Player Ratings - CL: Steaua București vs Arsenal | 02/10/07

[Lukazan]

Almunia - 6 One dodgy moment but otherwise solid.

Sagna - 7 Solid at the back and supported the attack well, although chose to play it safe most of the time.

Senderos - 8 Flawless display. More of the same please, Phil.

Toure - 7 One mistake but otherwise solid. Also saved off the line.

Clichy - 7 Decision making was a little off at times and his final ball was, again, poor but he defended brilliantly and always made himself available on the attack.

Eboue - 4 One moment aside, very poor.

Fabregas - 6.5 Not his best performance but he was still too good for Bucharest.

Flamini - 8 Another sensational game. It's hard to see Gilberto, or anyone else for that matter, getting in midfield alongside Fabregas.

Hleb - 8 Thought he was great. A couple of sloppy moments but he was involved in just about everything we created tonight, including the goal. We should be thanking our lucky stars he's back so soon after the tackle on Saturday.

Adebayor - 6 Decent second half but a horrible piss-poor first half. Decision making and touch were off all night but credit to him, he carried on and played a big part in our goal.

RVP - 6.5 Got the goal with a sublime finish and linked up quite well in the first half but overall was abit quiet.

 

[Guillermo]

I'm agreed with pretty-much all your ratings, Luka, except that of Adebayor. I think you may have been a little harsh on him.

He ran all night, as we have come to expect, but it was penetrative and clever running. I love the way he holds the ball up after breaking the offside trap.

He was probably denied a good goal too.

 

[Lord Dula]

Almunia 7
Sagna 7.5
Toure 6.5
Senderos 7
Clichy 6.5
Fabregas 6.5
Hleb 7
Flamini 7.5
Eboue 6
RvP 7
Ade 7.5

 

[EMIR8_SOLDIER]

Senderos 8 MOTM

 

[cloista]

Almunia - 7 - Got lucky with Toure covering o n the line, but otherwise pretty solid.

Sagna - 7 - Solid, got forward well.

Toure - 7 - Solid, Captain's clearance off the line, but a dodgy moment.

Senderos - 8 - Dominant.

Clichy - 7 - Got forward well, but final ball was off. Defended solidly.

Eboue - 4 - Made me want Theo on the right...

Cesc - 7 - A bit quiet, but probed and linked well. Should have scored.

Flamini - 8 - Arsène calls him bossy, and you have to give him credit, he's been a fantastic midfield general this season so far.

Hleb - 8 - Creative, slick, and coped with being dumped on his arse a lot.

Adebayor - 7 - Not his best, but lead the line well in general. Decision making could have been better.

RvP - 8 - Linked well and was generally difficult to pick up. Emphatic finish.

 

[-Shaun-]

Almunia 6 (Fine apart from one mistake)
Sagna 6.5 (Fairly quiet)
Touré 7 (Good as usual)
Senderos 8 (Flawless)
Clichy 7.5 (Very lively)
Fabregas 6 (Below his standards)
Hleb 8 (Very creative)
Flamini 7.5 (Another amazing game)
Eboue 6 (Never got into the game)
Van Persie 7 (Great goal)
Adebayor 8 (Was brilliant, showed amazing control and was so involved in all the attacking)

 

[Juicy]

Almunia- 7
Sagna- 7
Toure- 7
Senderos- 8
Clichy- 7
Fabregas- 6.5
Hleb- 7
Flamini 7.5
Eboue- 6.5
Van Persie- 6.5
Adebayor- 7

Senderos man of the match I think. Solid would be the perfect way to describe how we played. There were a lot of 'sevenish' performances. I was very impressed with Senderos. Definitely nothing special but our defence stayed reasonably strong. Van Persie was terrible, without the goal he would have got a 5 or 5.5. His only redeeming feature was that his passing wasn't too bad. Fabregas, even without thinking about his miss, was poor, though he was getting stuck in with his takckles. The defence was making a good line, although that is not too hard against slow attackers. EDIT: just remembered, I thought Flamini was good, but gave a few needless fouls away and his too footed challenge could have got him into trouble. Overall, a solid performance.

 

[qs]

Almunia 6, alrightbut made a couple of dodgy decisions, specifically the one Toure bailed him out on

Sagna 8 great game. I think we've a new Lauren.

Touré 8 great.

Senderos 8+ even better

Clichy 7 some great things some not so great, plenty involved though and had a good game over all.

Fabregas 6 Poor by his own high standards

Hleb 8 impossible to deal with. If the ref had been on his game Hleb wouldve won a dozen frees

Flamini 8 another quality performance, does so much and has improved alot on the ball.

Eboue 3 terrible. One good cross, everything else was awful.

RvP 7 good job, took his goal well. Looked the only one likely to score IMO

Ade 5 terrible first hour, improved a little and managed an assist. Not a good game though.

 

[Pepe LeFrits]

Almunia 6
Clichy 6.5
Toure 7
Senderos 7
Sagna 6.5
Hleb 7
Fabregas 6
Flamini 7.5
Eboue 4.5
van Persie 6.5
Adebayor 6.5

 

[nazo]

Almunia - 6
Sagna - 7
Senderos - 8
Touré - 7
Clichy - 7
Eboue - 4
Fabregas - 6
Flamini - 8
Hleb - 8
Adebayor - 6
RVP - 6.5

 

[tactica442]

Almunia - 6
Sagna - 7
Kolo - 7
Senderso - 7
Clichy - 7
Eboue - 5
Flamini - 6
Fabregas - 6
Hleb - 7
RVP - 7
Ade - 8

Sub:
Gilberto - 7

 

[beepos]

I was impressed with Bertie after he came on. We were being flogged by Steau before that, at least for 10 mins leading to the goal.

 

[ricky1985]

My Rating's;

Almunia - 7. Very solid throughout. Communicated with the back four well.

Sagna - 7. Excellent defensively, but needs to be more bold in his attacking play. Although didnt help having Eboue in front of him.

Clichy - 6. A bit laxidacical at times. Although he didnt really get caught out, I though he underestimated his opponents slightly. Final ball was truly shocking.

Toure - 7. Played well, but got caught out aerially a couple of times.

Senderos - 8. Imperious tonight. He completely dominated their forward line. If he could be this good against better opposition he would be top drawer.

Eboue - 5. Very poor. Completely lost in our clever football, our retention of the ball was in danger every time he got involved. Put in one good cross that no-one attacked.

Hleb - 8. Every time he got the ball we looked dangerous. Just seems to play well every game these days. Shame their wasnt a few more on his wavelength tonight.

Fabregas - 6. Another poor performance following on from the West Ham game. He was so slow with the ball at his feet tonight. There was many times when it opened up for him in midfield and he just tried a hopeful pass or played a conservative horizontal pass. He has the ability to drive with the ball but chooses not to, why?

Flamini - 8. Excellent performance. He hassled and harried, but I fully expected that against tonights opposition.

Van Persie - 7. Played well. Passing was relatively good. His explosiveness around the box is not there at the moment. Brilliantly taken goal though.

Adebayor - 7. Decent but not great. Wanted to throw something at the tele when he kept getting caught offside. Needs to have more drive and determination, he isnt good enough to coast through games.

Thoughts on the game
For me this was an infuriating game to watch. We could have spanked them tonight but we were quite happy just playing in second gear, and coasting to victory. Maybe this is a wise move, because we haven't really expended too much energy tonight, and will reap the benefits on Sunday.

I feel when we dont play at full throttle, we are pretty toothless to watch because we dont have the penetration we normally have. It was like watching a game from last season and this leads me to believe this may have been a contributing factor to our relatively poor performance against the so called weaker teams.

But we won so we collect the three points and hop-foot back to the west. Yeehaa

 

[Macho]

Senderos was good tonight wasn't he? more of the same please! Looks like those string of games are starting to pay off.

 

[awooga83]

Almunia 6
Clichy 6
Touré 7
Senderos 7
Sagna 6.5
Hleb 6.5
Fabregas 5
Flamini 6.5
Eboue 5
van Persie 6.5
Adebayor 6

 

[No.8_Wright]

Almunia - 6
Sagna - 7
Senderos - 8
Toure - 8
Clichy - 5
Hleb - 7
Fabregas - 6/7
Flamini - 8
Eboue - 5
Adebayor - 7
Van Persie - 8

I thought the centre halves were immaculate. Back to their form when we went so long without conceding on our way to the final. Sagna also played well, rarely giving the ball away.

Clichy on the other hand I thought was very below par and can not believe many people haven't picked up on it. His defending was too lazy, losing the ball in the corner was atrociously sloppy and against a better team it would have been costly. He kept the guy onside when he was through in on goal, his crossing was extremely poor and his passing lacked conviction. I am a big fan of Clichy don't get me wrong and am always full of praise for him in 80% of his games but I just don't think he was there tonight.

Eboue was awful as well. Looked like he didn't want to be there, short of match fitness and it showed. He did not make any convincing runs forward and he slowed down our play on too many occasions taking too many touches.

Flamini was immense, our best performer at the moment imo, should no way be dropped and I think he is the reason why we are picking up points in these difficult away games. That back heel was top quality!

I gave Van Persie a high rating because he had one chance, one goal, showed that he is a top class striker.

Adebayor worked very hard at times and others not so. For him to deserve a starting place in Europe he has to run his socks off and perhaps come off at the end of games because he is so tired. I still don't think his finishing is good enough at the highest level and therefore he has to be one of our hardest workers on the field.

But overall it is good to win when we are not playing well and we showed grit and determination. Flamini is the key to these type of games and needs to play in big away matches alongside Fabregas.

 

[True Gooner]

Ades control tonight was unbelievable at times - he just didnt step up enough in the first half though - caused some problems in the second half
But brilliant control imo..

 

[gunnerGH]

Almunia - 6
Sagna - 7
Kolo - 7
Senderso - 7
Clichy - 7
Eboue - 5
Flamini - 6
Fabregas - 6
Hleb - 7
RVP - 7
Ade - 8

Sub:
Gilberto - 7

Spot on....

apart from your spelling of senderos that is...

 

[godfather]

Almunia 7
Sagna 7.5
Touré 7
Senderos 7.5
Clichy 6.5
Fabregas 6.5
Hleb 7
Flamini 7.5
Eboue 6
RvP 7
Ade 8

 

[Jameel46]

Almunia - 6
Toure - 7.5
Senderos - 7
Sagna - 6.5
Clichy - 6.5
Eboue - 5.5
Flamini - 8
Fabregas - 6.5
Hleb - 7
VP - 6.5
Adebayor - 7