Arsenal:
           Lehmann
    Lauren Cygan Toure Clichy
  Fabregas Gilberto Flamini Pires
Reyes (Henry 16) van Persie (Eboue 73)

We started well. After about a minute Lauren (making his 50th Champs League outing) put Cesc through on the right of the box, it was a difficult chance from a narrow angle but he forced a decent save out of the Sparta keeper Jaromir Blazek. 30 seconds later Clichy was putting a decent cross in from the left but Blazek claimed it comfortably.

On 2 minutes, Jose Antonio Reyes was put through in central left position by a long ball out of defence. But he delayed, and didn't have the patience to wait for support instead trying a lazy shot which was easily blocked.

A couple of minutes later a nice move across the pitch ended with Cesc trying to put Reyes in on the right hand side of the box with a neat flick using the outside of his boot. But it wasn't quiet strong enough and/or Reyes wasn't anticipating it and the pass was intercepted. We won the ball back quickly and it came to Reyes whose shot from the edge of the box was blocked at close range and spun through to the keeper.

Overall it was looking pretty good. Fine pressing by Arsenal in offence, and we were hunting Sparta down very effectively when they had the ball. We'd had one dodgy moment when Gael_Glichy's error nearly let a man in at Jens Lehmann's left hand post after a looping cross from their left, but it was a difficult half-chance with Lehmann having come across to cover that side of goal, and the striker only found the side-netting.

Then on about 15 minutes Reyes was fouled clumsily, but not maliciously, and went down obviously in some discomfort. He signalled almost immediately that he had to come off and after a quick check by Gary Lewin Jose was off down the tunnel. Turns out he's broken a rib.

On comes Thierry Henry, without even a warm-up. He took the captain's armband off of Gilberto, and started doing some warming up by the halfway line while the action was up the other end of the pitch.

Another looping cross from the far side of the pitch caused Clichy problems by the post on his side of the goal, this time he miskicked it for a corner. Have to say that for quite a while Clichy looked our weak link, with Pospech causing him problems down that wing.

On 20 minutes though, the game was lit up by a Henry special. Kolo Toure, a contender for man of the match, I thought, even with Henry on the pitch (and, to be fair, Cygan had a pretty good game too) hit a long ball forward. Henry was running forward to the edge of the box when it came down with one defender in front of him and one behind. He looked behind him and controlled the ball with the back of his foot as it landed, letting it bounce back away from him into the space that the defender following up was in the process of vacating. So now Henry's got back to goal with 2 defenders between him and the goal and the ball the other side. He nipped round the other side of the ball and before the defencers had time to react he whipped his right foot at it, sending a perfect shot curling round the defenders and inside the far post (it was heading a couple of yards wide before it started to turn). A memorable way to equal Ian Wright's Arsenal goalscoring record.

At this stage Henry was showing few signs of lack of either fitness or practice. Like I said before, the whole team was closing down well when Sparta had the ball, but you still noticed when Henry did it, such was his energy and determination. One time though, after Thierry had tried to lay the ball back for Robert Pires but had played it behind Bobby and chased after it when the opposition got the ball, he had a foul called against him and was probably a bit lucky not the be booked for his obvious display of irritation at the call.

On 32 minutes another deep cross from their left found Clichy stranded a bit too central - over-covering the centre-backs he'd left Pospech in acres of space. But he tried a volley which he sliced hopelessly wide.

A few minutes later they again found Pospech on the right, and his cross was headed out by Pascal Cygan. I couldn't decide if Pospech was particularly good or if Clichy was showing his inexperience. Maybe a bit of both. A minute later Zelenka tried a back heel in our box to put the ball into the 6 yard area, but it was bit random and Toure had not trouble clearing for a corner. The corner, from their right, came to Zelenka on the near side of goal and he flicked it goalwards between his own legs, but it was an easy take for Lehmann.

van Persie got booked a bit unluckily. He did have his arms up as he tried to get past a slow Sparta player, but the way the man went down as soon as a hand was laid on him was a bit much (and quite out of keeping with the rest of the game).

Near the end of the first half Lehmann nearly had a Lemon moment, rushing out of hsi box he did well to avoid handling outside the box, then had to follow the ball towards the touchline. Fortunately he got there in time to hoof it out for a throw. But he knew he was stranded and was gesticulating at the defence to cover the goal as he tried to recover position. Fortunately Sparta made a right hash of the chance, one player managed to take the throw quickly but the guy he played it to just passed it back out of play.

Sparta came out with a bit more fight to start the second half, but Arsenal continued to defend very well. On 52 minutes Lehmann hit a poor kick (under no pressure) which went straight to Kisel in space near the half way line. He brought it forward and hit a strong shot, but from that distance it had to be superbly placed to beat the keeper, and it wasn't. Still, Lehmann had to reach up to palm it over the bar. A couple of minutes later Kisel again hit a snap shot after Toure's defensive header landed at his feet. He was much closer to goal when he hit it, compared to the previous shot, but this time he sliced it miles wide.

For a while the ref seemed to want to equalise things. Flamini got booked for "foot up" when he went into a challenge with a man whose foot was just as high. Then Cygan was penalised for a sliding tackle which looked alright to me. The free kick, a few yards outside the box, was clearly well-rehearsed. Not so well executed. One player slipped the ball a few yards sideways so as to give another a clear line at goal with a bit of a run-up, but the striker fired his shot straight at the wall (ie a completely different direction to the goal).

Pospech was still troubling Glichy, who got himself booked for a foul just outside our box to the left. But our defence was still lookign comfortable overall.

On 65 Henry was put through on the right side of their box. He controlled it well and kept the ball patiently as others joined him, then tried a little chip goalwards for Fabregas but it was just too high for Cesc to do anything but glance on to a defender.

A few minutes later Henry slotted a terrific low pass into the box from just to the left of the D, seeing Cesc's diagonal left-to-right run. The youngster took the ball in his stride and continued the run before hooking a shot goalwards and forcing a save out of the keeper. As it happens, Cesc was running towards van Persie and may have done better to let his teammate have the shot. Pires took the corner and Cygan lost his marker at the far post but the ball was a little behind him making it hard to control the header... it went wide.

Emmanuel Eboue came on for van Persie and went to the right of midfield. Cesc seemed to switch to the left wing role and Pires came into a central position supporting Henry. Interesting substitution: less negative than those that Wenger sometimes comes out with in such situations (eg bringing a centreback on for a striker) and which sometimes fall flat. This move gave us more solidity, more in midfield, but didn't seem to reduce our attacking options (partly, perhaps, because van Persie seemed to me to have had quite a quiet game).

Moments later, it was 2-0. Eboue and Pires were both involved in winning the ball back on the right wing, then the latter hit a superb long ball forward from the halfway line. The pass found Henry's run perfectly, meeting him in the D. He took a couple of touches, kept his cool, then shot to the keeper's right, taking a slight deflection as it went beneath a defender but not enough to make any difference. As Henry said after the game, it would have been nice to break the record at Highbury. But as a friend said to me after the game: he will break the record at Highbury too, next time he scores there.

The Arsenal fans (who had been singing "Perry Groves World" earlier) burst into chants of "Wright Wright Wright", which obviously put them in a nostalgic mood because it was followed by songs for Keown, Winterburn and Adams among others.

Sparta had a few more ineffective attacks, and Arsenal responded well be spending some time just playing keep-ball, teasing them a bit. On 85 minutes one particularly long patient passing move ended with a ball forward to the right for Eboue to run onto. He hti a terrific cross on the run which Henry met in the box with a first-time shot, which was blocked.

Clichy had had a much better second half, and finally got the better of Pospech when the latter ran onto a pass towards Lehmann's left hand post. Gael could easily have given away a penalty but instead waited till the right moment to make a superb challenge and then when the ball came free it was Cygan who'd been alert enough to charge over and clear it. Clichy started the game much more nervous than I'd expected, but it's understandable (and worth remembering that most of his recent performances have been as a midfield sub). He finished the game very well. And having mentioned the rest of the defence I feel I ought to point out that Lauren had an excellent game too, at both ends of the pitch.

Quincy came on for Cesc. On 90 minutes Kisel tried another long-range effort which landed on the top of the net but which could have embarassed Lehmann (he'd come off his line). And in injury time Zelenka too almost poached a consolation, but his shot was deflected into the side netting from close range (and under much pressure). We defended the corner well and then kept the ball till the final whistle.

An excellent start to the Champs League campaign with 3 wins out of 3. As usual we're a different side in Europe to the Premiership, but it's the other way round now. At least we should be able to relax a bit in the Champs League now, and concentrate on getting the league campaign back on track. Obviously the loss of Reyes is a blow, but if Henry can stay fit it'll more than make up for it. All sources seem to be a bit distracted by the excitement over Henry's record, I've not seen any news on Reyes' injury yet.