Arsenal 2 Dinamo Zagreb 1: Arsenal clear the first Euro-hurdle

Kolo in action

It was hard to be too enthusiastic about a game that was in all honesty already won, but overall I thought the team did reasonably well to take it seriously and remain cool despite some provocation. They also remained cool in spite of a French referee determined to show he absolutely was not favouring the French team, albeit one captained by a Swede.

A lively start with some fast football from both teams as Almunia came out to head clear an early Zagreb attack. Flamini picked up a deserved yellow card early on but it took a bit longer before any of the rather taller Croatians went in the book. There was some unimpressive early play from Arsenal that saw us give the men in blue far too much space culminating with some good one-twos between Etto and Eduardo that saw Eduardo give the away team the lead after just 12 minutes. 0-1 Zagreb.

Dpric was very late on Flamini but no card. Van Persie had a great run where the third foul finally got a free kick and a yellow card for Agic. More great play from Van Persie followed a flare being ignited in the away section. Van Persie was the man of the moment when first his shot, then his run won us two corners. Two fouls on Hleb won two more free kicks as the ref got a tad whistle happy. When Hleb was chopped again Cesc found Van Persie whose header was cleared off the line. Our next corner saw the Zagreb morons coining Cesc. He offered the coin (or whatever) to the ref who ignored him. Freddie then took an elbow in the face courtesy of Drip from the corner, which the ref also ignored.

A brilliant run by Robin on the right and an angled shot was saved for another corner. Van Persie was pulled down on the edge of the box, but this too was ignored. More great play by Van Persie and a fine ball to Hleb. Robin has very much come of age and looks to be the man to partner Henry. Carlos took out Eboue. Another foul on Robin and a shove in the back on Freddie by Drpic. Hleb went on a tasty run. Drpic chopped Freddie again and at last got his overdue yellow card. Van Persie again went close but it set up Zagreb for a break that won a corner just before the one minute added time at the end of the half. All in all not too impressive, although I suspect quite a few of us were too busy admiring the stadium to notice. Did you notice how far apart the two managers sit in Ashburton? There also a decent distance from the forth official.

Arsenal kicked off the second half towards the North Bank; yes I know it has no name as yet but why change a habit of a lifetime. When the clock goes up behind the southwest screen that end will automatically become the Clock End. While I think of it, it was good to hear ‘Stand up for the Arsenal' rather than that other tedious version of the same song. Great ball from Kolo to Adebayor who was very ordinary on the night. Drpic carried on where he left off by chopping down Freddie. Eboue crossed, Adebayor left it when he might have shot and Freddie blasted over. Hleb to Adebayor who wasted a great chance to the crowd's obvious frustration. Johan to Robin with a great ball. Hoyte was trying to overlap but lacks a quality left foot so consequently I thought we lacked balance. A rare counter attack saw Modric hit a shot from range to no effect.

Van Persie - Outstanding skill

Hleb had a run and shot but it was blocked. Robin crossed too deep following a rather rare decent move. We were not really flowing and Cesc was getting nothing from the ref and in grave danger of getting up tight. Zagreb were caught offside as Almunia saved at feet. Brilliant cross by Van Persie that Adebayor totally failed to read, Wenger and Gooners were both annoyed. He was immediately replaced, with 25 minutes to go, by the main man. Flamini won a free kick on our left side of their box. Thierry took it, you just knew he would, but the keeper punched clear. Djourou picked up a soft yellow card after two fouls by Zagreb were mysteriously missed Monsieur Layec. They then went very close from their free kick that whistled past our near post. 21 minutes to go and Hleb was replaced by Gilberto. He was almost immediately held back by Buljat who got booked for his trouble.

Arsenal pressed as Titi won two free kicks against Corluka. A Van Persie corner saw Flamini head over. When our equaliser came it came from a free kick wide on our right from Robin and was headed home by our captain. Good to see Freddie not handing over the armband when Henry arrived on the pitch, and even better to see him score a goal. 1-1 and we'd equalled our previous best score at Ashburton. There were twelve minutes remaining. Cesc and Mamic where at it, despite Cesc giving away the best part of six inches in height. Theo replaced Robin and both received massive applause. Walcott picked up a ridiculous yellow card from the twat Bertrand Layec for having a shot after the whistle had gone.

Henry then inadvertently got in the way of a bullet from Freddie. Vukojevic shot wide as the stadium emptied. Mamic had a wild shot well over the bar and a late substitution saw one high scrabble score replace another. And so for the benefit of the twenty thousand or so who left early, including Marion, Ray, Martin, Val, Trev and Anne. The winner all the departing fans missed saw Henry play it out toTheo whose perfect low cross was controlled and slotted home by Flamini. 2-1 Arsenal and a new record score at Ashburton. How we chortled at the twenty thousand or so who missed the winner and a win is a win no matter how unconvincing.

Not quite sure how the Zagreb fans sneaked a flare into our ground given the pre-match searches they had to undertake. But I guess this was the very same police force that failed to communicate to us at all regarding the enforced hold up in St. Thomas' Road for quite a while after the game. It was the same police who failed to advise us about the unnecessarily closed entrances to Finsbury Park Tube and Railway Station. Everyone expects transport problems, everyone expects hold ups, everyone accepts that crowd control is not the easiest of tasks and very few punters get pissed off so long as they're told what is going on. Communication is a very simple business, any at all would have been welcomed but receiving none at all from the authorities is just piss-poor.

One of the principle problems appeared to be that the police were seemingly over zealous in prohibiting entry to the underground system after the game. I think the officer in charge should be told that trains were leaving both Arsenal and Finsbury Park on the Piccadilly line only one-third full because of the extremely restricted number of fans allowed into the stations at any one time. Last season the trains were leaving fully loaded. It seems a fairly logical consequence that if the trains were only one-third full then three times as many fans would be stuck in queues outside the stations. Chaos ensued and from by viewpoint was unnecessarily exacerbated by the total lack of communication. Such poor policing at a European away game would have any travelling MP's writing to the authorities. Get writing.