Merry Xmas, hopefully our best present comes a day late… 25 December, 2006

Merry Christmas everyone, hope you all had a good one and Santa brought you what you wanted. If you’re reading this today you’re just as sad as me going on the computer, but the evening on Christmas Day is so relaxed and tiring instead of being slumped on the sofa in front of some awful film I have chosen to write on the site.

We make the short trip to Watford tomorrow to face the team bottom at Christmas. It should be a walkover and we should be confident after putting six past Blackburn two days ago. However this season we have been so unbelievably inconsistent you cannot predict anything. If we do not win it will most definitely be 2 points dropped, we should win and I believe we will; I don’t even want to think about what would happen if we didn’t. It was 3-0 at home against the Hornets; anything like that again would do us just nicely.

Watford have no new injuries ahead of the game but they are still without Marlon King (Gooner), James Chambers and Clarke Carlisle. Ashley Young and Darius Henderson are threats going forward and ‘keeper Ben Foster who is on loan from Man United is very good. They are by no means an easy team to beat, they’re unlucky to be bottom of the table and they will be desperate to get anything out of this game.

Wenger won’t underestimate Watford and will field a very strong team, it’s not likely to be very different from Saturday’s team but I do hope Baptista gets a game and hopefully it is as a forward. He still hasn’t been given the chance to prove himself and I think this is the perfect game to let him show what he can do. By playing The Beast it is not weakening the side, playing someone like Song or Aliadiere would be but hopefully Arsene doesn’t do that.

I don’t think I am going to the game, there’s quite a few people I know with tickets in the Watford end but I don’t think I’m going to be able to nick one off them, I’d love to be going in the Gooner section but it was impossible to get tickets. If anyone wants to give me a ticket for Xmas I’d love them forever, but if anyone has actually got any spares please tell me, I would pay for them. I might go down and watch the game in a bar, it’s on Sky Sports 1 and kick off is 5.30, enjoy it to those of you that are going…lucky bastards

There never is much news on Christmas Day but I’ll fill you in on what happened recently. Jens Lehmann has said he may leave Arsenal in the summer. The German no.1 had a good game at the weekend and is still a firm favourite amongst the Gooners but he’s getting on a bit now and he’s at the stage where he’ll get one year contracts at a time. Last season was definitely his peak for Arsenal and we’ll need to be finding a replacement for him soon; I don’t feel that one of the reserve ‘keepers we have at the moment is going to be the successor to Mad Jens. This is what he said when he was asked if he’ll be leaving Ashburton Grove:

“I don’t know, but in the talks about my future, Arsenal definitely has top priority. A one-year contract wouldn’t be so bad. But I’m not saying that there is a 100 per cent chance I would stay in the event of an Arsenal offer. One has to look closely at everything. If there is no agreement with Arsenal, I’m open. I might not make a decision until May. I’m pretty relaxed about my whole situation.”

I’d like for him to stay on but he’s not going to get any better or any younger and one day he might decide to move on to a new challenge. This summer Arsene will have to look to bring in a new ‘keeper to guard the Emirates goal in years to come.

Thierry Henry has said he wants to become an Arsenal legend, you might argue he has already reached that status but he wants to become what Maldini is for Milan. He’s also revealed that one of the main reasons he stayed at Arsenal was due to the fans and their support to try and get him to stay:

“How I am thought of when my career ends is very important to me. I would like to be seen as a Paolo Maldini type of player so that when people speak about Arsenal, they speak of me. It’s something I feel strongly about. Titles and trophies can be won and they stay with you but loyalty remains even longer. When you arrive at training and you see you have received so many letters asking you to stay, it has an effect. When you get that on a daily basis it counts for something.”

In the summer I was desperate for Thierry to stay but this season he has been off colour and not the same player. It would be excellent if he can find his form again this season when he returns in the new year.

That’s enough for a Christmas Day special on The Cannon. I’m off to go watch a crappy movie. Enjoy the game tomorrow.