What a day! I am emotionally and mentally exhausted and I’ve
never been so glad for a season to finish. Who would’ve thought Soccer Saturday
(on Sunday) could be so entertaining? (I resisted watching a dodgy stream to
keep my nerves calm; they took quite a battering today). The entire day across
the whole league was simply crazy, and it was a rather fitting rollercoaster
day to end a rollercoaster season.
I was feeling pretty confident at kick-off, waiting
patiently for the goals to start flooding in. Unfortunately, they started going
in at the wrong ground when that traitor Adebayor put Tottenham ahead inside
100 seconds. And BANG, almost straight away into fourth. Great start…
Thankfully, as if the God of Football intended, Ben Foster
chose the perfect time to get ‘injured’. Enter stage left, Marton Fulop. If we
could have faced any goalkeeper, he was the one. I’m not quite sure what his
mistakes were or indeed how bad they were, but his first error came just two
minutes later. Already feeling sick after Spurs’ goal, it was erased by Matt Le
Tissier’s screaming. 0-1 Gunners. And of all people to take advantage of the
keeper’s howler, the man I probably most dreaded to see on the Arsenal team
sheet: Yossi Benayoun. I should apologise to Wenger, I’ll never judge your
squad selection again, Boss. Sign him on a permanent deal, please.
Then it all started to go wrong, very wrong. Long equalises from a decidedly offside position – 2 yards off, apparently. I was thinking we were going to be knocked out the CL by poor refereeing – the worst way to go. Then it got a lot worse when Dorrans put them ahead. I thought we’d blown it. I was this close to crying. I could hear WHL lot getting louder; it looked like it could be their day after all. But then, another scream from Le Tiss – the good kind. We seemed to shout ‘DESMOND!’ at the same time. The relief was immense, but we still had a job to do. Half-time – a chance to grab some oxygen.
Now the momentum was with us – but we had to score the dream
was over. The ‘keeper helped us again – how you can aim to punch one way only
for the ball to go in the opposite direction is beyond me. Only a ridiculous
FIFA glitch would explain it but in real-life? By the way, Laurent Koscielny
fully deserves that winning goal – he’s been one of our most improved players
this season along with Song and Rosicky. Cue delirious cheering.
What followed was the tensest half hour of my life. Fulham
weren’t doing us any favours and Arsenal were getting nervy at the back, and
needed a life-saving challenge from Kieran Gibbs to keep the victory intact. As
the focus switched over to the Manchester games, I began to calm down us I
prayed for the final whistle. And finally, I saw the interactive ticker at the
bottom of the screen confirm that we had, at long last, shrugged off the
challenge of Tottenham and secured CL football once again. But please, Arsenal,
do not make any of us go through that again.
To achieve what we have this season from where we came from
is remarkable. We sold Fabregas, let Nasri go (good riddance), got plagued by
defensive injuries, got hammered at Old Trafford, lost to teams we shouldn’t
have, had a blip in the New Year and stuttered towards the finish line at the
end but ultimately, still finished third. And if today’s game secures RVP’s
future at the club then it becomes so much more important. Well done, Arsenal.
Better luck next year, Spurs. (Evil laugh)
COME ON YOU REDS!
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