Will Arsenal deliberately try to injure Bale....or are they above that??

[Ribble]

Their players are more likely to injure themselves trying to put in a hard tackle than Bale.

Charlie Adam on the other hand is a cockend of the highest order, and I hope we have CL sewn up by the time we face Stoke in May so we can "rest" Bale in that game.

 

[Ironskullll]

How very true.

The poster must believe that Charlie Adams taking him twice on the same ankle in both the home and away games was a pure accident! Bale of course had time out injured.

Here's the original poster's post:

Put yourself in Arsenal's shoes. Stop Bale and you take a lot of our firepower away. Would Wenger or any of the Arsenal players be dirty enough to try to get Bale crocked for the rest of the season and race for fourth by going in hard with a few bad challenges on Sunday?

No-one's saying there aren't dirty players; no-one's saying that players don't deliberately foul opposition players; no-one's saying that in the heat of the moment some players don't do some really nasty things; no-one's saying that some players don't deliberately set out to intimidate opposition players, especially from the start; no-one's saying that some players don't seek to hurt the opposition physically by fouling them, and no-one saying that there aren't players who are so reckless that they're willing to endanger other players, and no-one saying that Charlie Adam isn't a dirty ****.

Back in the day Jack Charlton said this once: "I have a little black book with two players in it, and if I get a chance to do them I will. I will make them suffer before I pack this game in. If I can kick them four years over the touch line, I will." But that wasn't systematic and it wasn't about helping his team.

I'm suggesting that Arsenal do not have any players who would seek to put Bale out for the rest of the season, and I'm also suggesting that it would never even be discussed as a possible approach by anyone at that club. I'm also saying that I don't believe that there is a club in the league who would take that approach, even if there are some teams such as Stoke who do push the boundaries far more than others. "Systematically" was the word I used in my earlier post. Even Roy Keane did what he did for reasons of personal animosity rather than to somehow benefit his team (reference the subsequent mention of getting Bale out of the race for forth place.)

Suggesting as much isn't naive at all; it's realistic and measured.

 

[BelgianBrownie]

They spend too much time diving and rolling around to be dangerous

 

[nightgoat]

How very true.

The poster must believe that Charlie Adams taking him twice on the same ankle in both the home and away games was a pure accident! Bale of course had time out injured.

He went for Park Ji-Sung the day Blackpool got relegated in the same way he went for Bale at WHL that year as well.

 

[ExpatFan]

I remember in the NLD 2 years ago i think, when Wilshere had just come on, tried to get VdV booked straight off. Until Vdv told him to go do one.

Games of old would directly target a player. Vinnie Jones came out once and said that before the FA cup final they targeted McMahon as he was seen as the hard man. And he did. Sort the hardman out and the rest fall away. Have arsenal got a hard man ?? Probably JW, sort him out early doors and wind him up into doing something stupid.

Who's the ref for this game, do we know yet ?

Yep, I clearly remember that. Jones did him inside the first 30 seconds, I seem to remember. Certainly justified a booking at least but... first minute of a cup final, on the halfway line... no way was he going to get booked. McMahon spent the rest of the match limping before being substituted.

 

[double0]

All this Bale talk is getting ridiculous. To be fair in regards to the opening thread I don't see Arsenal as a dirty team they will want to show they can dominate possession. I won't be surprised if we played as the away team on the break.

 

[archiewasking]

I don't care how we play so long as we win. They can have 99.99999% of possession, hit the woodwork forty-seven times, miss eighteen penalties. If in our 0.00001% we score (preferably Adebayor with a back pass assist by Wilshere) and win one nil, I do not care a jot.

 

[Wazza]

I know it's bad but I can't be the only one who thought when were losing 5-2 last year that someone should injure RVP - had they done it, we would have finished 3rd.