Arsenal Season in Review, Part IV

By: Martin | May 29th, 2009

Okay, the end of season wrap-up stuff today. And we’re giving out awards. Is this kind of stupid and pointless? Yes, of course. But it’s the only trophies these guys will have won this year, so we press on…

Best 11 (based on play over course of entire season):

Almunia

Sagna-Toure-Gallas-Clichy

Walcott-Fabregas-Denilson-Nasri

Arshavin-van Persie

Bench: Adebayor, Bendtner, Fabianski, Song, Djourou, Eboue

Player of the Year: Robin van Persie
Most Pleasant Surprise: Alex Song
Biggest Disappointment: Emmanuel Adebayor
Best Newcomer: Andrei Arshavin (Honorable Mention: Samir Nasri)
Player We Missed Most: Mathieu Flamini
Biggest Win: Arsenal 3-Villareal 0 (April 15)
Biggest Loss: Arsenal 1-Manchester United 3 (May 5)
Best Moment: Winning penalty shootout over Roma at the Stadio Olimpico (March 11); (Honorable Mention) Eduardo’s return, in which he scored a goal, against Burnley (March 8 )
Worst Moment: Kieran Gibbs’ slip leads to an easy goal by Park Ji-Sung, effectively sinking our hopes of advancing to the Champions League final; (Honorable Mention) Aaron Lennon’s injury time goal grabs a 4-4 tie for Spurs at the Emirates in a game in which we led 4-2 in the 89th minute
Best Performance:Andrei Arshavin, 4 goals, Liverpool (April 21)

Goals of the Year:
3. Andrei Arshavin, Blackburn:
Arshavin beat his man to get to the byline, and everyone watching and playing in the game, including the Blackburn keeper, assumed he was going to try to center it. But when the keeper didn’t come out to close him down, he buried the ball in the roof of the net from a seemingly impossible angle. Brilliant play.

2. Eduardo, Burnley:
Okay, it was the FA Cup, and against a Championship side. But my goodness, what a strike. Arshavin saves the ball from going over the byline, Song puts Eduardo in, and Eduardo makes the keeper look foolish with a one-touch volley off the outside of his left foot. Eduardo only made 4 appearances for us this season, but moments like this remind us of what a clinical finisher the Crozilian really is. Very, very few strikers in the world would have had the cojones to try that, and even fewer still could have pulled it off. Magical stuff.

1. Emmanuel Adebayor, Villareal:
This goal would stand on its own even if it weren’t on such a big stage, but the fact that it was makes it that much more special. Nice ball in by Cesc and an absolutely inspired bicycle kick finish by Adebayor. It gave us the all important away goal, and forced Villareal to play football when they came to the Emirates the next week. If he hadn’t gotten that goal, and we had lost that match 1-0, Villareal would have looked to close up shop at the Emirates, and who knows what would have happened. Special, special goal.

My starting 11 going into next year:

Almunia

Sagna-Toure-[transfer]-Clichy

Walcott-Fabregas-Song-Nasri

Arshavin-van Persie

I am partially assuming that Adebayor and Gallas may very well be gone (more on that in the days to come), but even if they stay, I’m not convinced they are our best options. Maybe I’m naive, but if we add a top class center back this summer, I think that’s a team that could challenge for trophies. We shall see.

Well, that’s that, then. I’ve got a piece on why Robin van Persie was my player of the year tomorrow, and a two-part “summer preview” running Sunday and Monday, and that will be it for the big stuff until August. But Travis and I will certainly try to keep on top of Arsenal news. There’s bound to be a lot of transfer rumors, 99% of which will be utter crap made up to sell newspapers or get hits on their website, but we’ll write about it nonetheless.

I have very much enjoyed writing for the site since I came aboard this spring, and look forward to my first full season at the offside in 2009-2010. Thanks to Rob and Travis for letting me in. I would also like to extend a very sincere thanks to all of you for reading and all your feedback in the comments section–evaldo, homey, foreverzidane, and the rest–and I hope you stick around for the summer and next season. Cheers.