Fabianski wants to start against Spuds

Lukasz Fabianski wants to challenge for a place in the first team. For this to happen, I think he's got to do two things: firstly, displace Almunia as Arsenal's no.1 keeper; and secondly, limit his fuck-ups to one or less a game. It's a bit of a nightmare that it's very possible to achieve the former without necessarily achieving the latter.

He's setting the Tottenham Carling Cup tie as his breakthrough game. It's turning into a bit of a red-letter day for us. Tottenham are starting to emerge as a serious rival to us. There's been talk about Tottenham having a better squad than ours. It's a chance to gauge the strength of our Academy youngsters against "top 4" opposition. And now, it seems like it's another chance to witness the comic stylings of Lukasz Fabianski.

Fabianski said:

"My [target] is to challenge for a place in the first team. That is my aim and I am going to do everything to take my chances and be the number one keeper.

I will hopefully get a chance to do that in the Carling Cup game against Tottenham which is the earliest game for me to play in, where I want to show my best, show the boss that I'm able to play as the first goalkeeper.

Every game excites me, I always treat every game in the same way so there's really no big difference although I understand it is a massive game for the supporters."

Let's hope Fabianski doesn't really mean it when he says he'll treat the Carling Cup match in the same way as his other matches. If so, he'll: give the ball to the referee to allow the Spuds to shoot without him being ready; run out of the box and keep chasing opposition players; flap hopelessly, helplessly and haplessly; add to his growing collection of youTube memories. If so, we're probably going to score four and concede even more. Yes, it'll be exciting, but I'd rather we be boring and progress.

I quite like Arsenal in the Carling Cup. It's a nice chance to see our youngsters have a chance. I'd like to see Wellington strut his stuff come January 1st, so I hope we'll still be in the Carling Cup next year. And for that to happen, we need Fabianksi to approach the Tottenham tie in a different manner to which he is accustomed to - we need Fabianski to play like a fucking goalkeeper.

All in all, though, I'd rather Wojciech Szczesny in goal.

So on the 228th last day of my 20s, I had a one and half hour gap in the afternoon. Had a nap in the staff room and felt very refreshed afterwards. Might have to schedule one into every day from now on.