Valencia vs Real Mallorca - Estadio Mestalla, Valencia, Spain - Sunday 30th March 2008

Whilst in Spain, there was an opportunity to check out a football match. Valencia vs Mallorca was the occasion, both teams that Arsenal have played in the Champions League over the last 10 years. Although, this season, both are pretty far from qualifying for it again. Both sat firmly in mid table before this game, and given how tight the Spanish league is this season, that meant 6 or 7 points from both the UEFA Cup and the relegation places.

By their standards, Valencia had had a bad season so far. Proud owners of the worst home record in La Liga, they had suffered managerial changes, a disastrous Champions League exit from a group that they should have qualified from, and generally poor results all round. Despite a recent mini revival, which included reaching the Cup Final by beating Barcelona in the semis, and Valencia amazingly beating Real Madrid in the Bernabeu last week, the season has been crap. Which meant that tickets were nice and easy to come by, costing only €15 each, for a very decent view behind the goal.

As the game kicked off, the Valencia fans unfurled a massive flag behind one of the goals, the Gol Gran. It had the number 12 on it, presumably implying the 12th Man, but support in general seemed to be rather lacking for this game. As a football match it was awful, devoid of any passion, energy, or even the sense that any of the participating players, or watching fans, gave a toss about the outcome. Valencia were utterly pedestrian, and Mallorca were soon 2-0 up thanks to some well-taken chances. David Villa looked good for Valencia until he just walked down the tunnel after an hour (we later found out that he had injured himself, but it was an utterly bizarre departure - nobody on the bench even batted an eyelid as he walked past them). But overall, the game was boring - I would even rather watch Wigan vs Bolton than that - at least the players look like they care.

Talking of Wigan and Bolton, one thing that did strike me was the competence with which both teams passed the ball around on the ground. It was a bad game, played by 2 mid table Spanish league sides that are going nowhere - but the passing was better than the English national team can usually manage. Of course, they didn't run around quite as much, and the whole game was very much slower, which is sure to help. But the passing was good to watch, even if it rarely got either team anywhere.

As the game drew on, Valencia's team seemed to even give up pretending to their fans that they were trying, or that they cared. By the end, literally nobody in the stadium seemed to care what was happening on the pitch, least of all the players. As Valencia half heartedly pushed forward in search of a consolation goal that they didn't deserve, and never looked like getting, their fans started openly mocking their players' efforts - breaking into laughter after a particularly inept attempt at a free kick in front of goal. As is Spanish tradition in circumstances like this, the white hankies came out, and the whistling started. It was hard to argue, so poor was the game, and the home team's performance.

This was an interesting game in one respect, just to go and see the contrast between the Spanish and English leagues. Not a great advert for Spanish football (which I often find quite boring anyway), but then a mid table, end of season clash is unlikely to be I suppose. The fact that the stadium was nowhere near full, and cheap and easy to get into was also a reflection of the importance of the game - the previous day's game at Villarreal was sold out at higher ticket prices, because it mattered much more. Valencia are moving from the antique Mestalla, with its high stands, and no facilities, to a new 80,000 capacity stadium in the next couple of years. This is a ground like Highbury was in its last days - full of tradition and history. Sadly, Valencia don't currently play the football to match - they looked like a poor shadow of the team that got to 2 successive Champions League finals, not so long ago.

Trip to Valencia, Spain - 28th to 31st March 2008

A drinking and football trip to Valencia, a good opportunity to revisit a great city for going out and having a good time. The flight out there was on EasyJet - a change from my usual work travel, which usually involves "proper" airlines. So, it was off to Stansted to join the scrum to get on the plane. The EasyJet experience was actually pretty good in terms of everything that the airline themselves did - we were on time, the plane was in decent condition, and the drinks kept coming (for a fee, of course). My fellow EasyJet passengers were somewhat different, though - descending on the gate as soon as there was any prospect of boarding starting, as if their life depended on getting on the plane as soon as humanly possible. All very strange.

Our first night in the city involved lots of beer - starting at Manolo's Bar (and football shrine), the owner of which is so famous he even has his own Wikipedia entry. The evening ended up in an utterly fantastic indie bar called El Tornillo (The Screw). As soon as we walked in, they started playing Arctic Monkeys, The Courteeners, and other great UK Indie bands. An amazing find, and incredible to come across such a brilliant reproduction of the UK Indie scene - the owners and DJs really benefit from being able to access all that UK culture and music online. I will definitely be returning to El Tornillo.

The rest of the trip included more of the same - drinking, eating and watching football, in surroundings a good 10 degrees warmer than the UK. It has been too long since I was last in Valencia, and with the discovery of El Tornillo, I will definitely aim to return soon.

The Belgrave Scandal - Hope and Anchor, London - Sunday 23rd March 2008

After a really good Belgrave Scandal show recently, where they showed off their new songs and new slickness as a band, it was good to get another opportunity to see them fairly soon afterwards. A short notice gig at the Hope and Anchor in Islington, scene of Joy Division's first London gig amongst other moments in rock history, drew out a decent crowd of Scandal supporters. With no headline act, the band had the venue to themselves, and with all of the audience there specifically to see them, it was only ever going to be a good night.

The set started with Same Old Same Old, which sounded really rather good, and also went down a treat with the audience. Again, the band seemed to talk relatively little, which was good, and just concentrate on playing the songs instead - mostly running 2 songs together with no gaps in the middle. They played their excellent new song Black Pages, which really impressed me last time, and was equally good this time - definitely the best they have written so far. The highlight of the set for me was the start of House Of Cards - after the drums of Take That Train started petering out, Dan suddenly started playing Stone Roses drums, and it sounded brilliant, like Reni at his best.

The final song of the regular set was the newly rearranged Soul And Power, now with a more concise chorus, and so much the better for it. As the crowd wanted more, and there was nobody waiting to play afterwards, we had a 2 song encore, of Beedy Little Eyes, and a cover of Ring of Fire. All in all, an excellent set, played to an enthusiastic crowd. If the band keep getting better, it surely can't be long now before they get their break.

Chelsea vs Arsenal - Stamford Bridge, London - Sunday 23rd March 2008

After no wins in four games, and the League lead surrendered, nothing less than three points was required against Chelsea today, if we were to have any hope of staying in the title race. We didn't get any points at all, which means that any hope of winning the League is effectively dead for another year. We have now gone 5 league games without winning, our worst run for 9 years. Not the form of title winning sides, and by any measure, Arsenal have a huge form problem to deal with - we haven't had a good weekend in the League for far, far too long now.

The game itself started off OK - Arsenal made some decent chances in the first half, didn't take any of them, but what we saw was quite encouraging. After about 15 minutes of the second half, we took the lead when Bacary Sagna scored from a Fabregas corner. A well deserved goal for Sagna after the solid season he has had, and the death of his brother recently. The fact that Ashley Cole was stood trying to cut the corner out (and getting his deserved share of abuse from the away fans) was also highly amusing.

After we scored, though, it all went downhill from there. Within 10 minutes, we had lost Sagna to injury, Eboue had gone to right back, and the whole shape of the defence had been upset. Gallas, Toure and Eboue were still getting used to things, when Chelsea equalised through an opportunistic finish from Drogba. A very bad goal for a defence to concede, our players just seemed to switch off at the vital moment. Chelsea had 2 players offside in the buildup, but even so, the goal should not have been conceded. A few minutes later, Drogba scored again to make it 2-1, another goal that the Arsenal defence will not have been proud of. In truth, the game was fairly even overall, on another day Arsenal could have won, but the 2 defensive lapses cost us dearly.

So, how did we find ourselves here? No Arsenal fan expected to be in this position at the start of the season, lots of the pundits were saying we would be struggling to finish as high as 4th, and we were generally not expecting much from this season. So, it has gone better than anybody expected, but in truth, the lack of squad size has been our downfall - it has just taken longer than expected to hit home.

It means that we don't have anybody to give Hleb a kick up the arse and make him play for his place; it means we really suffered when Van Persie, Rosicky and now Eduardo got injured; and it means we must persist in playing Eboue as our main attacking threat down the right hand side. We lack width in our team, and when our main right midfielder provides one assist and no goals all season, the rest of the team will always struggle to pick up the slack. In short, we are too thin on the ground for players (especially players of the necessary quality), and it has finally come back to bite us.

All of this is a little disappointing, if only because it was so obvious to all at the start of the season. Arsenal fans pay the highest ticket prices in the League, Arsenal Football Club is a very rich organisation, yet somewhere along the line, we do not put the squad in place that we need in order to compete. Why Wenger won't spend some of the squillions at his disposal I have no idea, if only to give us a few more options through a long and hard season. Very frustrating indeed.

The other talking point around this game was about sportsmanship, something you are never likely to find at Stamford Bridge. From their idiotic fans (who sang "you don't know what you're doing" at their manager's substitutions which arguably won them the game - then cheered at the end like that didn't happen), who don't know how to spell the word; to their team who constantly hassle and backchat to referees; to the backroom staff who refuse to give the ball back at the end of the game in order to waste time. The club are a disgrace, and I hope Arsenal don't ever take on any of their tendencies.

Jose Mourinho made unsportsmanlike behaviour an art form at Chelsea, but it seems to have carried on since he left too. The "win at all costs" mentality, and the boring football, lack of sporting behaviour, and idiot glory hunters that go with it, is something that Chelsea are quite welcome to - I just hope it doesn't spread to the rest of the League. I don't want to take away from a good Chelsea performance that beat us today - and we have our own problems to solve - but they will continue to not get any credit from anybody, if they continue to win with such bad grace.

Work trip to Bucharest, Romania - 19th to 20th March 2008

This was a very short notice trip to Romania, which I only found out about 6 hours before I was due to fly out there. A colleague had pulled out of a meeting ill, so I was told to make emergency plans to be in Bucharest for the following morning. I managed to get a seat on a plane leaving later that day, and the last seat on the plane coming back the following day – at the very reasonable cost of almost £900 return!

I had been to Romania before, but as a backpacking student, and rather a long time ago. Since then, the country has joined the EU, and has one of the fastest growing economies in Europe – with double digit growth rates in wages for the last few years. I was due to talk to a group of clients for an hour or so. As when I went to Poland earlier this year, I found everybody I met in a professional capacity to be incredibly nice, welcoming and accommodating. The same could not be said for all of the other people I encountered.

On arriving at the airport (at just past midnight), I got my first taste of the Romanian love of bureaucracy (often badly organised of course!), with a very officious passport check. Despite now being an EU member, it looked as through some habits still die very hard. In general, the country seems to have an abundance of red tape, controls, checks, and paperwork – which makes the breakneck growth all the more surprising – surely it would be even quicker if they abandoned some of the needless pen pushing!

I made 3 car journeys whilst in the country, and heard a Queen song on the radio during every one of them. Whilst driving around the city, I also saw (slightly faded) posters advertising a Shakin Stevens gig. Add in the people with very poorly dyed blonde hair, and the cheesy decor in the airport lounge, and it was clear that, in many respects, Romania is still in the 1970s and 1980s. Things seem similar to Western Europe, just a bit out of date, and, well, just a bit shitty. And I suspect that Bucharest is the most “advanced” part of the country, by quite some distance - you hear stories of horses and carts still being used in more rural areas.

Differently to other “Eastern European” countries, Romania is Latin rather than Slavic – in terms of the language, the people, and the culture. This means lateness, a complete inability to queue up for anything, and pretty much everybody smoking heavily everywhere, all the time (I even saw a cigarette advert on TV!). It also means a language that looks familiar when you see it written down, looking rather like French or Spanish, or even Latin in some respects. If the Czech Republic and Poland are like ex-Communist versions of Germany, Romania is more like an ex-Communist version of Italy. When you think about that, it becomes easy to see how the country’s problems arose, and why it has been so poor

On the way back out to the airport, we experienced the traffic nightmare that seems to exist in every Eastern European capital, as the newly free and increasingly affluent population rush to buy cars. The main airport in Bucharest is small, chaotic, and frankly a hellish place to be – even considering Heathrow's failings. It is amazing to think that it is the major international airport of an EU capital – with 10 gates or so, and the main guy that checks boarding passes wearing jeans and a t-shirt – it all seems quite haphazard and a bit backward.

Romania is growing fast, and is modernising at a very exciting pace, but there is still a huge difference between it and the more developed EU economies. This trip really brought home to me that the newly enlarged EU is now a hugely diverse group of countries. Being a member can only be good for Romania, but in some respects, they have a lot of catching up to do!

Arsenal vs Middlesbrough - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 15th March 2008

On 11th February, Arsenal beat Blackburn at home, and I wrote that those 3 points might turn out to be a defining moment in Arsenal's season. That win took us 5 points clear, and if we'd gone on to win the League, that would have been the start of the run. Well, that absolutely isn't going to happen now. Since then, Arsenal have beaten AC Milan over 2 legs, but have failed to win a League game in the last month. Four draws, eight points dropped, and the title challenge now needing Manchester United (and Chelsea) to slip up if we are to get back into it.

The game itself was to some degree predictable - we have seen it before at Emirates. Middlesbrough went ahead after about half an hour, Jeremie Aliadiere predictably scoring against us again, after five years of not being able to score for love nor money when he played for us (except in the Carling Cup of course). Then, Middlesbrough put 10 men behind the ball for the rest of the game, Arsenal huffed and puffed but didn't really trouble the keeper, and eventually Kolo Toure scored an equaliser. The referee didn't help, giving lots Boro's way and being generally quite annoyingly incompetent, but Arsenal's lack of penetration was really what cost us.

It seems to me that Arsenal have a bit of a thing about "not losing" games at the moment. Ever since the unbeaten season, we seem to set great store in not losing, even when that means drawing far too many games. We have lost 1 league game this season, Manchester United have lost 4, but they are now above us in the league. We have drawn our last 4 games, and in some of them, Wenger has praised the never say die spirit of the team, and talked about how we refused to lose. If we had lost 2 of the last 4 games, and won the other 2, we would of course be 2 points better off, and still top of the league, so it is a very annoying obsession with "not losing".

Also, of course, the age old excuse is trotted out that Boro put 10 men behind the ball, and sat back on their one goal lead. Of course they did - what else could we expect in the circumstances? It is horrible to watch, and not why the Premier League is so popular worldwide, but the financial gap between Premiership and Championship is so great that teams have to play like that from a pragmatic point of view. Maybe the richness of the top flight will start to kill the spectacle, as teams play negatively through fear of relegation.

One thing is for sure, if you want to win the League, you have to have an answer to that - Manchester United and Chelsea usually do, and we do not. Either keep concentrating and don't concede the first goal; or pack your squad with enough firepower to overcome the defensiveness; or try a different (and more direct) way of playing. If you can't get results in these situations, you won't win the League, as we are surely about to find out.

Given this result, and the lottery nature of the Champions League (plus the fact that we would most likely have to play Liverpool, Chelsea and Man Utd or Barcelona in order to win it), the clever money has to be on Arsenal winning nothing (again) this season. Part of the reason is our squad, which by any measure is just too thin to be competing at the level we are trying to. To be fair, in August, nobody expected us to be challenging for anything at all - so we are overachieving in a sense. But it is annoying that the prospect of a League and Champions League challenge has been waved in front of us, only to turn out to be a mirage.

Not a good day for Arsenal fans. At the end of the day, we have to be getting better results than draws against Middlesbrough, Wigan and Birmingham if we want to be winning the League, it is as simple as that. We have taken 1 point from 2 games against Middlesbrough this season - everybody has their bogey teams, but that is ridiculous! The last few League performances have been very disappointing indeed, and with games against Chelsea, Bolton, Liverpool (x3) and Manchester United coming right up, things need to pick up quickly if our season is to avoid disintegrating rapidly from here. There is no bigger test than Chelsea away at the moment - they are probably on a better run of results than any team in the League at the moment - so next Sunday will be a big one.

Work trip to Zeist and The Hague, Netherlands - 13th to 14th March 2008

A relatively short trip to the Netherlands, but one which involved a fair bit of travelling around the country, and the chance to see a number of very "Dutch" things. The trip involved a tour of the Randstad, the densely populated network of towns and cities in the centre of the country. Getting around by train also allowed me to get acquainted with the excellent Dutch railway system, which is quick, efficient and cheap.

On landing in the country, I immediately got my first train, from the airport to Zeist, via Utrecht. We went past the Amsterdam Arena on the way, and I saw a few miserable looking Spurs fans on the station there, no doubt recovering from their defeat to PSV the previous night. Zeist is a nice little town, about in the centre of the country, where my company's office is located - in the middle of some woods. Luckily, the walk from the station to the office wasn't too wet and muddy.

The following day, I had a meeting in The Hague, which is where the Government sits, as well as the headquarters of a few big companies like Shell. To get from Utrecht to The Hague meant a tour of much of the country, so I saw lots of windmills, plenty of canals (including lots with big levees to protect the fact that the land is lower than the water level), and greenhouses and flower fields galore. All very Dutch, and we even passed through Gouda on the train as well. After the meeting, another train back to Schiphol and it was back home.

My flight there and back took me through City airport for the second time in as many weeks, and really brought home for me how much (and how quickly) City has gone downhill. As well as being fairly close to the centre of London, it used to have the advantage of being fairly quiet, quick to get through, and not packed to the rafters like Heathrow. Now, the owners seem to have responded to this, and the popularity it created, by filling the place with extra flights and passengers - to the point where it is now an overcrowded, bursting at the seams nightmare.

Everything now seems to take ages there (15 minutes to get through passport control, almost as long as the flight), there is simply not enough space for the planes and passengers that are being put through it, and generally most of the advantages to using the place are gradually disappearing. A real shame, and a classic example of osmosis at work - if an airport is quiet and nice, fill it with extra passengers so that it isn't quiet and nice any more. The experience almost made me nostalgic for Heathrow - bring on Terminal 5!

The Courteeners, Look See Proof - Barfly, London - Friday 7th March 2008

This was a short notice, but an action and celebrity packed night. I was idly looking on MySpace on Wednesday night, when I saw that the excellent Look See Proof, whose debut single Casualty is often on my iPod, were playing the Barfly 2 days later. Not only that, but the gig was to support The Courteeners, in a very hastily arranged show. Very excitedly, I headed over to Ticketweb to get some tickets, and started looking forward to the show.

Stopping off for a quick pre-gig pint in the Enterprise, we found ourselves sat on a table with Pixie Geldof, who looked suitably prima donna-ish, and was the first (and least) "famous" person of the night. We then headed into the Barfly, and got upstairs just in time for the start of Look See Proof's set. Four well-spoken boys from Hertfordshire, they certainly looked the part of an indie band, all the haircuts were in perfect order.

I really enjoyed Look See Proof's set - having only heard Casualty before, there were lots of other good songs in their set. The fact that 2 people share the singing duties - the bassist standing in the middle of the stage and leading the vocals, and the guitarist being very active at singing as well - means that the vocals are interesting, and allow for frantic songs with 2 people singing or screaming at once. Add some classic indie pop guitars - I thought the guitars sounded like The Maccabees at times, and you have the ingredients for a decent set. They had some pretty good songs, and despite the sound not being much cop at all, the set was pretty good I thought.

After a trip to the loo which also involved bumping into Liam Fray, The Courteeners played a short-ish set, which again wasn't helped by the really dodgy sound. There was a good hardcore of people towards the front, jumping about lots, much to the apparent bemusement of the Mr Fray. The set started quite slowly, with Aftershow, Kimberley, and Kings Of The New Road, three of their weaker and darker songs in my view - but by the time Bide Your Time properly kicked in, things were well and truly up and running, with a full room, and people trying to get to the front with every new song.

As the set drew on, the room got hotter, sweatier and more into the band, fantastic versions of Cavorting and new single Not Nineteen Forever really getting people involved. The set ended in its usual way, What Took You So Long including the now familiar verse from James's classic Tomorrow. No encore, of course, and it was back downstairs in the Barfly to have a debrief pint. I have no idea what was going on in there later, but Mark Ronson and Ricky Wilson from Kaiser Chiefs were in there - a most decent celebrity haul for an evening - to add to the later reports that Morrissey was watching the gig too.

Setlist: Aftershow / Kimberley / Kings Of The New Road / Bide Your Time / Please Don't / Acrylic / Fallowfield Hilbilly / Cavorting / Not Nineteen Forever / No You Didn't No You Don't / What Took You So Long.

Visit to Highbury Square, London - Thursday 6th March 2008

I got a fantastic opportunity to visit Highbury today, some 22 months to the day after the last game there. Since the football stopped, the ground has been being redeveloped into flats, and today's occasion was the "topping out" ceremony - the good luck ritual that happens when a building reaches its highest point.

It all started with a drinks reception in Club Level of Emirates Stadium, for a crowd of Arsenal employees, McAlpine employees, (lots of) press, and a handful of fans, of which I was lucky enough to be one. Welcomed in with a glass of champagne and some canapes, we were all given a very nice engraved Aquascutum pen to mark the occasion. We then tucked into a fantastic buffet lunch, made even more fantastic by the fact that Arsenal were paying - you know it is a very rare occasion where you get something free from Arsenal!

After lunch, we had coaches take us from Emirates Stadium to Highbury, a journey of about 700 yards as the crow flies, but one of over 3 times that, when you took as indirect a route as we did. A colossal waste of money and petrol, but it was at least nice and warm, and we took the scenic route down Holloway Road. All of the VIPs seemed to think nothing of such a short ride, but there you go.

We got dropped off on Avenell Road, near where the Clock End turnstiles used to be - and where the entrance to the site now sits. We walked in and along the side of the East Stand - the first thing that really struck you was how big the "pitch" area was. Of course, the lower tiers of the stands had been taken away, and it really does leave a huge area in the middle of the site - much bigger than our tiny pitch used to be. The other obvious thing was how huge Emirates Stadium looked in the distance.

We all got into a very ramshackle looking lift, and were taken 5 floors up, to the top of the East Stand, where the topping out ceremony was to take place. It was a strange yet emotional experience, looking out over Highbury - it looked so familiar, but completely different at the same time - weird. The topping out ceremony itself saw a few speeches made, then Arsene Wenger filling in a hole about 1 square metre big, with concrete that he shovelled in from a wheelbarrow. An utterly surreal thing to see Arsene Wenger doing.

Wenger made a short speech, saying how he had become a specialist in topping out ceremonies recently - and the few fans I was stood with were remarking that, if it weren't for Arsene Wenger, we wouldn't have move stadium, wouldn't be building a new development at Highbury, and wouldn't have beaten AC Milan earlier that week. So, only fitting that he was there to apply the finishing touches. After Arsene spoke, it was back down in the rickety lift, for some more drinks and canapes, then off home. An interesting, but slightly sad chance to see how the old ground has changed.

Work trip to Milan, Italy - 3rd to 5th March 2008

A trip to Milan for a couple of days work (and the small matter of watching the AC Milan vs Arsenal game on the Tuesday evening), started with a lovely Monday morning flight out from City airport. I saw Martin Samuel, the chief football correspondent for The Times, in the gate - he was clearly on his way to Milan to report on the game. The flight was OK, if you don't count the fact that the landing was aborted when we were about 30 seconds from landing. The pilot said "technical problems", but there was a KLM plane on the runway at the time, which may (or may not) have explained the issue.

I got the Malpensa Express into the city, and realised that "Express" in Italy means something very different to Northern Europe. The train stopped 3 times on the way to the city, and didn't seem to go much above 40mph. It may be fast by Italian standards, but not really in absolute terms.

During this trip, I was really struck by the complete contrast between the good and the bad of some things in Italy. For many things, like clothes, food, luxury goods, fast cars, and historical venues, they absolutely rule the world - and Italian things are at the pinnacle of the very best you can get. For lots of other things, however, like efficiency, organisation, and most service industries, they are a complete laughing stock - so badly organised and executed that it is almost beyond a joke. I guess you can't have it all (and if the organisation and efficiency is that important, there is a country called "Germany" where you can get it), but the total and utter inefficiency is amusing at times.

In particular, when you check into a hotel, they usually try to keep your passport for a few hours, to "make registration". Does anybody in the EU really still need to do this any more? Maybe there is a special hotel guest registration bureaucracy in Italy that is dedicated to this specific area of expertise. "Make registration" actually merely seems to involve photocopying your passport - then putting the photocopy in your (paper) file about your stay. A complete waste of everybody's time, and seems only to happen to create paper, and a job for somebody.


Anyway, thinking about the good stuff, I had some very nice food whilst there - a pizza where the red stuff on the base actually tasted really strongly of tomatoes, which is a real departure from a lot of the crap you get in the UK. The weather was good and sunny as well, so it made the city look appealing. An interesting trip, although much of the city seemed to shut down in readiness for Arsenal fans arriving - so perhaps not the ideal time to be in town - of course, apart from to watch football.

AC Milan vs Arsenal - San Siro, Milan, Italy - Tuesday 4th March 2008

With glorious hindsight, Arsenal played the perfect game of football, outplayed and then knocked out the European (and World) Champions, became the first English side to beat Milan in the San Siro, and proved again that they are more than good enough to beat absolutely any team in the world. The victory was no more than Arsenal deserved over the 2 games, the quality of Arsenal's football wasn't too surprising, but it was a surprise that Milan were stupid enough to give Arsenal the time and space to do it. Hindsight is a brilliant thing, but it wasn't quite like that all the way along.

Arriving at Lotto station after a few beers in the city centre (and lots more time spent looking for somewhere decent to go for a beer – Milan is hardly a good city for a drinking session), we made the 20 minute walk to the stadium. What had been a nice warm day was rapidly turning into a chilly and windy night, with a little bit of rain thrown in as well for good measure.

Despite having had to go through some classic Italian bureaucracy of everybody getting their name on their ticket, and being told that we would need to show passports or photo ID to get in, nobody made so much as even a cursory check on any of that – in fact, a photocopy of a ticket would have done just fine. Very typical of European away games in my experience – over the top on the pre information and organisation, but when it comes to 8pm on game day, it is all a total shambles.

After a joke of a “search”, and being allowed in, we walked for ever and ever (and ever and ever – we were all getting dizzy by the end), up a circular ramp, to our section in the gods of the stadium. We had the whole of the top tier behind one of the goals, and the 4,000 or so Gooners were in excellent voice throughout. One side of the ground, away to our left, was open, and being high up, we got the full force of the wind coming in for much of the game – making it pretty cold in the away section.

The game was almost a repeat of the home leg a couple of weeks previously. Milan had a couple of decent chances, but Arsenal dominated the play. The passing and movement was incredible to watch at times, Arsenal players were first on the scene whenever a ball ran loose, and the only surprise was that Milan looked so pedestrian. Despite this, they looked very dangerous on the occasions where they did get the ball forward, to the point where you suspected a hammer blow at some point. And, despite some great possession and play in the first half, Arsenal didn't cause Milan's keeper too many problems.

That started to change in the second half, with a few decent opportunities being carved out. Arsenal made and failed to take a good 3 or 4 opportunities in the first 20 minutes of the second half, and some of the optimism in the away section of the crowd started to drain away. Around the hour mark, Milan started to come into the game, having some of the ball, and testing Manuel Almunia on a few occasions. For much of this game, and the first game, Arsenal had given Milan a masterclass in how to play amazing football, but I was not alone in fearing that they were about to give us a masterclass in how to win 2-legged European ties without playing very well.

The, just as we were coming to terms with the prospect of extra time, came the bolt from the blue. Cesc Fabregas picked the ball up inside Milan’s half, cleverly found some space, then lashed a quite fantastic 30 yard shot which zipped along the ground, beyond the reach of the keeper, and into the bottom corner of Milan’s goal. Sitting directly behind Cesc Fabregas as he took the shot, it was one of those that looked special from the moment it left his boot. The pandemonium in the away end was brilliant, on a par with Madrid in February 2006, and Inter Milan in November 2003, as they very best of the best moments for Arsenal fans on the continent.

I don't think anybody thought that Milan would be able to score 2 goals, but there was a nervous 5 minutes or so anyway, where every touch from Almunia was cheered heartily. Then, just into injury time, Theo Walcott danced down the right, evaded a couple of challenges, and squared for Adebayor to tuck the ball into an unguarded net from 2 yards. That was it, and the celebrations started in earnest. Most people couldn't believe that we were beating Milan on their own patch (although they are most certainly a team in decline), and during the hour long “lock in” inside the stadium, it gradually all started to sink in.

A fantastic night, a great result, and a performance that shows Arsenal are capable of going all the way in the Champions League. Whether we will or not, is another matter entirely. Fabregas, Flamini and Hleb in particular had brilliant games, Flamini in particular, who kept world player of the year Kaka in his pocket for the whole game. Well done boys - a brilliant result.

Arsenal vs Aston Villa - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 1st March 2008

I guess it is impossible to talk about the Arsenal vs Aston Villa game, without first referring to the shitty week that Arsenal had on the previous weekend. Spurs won the Carling Cup, then embarrassed themselves with quite how overboard their fans and players went in celebration. Well done, but let's not get carried away. "Are You Watching Arsenal", they sang - and I'm sure that many Arsenal fans were not in fact watching, because they Carling Cup Final is not a desperately important game. In fact, I watched Liverpool vs Inter Milan in the Champions League last week, with much more interest that I watched that game. So, well done Spurs, but try not to embarrass yourselves by pretending that anybody really cares about the Carling Cup. Even Middlesbrough didn't go this mad when they won it.

The other bad thing last weekend was the injury to Eduardo. Lots of complete rubbish has been written about this in the last week (this was one of the few sensible articles). I don't think Martin Taylor intended to break Eduardo's leg, but I do absolutely think that, in the 3rd minute of the game, he intended to come in with a robust challenge, to let Eduardo know that he was there. Challenges like that have a "worst case scenario", which is that the player on the receiving end gets badly hurt. On this occasion, the worst case scenario happened - and for that reason, I think that Martin Taylor should be punished more severely than a normal red card for violent conduct.

Its a bit like being caught driving with a bit too much alcohol in your blood - that's one thing. Being caught with too much alcohol in your blood, and mowing somebody down, is quite another, and should obviously be punished more severely. If that had happened to an English player on the eve of a major tournament, the culprit would be hung out to dry (remember Aldo Duscher?), and the double standards from much of the media in this case are ridiculous. The most ridiculous argument of all being that "Eduardo was too quick for him" - what a shame! Having seen Jose Antonio Reyes kicked out of English football, this kind of thing really isn't what makes our game popular across the world.

Anyway, enough of that, and on to the Aston Villa game. After a disappointing and frustrating draw at Birmingham, where we contrived to throw 2 points away in the final moments, a win was absolutely essential. The game was also a key test of this Arsenal team's character - now that everything is against us, what would they do? Backs to the wall and say "fuck the world", like the teams of 91 and 98 did, or fall apart at the vital moment? After all the talk from the players of "winning for Eduardo", Arsenal fans were expecting good things.

But, Aston Villa aren't a bad side this season, challenging for a Champions League place, so it didn't quite work out the way we'd hoped. In truth, many Arsenal players weren't really at the races, and I think the team in general were suffering from a hangover after the disappointing draw last week. We were definitely way below par, and that made things easy for Villa - Gabriel Agbonlahor in particular looking really impressive. They took the lead after about half an hour, Philippe Senderos scoring an own goal, which John Carew probably would have scored instead if the ball had reached him. There was an offside in the build up (and the referee generally gave Arsenal nothing at all for the whole game), but Villa probably deserved the goal.

Even after that, Arsenal didn't really respond in the way that we'd all hoped. Passes were not fluent, several players were distinctly off colour, and it was one of the worst performances of the season, all in all. Scott Carson was not tested at all, whilst Villa, despite being considerably more defensive once they had scored (or Senderos had scored for them), had a couple of decent chances in each half. Bendtner came on to try and change things, and just when it looked like all was lost, he controlled a knockdown from Adebayor, and rolled the ball into the back of the net. The relief, on the pitch and in the stands, was obvious - and hopefully all the early leavers heard the cheers on their way to the Tube station. 1-1, and a bit of a lucky escape given the Arsenal performance.

Whereas the Birmingham game was 2 points lost in injury time, this was definitely a point gained. Probably a point more than our performance deserved, and especially vital because it means that we stay top of the league - if only by the skin of our teeth. With Manchester United not playing a League game for a couple of weeks, that should stay that way for a little while. But, unless we get out of the rut in form that we seem to be in at the moment, it won't be that way in May.