Midweek mayhem

Hey ho, it’s off to the Emirates we go.

When you’re in the Championship you can’t dwell too long on a bad result because the next match comes up so quickly, and anyone who says we’ll be finding that out before long will be shot as a defeatist. Here we are with a quick match to make us forget about the last one; I suppose one of the reasons playing a midweek game at the end of August is to increase attendances because the kids are still off school.

Arsenal away. Two of the greatest names in English football, locked in combat. There’s been times we’ve looked back wistfully at when we were better than them a few years earlier and wanted to know what happened, but to be honest that’s been when we were on top of our game and they were rebuilding; to also be honest they’ve spent most of the past century on a different level to us.

And if that’s not annoying enough, it’s also given rise to the most entitled bunch of supporters on earth. Tarquin and his mates Jezza and Toby got into footy some time in the mid-nineties and they jolly well love the Arse. Home of football and all that, so they blooming well should be in the Champions League every year and win a few of those cups the little clubs get so excited about, even if they do clutter up the season and get in the way of the proper games.

Talking of rebuilding, another infuriating thing about Arsenal is that when they need to do it, they get it right far too often. Their manager is the new Alex ‘They wanted him out and now look’ Ferguson, encouraging out of their depth bosses throughout football that they’ll get it right in time. Mentioning no names.

It was less than two years ago when we gave perhaps our best performance of the season here, looking like we were going in one direction while they were going nowhere (see above). Still, there’s no reason why we can’t do the same again.