ARSENAL GIFT SPURS SOME ACTUAL HISTORY

This glorious SPURS THUMPING blog will be my last on this site. If you are looking for my latest work, it’ll be on this Substack until the Le-Grove.co.uk address transfers over.

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How do you start a blog after a result like that?

Arsenal did the job. I haven’t felt this proud to be a fan of our glorious club in 20+ years. Beating Spurs in their house could be framed many ways, but for me, it felt like Arteta rubber-stamping his exit from Phase Three of the project.

• Phase 1: Do some dumb rookie things like signing Willian and giving Auba a £350k-a-week deal.
• Phase 2: Realize older players don’t care for your ideas. Be honest about what the club is, who the coaching staff are, and pressure ownership to back Project Youth 2.0. Also, beg Arsenal leadership to get Amazon in the door to do some doco-making.
• Phase 3: Add a layer of world-class talent to a world-class system. Improve the mental capabilities of the squad. Refine the playing style. Prove the team is ready to dominate by managing a successful league campaign with the added complexity of the Champions League.

We’re now into the final run of the season. All the weak-kneed bed-wetters who said we’d never get back to the top with a manager like Mikel Arteta are dry-heaving on force-fed humble Kai. The screamers on YouTube are going to have to find a new way to make revenue, like anti-vaxxing, Alpha male-ing or flat-earthing. The days of fleecing fan attention with subpar analysis are over – the adults have control – no one wants to watch someone scream ‘Arteta Out’ while they smoke indoors to a backdrop of crap Ikea art – with Hector Bellerin mocking in the comments section.

Arsenal is a no-drama zone. The case law has been settled. We are a serious club, top to bottom. This season has been magnificent regardless of where the league finishes. Elliot at Arsenal Vision tweeted that we’re tracking for a 101-point season in 2024. That is incredible.

The Spurs result was special because we didn’t really deserve the win. It was a rough performance pitted with individual errors and subpar performances. Spurs created more xG against us than any team this year. But for me, that is the win. You can’t be Champions if you only win the games you deserve to win. To find the next level, you have to steal games from big teams. As fans, you have to occasionally feel like you’ve taken out a loan on your Grandma’s excellent credit rating… knowing you’ve no intention of paying it back. That happened today… and we stole the old lady’s toaster in the process (and left the toilet seat up).

Let’s go full cliche here: It was a game of two halves.

The first half was far from perfect, but the plan seemed fairly clear. Lure Spurs into pressing us in dangerous spaces, escape with a ball to Ødegaard, then see what happens.

Well, what happened is we were three up by halftime. Arsenal took their chances. Two goals came from corners. Hojberg scored the first for Spurs. The third came from Kai Havertz nodding in a cross from Declan Rice.

Our second goal came from an outrageous counter-attack. Kai Havertz dropped a switched ball for the ages into Bukayo Saka’s path. The Spicy Sauce Influencer bounded into the area, made mincemeat of Ben Davies, and ripped a low shot past one of the best keepers in the league.

Spurs didn’t have a shot on target. You might say they were, in fact, a victim of the fixture list. 15 days off wasn’t a good look for them. But they had chances. Arsenal gave them set pieces, we gifted them transition opportunities, and we let Romero hit the post and allowed Son in on our goal one-on-one. 3-0 up felt dirty, but it didn’t feel secure. A bit like giving your phone number to an OnlyFans influencer.

If the second half was an OnlyFans category, it would have been self-immolation. We did the hard work. We rode out the first 18 minutes really well. Then we lit the match and set fire to our naked bodies.

David Raya received the ball under slight pressure, but no worse than usual. He had options around him. He could have gone short, long, or passed it out for a throw, a corner, or a goal kick. Instead, he chose to dink the ball over two attackers like he was playing 5-a-side against a team of 6-year-olds. The hesitancy meant he didn’t beat his man. Romero picked up the ball and finished like Gabriel Batistuta.

…now it was game on. We went from looking like we’d depressed Spurs into not pressing/giving up to firing them up into believing they’d kill our title dreams. Their fans perked up. The players looked energized. Arsenal were in trouble.

The Arsenal boys didn’t shrink… Saka had an incredible chance to kill the game down the other end, but he missed basically an open goal.

Then Declan gave away a penalty by booting a Spurs player up the arse by accident. Son scored, and Matt Kandela called me and said, “Pete, this is where the title bid ends.”

Our box turned into the Alamo. We gave away free kicks, corners, space for crosses, but one theme remained strong… David Raya claimed anything that went near him. Our defenders put their bodies on the line to clear. It was brilliant defending and outrageous keeping.

Now, there are people who will slam David Raya for the mistake. There’s no avoiding it. It was really bad. When you’re coasting at 3-0 up, you don’t need to take risks. He did. It cost him. But that was the first goal he’d conceded away in 6 games. It was his first major mistake in a while. Mistakes happen, you have to face it. But what was telling was how he responded. He was absolutely incredible after – and sadly, I know Aaron wouldn’t have responded the same way.

This is the broader talking point for me: When we lost THAT Newcastle game in 2022, part of the reason was we lacked bravery. Ramsdale hoofed, no one played through the press, we were bottle jobs, and cowards. Yesterday, our first-half plan revolved around high-risk passing in high-pressure areas… and it won us the game. The criticism of Raya was: He tried to do high-risk brave things when he should have hoofed it. Switching out of high-risk is hard – but I’d rather have a brave keeper willing to do brave things than a keeper who is scared. He’s a brilliant keeper – I’m just glad the season didn’t fall on one of his errors.

We won the game 3-2. That was the hardest game left we’ll play. City won by playing far worse football. There is still a huge chance this title goes our way.

So let’s chat about a few players that stood out.

Kai Havertz I’m sorry, but this guy is a freak of nature. He gets better and better. Chelsea fans all told us about him: He’s a big-game player.

Who showed up today? Big Game Kai.

His assist to Saka was so good I assumed it was from Declan Rice. A 50-yard moonraker into feet. Exceptional. His headed goal from a corner was soft for Spurs, but great for us, because Kai doesn’t score a lot of those sorts of goals. We’re also forgetting about the fact he had the ball in the net very early on as well. He was immense, his work rate, combined with output, makes him a bargainous summer signing.

Remember the nerds who told you he was a bad investment – and never trust them again.

Bukayo Saka This is a game his family would disown him for not performing in. He was electric. He hates Spurs, gets the rivalry, and puts on a show if he can. His goal was pure Mo Salah. He picked up the Kai pass in space and made sure the result of the space afforded to him by Angeball was punished to the max. I thought his off-ball movement was really positive, and his overall danger level felt really high.

Thomas ‘Party Boy’ Partey I thought he was finished. That Arteta had moved on from him. When he didn’t get the nod for the Villa game, it seemed over. Well, we were all wrong. Thomas is going to be the man in midfield for the rest of the season. He was f***ing outrageous. He’s gone from looking a bit overweight to deft on his feet, and maybe faster than he ever was. He was dropping bodies with his movement. The one-touch passing was accurate and devastating. He controls the midfield in a different way to Declan Rice, but it’s oh-so complimentary to his younger counterpart. I’m not sure how you deal with a midfield that good.

Mikel Arteta Matt Kandela said on the podcast that Arteta coached a 4-0 win, and he’s right. Tactically, both halves were perfect. Execution was far from sexy… but it did the job. We have the 2nd best manager in the world right now. I won’t hear anything different. We’re chasing City down until the last game of the season and doing it with kids on half the wages. What he’s done with this Arsenal side is one major trophy away from cementing his reputation…

…What he’s done with this Arsenal side is one major trophy away from cementing his reputation up there with Arsene Wenger and George Graham.

The only thing we’ve wanted for the last twenty years is to have an owner, manager, front office, back office… all going into work every day with the same mission: ‘Make Arsenal great’.

That wasn’t us from 2005 to 2017. It is us now.

Trophies are important, but they can be fluked. What is truly important is knowing the people that look after the thing we love really do care about it.

They do.

This season has been magnificent. The feelings I have towards the club have never been stronger. Whatever happens this season, you can be sure of one thing: No club is better placed to dominate the next 5 years than us.

Ok, that’s me done.

I accidentally posted the On The Whistle in a non-exclusive way yesterday, and we had a Livestream audience of 6100 concurrent AOPers. That is f***ing mad. Thank you to all those who watched. Check out the video here.

This will be the last Arsenal blog I post on WordPress. Beating Spurs was too beautiful not to exit this platform gracefully. If you want the blog, go to the Substack address until I work out the tech. All the writing is free until the end of the year. Thank you for reading commenting, being a part of this amazing journey. Now we move onto the next thing.

P.S. I am back for the Arsenal game. I don’t have a ticket. If you have a spare, I will buy it from you for a very good price. E-mail me! x