So we left Arsene Wenger in a hole. Stuck in the middle of a story in the depressing bit, desperately searching for his happy ending. And we feel that unless he chooses to visit one of the fine ‘Oriental Massage’ establishments, of which there are many in the back streets around Tottenham, run by fat, moustachioed Turkish women, that happy ending he otherwise seeks will be unfound.

The statistics would not be very uplifting reading for Arsenal. The percentage of teams to get through a 2-leg match after losing the first at home 3-1 is a mere 2.5%. However, its not zero. It can be done. Be a fucking miracle, statistically speaking (statisticians always swear a lot) but there is a glimmer.

Those same (bastard) statisticians claim that if you draw the first leg 1-1 (conceding that ‘vital away goal’), your chance of progress is 24.7%. As Spurs showed last night. Never a team to buck a trend, they decided to concede easily to conserve energy for the Cup Final on Sunday. A good plan.

And the loss in Florence frees the very busy schedule up a bit, so we can concentrate on important matters. Now we’ll have more time, more energy, more rest, so we can hopefully finish 5th and get into the Europa League. There’s no irony that our only hope of getting into that tournament next year is to get out of it this year. No irony, perhaps, but a great degree of circularity.

Liverpool went out of the Europa too, as did, so they keep mentioning, as if we care or consider them kindred souls, Celtic. If a mere 37 extra Scotsmen had dragged themselves out of the pub to vote ‘Yes’ last year, Glasgow would no longer be part of ‘Britain’ and we wouldn’t have to watch their football results. Scotland would be an independent sovereign state with Kenny Dalgleish as King, Alex Salmond as Oliver Cromwell and Gordon Strachan as Princess Eugenie.

So Everton remain the sole English survivor in the Europa.

And fancy putting Spurs on at 6 o’clock. Stupid bloody time. Didn’t they know I had to go and see my pension guy? So he could tell me that I should be able to retire (in abject fucking poverty) when I’m 107. So we booked a cruise for 2063. Though they’re not sure there’ll be any water left in the world by then.

Happy Ending

A xxxx