attempting to put together my first podcast but I'm just figuring it all out and I still need some people to do segments on it so please if you are interested email me. That's about all. Remember the prediction contest before the match this weekend. Later

Bucharest 0-1 Arsenal

Well we got the job done, even if it wasn't pretty. Arsenal won in the Romanian city of Bucharest last night with a goal from Robin Van Persie and now he's scored in two straight. Robin, Adebayor, and Hleb all passed their late fitness tests and made starts for the team even though they had been questionable yesterday morning. Our lineup looked like this:

Almunia
Sagna-Toure-Senderos-Clichy
Eboue-Cesc-Flamini-Hleb
RvP-Adebayor

As I mentioned before, we definitely were not playing at our Arsenal best today, and Bucharest thought they had taken the lead on six minutes. A free kick was sent into the box and headed hard and down and went right by Almunia into the net. I was stunned when it happened but thankfully the referee blew for offside and he clearly was on the replay.

Right after that Cesc had an unbelievable chance five yards from an open net and somehow skyed the ball over. It looked like the non-scoring Cesc of last year, not the wonder goal scorer this year. Hopefully he won't dwell on it.

Kolo Toure stopped their next best chance of the day. Almunia came way out of his box to punch clear, the ball fall to a Bucharest player who lobbed from about thirty yards and Kolo had to be there behind Almunia to head clear. Bit shoddy goalkeeping but luckily no harm done. Our goal came shortly after.

Adebayor made a great run into the box from the left and made it all the way to the end line. He turned and squared it back for Fabregas who couldn't get on the end of it but luckily the ball kept rolling and RvP was there to shoot. When he first shot I thought he was going to miss but it was his left foot and he didn't miss and we were 1-0 up.

That was pretty much the end of the game. There were a couple more chances for both teams but after the goal neither team ever looked much like scoring. It was another match where I worried we would never score, but the goal eventually came. This is the mark of a good team because we wouldn't get these results last year.

Man of the Match: Philippe Senderos was quite comfortable in defense and put in a good performance. He gets the award of Adebayor who missed some easy chances. Fabregas definitely didn't have his best day but Clichy was also good. Big Phil gets the nod though and let's hope he takes some confidence from this performance.

Needs Work: It's hard to pick these this season as we have won 9 matches in a row but I'll go with Almunia who was a little shaky in the net tonight. He had trouble dealing with some crosses and was totally caught off guard by the ball they got called offside on.

Robin Van Persie after the game gave the press a "told you so" type speech saying that he knew Arsenal would be good this year and said so, but the press laughed at him but they can't anymore.

"At the start of the season I said we will surprise - and everyone was laughing.

"Now 12 games into the season, everyone says, 'Ooh, look at Arsenal, they are a good team'. This I knew before and my mind has not changed.

"I started training early this season with Theo [Walcott] and after, when the rest of the lads came back in, I saw a great togetherness and belief and big quality. This is what I saw day in, day out."

RvP is right. Nobody gave us a chance this year and yet now we are playing amazing football. It's wonderful to watch and I am enjoying it thouroughly.

Oh and since we didn't really get the ArseNole prediction contest going before yesterday's match we'll start it before the Sunderland match this weekend. Post your score prediction in the comments and I'll add up the number of correct predictions for the year and that person will win an Arsenal prize. Standings will be shown on the website.

And that's all I have for you today. Later

Bucharest Preview

Alright Champion's League again today, and we play in Bucharest. It's gonna be a short post today as I'm quite busy, but it'll work.

And get this, the Bucharest manager will be sacked if he loses this game to Arsenal. This will only be his third game in charge and the other two were both victories, but the owner apparently doesn't think much of him and says he'll get the boot with a loss.

So now some injury news right quick. Jens Lehmann is still out so Almunia will retain his place, and probably will even when Mad Jens is fit, but we'll see. Alexander Hleb is rated as 50/50 by Wenger after that tackle by Mark Noble at the weekend. Adebayor, Diaby, Flamini, and Van Persie all also face late fitness tests to see if they'll be able to go. This could present us with a bit of a striker problem, but I think the lineup will look like this:

Almunia
Sagna-Toure-Senderos-Clichy
Eboue-Fabregas-Gilberto-Walcott
Adebayor-Bendtner

I decided that I would give Bendtner the start here as I doubt both Adebayor and RvP will pass fitness tests well enough for Wenger to risk them against Bucharest.

In other news Alisher Usmanov says he is not planning taking over Arsenal and simply wants to make football bigger in Russia. He's clearly full of it as he wouldn't say he's planning a "blocking stake" if he was just in it to make football bigger. He says there is no problem with "Russian (mafia) money coming in to the "World's biggest football club."" He is no fan and he just wants to make some money off of our club. Arseblog reported that Usmanov tried to buy into Liverpool before it was sold, so yeah he's not looking like a huge Arsenal fan anymore huh?

As for transfer rumors, we have one today. Jussi Jaaskelainen has been linked with us since contract negotiations with Bolton seem to have broken down completely. He's out of contract after this year and can talk to clubs on January 1st. He's a pretty good keeper but I'm undecided if we should try to make a move for him.

My final score prediction for the match tonight is 2-0 to the Arsenal.

Also I'd like to announce the ArseNole prediction contest. Just go to Arsenole.com, leave a comment and predict the score for the match tonight. One guess per person can be made any time before the match starts. For every match you predict correctly I will give you a point. The person with the most points will win an Arsenal prize! I will update the standings on the website after this match.

Later Gooners