Arsenal v Blackburn; FA Cup 5th Round Match Preview
It is the biggest question floating in the Goonerverse today – win the FA Cup or secure 4th place (or above) and qualify for the Champion’s League next season. And it is directly relevant to this match as the Gunners will look to advance to the next round by vanquishing their Lancashire visitors.
There still are questions floating out there as to whether or not Wenger is taking this cup run with serious intent. The manager moved quickly this week to allay any concerns about this:
“The FA Cup is an important target for us. We always take it very seriously, we’re on a good run and we want to continue the run,” Wenger recently said.
For the most part Wenger is faced with a fully healthy squad with the exception of Gibbs and Jenkinson who will serve his one game suspension from the last match. I think the expectation is that there will be a few new faces in the lineup but there should be regular XI as well featuring, especially in defense. It’s likely this match will also Gervinho make his return to the squad after taking some time off after returning from the Africa Cup of Nations.
Arsenal have yet to lose to get knocked out of the FA Cup by lower level competition since 1996. however, this Blackburn squad are still chock full of players who have Premier League experience and are fighting hard to get back to the top of the rung. While they hadn’t been performing with any consistency, they seem to have found some footing under new manager Michael Appleton (their fifth this season.)
The Gunners can expect to have an opponent that will sit back and look to hit them on the counter. Which means patience will be the order of the day. However, with patience also comes – playing smart. Oneof my biggest criticisms of this team has been that when they face an opponent who sits deep they lack creativity and movement going forward. Oppponents are more than happy to let Arsenal have the ball deep and pass it around the box. The fact is Arsenal haven’t been good at penetrating teams that manage to sit back on them.
Smart play means short passes and movement off the box. Being more direct. That’s what Arsenal will need to do and they will need to penetrate to get their chances.
It’s hard to see anything but an Arsenal win here but let’s remember we said the same thing about Bradford City.
FA Cup Match Facts Courtesy of BBC
- Arsenal are the second most successful club in FA Cup history, but they have not won a major trophy since this competition eight years ago.
- The Gunners have never been knocked out of the FA Cup by a lower league club in the Arsene Wenger era, and have ended the interest of 28 such clubs since losing to Sheffield United in 1996.
- The North London club have progressed beyond the fifth round in only two of the seven seasons since last lifting the silverware.
- Arsenal beat Blackburn 3-0 in the semi-finals of the FA Cup in April 2005 and went on to win the competition for the 10th and most recent time.
- Blackburn beat the Gunners 1-0 in the 1928 semi-finals and went on to lift the silverware for the sixth and most recent occasion.
- This is the eighth time they have drawn each other in the competition: Arsenal lead 4-3.
- The clubs last met in the Premier League in February last year, when Arsenal humiliated their Lancashire opponents 7-1 at the Emirates Stadium.
Injuries:
Arsenal: Gibbs (thigh), Jenksinson (suspended -1)
Blackburn: Dunn (calf), G Hanley (hamstring), King (hamstring), Best (knee), Etuhu (knee)
Match Official:
Mike Dean (27 Matches Y99, R4)
Broadcast Information:
US: Fox Soccer Channel 10:00 AM EST
UK: BBC Radio 5 Live 15.00 GMT
YAMA Prediction:
Arsenal: 3
Blackburn: 1
Projected Lineups:
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For the record I think Wenger is kind of on the right track, bringing in players like Monreal, Cazorla, Podoslki, but his negligent and – in polite terms, ‘dreamy’- management between 08-11 means the wound is too deep, too infected, to effectively cauterize or close. Gervinho, Diaby, Giroud, Ramsey are tangible/obvious trojan horses IMO, but there is a subtle rot that has already set in deep on the bowels of Colney and Wenger is unwilling to get the colonoscopy needed, for he himself is the sinister polyp.
Hope you get better Steve.
Cheers, Mazza….Hopefully I’ll be back to my usual activities and watching less of the eye gouging stuff. At least the other “big” clubs took notice and handed out drubbings in their matches today….
I’d like to hear what kiwi (among others, of course) thinks of this latest round of humiliation, but on the other hand, I hope he didn’t get up in the wee hours to witness it. Overall there’s lots of good writing in the Goonersphere. Plenty of the usual Wenger can’t coach or make subs or inspire, etc., etc., but others, both more subtle and/or more comprehensive. Our boy Timmy the Tooth (7amkickoff) had a pretty spot on allegory and he no longer has a hiding function among his comments….
Weren’t you a big Ramsey guy, pre-injury at least? For me there’s something about his running that changed, like he can’t go as low and corner as tightly, which is key when you’ve only got the one working foot. He was rested for Bayern yesterday….Hmmmm….
This group has only the “character test” and (fingers crossed) a hopefully less humiliating bow out of Europe and then the remaining 12 league matches. Too much pressure, probably, but the general drop in quality in the league is amazing to me and I still think we could be the best of the mid-table teams. I actually find fascination watching teams absorb a drubbing and then bouncing back. Arsenal shouldn’t be in that position (of course) and maybe our manager can no longer pull the strings on his happy pack. Likewise, longer term, I don’t see the emperor doing well with succession nor delegation, so the thickness of the see-through clothing only grows, even if the economic basis of the uber-plan might be sound. Not quite as elegant as the polyp/colonoscopy analogy but there you go. Maybe I just need to keep focused on Granada CF and their relegation battle while scouting all the players we’ll never buy.
Just trying to get/keep/stay on the healthier side of things….
Ramsey improved massively just before his injury and I was becoming a big fan, but he was always a fragile talent, very raw. He had flattered to deceive up until that improvement and it was only when he developed the confidence to be spontaneous that his talent came through. He doesn’t see to have the physical power or confidence to recapture that spontaneity and now all we’re left with is his a shell.
Both him and Giroud seem to have immobile trunks. A lack of agility and mobility in the hips, which handicap alot of what they try to do. Ramsey can blame the injury for that I suppose but Giroud is just heavy boned it seems. There’s no hope for him. He’ll always be leaning back or off balance at inappropriate times.
Interesting way of putting it.
I never played football but I did play other field sports and the first thing I notice is the way players run. I see a lot of over-striding (Ramsey, Jenkinson, Wilshere a bit….) but stiffness and pranciness (Giroud) can also inhibit the ability to “gather” oneself to beat opponents and make the correct touch on the ball. In general, I think these things can be improved and are a huge area where coaching could exert a positive force. Unfortunately I doubt such things are ever looked at at London Colney…. In truth, I’ve got a little extra hope for Giroud just because he has been improving as he gets older and maybe applies himself to these very detailed sorts of things, and I tend towards being hopeful….
Anyhow, while I enjoy talking about such matters, they seem beyond minuscule in terms of turning around the aircraft carrier….
On the right track to continue this quest to keep in the Top 4 maybe… but if we are still selling our best players every season, we are not on the right track to attempt to win the league or a trophy.
That’s well put. He was both wrong and then stubborn about it for so long, that ‘too little, too late’ has become the mantra for not just individual games (in which we too often only choose to play the second half), but the overarching theme for his management style.
And even for the small, incremental changes his has made, none of it is enough to redress the balance with all the things that *haven’t* changed. The calamitious defense, ridiculous set pieces, etc. And that’s why the rhetoric all seems so familiar.
“We did not play well enough to beat Blackburn on Saturday.
We had a lot of possession, we had 16 shots at goal and they only had one shot at goal. But it was vital for us to keep a clean sheet and we could not do that because we made a mistake and let them in.”
Really, change the team name and we’ve heard it all so many times before. Nothing will fundamentally change until there’s, you know…change.
just a few interesting statistics for you on a snowy New England morning:
Carlos Vela leads his club, Real Soc. in both goals and assists.
9 goals – 5 assists
They sit in 5th or 6th place…
Jeremie Aliadiare leads his club, Lorient, in both goals and assists.
10 goals – 8 assists
They sit in 7th place…
is it Arsene? is it Arsenal?
who knows… but there is definitely life after Arsenal FC for some.
Sorry people, blog (sized) post coming…. I’m on a bit of drug regime (not just the normal coffee/alcohol stuff….) trying to knock out this “referred femoral nerve pain.” The current course (which ends today) is powerful stuff with side effects including “insomnia,” and “euphoria” (or, possibly, “mania”)…. This was supposed to be the euphoria phase and I’m supposed to be off the drug come Tuesday when my hope was to be (at least close to) “pain free”….
Alas no…. (As in life)….There are no guarantees in being a sports fan, but geez…..
After the match, where we had our replay up at Blackburn (thankfully) stolen away by a sloppy line change (that’s an ice hockey term, by the way….) I happened to read that guy Tim and his blog Arse2Mouse. It’s a worthy post match moan. In particular, I clicked and read his link to an earlier post about Arsenal as a “Zombie Club.” Good reading and a handy summation of the overall malaise. He deals with the nuts and bolts while my story is more personal. (Hey it’s my blog!….)
What I feel is that my (inherent) sense of hope is being squeezed to the point where I almost cannot bear it. In the short term, the team needs a response Tuesday. Unlike other (more gloomy) sorts wrote on the previous thread, I believe we have just about zero hope of beating a team like Bayern over two legs, but we can at least show some fight and (if the bounces fall our way) draw or even win over 90 minutes. Imagine getting to penalties in Munich. Please god, no. Bradford City was too much, if I recall. A smidgen of hope is all I ask, and leaving the home ground to cheers would be such a boon for the boys. A score draw (the clean sheet being impossible….) or only losing on a call or fluke would suffice. A win would probably be TOO good and would likely bite us in the ass for the more important match: Aston Villa, also at home, on the weekend, where three points are an absolute must….
So no trophies and a grind to try to get back to a tournament that is all about money as we cannot (realistically) hope to (truly) compete for it. I (lonely among the masses) can actually take that scenario and defer my hope towards the Arsene-l vision that Football is in a bubble period and that selling players for 5 times their worth (and paying them 3 times their salary) and replacing them with decent ones who see Arsenal as a step up (pero, que piensas ahora, Nacho?….) is good strategy, long-term. I like long term hope. The other route seems fun but silly. Witness the (compound) sufferings of my friend Stag, the QPR fan…..
Still, I need somewhere to place my hope in the short term, hence yesterday’s match being a big one. On this Stag and I are in agreement, though I thought HE was being overly optimistic. Weren’t we bound to draw one of the better clubs in the next round where we would likely have to sacrifice it (or try to win with our “squad depth”) given the tenuous nature of our league position?
So. short term, as a venue for my “hope, it’s about the players. Yesterday was perfect. I want Gervinho (a “confidence” player—aren’t they all?….) to carry on from his better AfCon and convince the skeptical fans in the stadium. Likewise the freckled fat-boy (Alex Oxlade Chamberlain) or Glass Ankled Abou D or Lil’ Mozart or even the Hunky French Striker whose confidence is a prancy as his running (Giroud). On defense, more bedding in for Nacho and fitness tests to pass for our two (would be) best CBs……Even our back-up keeper would get a good chance for a clean sheet….Oh wait…. (CK is more than correct, that squad put out should have beaten Blackburn, who were also resting players….)
The fans “should” be louder and prouder and more “supportive,” and some sort of “symbiosis” is necessary, but can you blame them? You pay your money for “entertainment” and you expect a happy ending. At the very least you want a professional show. I don’t mean to single him out, because he seems a decent player. but that is some divey crap Le Coq serves up. How long can “we” support new players when we know they’re not as good as the ones we sell (or fail to keep)? Sorry, but I’d rather watch Bacary Sagna play in Coquelin’s “natural position” (whatever that might be….) until he’s 40 than see a repeat of Le Coq’s show over a full match again. (Can nobody translate the name “Mike Dean” to our boys trying to win fouls?) I live with the dread that Bac will be moved on for purely economic reasons while I’ve got his name on my shirt (even if it was the DAG who payed for it)…. (As he does for my blog-space…. Cheers, mate….)
Qualifying for the CL matters, as does having a club with International footballers, at least in this time and place. The non-manaical fan will watch his (or her) team and will watch the tournaments (or whatever game is on) and we want to see the players who impress us come to our club. I was always fascinated with Santi Cazorla and it was very cool that we bought him, for example. Others might feel similarly about Poldoski (who hasn’t played for 2 matches now, is he hurt?…) or others. Likewise we want our boys stepping on the tournament stage and I still feel good about Cesc’s contributions to the Spanish national squad. I feel less good about what he did yesterday, scorching the hands of the Granada keeper for a Messi put-back, ending the dream of beating both Real Madrid and Barca at the tiny Estadio Nuevo Los Carmenes. No points for the Granadin(y)os but they look so much better for avoiding the drop. It’s kind of spectacular to know that the crowd (skeptical, technically obsessed Spaniards, no less) was singing and holding scarves at full stretch.
Nobody wants to lose and we shouldn’t have yesterday. A long term perspective IS good but (god almighty) we could use a little day to day. Only a trophy (and a big one, at that) would justify (real) celebration in our part of North London, so I guess I’ll hold out for that. August comes early, it seems….unless we can rally and get up for that 4th place spot…..
So, that’s it, like Mazza says, (when he’s on his game, at least….) there’s nothing more to see here. Thanks for reading. At least “Character Test Tuesday” comes quickly….
this team isn’t worth all these words you typed…
No kidding….but I’m not the only one seeking therapy (or relief from pain/disappointment) in this venue…. (winky face)….Thanks nonetheless for reading, if indeed you did….
The team we fielded should have been able to do the job. Plain and simple, they didn’t. Now that he believes he is a striker, Theo doesn’t track back any more.Passed of his man to an invisible defender, which resulted in the goal.
Move along everything. Nothing to see here. Repeat – nothing to see here.
* Move along everyone.
Lacked a little bit sharpness there with my spelling. I will respond well on Tuesday night.
I’m sure it is very painful and very disappointing to have a typo like that. Tuesday will be a good opportunity to show you have character.
I’ve never questioned my commitment and desire. Oh, you said character. Well, I leave that for other people to judge……
Let’s see how well you type on Tuesday. What is important now is to focus on the next one.
there you go.
we rested our 3 best players, so they’d be fresh for a competition we can NOT win…
and even with a strong Arsenal side, we lose at home to a Championship team.
One chance for Blackburn… is all they need.
another year over, without a trophy.
yes. please, lets keep Wenger on for LIFE. Because he really is a wonderful manager
who motivates his players so well, who knows how to manage in game, makes all the right decisions.
how much more embarrassment can be heaped upon this once great club?
on the positive side, the season is over early, so I don’t have waste my Spring watching.
….
Those Wenger’s post match notes on what he learned from today?
Yeah. You think I’ve overstated it?
Well I leave other people to judge that. And they do that very well, for people who have worked one day in the game.
;)
wow, look at all the posts!
Half Time. and this is the Arsenal I remember in the past few years!
80% possession. Passing the ball side to side. Creating almost nothing. Numerous corners resulting in nothing. And one big chance by Gervinho, 1 on 1 with the keeper, and he can’t even get the shot on net.
This is Arsenal under Arsene Wenger in recent years.
Blackburn are sitting there, almost everyone back, and limiting good chances to a very few.
They’ll wait for Arsenal’s defense to make a boneheaded play, or they’ll wait for a dead ball chance, where we are known to give free headers to opponents.
Please. Bring on Cazorla and Theo.
We’ll see how serious Wenger is about this competition this year, by who he selects to play.
We all know he has thrown this competition into the waste bin regularly, in recent years, when it competes with a big CL match.
As I stated, I’d rather win the FA Cup, than get a top 4 spot, this season.
We are not really competing in the Champions League. We don’t have much of a chance against the heavyweights of Europe. That’s a sad fact, considering we WERE very much a heavyweight, not so long ago.
I watch the FA Cup with far more interest than the league games…
and I hope we manage to dispatch this Championship team, like we are supposed to, and get a good draw in the next round as well.
I hope I’ll be watching Theo Walcott tomorrow.
How about a nice easy win. Early goal, put it away around half time, and pile on in the 2nd Half… take a few regulars out after 60?
3-0 to the Arsenal.