I have always been an advocate of fair play in football and Arsene Wenger has certainly tried to make his Arsenal team stick to those principles in recent years. More and more though, we hear that Arsenal have lost a key factor that we had when winning titles in the years up to an including the amazing invincibles season.
A lot of pundits have claimed that the loss of and failure to replace combative players like Vieira and Keown has made Arsenal a soft touch. I am not so sure, but when we get three players sent off in two games without committing many fouls and actually being on the receiving end, I have to question the point of playing fair.
Also, you can bet that all teams that are due to play Arsenal in the coming weeks and months will try to bully us and get under our skin. So we need to be ready and to meet fire with fire. If that means picking up a few more yellow cards than usual, so be it.
If I am sick of the rough treatment the Arsenal team gets, how much more sick of it must the players be? Arsene Wenger needs to get his team to add some nasty to their passing game and I would start with bringing Flamini back to face the spuds. What do you think Gooners?