Arsenal vs Hull City - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 27th September 2008

Since the disastrous performance and result at Fulham 5 weeks ago, things have been mainly good. Arsenal had won 3 league games in a row, scoring 10 goals in the process and conceding one. No goals conceded from open play all season, top of the League, and the kids won convincingly in the Carling Cup. The mood before the game was generally that things could be a lot worse. Hey, we could even lose at home to a newly promoted team - that would be bad!

This game was one of those hiccups - seemed to me like it was just one of those things that happens to teams sometimes. Only our second ever defeat at Emirates Stadium, and you could have got good odds on the first 2 teams to beat us being West Ham and Hull City. It was a pretty freakish result - although one that Hull worked hard for, were well organised to go after, and in the end may have deserved. Arsenal created far more chances of course - but from the opposition point of view, it was 3 points well earned by their organisation and commitment in defence, chances well taken, and a goal worthy of helping to win any game.

From Arsenal's perspective though, this was a smash and grab. All seemed fine at half time - Arsenal had created the better chances and had the majority of possession, even if they hadn't got all that close to a goal. When Fabregas was involved in bundling the ball into the net about 5 minutes after half time, it seemed like another win was on the cards. But then, a fantastic goal by Geovanni, followed by a winner about 5 minutes later, completely knocked the stuffing out of the home side. By the time Arsenal came to terms with what was going on, and what they needed to do, Hull had organised themselves enough in defence to make that task extremely hard. Then, their commitment right up until the end ultimately frustrated Arsenal, despite a good number of chances being created and missed.

What lost Arsenal this game, in truth, was the abysmal defending from the corner that led to Hull's winner. An unforgivable lapse in concentration, again, from a set piece - and William Gallas in particular deserves both barrels for allowing it to happen for the umpteenth time. Our weakness from set pieces is such a well known and glaringly obvious failing, that any team could feasibly come to Emirates with a game plan to win corners, nick a goal, then shut up shop. It seems ridiculous that any team with title aspirations should have such an obvious weakness.

All in all, this is a game that Arsenal could quite easily have won - the wonder goal knocked us onto the back foot, and the set piece goal took full advantage by hitting us where we were weakest. But Arsenal created plenty, and on another day, the game could easily have been won by 3 or 4 goals. Just one of those things. It was nowhere near as depressing as the Fulham game a few weeks ago, where nothing was created, and we never looked like being able to score. But, despite the fact we could have won it, there definitely remains something significant to work on in training this week.

Hull City (or "West Brom" as Arsene Wenger rather unfortunately called them afterwards, in a moment of confusion) fans celebrated in North London all evening, after a very good result for them. I'd rather see that than have Chelsea, Man U or Spurs fans celebrating in our backyard, so fair play to them for being chuffed with a pretty spectacular result for their team.