Arsenal
Greatness is as Greatness Does - Keep on Grinding
Greatness
By Boris Mellor
September 26 2009
Vito Mannone was quite rightly acclaimed man of the match, but the headline is not a reference to his excellent goal keeping display. There is no doubt that without his performance Arsenal may have lost this game, but there again that's what keepers are for, keeping the ball out of the net.
No the headline refers to the one moment of genius in the whole game, the combined efforts of Cesc Fabregas and Robin van Persie.
What a pass by Cesc, almost like a golfer chipping out of the rough he made the ball run in front of RvP. RvP carefully controlled with his left and put it beyond the keeper with his right. It was an irresistible moment, no defence could have failed to succumb.
It changed the balance of the game, it meant that Arsenal now dominated the midfield from then on, whilst previously it had been Fulham who looked most likely to score.
As good as Mannone was if Arsenal had not eventually scored maybe Fulham would have finally found the net. The goal knocked the wind out of Fulham allowing Arsenal to find more ways forward.
At the end of the first half Fulham went back to the dressing room probably feeling they were the better team and unlucky not to be at least a goal up. That would not have been an unreasonable assumption.
Arsenal were often second to the ball, and Cesc and Arshavin created very little. No doubt some fans started putting Cesc under the microscope, is he unhappy, off form etc? True he was not playing well, but on 52 minutes he took the match by the scruff of the neck and with an inspired move of stunning simplicity sunk his rapier deep into Fulham's heart. He had answered the doubters, including the author, greatness is as greatness does.
After that Arsenal could have had more goals, but the team insisted on letting the fans suffer a nail biting experience up to the 95 th minute. Not for them the easy way out of putting the ball into a gaping wide net.
Mannone does twice what Almunia is yet to do.
Vito now has two clean sheets in the Premiership to Almunia's none, two clean sheets in a row! I certainly wouldn't have put money on that. Although the iron rule of waiting for a bus has probably asserted itself, you wait ages for one and then two turn up all at once. Thanks to Vito some gritty, if not always astute, defending prevented the Cottagers from scoring.
It wasn't always pretty but it was good to see that the team can concentrate on preventing a goal for 95 minutes. Out of such feats confidence can grow, when Almunia recovers, whether he get his place back or not, he will be aware that he has some real competition for his place. That can only be to the good.
Grinding it out
I refused to accept Wenger's logic that the City game was a good performance, if you concede four you are not good enough. It's the score that counts, when Man Utd and Chelsea win like this it's called "grinding it out", and we are told that it is the reason for their greatness. Last year Fulham used the same tactics and Arsenal lamely rolled over, this time they fought to the last. It does indicate some improvement.
I am not arguing that it proves Arsenal will be a great team this season, but it is a good result, and if the Gunners continue grinding out results like this then they can become real contenders.
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Stumbleupon26/09/2009 22:40
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2009:09:30:20:13:49 by Padre Pio.
As Voltz said "when Chelsea win 1 - 0 its a sign of greatness, but when Arsenal win 1 - 0 its considered a sign of their weakness"
"Same old Arsenal, alwasy cheating" when Gallas was clearly in pain after landing on his back?
Galas had too many knocks for the past 2 weeks.
I would rest him for thsi midweek match.
But the commentators were spot on about Zamora yesterday, he's got 75% of what Fulham need in a striker. He's just not clinical enough when it comes to scoring. There were a couple of times yesterday that a better striker would've caught Vito out of position, and scored. We got lucky with Zamora (watch, Zamora laugh
) being a@#$%&shot!!
Was a game perfectly set up for Vito to play. I'm glad he made the most of it, and (hopefully) gained confidence from.
its easy to get carried away by that excellent pass by Cesc and an even excellent finish by RVP cos it was a delight to watch.hopefully now that RVP has broken the deadlock may be the goals will flow.
i don't even want to get into why cesc's form has dropped cos i will maintain that he needs constant midfield partners that will compliment his game so he can give his best before judging him.no one likes to change partners constantly.
Only partly - it needed a goal for that, and we had what Fukham lacked, two geniuses.
Greatness is what greatness does. We need to recognise it and respect it when we see it.
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