Arsenal eliminated AC Milan from the Champions League yesterday at the San Siro, and the Guardian’s Barry Glendenning and Paul Doyle aren’t above saying “told ya so”. On behalf of the paper, anyway.
We feel it’s worth drawing your attention to yesterday’s Fiver, where we confidently and correctly tooted that Meeeelan goalkeeper Zeljko Kalac would probably be to blame for his side’s elimination from Big Cup. (Of course we also incorrectly predicted he’d have the game of his life, but hopefully you’ve forgotten that.)
Because let’s face it, if Kalac had been as quick to react to Cesc Fabregas’s 84th minute 120-yard strike as he was to blame his central defenders for not closing down the Arsenal midfielder, the headline writers of that pink newspaper James Richardson used to prop up with big ice-creams back when he still had hair might well be celebrating a spawny Meeeelan win courtesy of a last-minute deflection off Pippo Inzaghi’s shoulder, rather than dreaming up stereotypically hysterical headlines such as: “MILAN: THE END”.But he wasn’t, so they’re not, which means that it’s Arsenal who are triumphant today, after becoming the first English team to successfully storm Fortress San Siro (at least when the Rossoneri were manning the gates) since the dawn of time. “We played with authority, maturity and talent. I’m very proud of the team. To come here and beat a side like Milan deserves a lot of credit,” declared Arsene Wenger in this fancy Rebranded Website video clip. At least we think that’s what he said, because we were unable to listen to it. Some light-fingered colleague has half-inched our New Media cans.