Arsenal: January & February update: City Overtaken, First silverware of the season won or not won?

Hi everyone, welcome back to another update of my Arsenal journey. At the end of December we were sitting 2nd, 2 points behind Man City.

Before we start, we made one signing in January, a loan signing which cost us 600k with the option to buy him for 7m at the end of the season. He is…….. Rafael Van Der Vaart!!! He certainly will not be a starter, because at this moment I regard Simon Vuckevic as a better player. However, he is a good player to have in the squad. He was bought just before the Birmingham game so he missed all the matches in January apart from the Birmingham game.

 We also let a total of 5 players depart, the most notable one William Gallas. Gallas became the fourth choice defender in the squad. He was losing his attributes, which convinced me to sell. He left for 600k with an option for Udinese to sign him for 7m in the next window.

We also had some disturbing new which we could have done without, Barcelona showed their intrest in Robin Van Persie, and the striker was intrested, i immediately ruled out the sale and set Van Persie’s asking price to 100m.

JANUARY RESULTS

We played 9 games in January, 3 vs Man City! The first game of the month we had a dissapointing draw vs Brighton, we played a weaker team, making 11 change, but that isn’t an excuse. The draw resulted in a replay, which I certainly didn’t want, however we scraped a one goal victory through Eduardo’s goal. 

Our next game was against title rivals Man City in the league cup semi-final, which we won 1-0, a close game, but Andrey Arshavin’s goal gave us an advantage before the return leg.

After the game we found out we set a new defensive record:

3 days later, we faced Man City again, this time in the Premier League, a key game which we couldn’t lose. Man City were the better team and had much more chances than us but they didn’t take them. This was certainly was going to a be a bore draw if it wasn’t for Simon Vuckevic’s super strike.

Our next game was a league game vs Blackburn, we won comfortably 4-0.

We then faced Man City again, the third time in the month for the second leg of the League cup. It was 0-0 draw, and we were through to the final, and suprisingley we will face Everton in the final.

We then faced Derby County in the FA Cup, Samir Nasri was inform on the day and he got two goals, and guess who will we face in the next round……? MAN CITY AGAIN! grr

Our first defeat of the season came against Chelsea. They simply controlled us, we were lucky to get our two goals. Nicolas Otamendi had a terrible game, he was at fault for all of the goals. He got a rating of 5.1 which explains the whole story…..

The last game of the month was against Birmingham City, where Rafeal Van Der Vaart made his debut. He made an instant impact by winning us a penalty for our second goal which Van Persie slotted in. Arshavin scored when Fabregas made a pass to him inside the defender, he only had to beat the defender which he successfully did.

FEBRUARY RESULTS

We started the month with a convincing win over West Ham, which continued vs Stoke. Van Der Vaart scored two screamers which won us the game in the first half.

Now, we had to face City AGAIN in an FA Cup match. Sadly they got their revenge and we were out in the 5th round! Our defence was all over the  place in the first half, Tevez scored an early goal, which Adebayor doubled early in the second half. We still had hope when Arshavin scored in the 59th minute but it never happened…..

After the game it was time to travel to Russia, for our first leg match against Rubin Kazan. We had Zapata & Otamendi injured for the game so we had to rely on Campbell and Vermaelan. The game was a brilliant game, I just wish the YouTube feature which is in the new FM11 was in this game also. The game had 2 red cards, a 3-0 lead, a 2 goal comeback, excellent football and injuries! Alex Song played a 25 yard pass on the ground to Robin Van Persie and he got between two defenders and placed the ball in the left hand corner. A minute later, Gael Clichy was tackled hardly and he picked up an injury which he could have shaked off, I didn’t want to take a risk and I took him off.Then a weak clearence by the keeper was headed by Thomas Vermaelan to Alex Song who went between two defenders and cooly slotted the ball in the net. We were 2-0 up in 25mins! In the 38th minute Simon Vuckevic’s neat ball around the corner was collected by Robin Van Persie, he went round the defender and cooly slotted the ball in the back of the net. Rubin Kazan got a goal before half time which calmed me down. We were 3-1 up at half time! Just before the half time whistle Sol Campbell picked up an injury and I had to replace him with Denilson who had to play CB! The second half saw a Rubin Kazan domination, They scored a goal which certainly worried me and then had two red cards also! Luckily the game ended 3-2 and we won.

We headed straight back to England for an away game at Wolves. I had to give some of the players a rest as they were exhausted. We suffered a suprise defeat. It seems as though our back up team can’t win but I can’t use that as an excuse.

The players that i rested for the Wolves game were nice and fresh for the North London Derby at home. We had a big blow in the 39th minute, striker Robin Van Persie was forced to come off with an injury and was replace by Eduardo. Both teams controlled periods of the game and it looked like a draw, untill Simon Vuckevic came up with the all important goal in the last second of the game from a corner….

Our next game was a game at WEMBLEY (!), we were going to pay Everton in the League Cup Final!

The team that played:

We were missing RVP, Arshavin, Dzeko, Ramsey, VDV all through injury so we had to play a slightly weaker team.

Before the game I had a decision to make wheather I was going to play RVP on the bench just in case he was needed, I decided to take that risk.

The first 90mins were kind of boring, both teams were cancelling each other out, there was very limited opportunities for both teams but Everton had the better. At full time I made a double substitution, Marco Verratti and Carlos Vela replaced Samir Nasri and Theo Walcott, both were exhausted! In the 94th minute, striker Eduardo suffered a broken jaw which forced him to come off, and I replaced him with Robin Van Persie! The decision certainly proved correct when Van Persie gave us the lead in the 100th minute. Then Kieren Gibbs was given a second yellow card and we were down to ten men. I was concerned, but Marco Verratti took my concerns away when he scored from a powerful shot outside the area. WE WON THE LEAGUE CUP! The trophy drought was over!

The board, fans and legendery striker Thierry Henry were all delighted:

Once again I had some nice messages in my inbox the next day:

SQUAD RATING

THE LEAGUE TABLE

So at the end of February Man City were overtaken at the top at last, we lead them by 7 points! City don’t seem to know how to continue winning games all through the season. Wigan also seem to be going down to the Championship.

Well thats it folks, sorry for waiting a long time for this update, we have won our first silverware of the season and we have taken City over at the top of the PL. Unfortunately we have been knocked out of the FA Cup earlier than planned.

Thanks for reading, take care, Sayam