Arsenal have often been accused of being weak and non physical and the lesser teams in the Premiership have seen this as an excuse to get stuck into Arsenal and ‘kick them off the park’ to quote a manager or two. Although I have nothing against players wanting to get stuck into to Arsenal players, closing them down early to stop their flowing football seems like a good choice of tactic but for teams to take it that one step futher and constantly foul the players with poorly timed tackles just to stop the play isn’t acceptable. However over the last 5 or so years it has been seen as acceptable in managers and the medias eye to do this as it is apparently the most effective way to beat Arsenal. Yesterday we once again saw the dark side to this method. For the 3rd time in just under 4 years an Arsenal player suffered an horrific injury against a club who adopt these tactics. I am not saying Ryan Shawcross at Stoke intended to snapping Aaron Ramsey’s ankle but before the match manager Tony Pulis would have told his players to go out there, be physical and get stuck into Arsenal and a result this injury occurred.

Ramsey will not play football again until Christmas at the earliest. He joins a growing list of Arsenal players out injured, granted there are couple out injured from international duty and training but the majority of injuries are picked up in matches against teams like Stoke who set out from the get go to get stuck into Arsenal. I’m glad these other current injuries are not as horrific as Ramseys but I have never known a team to suffer 3 horror injuries like this at all let alone in just 4 years.