Joy at home of biggest nemesis

WE’VE had such a miserable time up at the Reebok in recent seasons that after the extreme disappointment of the defeat at Stamford Bridge last weekend, it was perfectly understandable that there were plenty of Arsenal fans who thought better of revisiting this annual masochistic ritual.

It’s hard to have sympathy for the precarious predicament of a club that didn’t have the good sense to hang onto their one and only regular goal scorer and I’m certain that there won’t be too many Gooners who’ll be disappointed if we don’t ever have to go back there again. But if this should prove to have been our Bolton swansong, it was one helluva way to bow out.

In the absence of Kevin Nolan (with 5 goals, their highest scorer after Anelka), you’d imagine that even Arsenal’s leaky defence might hold firm against a team that hadn’t scored in 360 minutes of footie previously.

However as much as I adore Kolo Touré, he’s been playing at centre-back for so long that he’s bound to lack some of Bacary Sagna’s instinctive defensive tendencies at full back, as evidenced by the way in which Taylor managed to get his head on the ball for Bolton to take a surprising lead, from their first meaningful attack of the game.

After that, having failed to capitalise on any of our goal scoring opportunities, it seemed as if it wasn’t to be our day. After Bendtner’s shot had deflected wide, just about Bolton’s second effort on goal was diverted into the net.

But in the meantime Foy probably did us a big favour by sending Diaby off. No matter whether it’s us or the opposition, I hate seeing refs reach for the red card so robotically. I appreciate the need to try and prevent dangerous tackles, of which there can be little doubt Diaby’s was a prime example. But personally I don’t believe you can stamp them out completely, not without making football a less committed, not so full-blooded and thereby a far less thrilling spectacle.

The efforts to over-protect players are symptomatic of this whole nanny state culture and to my mind the authorities have a much greater responsibility not to tinker with the beautiful game because it wasn’t broke in the first place (and no I wasn’t calling for Martin Taylor to be banned a couple of weeks back!).

Mind you, the Arsenal have a habit of performing better with 10 men than the full complement and combined with the two-goal deficit, Diaby’s premature exit served to force Wenger’s hand. Usually Le Prof will leave his side unaltered until the last 15/20 minutes, but with half an hour remaining Arsène rung the changes, which proved to be the catalyst for an astonishing comeback.

Considering that Bolton looked far more likely to score a third after the restart with a rapid succession of corners, if I’m honest our remarkable revival was probably more a mixture of some long awaited good fortune combined with the home side’s implosion, rather than any really dramatic turnaround in the Gunners form.

Fabregas’ passes were still going astray and Van Persie was still struggling to hit the proverbial cow’s arse (and under such circumstances, all credit to Robin for stepping up for the penalty).

However I’m convinced that the form will come with the restoration of a little confidence. Far more important was that in the sort of torrential conditions which would’ve seen many a lesser team give up the ghost, we showed the sort of ‘never say die’ mettle which meant that we made our own luck.

With a Man United slump looking more and more unlikely, in the end Saturday’s result might only prove important in terms of a much-needed boost to morale, prior to tonight’s big game.

Whether the spirit of togetherness that was engendered by events on Saturday afternoon will prove sufficient to take us all the way to the final in Moscow is another matter. But it sure won’t do us any harm and it is encounters such as these, which can forge an ethos whose effects might last long beyond May.

Arsène needs to be bold against the Scousers by putting our home advantage to good effect by playing two strikers. Even with a fit and available Sagna I wouldn’t have had much confidence in our ability to maintain a clean sheet, especially with Torres on such a hot streak.

As ever, our success will depend on our ability to outscore the opposition. While I may not be nearly so confident as I was prior to our meeting with AC Milan, I am hopeful that if we can contain Torres and co to no more than a single goal, we can go to Anfield with everything still to play for. Then again if Fabregas rises to the occasion and Robin finds his shooting boots, I certainly won’t be complaining if my predictive skills fail me and we kill the tie in the first leg!

* Bernard Azulay