Arsenal play their A game to put Alkmaar to Zzzzzzzzz

Arsenal 4 AZ Akmaar 1

Ronald Koeman’s freaky run against Arsenal and English teams in general was abruptly brought to an end. It could have been a lot worse had Arsene decided to keep a Fabregas keen to get his hatrick as well as the stand in goal creating machine in Arshavin.

Barely three minutes had gone when a few one touch passes led to Van Persie firing just wide across goal. That was the warning sign, our forward man daring to break the deadlock with his weaker right foot. It is a good sign of the Dutchman’s confidence that he now regularly makes it a point to dismiss this notion of a chocolate foot.

With Sergio Romero in goal for AZ, the likelihood of a goal or two for us seemed a lot higher than normal. I thought he was young goalkeeper, he is only 3 days older than me and the inexperience showed in his decision-making.

Take nothing away from Fabregas’ first goal. Yes, the shot was weak but when a certain guy across the Capital scores deflected goals time after time and it is proclaimed as pure artistry, we should give credit to Cesc for his quick thinking to taking a shot towards the near post and fooling Romero who had already gone the other way.

Once Cesc scored it seemed inevitable that more goals would come. It was closer to half time but it was a beauty. First Arshavin turned effortlessly from an AZ player before slipping a pass to Nasri. The Frenchman duly wrong footed the opposition in front of him before curling the ball low to the keeper’s left.

If you thought that was clinical, the next two were just as ruthless if not more. Diaby haters look away now. The third goal came about when firstly, Diaby won the ball in central midfield and he found Arshavin with a straightforward pass. The Russian could have rung rings around the AZ defenders and taken a shot himself. As it turns out, he found Cesc with a pass on the left side and the skipper promptly finished this briefest of moves off with his side foot effort.

As if he didn’t do enough to keep the negative vibes down, Diaby then had the balls to swiftly control an almost perfect pass from Arshavin before calmly sloting it in. This move also came from a swift counter attack that included a backheel from Eduardo that will surely get a million youtube hits. As well as that, I saw Arshavin and crucially Diaby, running three quarters of the pitch to get this 4th goal.

Let me tell you why that is so unique.
1) I never knew Diaby could have such a good acceleration on him.
2) We were winning 3-0, this was our 2nd game in 4 days and yet both showed tremendous commitment to give a more accurate reflection of our dominance in the score count.

AZ had their best spells sandwiched between the third and fourth goal. Almunia who had very little to do was called to act quickly on a snapshot by Pelle and then had to pluck the ball quickly when a cross came in.

Still I don’t think he expected the ball to come to his goal from an Arsenal corner. That is what happened and AZ scored their consolation goal. As counter attack goals go, it was swift but they had their lucky breaks. Gibbs who was rather hesitant at times in his defensive duties (Arshavin, Diaby and Song took turns to cover the left back position) lost his challenge roughly near the half way line.

The ball fell to Lens who ran like Forest Gump, plenty of self belief, aided by Ramsey’s inability to make a more meaningful attempt at a tackle. Eboue, fair play to him, was in the right position to make that challenge but as things go the Dutchman duly fluked his shot and it rolled in.

But it is the same as Fabregas’ goal, no? Wrong. Whilst Cesc always looked like taking a shot, The Dutchman’s goal was more a case of him getting the jitters.

It wasn’t the cleansheet we wanted. But you know when you win 4-1 it can be glossed over for now can’t it? It isn’t as if we got a last minute 3-3 or a 2-2 draw like United or Chelsea. Besides we now have 10 points but as we have the tougher group, we have to win one more game to seal qualification and top spot.