Arsenal vs Cardiff City - Emirates Stadium, London - Monday 16th February 2009

After what seemed like ages since the last Arsenal home game, this was the first of several in quick succession. The initial attempt to replay against Cardiff was snowed off a fortnight previously, so were in the strange position that all of the fifth round ties had been played (at least the first attempts at them), before we had even got through the fourth round. This also meant that Arsenal were in the quarter final draw, with a very winnable set of home games to see us to the semi finals.

On the way up to the stadium, I walked past the Lord Nelson, which was full of hundreds of Cardiff fans, all boxed in by police. Holloway Road resembled a war zone, with broken windows in the pub, and bits of smashed furniture in the road. Some will tell you that Cardiff fans unfairly have a bad reputation - but I've never seen any other away fans do that (well, Ok, apart from Spurs).

The game itself was a million times better than the first game, although that wasn't saying much! This time, Cardiff's confidence seemed to have gone - they were nowhere near as bright as they were in their home game, and much less able to make life difficult for Arsenal. Much of this may have been because the Arsenal team were on a high, thanks to Eduardo's return to the first team. He was greeted with rapturous applause, well deserved, and combining with creative players like Nasri and Vela, his reappearance really managed to get the Arsenal fans excited again that they could be creative and play good football. With Fabregas and Walcott to come back too, and Arshavin yet to make his debut, there was a real sense that the worst of our season - with its lack of penetration and no quality players - could just about be behind us.

The game itself was the best Arsenal have played for a while - the team seemed to gel a lot better, and defence, midfield and attack all seemed to know what they were doing. With 2 goals on his return, this really was the Eduardo show. His first came after he had played a big part in the buildup, working with Vela, then getting his head onto a cross to score. Bendtner added a second with a header shortly after, before Eduardo won and converted a penalty just after half time. When he was replaced by Robin Van Persie after an hour, the whole ground was on their feet to applaud him. Thank God he's back.

Van Persie put the icing on the cake with a fourth goal right at the end, and although Cardiff had a couple of decent chances themselves, 4-0 wasn't terribly unfair. On another day, it would have been a frustrating 1-0 win for Arsenal, but things seemed to go right today. The Cardiff keeper was probably man of the match, which says a lot about how the game went. This was a big boost for Arsenal fans, with the return of Eduardo seeming to bring the return of decent play and goals with him too. For that amongst many reasons, welcome back Eddie, we have missed you!