The handshake between Rafa Benitez and Mark Hughes at the end of today's 2-2 draw spoke
volumes. Although a pulsating second half had rescued what looked to be a turgid scoreless draw provided
plenty of the attacking threat both sides possess, their frustrated expressions bore the knowledge
of all too familiar frailties and failings that continue to cost their respctive sides. Click to continue reading...
Reina Carragher Skrtel Agger Insua Mascherano Lucas Kuyt Gerrard Babel Ngog Goals: Skrtel 50' Adebayor 69' Ireland 76' Benayoun 77' Paid the price for sitting on a lead and for poor marking on set plays. And, of course, less than
10 minutes later, Liverpool went behind to an incredibly dubious goal. Click to continue reading...
"I am going to have lots of options but it is a good problem to have," he said.
"We have good players playing well and good players still to come back. Now it is down to me to
make sure I pick the right options for the right opposition."
For "Collymore closing in..." in 1996, you can read "It's Michael Owen..." in
2009. Both games were littered with brilliant goals, pathetic defending and some of the most
exciting football the Premier League has seen. Now though, two days on from "The Greatest
Manchester Derby in the History of Anything Anytime Ever", it is surely the time to look back
on it with a more tactical eye.
The Manchester derby was an enthralling affair providing us with one of the games of the season.
The momentum ebbed and flowed between the two teams throughout as both searched for the upper hand
on the other. Before kick off we were greeted with the news Carlos Tevez would start, which added
even more spice to the game.
With the war of words/name calling/mind-games that have been prevalent the past forty-eight hours
or so, it is a signal that the derby is now very much upon us - and the media has taken an even
greater interest in this game than usual. We have had plenty of comments so far, with particular contributions from Ferguson, Hughes, Toure,
de Jong, Ireland and Sylvinho to stoke up the flames ahead of the weekend. Click to continue reading...
Man City 4 (Almunia og 20, Bellamy 74, Adebayor 80, Wright-Phillips 84) Arsenal 2 (Van
Persie 62, Rosicky 88) (Premiership)
Twice we've travelled to Manchester in recent weeks. Twice we've played well, created the bulk
of the chances but not had the clinical edge or the luck to put them away.
Given - Solid presence once again and made a couple of important saves. No chance with either of
the goals. 6.5 Richards - Impressive both in defence and going forward. Linked well with Wright-Phillips and a
constant threat. Best game of the season. 8 Toure - Defence qualities are better than first thought. Click to continue reading...
Make no mistake, todays win was an important one. With eyes upon us, and an air of expectation around the stadium we turned in a result and
performance that suggested this side could be ready to achieve something. With a more defensive formation, we managed to combine both endeavour and an attacking threat to
come away with all three points when at one stage we may well have been facing a defeat. Click to continue reading...
Adebayor decided to remind us all of why we sold him today ahead of the game by saying that any
fans who booed him during his tenure with Arsenal are "not real fans" and "tomorrow they will
support Liverpool." He just doesn't get it, does he? The relationship between supporters and
players is just that a relationship.
Having lost 2-1 away at Manchester United, Arsenal face the other side of Manchester, Mark
Hughes' team who according to many, may as well fight for one of the top four Premiership
positions.
As for the line-ups, contrary to false rumours, captain Cesc Fabregas is fit to start but Tomas
Rosicky is only the bench for the Arsenal, joined by Eduardo.
Given - More smart saves and another assured performance. Has not put a foot wrong since he
signed. 7.5 Richards - Struggled against the lively Moses after being booked early. 6 Toure - The new captain had a strong all-round performance both defending and coming forward.Click to continue reading...
A hard fought and hard earned victory, but impressive in the context of previous failures at this
stage of the competition at lower league sides. For the most part it was a struggle as we contended with a Palace side who impressed. There were
pacy, lively and rarely afforded us any time and space on the ball. Click to continue reading...
You look at a lot of sides or managers who are aiming for grander things in the long run, and it is
often the Carling Cup that has been the first stepping stone on that journey. Whilst the nature of cup competition are a little difficult to predict, this competition is the one
that looks most likely to yield a trophy during 2009/10. Click to continue reading...
Hamburg shook off their early season funk and tore apart Dortmund at the Nordbank Arena. It was
the 4th straight victory for the Dinosaurs at home against BVB. A series of early goals seemed to
settle the match by the 12th minute. Guy Demel pushed the first over the line after a massive
keeper error in the 4th.
I feel as if I've done nothing but write about Manchester City this summer. And frankly I'm getting
tired of it. I'm very ready to see how this experiment in fantasy football (English version) plays
out in real life. The cream of world football went to Madrid this summer, but a lot of attacking
talent has ended up at Eastlands. Click to continue reading...
Shaun Wright-Phillips may not think so, but there could well be some similarities between Chelsea
and ourselves - from his own perspective at least. Now, with the summer additions, Wright-Phillips could find himself on the outside looking in, much
like his time at Chelsea. Mark Hughes now realistically has two players in every position. Click to continue reading...
Dude, I'm a little miffed at the moment. Excuse the rant that follows for a brief part of this post. Can't believe I'm saying this but it is
a strange period in my football following, as an Arsenal fan, where I would rather see a current
Arsenal player join Utd or Liverpool. Heck, even someone joining Chelsea doesn't give me the
vitriolic feeling as much as the idea that an Arsenal player is enticed by something other than the
wages to join Man City. Click to continue reading...
The Vodacom Challenge finished on Saturday with South African side Kaiser Chiefs FC taking on
English Premier League side Manchester City. The two teams played earlier in the week as Man City
won that match 1-0. Here's a recap and video highlights of Saturday's match.
Man City falls to Kaiser Chiefs FC 0-1 Video Highlights - Manchester City
couldn't repeat their performance earlier in the week against the Kaiser Chiefs as they fell
0-1.
Much is made of the strength in depth of the top four in comparison to rest of the Premier League,
with an indication of this strength being the quality of your substitutes bench. During 2008/09, the bench would routinely feature the likes of Hamman, Etuhu, Garrido, Evans,
Caicedo, Gelson, Vassell and Glauber. Click to continue reading...
Mars Attacks Alien Vincent Kompany Manchester City defensive midfielder Vincent Kompany is set to miss the start of the upcoming
Premier League season due to foot surgery. Despite losing the 6 foot 5 in Kompany - who made 34 appearances for City last season, scoring one
goal - The Citizens' management and ownership team is not too fazed - as they are sticking to their
well-publicized plans of pursuing a non-traditional 1-1-8 formation this season. Click to continue reading...
Roque Santa Cruz has completed his £17million move to Manchester City.
The Paraguayan passed a medical with the Eastlands outfit on Monday afternoon and has now signed
a deal to link up once more with Mark Hughes, his former manager at Blackburn.
Hughes has never made any secret of his desire to have Santa Cruz at City and having assured
themselves the knee injury that kept the South American out at the end of last season has fully
cleared up, the Blues have completed the signing of the striker.
A disappointing day, and like Jack, for me there were too many echoes of the 1-0 defeat earlier
this season in todays game, and we never really convinced that we were ever likely to be in the
game. Principally, we lacked the intent, belief and purpose that was needed to take anything from todays
game. Click to continue reading...
The 151st Manchester derby is upon us this Sunday, and added to the usual spice of a derby clash, a
couple of sub plots have been thrown in to the mix, namely United aiming for the title and
ourselves gunning for seventh spot to secure Europa League qualification next season. Looking at our final three games, I feel six points should be enough to achieve this but I would
argue that taking something from tomorrows game would be a huge boost. Click to continue reading...
Amongst five other changes from Thursday night's defeat in Hamburg. An interesting forward line,
with Etuhu, Bojinov and Petrov all starting. Man City: Given, Richards, Onuoha, Dunne, Garrido, Etuhu, Zabaleta, Ireland, De Jong,
Petrov, Bojinov. Subs: Hart, Robinho, Elano, Fernandes, Evans, Sturridge, McGivern. Click to continue reading...
div style="text-align: center;"[a
href="http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/saturday-s-key-battles-arsenal-v-man-city"arsenal.com
preview/a, a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_prem/7972747.stm"bbc sport
preview/a]br //divbr /The bookies make us very much second favourites for Saturday's trip to The
Emirates, and even putting aside our miserable away form, Arsenal's resurgence of late backs this
up in what is expected to be a very different game than when we met a href="http://bitterandblue. Click to continue reading...
RampantCan I say much? Probably not. Another tale of what might have been, lost dreams and happily
drunken fans.Sometimes brave displays and happy drunks are not enough. Were they enough tonight? I
honestly don't know.We started well, much better than expected. We had Holland rattled and De
Jong's yellow card was the least they deserved. Click to continue reading...
