Arsenal 3 v Stoke City 0 - Premier League

Sunday 1st April 2018
FA Premier League
at Ashburton Grove (Emirates Stadium)
Arsenal FC (0) 3
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang 75 pen, 86
Alexandre Lacazette 89 pen
Stoke City (0) 0
Officially announced attendance: 59,371

During a lull in play (otherwise known as the first half), I bravely approached a severely cross eyed gentleman, on my own, who was pointing towards the spectators in the upper tier and mumbling to himself, while looking very confused and perplexed; so naturally, being a caring kind of soul with a heart of gold, I enquired if he was alright.
"Yes thank you, though it is very kind of you both to ask after me, but I'm just counting today's crowd for Arsenal's press office"
And with that he waved me farewell with his seven figured hand.
I possibly made this intro up, but if it had really happened, it might have explained a lot.

59,371 here today my arse! If Arsenal want to declare all of their absent season ticket holders and include them in their inflated crowd figure total, then that is their business, but going on this afternoon's headcount, at least half of them couldn't be bothered to turn up, which is strange given the amount of money that they must've shelled out up front... while a whole lot of genuine supporters have been priced out of attending Gunners matches on a regular basis, if they even go anymore at all.

Back in the day, when a nucleus of hardcore Gunners supporters made a stand against bond schemes, membership schemes and massive price hikes, they were dismissed as dinosaurs standing in the way of progress and stampeded by an indecent rush of well heeled and affluent supporters, wanting a piece of the action... but not fully understanding or bargaining for what they were buying into.
Well 'top end' football is now deservedly starting to reap what it has sown. Do the moneyed types want a piece of that action, when it's crappy old Stoke City rolling into town, for a game that has next to nothing resting on the outcome of it for the home side? Looking around me today... obviously not!

And what about all of the younger generation of fans who've been priced out or moved on to find more appealing stuff to do elsewhere, by the minefield of logistics it takes to obtain a solitary match ticket, that doesn't even come with a guaranteed opportunity of being able to sit with family and/or friends.
Since the Emirates Stadium was opened in 2006, a whole generation of fans and youngsters have stopped attending games, or in some cases couldn't afford to start going to them in the first place... and all of those empty

red padded seats are a monument to the way that the greedy despots in the game, have slammed the door firmly shut of the faces of untold amounts of people, who despite their allegiances, aren't likely to ever want to go through all the rigmarole of buying an overpriced ticket to very occasionally watch the team that they love, when they are only offered the scraps, but are excluded and made to feel unwanted from any of the major games and main events.
The people who used to turn up in all weathers, under any circumstances, whoever the opposition were, are thin on the ground at clubs like Arsenal these days.

And I would imagine that situation is pretty much the same at most of the big clubs.

Anyway, I've been rambling on for long enough, so let's move on and discuss this weekend's live entertainment.

The O2 Academy in Islington is staging some of the main events at the 30th London International Ska Festival this weekend... and in between attending two loooong nights of excellent sounds with me, my good lady wanted to go to the Kings Head Theatre near the venue to watch an afternoon performance of The Mikado. Well dear reader (I know that there is at least one of you left, because you

text me regularly about my crap spelling and typos), no effing way was I having any of that caper, so my son and heir was called upon to travel forthwith into the sprawling Metropolis from his homestead in Bedfordshire, to accompany his mother for the afternoon, while I feigned disappointment and offered: "It's not really my thing, I wouldn't be very good company at a do like that, you go and enjoy yourselves, I'll find something else to do", to which the blonde Beelzebub retorted: "1) What time is kick off? 2) Will you be back in time for tonight? 3) The first band is on at 6.30PM". 

I'm busted! The answers for purposes of clarification are: 1) 1.30PM 2) Yes, I wouldn't miss it for the world & 3) They're actually a Reagge Choir not a band, such is the wonderful diversity of the acts performing across the spectrum of this very special gathering.

This weekend marks the sad anniversary of the death, far too young, of David Rocastle seventeen years ago. He was immensely popular at all of the clubs he played at, but is afforded home grown, 'one of our own', legend status among the Gunners faithful of a certain vintage.

As the game kicked off, a couple of hundred people in a lower tier corner of the North Bank, tried to get a "Rocky Rocastle" chant going by way of a tribute, but regrettably it didn't catch on and I doubt if it even sounded like a distant murmur to those who were watching this game on television.

"Why aren't they paying their respects to Rocky!?" my friend demanded to know and all I could come up with by a way of explanation was: "Most of these Nouveau style Premier League glory hunter ****s have probably never even heard of him, a lot of the old guard have been phased out and replaced with this ****ing bunch of morons... along with a whole load Japanese tourists types who don't mind blowing £150 on a ticket from a West End bucket shop, so they can spend the entire game taking selfies and pictures of their friends, instead of responding to anything that's actually happening on the field of play" 

Woo hoo! Go me with my long winded analogy and soapbox outburst, hey!?.

By way of an example of the calibre of some (but certainly not all) of the people that watch and apparently support Arsenal circa 2018... when I was towards the ground from the Supporters Club building at the end of St. Thomas's Road, nearing Arsenal tube station, a couple dressed from head to toe in brand spanking new official Arsenal club merchandise, set off with an 'AFC - STOKE' half and half scarf apiece, beckoned me over and asked in hushed tones: "I can't get my bearings, which way is the Emirates Stadium?"

Bloody tourists and day trippers, they get everywhere.
This is me eight years ago. En route to see Millwall v Hearts.
I wish that I could still fit into that red Studio One Records t-shirt

I merely pointed ahead, because I was far too polite to say: "It's that f***ing thing over there! The tall grey building with lots of red bits plastered all over it!"

The first half was awful, really short on quality and horribly bad.

Arsenal only had one clear cut opportunity in the entire opening forty five minutes, when Aaron Ramsey clipped the crossbar with an  angled shot.
But it was one shot more than relegation threatened Stoke had in the opening half, where their performance bought to mind the memory of the time that the Potters visited nearby Highbury in 1980 and kept nine men back in their own half while employing a lone striker up front. Pretty standard tactics in this day and age, now I come to think of it.

Sarcasm got the better of me at half time

Stoke still lost that game 2-0, despite their ultra defensive tactics and when quizzed about his approach after the game, their manager famously said: "If you want entertainment, go and watch a bunch of clowns"
The fact that I am using this well worn anecdote to fill column inches in respect of the first half of this afternoons's game, speaks volumes for just how insomnia busting an episode it turned out to be.
In truth there wasn't much else to write home about.
I even considered leaving at half time, but decided to stand in an aisle and practice my dance steps for tonight instead... I had plenty of room to myself!
HT: 0-0 zzzzzzz

As the players came out for the second half, I was asked, if this was the worst game of football that I had ever seen... at that point, it was certainly heading towards claiming such a dubious accolade thus far.
There was almost a ripple of surprised excitement when Stoke's Xherdan Shaqiri struck the ball firmly against the left hand post from a right wing corner, to break up the lengthy spell of ball retention by the home side, where they would patiently pass the ball around in circles, covering ever nook and cranny of the pitch, barring the Potters penalty area.
For a while, the tempo was similar to that of a pre-season warm up game and today's remit from Arsene Wenger seemed to be that his team had been told to keep hold of the ball and complete as many passes as possible, without going near either goal.

Patience is a virtue, but at this rate, there is going to be a revival of the 'boring, boring, Arsenal' tag, as the cavalier ways of 'the Invincibles' have been consigned to an ever more distant memory, and a less entertaining manner of play is being adopted.
But, a win is a win, even if the paying public who came along to be entertained, didn't exactly get anything like value for money.
Just when you thought the game was fizzling out into a goalless stalemate, the referee decided to take on the responsibility of injecting a bit of life into the game, by awarding a very soft penalty with fifteen minutes to go; when Martins Indi tackled Mesut Ozil from behind in the Stoke area. He got a touch on the ball before clipping the German play maker, but the visitor's appeals were all in vain, because tackling from behind has been banned since football was played in black and white.

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang's spot kick finally broke the deadlock in the 75th minute, but ironically a large number of the crowd began to leave the stadium a few minutes later, though that might have had something to do with the visitors introducing Peter Crouch from the bench... I mean, sometime's enough is enough.

Who would have thought that those early leavers were going to miss a two goal climax right at the end. But that is exactly what happened, when Aubameyang netted again from Ozil's corner kick, before sacrificing the opportunity to grab an hat trick, by abdicating the pleasure of scoring a last minute penalty to Alexandre Lacazette on the occasion of his fleeting return from injury, after Badou Ndiaye's had pushed the Gunners substitute in the back inside the area.

Full time

It was a great gesture by Aubameyang which Lacazette took full advantage of, to give Arsenal a 3-0 win that some said was perhaps a bit flattering, although, as the second half ticked by, Jack Butland in the Stoke goal had pulled off a number of decent saves and looks like a goods bet to claim the England number 1 shirt for the forthcoming World Cup in Russia.

FT: Arsenal 3 v Stoke City 0

That must've come as a bit of a shock to those who left well before the end of the game.

After the dust had settled, the Arsenal manager was asked to quantify the number of empty seats at the ground, which have become a regular feature at recent games, but he knew the answer to that, apparently:

 "It's just down to the fact that we're not fighting for the championship,
"People know that will not change now. They will be back on Thursday (Europa League v CSKA Moscow), don't worry.

"It's explainable by the fact that it's Easter. It's a family happening, where people go away and it's a fact that we don't think about a lot in the Premier League. There's also the fact that we had a break."
So it's all about the tradition of people heading off on holiday together at Easter... phew! I was starting to get the impression that there might have been a few slightly bigger issues rumbling just below the surface and causing a few tensions among the supporters at Ashburton Grove.
It just shows what I know then.

You might have detected a whiff of 'modern football is rubbish' rhetoric, attitude and opinion running throughout the spine of the above blog post. 

So just let me say this, to clear a few things up... there is much that is wrong with football's higher echelons, that would put anybody off watching games in the Premier League; so with that in mind, I have decided to recommence my lengthy boycott of top flight matches, and as a consequence I won't be going anywhere near any of this kind of stuff again, until at least next Sunday, when once again I'll be in Islington, just in time for the visit of Southampton to Ashburton Grove. 

Contrary is my middle name.

I wouldn't say that I am still in love with the beautiful game anymore, not in the massive way that I undoubtedly once was. But I'm still fascinated, infatuated and possibly a little bit obsessed, with the mechanisms sport, in all of it's forms, at many different levels. All told, variety is the spice of life and you really don't have to limit yourself to just one flavour. 

Imagine only ever doing the same things, the same old tried and tested way, within the same circle of people, week in, week out, forever and a day.

Follow your own chosen path my friends (and foes)... because life is for living and you have nothing to lose but your chains... you ask Karl Marx next time you see him.

Next up, I'll be in Bolton (well Horwich to be precise) on Tuesday night, to see if Birmingham City can claw their way out of the Championship relegation scrap and continue their revival under the guidance of Garry Monk... don't you wish that you were going too!? 

Then later in the week, I'm hoping to get a couple of non-league games in as well, assuming that a few of my regular haunts are still above sea level by then.