As North London derbies go, this was the biggest I remember for a while. Penultimate game at Highbury, and practically a play off for that 4th Champions League place too - all made more interesting by the presence of the best Spurs side for a long, long time. This was a big one, and all involved (at least amongst the fans) knew it.
The away fans were typically obnoxious when walking the 100 yards from the station to away entrance - how brave they are, whilst surrounded by the pensioners in the West Upper, and dozens of police in riot gear (far more, incidentally, that I have seen at Highbury recently).
As if Spurs really needed a boost going into the game, Wenger's decision to rest Henry and Fabregas must have provided it - surely NOT seeing Henry's name on the team sheet must have given them a huge lift in confidence. Add that to a decent Spurs side now, and one that was significantly more rested than Arsenal, and this was always going to be very difficult.
The first half was very nervy indeed, a number of Arsenal players seemed pretty disinterested, either that or they were just having a bad game at the least useful time imaginable! Spurs had by far the better of the first half, created some good chances. and if anybody deserved a goal in the first half, it was them.
The second half started with a boost for Arsenal - Thierry Henry started warming up along the touchline. After a while, he ran back towards the bench, ripped his training shirt off, and threw it on the floor. The cheer that greeted that moment is something I will remember for a long time indeed. He and Fabregas came on for the last half hour, to see what they could do.
Spurs goal will be described as controversial by everybody. 2 Arsenal players were down injured, and Spurs played on - in particular exploiting the fact that Arsenal had no right back, to score. My view was that, although the ball should probably have been put out of play, in fact 2/3 of the time it wouldn't have been in that situation, by any team. So, yes, controversial, but these things happen.
The first goal did at least fire the crowd up, and our captain. I spent a good 15 minutes fearing that the day might end up as a complete, unmitigated disaster - losing to Spurs by that goal. So, when Adebayor put Henry through with not long left, and Henry finished very well, the whole place erupted. In fact, the person that went maddest was Thierry himself, who needed physically restraining by 2 team mates, from running all the way over to the Spurs fans. A true Gooner, he really does hate them as much as we do.
Although getting a point all but secured Spurs 4th place, on the game today they probably deserved it, and if any team deserved to get a result from the game, it was Spurs more than Arsenal. But, that was undoubtedly because of the number of extra, tough games that Arsenal are playing at the moment - and if all goes well, we may still be in the Champions League yet.
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