UNTOLD ARSENAL

Early in 2007 the story was going around that Flamini (who we signed from Marseille in 2004) was fed up with the lack of starting opportunities he had at Arsenal.  He was played in a lot of games, but mostly as a substitute.

Flamini didn’t leave at the end of 2006/7 of course, and went on to start in most games in 2007/8 - so he got what he wanted.  Arsenal also played in the Euro Cup that season, and got into it again for 2008/9, as we all know.

Flamini then left, as we all also know.  He left for a team that did not qualify for the Champions League.    Which looked a bit odd.

Now we find he has left for a team that doesn’t include him in the starting line up either.  He’s back to coming on as a substitute.

So there he was.  Virtually guaranteed a place in the Arsenal starting XI.  On the edge of creating one of the great EPL partnerships with Fabregas.  Playing in the top competition.   And he gives it all up to be a substitute, and play against the likes of the Tiny Totts in the Diddly Cup.

For some people the word “prat” seems just a perfect description.  One might almost start beliving that all the chat on this web site about their being a “Curse of Arsenal” might perhaps, actually be true.   Poor old Hleb out injured.  That Mr Henry being kept out of the BarBarBarca-Sheep team by Eto’o and when he does play, being played on the wing.  Mr Flamini not in the Euro Cup and not even in the team most of the time.

It is enough to make you cry your heart out.

Or not, as the case might be.

There was a time, when Sol Campbell was playing at Arsenal, when we’d all sing the song that starts (in its recorded version) “Hey Baby, I wanna know…” The second word was changed.

The club made a big fuss about it and said anyone who sang that naughty little song any more would be kicked out and have their membership removed. The club won, and we shut up… until that final moment when Tony Adams scored the last goal in the 4-0 win (the famous picture where he turns arms wide to face the north bank - indeed to face me - nice one Tony).

We’d won the league, the players went off, and in the interim the DJ helpfully played some music while we waited for the guys to come back on, lift the trophy and stroll round the pitch.

Yes the DJ helpfully played some records. Including, “Hey Baby, I wanna know…” and 38,000 gooners as one took up the song we had all been refused the right to sing. As one of the coppers at the time said, “We couldn’t arrest all 38,000 of them”.

Personally I am not sure that this song, which refers in one word to the Totts Jewish origins is that offensive, but I fully recognise that I have no ability to understand what it is like to have been Jewish during a time of persecution, torture and extermination, nor to have been born into a family where that happened. So, I concede - if that song is offensive through its one word, I’ll back down.

But backing down is not something fans of the Totts will do. Their behaviour towards Campbell since he left the Totts has been atrocious in the extreme - and has been undertaken not by a small band of nutters but by virtually the whole of the away support.

The Sweet FA who claim to “run” our game has now been asked to act following a police complaint the behaviour of Totts supporters against Sol Campbell at Portsmouth on Sunday.

Hampshire Constabulary said they couldn’t do anything because of the “sheer number of people involved” in the chanting. These people were all Totts supporters. The FA has said it is “awaiting reports from witnesses and officials at the game”.

However even the dozy FA now understands that it has been contacted by the police. A Hampshire police spokesman said: “Our officers at the game were aware of the problem but it was not feasible to make arrests in that kind of huge crowd situation. So no arrests were made.”

It will be interesting to see what the FA do. They have made a big fuss about what is said and sung at games in Croatia, and protested that Croatia only gets fined trivial amounts for the behaviour of its supporters. Will it act any differently this time?

It will, in my opinion, be a defining moment. If the FA do not act, and act in the sort of way that they have demanded UEFA act over Croatia (expulsion from the competition is one of the things that has been demanded for Croatia), then they are saying, “when away supporters are gathered, and there are too many involved in the chanting for the police to touch, we won’t do anything much.”

If that is the statement they make, it will be the most interesting statement the FA has made for years.

I wrote the previous piece about the number of shots the teams had on saturday night, and then really worried.  Could the Manchester Bankrupt figure of 32 shots be right?  It seems insanely high.

I took that figure from the Guardian web site - along with all the others - and so decided to go looking for stats on the games from other sites.

Interestingly, no one else has that figure for Manchester B - the Sky site for example has 23 shots - still high but not as ludicrous as the Guardian.

But more worrying is the fact that all sorts of other stats varied site by site.

I won’t bore you with all the details, but basically from now on I am not going to believe any of these figures anywhere.  They are probably made up by a bunch of journalists as they share their drinks before and after the game.

That scoreline is the number of shots each side had.  To give you an idea of where that stands in the scheme of things here’s some other weekend scores based on goal attempts

Wigan 10, Manchester Arab 11

Stoke 5 CSKA Fulham 14

Manchester B 32 Bolton 10

Aston V 12, Sunderland 9

Portsmouth 9 Tiny Totts 15

Everton 4, Liverpool Insolvency 11

Which tells us that mostly the team with the most goal attempts wins the game, and that in terms of goal attempts Arsenal were only beaten by an extraordinary high score from Manchester B - a score so high I really wonder if the stats are right.  (certainly if these stats, which come from the Guardian are right, the most extraordinary thing is that Manchester B only got two goals).

But I want to make a broader point - which is that if we had got a tiny number of shots then clearly we would simply be not working as an attacking forward moving team.   But we didn’t.

If you look at the same stats for the Fulham defeat the result was

Fulham 5 Arsenal 15

And overall this starts to tell us where the problem is.   Converting those shots into goals.  It’s not a midfield thing, nor is it a defensive thing.  It is simply converting those shots into goals.  It is, don’t do a Hleb, do a Henry.

It is the time of year when Tottenham change their manager.  It matters not whether the current manager is a decent guy having a hard time at an insane club, or a jumped up twirp who really has limited ability and no power as the big men on the board do their crazy thing.

One year they can’t stop buying forwards, the next year they can’t stop selling them  Either way, about this time, the manager goes.

So the next question is: who is insane enough to take over Tottenham at this moment.

Answer: Mr Crisis-Club, Terry Venebles - and failing that, me.

Mr V makes his money out of clubs in trouble - he goes in, screws it up, and then gets paid off - a good life if you can get it.

To give just a few examples from recent years…

Leeds United gave him £2m to go away after eight months, when he was also earning a £2m a year salary

Crystal Palace gave him £1m after seven months during which time he was on a £750k,000 a year tax-free salary (that’s the equivalent to £1.5 million a year).  They also gave him an interest-free loan of half a million, a rather nice house, a Mercedes Benz  car and a signing on of a £135,000.  (Quite clearly the man had money problems - I mean you don’t go to your employer for a whacking great interest free loan if you have a fortune stashed in the bank).

Portsmouth had him for 17 months and then paid him £500,000 to go away.

With this sort of track record I would suggest it is inevitable that Venebles will go meandering along the Lane in search of another short-term deal - just to help the club get into an even worse position than they are in now.

But we feel sad for our friends from the High Street.  So Untold Arsenal has offered to help.   In a letter to the Tiny Totts we have stated that whatever Venebles asks for, we’ll do twice the job for half the money.   Thus, if he takes them down to the Championship for £2 million, we’ll take them into League 1 for just £1 million.

It is a deal that no self-respecting Tott could ignore, and I am sitting by the phone even as I write awaiting a call.   After all, if they can employ Ramos, why not me?

Here’s a simple fact - we’re two points behind the leaders, with a goal difference that is only one worse than the leaders.

Here’s another fact - our children’s team looked a dream and a half on tuesday.

Or another fact - even if Manchester Bankrupt win their game in hand we are still above them in the league.

Or another - when Manchester B screwed up earlier this season - or indeed at the start of last season - I don’t recall anyone saying, “that’s it, all over, that’s the end, Man B are dead in the water…”   Of course not.  Everyone takes it that their manager knows a thing or two about football, and has just had a bit of a bad run.

I’m just another supporter, and, for what its worth, what I feel at the moment is…

a) there is nothing written in the laws of the universe that says Arsenal have to be one of the top teams - after all for many years of my life the club has very obviously not been one of the top teams.

b) I have never in all these years of watching the club seen football as exciting and stunning as in the Wenger era.

c) The football I am seeing now is not worse than during the 2 Wenger double seasons - it is in fact better.

d) The only period at all in all the years I have been watching Arsenal in which the team exceeded what is being offered now was the unbeaten season - but

e) The prelude to the unbeaten season was a dreadful awful terrible dispiriting defeat at home to Leeds which lost us the league

f) The aftermath of the 49 was a dreadful run where we couldn’t have beaten our own children’s team

I don’t think this is a disaster at all - because I am not going to measure everything against out ability to win every single game.

I loved the game against Sheffield U, I am not going to give up on this season after just a handful of games, I am certainly not going to start criticising Wenger just because we have lost two games this season by the odd goal, I am going to the game against Porto full of enthusiasm, the world did not end on saturday evening, and most important of all…

If I was coming to this country from Brazil, with no knowledge of English football, but as an incomer was looking for a team to support, I would look for an attractive, attack minded team that could make a serious challenge to win the league.   That would reduce the field to two - Manchester B and Arsenal.  I would choose Arsenal because of the tradition, the ownership, and above all the pure style and quality of the club.

One defeat by one goal changes nothing.

Thierry Henry said in an interview published on 26 September that he will consider leaving Barcelona in January if the coach Pep Guardiola leaves him on the bench much more.

What the great man actually said in L’Equipe was, “For now, it is not a matter of the moment. But if things stay the same, of course we’ll have to talk about this,”

Admittedly this isn’t quite the same as “I’ve had it up to ‘ere with this bunch of sheep and I want out and I want out now”, but maybe my translation skills aren’t what they were.

Our old friend didn’t actually get onto the pitch during Bar-bar’s 3-2 win over Real Betis on Wednesday.  Not even on the wing, which he doesn’t like (and if you recall that was where he was playing fairly uselessly when Wenger signed him and converted him to a centre forward.

Our man in Barcelona said that he thought he would play up front this season when he decided to stay in the summer.  Guardiola, speaking in that open, honest and truthful way that all Barca people use, said he didn’t want Samuel Eto’o anymore  - and that left the door open.

And following the normal pattern of Barca events Eto’o is now the usual starter.

In L’Equipe the interviewer asks Thierry if the boss had told him he would be the regular starter in the centre forward slot as he was at Arsenal.   Thierry replied…

“It is true I had a talk with the coach before the season began. For me, this talk was very clear,” and added that on the strength of that he had turned down offers from elsewhere.

So now it looks like he is off again and the android press will be running “Thierry’s coming home” stories just as soon as they can find someone who can speak French - and someone else who can write English.

But what would we do with him?   We have, in no particular order…

Adebayor, thought to be leaving in the summer but whom the stats suggest scores 1 goal every 2 games - which is utterly astonishing.  He runs around a lot which is good.

Van Persie.  Reckoned by most blogs last summer to be not even worth counting since he would get injured in the warm up to the first game, he’s doing incredibly well and clearly scares the shit out of everyone who plays against him.

Bendtner.  Reckoned by many web sites to be decidely third rate, he just seems to score goals - and fairly neat ones too.

Carlos Vela.   Ignored by most blogs or dismissed as “just another kid - we need proven ability” I gave him my vote as the potential discovery of the year, and so far he’s not letting me down.  I’d at the very least have him on the bench every game.

Eduardo.  Said by many to be unlikely to return to his best.  Due to return in about 8 weeks, so we’ll see.

Where on earth would we put Thierry, wonderful player though he is, in among that lot?