Happy Wednesday peeps. How you doing? Are you feeling chipper even though we’re on an international break now? I know I still am. Sitting top of the table will do that to you.

I think it is because we all know that in reality it won’t last, which is why we’re maybe taking this ‘top of the league’ stuff as far as we can and with as much good humour as possible. You can’t not just look at City and expect them to just keep on winning like some sort of relentless, unstoppable machine, especially now they have Haaland. The next team they play is Man United at home on Sunday 2nd October and that game will most certainly end in a win. Man United are a bang average team and were fortunate with one or two decisions, then got away with a slight bit of naivety from us when we played them, but we’ve seen plenty of games this season in which they haven’t looked great at all and I would expect City to turn them over comfortably. When you compare that with the game against the Scum we have, in which it will be bloody tough as they are probably the best team in the league at sitting camped in their own half and springing the counter, it is why we need to bask in the glory of being top of the league right now, because it won’t last forever and probably won’t be the case in another seven games time.

But that’s fine, I’m ok with it and right now, I’m just enjoying thinking about The Arsenal and the performances so far this season that have got us to where we are. The weather has been good this season and the sun has been shining on our season, that’s for sure.

When you’re riling up sections of the mainstream media like some of the idiots on TalkSh*te too, it can only be a good thing, because they can’t bash us about the football so now it’s the fact we played a 15-year-old last Sunday. Danny Mills – still reeling from having his career rendered effectively redundant by Thierry Henry all those years ago – wanted to have his say and unsurprisingly he’s said it isn’t right, how do the other academy players feel, blah, blah, blah…

Here’s the thing Danny:

  1. You don’t get to choose what decisions an Arsenal manager makes
  2. Arteta and his team are a little closer to the Arsenal academy players than you are
  3. If I’m an 18-year-old at Arsenal right now I’m thinking “if I impress, I’m going to get my chance to make the matchday squad. Arteta has just shown that”
  4. You don’t understand the context because apparently this kid is being touted by all the big clubs in England. By giving him this experience now, does it bond him closer to the club and lessen the chances of having his head turned by those other clubs?
  5. You are Danny Mills and your views have always amounted to the square root of f*ck all. It’s well documented how much you don’t like Arsenal. Oh, and by the way, is this you suggesting that Ben White should be at Man United ahead of Arsenal?

I haven’t really spoken too much about the debut of Ethan Nwaneri and his record breaking appearance at the weekend, probably because to me it didn’t really feel like a ‘big’ thing. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great for him, at 15 he’s already achieved my dream of playing for Arsenal for even just a minute or two, so that’s a memory he can have forever. Getting Arsenal in to the history books by playing the youngest ever kid in the Premier League is nice, but it doesn’t really mean much at all. I’m not really expecting him to rock up in the League Cup when we play them at the Emirates in November and that might be a time in which some of those 18 and 19-year-olds get some bench time or maybe one or two get on the pitch. If I’m an 18-year-old I’m earmarking longer than a token couple of minutes on the pitch in a league game in which Arsenal are cruising and because of injuries have had to take some of the kids along with them to Brentford. Instead, I’m getting my head down and looking to see if I can have 5, 10 or 15 minutes in the League Cup.

So, in short, this symbolic gesture of playing Nwaneri for a couple of minutes at the end of the game was nothing more than a nice occasion for the lad and I’m sure he enjoyed it, we all know his name now, so it’ll be back to getting his head down, impressing in the youth team and if he progresses enough then within the next four years we might see him line up in the first team again in the future perhaps.

Other than that storm in a teacup that has been generated by a couple of minutes at the end of a game we comprehensively won, there isn’t a lot going on, as you’d expect. I quite liked the article from Matt Turner about his first few months at The Arsenal but rather than pour over the comments he made you should check out the guys at Arseblog News who have his comments in a little more depth. I like the guy. Alright, he’s had a slightly shaky start in a couple of matches, we’ve all heard the stories about how the distribution with the ball at his feet isn’t great, but let’s give him a chance, eh? I think most Arsenal fans are willing to do that and hey, providing Ramsdale stays fit we’re all good with him as a backup. He’ll get a few more minutes in the Europa League to get more chance to warm up to our game and hopefully we can start to see signs of his improved distribution as he gets more training under his belt.

That’s it from me today. Time to head off to the world of work so I’ll catch you peeps tomorrow. Have a good one.