Arsenal 1 - 0 Villareal

This squirrel must be one of the travelling Villareal fans who tried its best to test our defense with its low gravity, pace and trickery. Of course Lehmann was up for the task of ushering the invader away; he is the best goalkeeper in the season's Champions League anyway.

Villareal are above all, a team. They showed that last night with their tight defense and good communication among teammates. David Platt wrote an interesting piece in the Guardian on how Villareal, by crowding the centre of the park, managed to halt Arsenal while at the same time eliminating spaces needed by their very own playmaker, Riquelme, to operate. But they seemed satisfied with the result. They believe that they could keep cleansheet and score two against us at their own home. To be honest, I believe they could. So does Wenger.

We need to be at our best defensively to protect the lead and try to score a precious away goal early in the second leg. Villareal, on the other hand, will play more attacking football and Riquelme will be unleashed to roam more freely. Riquelme can dictate the tempo of the game and we must not allow that to happen. We will probably see the best of Riquelme in the second leg. So we will need the best of Gilberto to deal with him.

Gilberto earned praise for his performance and as much as I dislike him, I have to say that he has played very well lately. He has taken up the responsibility of being the senior player. His passing is still awful at times but he shields the back four excellently. He was even involved in our attacks last night. If Wenger says that the quiet Brazilian is a leader, then he probably is. Well done, Gilberto!

Wenger thought that there should have been another goal and I agree. We created quite a number of chances. Henry's precise timing and Arsenal's fast pace once again 'backfired' as Henry had a good goal disallowed. Villareal themselves had a rather sound penalty claim not given. But no one can disagree that Arsenal deserve the win. And what an Arsenal goal.

Henry's clever pass found the industrious Hleb who made a run into the goalline and cut it back for Toure to score. 1-0 to Arsenal. What a precious goal. And Toure, of all, deserves to be the scorer. He has been giving his all and never stop fighting. A friend of mine asked me few days ago 'Who is your favorite Arsenal player at the moment?' That man is Kolo Toure.

I just love this pic. Looking at Senderos, Cesc, and Flamini hugging the goalscorer. They are all our future. They are the bunch of kids who have grown unbelieveably in the last few months. Senderos took a huge blow for his mistakes against Drogba but the big Swiss kept his head down and worked hard to improve. He showed that above all, he is not a quitter. So was Cesc who was expected to replace PV. Flamini has of course been even more exceptional. He is the one with limited talent but he has been our new Ray Parlour. I said this before and I will repeat this. Flamini is a great soldier Wenger has to keep in the side. A man who knows his limit and play to his strength is one who can win the battle.

And in Kolo Toure, these kids have a leader whose passion and determination is there for them to see week in week out. Awesome.

*pics taken from the Sun's website