Did it look like a brutal afternoon for Denilson and Diaby? Stroll in the park more like, there was no midfield battle to be had.

No, but Scholes would have picked up a red card for one of 2 brutal tackles if he had been a Stoke player.

Ricky, I'm not saying I don't think Aaron would have done a better job - he's a much better player than either of those. Rather, I can really understand why Wenger might be just slightly cautious with him, and am not too worried that he might have written off his chance of contributing in the immediate future.

You wouldn't put money on him starting against West Brom though would you? And that's with both Diaby and Denilson playing pretty crappie once again.

No, but I wouldn't bet on Diaby and Denilson having too many more chances to get it wrong in the next few weeks either.

We'll win because they cant keep a clean sheet to save their lives

Cue them somehow getting a clean sheet.

Remember how Sunderland were on a 5 game losing streak before playing us?

Haven't they been on a decent run of form in the past few weeks? I only say this because I've been keeping an eye on them since Vela joined.

General Mirth wrote:

Haven't they been on a decent run of form in the past few weeks? I only say this because I've been keeping an eye on them since Vela joined.

Yes they've won their last game and have drawn the three previous to that.

Vela has scored some important goals for them but they will be without him for this.

Also, they've only managed one clean sheet at home in the league this season.

Should be a surefire victory provided we can keep them down to fewer than two shots on target then.

Hence the gloomy joke. Remember that "50% of all shots on target are goals" stat of Almunia's from last year?

In the words of a random boxing coach i saw on channel 5 . " ABUSE HIM ABUUUUSE HIM"

I suppose Al will definitely be in goal for this?
There will be no shock Lehmann selection?

hope for the best expect the worst.

Jens, at about 59 years of age now, not having played for a long time is hardly an upgrade on even Average Al.

I have a really bad feeling about this game. West Brom need every point they can get, and they'll be able to smell the fear in our boys. I see another loss

IBL wrote:

They'll win because we cant keep a clean sheet to save our lives

Fixed.

Caligula wrote:

I have a really bad feeling about this game. West Brom need every point they can get, and they'll be able to smell the fear in our boys.

What are they, a pack of wolves?

...

played against wolves twice and won anyway.

Nah, we just smell bad :-)