Arsenal Preview

[RevidgeBlue]

Blood, seat and tears.

Despite the early set back, the lads battled and held a rampant Arsenal.

There was no disgrace in that performance.

Completely disagree Alan, whilst the scoreline was respectable, the performance itself was absolutely dire.

We were sloppy and unprofessional in the opening thirty minutes, Tugay lazily got caught in possesion twice inside the opening three minutes, the second occasion led to the corner from which they scored the first.

It got worse from there, McCarthy lost Senderos completely giving him a free header from six yards.

The opening half hour was so one side it was unbelievable. It was almost as if it was so easy for Arsenal they took their foot off the gas and after that they were almost as bad as us.

I was amazed to hear Mark Hughes afterwards say he was pleased with the performance.

WE never troubled Lehmann once in 90 mins.

I know it was a makeshift line up but it wasn't good.

As for Bruno Berner JFHC. I don't think he passed the ball further than two yards all match. If you couldn't dip into the Championship and find at least twenty or thirty players better than him I'd be amazed. Once again the question of the Academy rears up, if it can't provide cover at least as good as him, it's got problems.

I thought Tugay was poor as well tonight, well off the pace throughout, so I'll agree with Alan to an extent that the other nine battled hard considering we were playing with effectively nine men.

[Yorick]

2-0 in reallity is fair do's. Arsenal are the prem leaders by 5 points and deservedly so. The plain fact is that we have a decent 1st X1 but a weak backup squad and having to rely on the likes of Berner and Rigters is ludicrous. The Prem League need to address the situation pronto. £30 odd million TV income and yet we are so threadbare of talent that a few injuries and suspensions proves that something is seriously wrong with the entire Prem circus.

But. Personally speaking there are far too many people sucking lemons on here. Blackburn almost losing 1-0 away in the league to the mighty Arsenal in 2008 given the respective background and financial situation is one hell of a positive result. In fact one that about 90 other professional clubs can only ever dream about. Time for many on here to wake up and smell the coffee.

[Grabbi Graeme]

After a bad start and the worse fears going through every Rovers supporter, but after the goal we did settle and although didn't ask Arsenal many questions in their penalty area we did contain them with a combination of some fraught defending and Friedel.

But let's remember who we were playing, that's why Arsenal are top and were not, we did have a thrown together side and let's hope that Hughes main topic for the players on the trip to Oralndo is how to pass to players who wear the same kit as you.

Friedel 9

Great saves from the big man and not much he could do with the goals, even first goal Sendoros should have been marked better.

Warnock 7

Another good solid job by the full back and with Pearce and the Italian mafia man in the crowd.

Bert Mk 2 6

Good defending but could have have done more going forward.

Ooijer 7

Another solid performance before having to give in to injury.

Zurab 7

Showing he is at the moment one of our better CB's.

Bentley 6

Hope the good press isnt going to his head, set pieces poor tonight.

Berner ?

What position was he playing did he know, he seemed to drift about.

Tugay 5

Poor passing and not really a game for him too much pace in midfield for him to compete.

Reid 6

Is getting better but still not near what we have seen before.

Santa Cruz 7

For his effort, difficult to try and score when you dont see much of the ball.

McCarthy 4

Can't fault his effort, not trying to score but the effort to try and get himself on Soccer AM's Showboat. great when your 4-0 up but when a goal down dont try fancy tricks.

Subs

Too late for any of them to make a impact.

MOM- Pedersen (Well he has to win it sometime)

[RevidgeBlue]

2-0 in reallity is fair do's. Arsenal are the prem leaders by 5 points and deservedly so. The plain fact is that we have a decent 1st X1 but a weak backup squad and having to rely on the likes of Berner and Rigters is ludicrous. The Prem League need to address the situation pronto. £30 odd million TV income and yet we are so threadbare of talent that a few injuries and suspensions proves that something is seriously wrong with the entire Prem circus.

But. Personally speaking there are far too many people sucking lemons on here. Blackburn almost losing 1-0 away in the league to the mighty Arsenal in 2008 given the respective background and financial situation is one hell of a positive result. In fact one that about 90 other professional clubs can only ever dream about. Time for many on here to wake up and smell the coffee.

Disagree with that post entirely, last season we went to the Emirates in the Cup with a similarly depleted squad, dug in, closed them down, COMPETED and ground out a great result even though it was very ugly to watch.

We completely failed to do that this time, we conceded a ludicrously soft goal after just 3 mins, could quite easily have been on the end of a hiding, and never threatened Lehmann's goal once.

[Grabbi Graeme]

We also went to the Emirates in the League and looked what happend that time.

[RibbleValleyRover]

We also went to the Emirates in the League and looked what happend that time.

A scoreline that highly flattered Arsenal?

[RevidgeBlue]

We also went to the Emirates in the League and looked what happend that time.

We played a heck of a lot better then as well despite conceding the three very late goals to eventually go down 6-2.

We looked like we were going to get something out of that game at 3-2 down, tonight was simply a question of were we going to lose by just the one goal or by more.

[Hasta]

But. Personally speaking there are far too many people sucking lemons on here. Blackburn almost losing 1-0 away in the league to the mighty Arsenal in 2008 given the respective background and financial situation is one hell of a positive result. In fact one that about 90 other professional clubs can only ever dream about. Time for many on here to wake up and smell the coffee.

For my gripe it doesn't matter that it was Arsenal. On Wednesday night when I play five a side football i will be able to pass 5 yards to one of my players under no pressure. It doesn't matter whether the opposition is Fat Bob from the Pub, my mate Mick, Cesc Fabregas or Pele. If there is no-one near me I can still pass it. Today Rovers couldn't do the simple things right. Things they do all week in training and most games were not happening. Like the Sunderland and Derby games, if you look past the result you'll see a very poor performance that, had we lost 4-0, we couldn't have complained about.

As to your second point, had Carlisle or Doncaster gone to the Emirates in the cup and played like that then fair enough. However we are supposed to be an established Premier League team with a squad of players better than it has been for the last 3 years according to Mark Hughes. If that's the case then having one meaningfull attack, being constantly caught in posession and generally comprehensively beaten at a canter is not good enough.

We're not playing well and picking up results that mask our performances. It won't keep going on forever.

[Grabbi Graeme]

Playing well and getting beat 6-2 Vs playing crap and wining 1-0. which one are you going to take, at the moment we have to take what we can, the squad size, injuries and suspensions mean we dont have a lot to play around with especially in midfield, tonight we played a better side with better players and we did match them for some parts of the game, one early mistake was our downfall and we chased the game after that.

0-0 at half time and I would have fancied a point from it, which is what I would have took before the game started.

[jim mk2]

, whilst the scoreline was respectable, the performance itself was absolutely dire.

.

Rubbish.

I was at the Emirates last night and Rovers played so well with so much possession and passing movement that they reduced the home crowd to silence between the 3rd and 89th minutes. I even heard Arsenal fans complimenting Rovers on their football after the match.

Positives for me was the backline of Emerton, Ooijer, Zurab and Warnock, who were solid and barely put a foot wrong all night, while Reid had an excellent match in midfield. The negatives were the performances of McCarthy, who contributes little and should be replaced by Roberts, Cruz and Bentley. Berner is out of his depth.

[RevidgeBlue]

Rubbish.

I was at the Emirates last night and Rovers played so well with so much possession and passing movement that they reduced the home crowd to silence between the 3rd and 89th minutes.

Had any of it happened in Arsenal's half of the pitch it might have looked even better.

Might have been just the job had we been one up. Pretty useless at one down.

[philipl]

Rubbish.

I was at the Emirates last night and Rovers played so well with so much possession and passing movement that they reduced the home crowd to silence between the 3rd and 89th minutes. I even heard Arsenal fans complimenting Rovers on their football after the match.

Positives for me was the backline of Emerton, Ooijer, Zurab and Warnock, who were solid and barely put a foot wrong all night, while Reid had an excellent match in midfield. The negatives were the performances of McCarthy, who contributes little and should be replaced by Roberts, Cruz and Bentley. Berner is out of his depth.

Pretty fair assessment from what I saw on the TV.

Huge shame that we conceded that early goal but seen it again and there was a very cynical block which allows Senderos to get his free header.

[Eddie]

Had any of it happened in Arsenal's half of the pitch it might have looked even better.

Might have been just the job had we been one up. Pretty useless at one down.

Totally agree with you. Yes, we had a decent amount of the ball and passed it about, but Arsenal didn't care. We handed them the lead by yet again failing to defend a set piece and giving away the first goal, from that point on they were happy to defend that lead. We only looked like scoring about twice, that might even be generous as I can only really remember one real chance. They are a good side, they know how to control games and they know that once you have the first goal you can let a side play in front of you and that is what they did. We shouldn't try and fool ourselves and turn that into a good performance, no one did anything worthwhile or special. They could easily have scored more than they did and we never looked like scoring.

[philipl]

Lets see if Man U and AC Milan show us how it is done when playing against Arsenal.

[Roost]

I actually thought we came back into the game really well after the early setback - especially as we only seemed to have 9 players on the pitch - Benni & bunsen berner were abysmal.

Someone should remind Benni that swaggering around the pitch chewing gum isnt his only role, he needs to back it up with up with perhaps marking someone now and again, and could even stretch to holding on to possession, rather than losing the ball and then throwing your hands up like its someone elses fault.

As for Berner - ok, he was out of position - but he was really poor. He just could not read the game and appeared lethargic, as did Tugay in places.

We might not have created much, but we stifled them out for long periods - no mean feat at th'emirates.

Bring on Notlob.......................

One Love - BRFC

[Cocker]

Lets see if Man U and AC Milan show us how it is done when playing against Arsenal.

Add to that Man U and Milan dropping 7 players from their team too.

Some people need to wake up

[stuwilky]

Blood, seat and tears.

Despite the early set back, the lads battled and held a rampant Arsenal.

There was no disgrace in that performance.

Indeed.

In fact Id go as far as saying it was "good", although having read some of the comments I think I watched a completely different match - quotes like "didnt attack once" and such like dont seem to ring true, especially after we dominated the latter part of the second half and were unlucky not to score through Benni McCarthy.

[modes98]

The negatives were the performances of McCarthy, who contributes little and should be replaced by Roberts, Cruz and Bentley.

Bentley has to be played on the right, i see no point in taking your only crosser out of the game by playing him in the middle.

When Roberts came on i thought he would do a great job for us but he looked as in effective as McCarthy and i think it's a case of the opposition played those 2 off the park. I doubt that anyone else would do any better against them. Benni was wasteful in possession at times but was trying to do something a little special to get us back into the game.

The less said about his header the better. If it had been Rocky on the end of it we would have been level.

Edit: Official Site has Andre out for a minimum 3-4 weeks.

[Yorick]

2-0 in reallity is fair do's. Arsenal are the prem leaders by 5 points and deservedly so. The plain fact is that we have a decent 1st X1 but a weak backup squad and having to rely on the likes of Berner and Rigters is ludicrous. The Prem League need to address the situation pronto. £30 odd million TV income and yet we are so threadbare of talent that a few injuries and suspensions proves that something is seriously wrong with the entire Prem circus.

But. Personally speaking there are far too many people sucking lemons on here. Blackburn almost losing 1-0 away in the league to the mighty Arsenal in 2008 given the respective background and financial situation is one hell of a positive result. In fact one that about 90 other professional clubs can only ever dream about. Time for many on here to wake up and smell the coffee.

Disagree with that post entirely,

You disagree entirely Revidgeblue? That statement suggests that you think that we do have a strong enough squad depth to compete with one of the top clubs in the world when we have been significantly depleted by suspension and injury? Also that you must think Berner and Rigters are top quality players? That the distribution of wealth within the Premier and Champions League is healthy? You must think that all the other clubs in the country except Man Utd and maybe Chelsea would view a virtual 1-0 and actual 2-0 defeat at the Emirates as a disaster of cataclysmic proportions? You think that a 38 year old teamed up with a player still returning from serious career threatening injury should be able to compete with the array of talent that Arsenal possess in midfield especially when the door to the title has unexpectedly swung wide open for them just 24 hours earlier?

Not the best performance maybe but Arsenal must have been well up for that game last night.

[Yorick]

We played a heck of a lot better then as well despite conceding the three very late goals to eventually go down 6-2.

We looked like we were going to get something out of that game at 3-2 down, tonight was simply a question of were we going to lose by just the one goal or by more.

Funny how time can fade the memory.

http://www.brfcs.co.uk/mb/index.php?act=fi...&pid=470752

[jonv]

i feel we would have won if gamst was playing.

he is my motm

i refuse to participate in this matches poll.

[jonv]

eh' what the heck...

[Yorick]

Right well I'll own up to providing Zurab with his as yet solitary vote for MoM as long as whoever voted for Benny does likewise.

[jonv]

[Boz]

Yorick, I tend to be agreeing with your assessment and likewise will admit to just adding another vote for our follicly challenged Georgian. I thought that overall our defence played quite well. Benni appears to now be at the same confidence level as MGP. Not such a disappointing performance with my highlight being our ball retention, until the inclusion of the aforementioned, when a flick generally ended with lost possession. Oh yes and that header from Bents's great cross, blimey!

I must give special mention to a good Arsenal team, especially their two full backs who when they came forward looked very dangerous.