Arsenal Survive November and the Mets Prepare For 2011

Winners

As in past seasons November proved to be a challenging month for Arsenal.  A home defeat to Newcastle was hard enough but wasting an opportunity to lock up a spot in the knockout stages of the Champions League to a mediocre Braga side was gut wrenching.  Bad as these two losses were, the real "knife in the back moment" for all Gunners came when Arsenal blew a 2-0 half time lead to the Spuds of Tottenham, losing 3-2 in front of the Emirates crowd.

Since then, Arsenal beat Villa 4-2 in the league and locked up a spot in the semi finals of the Carling Cup with an easy 2-0 win over Wigan.  Despite all the disappointments of November, Arsenal are still alive in all competitions and along with Chelsea sit just two points behind current leaders Manchester United. Chelsea have had a real dip in form (very enjoyable to see) and are ahead of Arsenal in the standings solely on goal differential.  Man. U. don't look too good themselves.  Despite not having lost in the league yet this season, they've blown several leads and have a large number of draws.  With Shrek back in the fold, they hope form will improve.

An additional bright spot was seeing Alex Ferguson and his egotistical side get whipped by last place West Ham in the other Carling Cup quarter finals.  Of course once they lost, Man. U. supporters put a spin on the result by claiming that it was just their reserves and it was just the Carling Cup.  Whatever, we'll take it.

Arsenal have been drawn against dirtbag Roy Keane and his Ipswich team in the Carling Cup semi-finals. The trophy drought could soon be over for the boys from North London.


On a nostalgic note, it was weird but pretty cool seeing former Arsenal legend Robert Pires back in uniform amongst Arsene Wenger and Arsenal, albeit in a Villa jersey.



Losers



As for the Mets, the winter meetings get underway this weekend in Orlando and Mets fans everywhere are holding their breath.  Now that a new GM and manager are in place, putting together the roster for 2011 is priority number one.  Typical for Mets fans, however, is the breaking news that Johan Santana won't be ready to pitch for the team until JUNE.  It's looking like 2012 can't come soon enough for this team.