If you’re curious, we have 29 players listed in our first-team. Which means we are only a few injuries away from having literally more than half our team injured. Maybe there’s something to this November curse after all.

The big news is that the injury is not quite as bad as it had been first thought. Originally, everyone was reporting 2-3 months, some of the more sensationalist English papers were saying out for the season. But Arsenal have announced that he will be out for approximately 6 weeks. Which means, basically, he’ll be out until the first of the year, and will probably need at least a week or two to get back into game shape.

So the big question is: how much is this going to impact the club? The answer is, I think, complicated–in some ways, a lot, but in other ways, not so much.

First, as is custom, the good news. Arsenal have 11 games between now and January 1. Two of those are the last two Champions League group stage games. You’d have to think we can beat Standard Liege at home without Robbie, which will clinch first place in the group, rendering the match against Olympiakos irrelevant. So those two games aren’t particularly meaningful. One of the matches is a Carling Cup match with Man City (and if he had, he probably would have brought a shiv on the pitch and given Adebayor the old jailhouse how-do-you-do in retaliation for the face stomping, which would have resulted in a suspension until January anyway), which he wouldn’t have played in anyway.

That leaves us with the 8 league games:

11/21–at Sunderland
11/29–Chelsea
12/5–Stoke
12/13–at Liverpool
12/16–at Burnley
12/19–Hull City
12/27–Aston Villa
12/30–at Portsmouth

Obviously, the Chelsea and Liverpool matches are marquee match-ups where van Persie’s absence will really be felt (although it must be said that both those squads have ample injury woes of their own). And Aston Villa will also be a tough match-up, although it is at least at home. But other than that, we have a couple of games which may give us a little trouble (at Burnley, at Sunderland) and three matches we should absolutely win without too much trouble with or without Robbie (at Portsmouth, Hull City, Stoke). In terms of scheduling, then, it could have been a lot worse–his absence will only impact our chances in one out of the four competitions, and the league schedule in his absence is not particularly punishing, so if we band together and play well, we could definitely still be hanging around the top of the table by the time he comes back.

Now, the bad news. I know there were some of you in the comments to the last post who said that you didn’t think we would miss him that much, but I would respectfully disagree. I think he is absolutely essential to the 4-3-3 formation running as well as it has, and I’m not sure there’s any obvious candidate to replace him. He has adapted his game to a kind of hybrid sniper/playmaker which suits the formation perfectly. He is a target man of a sort, but always gets the ball into his feet, and then, once he gets it, has enough skill to control the ball and make a move quickly past the defender, and can pass or shoot with equally deadly effectiveness. This puts defenders trying to mark him in a quandary–they can’t mark him too tight, because he’s capable of turning them and getting the ball behind them with one touch; on the other hand, they can’t play off him, because when he has the ball in space he’s deadly shooting from long range or using a pass to put someone else through. And, of course, he is our main direct kick taker. Honestly, other than Cesc, I’d argue Robbie is probably the least replaceable member of our squad (although Vermaelen may already be close).

Frankly, no one else on the squad really fits that role. If I had to guess, I think we’ll see Eduardo step into that role for the time being, but he doesn’t have the skill set to play that role nearly as well as RvP did. There might be an outside chance we could see Arshavin try to do it, but with his size and lack of positional discipline, it would seem a poor fit. Those are really are only fit strikers at the moment. Other than those two, I think we’ll see one of Rosicky, Nasri, or Eboue fill the other wing/forward role. Theo Walcott and Carlos Vela shouldn’t be out for too much longer, which gives us some more depth up front.

It’ll be hurt, but we knew some major injuries were a-comin’, and, like I said, Chelsea’s hurting just as bad as we are so there’s nothing to do but get out there and keep picking up 3 points until some of our injured start coming back. As the kids in PS 22 say…

UPDATE: Apparently RvP is signed up for some radical therapy from a Serbian woman which involves…well, just read it for yourself. Ick.

In what, you may ask, super-important match was he playing in to take on such an injury? Was it the World Cup? Nope. The European championships? Nope. A qualifier for one of those tournaments? Nope. It was a friendly. A completely stupid, meaningless friendly. It’s so good to know that our chances of winning the league took just took a significant hit so Holland could draw 0-0 with Italy a full 8 months before their next significant match.

I don’t really know what to say. I’m just really, really, really angry. But anger won’t actually do any good. I’ll just say that at some point the clubs are going to have to actually make a stand–they’ll never be able to absolutely stop players from playing for their countries (and I’m not suggesting that they should), but it seems perfectly reasonable that a club would have legitimate objections to its players playing in a completely meaningless match at this point in the season. It would be nice if more countries were like Mexico (NOTE: that’s the first time I have ever started a sentence with that clause), who didn’t schedule matches for this international break because it didn’t see the need to interfere with its players club obligations. Most international federations won’t do this, if for no other reason than they want the revenue. Well, Dutch football federation, I hope the money was worth it. But to them, of course it is–they’re not the ones that are going to have to pay van Persie’s wages and cover the cost of his medical care and rehabilitation for the next 2-3 months, so what do they care. And therein lies the problem. But you’ve heard me make this argument dozens of times already, so I won’t repeat myself any more than I already have.

Sigh. Arsene Wenger said it better than I ever could:

Gerard Houllier’s thoughts on the matter [international football] echo mine. He thinks that what the national coaches are doing is like taking the car from his garage without even asking permission. They will then use the car for ten days and abandon it in a field without any petrol left in the tank. We then have to recover it, but it is broken down. Then a month later they will come to take your car again, and for good measure you’re expected to be nice about it.

I know I’m probably just impulsively speaking out of anger, but you know what? I’m tired of being nice about it–at some point we need to think about getting a lock for the garage.

Gael Clichy reportedly has a stress fracture in his back, and will be out for about a month. Two weeks of that month will be the international break, but he will, at the very least, miss league fixtures against Wolves and Chelsea and Champions League matches against AZ and Standard. And frankly, when you hear the words “fracture” and “spine” in the same sentence, I think you have to prepare for a pretty long layoff—I wouldn’t be surprised a bit if we don’t see him in first-team action again until late December or January. This is particularly true because this is Clichy’s second spinal stress fracture in less than a year, as he missed much of last spring due to the same injury. Clichy’s just 24, so for him to have developed what appears to be a chronic/recurring problem of such severity so early in his career is cause for concern.

I’m no doctor, but when I used to run a lot I had a stress fracture in my leg, and it’s a very, very weird injury, in that it doesn’t actually hurt very much unless you’re doing the activity which caused the injury in the first place. And that almost makes it more frustrating, because within a couple days of the injury, you actually feel perfectly normal, but have to refrain from hard exercise for such a long time. Because of this, I think a stress fracture is one of the easiest injuries to exacerbate due to insufficient layoff time, and this is something Clichy, Wenger, and the Arsenal medical staff need to be very careful about. Because Clichy’s probably going to feel like he’s 100% by the end of November and early December, and going to be pushing to get back on the field. And we’ve got a lot of tough matches around that time, so the temptation to bring him back is going to be great. But the first priority at this point absolutely needs to be making sure he’s 100% healed from this, and then doing tests or biomechanical analysis to determine exactly why Clichy has suffered this very unusual injury twice now, and what can be done to prevent a recurrence in the future. Here’s hoping they can.

On the pitch, I actually don’t think this hurts us all that much. The fact is that Clichy has never been able to recapture the form he showed in 2007-2008, when he was the Premiership’s best left-back and looked like he was ready to become one of the world’s best fullbacks for the next decade or so. He’s still been a good player, but his confidence appears to be quite low at the moment and he hasn’t really been the same marauding presence down the left since the 2008-2009 season began. Add in an unusual number of bad defensive mistakes which have led to goals or scoring opportunities for the opposition, and I think we can say that Clichy, while certainly one of the better fullbacks in the Premiership, isn’t the world-beater we were hoping he would become by this point in his career.

While he’s still just 20, Kieran Gibbs will get another chance to show that he’s ready to play at the highest level. It’s unfortunate that everyone only remembers his slip which gifted a goal to Manchester United in the second leg of the Champions League semifinal last season, because up until that point he had done a very capable job filling in for Clichy. He has continued to shine for the England U-21s and the Carling Cup squad, and will be itching to show that he’s ready to play first-team football. He is also aware that Fabio Capello is eyeing him for a possible national team call up ahead of the World Cup, so he has every motivation in the world to play great football. If I may make a bold prediction, I say he’s going to impress us, and leave Wenger with a dilemma on his hands once Clichy returns to the squad. And Armand Traore is healthy again, so he will provide cover for Gibbs while Clichy is out.

Nicklas Bendtner is also out for a while with a groin injury, which forced his early removal from the Spurs game on Saturday, and Wenger said he would likely be out for around a month. Fabianski, Denilson, Walcott, and Djourou are still out with long-term injuries as well. In better news, Rosicky returns to the squad after being out with his knee injury, although Wenger says he will not start tomorrow. My best guess at a lineup:

Almunia

Sagna-Gallas-Vermaelen-Gibbs

Diaby-Song-Fabregas

Eduardo-van Persie-Arshavin

Eduardo’s really just a guess–Eboue could easily start there as well. It’s also going to be interesting to see where Wenger sees Nasri fitting into the 4-3-3–he got injured so early in the preseason it’s not clear what his role will be. Last year he mainly played on the left wing, but he’s capable of playing in the center of midfield, and played a bit as a supporting striker in France so could be moved to the frontline. Then there was all that speculation last season about him playing as a holding midfielder. It’s weird for two reasons: (1) Alex Song has played well enough to have a firm grip on that role at the moment; and (2) Nasri’s got so much skill and technique (and so little size and strength) that it seems like he’d be best used further up the pitch. I think he’ll probably start out on the bench this game, but will be starting somewhere soon enough.

I gave my general overview of AZ’s squad in the previous preview, so there’s no need to go over that again. The big news is that AZ will be missing their best player and primary attacking threat, Mounir El Hamdaoui, for the match.

The bottom line is that AZ is an inferior squad missing their main scoring threat. We will be looking for a measure of revenge after gifting them a point two weeks ago when Arshavin stupidly conceded a free kick by being offsides so late in the game, and Diaby’s poor defending on the resulting free kick into the box gave them a last-gasp goal. This is also a very important match because a win would, in all likelihood, clinch our spot in the knockout rounds (the only way it wouldn’t would be if Standard were to win all 3 of its remaining matches, unlikely since they’ve only been able to salvage one draw from their first 3, and we were to lose our remaining 2). As I’ve said before, this would be a huge weight off because it would allow Wenger to rotate the squad in the final two group stage matches (home against Standard and then away to Olympiakos), and focus on fielding the strongest possible side in league fixtures against Chelsea and Liverpool. We’ve got a lot to play for and have been very successful at the Emirates in European fixtures, so anything less than 3 points would have to be viewed as a massive disappointment.

In other news, Robin van Persie has been saying things which reveal him to be all kinds of awesome. Regarding the win over Spurs at the weekend, he said:

It always feels good to beat Spurs. It even feels good when we don’t play them and they get beaten, so it’s especially good when we’ve played them.

Ha—take that, Robbie Keane. He also responded to the news that we drew Manchester City in the Carling Cup (the game will be on December 2, once again bumping our much-ballyhooed game in hand against Bolton to a later date) by saying:

What’s the draw? Manchester City away? Nice. I want to play that one. If the boss decides to let me play, I’m happy. I’d love to play. We fancy winning that competition.

Now, clearly, Wenger will not let him play in that match, and we do not actually fancy winning that competition. Our reserve team would really have to put together one hell of a game to get through to the semifinals—Manchester City beat our first-team at the Eastlands, and they have not been fielding a weakened side in the Carling Cup (they don’t have to worry about fixture congestion nearly as much as we do, since, you know, they didn’t qualify for Europe last season). But you know, in some ways, it’s a good draw for us, because I think everyone (me included) expects City to win that match in a walk. But that means that there is absolutely no pressure for the youngsters, and they can go out there with nothing to lose and play their hearts out. If they were to somehow scrape through, Wenger would be lauded as a genius, everybody would be falling all over themselves to praise Arsenal’s youth setup, and Manchester City would he humiliated. I’m smiling just thinking about it.

But I like it that Robbie is so positive. I think having a team leader with that kind of attitude is infectious, and rubs off on the younger players. I also sincerely bet he would love to play against Manchester City again, if for no other reason than to break his foot off in Adebayor’s ass in retaliation for “the stomp.” Remember Adebayor? He’s the guy who hasn’t scored a goal since then. Anyway, the chance of taking a stupid red, if nothing else, is ample reason to keep Robbie on the bench for that one.

Finally, van Persie has talked about how he’s growing more and more comfortable in the single-striker role in an article on the official site . It’s an interesting read, and it’s been clear from his recent performances that he’s thriving. And it’s not just the return, although 8 goals in his last 9 games speaks for itself, but just how comfortable and effective he looks.

I think at the beginning of the year many of you, me included, thought he would be better in one of the forward/wing slots, because he doesn’t fit the traditional target man mold like Adebayor or Bendtner. What I failed to realize, though, is that a traditional target man doesn’t have much of a place in the way we play, because our center striker actually gets very little of his service through the air. Instead, we work the ball up along the ground, and our “target man” gets balls into his feet. So he doesn’t need to be that physical or imposing or good with his head, but instead needs to have a good first touch and enough skill and technique to control and keep the ball with his feet until support arrives. And van Persie is great at that. He’s so dangerous at spinning defenders one-on-one and getting a shot off that guys marking him will generally give him a little bit of space to latch onto passes and hold play up. And our 4-3-3, when we’re playing aggressively, usually means that he has passing options to either side of him almost immediately, so he doesn’t have to use his body to shield the ball from defenders for any extended period of time. I guess at some point we should just stop being surprised when Wenger sees something that we don’t, huh? But it’s funny–while everyone debates whether Torres, Rooney, or Drogba is the best striker in the Premiership, Robin van Persie, bought for less than £3 million, just keeps scoring goals with the best of them. And that’s just fine by me.

That’s it. Here’ s hoping we get those 3 points and punch our ticket to the knockout rounds. Come on Arsenal.

First, Lukasz Fabianski, who many were predicting would become Arsenal’s # 1 goalkeeper when he returned to health, hurt his thigh in last night’s Carling Cup fixture and will be out until after the international break in November. This was unrelated to his knee injury, so he wasn’t rushed back, just seems to be a random injury. Also, at present it’s kind of funny on the official site, which has a story entitled “Fabianski–I am so happy to be back again” just below the newest story, “Keeper Fabianski ruled out for 3 weeks.” That’s Arsenal in a nutshell right there. Wenger says he’s not sure who will start in goal on Saturday, but will decide after training on Friday. As I’ve said before, I hate this keeper by committee mess, and think Wenger needs to sort it out sooner rather than later. Competition for places is one thing, but having no idea who’s going to be in the net between one game and the next is detrimental to the team.

In “starting to become worrying” news, Fran Merida has yet to sign a new contract with Arsenal. His contract is up at the end of the season, and while he says he wants to remain a Gunner, he has already rejected one offer of a five-year deal. Several Spanish clubs, including Atletico Madrid and Sevilla, have been monitoring his progress and would no doubt love to have him in their set-up. He’s making a lot of progress, and I was happy to see him score his first senior goal last night. The fact that Wenger decided to keep him with the squad instead of letting him leave on loan is evidence that Wenger thinks he is a valuable asset and capable of contributing to the team. If he is patient, works hard, and continues to develop, he will be an important part of the senior set-up in a year or two. Speculating about the future is always dangerous, but screw it, let’s have a little fun for a second–can you imagine in 2-3 years a midfield of Cesc, Ramsey, Wilshere, Ramsey, Denilson, Nasri, Song, and Merida? All those guys look like they will turn into excellent players, and the thought of that group serving as a unit reaching their prime together is salivating. It’s encouraging that he says he wants to stay, but that’s what Flamini said, too, right up until he left for Milan. This bears watching, but hopefully we’ll get him back under contract soon. Also, I may be wrong on this, but due to his age, he’s not allowed to leave without compensation as long as we’ve offered him a contract, right?

Also, England boss Fabio Capello attended the match yesterday to get a view of Kieran Gibbs, who apparently put in an excellent performance. Gibbs seems awfully young to be representing England on the senior level, but has shown himself to be quite a player in limited action. And after Cashley, it’s not like England has an abundance of options at left-back. Gibbs may very well be better than Wayne Bridge right now, or possibly will be by the time summer comes around. And the fact that he can play right-back is to his benefit, as well. I can actually seem him making the squad and traveling to South Africa as kind of a fifth fullback/reserve defender type, who is handy to have around in practice and may never even make the bench for a game, but is good to have on the roster in case of injury. Wenger has backed him, and it would be a nice experience for the youngster, I hope he gets the call.

Finally, Phil Brown (pictured at right) was the subject of reports that he had been fired as Hull City boss a few days ago, but the reports were apparently wrong. He stays in charge for now, but all is clearly not well at the KC Stadium, and you’d have to think he wouldn’t survive a few more bad performances. I normally try to sympathize with managers under the gun, because they are often held to ridiculous, unrealistic standards by fans and ownership (Avram Grant was inches away from winning the Champions League, and got fired), but after “loogie-gate” in the FA Cup quarterfinal last season (you can read my original thoughts on it here), I have no respect at all for Brown, and won’t be sorry to see him go, I have to say.

Oh. I also suppose you want some actual “facts” or “information” about AZ, not just my bizarre Harry Potter fantasy world of what they must be like based on the simple fact that their name is kind of like something I read about in a book. Sigh…fine.

AZ are the defending Eredivisie champs, but haven’t been quite as successful so far this season, currently sitting 6th in the table, with 5 wins and 5 losses in their 10 matches. However, they have been pretty formidable at home, winning 3 out of 4 and outscoring their opponents by a margin of almost 2 goals per game. Last season, they had the best home record in the Eredivisie, winning 14 of 17 home fixtures and outscoring their opponents 38-7. All time, they have played 34 home matches in UEFA competitions. And they have lost…once (to Everton a few years ago). Their home stadium is quite small by European standards, holding a little more than 17,000 supporters.

Generally speaking, I find the smaller venues to be much tougher places to play than the big, sparkly new stadiums. The fans that get those tickets tend to be die-hard supporters, and those stadiums are usually older and put the fans very close to the field, which can unsettle visiting clubs a bit.

Make no mistake–this is not an easy place to go into and win, and I really think this match is going to be quite a bit tougher than most pundits and Arsenal fans think. Especially given our rotation and injury issues (see below), a win would be a very, very good result for us, and draw here would be nothing to be ashamed of.

AZ’s main danger is Moroccan striker Mounir El Hamdaoui. The former Spurs forward (although due to injuries and other issues, he never played a first-team match for Tottenham) has emerged as a top quality striker for AZ. He scored 24 goals in 32 games in all competitions last season, and already has 6 goals in 8 games this season. A player of his quality will no doubt be looking to impress an international audience with a good performance against Arsenal, so Gallas and Vermaelen will really need to focus on locking him down.

Midfielder David Mendes da Silva is apparently the main playmaker/distributor for AZ, so our forwards will look to track back and disrupt his rhythm, and Alex Song will try to make sure that he is in for a long day. Their defense is held together by veteran Dutchman Kew Jaliens, who was a teammate of Robin van Persie’s on the Netherlands 2006 World Cup side, and will be looking to shut him down. And we’ll also need to look out for Stijn Schaars–he captains the side, plays regularly for the Dutch national team, and is tough in the tackle and has a dangerous left foot.

As for us, we’ve got our fair share of injury woes to deal with. Theo Walcott is out 3-4 weeks with the injury sustained against Birmingham. It’s really a shame. Theo came into this season with a lot to prove, but hasn’t had an opportunity yet because of injuries. More importantly, it hurts the team quite a bit, as we were really depending on him as one of our attackers in the 4-3-3. Hopefully he’ll have a safe and speedy recovery. This almost certainly means that he’ll be out of action until we return from the November international break on November 21st.

Rosicky is also out with a minor knee problem, but Wenger seems to think he’ll be fit for the West Ham game on Saturday. Bendtner, Denilson, Djourou, and Eduardo are still injured as well. Fabianski and Nasri will not feature, but will play in the Reserves League match tomorrow against Wolves, which means they are both pretty close to a return. The only good news is that Clichy returns to the squad after a minor ankle injury.

The injuries to Eduardo, Bendtner, Rosicky, and Walcott mean that we’re really stretched for attackers, and Wenger really has a lineup dilemma on his hands. Aside from van Persie and Arshavin, we have Carlos Vela, who has barely featured this season, and youngster Sanchez Watt. I think this means Wenger will abandon the 4-3-3, at least for this match, in favor of either a 4-5-1 with van Persie up top and Arshavin and Eboue on the wings, or a more conventional 4-4-2, with Arshavin joining van Persie up top, Eboue on the right, and Diaby playing out of position on the left. My best guess at a lineup:

Almunia

Sagna-Gallas-Vermaelen-Clichy

Eboue-Song-Fabregas-Diaby

van Persie-Arshavin

I really do think we’ll see quite a bit of substitute action, especially if we can grab a lead, for this match. Expect to see Ramsey get some significant action, and if we go to a 4-5-1 he could even start. I think we’ll see Wilshere as well, and possibly Vela or Traore, some guys we haven’t seen much of so far this season.

I think we’re pretty much a lock for getting through to the knockout stages at this point. But a win tomorrow would give us 9 points already, and at least a 5 point advantage over the 3rd place team in the group. Last season, only one club (Shakhtar Donetsk) had as many as 9 points and didn’t make it through the group stages. Especially with 2 of our last 3 group stage matches at home, it’s no stretch to say that a win tomorrow puts us into the group stages.

I think this matters because, as I mentioned in the comments the other day, we have a pretty tough schedule coming up over the next few months. How’s this for a 3-week span?:

11/21–Sunderland (home)
11/24–Standard (home)
11/29–Chelsea (home)
12/2–Bolton (home) (but possibly a Carling Cup fixture instead)
12/5–Stoke (home)
12/9–Olympiakos (away)
12/13–Liverpool (away)

That’s 7 games in 22 days for those keeping score at home. A lot of them are very tough, important league fixtures which could very well be crucial to our title bid (especially the Sunderland, Chelsea, and Liverpool fixtures). It would be really nice if we already basically had our place in the knockout stages booked at that point, so we could rotate the squad and rest some guys against Standard and (especially) Olympiakos, and instead focus on making sure everyone is rested and full strength for Chelsea and Liverpool. So I would argue that while we do have some margin for error, getting a good result in tomorrow’s match is actually very important, and could have some very positive spillover results in other competitions.

In other news, Andrei Arshavin and Cesc Fabregas were both listed among the 30 finalists for the Ballon D’or award. Either Ronaldo or Messi will win, but it’s an honor to be named among the world’s best 30 players, and both deserve it, although I’m a bit surprised and disappointed Robin van Persie’s name wasn’t on the list. Elsewhere, Arsene Wenger confirmed that Sol Campbell will be training with the club for a bit, although he said there is no chance he will sign with the club. Elsewhere, Arsene Wenger slammed Birmingham’s traveling fans as “stupid” for chanting Martin Taylor’s name while Theo Walcott was lying on the pitch yesterday. And quite right. While I don’t think the tackle which injured Theo was dirty, Taylor’s tackle 2 seasons ago most definitely was, and to glorify someone who maliciously broke another player’s leg and almost ended his career is pretty classless. Wenger has also given an interview talking about why he didn’t go to Real Madrid last summer, but it wasn’t anything he hadn’t said before.

Also, Chelsea lost to Aston Villa, and Liverpool lost to a beach ball Sunderland. Manchester City drew, and Alex Ferguson might get suspended for calling someone who is fat and out shape…fat and out of shape. Great (and hilarious) news, the lot of it.

Anyway, I’ll have a game thread up for the match tomorrow. I’m not sure if the game is being broadcast live here in the states, but Fox Soccer is showing a tape-delayed broadcast of it at 5 p.m. tomorrow, and streams shouldn’t be too difficult to find if you want to watch it live.

Come on Arsenal.

Four more teams punched their tickets to South Africa yesterday. And it brings the list of players currently affiliated with Arsenal who will likely play in the World Cup at 8:

–Robin van Persie (Netherlands)
–Theo Walcott (England)
–Cesc Fabregas (Spain)
–Nicklas Bendtner (Denmark)
–Emmanuel Eboue (Ivory Coast)
–Carlos Vela (Mexico)
–Philippe Senderos (Switzerland)
–Johan Djourou (Switzerland)

There are others who may sneak onto their national teams (Denilson, Almunia) which have already qualified, and a number of Gunners who play important roles for national teams which still have a chance at qualifying (Clichy, Sagna, Gallas, Nasri, Song, Arshavin). I suspect when it’s all said and done we’ll have about a dozen or so players feature for their national sides in the World Cup.

But enough with the internationals. Arsenal is back, and we actually have five games between now and the end of the month. We have a triple-decker “ham” sandwich of league fixtures against Birmingham, West Ham, and Tottenham, plus a Champions League fixture against AZ and the Carling Cup match-up with Liverpool. Five important matches in 14 days will really show us what we have and dictate what happens the rest of the season, and that kind of fixture congestion can really tax the squad’s depth. Fortunately, the return of Walcott and the imminent return of Nasri (who says he’ll be back for the West Ham game next weekend), give us a few more options for substitutions and rotation.

This will be our first match-up with Birmingham since the Eduardo horror tackle/Gallas hissyfit game which was in many ways the beginning of the end of our title bid in 2007-2008. It’s a game we should expect nothing less than 3 points from, and a good chance to exorcise those demons. But I’ll be back with a full preview tomorrow.

Finally, in what could be big news, Stan Kroenke has again increased his share of ownership in Arsenal, and now owns 28.9% of the club’s shares. If he gets to 29.9%, rules mandate that he formally launch a takeover bid. In the past, he has consistently denied any intention of doing so, and has claimed that he is content to own just less than that and let the current board and management run things as they have in the past. And frankly, he has given us no reason not to take us at his word–unlike that Uzbeki d-bag Usmanov, who was transparently trying to take over the club with David Dein, Kroenke has maintained cordial relations with the board and current club management, and hasn’t criticized the club or Wenger in an obvious attempt to make fans feel like his ownership is the only chance Arsenal has to win trophies. Still, with Kroenke’s substantial stake in the club plus his substantial wealth, the fact is that he could probably take over the ownership of the club with a snap of his fingers, so it bears monitoring.

First, and most seriously, Denilson is apparently out two months with a “small” fracture in his back. It’s like that line that “minor” surgery is surgery that’s being done on someone else–if someone told me I had a spinal fracture, I wouldn’t think it was so “small.” Anyway, this sounds a lot like the stress fracture that Clichy was dealing with last season.

Bad news for the young Brazilian, who had looked pretty decent in limited action this season. He led the team in appearances last season and seemed to be coming into his own. At the very least, though, we’re going to need him healthy in January, when we will be without Alex Song due to the African Cup of Nations. Hopefully he makes a complete and speedy recovery.

In other news, Nicklas Bendtner is out of tomorrow’s Champions League clash with Olympiakos because he crashed his Aston Martin into a tree. He was apparently on his way to training when his car went off the road. Fortunately, he’s physically fine other than a couple scrapes and bruises, and Wenger says he should be fine to play against Blackburn on Sunday. And since he’s fine, we can make light of it…

No word on whether or not he was wearing pants at the time of the accident. And now I’ve got this song stuck in my head:

It’s just infuriating. Wenger is, understandably, upset. The international teams, especially in situations like this where they don’t have another match for another month, have zero incentive to protect a player’s health. What does Russia care if Arshavin is out for a couple of weeks? As long as he’s healthy again by October, it doesn’t hurt them. Meanwhile, the club, which pays Arshavin’s salary, and in the cases of some players, is responsible for the player’s development and training, is the one who suffers.

Honestly, at this point, I’m all in favor of doing away with all these international breaks, and just having a few international breaks per year–give them all of January and the summer. Instead of playing qualifiers two at a time, which is a pain because then you have to go back and remember who is playing well, which country is in which group, what the scenarios are, etc., why not have them play 5 or 6 at a time over the course of a month? This would build up momentum and be more exciting, almost like a mini tournament, and allow team members to get used to playing together for a longer period of time. More importantly, if Guus Hiddink wanted to play a player just coming off injury for 90 minutes, that would be his prerogative, but if theplayer re-injured himself, it would be the international team that suffered the consequences. I guarantee you under this scenario international teams wouldn’t be quite so callous about players’ injuries.

Elsewhere, the news was apparently good, although I wouldn’t be surprised if we didn’t hear about another knock or two as the players return to England today. Rosicky played 60 minutes for Czech Republic, which is good news–I doubt he’ll play on Saturday, but we could see him on Wednesday. Fabregas played and scored for Spain to clinch a world cup berth. Eduardo scored Croatia’s lone goal in the 5-1 beatdown they took from England. Bendtner scored in Denmark’s 1-1 draw with Albania. Arsenal alum Thierry Henry scored in France’s 1-1 draw with Serbia. The official site has a full round-up here.

At any rate, Arshavin is out–I’ll cover this more in my preview tomorrow, but I imagine either Eduardo will start in Arshavin’s place along the front line, or we’ll go to a more standard 4-4-2 with Diaby getting a start. Here’s hoping it’s the former–for all the controversy about the dive, Eduardo’s been playing well lately, and I get the sense he’s pissed off and has something to prove, and could have a goal or two in him.

I also hate the international break because of the mind-numbing boredom it brings. As evidence of this, the official site unveiled its first in a series of “Fantasy Battles.” The concept is, basically, that an Arsenal player sits down and answers a series of stupid questions about “who would win a fight between…” Yes, I’m serious.

Anyway, in the initial installment, Gael Clichy is in the hot seat. Clichy’s picks:

1. A bear could beat a crocodile (because “it’s strong and I think it’s really powerful”)
2. Spiderman could beat Batman
3. Lara Croft could beat Wonder Woman

I’m honestly not sure which is more troubling–that our club and our players are spending time on stuff like this, or that Gael Clichy actually thinks Lara Croft could beat Wonder Woman. Wonder Woman is a lost Amazon with super strength and super speed (not to mention command of the animal kingdom and an invisible jet). Lara Croft has…what? Big boobs and a gun? Pfft. Regular readers will know that I’ve criticized Clichy’s decisionmaking over the past year or so, but even I didn’t think it was this bad.

This is what the international breaks reduce us to–talking about crocodiles and Wonder Woman instead of football. Thank God it’s over, hopefully we won’t hear about any more injuries today. Man City preview coming tomorrow.

Not good. Djourou underwent surgery and won’t be back until March at the earliest. And we’re one step closer to having to watch Silvestre play. Ugh.

The injury was the one picked up on international duty last month, reminding us of why we hate internationals. Other than that, there don’t appear to be any other injuries to report. Arshavin sat out Russia’s game yesterday with the groin injury he picked up against United. Cesc came on as a sub for Spain in the 70th minute without incident. Tomas Rosicky did not feature in the Czech Republic squad who drew against Slovakia.

Not much else in the way of news to report. Needless to say, this makes it that much more important that Gallas and Vermaelen stay healthy, and all of a sudden, Senderos has gone from being on his way out to being a guy who may very well play an important role in Arsenal’s quest for trophies this season.

You also have to feel really bad for Djourou. The young swiss back has worked hard for years, and at times looked very good when called into action last season. Although not in the first-choice 11, Djourou figured to see plenty of action for us this season, and has now suffered a huge setback to his career aspirations. I’m sure I speak for all Arsenal fans when I say I hope he has a complete and speedy recovery–even if it’s not for us, he deserves to have a long, happy, successful career, and hopefully this will be nothing more than a speedbump.