I RECKON that after 11 years of the same man managing the team I allow to matter a little more in the grand scheme of my life than they probably should, it’s little surprise I’ve started to adopt the odd trait of his.

For example, I plead guilty to returning from the odd night and whipping up the occasional plate of steamed broccoli in the hope it would somehow make me a more efficient, streamlined individual the next day. It didn’t.

And I’m also probably guilty of adopting some of his soreness at losing. I tell you, for a game that didn’t matter, I was incandescent on Tuesday night. Sure, it was a horrible cock-up by Senderos, but speaking to myself as much as you: “Get a grip! It was one game that didn’t matter anyway.”

It’s hard to know with Arsene whether his histrionics (for that’s what they are) make things worse or instead serve to take the heat off the players. If it’s the latter then it’s a stroke of luck really because all roads point to this being a man genuinely driven by an appalling acceptance of losing. It may not come across too well to some in the meantime, but the day it ceases will probably also be the day when he realises his time is up.

I do wonder, however, if underneath the bruised reaction of both boss and fans to defeat on Tuesday lies a greater insecurity. Are we haunted by seasons past, where one innocuous loss has rapidly led to another and before we know it things are slipping away from us?

If so, it shouldn’t. We are through to the knock-out stages of the Champions League and going on our performances two years ago against Real and last year against PSV, I’m not sure whether us picking a so called smaller side would in fact be any kind of advantage.

And in the league, we’re in a position where there is little chance of us running away with things (three strong challengers will ensure that) but equally we’ve got ourselves to a spot where a slip-up of a few points will not leave us off the pace. And that’s something to be cherished.

Which brings us to Villa tomorrow and it’s not ideal to be playing them on their back of their 4-0 win at Blackburn because frankly, that’s an impressive result.

The likely absences of Hleb, Cesc and RVP is not great either because despite all Adebayor’s goals, they have probably be our three most potent attackers.

I only hope Arsene plumps for 4-4-2 rather than 4-5-1, which really seems to have very little point whatsoever. It’s almost certain Adebayor will start and having largely rested him in midweek, I wonder if Theo will come in. Unless he thinks Adebayor and Bendtner can play together - which might not be as impossible as you would naturally think.

Then it should be Rosicky, Eboue, Flamini and one other. The temptation would be Denilson, given that he is probably the most creative and Cesc like of the rest of the bunch. Though that said, Diarra’s rest could also see him play.

And if Clichy is fit to return, we should be full-strength at the back and compared to the one that played in Sevilla, it should be a marked improvement. It’s no insult to Justin Hoyte and Armando Traore to say Sagna and Clichy are currently some way ahead of them. Not only do they boost us going forward, but they are defensively more assured too.

And Gallas for Senderos should be no bad thing either. So let us not panic. It’s a tough run of games but they happen and we’re in a great position. A win would be nice and Blackburn not capitulating at home to Newcastle in the way they did to Villa three days before we played them would be appreciated as well.

PLAYA RATINGS

ALMUNIA
Blameless for the goals and largely faultless with the exception of one poorly punched corner.7

HOYTE
Fine. I liked his ‘accidental’ stamp. The guy completely deserved it. Go in like that and you can have no complaints about getting hurt.6.5

TOURE
Looked good next to Senderos. But then so would I. Unlucky for the penalty.7

SENDEROS
In an excellent squad, he stands out.5

TRAORE
Given a bit of a runaround but looks seriously good.6.5

CESC
Started well but faded seriously. Back in the game at the start of the second half but then pulled his hamstring.6

GILBERTO
Marginally at fault for the opening goal and not at his sharpest. Failed to get a foothold on the game in the second half..6

EBOUE
Honestly, if this guy got his head together he could be excellent. There were some outstanding moments where he beat his man and crossed brilliant balls in too. But there was the usual idiocy too.7

DENILSON
Like the team, he looked sharp from the start. Like the team, he faded afterwards.6

EDUARDO
Brilliantly taken goal and frankly that’s all you can ask for from a striker in a game like this. Looked really dangerous early on, far less so as the team waned.7

BENDTNER
Brilliant work for the goal and looked really sharp early on. In fact, he looked really sharp for most of the game. It’s fair to say he’s pushing Adebayor for a place in the side.7

SUB: ROSICKY
Failed to make an impact of any kind.6

SUB: SAGNA
Unlucky for the penalty.6.5

SUB: WALCOTT
Little time to make an impression.6.5

AFTER going 28 games without defeat I should really be sanguine about this loss.

I’m not. In fact, I’m bloody furious.

Why? Because we started brilliantly and threw it away due to sheer ineptitude.

Ignore the ITV prattling on about poor defending for our goal (they are to football analysis what England are to Euro2008) and instead appreciate how brilliantly worked it was.

It all started so well

An ingenious back heel down the line from Eboue (no, really), great hold up play and a perfectly flighted ball from the excellent Bendtner and the kind of attacking play from Eduardo that had it come from Rooney would have prompted Man U supporting commentator Clive Tyldesley to completely lose it. The Broatian chested the ball, ignored a barge in the back, took it past the keeper and defender and slotted it home. Lovely.

And we were in total control. In fact, we were confounding my expectations. I’d banked on a really tough night but we had drawn the Sevilla sting, got our lead and were in control. All that is required in these situations is sufficient defensive competence to ensure that if you do concede it will at least be a good goal and sufficient attacking nous to snaffle a second if the chance arises.

Instead we got Phillipe Senderos. I’m going to lay the criticism on like custard here because most of the time this guy dodges bullets with a deftness that would make former Prime Minister Blair blush. Honestly, forget Teflon Tony, up until now it’s been Teflon Phil: however inept his defending, it’s been impossible to pin responsibility for a single goal on him this season.

But not any more because his shanked clearance for the Sevilla clearance was inexcusable. Honestly, I put in a distinctively average substitute appearance for a Sunday league side on err Sunday but nothing I did was remotely as bad as what Senderos did.

Don’t get me wrong - had Kolo done the same I’d have dismissed it as an aberration. But this had been coming and loathe as I am to overreact, you have to ask where things are going for Senderos. It’s been cock-up after cock-up and it’s hard really to argue that he’s improving when he should be.

It was all the inspiration Sevilla needed to turn the tables and we can only be thankful it happened in a largely irrelevant game as opposed to a crucial qualifier. But the worry is it will happen again and potentially in a more important game.

We essentially had to win the game again and against a decent Sevilla side with their tails up it proved tough. Their second goal was well worked and despite the best efforts of Bendtner, we struggled to create much.

The most obvious sign of our inferiority was Cesc’s failure to touch the ball for the final quarter of an hour of the first half.

There were a few interesting moments, such as Eboue being brought down for what should have been a penalty. But staking your future on an Emmanuel Eboue penalty claim is about as safe as sticking your life savings in Northern Rock, so we can hardly complain.

Given his position, how the ref could give a penalty (subsequently overturned) for the handball by Senderos is beyond me. Were it the official’s job to punish crap defending, then fair enough. But it’s not and that was never a penalty. The penalty that was given was generous too, but we can hardly complain about the defeat.

It’s a frustrating result because it was a needless loss. What matters now is that unlike the reverse at Old Trafford three years ago, we don’t let the end of an unbeaten run get to us. We’ve three tough away games coming up and a win would have been great but there is no need for a defeat to be a death knell either.

Before I finish, I should correct a couple of inaccuracies spouted on ITV. The first is that when Toure goes to Africa, it will automatically be Gallas and Senderos with Gilberto as back-up. It won’t. Djourou will be back.

And secondly, we do not need Slavia Prague to beat Sevilla. We have to beat Bucharest and if we do, then a point for Slavia will see us qualify as top of the group. There you have it.

IT’S the first of two “Villas” in five days tonight and I suppose more than anything we’re protecting our unbeaten record stretching back 28 games.

Gunnerblog has had a very reasonable punt at the team and I’d agree that Hoyte and Traore that Almunia, Hoyte, Traore, Senderos and Toure will make up the defence.

The latter will, of course, be captain. But things could have been so very different for way back in summer 2005 Arsene seriously considered making big Phil Senderos captain in the aftermath of Patrick Vieira’s shock departure.

The revelation comes via Tony Adams in Xavier Rivoire’s biography of the boss, which I finally got round to reading on my recent holiday. Adams reveals:

It’s quite a thought really. Say what you like about Thierry Henry’s captaincy, I think it’s safe to say giving Senderos the armband could have created some serious problems. You can’t really drop your captain but you can’t really argue Senderos and Toure OR Gallas would currently be an improvement on Toure AND Gallas.

The book itself is a largely decent read, but I’ll leave a more geeky review of it for another day.

Unlike Gunnerblog, I reckon we could see Eboue or more likely Rosicky (or even both) given a rest, with either Denilson or Diarra filling in on the flanks and Gilberto and possibly Cesc coming in. Equally, Cesc could be used as an impact player from the bench, which he’s quite decent at (see Wigan away last season).

Up front it’s Bendtner and one other.

Here’s hoping the Freeview reception holds tonight as I can’t be bothered to go to the pub.

THERE was this infuriating old Irish guy in the pub walking around after 75 minutes proclaiming: “I tell you, I’ve been watching for 50 years and this team always scores late. They always score late.”

Of course I knew it was true but the last thing you do in these situations is to jinx the situation and admit as much. So this ridiculous standoff emerged where I refused to acknowledge it, he prattled on and on and then when we did score, he proclaimed some sort of moral victory when in fact if anyone was to be congratulated, it should have been me for keeping schtum.

Anyway, the extent to which we missed Cesc and Hleb should not be too concerning.

Any team would miss their two play-makers. And to me our disjointedness looked more a measure of the pair’s excellence thus far than any great deficiencies among their replacements.

Cesc is now back - but Hleb’s absence will last a few weeks longer and perhaps now is the time for Tomas Rosicky to step up and really show what he can do.

He was by no means outstanding on Saturday, but I thought he did decently enough and looked a little sparkier and livelier than usual. For those of you like me who at 0-0 begs us to score and then when we do gets twice as nervy, the clinching second goal was a blessed relief.

And there was something distinctly Piresian about the way Rosicky took it. As Bendtner (who again made a telling difference) set the number 7 gallivanting towards goal, my thought as “Bobby Pires would have tucked this away”. Tommy R didn’t so much slide it as semi scuff the ball home. But in the circumstances it was actually a very controlled finish with the ball bouncing around like mad beforehand.

By our standards, this was one of our less coherent dominations where we enjoy 76 per cent overall possession. Adebayor and Theo looked like strangers. The youngster enjoyed impressive cameos but still looks very green. But that’s cool. Cesc may have been a star at 18 but remember it took Joe Cole til 22 or 23 next time you prepare to write off Theo.

Diarra and Denilson were fine but unspectacular. Eboue did some stuff very well. But he also does other simple things very badly. It’s infuriating.

Sagna and Clichy were, as ever, very good. Their attitudes are excellent and if you ever had to take footballers into the trenches with you (which you wouldn’t), you’d nab em.

Finally, we come to Kolo and Gallas. The two have been inspirational recently and my only complaint would be that perhaps they do not get forward enough against the likes of Wigan. Struggling sides can spend all week figuring out how to stifle Hleb or Cesc or any of our other attackers.

But chuck Gallas or Kolo in and they frequently look stumped. Anyway, the march continues. More tonight or tomorrow.

WELL, it’s hard to believe the FA are meeting to offer him their unqualified support when they convene at 8.30am.

And rightly so. That it is so easy to ditch an international manager and so hard to completely discard the equally culpable players may be unfair, but it does not change the fact that Steve McClaren has nothing to offer England.

There is no “yes, but”. There are no successes at club level that could offer a reprieve. And there was no hard luck story against Croatia worthy of offering another chance.

England were utterly dismal with the sole exception of one magnificent ball from Beckham and a perfect finish from Crouch. Scott Carson was to blame for one goal in a terrible campaign. Nothing more. One down was hardly a mountain to climb when all we needed was a draw.

More pertinently, you could ask why big Sol Campbell allowed Eduardo a zillion touches on his left foot for the second goal and why he jumped out of the way of the shot for the third as if he were trying not to block a howitzer from one of his own players.

You could also ask why Croatia scored twice from range on a terrible pitch and England, to the best of my recollection, never once shot from distance in open play. Wembley, it should be said, not only has a terrible pitch but also a wretched television camera angle.

In fairness to McClaren, and as David Lacey pointed out in the Guardian on Saturday, he saved us from Sam Allardyce.

And for that we should be truly grateful.

But he must go. Unless it means Allardyce, obviously.