Wigan 0-1 Arsenal – 13/12/06 – (Barclays Premiership) 14 December, 2006

The first half was absolutely shocking and ideas that we were improving were quickly dismissed. There was no Fabregas who as rested as I thought he might be and Hleb was replaced my Walcott. Before the game I was saying we needed to let Cesc sit out of this one but we really missed him and you could see how much of a vital player his is to this team. We played a 4-5-1 again and we really need to stop, it just didn’t allow us to create anything. We should only use this formation against the top teams and ones that will cause us problems. Wigan is not one of those teams and neither is Portsmouth so hopefully we’ll go back to two up top on Saturday.

I can’t even bring myself to write about the first half, it was a terrible performance from the boys and there was no urgency or quality about our play. We just kept giving the ball away again which is something we’ve been doing alot of recently. Things did get better in the second half but still we weren’t playing anywhere near as good as we can. I liked the look of Clichy in the second half; he was getting down the wing well and crossing in some good balls. In the 52nd minute Gael crossed and there were three Arsenal players in the box (for once) and the ball arrived at Walcott’s feet. Theo didn’t really know what to do and pressure from Wigan’s defenders forced a corner. The ball was whipped in and headed out by a defender but it went straight to Ljungberg who drove back into the box and squared the ball across to Adebayor but it was too far in front of him and the attack was over.

We were starting to find some rhythm now and starting to create some decent attacking moves. 2 minutes later Gilberto played an excellent through ball for Adebayor but he couldn’t quite reach it but he was clean through if he got it right. The game was much more open now in the second half and it was pretty much end-to-end attacking football.

In the 56th minute Baptista played a great ball through to Walcott on the right who squared it for Adebayor to tap into the open net. Somehow Ade couldn’t get a touch on it with the pressure from a defender and the ball just went running past him. Should’ve really been one nil here.

Wigan were having chances of their own though and we had to make sure our defending was tight so we didn’t concede. Josip Skoko picked up the ball on the outside of the box and shot a powerful shot towards goal, it looked dangerous but it went straight at Lehmann who was able to divert the ball away from goal.

Kolo Toure had an excellent game at the back and he needed to be with all the attacks we were letting Wigan have. Kolo only made one mistake in the game, just after the hour mark. We were passing the ball around the back four when he got the ball stuck underneath his feet and Camara pounced to steal the ball and had only the ‘keeper to beat. Toure did incredibly well though to force the Wigan striker out wide and nick the ball back off him.

Baptista got a rare start today so everybody had one eye on the Brazilian to see what he could do. His first half wasn’t especially good but neither was anyone’s. I was trying to watch his game but every time he got the ball he was closed down by an opposition player. He did play some clever through balls and some nice passes but I still can’t judge him, he really needs a good run of games. He took a good free kick on 66 minutes, the ball was heading for the top left corner dipping over the way but it went just wide. He was substituted just after that along with Flamini as Fabregas and Van Persie came on to try and get a wining goal. Things were getting a bit rushed and nervous and bringing on these two was good for the team. Also we switched to a 4-4-2 after the subs came on and our shape looked much better, Wenger must realise this is our best formation.

With 5 minutes to go we won a free kick near the half way line and Cesc played a great long ball over the top for Adebayor to run onto. His first touch wasn’t great and Kirkland just collected it before it could be knocked into the goal. However two minutes later, Fabregas played another long ball over the defence for Adebayor and this time his control was good and he simply slotted it between the ‘keepers legs to get the last minute winner for Arsenal.

Cesc was really influential when he came on and I think it might’ve been 0-0 if it weren’t for him. It could’ve been 1-0 to them if it weren’t for Toure. We might not have deserved that win but I’ll take a scrappy three points any day. That win puts us up to third, 10 pts behind Chelsea and 15 behind Man United; there’s only 5 points between us in 3rd and Everton in 10th though so we can’t afford to drop points and be overtaken by the chasing pack. It’s the draw for the next round of the Champions League tomorrow so I’ll write up about that at some point. See ya.