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Here is Preview Percy’s latest column on the subject of this weekend’s trip to Arsenal. Adopting the recent attitude from the club we’d like to say that if you don’t like it, it’s your own fault...

Next up we make the trip up to Islington where we will be hosted by Arsenal. It’s a 3pm Saturday kick-off. Engineering works on the C2C and strike action on the Elizabeth Line may mess your journey up a bit. Also, should you be flying in from, say, Malta, the weather looks a bit messy over France. Check before you leave and all that.




So Arsenal then. They’ve won seven and drawn four of their last 11 and their last six read DWDWWW. This has left them in second place in the Premier League, eight points behind Liverpool, who PGMOL clearly have their pension fund on in the absence of any semblance of reasonable form from Man City. Why are they moaning, then?

Well looking at their last outing as an example, they laboured to a 2-0 win at Leicester with two late goals serving to disguise the fact that for much of the game they looked fairly toothless. They are short on attacking options due to the absences of Jesus, Saka and Havertz.

Jesus has done his anterior cruciate ligament whilst Saka may not have injured his thigh quite so badly had he not spent so much time throwing himself to the floor every five minutes. Then there was Havertz whose injury prompted one of the most hilarious injury bulletins I have ever heard.

You see they were “having a great training camp in Dubai. Recharging, training, having some time off and connecting with nature in a different environment when the injury happened in an unexpected way”. The statement didn’t go into any further detail but it sounds like we must add “pulled up while hugging a tree” to the list of bizarre injuries that players have sustained over the years.

Anyway, the support are moaning about the lack of cover up front in Havertz’s absence, much as they were moaning when he was fit and available for selection in the first place.

Much of the discontent from their support stems from their lack of investment in the transfer window just gone. On the other hand this failure to invest on the part of the ownership has gone down as well with Daisy as a pint of Scruttocks Faintly Dirigible Ale as expertly kept by Algernon, mine host at the Swan and Superinjunction. This is, of course, due to the fact that it means that Daisy doesn’t have to do any research into the new signings.

There has been speculation as to the reason for the lack of spending. Some of this speculation involves the departure of “Sporting Director” Edu who has gone to perform a similar role at Forest and the group of clubs owned by their chairman. Whatever the reason, “sources” claim that Arteta has been "angered" by the situation.

All of which has the usual sources with far too much time on their hands looking forward to the summer. The funniest bit of speculation has seen Harry Kane’s rumoured £54m release clause thrown out there, linking the Kroenkies with a potential swoop (a word seldom used outside football articles these days) for the somehow England captain.

This is a move that would be highly amusing, if only for the spectacle of tormented Tottenham fans testing their room-temperature IQs in trying to work out whether they should applaud him or boo him. In truth such a move would be a good one for Kane.

Last season’s blip aside, the Bundesliga has reverted back to its more traditional one horse race. This means that Kane is likely to win a trophy for the first time in his pro career, something that will cause him no end of torment as he works out how he should react. So a move to Arsenal where he would be unencumbered by such worries would be excellent for the player’s mental health.




Anyhow, enough of them. Let’s move on to the wild and wacky world of association football shall we? And PGMOL proudly went public last week to tell us that there have been fewer VAR errors this season that at the same time last season. Now there is a technical term for the making of such statements, and that term is called “lying through one’s teeth”.

Quite apart from them taking pride in admitting that, even when presented with slowed down clear evidence there are still a number of cases where they admit they have no idea of what they are doing, it’s them who decide whether or not an error has been made in the first place.

If they decide no error has been made then that error does not officially exist. It’s a bit like a murderer going into court and also being the jury as well as the accused, then acting all surprised when he finds himself not guilty. As we will see later on the ludicrousness of this state of affairs was there for all to see this weekend.

Elsewhere the Sullivan family have put up a £10k reward for information leading to the arrest of someone who tried to break into their Theydon Bois pad a while back. Thankfully the alarms were set off before the perpetrator could half-inch anything.

There are rumours In the underworld – so I’m told, I should stress – that what actually happened was that the would-be Raffles took one look through a window and opted to leave the place alone on the grounds of taste. One cannot possibly comment on such scuttlebutt, obviously.

Meanwhile the good Baroness has pitched up on a podcast (I believe it’s like a radio show you get on your computer or something) to take part in, well not so much an interview as an act of worship from Sky Sports’ “inside The Boardroom” series.

I suppose when one of the presenters is fellow board member Jack “son of” Sullivan, the likelihood of anything approaching real insight is on a par with the likelihood of Donald Trump developing self-awareness any time soon.

I shall comment further on what was said in future columns. I have yet to listen to the full broadcast but by the sound of things there is enough material in there to keep this column going for a while yet. I shall just comment on one aspect that has been mentioned.

You see, apparently the Olympic Stadium (and no amount of re-branding as the “London Stadium” is going to change the fact that it’s an athletics stadium) is absolutely perfect. It’s the supporters who are in the wrong because we don’t like change. Which of course is a load of hogwash.

Change would have been acceptable had it involved a move to new venue purpose built for football for example. The Baroness described the move as “the right move for the right reasons”. Those “right reasons” presumably being to be able to turn a quick profit on the sale of the old ground whilst paying next to nothing for its replacement.




That’s before we even think about the lack of an anti-embarrassment clause in the deal that sold the Boleyn which allowed the buyers to turn an instant profit by selling it on while the ink was still drying on the original sale.

I would heartily recommend m’learned colleague Mr Barlow’s article on the subject elsewhere in these pages – nail on the head. Meanwhile next time out I will address the complex mathematics involved on how the Baroness has made football more affordable by raising prices and cutting concessions.

And so to matters on the pitch. Well the first 45 minutes against Brentford last week were awful. The three changes made at the interval were desperately needed and had the desired effect. We were the better side in the second half and a bit more composure from Kudus should have seen us equalise.

Brentford basically stuck 11 players behind the ball and fell over in agony every time someone came within a few yards of them. Then there was the penalty. Bowen was cleared out. It was a clear and obvious error on the part of Darren England for whom every decision usually contains a clear and obvious error.

It was referred to VAR who, instead of correcting the gob-smackingly stupid blunder, elected to compound it by adding it to the ever increasing list of blunders covered up to make the PGMOL figures look good.

Remember that stat about how few errors VAR makes? This is the reason why those stats are as dishonest as the organisation from which they defecate. Throw in the fact that the ref blew up early – allowing two substitutions and a lengthy fake injury to their ‘keeper to go without addition all added up to another fine day for the idiotocracy in charge of matches these days.

On the injury front our luck hasn’t changed. Lucas Paqueta has been injured in a training ground collision with Aaron Wan-Bissaka. Having gone over on his ankle, he’s likely to miss this weekend and the Leicester match next Thursday.

Valdimir Coufal’s thigh is likely to keep him out for a similar period. Crysensio Summerville is looking at an early April return. Niclas Fullkrug is still a while away and, of course Michail Antonio will be ages yet. The recent photo of him on his rehab was good news, though the amount of muscle wastage on the leg with the most damage was astounding.

So on to the prediction. Well on the bright side, we won’t have Anthony Taylor in charge so that may save a few goals. Ferguson will have had another week training. However, I see this going the way of Chelsea away – any good work being undone by an official giving them a helping hand.

So the £2.50 that I was going to spend on a copy of the Psychology Today article “The Top Ten Secrets Of Effective Liars” to distribute to the hierarchy at PGMOL in the hope they will stop tyring to insult our collective intelligence, will instead be placed, reluctantly, on a home win. Let’s call it 2-1 to them shall we, Mr. Winstone?

Enjoy the game!




When Last We met At The Haemorrhoid : Won 2-0 Premier League December 2024
A surprise but nonetheless deserved win courtesy of goals from Souceck in the first half and Mavropanos in the second. It should have been three – Benrahma missed a penalty given away by Rice. Just as an aside, they finished two points behind Manchester City in the final table. Which was nice.

Odds on?
You can get 10/1 for a West Ham victory with club sponsors Betway, although Arsenal are - understandably perhaps, given both teams' recent form - hot favourites at 1/4. The draw is also available at 19/4.

Referee: Craig Pawson
Hardly seems to matter really. For what it’s worth UEFA relegated him down to their THIRD level of officials at the start of this season. PGMOL think he’s great. Go figure.

Danger Man: Raheem Sterling
No, hear me out. Here’s a player having a season on the lousy side of the scale. Hasn’t scored since they beat Bolton in the League Cup back in September, a goal which remains the player’s only goal in 19 matches across all competitions this season. Of COURSE he’s going to score against us.

Percy and Daisy’s Arsenal Fact Of The Week Type Thing
Some years ago Arsenal got away with a spot of dodgy dealing as a passport scandal rocked Europe. Having somehow been tipped off that Silvinho’s Portuguese passport might not actually be the genuine article, they flogged the player in something of a rush to Celta Vigo, cheerfully announcing to the investigators “you’ve just missed him”. The best thing about all this though was the BBC website report on the matter which contained a photo of Sepp “Mr Brown Paper Bag” Blatter underneath which they had added the caption: “Blatter is concerned by dishonesty in the game”. Yes THAT Sepp Blatter!

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