Montpellier 1-2 Arsenal: Phew!

                                                     Montpellier 1-2 Arsenal Report - Pictures

Apologies for going AWOL the past week, Afrogunner was away from the blogosphere due to technical reasons.

Last night Arsenal won against the current French League 1 Champions, Montpellier in France. There had been rumours to the effect that players would be rotated for this game. I had my doubts about those rumours and they turned out to be false. Football is all about momentum and to go into the first game of the Champions League, away from home, with a much changed Arsenal side would have been madness.

We saw from the weekend how changing goal keepers for the sake of maintaining the pecking order can sometimes backfire. Szeczesny, our number 1 keeper gifted a goal to Southampton. On current form, I think perhaps Don Vito Mannone should remain in goal. Apart from the penalty, Don Mannone has not conceded any goals so far this season, looks sharp and confident and it begs the question; what does a keeper have to do to get more game time? I think it's high time we started rotating goal keepers just like we do with infield players, especially when you have very good keepers (on current form) like we have at Arsenal... yeah dream on Afrogunner...

Coquelin, Oxlade-Chamberlain and Szeczesny were replaced by Diaby, Giroud and Mannone respectively from last weekend's starting Lineup. Arsenal, I must say looked very tired by the beginning of the second half. Cazorla had a stinker of a game, by his high standards. He gave the ball away several times, got caught in possession on a few occassions and general was frustrated with his own performance. Diaby, confirmed what I said about his lack of defensive discipline early in the second half. There he was dribbling in our penalty box, slipped and fell under pressure and it was thanks to Montpellier's way-ward finishing that they did not equalise.

The game started fairly well for Arsenal. Montpellier looked sharp and lively in the opening 10 minutes. Diaby received a yellow card just 30 seconds after kick-off for a clumsy challenge. Arsenal were just starting to find their rhythm in the 9th minute when against the run of play, Montpellier were awarded a soft penalty after a challenge by Vermaelen on the edge of our box. Belhanda stepped up and did a Pirlo. 1-0 to Montpellier. The penalty was so slow that I thought I was watching in slow motion. I thought Don Mannone should have reacted quicker and got up to save it. But there you go.

Montpellier's lead lasted only about 6 minutes. Arsenal stepped up a gear and their combination play leading up to the equaliser was just sumptous. Giroud played the through ball to Podolski and from 11 yards? on Podolski's left foot?  with only the keeper to beat? there could only be one outcome! He slid the ball neatly past the on-rushing keeper to make it 1-1. I was still celebrating the first goal when Gervinho ran onto a through ball 2 minutes later. he bundled into a Montpellier defender, but the ball bounced into the path of Jenkinson who fizzed in a low, hard cross accross the face of the Montpellier goal. Gervinho wouldn't miss from 2 yards out. 1-2 in favour of Arsenal.

At this point I thought we would go on to to shag Montpellier for 6, but Arsenal seemed content to just play it safe. Half time arrived with Arsenal in the lead and I thught we would go on to score more so I opened my bottle of wine and laid back to enjoy what was to come. It never did.

Arsenal came back looking as if they had tied lead bars to their boots. They looked completely exhausted. The passing was nowhere, the organisation was a joke and individuals started making the kind of errors that have seen Arsenal fail to win anything in the past few years. Diaby was the chief culprit. First, he decided to go on a dribbling spree in our box, facing our keeper. we were nearly punished after he slipped and lost the ball. A few minutes later he did the same thing just outside our box and was caught in possession. I started to get annoyed.

But then the same Diaby picked up the ball from just outside our box, ran through the entire Montpellier team and laid it off for Cazorla on the left flank to shoot at goal. Had Cazorla kept the ball low, he would have scored. But he was having an off night. Montpellier then started to pile wave after wave of attack while Arsenal just held on. Oliver Giroud had no joy on the night. There was simply no service to him all night.

Montpellier struck the bar, had a point-blank shot saved by Don Mannone, a penalty appeal ignored and several other shots saved. I was crapping myself throughout the second half.

In the 75th minute, Ramsey was brought on for the French International striker who left the pitch to a round of applause from his the Montpellier fans. I liked that. Respect. Arsenal seemd a little bit more stable and kept the ball slightly better. But we were really looking like crap and worryingly very tired. In the 90th minute, Podolski and Cazorla were replaced by Walcott and Coquelin respectively to see out the game.

Thamkfully, Montpellier sold their most prolific striker to us. A better team would have punished us last night. Just ask Manchester City.

But, onwards march the Arsenal. 3 points in the bag and now we look forward to Manchester City. I hope we are fresh for that game because they will punish us if we are not.

Onwards march the Arsenal!!