Morning.
Happy Friday everyone. This is gonna be a very quick blog before I go and ruin a nice walk by trying to hit a small ball into a hole very far away. Let’s start with Bukayo Saka who scored a cracking goal for England as they beat Wales 3-0 in a friendly last night.
It’s a classic Saka strike, on his left foot from just inside the box, and he put it pretty close to top corner giving the keeper no chance. Watch here. It feels like it’s been a while since he’s scored one of those for us, but it’s a nice reminder that this is what he has in his locker, and I’m pretty sure we’ll see him do this again in red and white sooner rather than later.
It’s easy to forget he’s still only 24, and while the start to this season has been a bit stop/start, on top of a big absence last season, when he’s fit and playing regularly, he is all about goals and assists. England have a World Cup qualifier away to Latvia on Tuesday and there’s no doubt he’s going to play in that. Hopefully a game they can win comfortably so he doesn’t have to do 90 minutes before we face Fulham when the real stuff returns.
Declan Rice captained England last night, and played 70 minutes, while Myles Lewis-Skelly came on for the final 10 minutes or so. Eberechi Eze didn’t get off the bench. Afterwards, Thomas Tuchel was critical of the lack of support for his side, saying:
We could have been 5-0 up at half-time. We couldn’t score the fourth and fifth ones. The stadium was silent. We didn’t get any energy back from the stands. I would have wished for a bit more support in phases where it gets difficult. In the second half to get behind us, there was a bit too much support for Wales. It could have helped us to regain energy, but it is what it is and that is it.
It’s an interesting road to go down, because it feels – from the outside at least – his relationship with England fans isn’t particularly great. I know we’ve all become used to the idea of ‘foreign’ managers taking charge of other countries, but a German man in this job is always going to be under extra scrutiny from sections of the support. That said, I kinda like that Tuchel doesn’t seem to give a shit about that and will speak his mind, but I wonder too if the atmosphere is simply a by-product of the complete over-saturation of football these days.
There’s no escape from the game at any point, so everything feels kind of routine or mundane. Nothing is special anymore. It’s just all football, all the time, and eventually I think that will impact how people react and behave. I don’t think this is an issue for international games only, by the way. You could just as easily apply this to the Premier League at times too. Anyway, Tuchel’s job is to win matches, not necessarily the hearts and minds of the fans with his post-game press conferences. And if he does the former, he’ll keep most of the complaints to a minimum.
Meanwhile, in Belarus Christian Norgaard got some minutes in the second half as Denmark won 6-0 in their World Cup qualifier. And in Malta, Jurrien Timber played at centre-half alongside Virgil van Dijk as the Netherlands ran out 4-0 winners in that game.
As for tonight’s Arsenal involvement, William Saliba could play for France as they take on Azerbaijan at home; Gabriel and Gabriel Martinelli could feature for Brazil in a friendly away against South Korea; Viktor Gyokeres’ Sweden face Switzerland in a World Cup qualifier; Leandro Trossard and Belgium take on North Macedonia; while Tommy Setford and Ethan Nwaneri are in the England U20 and U21 squads respectively, and Cristhian Mosquera will likely be in action for Spain’s U21s at home to Norway.
So, plenty of our lads in action, and let’s hope for clean bills of health all round. Righto, I’m gonna leave it there for this morning. If you haven’t had a chance to listen yet, there’s a good Interlull chat with Clive Palmer in the latest Arsecast which is below. Have a good Friday folks.
