A wise man once questioned why Lukas Podolski was not seeing more minutes or a regular spot in the starting XI. After the Manchester United tie, a wiser man answered in a studious French accent, "Zat's why, dummee." Lukas looked lethargic and limpy.
It's a chicken-and-the-egg sort of scenario where he won't be match fit until he gets some matches, but won't get matches if he's not fit. Feels a bit Chamakh-y or Arshavin-y. Fortunately for Lukas, the Handsome French Bloke earned that silly red card and the team is without its only out-and-out striker for the time being, so The Boss looks set to hand Poldi the central forward role again this weekend for our match at QPR. I certainly hope that Lukas is able to take better advantage of this opportunity and that the injury he so clearly is carrying will not affect him too badly.
Whither Walcott?
Why not feature Theodore down the middle against a Hoops side with feck all to play for? My money is not only in Theo's pocket, but also on the fact that he spent large swaths of time against Man U just standing around, his goal aside. About that goal: with 12 weeks between goals, at £100,000 per week, it cost us 18.15 billion Indonesian rupiahs (since the club is so interested in that region; I'm not bitter over another summer without seeing our Gunners travel Stateside or anything). Let that sink in for a bit. If you didn't do your job for 12 weeks, could you look forward to receiving a six-figure pay packet every week regardless? Madness. I certainly don't excpect any of our players to score goals every week, but I do expect a player who held the club over a barrel and crowed so loudly about wanting to score goals to find the back of the net more regularly.
Southern Hospitality
On to more positive pursuits. Many have and will write better reviews of the Man U match and previews of the matches ahead. I would like to take some time to instead turn an eye locally and praise our Charleston Gooners. The show of support on hand at Moe's Crosstown Tavern for brunch on Sunday morning was phenomenal. My recollection is that this was our biggest turn out since the first Chelsea match earlier this campaign, which itself set a recent high water mark for Charsenal. We saw many new faces mingling with the more familiar, and we hope to see everyone who attended come back out for the remaining matches of the season.
Shirts
There have been rumblings of getting t-shirts printed with the Charsenal crest on the front and the art deco badge on the back. Would you get one? Hit us up on
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Facebook so we can gauge interest!