Birmingham City (0) 0 - 2 (1) Arsenal
St Andrews, Saturday 4th February 2006
FA Premiership
Arsenal:
Lehmann
Flamini Senderos Djourou Flamini
Fabregas Diaby Gilberto Reyes (Hleb 79)
Henry Adebayor
(subs: Almunia, Bergkamp, Hleb, Pires, Walcott)
An interesting line-up. I guess Flamini at right back was
expected - he does at least have more than 45 minutes
experience in that position. But giving Emmanuel Adebayor
his debut from the start, in preference to Dennis Bergkamp and
Robert Pires (who were on the bench) and the rested Robin van Persie
and Freddie Ljungberg (who weren't), was not expected by me.
It's nice to see, though,
because perhaps some of our stars haven't been under enough
pressure for their places. It's not like the cups where "resting"
players means resting them - so they're available for more important
games. All the Premiership games are now our most important games,
so choosing the new boy to start seems to me like it shows that
Wenger knows he's got to find something or somebody new.
And it's also nice to see Abou Diaby continue alongside
Gilberto, even though Cesc Fabregas and Alexander Hleb
were both available. It seemed strange when he was subbed
against
West Ham last week, having been our biggest threat
from midfield.
Birmingham made the better start, but the makeshift defence
was up to it and Jens Lehmann made a superb diving save to deny Jarosik's thunderous drive, just enough of a fingertip at a stretch to take it round the post.
Thierry Henry hit an early free kick which was
blocked by the wall but apart from that we hadn't had
much to get excited by until the opening goal on
22 minutes. Oh, Henry had had a shot deflected by Adebayor, ahead of him just inside the box, but the deflection was kind to Taylor in the City goal.
Anyway, the goal came from Diaby's shot from the right, a pretty
poor effort really (though great to see him getting into such positions and having a go at goal) which ricocheted off 2 defender and popped up for Adebayor to nod it home.
A couple of minutes later City nearly came back when Pennant
beat Larsson a bit easily and put a good cross over to the far
post where Heskey failed to convert it.
Adebayor probably should have made it 2 a few minutes later.
Cesc played the ball through the middle for him and after a 20
yard run, Adebayor opened his body up 12 yards out to place a
shot past the keeper into the
corner, but managed to pass it straight at the keeper instead.
Birmingham were playing a long ball game, and often winning the
header or whatever initially, but our defence and midfield
were closing things up quick enough to usually snap it up
soon after that.
The second half was more of the same.
Just after the hour, a great ball forward by Fabregas found
Henry who raced onto it and and buried his shot past Taylor
for his 200th Arsenal goal.
Heskey was possibly unlucky to get booked, raising his foot
to try to trap a high ball he accidentally caught Senderos
on the head. It was similar to the van Persie one in the
Champs League earlier in the season, so perhaps Heskey was
lucky not to be sent straight off. He wasn't so lucky in the
last few minutes though, when he got a second booking for
a foul on Flamini and was sent off.
The 2-0 win takes us back above Wigan into 5th, with a game in hand
(see table).
We're one point behind Tottenham who are at home to Charlton tomorrow. Henry's goal extends his record-breaking
tally, becoming the first Arsenal player ever to score 200 goals
for Arsenal. Coincidentally, he reached his first century in a league match at St Andrews as well, in a 4-0 win just over 3 years ago, back in January 2003.
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