Silvestre and Bischoff make reserve appearance 6 October, 2008

It begins, it’s officially international week and you know what that means…pure fucking boredom. It’s hard enough for me updating the site at the moment and it’s going to be even worse when there’s nothing actually to talk about. Hopefully we’ll see Theo Walcott again at the weekend.

Anyway, getting sidetracked. We’ll moan about the lack of news when we get to it…

Amaury Bischoff and Mikael Silvestre played in an Arsenal shirt for the first time tonight as the reserves beat Stoke 3-2. Silvestre played the full 90 minutes and Bischoff only managed an hour but he’s just been out for a long time with injury.

I wasn’t able to watch the game and the match report hardly even talks about our two players making debuts. The extent of that is that Silvestre made a sliding tackle in a Stoke counter attack. That’s all we know…

Stil though, it shows us how close they are to being available. I didn’t actually realise that Bischoff was match fit, I thought he was still some time away. I’m interested to see what he actually looks like, he’s an unknown quantity; could be bollocks or he could actually show some potential. Hopefully we’ll get to find out in the next round of the Carling Cup.

Silvestre, we know what we’re getting really. I just see him as back-up really anyway. However if he turns out to actually be quite good for us then maybe he could work his way into the first team. I still can’t think of him as an Arsenal player.

Manuel Almunia’s been talking about Theo Walcott saying how his ‘no more mr. nice guy’ attitude has helped his game:

“Theo was too nice maybe in the last two years but this season you can see that when he gets tackled he gets furious and that shows you he has changed.

When he used to take a tackle he didn’t reply with anything, he didn’t say anything to the referee or the opposing player. He would get tackled and stay on the floor, and he would never say anything. Now I like him more on the field.”

It’s true. Almunia says that Theo likes to talk to more experienced players and I think it has helped his game. Theirry Henry has left his mark on Theo after he took him under his wing as his young apprentice. David Beckham was saying a few weeks ago that Theo asked him how he could improve his game and he said that he told Theo to be a little more selfish, more ruthless and it has helped.

He’s starting to get a few goals now and he’s not afraid to shoot. He’s improved his running down the wing and he’s just all round improved his game to become a much more dangerous player, opposition defenders must hate playing him.

Well that’s about it for tonight. Hopefully there’ll be something to talk about tomorrow. Don’t forget tomorrow is the last day to enter that competition for the Nike Arsenal ball. Make sure you get your entry in.

Thanks for reading.