Birmingham – Arsenal Match Thread

Lineups are in:

Birmingham: Starters: Foster, Dann, Johnson, Ridgewell, Carr, Ferguson, Gardner, Beausejour, Larsson, Jerome, Bowyer Bench: Phillips, Fahey, Taylor, Hleb, Derbyshire, Zigic, Jiranek

Arsenal: Starters: Flaps, Sagna, Clichy, Koscielny, Djourou, Song, Wilshere, Cesc, Theo, Nasri, van Persie Bench: Wojo, Eboue, Squillaci, Denilson, Bendtner, Arshavin, Rosicky

Well, no real news with the starting lineup — it was exactly as I predicted in my preview. Theo van Nasregas makes its triumphant return. The only curious note in our lineup is that Chamakh was left out of the squad completely. On the face of it, this is a decision that makes no sense — he’s played well and scored a lot of goals for us this season, and is very useful as a late sub for his proficiency both attacking and defending set pieces. I can only speculate that either (a) he has picked up a minor knock, or (b) there is something going on behind the scenes. I know Wenger has spoken about Chamakh has become “tired” and “jaded” (a curious word to use as I understand it) by the Premiership so far, but he can’t honestly be so tired he couldn’t play for 10 minutes, could he?

Manchester United beat West Brom this morning under pretty controversial circumstances, as several big calls went their way and West Brom missed a penalty. Wojo stirred up what is sure to be a bit of controversy this morning during the game. Brom had what was apparently a stone-wall penalty and last-man red-card turned down when Gary Neville made a bad challenge ona man clean through on goal in the box. Anyway, on his Twitter account, Wojo tweeted, “How can you not get frustrated with decitions like that going ALWAYS Man Utds way?! Its a clear pen and sending off!” And then, when some people started to give him stick for it and criticize him (including, hilariously, some Juventus fans, who don’t exactly have the cleanest moral track record when it comes to matters of preferential treatment from referees), he followed up with, “I don’t understand why some of you get frustrated with me for saying this. The decition was shocking! FACT! What a goal for WBA btw!”

I’m sure a big deal will be made of this in some quarters. He may very well get fined. And he should probably be talked to about this (well, the whole team probably needs to be talked to about this) — I’m sure he was right about it, and he wasn’t saying anything that thousands of others people weren’t saying on Twitter, or anything we weren’t all thinking. But this on the heels of Cesc’s tweet about the penalty we were not awarded against Wigan on Wednesday: “‘What’s the difference between this handball and my one versus Spurs? Referees don’t want us to complain about them but they make life difficult for themselves.”, which as also very reasonable for what that’s worth, we should be wary of having a team of guys on Twitter who complain about referees’ calls, if for no other reason than that that’s not the best way to get into the referees’ good graces.

Results elsewhere didn’t go our way, either. Manchester City held on to beat Blackpool 1-0, and Spurs beat Fulham by the same scoreline. Which means that we currently sit 5 points behind both Manc teams, are even on points with Spurs, and are just 2 points ahead of Chelsea. 3 points is really essential to this one.

Also, a reminder that the yellow card accumulation rules state that a player gets suspended if he gets 5 yellow cards before January 1 (like Cesc did against Chelsea). That now resets, so guys with yellows (I think just Chamakh and Koscielny are not suspended if they get another one today). The More You Know…

Come on Arsenal.

**********

Don’t forget to follow the Arsenal Offside on Twitter for the latest news, links, and updates: www.twitter.com/arsenaloffside

Some Related Stories:

Category: Arsenal News, Birmingham, Fixtures, Premiership