We bought our own house in Santa Cruz\u2019s hinterlands in mid-2003, and had neither TV nor cable when we moved in. I had spent much of the previous few years watching sports at local bars which were walking distance from where we lived in town. So it was with great anticipation I signed for the new cable setup, and purchased a flat-screen TV (never as big as Chris’s), to watch at home, the nearest sports bar being six miles away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The first game available to me was vs. Everton at Highbury in August of 2003. It was also the first game my son (then 5) and I were able to watch together. And what a sweet game it was: the first of our Invincible season, with a pair of goals by Henry and Pires blotted only by a late Radzinski consolation. My son still remembers me telling him about the \u201ctelepathic communication\u201d had between Robert and Thierry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Although we don\u2019t have players with that kind of skill (OR telepathy) at the moment, there doesn\u2019t seem to be much doubt that our Arsenal are a team on the up. With no losses since the bus stop blues overtook us at the end of Mikel Arteta\u2019s first home game in December, we\u2019re finally lifting our season out of the treacle and onto firm ground. Five wins, five draws and that lone loss are what has rescued us from the doldrums of Unai. The win in Athens was the third in a run of clean sheets; perhaps the most remarkable result of MA8\u2019s tenure is how suddenly Skodran Mustafi and David Luiz look like a wall rather than an open window. Only those blues have hit us for more than one since our helmet of hair took over from our own bald model.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, Arsenal are not the only team playing Sunday afternoon at 4:30 that has seen their fortunes rise under a new manager. Both Arteta and Ancelloti saw their first games the same day, the week following our nil draw at Goodison Park; Ancelloti brought a win to toffeeland, whereas Mikel could only bring a draw back from the South Coast to those suffering in red. When we met them at theirs in December Everton were sitting in 15th, 4 points out of the relegation zone. Arsenal were in 11th, four points better on 23 after an uneven run under our Freddie. Ancelloti has pulled Everton up five places, passing us by as we sit still in 11th. Did our head honchos make the wrong hiring decision? It\u2019s a question that fairly could be asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As far as I am concerned, the answer is no: the honchos hired the right man. While I appreciate what Ancelloti brings to the blue side of the Mersey it doesn\u2019t match Arteta\u2019s spirit, work ethic, and skill at clarifying how he wants our Gunners to play. Now it\u2019s just getting them to do it for 90 minutes, rather than 60 or 45 (as we\u2019ve seen in our last two matches). Let\u2019s hope this is the game. We\u2019re up against two players well in form (Calvert-Lewin and Richarlison, their top goalscorers), fed by, among others, ex-Gunner Alex Iwobi, hoping to use their 3-5-2 to clog the midfield and bring in crosses from the wing. What Mikel is building in our squad should be enough to combat that threat, with organization supporting the defense (Xhaka dropping in to left back when Saka flies forward, for example) and our slow-slow-fast movement putting their seemingly brittle defense under pressure, or shattering them from the counter. They also seem to leak goals from set pieces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Everton are not missing a lot of players through injury or suspension. Only midfielder Gbamin will miss out for sure, with our old boy Theo Walcott (now 30, 31 in three weeks!!) likely missing after a knee knock. They welcome back Delph (suspension) and Gomes (out since November with a Diaby-esque ankle injury); it will be a surprise if Gomes starts. Our long-term absentees haven\u2019t changed, with Tierney, Cedric, and Chambers still unavailable. We should see back Torreira and \u00d6zil, though Bellerin and Papa both are dealing with knocks. Given that, and who played in Athens, I think we\u2019ll see the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Leno
AMN Mustafi Luiz Saka
Torreira \u00d6zil Xhaka
Pepe Laca Auba<\/p>\n\n\n\n
with a bench of Martinez, Holding, Kolasinac, Nketiah, Willock, Guendouzi and Martinelli<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Holics\u2019 Pound<\/strong> COYG!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We bought our own house in Santa Cruz\u2019s hinterlands in mid-2003, and had neither TV nor cable when we moved in. I had spent much of the previous few years watching sports at local bars which were walking distance from where we lived in town. So it was with great anticipation I signed for the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=328"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":508,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328\/revisions\/508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
We haven\u2019t lost at home to Everton since Kanchelskis put an 84th minute winner past David Seaman at Highbury in our third game of 1996. And in their last two games, while Everton has run out winners both, they\u2019ve given up three goals to the six they\u2019ve scored. It\u2019s doubtful their defense can keep a clean sheet against us; they\u2019ve only been able to keep out Burnley and Brighton since hitching their fortunes to Ancelloti\u2019s wagon. Since that 1996 loss we\u2019ve averaged more than 3 goals per game against them, and they less than one against us\u2026I\u2019m considering Arsenal 3-1 Everton to be a decent shout for the final score tomorrow, which can be had at 16\/1; you can double those odds if you go for 4-1. If you want to tease the old man in the Haymarket and say our defense will nobletts in a goal while we crack them for four, you can get 40\/1\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n