Arsenal News

It’s been months since we talked about players and matches, what with midweek dribble ball and the invasion of the hatchet men last saturday, so here’s a quick run down on this saturdays team, before a quick review of the opposition and their semi-illustrated history.
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Almunia
Sagna Vermaelen Silvestre Clichy (Eboue, Traore)
Ramsey, Denilson, Ramsey, Cesc, Ramsey, Nasri  [...]

Rhys Jaggar and Tony Attwood
There are fans of a certain age who can remember Ajax being top dogs in Europe. In fact, that was really the first dominant European side I remember as a boy. Cruyff et al. I wasn’t quite old enough to remember the Lisbon Lions or Feyenoord, but both won the [...]

London police have seized half a tonne of footballing equipment in buildings that they say were being used as a base by the terrorist football separatist group “KGB Fulham”
The discovery of the dump, which included shirts, boots, and grass cutting equipment, was made in the early hours of saturday morning.
Fake driving licences, cars capable of [...]

Today’s game is in the FA Cup, or Facup as it is known in the Latin tongue which still dominates the region where Stoke play.   As with all nouns in Latin the word “facup” can be conjugated and it is vital to be able to do this properly if wishing to discourse with the locals [...]

Special advanced notice: although much of the commentary consists of mindless gibberish there is a bit of serious stuff part way through, which is all true.  You have to guess which bit it is.
Part the First: The Evil Empire
Bolton Wanderers, known as Notlob, make the Evil Empire look like a troupe of ballet dancers performing [...]

This is it: the big day.  The very big day.  The biggest day of biggest days of all biggest days.
For today is the day (the exact day, the very exact day, the precise day).  And already it has been celebrated by the most extraordinarily bizarre and eccentric radio broadcast about football ever.
Which is just right [...]

By Walter Broeckx
The starting line up was Almunia, Sagna, Gallas, Vermaelen, Traore, Denilson, Diaby, Ramsey, Nasri, Arshavin and Eduardo.
Bolton kick off and launch a rocket at the Arsenal goal. The ball hits Almunia (who is still waving at the crowd behind his goal) on the back of his head and it goes out for a [...]

There were unprecedented scenes tonight at Untold Towers, the rural enclave which houses Untold Arsenal.
As editors and copywriters gathered on the 42nd floor and watched in amazement a crowd of over 400 bookmakers, bookies runners and a couple of burger sellers attacked the building with sticks, staves and a centurian tank.
At first it was  thought [...]

Warning: contains dead bodies, mild peril, partial nudity, swearing, irony  and occasional violence.
“West Ham are in dire straits,” said Billy the Dog, as I approached the allotment and offered him a pint of sweet sherry.  “That Mark Knoffler has lost it, the new glacier tax is hitting them hard, and their bid to host the [...]

By Billy the Dog McGraw, Enfield Allotments, Middlesex.
I have rarely seen my old mate Tony Attwood as close to tears as he was when he approached me this morning on the allotment.  I was just nattering to that Dennis Bergkamp who grows carrots next to my plot, when Tony rushed up.
“They’re all arguing with each [...]

By Billy the Dog, landlord of the Toppled Bollard, Islington.
I had that Arsene Wenger round here the other night doing his basso profundo with the carol singers.  They were collecting money for the Arsenal transfer funds which are somewhere between desperation and zero.
“Ere Arse,” I said, adopting the familiar style that is customary for gentleman [...]

1.  Take individual moments from games and use them as proof for your point.   But avoid seeing these in context.   So if a player makes a bad pass just before the opposition score, focus on that, blame him for the goal, and ignore anything else he did in the game.   Keep the whole argument incredibly [...]

In a tearful and emotional statement, Billy The Dog McGraw, landlord of the Toppled Bollard, just off Gillespie Road, today denied that he had had any close or passionate relationship with golf master Tiger Woods.
“It is stupid to suggest I could do such a thing,” said Billy over a pint of vodka.  “Do I look [...]

It was a very subdued Billy the Dog McGraw at the Toppled Bollard public house today as we gathered just beyond our old spiritual home, deliberately drinking in the street, just to annoy the police.
The news had come through about Rob VP, another martyr to the insane stupidity of the international friendly.
I debated who was [...]

Last week I wrote a piece for an Arsenal web site in India, in return for the piece they wrote for Untold.
It went up, and they said nice things about it.  No problem.
Yesterday, it reappeared on another site with a different headline.   The author said it was the funniest article he had ever read about [...]

Walter Broeckx and Tony Attwood meet László Bölöni

Most visiting teams playing at the Ems tend to stay at the Toppled Bollard (also known as the Auld Triangle) in Islington, and so it was natural that this week Walter, our Belgium correspondent and I (UNTOLD’s resident loonie) went to meet Transylvanian László Bölöni, manager of Royal Standard [...]

Tottenham Hotspur have continued their theme of celebrating matches against Arsenal with a special edition DVD and Spurs coffee mug following the 3-0 defeat on saturday.
The official reason for this release is not that the club like to find every possible way of ripping off its supporters and getting them to fork out good money [...]

Big Ears: So Noddy, what did you make of it?
Noddy: Well the red half of north London will be crowing with delight but when you look at the game in detail you can see it is more likely a false dawn.
Big Ears: Or a red sunset.
Noddy: Or a red mist.
Big Ears: Or 99 red balloons.
Noddy: [...]

15 October 2009
“‘If people are stupid enough to shout abuse when I go back [to Portsmouth] they need their heads looking at.”
16 October 2009
“I know some idiots will try to have a go.”

17 October 2009,
The Sun: “Harry Redknapp has let rip on the eve of his explosive return to Fratton Park. ‘The phone [...]

By Billy “the Dog” McGraw watching the TV in the Auld Triangle
God this was awful.  Arsenal didn’t have a clue.    Mine’s a pint of Carlsberg.  When Liverpool attacked Arsenal had no idea how to clear the ball, and I’ll smash the face in of anyone who says anything else.  It can’t get any worse.
Ere mind [...]

I can’t tell you how brilliant the correspondents of this site are.  The other night “LRV” summed up the forthcoming Arsenal/Evil Empire game from this saturday with a perfect quote from Yeats: “Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.”  How good is that?
And would you know it, while we were discussing the appalling nature [...]

As usual Phil has done an excellent, well-researched piece which tells us all we need to know (see last post if you haven’t read it – you really can’t watch the match without it).
Which naturally allows me a chance to do my usual jink around the fringes of reality and consider the delicate matter of [...]

All tomorrow’s parties: the service that tells you the result before the game has kicked off.
You will be excused if you don’t know that Celtic are playing Arsenal tonight, as the BBC has ordered a virtual blackout of news on the game.
This follows the appalling embarrassment the Corporation faced after their “expert” Mark Lawrenson predicted [...]

As you may know, Team Talk often take articles from here and publishes them later under other people’s names.
I was discussing this with TT yesterday and patiently explaining the software they need to install to stop this, when it suddenly occurred to me that if I reversed the polarity (as we used to [...]

by Michael Fisher and Tony Attwood
There is this supporter. She is, well, different. She inhabited Highbury, and she is now in residence at the Ems. She is there at every game. She has her own seat and such is her presence that some people edge away. Others have [...]