Birmingham Preview

Afternoon all,

Apologies for not blogging yesterday. I forgot it was new year's eve (silly me) and I ended up celebrating a little wildly if you will, to give 2010 a good send off. On that note I'd like to wish everyone a year full of happiness, health and of course success for the Arsenal. The celebrations are over now though and its back to reality. We take on Brum at St Andrews today in what promises to be a very difficult game. Last I checked they'd only lost once at home this season so we will need to be at our best.

We have dark memories of going down to their place. Two years ago obviously there was the horrific injury to Eduardo followed by Birmingham's late fightback to nick a point which resulted in Gallas crying on the pitch. Last season we were frustrated again as Kevin Phillips netted in the last minute thanks to another howler from Almunia. However, I'm slightly more confident going into this one. We're a far stronger team this season, we welcome back players who starred against Chelsea and of course we have a pretty good record away from home. I know we've beaten the Blues at home rather easily the past few seasons but I'd love to get one over them at their place. We haven't beaten them at St Andrews since 2006 I think when Henry scored and Adebayor made his debut.

With United snatching a poxy win this morning our game has basically become a must win. We cannot afford to carry on dropping points to smaller teams. This is a crucial month in the title race. United have another easy three points on Tuesday night when they host Stoke who we know will just go there and bend over. We entertain City which is another massive game that I'm confident we can win if we play like we did against Chelsea.

Anyway, we welcome back Cesc, Song and Van Persie today. Diaby of course is out for another couple of weeks which is really frustrating but all we can do is back him to get back to his best as soon as possible. Here's how I see us lining out:

Fabianski

Sagna - Djourou - Koscielny - Clichy

Fabregas - Song - Wilshere

Walcott - Van Persie - Nasri

When you look at that team, all you want to do is drule. We have quality in every position. I just hope that's the team Arsene opts for. The majority of them should be fresh and raring to go having been rested against Wigan midweek. If we can play our game and close Birmingham down then there should only be one winner unless Phillips comes on again and pounces on an absolute howler from Fabianski heh. Surely Djourou will start. He has been our most consistant centre-back this season, one of few players not to receive any critisism so far. The only problem with him is that he struggles to play games back to back which is a big problem when your a centre-back because its ideal to have a partnership. Its not exactly a position you like to rotate.

As for the Birmingham team:

Foster

Carr - Johnson - Dann - Ridgewell

Larsson - Gardner - Ferguson - Bowyer - Hleb

Jerome

I'm expecting the Blues to make it as hard as possible for us by packing the midfield. Bowyer, Ferguson and Gardner love a crunching tackle so we'll have to be quick and disciplined. By the way McLeish was talking during the week it seems he may give our old friend Hleb the nod. He'll be wanting to prove a point against us, as will Larsson. Up front you have Cameron Jerome who has been pretty ineffective for the Blues in recent weeks but I wouldn't be surprised if he ended his bad run of form against us. It would be typical wouldn't it? That defence is so hard to break down and then you have Foster in goal who has been magnificent for them this season. But its like I said, if we can play the way we know we're capable of, then we should run out comfortable winners.

A quick round up of other news now and I'll start by wishing our Jack Wilshere a happy birthday. He's 19 today, surprising I know considering how good he's been for us. Its easy to forget he's that young so hopefully we'll be seeing him wearing the Arsenal colours for years to come.

Elsewhere Wenger confirmed Emmanuel Eboue has signed a new contract. I'm hearing the deal runs until 2014 and its a big boost. He's a fantastic lad to have around, always optimistic and can do a job on the pitch. Apparently he actually signed the deal a few months ago but I'm not too sure about it. Strange if its true though. Wenger followed up this great news with more great news. He fully expects Pat rice to stay with us beyond the summer. Rumours were floating around that this would be his final year but clearly that dosen't appear to be the case. Pat has been a fantastic servant to this club and I'd be more than happy to have him around the place in the coming years. The good news dosen't end there. I'm hearing we are working on new deals for Gael Clichy and Samir Nasri. If we can tie both of them up to long term contracts, it would be a
very big boost indeed.

Small transfer round up now. Carlos Vela looks set to go out on loan. All the journalists saying he would join Espanyol or Valencia for £7m were talking thrash. He might even join a Premier League club for the remainder of the season which would be great. A club like West Brom who play attractive football would be best suited to him and based on today, they could do with a finisher. Vito Mannone has returned to the club because he's injured and Hull City have already signed Brad Guzan on loan. If Wenger decides against loaning Mannone out again you do wonder if that means the end for Almunia. I'm hearing a lot of rumours regarding his future so I won't comment on it until I have solid news. Finally when Arsene was asked about signing anyone in January he replied:
"There's a big chance we won't sign anyone because it's difficult to find better players than what we have, but if there's an exceptional opportunity, you never know."

That's it for today folks. I could be back later with a match report on the game. If not, we'll chat tomorrow.
Later.