Saturday, September 18, 2010

The 'Jose Mourinho' Factor

What is it? Its what Mourinho has a tendency to do at every club he's at. He creates a 'siege-mentality' around the club which fuels his teams. 'Decisions constantly go against us', 'no one wants us to succeed', these are the kind of things that are said to the media. It's exactly what he did at Chelsea and his teams thrived in the mission to prove their apparent doubters wrong, winning two league titles.

At his next club, Inter Milan, he simply made himself the most hated man in Italian football. His players again responded on the pitch. They won the league in Mourinho's first season and then, in the following one, won an unprecedented treble. It was another masterstroke by the intelligent yet extremely narcissistic manager.

I think that this season, Arsene Wenger has used this technique more than ever. In the past few weeks, Wenger has been attacked from all angles and by all manner of people. Managers, former referees and washed-up pundits have all stepped up to have their own digs at Le Boss for his opinions on tackles and (a lack of) protection from referees. The reaction by gunners fans everywhere has been fantastic. Everyone has rallied behind Wenger in his defense. Blogs everywhere have went about dismantling the attacks of Allardyce and Coyle in impressive fashion. But you'd have to wonder what the players make of it all?

Surely some of them listen to the news and read the papers so they all must have found out how their manager has been criticized in the weeks gone by. So, could you call the results against Blackburn, Bolton and Braga a showing of allegiance to Wenger and his beliefs? I'd like to think so and I hope it continues.

Another man has also been in the media limelight: Cesc Fabregas. He's has had his commitment to the cause doubted and he and the players have responded in the right manner. The way he played against Braga showed how much he still loves the club and how much he wants to succeed here. The statement from Clichy mid-week showed that the squad also believes this.

While the latter isn't an example of the Mourinho Factor, it could still have the same effect on the team. A mental resilience that was lacking last season in the big games could be instilled through the adversary we've faced so far. Perhaps the cirumstances weren't right for this young team to succeed last season. There wasn't a major issue for the boys to respond to early enough in the season. The response when Ramsey was scythed down was admirable but we had already lost twice to Man United and Chelsea by then.

We won't really know where the team is mentally until the final whistle blows in the match against Chelsea. But there are small signs starting to show that this team is ready to lift trophies.

Sunday, September 12, 2010

Arsenal Begin To Hit Full Flow

Arsenal 4 Bolton 1

There were a lot of positives to take from the match yesterday. We cruised to a comfortable victory with a lot of individuals putting in encouraging displays. But I want to get the negatives out of the way first.

The referee, Stuart Atwell, had a nightmare. He missed an awful lot of incidents yesterday, one of which cost Bolton their best centre-back, and just seemed completely out of his depth. And even without Cahill's sending off, Bolton could have very easily finished the game with even less than 10 men. How Kevin Davies stayed on the field after consecutive, late challenges on Rosicky and Wilshere is beyond me. He only got booked for the second one which could very easily have been a red on its own.

Then in the second half he missed a foul by Song on the edge of the Arsenal penalty area. Not to be harsh on Song or anything, but it was a blatant trip. Then the ball came to Chamakh on the sideline and he flicked a beautiful pass through the legs of Cahill and onto Arshavin, getting clattered by the Bolton player in the process. A tackle from behind is a red card so, in my opinion there was no debate. However, it shouldn't have happened because it should have been a free-kick to Bolton.

The worst one of all though was Robinson's foul on Diaby. It was an horrendous challenge. Over the ball, studs up and right into Diaby's leg. If Diaby hadn't managed to get his weight off his leg, it would have snapped. And Atwell didn't even dish out a booking. Idiot.

Anyway to the positives of the match. First of all I want to mention and really hard working performance by Arshavin. He was constantly moving along Bolton's backline and gave them a torrid time. Chamakh grew into the game as it progressed and scored with a powerful header. Almunia had the jitters at times with a few back passes but looked okay after that. Squillaci gave a good account of himself but probably needs a couple of more games to get into the full swing of things. His partner Koscielny had one bad header back to Almunia that lead to the goal but apart from that was pretty good. Fabregas wasn't his brilliant best but set up three goals and some other good chances all the same. Song had the unusual role of driving forward from midfield and scored an excellent goal.

My man of the match would have to go to Rosicky. He was on fire and covered the whole pitch despite being picked on the right of the front three. His pass to Arshavin early on was world-class and I think that he is getting back to his world-class best. He's had an electric start to the season and I hope that this isn't a false dawn and that his form continues like this. Because if it does he'll be impossible to keep out of the side.

Next up is the Portuguese side Braga in the Champions League. They knocked out Celtic and Sevilla in the qualifiers so they obviously have some pedigree. Our next game after that is Sunderland away in the league. Last season we went there with a major interlull hangover having lost Van Persie for 5 months and with Bendtner also out, had no one to spearhead the attack.

Anyway it's Braga next and a win would build the foundations for qualification to the next stage. Hopefully Diaby's injury isn't serious and no one else picked up any injuries this weekend.