Happy Friday folks!

I’ve not been drinking for a few weeks and, unlike when I set myself one of those ‘don’t drink for a calendar month’ jobbies, this time around I just did it midway through the month after I got back from Greece and I found the first couple of week’s really easy. They just flew by. The reason I tell you this, my dear friend, is that I feel like this Interlull has managed to fly by already. Now, the downside of my non-drinking is that I found out I really like beer and wine and once I got to two-and-a-half weeks in to my none drinking, I started to fancy a pint. Or a glass of Napa Valley Cab Sav. So clearly the ‘it’s easy’ feeling dissipates after a while and now I find myself really hankering for booze. And I suspect it will be the same for The Arsenal come this weekend. I hadn’t even been thinking about the internationals and as I got home from work last night and fired up the gas for some cooking, I switched on the TV in the kitchen and England were just kicking off.

I just hope that by the time Monday/Tuesday rolls around, I still have that “huh, that’s gone quickly” feeling. It will make this pointless footballing weekend a little easier to take.

I did watch the first 45 of England versus Wales. Well, I say ‘watch’, but in reality I was cooking so it was on in the background. I saw enough to see that Rice was pulling the strings as captain and Saka was doing Saka things by belting an absolute beauty in to the top corner. Save that for Fulham away, son. MLS got some minutes at the end and so that’s good to see him bag another cap for a 15 minute cameo.

Other than that, I didn’t bother watching the second half and the only other Arsenal player that I think was in action was Jurrien Timber, who bloody well played the whole 90 against Malta, which is a bit annoying. By the looks of it he played as a centre half and so perhaps given that the Dutch will have dominated the ball, that means his body wasn’t put under as much stress. If you’re a full back these days you’re 100% doing more running as you join attacks compared to playing centre half, so I am going to speculate that we find ourselves in a situation in which he hasn’t exerted as much stress on his body as he might have done playing right back. At least that’s what I hope, anyway.

The Dutch played Weghorst at centre forward, so I suspect it was a rotated team, which means I have my fingers crossed that when they play Poland on Sunday Jurrien is once again moved to the bench. Sorry Jurrien, but you are far too important to us, for us to be happy that you are being risked against the Finnish. In Belarus Christian Norgaard got off the subs bench on 64 minutes, which is one player you’d say it was good that they’re getting game time given the lack of minutes he’s had so far.

Today we’ll see more of our boys go through the international mill with Big Vik for Sweden against Switzerland, Saliba up for France against Ukraine, Leo in the squad against North Macedonia and Brazil playing away to South Korea. That means big trips for Big Gabi and Martinelli too. Honestly, why can’t they play a friendly against the Isle of Man or something? There’s also under-21s action for Ethan and under-19s action for Dowman, who I expect will bag a hat trick of goals away to Belgium because, at this stage, playing him in the under-19s is a bit like when I was asked to play up against the under-7s because my brother was playing and my uncle was taking training with me having nothing to do. I was 10 against six-year-olds. It was great fun having them all run around me, but I don’t think it made for a great watch, nor great training for those kids. That’s where we’re at with Max. Just whack him in to the 21s guys – he’s no doubt good enough I suspect.

Then tomorrow we’ll have Spain in action against Georgia and Italy away to Estonia. I think that concludes round one of these horrific football matches, but by Wednesday next week we should have all of the players responding and I have to say, I’m glad a lot of these fixtures have been pulled forward. If we take the two Brazilian Gabi’s, for example; they’ll finish their game against Japan on Tuesday, spending Wednesday travelling, by Thursday be back at home and then maybe on Friday they can take some part in training before Saturday. When they’ve had games in South America that have been on Wednesday it’s been a bit of an ask to have them be ready for a Saturday kick off, but that extra 24 hours this time might do them – and us – a world of good.

Because there’s no proper football this weekend they’ll be no Arteta press conference, nor is there any opportunity to have a little look at what opposition fans are feeling ahead of the weekend’s action, so I’m going to put a pin in today’s musings and be back tomorrow with more Arsenal-related thoughts. See you then.