Morning folks – how are we all holding up?

On Wednesday night I couldn’t watch the game, as I was working, which meant I just found out about the result after it had happened. Because I was at a client networking dinner that i’d organised, it meant I was given access to a few beverages and so I was kind of drowning my sorrows before we’d even kicked off. I listened to the Arsecast Extra yesterday and James joked about ‘pre-grieving’; I think that was me leading up to this game and then even on the night before a ball was kicked.

My expectations going in to the game were basically zero, so when I found out the result, I was sad, upset, felt down, but I think not being immersed in the game itself meant that I was able to compartmentalise it a little. I put it in to a box and if I’m honest, although yesterday I used a hangover as my excuse as to why I didn’t write any thoughts yesterday on it on here, I don’t think I was ready to take it out of the box until today. So here I am.

I wasn’t down to do the Same old Arsenal show as I couldn’t get on last night as it was last night, but even if I could, it still would have been tough to ‘take it out of the box’. And it got me to thinking about the mindset of those Arsenal players and wondering where their heads are at this morning. Are they still reeling from the defeat? Are they able to basically just chuck that poor performance on a metaphorical dumpster fire and move on? They kind of have to, I guess, because there are still five games left to go. We may now find it uncomfortable with the slow and monotonous march towards the league title that Bayern….sorry…CITY….will now have for the remainder of the season, but as Ramsdale said in the immediate aftermath of the game on Wednesday, we have to do our thing and be ready to pounce in case some kind of miracle happens. The likelihood is slim and by Sunday afternoon City will be top of the league after they pull apart a Fulham side who are on the beach, before doing over a West Ham side who have secured their Premier League status and will no doubt have an eye on their Europa Conference League chances in the semi final.

But the players need to just get themselves in a bubble, focus on Chelsea on Tuesday, with the hope that they can somehow overcome them in a London Derby. Chelsea may be terrible this season, but they are better than a terrible Southampton side who picked up a draw at the Emirates, but who I see from last night’s results have turned back in to the team who can’t score goals and lost at home to Bournemouth. Just as I said – they’ve saved their goalscoring for us and have turned back in to a joke. I hope they get relegated (bitter, me?).

In a way, having that game on Tuesday might be a good thing. I am going to take the weekend to relax and not get stressed about football too much. I certainly won’t be tuning in on Sunday and this weekend The Management and I are off to see some friends in Leamington Spa. It’s a bank holiday here in the UK and that means that I’ll go for a couple of days, not bother with football, hopefully refresh and reset myself in prep for heading towards the Emirates on Tuesday night. We’re going to need some sort of a result against Lampard’s stuttering team, that’s for sure.

And so I think I might call a halt to today’s proceedings. There is no point in me going over the game in any detail as I didn’t watch it. There is no point in me casting doubt on Arteta’s decision to change nothing, because I didn’t see it play out, I’ve only heard it from other fans. I’ve seen some of the goals and the defending is all kinds of woeful, but right now if I am honest, I don’t really have the energy to get angry with the players. They got us in to a great position up to this point, they have fallen at one of the last hurdles, a lot of that is down to injuries in defence and here we are.

So back in ‘the box’ goes this City result and hopefully I can try not to think about the fact that the title is basically done. I’ve been telling myself all season that it wasn’t on in the first place. Maybe the ‘pre-grieving’ started longer ago than I thought.

Catch you guys tomorrow.