Barnet 0-2 Arsenal – 14/07/07 – (Friendly) 15 July, 2007

It was quite strange going back to see Arsenal again. It’s only Barnet but I had been looking forward to this game for a little while just for the fact I would be back in the stands watching and supporting Arsenal again. It was quite a strong starting line-up: Almunia, Toure, Clichy, Flamini, Denilson Walcott, Adebayor and Van Persie all started and I thought we could be in for a thrashing, but after a few minutes of the game you could tell it was a typical pre-season friendly and this was actually the first game of football these players have played since May.

I was in the North Terrace and behind the goal were a group of fans singing so I thought I’d squeeze my way over there. At points they would sing some quite racist songs about Tottenham, I didn’t join in but to be honest with you I didn’t really mind the singing. I know it’s all a joke and they don’t actually mean the things they say but I can very much see how inappropriate the songs are. One Gooner turned round and said something about them singing these songs, which resulted in a big squaring up. Wasn’t nice but in the end they ignored each other.

It was great to see the boys back in action on the pitch, especially Robin Van Persie, it’s too early to talk of performances but you could definitely see that bad injury he got last year was not hindering his play whatsoever. Also he did make quite a few good shots, flicks, displays of skill and good through balls; 07/08 could be a very good season for Robin.

The first goal came after 18 minutes from a corner. Van Persie took it and it came in low to Walcott who played it into the danger area. Adebayor was there to stick the ball in the back of the net and it was 1-0 to the Arsenal. The goal was scored down the other end of the pitch in a crowed area so it was quite hard to see exactly what went on, and I haven’t seen a replay since. We’d got our first goal and that’s all that mattered.

Barnet came vary close to scoring a few minutes later. A loss in concentration in the Arsenal defence and the home striker was through on goal. The real slim shady Almunia did really well to come out and block the shot. A great save; it could’ve very easily been 1-1 at this point.

We should’ve scored again before half time, the closest effort was Van Persie’s header, which came off the underside of the bar and bounced out. Anyway half time came and we were 1-0 up. At the break we made 6 changes, Almunia, Gilbert, Clichy, Song, Randall and Van Persie all came off to be replaced by our new ‘keeper Fabianski, new 16-year-old defender Nordtveit, Traore, Gavin Hoyte, Gibbs and Barazite. A slightly weaker side now but we still had Toure, Walcott and Adebayor remaining from the first half.

We had a few more decent chances in the opening stages of the second half but nothing too dangerous for the Barnet goalie. However 10 minutes into the second 45 Denilson was tackled badly and was down on the floor for quite some time. Eventually he was stretchered off and it looked like he had suffered quite a bad injury. However later in the game it was announced that the injury was not serious and after the game he was seen walking to bus fine.

Adebayor missed a good chance to double the lead but not long after, half time substitution Nacer Barazite did just that with a brilliant goal in the 66th minute. He charged into the box but was getting pushed away from goal giving him a difficult angle to finish from, forcing him to cross. However he turned and powered a shot into the top corner of the net. It was unstoppable for the Barnet ‘keeper and that was 2-0 to Arsenal.

Just after that we made another round of substitutions: Toure, Walcott and Adebayor came off to be replaced by Paul Rogers, Merida and Rui Fonte. I don’t really remember the rest of the game to be honest. Not a lot happened really but I was distracted by the funniest thing in the crowd. That group of fans I said I was with sarcastically cheered the announcement that Paul Rogers had come on and for the remainder of the game we sang as many songs we could think of about the young defender. There was a bit of confusion as to who we were looking out for when we sang ‘Rogers give us a wave’, but he eventually did. It had me in hysterics.

The atmosphere was all ruined at the end when the two who were arguing about the racist songs got into a bit of handbags. In all it was a good day out, 2-0 the final score but really I just came to see the Arsenal boys back in action. Sorry about the poor quality of match report, it’s hard to do with these sort of games but there you go.

Just a quick mention of some individuals: Fabianski had a good debut with a clean sheet and made a few stops when needed. He seems a bit of a Lehmann character that doesn’t mind coming out of his box a bit to stop the ball. A few crazy moments but he’ll be pleased with the clean sheet. Walcott had a good game, his pace was way too much for the Barnet defence. Also he was getting quite involved in the game giving 100%. At one point he was tackled quite badly and went on a bit of a tackling rampage, which was quite amusing but was all in good spirit. Van Persie who I mentioned earlier had a good first half, a player who I’m very exited to see next season. Nacer Barazite will be please with his goal but I think we had quite a good 45 minutes, maybe one for the future.

There were no poor performances; it was just your average pre-season friendly. The next game is on Thursday against Genclerbirligi in our Austrian tour.

Thanks for reading.