Tag Archives: Abou Diaby

And Diaby goes down…again.

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No joke. I wish it were. In what is becoming a ludicrously tragic or tragically ludicrous farce, a Kafka-esque nightmare, a boilerplate Bill Murray movie involving Groundhog Day, Abou Diaby has again suffered an injury. After playing 45 minutes with the U21s against Arsenal and by most accounts, doing well, it appears that the Fates have seen fit to once again strike down a man whose only crimes are being harshly tackled and trying his level-best to fight his way back. Apparently, he should have just hung up his boots and taken up crochet. Even then, I suspect the Fates, capricious and cruel as they are, would find a way to snap some heretofore unknown knuckle ligament, rendering him incapable of even knitting. Forget purling. Don’t even ask.

According to Arsenal’s twitter feed, he has suffered a little groin problem. Is that “little” a Wengerism akin to ‘niggle’ or ‘handbrake’, or is it an actual part of the diagnosis? Hard to tell. At first blush, though, our reactions probably sift out into one of two categories, the first one being something like “what do you expect? It’s Diaby. Time to cut our losses.” The second, more-rational one might sound something more like “keep calm. He’s been out for 13 months and had major reconstructive surgery. It’s a minor muscular issue. Why rush him back to full first-team action anyway?” You can decide for yourself which camp you fall into or if you’d like to pitch your tent elsewhere. Beware, though, for the tolerance of nuanced positions can at times run dangerously low. It’s with that in mind that I venture forward with caution.

My own reaction tends towards the more-optimistic, which should come as no surprise to regular readers. I’m an optimist, though I have my limits. I still see Diaby as a player with a lot to offer this club if and when he does recover. I’ve suggested that the ACL injury is perhaps the tonic he needs to let his body heal more thoroughly. One cannot rush back from tearing an ACL, after all, in the same way that one might from a strained muscle. This latest setback, however serious it may be, does dampen my optimism just a bit. It’s on more of a personal level, though, less on a footballing one. After all, what has Diaby done to deserve this? A part of me wonders if he was Buddhist in a past life and did do something to incur a karmic debt that he is now repaying in this life. Injury after injury after injury. It’s heartbreaking. I’ve reached a point with Diaby that I want to see him play without any regard to how it bolsters our roster, diversifies our strategic or tactical options, or helps us win matches. I just want to see Diaby play. Period. Just for him. Just because he deserves a chance to run and lope and gallop. If daisies and other wildflowers could be made available on the pitch, all the better to let him frolic and gallivant as well. Footloose and fancy-free. Enjoying the ecstasy. Gamboling. And so on.

Like a fair few others, I have eagerly awaited Diaby’s return. I even hoped it might happen as soon as Monday against Newcastle, if only as a cameo in the waning minutes of the second half. On his day, after all, he can devastate and eviscerate in a manner reminiscent of Vieira (so says Sagna, among others). That was perhaps a bit optimistic, it turns out, as the groin problem will certainly keep him out of Monday’s match and might very well keep him out of matches for another week or more. It’s a far cry from the heartbreak I felt after we last lost him, but I teared up all the same, not because we need him or on the pitch but because he deserves it. He’s more cursed than Tantalus. Each time fitness seems to be within his grasp, it slips away, always eluding him, always deluding him (and us) into believing he can have it. When he does come back, whether it’s next weekend against West Brom, I hope he’s free and clear and can experience a performance unfettered by the injuries, physical and pyschological, that have plagued him for all too long. For him. For his own sake. For the love of the game.

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Pogba? I'll pass. Pirlo? Perhaps…

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Ever since the departure of Patrick Vieira, it seems, we’ve hungered for that domineering, physical defensive midfielder who can bomb forward and wreak havoc on the opposition’s structure, defense, and counter-attacking options. We’ve tried Diaby but, for various reasons, failed. Alex Song filled in for a spell but was never as disciplined in the back or assertive going forward, offering recklessness in place of swashbuckling. More recently, we’ve gotten by with various permutations of Ramsey, Arteta, Flamini, and Wilshere but have struggled to replicate the kind of partnership that saw Vieira work so well alongside Silva, for example. For better or for worse, the myopia that results has seen us set our sights on Juventus’s Paul Pogba, but I’m not seeing it. As exciting as he may be, he’s just not the player we need.

First, a few brass tacks are in order. At 21, Pogba’s still on the upswing, and more power to him for that. However, the downside to this is that his likely price-tag looks to upwards of £40m. That’s madness, even in an era when Gareth Bale can go for more than twice that. It wasn’t so long ago that we were beguiled by another beguiling talent, one Julian Draxler, who himself seemed to command a £40m asking price in the same season that saw us nab Mesut Özil, by all accounts one of the best in the world at what he does. To then turn around six months or 12 months later to pony up the same for an ingenue, a starlet, reeks of ridiculosity (again, as with my invention of “imperiosity”, I know that “ridiculosity” is not a real word, but I like its rhythm. It’s almost onomatopoeic). At any rate, that £40m is likely just a starting point for negotiations. Once PSG gets involved, we’ll wax nostalgic about the times when one could acquire a young defensive midfielder for a fee in the low eight figures. If we’re going to address the current squad’s deficiencies, we can ill-afford to spend half our reported kitty on a defensive midfielder.

If the financials don’t quite grab you by the short and curlies, consider the aesthetics. We already have a plethora of forward-thinking midfielders who can play box-to-box: Ramsey. Wilshere. Rosický. Ox (dare I include Diaby? I dare). Diaby. Each of these excels at getting forward and slicing open the opposition, whether it be with the ball at his feet or with the key-pass. How many of the untallied second-assists would be credited to that slate of players? How many chances? No, we don’t need another bomber who gets into the box to create or finish chances. We have that. Last I checked, Aaron Ramsey was a Player of the Year and a Golden Boot candidate before he red-lined. Alongside him, of course, are the aforementioned Wilshere, Rosický, and Ox, each of whom love nothing more than to run amok in the opposition’s defensive third, harassing and and pressing and all the rest. Each of them can be brought to heel, required if not forced to lie deeper in order to shield the back-four, but why? Why deprive them and us of the sheer joy of seeing them collect the ball and slalom up the pitch, the ball pinging to and fro from their feet or to a teammate and back, as they sluice through hapless defenders? No, thank you. I want my Ramsey, Wilshere, Ox, and, yes, Diaby unleashed. To add Pogba to that mix, as exciting as it might be, would risk opening us up to the very counters we hope to unleash. At the opening whistle, we’d start in an ersatz 4-2-3-1 only to end up, minutes later, in a 4-0-5-1. In short, we need someone who can stay home, attending to the less-scintillating aspects of shielding that back-four, digging in and defending deep. Pogba, as sexy as his name sounds, is not cut from that kind of cloth, even in a league as cynically defensive as Serie A. If Juve hold a fire-sale and make the man available at a cut-rate price, well, that’s a different story. Time will tell if that story will be told.

Currently, our holding midfielder, our regista, if the term may be used, is all too often Flamini or Arteta. Each of them is content with (or confined to, by skill-set or age) sitting deep in front of that back-four, receiving the ball and distributing forward. However, as we’ll all freely admit, Arteta has lost a step or two, and Flamini is a bit, um, aggressive. In either case, the defense suffers, whether it be through passing lanes left open or set-pieces conceded. That brings me to Pirlo. At 34, he might at first seem to be an odd replacement-cum-upgrade for Arteta (32) or Flamini (30). He might also suffer by comparison with Vieira and Pogba when it comes to stature or brawn. However, compare him to the likes of Steven Gerrard. Pirlo need not rampage wildly in front of the back-four to have an impact. He could collect the ball from Per, Kos, or Szcz, and coolly spray passes forward to Walcott, Ox, Ramsey, or Gnabry, among others. What he lacks in grit he more than makes up for in guile. Pirlo won’t boss anyone off the ball, but we’ve seen how we can more then get by without that. No one would mistake Arteta or Flamini for thugs (despite Flamini’s over-earnest attempts). Put a Pirlo-esque player in front of the back-four and let him distribute the ball forward to the more-creative, aggressive types, and we might be in business. After all, one can win the ball through astute timing just as well as through brute force.

If the aesthetics don’t sway you, perhaps the financials will. Whereas Pogba might not be available below the £40m range. Pirlo is a Bosman. His contract ends 30 June. While I’m sure that Juve would try to at least swing a re-signing and Pirlo would be willing to play along, Pirlo’s market-value seems to hover in the £10-12m range. That’s been our wheelhouse, for better or for worse: Giroud. Podolski. Cazorla. Arteta. Each of them has signed at that level, and each of them has delivered on, if not exceeded, expectations. Pirlo is a technically-astute, savvy footballer who could slot in alongside our more-aggressive young Guns. This is not a call to arms towards signing the man, only a suggestion that we do a bit of window-shopping before going all-in for the latest flavor of the month. I don’t oppose Pogba by any means; I merely offer a temporary word or two of caution.

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Abou impresses on debut; will he rise from the ashes?

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It’s been more than a year since we last saw Abou Diaby, having last appeared on 16 March 2013 against Swansea. Ever since, the debate over his future with the club was been almost as divisive as the one over Arsène’s. With Diaby having made an impressive return with Arsenal’s U21s, is there any chance we’ll see his resurrection, even if it’s only a symbolic one? After all, he did play 45 minutes in his first appearance since tearing that ACL, no mean feat, and by all accounts was impressive if not dominant. Assuming we can sew up fourth place (something that may have been just a bit easier with Everton losing Kevin Mirallas), the return of Abou “like a new signing” Diaby might be just around the corner.

First, the match itself. In many ways, it was an important match for the U21s. The loss means that they can’t finish in the top of half of the table and will play in next season’s second division. This means that our younger players will miss out on competing against the likes of the U21s at Chelsea, Liverpool, or Man U and instead will square off against others who finish in the bottom half, such as Reading, Stoke, Middlesbrough, and others. Whether this dampens enthusiasm or hampers development is an open question.

In the first half, with Diaby playing as a defensive midfielder, we took a 1-0 lead into halftime. It was after Diaby came off at the half that Chelsea went ahead, although I’m not suggesting a cause-and-effect relationship. Diaby, while not domineering, saw a lot of action and did look impressive. Keep in mind the contrasting factors: one, this was his first competitive action in over 13 months, and two, he was playing against boys. Those who might have expected him to simply have his way on the pitch are forgetting the first factor; those who demand his return to top-flight action ignore the second. For him to come back from ACL surgery is a massive task, but the early returns from this match suggest that he’s made quite a bit of progress. He looked rusty, and he faded towards the end of the first half, but he also showed flashes, even stretches, of the kind of player he was, is, and might still be. With little more than four weeks left in our season, it might seem impossible or pointless to bring him back. Then again, if we can render a match or two inconsequential, let’s see what he can do.

Speaking before the U21 match, Arsène was confident about Diaby’s fitness and availability:

Yes, of course [he could play for the first team this season]; it depends how well he comes out of the game. He hasn’t played for a year, but physically he is ready to play, completely. It is now just decision-making, getting used to challenges again. He needs a game.

Well, he had half of a game at the U21 level, and it was one that the squad knew it needed to win in order to stay in the top half and Chelsea wanted to win in order to enter the playoffs as league champs. The stakes might not have been at the same level of helping us finish fourth in the Prem, of course, but it was hardly a Sunday league game either.

In the past, I’ve suggested that the ACL injury might, ironically, be just the tonic that Diaby has needed ever since he first went down with the injury that first seemed to derail his career (the one from Sunderland’s Dan Smith). Ever since then, Diaby has been plagued by so many injuries that it’s easy to lose count. After he tore the ACL, I suggested that the severity of the injury and the length of the layoff might allow the rest of his body to heal all of the other sprains, strains, pulls, he’s suffered and perhaps rushed back from. He’s taken his first, tentative steps towards living up to that prediction, and even if there isn’t quite enough time for him to make a full return, the early signs are that, when he does come back, he’ll remind us of the player he’s been, albeit all too rarely.

We’ve long-looked for Vieira’s Heir, a big, dominant, swash-buckling box-to-box type who can lord it over the opposition. If Diaby can rejoin the first team and play as he was playing before again succumbing to injury, his wearing of the number four on Tuesday may look as symbolic as it gets.

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Rare Diaby sighting reported at Colney

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The photo is grainy, and there are those who would cast doubt on its veracity, claiming ito be a crudely Photoshopped hoax, but believers swear it to be irrefutable proof that a creature know as Sasquatch, Bigfoot, or perhaps more officially Homo sapiens aboudensis. Though the photo is grainy and out of focus, it purports to capture the languid movements of a player rarely seen in these parts but who is reported to make occasional appearances as the seasons turn. Witnesses to the sighting suggest that the beast stands close to 1.9m and may weigh as many as 80kg. He was said to be moving gingerly but with a grace and languidity that belie the gangly frame.

Scientists have been called in to study the photo as well as the grounds on which the sighting took place near the Arsenal Training Centre in Hertfordshire, England. If confirmed, it is suggested that this entity, this speciemn, might someday soon be seen running box to box on various pitches across England, laying waste to those who dare to oppose. In particular, the residents of Liverpool, Manchester, and various sections of London itself have been advised to take necessary precautions to protect themselves lest they feel the full brunt of his awesome, if rarely displayed, prowess.

It is unclear what has prompted the reappearance of the aboudensis, but scientists speculate that the changing of the season, the closing of the winter transfer-window, and the flagging hopes of the Arsenal faithful have inspired him from his hibernation. His sighting has been likened to a new signing, as true a sign of the arrival of spring as the first robin or tulip in bloom.

Furthermore, it is anyone’s guess as to whether this sighting is more like the Groundhog’s Day of legend, in which the groundhog emerges from his burrow. If it is cloudy and he cannot see his shadow, he returns, and spring is indeed here. If, however, it is sunny and he sees his own shadow, we are in for another six weeks of winter. With the Prem season itself set to close on 11 May, but with a potential 17 May FA Cup final also hanging in the balance, it was unclear whether or not he did or did not see his shadow. One thing is certain: anxious onlookers will study this and other portents to come.

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One league where we're comfortably top of the table…

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Can the injury-tally grow any more? With news that Jack Wilshere will now be out for at least six weeks, we may set a record for player-games missed to injury. It certainly looks as if we’ll finish the season with the most games missed, and that was before Wilshere went down. After 29 matches, we’re top of the table in the Injury League with 219 player-games missed. The gap between us and second place is immense—Man U lags behind at 156 player-games missed. It’s a cruel irony then that a team already as deep as Chelsea is near the bottom of the table with only 81; only Southampton (76) and Cardiff (51) have missed fewer. What kind of world do we live in in which a team like Stoke, notorious for inflicting grievous harm on other players, has only missed 86 games? It’s a cold, cruel world indeed, and it seems as if the dark forces of the universe are arrayed against us. Dodgy refereeing. Ludicrous draws in various cup competitions. Injury after injury after injury. Hang it all, I say.

Of course, we’ve swollen our numbers a bit with the likes of Abou Diaby, Yaya Sanogo, and a few other long-termers, of course, but the pervasiveness of injuries on its own would probably be enough to keep us in the top four. Aside from a few stalwarts, it’s hard to find a position that hasn’t been affected by injuries. Center-back, for one, has been blessedly injury-free—assuming that the issue that kept Kos out of France’s friendly dissipates soon. Keeper, not bad. Forward, ironically, has been limited almost in spite of injury as Giroud heroically and stoically plodded along without rest or injury while waiting for Sanogo and Bendtner to heal up and get fit. The midfield, of course, has been decimated. Diaby. Walcott. Podolski. Ox. Ramsey. Wilshere. The list goes on.

It frustrates me to no end. I’m not referring to questions like “is it the trainer’s fault?” or “doesn’t this prove that we need more rotation?” or “why didn’t we sign more players”? or “why the hell do friendlies exist?” It’s more to the point to ask why such matches are called friendlies when a player can go in as recklessly as Agger did on Wilshere. Crappy first touch, Danny-boy. Don’t make matters worse with a sloppy tackle. Moron. Breathing new life into the term oxymoron—is it a “friendly” fracture that Jack suffered? Or is it a case of “can’t beat ’em, maim ’em?”

Back to the frustration to which I alluded. I’m just as guilty of the following feeling as anyone else—learning of Wilshere’s injury has thrown Gooners into a tailspin, convincing us that there is in fact a conspiracy (something I poked fun at here) to keep Arsenal from winning anything this year. Finding out that Wilshere is all but done for the season—because why bother playing him in the last four or five matches even if he is ruled fit to play?—has somehow proven that the conspiracy is real, and Hodgson and Agger are either in on it or unwitting pawns in a larger chess-match. From what I can tell of ol’ Roy, I suspect the latter.

Instead of ruing the hand we’ve been dealt, though, I hope the lads look ’round the locker room, size each other up, and realize that the run-in depends on them and them alone. There will be no help from referees or doctors, no mercy shown by Bayern or Chelsea or Liverpool (Agger, I’m looking squarely at you). Shorn of Wilshere, Walcott, and Diaby for the rest of the season, but looking to the returns of Kos and Monreal by Saturday, and the returns of Ramsey and Källström, it’s high-time to resurrect the spirit that was such a part of the early season. Fueled by success, this squad drew strength from each member and became something greater than the sum of its parts. Despite the limitations, exacerbated by the injuries, we found a way through the UCL Group of Death and to the top of the Prem. Seeing teammates fall need not erode that spirit. Each time, after all, someone else has risen to the call, whether it’s been scoring goals, filling in at unfamiliar positions, or doing the dirty work so that someone else gets the highlight-reel moment, we’ve seen this squad dig in and rally against the odds before.

It would be easy to interpret Wilshere’s injury as a nail in a coffin, or a window of opportunity slamming shut. We’ve already been written off in the Champions League and Prem, but that just means we can play like a team with nothing to lose. Pressure’s off, as few expected us to succeed in the fixtures to come even at full-strength. Wilshere may have been struggling for form in recent weeks, and and his injury may be a blessing in disguise, but the symbolism of his injury is open to interpretation. The early returns focus on how this proves that we don’t have what it takes. My take on the matter is that it will reveal a depth of resiliency, pride, and resolve in the rest of the squad, even to invigorate rather than enervate, and that those who take up the banner that Wilshere can no longer wave, save from the sidelines, will show the doubters that there’s fight in this squad still. They’ll assume that we’re teetering and on the ropes, but it’s just the set-up for the ol’ rope-a-dope. We’ve taken some blows and look to be on our last feet, but that’s the prelude to us fighting back and landing a few knock-out blows instead.

First up, Everton.

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