Cesc & Senderos advance! Adebayor ...

No less than five Arsenal players involved yesterday. Let’s begin!

Cesc Fabregas came on for Spain yesterday in the match against Tunisia as a sub along with Raul in the 45 minute and demonstrated exactly why he is such an important asset for the club. The Spaniards were trailing to a goal by Tunisia from as early as the 8th minute and were like that the entire half. Then our super boy Cesc appeared and made an impact soon. As soon as he came on he struck a 20 yard kick only to be fisted by the Tunisian goalkeeper Ali Boumnijel. Then Cesc played his part. In the 71st minute Joaquin Sanchez made a cross from the right of the box which was dummied well by Torres for the ball to be received by Cesc who took a first time shot on the goal but the goalkeeper Ali Boumnijel parried the ball which fell in the path of the onrushing Raul who actually did well to slot the ball home on the rebound and make Cesc’ s effort count. Spain had equalized now.

Both the substitutions had paid off but there was more to come from the arsenal player. Soon he got into the box again and his effort was blocked by the goalkeeper. Soon Spain took a lead in the 76th minute. And Cesc was to be involved in that too. This time Cesc delivered an exquisite pass from his own half to coincide with Torres excellent run and Torres rounded off the goalkeeper before he put the ball in the net to make it 2-1 for Spain. Spain eventually won the match 3-1 after Torres slotted another one through a penalty late in the game. A nice game for Fabregas but not so for Reyes as he was an unused sub in the match. Fabregas played his part very well and if only he could have scored one for himself. No worries. He will get scoring himself soon!

Later, after the game, Cesc stressed the importance of the win for Spain by saying:

We had belief and it’s always important to come back in the game like that because we knew that a win would put us into the next round.

The significance of the contribution made by Cesc wasn’t lost on the Spanish coach Luis Aragones when amongst other things he said:

We dealt with it after the break though, with Xavi improving and Cesc (Fabregas) coming on and doing a good job. In the second half, we played our quick, technical game and created danger. We don't have huge, physical players, so we have to rely on our strengths. Raul is fast and has great technique, and that paid dividends. Bringing him and Cesc on worked out very well.

There were 2 matches that involved Arsenal players yesterday. One was the one wrote of above i.e. Spain Vs Tunisia and the other one Togo Vs Switzerland. I have finished off with the first one wherein we had Cesc and Reyes involved, now the second one. In the second we had three arsenal players taking part and they were Senderos and Johan Djourou for Switzerland and Adebayor for Togo.

Senderos played a full 90 minutes as the Swiss won the match 2-0 with a goal in each half. That gives Senderos a second clean sheet to his name in two matches until now in the World Cup. Johan Djourou was an unused substitute here. With the win the Swiss have made their qualification foe the knock-out rounds a good possibility and with that comes for Senderos more chances to play for his country.
But, as I said earlier, another arsenal player Adebayor was involved in the game. The defeat was a blow for Togo who were making their debut in the World Cup and have now crashed out on account of two back to back defeats. Adebayor himself played well but couldn’t conjure up a goal. Later Adebayor said:

The Swiss were strong on the counter-attack. We had problems with our build-up play. I was always asking for the ball but unfortunately I didn’t always receive the support. We’re not disappointed because we gave our best and could have won
the game.

It would have been fantastic to see him score some goals in the World Cup but it’s not so the case as he and Togo now head home.

Lots of news to come in tomorrow as a few more arsenal players involved in todays fixtures as Germany(Jens) takes on Ecuador and Sweden (Freddie) will fight it out with England (Ashely Cole, Sol and Theo).

Lets hope Theo gets a break today.