More blood curdling threats: Plates are Spinning

Celebrate?
By Boris Mellor
April 14 2006

More blood curdling threats before Saturday's match against WBA. You know the sort of thing Pompey only broke a nose – we’re going to break a few legs.

Well they didn’t quite say that, but Kevin Campbell is quoted as saying "We've got to make it messy and nasty and be ourselves and try to get something from the game."

Well Pompey got in the Gunners faces, or Sol’s face, ok – imagine the fuss if it happened the other way around? But that wasn’t why Arsenal lost – no one was in Adebayor’s or any other potential scorers faces when we failed to take the chances. No one was in the defence's face when Lua Lua was given a free header. It was Arsenal who should have been in their face, attacking the ball not watching it.

However Campbell is deluding himself, it won’t work at Highbury – it should rebound on them. However WBA have already beat Arsenal this season, and drew this fixture last season, so no time to get cocky.

Plates are Spinning

Meanwhile Wenger has to continue his juggling act in his attempt to get the team fit for Villarreal and Spurs, three big games in six days! As Wenger told the press you would have to be mad not to rest players in that situation.

Originally Wenger had promised not to juggle the team too much but he broke his own rule. Clearly he has done that with good reason – the team are exhausted by the effort they have put into Europe. To some extent Arsene is not dictating to events, events are dictating to him. Willpower alone cannot change that, rest is the best solution – very difficult in the heat of battle.

Hopefully the fact that a good number of players were rested against Pompey will allow for recovery, and for Arsene to get back control of the Gunners fate. But meanwhile expect a few more spinning plates on Saturday, lets hope they all stay up in the air and don’t come crashing down.