Weekend fallout …Michael Thomas monent…Win a free tee…

I’m going to have to keep it short Gooner’s as I have a lot on and time is my enemy at the moment. Allgoonerdup.com’s posts might be a bit sporadic over the next week or so, so I apologies in advance to all you good people who like your daily dose of football and humour. OK so first up, we lost. Yep so we did, anyone REALLY that surprised? I think even the ardent Arsene Wenger fan (I’m on about the AKB’s) must admit we were fecking awful against Fulham and the blame has to rest at the feet of Wenger who hasn’t strengthened our midfield. OK it’s quite easy to say “I told you so” but come on even with our injuries, you can’t expect to beat a Premier League team with the likes of Eboué and Denilson in the central midfield berth. Alright I wont knock Denilson too much, the boy has got talent he just happened to have his worst game in an Arsenal shirt when he needed to step up. 

I know Emmanuel Eboué is the new ‘Pascal Cygan’ the player all fans love to hate, but admittedly he isn’t doing himself any favours. He was fecking awful against Fulham. I can’t believe we are serious title contenders with a player like Emmanuel Eboué supposedly doing the defensive midfield work. If Eboué was brought in to do a ‘Flamini’ job it desperately failed. Mathieu Flamini was all work rate, jumping into tackles with full gusto, running up and down the pitch like a maniac and just pure energy, Emmanuel Eboué on the other hand was none of those – he wasn’t even close to one of those. If we are to play like we did last season we need a Mathieu Flamini type player, simple as that. We haven’t got one of those amongst our ranks so will Le Gaffer buy one? Who knows? Wenger still reckons he’s no closer to signing anyone. Well if that’s the case this season will be a fecking long one Gooner’s and we’ll know how it feels to be a spud supporter, what with losing against teams you should be caning and generally being a laughing stock. 

I haven’t got the answers to improve us, that’s down to the manager and his cheque book and the players he’s identified. We do need to buy, our squad is paper thin. After losing the experience of Alex Hleb, Mathieu Flamini and Gilberto Silva, Le Gaffer still hasn’t addressed getting the quality players in with the added bonus of ‘experience’, in my opinion. But we do need it and need it quick. I’m just glad we lost against a team like Fulham and it was so early in the season. At least Le Gaffer can see early doors what he needs to do and hopefully he will. Cross those fingers someone decent with experience is signed up Gooners.

St Michael Thomas t-shirt…

The winner of the St Michael Thomas t-shirt is Darren Taylor, a Gooner from Bristol. So well done Gooner – hope you enjoy your prize. The answer to the question was Michael Thomas wore the number four shirt when we beat Liverpool at Anfield in 1989 to grab the title. Which is nice. 

‘Thomas – it’s up for grabs now’ – Where was you?

As part of this season and trying to tie in with all the 20th anniversary shenanigans of that famous last minute championship win, allgoonerdup.com is doing a ‘JFK ‘where was you’ moment’. But obviously the moment we’re doing is -’Thomas – it’s up for grabs now’ moment. Every Gooner knows where they were when that goal went in and we’re going to publish your emails. There will be one a day, so get amongst it and send your emails in via the contacts page and mark the subject line ‘Thomas – it’s up for grabs moment’. I’ll be doing some sort of fancy graphic and that just to give the piece some ‘air play’. But get your emails in and I’ll post where you were and that.

Girl in a shirt

Allgoonerdup is looking to give the Goonerbabe page a bit of a boost and we’re going for a ‘Girl in the Shirt’ approach. Do you have any pictures of your girl in the shirt or girls get yourself seen on the Goonerbabe wall and send in your own pictures. Lets get this party started right. Send your pictures in and tell us your name, favourite player, favourite all time player, favourite drink and if you have anything else to declare to babe@allgoonerdup.com

Oorah – it’s on people…Cesc joins injury list…St Michael Thomas t-shirt up for grabs..

Hello Gooner’s and good day to you all.

Well today starts the beginning of our 2008/09 season and it’s going to be an emotional roller coaster and an exciting one, no doubt. The long road towards getting some much needed silverware in The Grove’s trophy cabinet starts now and I’m not even going to recognise or give props to The Amsterdam Tournament Cup. As that great rapper MC Hammer, he of the baggy pants look once said we need ‘proper’ silverware this season. 

Our march to glory and a first ‘proper’ trophy since 2005 in that infamous F.A. Cup Final when we bashed Manchester USA from pillar to post and generally spanked the bejesus out of the them comes in the shape of FC Twente. FC Twente as we all know are bossed by none other than the ‘wally with the brolly’ Steve McClaren and he for one will be looking for an upset against a English club so he can ram all the taunts (deservedly at that) aimed at him by the British press back down their throats. I’m sure that would be motivation enough for him to get the British sports journo’s to actually write something positive about him. Anyway that’s his look out, our aim is to make sure that isn’t even close to being a reality – a bit like spurs being considered a Big Four Club™.

Which brings me nicely to Dutch Master in the making Robin van Persie who has labeled FC Twente the Dutch equivalent of ‘that’ team with an extreme deluded sense of grandeur and lets be honest they have the fans to match as they seem to think one Carling Cup victory puts god knows how many years of obscurity into the shade. Anyhow what with FC Twente being compared to spurs, if that wasn’t motivation enough for The Wenger Boys I’m really not sure what is. It’s not even a money thing. You can’t give someone a bonus for beating them, the mentality should be you just don’t want to lose against them, it shouldn’t even be a consideration. Such instances should see you ridiculed on a scale of Fat Ronaldo being caught in a hotel room with a bunch of transvestites and then banished to a far away place – like the Isle of Dogs or some other god forsaken place. 

Anyhoo Gooner’s I digress I’m supposed to be chatting football. So FC Twente the Dutch equivalent of spurs, I’ve got that covered. Not like our midfield where players are dropping like a fat man after a 5m sprint. Not only has ‘first pick’ Abou Diaby been put on the injury list, he is now joined with the sicknote waving shenanigans by WonderBoy™ TheCesc, Kolo Touré and Philippe Senderos. I think that groan can be heard all over North London. Well now we’ll see how much depth the squad has, I actually feel a bit responsible for The Cesc’s injury, no I wasn’t invited to join the boys at London Colney and buckled The Cesc with an ill timed challenge but I wrote a piece the other day and said we’ll be well up the shitter if The Cesc does get injured as we do need some experience and cohesion in midfield. What with messrs Gilberto, Hleb and Flamini all doing one there’s no consistency in the midfield, so hopefully the pre-season games will of had the new comers and second choice players getting an understanding with each other. Well cross you fingers, either that or any of the traveling fans I suggest you grab your boots because you’ll more than likely get a game if anyone else gets injured at this rate.

I shall finish on a positive note though Gooner’s. What with these injuries it gives the ‘second choice’ players a chance to stake a claim and do a ‘Mathieu Flamini’ and prove they have what it takes. Now is the time for the likes of Johan Djourou, Aaron Ramsey, Denilson and even Theo Walcott to step up to the plate. Well Gooner’s it’s going to be an emotional roller coaster ride tonight, enjoy the game which is being shown live on Setanta One, get behind the team and lets roar on The Arsenal to victory. As the motto goes Victory Concordia Crescit – C’mon Arsenal.

I can almost smell it… Michael Thomas t-shirt up for grabs now…

We’re getting close kids! The Charity.. sorry… Community Shield is this weekend, featuring the Arsenal Retirement Home versus the Northern Scum. It’s a match that I rarely get excited about other than it being the flare that is sent up to warn of proper football coming shortly. So there is only a week of preparations to get through before we can see our lads in serious action again. 

First up in that preparation is The Amsterdam Tournament, which is working out as an ideal warm up for the match up against FC Twente, currently being mismanaged by Steve ‘Euro2008 Commentator’ McClaren. I think Arsene will be feeling pretty confident that Steve poses little threat in terms of tactical awareness, and the run out against Ajax is ideal.

Of course in the background there is plenty of stuff going on. The newspapers have taken to linking us with every centre midfielder in the known universe for one thing, and so far we look no closer to signing one – something that Arsene has publicly acknowledged. It is odd though – if we need a new midfielder, and I realise the transfer window is still open for a while yet, that we wouldn’t try to get someone in before the season started rather than during its first month. But Denilson has played well in the few run outs he has, and the lure of a first team place will hopefully push him to become the great player he has the potential to be. His challenger for that spot, Abou Diaby, needs to stop hanging out with Tomas Rosicky and RvP if he wants to claim the spot – he has been far too injury prone in recent months, or most of his Arsenal career if you want to be cynical, although Sunderland’s hatchet man Matt Smith had a hand in that. I still doubt whether he has it in him to last a whole campaign. And keeping with the script the gangly Vieira wannabe is injured once again, FFS! What is it with our players, the season hasn’t even started and we’ve got more casualties than a party thrown by Michael Barrymore. Scarily, Ebouseless got a run at centre midfield against ‘Ze Germans’, which I’m hoping was merely a plan to get him some fitness and not a test run for yet another position switch. 

Meanwhile Jack ‘Wonderkid of the week’ Wilshere is impressing everyone still – enough so that he has been given a first team squad position. I can’t imagine that he’ll see much of the Premier League, despite Arsene assertion that he wouldn’t be afraid to throw him in, but it is still wonderful to have such a hot prospect, an English one at that, coming through the ranks. I’m sure Gael Clichy is wondering what the hell is going on with him consistently being one of the oldest players on the pitch for us in the warm up games. 

And first up we get West Brom, who are fresh up from the Championship. They’ll be out for an upset so it’ll be a tougher game than it looks on paper but hopefully we’ll knock the confidence out of them early on and from there it will be a steady slide into oblivion. I’m particularly keen to see Samir Nasri take the field – if he can be more of a Pires than a Hleb then I think we’ll challenge for honours again this season. If not, we obviously need younger players! 

Roll on The Amsterdam Tournament enjoy it Gooner’s, the real curtain raiser for ‘proper football’! C’mon on The Arsenal.

By Paul Wright Allgoonerdup roving reporter.

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Lets get commenting Gooners…