Legends Passed This Way
Sep 9th, 2018 by 'holic
Apologies to all. My holiday has been followed by what will be a laborious upgrade to the living room and getting as much paid work done as I can before vanishing north of Hadrian’s Wall for three nights. None of which is Arsenal related unlike this afternoon’s match against the Real Madrid Legends. I don’t mind admitting I missed being there in a big way.
A word for David Seaman who was on the team sheet but had a calf problem in the warm up and missed out on a chance to experience the love of an Arsenal home crowd this time around. Jens Lehmann stepped up to the plate and would enjoy quite the day.
This was something of a taster for what would happen at Wembley later in the day, but with a different outcome. The visitors were technically superior pretty much throughout. In the reverse fixture at the Bernabeu we could point to the inclusion of Alonso as the younger, match-fit player. This time Makelele dominated the early proceedings, but the crowd were enchanted by the skills on display and we had our moments.
I saw the Milan Glorie fixture last season and was frustrated not to make this, but a healthy crowd turned up to enjoy some moments of pure nostalgia. The ninety minutes followed a pattern out of the George Graham years with Real very much the dominant attacking force but we constructed defensive banks that were difficult to break down, and when they did Jens Lehmann was at the top of his game.
We might have nicked something had Gilberto or Davor Suker enjoyed better fortune in the opening half but it would have been harsh on the excellent visitors. In the second half the multitude of substitutions made for some interesting moments. You might have expected Gilles Grimandi to have another Edgar Davids moment but pride of place went to David Hillier for a misjudged assault on Rivera.
Jeremie Alliadiere came close to snatching an unlikely winner, but we most certainly had the overworked Lehmann to thank for taking the contest to another phase.
At the final whistle we could say that over two legs Real had beaten the Arsenal after our summer defeat. However, a penalty shoot-out was required and what a magnificent performance from those charged with taking our kicks and stopping Real’s.
Robert Pires drilled the first one home and set the tone for the added entertainment. Velasco levelled nontianantly. A well fed Gilles Grimandi slammed his effort into the top left corner. 2-1 to the Arsenal. We needed Jens to do his thing. He obliged by clawing in Alfonso’s effort. Advantage Arsenal.
Matt Upson stepped up to reinforce our advantage and drilled one to the left of the goalkeeper. The mood was changing. The Vulture, Butragueno, planted one wide of Jens who had anticipated a Panenka, I think, and it was 3-2.
Alliadiere, still the fastest player on show, did plant one down the middle and we were 4-2 to the good. Campo would need to score to keep it alive. He did! Cue theatre. Thomas Rosicky started marching forward to take the decisive penalty, but Jens Lehmann had grabbed the ball and spotted it, Little Mozart went back to the centre circle, chuckling. Mad Jens hammered the perfect spot-kick into the top left corner and we had won the shoot-out 5-3.
It was fun, as it was meant to be, and old rivals embraced each other with respect. I really am enjoying this type of fixture coming into the international break to give people the chance to show those now departed their appreciation.
55 Responses to “Legends Passed This Way”
Opportunistic drink.
Lifting one theatrically for Mad Jens. COYG
Excellent report Guvna.
Sadly I missed the occasion completely.
It sounds like a good day out and a fine finish.
I am a well-known old curmudgeon and absolutely hate seeing once great players and athleteslooking like fat old pub players so I avoid these events like the plague . That may put me in a minority on here but I prefer to remember Bobby Pires when he was a world class talent not a portly middle-aged man . I saw my mate at a party last night and he had been and taken his grandson. To the grandson it meant nothing because he can see players in their prime and extolling the virtues of Parlour or Rosicky when they aren’t special talents isn’t all that logical to me. Nice to see money raised for charity but I will pass on these occasions. They just make me sad not nostalgic . It had the same impact on my mate who left before the penalty shootout.
TTG, I am in truth, very much of the same mind. Curmudgeons of the bar unite!
The nearest to that type of match I have actually attended was the DB10 testimonial which gave me the privilege of finally seeing the great Johan Cruyff play football in the flesh.
However I too prefer to remember RP7 as I do haring down the left wing with his odd hen toed gait rather than simply showing his no doubt permanent ball skills at a pace that I may be able to emulate. That game did raise a lot of money for charity, gave a lot of ex-pros a bit of fun and fans and families a good day out at TNHOF.
Let me make it a trio of curmudgeons. I have been to these games in the past but no more, either pre—season or in an international break. I spend probably >£4K per season following The Arsenal (and that now out of a pension). I’m not inclined to spend time and money on friendlies. But good luck to those who do, I hope you had a great day.
I seem to have started Curmudgeons Anonymous! Sorry ?
Let’s cheer ourselves up. The Ladies won 5-0 and played some really good stuff. Nice to beat The Scallies 5-0 at anything!
Curmudgeons in this bar? I am shocked! Shocked!
Ah be quiet and stick to your half of mild!
???
It is the finest claret, C100. Nothing is too good for the working man.
A glass on the bar for all curmudgeons. It mellows the mood.
Ned. Reminds me of Clive Jenkins speaking at an ASTMS conference. “Yes my suits are bespoke. Yes my shirts are made to measure and monogrammed. But that, brothers and sisters is what I am working for, for you!”
Huge applause!
Can I share that bottle – St Emilion Premier Cru I hope?
???
No bike ride. K went to Pippa’s and I am watching the men’s final
Please disregard my previous which was intended for a different audience.
Instead, I meant to say this: Will the djoke be on Djokovic or will Novak get the djump on him?
The bar for all curmudgeons?
How delightful!
Count me in!
Port and lemon please, luv. ?
But not the 56 Cockburn. No lemonade in that. On pain of death.
After I’ve helped finish Ned’s St Emilion I’d like a rare old cognac. Without lemonade or ice.
One for the landlord and all fellow curmudgeons. Fuck it I can’t think of a better way to spend a pension.
Your palate speak well of you, C100
Clive Jenkins listed ‘organising the middle classes’ as his recreation in Who’s Who. The ‘nothing is too good for the working class’ line comes from Big Bill Hayward, the radical US union leader at the start of the 20th century, about the same time port and lemon was invented as a drink.
Yet again Interlull karma falls on the bar.
Masters five a sides need to make a comeback. If they ever went away. But make them proper Masters, not some bloke who played in goal for Arsenal when he was 15, then played all his career for Bristol Rovers, turning out as an Arse(nal) Master.
They could relaunch the Daily Express Fives for added nostalgia 🙂
Having been told categorically that Gazidis was leaving for Milan I’m now categorically told that he is staying. How exciting or important this is , is a matter of opinion.
Torreira is injured but how seriously we do not know. As usual the social media butterflies were all over the story but revealed bugger all. I’m enjoying this curmudgeonly personality! Well as much as a curmudgeon can enjoy anything! ?
Did Kroenke toss a few bucks Gazidis’s way, TTG?
Cynic.
Am I to take it that Aliadiere is not a true legend then? 😉
Seems we got a bargain buy in Torreira. Seventh most underpriced transfer of the recent window, according to CIES Football Observatory’s calculations.
Usual suspects among the money-no-object gang.
http://www.football-observatory.com/IMG/sites/b5wp/2018/232/en/
Legends are made in the eye of the beholder.
Kerrea Gilbert is a legend.
To someone.
Probably.
Or not.
UEFA announces plans to create a third competition that would increase the number of clubs involved in European football from 80 to 96. The curious difference of 16 clubs may have some correspondence to the sometimes floated idea of creating a European super league, which might have the same number of clubs. Since the Champions League now has 32 teams in the group stage and the Europa League has 48, my calculator tells me that by subtracting 16 clubs from the Champions League for the creation of the super league, that leaves room for the addition of 32 clubs of a level worse than Qarabag to be added to the Europa League. Joy for Qarabag in other words.
‘holic
Please replace the link above with this one (apologies for my haphazard postings):
https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/45344645
bt8b@25: 32 teams in the CL, 32 teams in the Europy, and 32 teams in the new Third Cup?
That is starting to look like intended symmetry.
Apply UEFA nations league logic to it, and you end up with a three-tier league.
Each tier would have eight groups of four for a round-robin group stage. Top two in each group advance to the knock out phase. So 16 teams playing for each cup.
Quarter-finalists in the Third Cup and Europy get promotion the following season to the next higher tier’s competition, replacing the clubs at the bottom of each group in the Europy league and CL respectively.
So eight up and eight down but the downs from the CL unlikely to be any of the big clubs as it would be just eight of 32 at risk.
Last season, under this arrangement, the relegated CL clubs would have been Benfica, Anderlecht, Qarabag, Olympiacos, Maribor, Feyenoord, Monaco and APOEL.
Promoted to the CL would have been Red Bull Leipzig, Marseille, Lazio, Red Bull Salzburg, CSKA Moscow, Atletico Madrid, Sporting and ourselves.
Placings in domestic leagues and cups would no longer matter for qualification for European competition, though they could still be used for seedings to give domestic competitions more interest.
The initial distribution of the 96 clubs into the three tiers would probably be done on the basis of a revamped UEFA club coefficients (the current one is based on only CL and Europa league games so wouldn’t work for this scheme).
Promotion and relegation would take care of things after that.
Big clubs would not worry about that, though. Indeed, they might welcome it. On the current coefficients, the CL tier would start with six English clubs, five Spanish, four German, four Italian, three French, two Portuguese, two Ukranian, one Russian, one Swiss, one Turkish, one Austrian, one Greek and one Dutch.
There would also have to be some arrangement for entry into the new Third tier, with, maybe, the bottom eight or 16 in the group stage being replaced each season, based on some criteria, possibly club coefficents, possibly regional playoffs between the winners of smaller national leagues and cups.
One plus of this arrangement is that it would get rid of mid-summer qualifying round games. All three tiers could operate on the same schedule, although TV would probably insist on the tiers playing on different nights.
You read it here first.
Clive @the previous drinks: I see Hendon from your old stamping ground knocked off Harlow in the FA Cup eventually. Replay went to extra time. Winning goal in the 118th minute from the penalty spot. Earns the club a much needed, no doubt, £6,000. When you think a good number of Arsenal first teamers earn at least twice that much every day, it makes you realise the financial gulf between the Premiership and tier seven football. Doing it tough barely covers it.
Ned, Your scheme has quite a lot of sense to it. I suggest that UEFA hire you, or at least steal your plan seeing as it is out on the internet for free. In some ways it, or any proposed change, must be an improvement over what we have seen over and over again for the last 10 years. Before we were relegated to the Europa League of course, which has provided the diversion of change if not success.
UEFA hire Ned? They’d never be that sensible.
Ned,
I’ve heard nothing about Gazidis from anybody remotely in the know . His deal at Milan would be heavily incentivised. Maybe the Kroenkes have agreed to match those incentives should we reach financial targets. That might not be news the supporters would welcome as they’d like to see profits going into team building . But I’m speculating. Arsenal doesn’t leak like it used to!
I have long given up on football administrators being sensibile, bt8b.
I am sure it is not beyond the wit of Kroenke to come up with a long-term incentive plan for Gazidis, TTG. Plenty of private companies have key-executive shadow/synthetic equity schemes. What would be interesting is if there was someway of including playing targets along with financial ones, which would address the supporters point you raise.
Excellent analysis Ned @28.
You outline well UEFA’s likely plan for their new Thousand Year Reich. This will bring, from their perspective, the added bonus of reducing big clubs’ interest in their domestic leagues and more spondulips for them.
Ultimately this will divert television income to the UEFA competitions as the ‘golden egg’ or at least the goose that lays it will not continue to grow as televised football has already passed saturation point for most people I know. Diversion of TV income will inevitably widen the gap between the haves and have nots and end the recent relative democratisation in the PL. That will provide an interesting challenge for the smug fat cats at PL HQ, La Liga etc
Saw that Ned.
Made it hard on themselves,as had enough chances in the home game to win it at the weekend. .
Hopefully another decent draw in the next round,could give them another financial boost.
On another note,
I see AMN,who was originally due back from injury late October,is now not expected back till end of November.
That thug Walker has a lot to answer for.
Little things I should have said and done
I just never took the time
By the way there is no truth to the rumor that those lines were written about Alexis Sanchez. Can’t say I miss him.
Fair State Brewing Cooperative
Stock pick o’ the day
Are we getting focused on Newcostle United yet?
Good thing Danny didn’t use up his weekly quota of goals for Inger-land. The smart bet is on him, as our number one striker in disguise, to score AT ANY TIME.
If he scores in warmups I am going to try to cash in.
The little red bugs are swarming in the garden. Means the first snows are only weeks away so I am making like the bugs and enjoying the warmth. Cheers!
Nice 3-0 win against Coventry in our first ever Checkatrade Trophy tie!
Smith- Rowe, Nketiah and Willock with the goals. A good start to the competition
TTG
re Checker trophy comp,
We are now fielding 3 Academy teams, as this comp has us playing as under 21’s,whereas our league teams are under 18’s and under 23’s.
Along with Coventry,we are in a 4 team group with Forest Green Rovers and Cheltenham.
Not sure if we play the other 3 teams both home and away or not,but next fixture is not till end of October against Cheltenham.
Plenty of premier league sides have entered teams in the comp,including our friends down the road,who last week lost to Crawley Town from the bottom tier of the football league.
Make of that what you will.
Morning all. Currently jet-lagged in Scotland after much motoring shenanigans. Good to see the kids won last night. Hopefully I’ll be back in time to do a preview tomorrow, but that may be a vain hope.
Vain Hope? Wasn’t she one of the receptionists in Crossroads?
(Look it up, millennials. Cultural gold that.)
Tish! Tish, Cynic!
Turns out Unai doesn’t even know whether Ivan is going to Milan. And I thought he was an insider.
bt8b, For someone speaking in what is probably his fourth or fifth language, I though Emery gave a very deft non-answer answer to the Gazidis questions.
And he has got some bottle to have done the press conferences in English from the start. He deserves credit for that.
Aw, Ned. I wuz kiddin’ and I agree with you that Unai gave very good answers on that and the rest of the questions he was asked. I would still like to know theodds on Ivan going to Milan though. Suppose Ladbrokes has ‘em but I can’t be bothered as my missus likes to say.
Spurs #1 keeper out for several weeks with drunk driving disease as the Merkans are wont to say. I would know as a Merkan myself, although I have never been found out, tried, convicted or even accused.
But to put the focus back on the drunken Spurs #1 keeper, what if he falls over drunk at an in opportune moment? ???????????
I have fallen over drunk far too many times. But never at an opportune moment. However, if I were the spuds’ goalkeeper, then, from my current perspective, almost every moment would seem like a great moment to collapse in a stupor!
I’m in Barcelona. For the first time.
My Spanish is pretty shaky, but I am enjoying this city one hell of a lot!
Apparently ‘Camp Nou’ is pronounced ‘ Camp NO’…. says it all! ?
Hi honey, I’m home! >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tish! Tish, Cynic!
Gesundheit!
I know… good comedy is all in the timing but sod it anyway.
And it helps if you close your tags as well.