Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Arsenal Joga Bonito Wednesday:
Arsene Wenger Man-Crush Edition

So Arsenal lost their Champions League match away to CSKA Moscow 1-0 on a free kick where Mad Jens was seriously screened and basically had no chance. Henry scored a perfectly legitimate goal to equalize at the end, but not only was it wrongly disallowed by the referee, he even booked TH14 for an intentional handball. Afterwards he was not pleased. A SEC Football level of refereeing mistake which cost Arsenal a point and gave CSKA Moscow an extra two. Arsenal didn't play very well in the cold weather and bad pitch, it was like they never really got going. To be fair CSKA played very well, and playing in their stadium is no joke apparently; hopefully Arsenal can win the return match in the friendly confines of their new home in 2 weeks and reassert themselves as group leaders.

All of the other big boys won, and Chel$ea beat Barca 1-0 on a great piece of skill from Didier Drogba in an otherwise disappointing match. Barca looked like they really miss Eto'o, and Ronaldinho played as poorly as I have ever seen him play.

Last week marked Arsene Wenger's 10 year anniversay at Arsenal Football Club, so this week's AJBW celebrates his 10 years in charge of the club. There's also a BBC piece on his tenure here. He may very well be my favorite person in sport, and for my money he is the best manager in the world, period. Enjoy.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

In fairness, that was one helluva a goal from Daniel Carvalho.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMJ-ZTYF9n0

Someone is running CSKA Moscow the way I would run a football team. The Brazilian who drew the foul, Wagner Love, the Brazilian who backheeled it back, Dudu Cearense, and Daniel Carvalho are/were all young players that struck me as promising players a couple years back (admittedly, Wagner Love mostly for his name). Carvalho and Cearense were part of a very good looking Brazilian youth squad that won the FIFA Youth World Cup in 2003 where Carvalho was the undoubted find of the tournament. Great scorer from midfield, and left footed, I'm shocked that nobody in the big leagues have swooped him yet (Arsene should be convinced now).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNwUeE2c12s

Also, Igor Akinfeev is probably the best young keeper in the world. And the utter confusion of having 2 twin brothers as their fullbacks. I won't be surprised if that team makes it to the Quarters and beyond.

Anonymous said...

Oh, I should say something about Arsene shouldn't I?

Uh... he's good.

Should be running RM.

Whichever.

Kanu said...

Yes - they (CSKA) did win the UEFA Cup in 2005 and I believe they made it to the semifinals of UEFA in 2006, so they have that European tournament experience.

CSKA are owned by Abromavich/Sibneft, no? Isn't this the club that he had Sibneft buy a huge stake in so as to avoid conflict of interest by buying himself. Hold on...

Well, sort of, but now apparently his influence (at least explicitly) is no longer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Abramovich#CSKA_Moscow

Funniest thing about Vagner Love is not the blue corn row braided mullet, but rather that he realizes how great his name is, so on the back of his jersey he puts the whole thing "VAGNER LOVE", which looks hilarious and is ironic in that he is Brasilian, land of the 1 name footballers.

Kanu said...

FYI - Wenger has said that he wouldn't coach somewhere like RM because he wouldn't have the control that he does at Arsenal, where he was given control over absolutely everything. At RM he knows that there would be too many people (and thier egos) trying to influence him on damn near everything.

Of course, Capello is pretty damn good himself.

Anonymous said...

Capello is good for RM the same way a root canal is good for you. It might be good, but it's not fun.

But I am taking enormous joys from the fact that Barca seem to be underperforming. Schauenfraude is a beautiful thing.

Anonymous said...

Hey Kanu,

Looks like I'm vindicated. Both reporters called TH14 'Terry.' All I need to hear now is the Henry part!