Bilmey – A month away drove me crazy

It’s been almost a month since I wrote my last blog and without doubt it’s been a month full of surprises. Well, my exams did throw up a few surprise questions but I shouldn’t be complaining. If I’ve messed up my exams, it’s my own fault. I spend the day before my Electronics paper watching late night Champions League action in Greece and my already poor Mathematics was subjected to a painful 1-0 loss to Man City. I am not complaining though, it’s all a part of being a faithful Gooner and I’ve been so for the past five years!

To start with the Man City game, no matter what the result was, it was a triumph of philosophy. Our young lads gave them a rude shock with a committed performance and they needed a 38m striker and 100m worth of talent to finally edge a second string Arsenal line up. I can’t help but smile when I think what would have happened if Van Persie had played a part in that match.

Now that I’ve mentioned out captain, there seems to be no end to the talks about Arsenal being a one man team. Really? What about Liverpool then? Liverpool without Suarez would look worse than Arsenal without Van Persie. So why aren’t Liverpool a one man team? Is it just because they’ve got a 35m striker who is as good as Chamakh or a 20m winger who has no assists in almost 15 games? My guess is as good as yours.

Last weekend’s celebrations were great. The selection of Chapman, Adams and Henry for the statues was perfect but I am sure more will follow in the near future. It was great to see all the legends together and it was only fitting that a future legend scored a stunning goal to seal the match.  No one can match the fantastic history of clubs like Arsenal, Liverpool and United. Even Manchester City fans will acknowledge that their petro-billions won’t give them such emotional and proud history and loyal Man City fans will savour the FA Cup victory 35 years ago more than their triumph last season. A faultless day to mark the 125 anniversary of a faultless club! 

Now that we are into December, the festive season is finally upon us. Christmas is not very big in India but I’m happy that I’ll still get a week-long vacation! This weekend’s City game will be a huge test of character for Arsenal but from then on, it’s a great run of fixtures until United come to Emirates on Jan 22. Arsenal are not in a position where they can afford to drop points but Wenger can’t play with his first choice players in every game either. The best option is to keep rotating players in batches so that we don’t have to field a fully second string team in any league match.

Finally, we are nearing January! Which means it is transfer time again! Yeah, I understand. I shouldn’t get this excited about the winter transfer window being an Arsenal fan. I can’t remember anybody in the recent past other than Arshavin who came in January but I have this funny feeling that we’ll see some investment from Arsenal. I am sure we won’t see 30m signings like Goetze, Hazard or Benzema because I don’t think we’ll ever sign these players.

But don’t be surprised if Wenger throws a 5m here and a 10m there and buys a couple of decent players. Someone like Baines wouldn’t cost more than 12m and Podolski is supposedly valued at the same price by FC Koln. We’ll be lucky to see these guys in an Arsenal shirt but my bet is on Wenger making a surprise buy similar to the signing of Arteta or Park. Mind you, he’ll get it right as always! 

I think it’s time for a stop though. I’ve been ranting off for the past half an hour about how I’ve felt this past month and maybe tomorrow I’ll get going with something more specific!

WTTGT Writer: Vivek Arulnathan

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