The Soccer Blog: Birmingham 0 - Arsenal 3: Match Highlights and Reaction

Sunday 2 January 2011

Birmingham 0 - Arsenal 3: Match Highlights and Reaction

Birmingham 0 – Arsenal 3: Match Highlights and Reaction - The Offside - Arsenal blog

« Birmingham 0 – Arsenal 3: Arsenal Pull Away in Style After Nervy First-Half (UPDATED with Player Ratings) | Home | Birmingham 0 – Arsenal 3: Match Highlights and ReactionBy: Martin | January 2nd, 2011
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Highlights of yesterday’s 3-0 win over Birmingham, plus some more reaction stuff, after the jump:

Birmingham City v Arsenal
Uploaded by wcphenix. – More professional, college and classic sports videos.

One of the big talking points after the match was Wenger’s rotation policy. Many people pointed to this as objective proof that Wenger cocked up the Wigan game by rotating the players so much. I would say that that is a pretty narrow view of things that is ignoring a lot of factors. First, I think it’s a little foolish to assume that these players would have played as well as they did against Chelsea or against Brum yesterday if they were operating on 1 day of rest. Based on what we’ve seen from Arsenal in years past, I actually don’t think they would have played like that at all. And secondly, I don’t think they would have played as well as they did yesterday had they been operating on 2 days rest instead of 4. Maybe I’m getting to be as stubborn as Wenger is, but I still defend his decision to rotate. For me, look no further than Manchester United, who stuck with the same team through all three of their matches (which were more spaced out than ours) — they dropped points against Birmingham away, and they probably should have dropped points against West Brom away, and looked pretty listless and exhausted yesterday.

Asked about it at the post-match press conference, here’s what he had to say about it:

I can understand that I was criticised but I think what is important is that I am paid to make decisions. Strong decisions are better than half decisions. I took a decision and it nearly worked, we were a little bit unlucky. I could have played the same team three times and lost at Wigan and tonight. I consider that we dropped two points at Wigan but you can also say that Manchester United dropped two points at St Andrew’s. Over the festive period we were the team with less recovery time than any team and the team who played, along with Manchester United, twice away from home.

Which is not to say that I don’t want to see an unchanged squad against Manchester City on Wednesday, because I really do think we’ve discovered the best configuration of players to get the most out of things. Song seems to be acting less of a fool in this current lineup, and having Nasri and Theo on the wings helps massively. Clichy has not made a mistake the last couple of matches, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that he just gets hung out to dry so much less when he has Nasri in front of him than he does when Arshavin is there. Nasri and Theo both take defending very seriously and work hard at it, and it helps the team immeasurably.

In other news, the FA is set to probe into the matter of Lee Bowyer’s incidents with Sagna yesterday, and Bowyer may face a fine. The way I understand it is that the FA cannot punish anything the referee saw and deemed not worthy of punishment. But if the referee says he did not see the incident(s), the FA may take action. Given that the ball was well away, I would be surprised if the referee saw at least the first incident, which was by far the worse of the two. For me it was a blatantly intentional stamp, and if he had seen it, it would have been straight red for violent conduct no questions asked, which would have led to a 3-match suspension. So I would say that a 3-match ban at a minimum would be fair, but you never know with the FA.

Birmingham manager Alex McLeish is complaining about the refereeing, both awarding the van Persie free kick which led to the first goal, and not awarding the penalty to them when the ball hit van Persie’s elbow in the box. I think he’s got a fair point about both calls, and you can understand where he’s coming from. But since we got jobbed a couple of times by the referee on Wednesday against Wigan, and we put 11 shots on goal to Birmingham’s 1, I have to say I’m not losing any sleep over it.

And that’s about it, really. Enjoy the rest of your weekends. I’ll be back tomorrow with a January transfer window preview, so look for that.

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Category: Arsenal News, Birmingham, Fixtures, Premiership, Video

Tags: Arsenal News, Birmingham, Fixtures, Premiership, Video
Tweet « Birmingham 0 – Arsenal 3: Arsenal Pull Away in Style After Nervy First-Half (UPDATED with Player Ratings) | Home | SairaxAnd you're right about the rotation. We only got a draw at Wigan, but looking at the bigger picture, it all worked out well for us. It's going to be a tough couple of months so managing the squad is going to be trickyFred JacobHow come it have no games weekendGigi_manThx for the video, I tried to post one from youtube but it was "backwards" meaning that the image was turned from side to side so you d see the numbers and names on the shirts the other way, maybe it got banned because of that ;P

Chelsea just drew in a heat-rushing, breath-taking game, if I was either a Che or Villa fan I d be having a heart attack.MartinChelsea dropped points to Aston Villa in an absolutely bananas match today -- ended 3-3 with 3 goals (2 from Chelsea to go from trailing 2-1 to winning 3-2, and an injury time equalizer from Villa) coming after the 84th minute. Chelsea are now 6 points behind Manchester United, who have a game in hand on them, and you'd have to say their title hopes are on life support at the moment. When you consider that United's game in hand is against Blackpool, which they'll probably win, it seems pretty unlikely that Chelsea can make up 9 points on United over the last 18 matches.Darren_VRemember when you had Chelsea as strong title favorites? BHaahahaha... what a dumb prediction!!!

I had the same one...SairaxI remember someone said something different and was brushed off.....Fred JacobAll we can hope is Chelsea come out that slump to bet both ManU and ManCity when they face them.CuverdaleCouldn't agree more about the defending from the wings in relation to Clichy's improvement. Although he's still finding his feet VP gives us a totally different dimension. You can see that Nasri, Fab & VP love playing together. If they all stay fit it's a mouthwatering prospect especially with Walcott's pace as an alternative outlet.Peevishlol @ January transfer preview - as an Arsenal blog, that should be fairly brief :PMartinYeah, unless some long-winded, pretentious blowhard is writing it . . .Peevish....you know you should really treat Sairax better if you want her to keep up her great work on the blog...SairaxCan't believe the kind of abuse I put up with around hereDarren_VI can't beleive the kind of abuse you create over on twitter, but there you go ;)SairaxI know. I should really be banned.linzhangxxPlease enter a comment to post.blog comments powered by Disqus