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Extensive scans have been performed on Rosicky, and the Czech midfielder will be out for five months, a sickening blow for not only the player and his leg but the club as well.

The latest injection of cash from TV revenue, gate receipts and prize money saw our balance improve significantly, which is very pleasing.

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Team against Newcastle :

Lehmann
Eboue
Toure
Richards
Gallas

Hleb
Gilberto
Fabregas
Emanuelson

Asamoah
Henry

Subs :

Adebayor
Baptista
Van Persie
Walcott
Obertan


Walcott is called up to the squad while Emanuelson moves to left midfield, Gallas moves out to left back leaving a hole where Richards returns to his central position.

English Premiership 22/10/2006
Emirates Stadium, Arsenal

Arsenal V Newcastle

We looked comfortable once again in the first half, dominating play and producing some good passing moves, but it was right at the end of the half when Urby Emanuelson , revelling in his new midfield role, struck with a glorious effort from some way outside the box. Gyan Asamoah, who is producing an extraordinary amount of assists at the moment headed on for Emanuelson to curl a fantastic effort in with his left foot.

In the second half Thierry Henry looked certain to double the lead before Steven Taylor made a heroic last ditch tackle to deny the striker, but we were not to be prevented for too long, and on seventy minutes Henry sealed the win with a rare header, Urby Emanuelson enjoying his new freedom, crossing in the ball for Henry to get on the end of.

Arsenal 2
Emanuelson 45
Henry 70

Newcastle 0

Man of The Match : Urby Emanuelson (Arsenal)

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Urby Emanuelson has been named in the Premiership team of the week, placed in his most recent position of left midfield. Emanuelson will be given a break in our next match however, I am looking to rest several players in our League Cup game against Derby. Youngsters like Marchisio, Diaby, Obertan, Cardenas and Walcott will be given a game

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Team against Derby :

Enyeama

Hoyte
Djourou
Richards
Clichy

Obertan
Marchisio
Denilson

Cardenas
Moutinho

Walcott


Subs :
Senderos
Ricardo
Van Persie
Baptista
Diaby

A handful of players make their first starts for the club, Enyeama, Marchisio, Cardenas, Moutinho and Walcott are those players, while the defence all have more experience, with Clichy, Hoyte and Djourou all recognised defenders at the club and Richards an England U21 International with several Arsenal appearances this season. Ricardo is named on the bench, but unless Lehmann gets injured this season he is unlikely to play much more than Mart Poom did. Diaby is also named in the squad for the first time since he broke his ankle last season. The youngsters line up with a 4-3-2-1 formation to accommodate both Moutinho and Cardenas, while Denilson is played out of position on the wing. Arturo Lupoli, who would perhaps be playing against them were he still at the club, is in Derby’s first team for the game, he is on loan there and will be looking to make a good impression against his parent club.

League Cup Third Round 25/10/06
Emirates Stadium, Arsenal

Arsenal V Derby


The first half was incredibly even, with my young Arsenal team perhaps just shading it, but it was clear they were yet to get used to this formation and weren’t playing at their best. Soon after the break however, Paul Boertien got himself sent off for a second yellow after shoving Sherman Cardenas. Then the game started to sway in our favour and Theo Walcott broke the deadlock on fifty six minutes with an absolute wonder goal and a great strike to grace his first start. Walcott picked up the ball just past the halfway line as we launched a counter attack and sped past three defenders before curling the ball in past Lee Camp. The game was finished five minutes later as Gabriel Obertan powered a header into the goal from a Denilson cross. Derby were beaten and to compile matters they went down to nine men when Mo Camara lost his head and elbowed Obertan in the face with ten minutes left, the Guinea defender was shown a straight red and is likely to be given a huge ban now. The one Derby performance that did stand out was that of Giles Barnes, who stood out among his team mates with after a decent game. The midfielder has been on my radar for a while and I will be keeping an eye on him, but I would like to wait for him to progress before making any possible move for the teenager.

Arsenal 2
Walcott 56
Obertan 61

Derby 0
Boertien (s/o) 48
Camara (s/o) 80

Man of The Match : Theo Walcott (Arsenal)

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Joao Moutinho picked up a knock against Derby and is out for a week with a damaged elbow, to be honest I would rather another player kept suffering these little injuries as Moutinho is proving very useful even at his young age. The 2-0 win sees us pick up £30,000 in prize money

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The Telegraph

Arsenal Still On Track With Unproven Wulfric

It’s still early days in Tom Wulfric’s Arsenal career but things are looking rosy for Arsene Wenger’s successor, Gunners fans still miss the French professor and his eye for youth but thirteen wins in the last fifteen games for Arsenal have assured fans that the club is still moving forward. When Wenger left there was an air of defeatism among fans and even some players, but soon people began to talk of ‘a world class manager’ taking over and continuing the Frenchman’s good work, but when talks with World Cup winning coach Marcelo Lippi broke down, fans and pundits started to doubt the club’s future. Doubt turned into fear and anger when the Gunners appointed former Portsmouth reserve team boss and scout Wulfric. Protest against the 20 year old’s shock appointment were made and fans booed Wulfric at every opportunity. Although he is a fair way off being put in the same class as the other managers in this division, Wulfric has now got the fans on his side after an impressive string of results. Only Chelsea and Manchester City have come out of an encounter with Arsenal with points this season and the club boast a 100% record in the Champions League as well, having beaten Roma, CSKA Moscow and Galatasaray convincingly. These good results have not come cheaply though, Wulfric has already spent over twenty million pounds at the club, and only numerous sales could help him spend so much, with Lauren and Freddie Ljungberg among the big names to have departed this season. “The support of the fans and the board has really helped” said Wulfric, “They have given me money to spend and I needed that, and the fans are a great asset.” A spokesperson for the official Arsenal fan club also commented on Wulfric’s achievements, “Everyone was sceptical at first because he wasn’t very well known but the fans are very pleased with the progress the club has been making and we are all in full support of his management of the club now. It was a tough act to follow what with Arsene’s success at the club but he’s done well so far.” Wulfric is well aware that a succession of bad results could cost him however, “I’m under no illusions” he claimed, “If we start to shoot down the table then people will start saying I should go because I still don’t have a big reputation and the board can’t say ‘but look at what he’s achieved in the past, stick with him’, because I am so inexperienced. A top four finish is absolutely vital, not just for my future but for the club’s”. Talk of a top four finish for the Gunners hasn’t been a regular occurrence recently though, after seven wins out of nine in the Premiership Arsenal now sit top of the league on 21 points, two points ahead of surprise package Fulham, and three ahead of Manchester United. Champions Chelsea are well down in eleventh after losing four games already, they will have to improve if they are to retain the title, while at the bottom it’s the three clubs that came up this season that sit in the relegation places. Sheffield, Watford and Reading are all three points behind Wigan who are in seventeenth. In other competitions the draw for the League Cup Fourth round is today with no upsets in the last round the hat is full of top flight teams.


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I put down the newspaper and headed to yet another conference, this time to talk about the teams chances against West Ham, and recent comments made to the media by Alan Pardew, who I must say I have not taken a liking to.

“Mr Wulfric, what do you make of Alan Pardew’s claim that Arsenal are not good enough to win the league this season?”

“Let’s just say that we have more chance of winning the league than they have of avoiding relegation, I presume he is jealous that he will win nothing more than a couple of points at West Ham while we challenge for major honours” I replied, enjoying criticising Pardew.

“West Ham are currently in 15th place, how do you see the game panning out?”

“I don’t think where they stand in the table will make a great deal of difference, I would be no more concerned if they were second, because they have had difficult matches recently, Man United and Liverpool both beat them narrowly, and before that they won three games in a row against teams nearer the bottom. It’s logic that they would have more chance against lesser teams, so you can’t read much into their form, it’s really been non existent”

“How confident are you of maintaining the club’s seven game winning streak against a team that you failed to beat last season?”

“I am not entirely sure how they beat Arsenal last season, but I would say there was a fair bit of luck involved, and my team are better than West Ham, there is no two ways about that, so if we play to our best I am sure we will win.”

“Moving on to transfers , could you tell us a bit more about Matteo Cassani, and what role you expect him to play at Arsenal when he arrives?”

“He is an extremely versatile player and the times I have seen him play I have been impressed by how disciplined he is. He should offer good cover for Emanuel Eboue at right back which is something we haven’t really got at the moment. He is still young and is learning so I will not be expecting too much from him straight away but I am confident he will become a good player for us.”

“Will this signal the end of Justin Hoyte’s career at the club?”

“No, if Hoyte plays well and proves to me that he should be here he will stay, and he will get his chance but of course he will have to keep working hard because there is a lot of competition for the whole defence now”

“Is there any more news on the injuries to Joao Moutinho and Andres Guardado?”

“Unfortunately Guardado is still out for another two weeks, but Urby Emanuelson is doing very well covering for him, and Moutinho is out for a week, though he may be able to return before that because his elbow is healing well and I do not think it too much of a risk to play him like he is”

“A few hours ago Arsenal were pitted against Middlesbrough in the League Cup Fourth round, what is your take on the draw?”

“We would be up for it whoever we are facing and they will make it tough, especially with it being at the Riverside, but we can give them a game”

“Are you intending to stick with your youngsters for the game?”

“I have full faith in them and they should play, yes”

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Team against West Ham :

Lehmann

Eboue
Toure
Richards
Gallas

Hleb
Gilberto
Fabregas
Emanuelson

Asamoah
Henry

Subs :

Adebayor
Baptista
Van Persie
Walcott
Obertan

Jens Lehmann starts once again in goals, as Ricardo awaits his first appearance for the club. The German has started every game bar the League Cup clash with Derby, the same goes for Kolo Toure. William Gallas plays at left back again ahead of Clichy who is now recovered but lacking match fitness, I am planning to give him some reserve team football before returning him to action in the first team.

English Premiership 28/10/2006
Upton Park, West Ham

West Ham V Arsenal

Fit and refreshed from the midweek break when the youngsters took on Derby, the first team was raring to go. The players were faster and sharper than ever and came out at speed against a West Ham side who had almost all played the midweek cup game at a Old Trafford. Despite dominating early on we failed to get that early goal to settle the nerves. A golden opportunity presented itself to Thierry Henry after twenty minutes but he hit the post when clean through on goal, moments later he was denied again, this time by Robert Green who dived at full stretch to claw the strikers effort away. It was only a matter of time though, and when Eboue put Henry through again ten minutes before half time he couldn’t miss, tapping past Green after evading George McCartney’s flying tackle. West Hams defence had been sliced open and now it was starting to crumble, Alexandr Hleb picked up the ball out wide and curled the ball in and Gyan Asamoah was there to meet it with his head and double the lead. Asamoah was proving a brilliant signing, albeit a temporary one, he has been our best player of the season, officially getting an average rating of 7.9 per match, he also had 7 assists and 4 man of the match awards to his name before this match, a remarkable achievement. Our two goal lead was a comfortable one, but things got even better in the forty fourth minute when Asamoah glanced a header on over the West Ham defence for Henry to slide in and make it 3-0. West Ham were sunk and the game was finished. At half time I told the players how pleased I was, but I could not help but feel they would ease off in the second half, as they so often do.

After the restart the players kept playing well, putting together some good moves, but they knew the game as over, and there was not as much intent in their play. In the sixty third minute Urby Emanuelson somewhat limited our left sided options, the Dutch midfielder somewhat stupidly hacked down Marlon Harewood with two feet in full view of Mike Riley, who was quick to brandish a red. With Rosicky crocked for five months, Guardado for two and Clichy not yet back to full fitness this was extremely bad timing. I exchanged a few words with the defender as he walked off, and was glad to see him look remorseful as he disappeared into the tunnel. I then had a tactics reshuffle, moving Henry to left wing and playing Asamoah on his own up front but this didn’t work too well. Asamoah and Henry both played well but it wasn’t as effective. Micah Richards began to move forward more however, supporting our attacks and also getting back to keep West Ham out, not even his brilliant defending could stop Mladen Krystajics deflected freekick going hwoever. When the Hammers were awarded a set piece to the right of the box the Serb’s cross hit the wall before bouncing past Lehmann.

Mike Riley evened up the numbers five minutes later when he sent off Nigel Reo Coker for a late tackle on Kolo Toure, but the game was already over and the final whistle blew to see us go five points clear at the top of the table ahead of Manchester United, who are second.

West Ham 1
Krystajic 75
Reo Coker (s/o) 80

Arsenal 3
Henry 36, 41
Asamoah 44
Emanuelson (s/o) 63

Man of the Match : Micah Richards (Arsenal)

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After their strong performances against West Ham, Gallas, Richards and Henry have all been named in the Premiership Team of The Week.

There is hardly any rest for the players as we are off to Italy today for our match against Roma at the Olimpico in Rome. I shall not be joining the players and staff on the plane back to England though, I am planning to stay in Italy to see Palermo face Pasching in the UEFA Cup. I want to see Mattia Cassani and Cristian Zaccardo in action, although Cassani has recently been moved to the bench following Zaccardo’s return to right back, so it is likely I will only see Zaccardo play.

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The team arrived in Rome yesterday and the big game is tonight, if we win then we will be within touching distance of the next round, though Roma are the favourites at their home ground. They have also pulled themselves together since we last played them, and are second in Serie A behind Inter Milan after three straight wins.

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Team against Roma :

Lehmann

Eboue
Toure
Richards
Gallas

Hleb
Gilberto
Fabregas
Van Persie

Asamoah
Henry


Subs :

Adebayor
Baptista
Marchisio
Walcott
Obertan
Clichy
Ricardo

Van Persie comes in on the left wing for Emanuelson who is inelegible, while the bench is given an overhaul as Ricardo, Clichy, Obertan, Walcott and Marchisio all travel to Rome

Champions League Group C Game 4 31/10/2006Olimpico, Rome

Roma V Arsenal


Just as they were in the game at the Emirates, Roma were caught out by our speed in the opening stages as Theirry Henry opened the scoring after a flick on from Toure, who had powered through the Roma midfield like an express train. The Ivorian exchanged passes with Van Persie before flicking on for Henry to drive across the face of the goal and open the scoring. Burning from having fallen behind so soon Roma started to play fiercely and their skipper Fransesco Totti was cautioned when he came to blows with Theirry Henry, who also picked up a yellow for upending the Italian. Not long after Roma were down to ten men when Mancini was sent off for elbowing Jens Lehmann in the face in the crowded penalty area while Totti prepared to take a corner. This proved costly to Roma, who struggled to get back into the game while we passed the ball around with ease. In the nineteenth minute we were given the chance to double our lead when Daniel De Rossi was judged to have pushed Gyan Asamoah in the box, Alex Hleb stepped up but his penalty was saved by the towering Massimo Doni. We finally did score a second in the twenty ninth minute however when William Gallas’ serving shot was tipped away brilliantly by Doni, only for Asamoah to pounce on the rebound.

In the second half the skilful, intricate play of the first forty five started to turn into a battle. Tackles were fought out brutally and players really dug in as we fought to keep Roma out, and at the same time, break down their well organised and hard working defence. Cards were accumulated and free kicks awarded while Roma began to lose the battle. The efficiency and effort of Gilberto Silva started to take it’s toll on the whole Roma team, as they were brought down by our hard work and skill. The midfield partnership of Gilberto and Fabregas seized control of the midfield and didn’t let go as we poured forward in search of a third. It never came, but by the end of 90 minutes the Roma players were well beaten and it was obvious they had suffered from being down to ten men. Mancini offers them width, flair and energy and they were at a disadvantage, but that didn’t detract from a very satisfying and important win. At the end a total of ten players were on yellow cards, though only three of them were Arsenal players, with Van Persie and Eboue joining Henry in Markus Merk’s book.

Roma 0
Mancini (s/o) 14

Arsenal 2
Henry 2
Asamoah 35
Hleb m/p 19

Man of The Match : Gilberto Silva (Arsenal)