Arsenal FC
An Arsenal blog written by arsenal fan

 

Wednesday, December 6, 2006
Henry the cheerleader makes Wenger the doomsayer

Even though he was absent from selection, be the cause a mysterious neck injury, a sciatic nerve, tiredness, a training-ground tantrum or a trace of polonium 210 at the Emirates Stadium, Thierry Henry managed to play a dramatic part on derby day.

Rumours abounded before kick-off of a disagreement with Arsene Wenger reported in a tabloid splash in the morning. Henry duly spent all day on a PR offensive that Max Clifford would have admired. He gave interviews to explain how upset he was to miss such a game, spent the match down on the touchline as a very visible cheerleader in chief and ambled on to the pitch at the end to embrace and share jokes with Arsenal's jubilant players. He certainly looked a lot happier than he has while playing of late.

So all is well, then? Hardly. Half an hour after the final whistle, Wenger struggled to emulate his compatriot's high spirits when conversation turned from a comfortable 3-0 win to Henry. Habitually loath to criticise his own players when there is another excuse to lean on, Wenger's unease was conspicuous and did little to suggest the 'Thierry bust-up' headlines were the pure fiction Henry would have us believe.

'I want to sit down with him and tell him what I expect of him when he has recovered,' said Wenger, with conspicuous iciness. How did he feel about Henry giving statements about how he felt? 'I am not happy and not unhappy,' said Wenger. 'He is tired and needs to take time to prepare to play. He cannot rest for five days and then come straight back without preparing properly and play at the level the players did against Tottenham. I don't want to talk more about it. I want to give a lot of credit to the team and the rest is internal matters.'

Henry had endeavoured to 'clear up' the story earlier. 'No one actually knows what we said to each other and still they are speculating,' he said. 'I received a call saying that they were going to run a story saying I was in France sulking. I don't know if you ever watched Star Trek but I don't have the power to teleport myself.

'Nothing that has been said in the paper is true and it's a bit of a shame that all the time you have to come out and justify stuff in this country. I did leave the training ground disappointed on Friday because I wanted to play against Spurs. Nobody forced me to not play. It was a discussi

on that we had and I was upset because I don't like to not play. I want to be on the pitch. But sometimes you have to be honest with yourself and listen to your body.'

In the meantime, Henry and Wenger clearly have some making up to do to remove what appears to be an uncharacteristic wedge between them. There are plenty of top teams seeking top strikers so they would do well to do it soon.

As an indicator of how Arsenal will fare without Henry for the foreseeable future - he is suspended from the Porto match and ruled himself out of the grudge fixture next weekend at Chelsea and possibly a good while beyond - Emmanuel Adebayor rose to the challenge.

Questions had been raised about the £7 million Arsenal spent to bring him to the Premiership. There is

no better way to make himself popular in the red corner of north London than to score crucial goals to see off Manchester United and Tottenham.

His workrate in unsettling the Spurs back four was outstanding and he merited the crucial first goal that unfroze Arsenal's dented self-belief. Last week, in cowering to successive defeats at Bolton and Fulham, Arsenal were suffering the Premiership's most extreme confidence crisis. There is no team in the league whose performances veer so wildly between inspiring and incompetent.

But then again, they were playing Tottenham, who are on a bad day as flaky as their neighbours. These affairs are usually stormy and spiteful, but that rather depends on both teams showing up. Spurs were just about there in body but not in soul.

Wenger had been looking for new leadership and the heart shown by two 19-year-olds in dominant defender Johan Djourou and midfield orchestrator Cesc Fabregas, with 21-year-old Adebayor leading the line, epitomised why he is sticking with this team even though their inexperience hurts from time to time.


Tellingly, despite their youth, Arsenal had only one player new to the club this season in their line-up compared with five newcomers representing Spurs. Some of their players are evidently still learning about the nuances of Premiership football and derbies in particular.

Judging by the dark expression worn by Martin Jol afterwards, they will want to learn fast. Despite the emphatic scoreline, both managers left the Emirates with food for thought.

Labels: , ,

 

posted by Labanon @ 12:37 AM  
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home
 

 

 
About Me

Name: Labanon
Home:
About Me:
See my complete profile

Previous Post
Archives
FootBall Talk

 


 

Links

 

Powered by

 



BLOGGER

html>