Barcelona vs Arsenal. 29/09/99

Barcelona (1) 1 - 1 (0) Arsenal

Nou Camp. Wednesday 29th September 1999

UEFA Champions League, first group stage. match 3

See below for reports by: Rupe

Preview

Arsenal team news
update Tuesday Alex Manninger is being tested tonight in Spain, but it looks very likely that he'll start the game tomorrow with Seaman on the bench. John Lukic has made the trip too in case one of these is declared unfit.
AFCi's match preview echoes what we said below, that Davor Suker's record against Barcelona and at the Nou Camp is likely to get him the nod up front. apparently the data we were given wasn't completely accurate though, in that he has 7 in 12 games against Barcelona in total, not just at the Nou Camp (where he has 5, he reckons).
The big worry is in goal, where Alex Manninger picked up an injury against Watford on Saturday. But the latest news is that he's likely to be fit thus removing the need to risk Dave Seaman's return in such a big game.
Although Luzhny and Silvinho did ok on Saturday (in the end), it seems certain that Dixon and Winterburn's greater understanding will see them return in the full-back positions.
Up front, we expect to see Davor Suker start alongside Dennis Bergkamp with Kanu and Henry on the bench. Barca won't be pleased to see Suker - he scored 7 goals for Real Madrid in 12 matches at the Nou Camp. His experience in Spain should thus tip the balance in his favour and Dennis, well, you don't get him to drive to Barcelona only to leave him on the bench do you?
Barca team news
What can we say? It looks like they'll be pretty strong. As a measure of this, Jari Litmanen, with one of the best Champions League pegigrees (18 goals in 32 games for Ajax) is likely to be relegated to the bench to make way for Luis Enrique. Litmanen will probably be joined there by Dani who scored a hattrick for Barca at the weekend but will probably move aside for Patrick Kluivert to return.
UK TV News
The match will be screeend on the Jumbotron at Highbury. Admission £10 (£5 concession) as usual. Kick-off is 7.45 and the gates open at 6.45. Cash on the day only, at the turnstiles.
While we understand that the club aren't massively impressed with ITV's decision to show the Man Utd match, the fact that it will boost the numbers at Highbury might sweeten the pill for them somewhat ;-)
The match will be screened live on ITV2, which is only available to people with OnDigital or cable (in the latter case, it might depend on your supplier and package).
The Marlborough (pub in Richmond, 46 Friar Stile Rd) have emailed to ask us to pass on the info that they'll be showing ITV2 tonight.
If you run a pub and want us to advertise the fact that you're showing the game please drop us a line, if you're just a punter please make sure you check with the landlord before doing this, as some don't like it to be advertised in this way.
Scandalously, ITV have decided to show Man United at home to Marseilles rather than our game in Barcelona. This includes Carlton, supposedly the ITV station for London. The decision beggars belief.
There will be extended highlights of our match on terrestrial ITV at 11.30 (possibly with regional variations - check your local listings), but to catch it live you need to be able to receive ITV2. Pubs and clubs are not supposed to show this channel, but if you are lucky you may find one that will do it on the sly.
We've received quite a few messages from Arsenal fans on the subject. I'll try to find time to write more about it but for the time being...
- Although Carlton occasionally claim that the decision is made by (national) ITV Sport and is out of their hands, when pressed they admit that they do have the ability to show a different match. And they can get a bit embarassed when it's pointed out to them that Granada, who cover the Manchester area, are much more willing to opt out of the national decision.
- It appears that Carlton's "real" justification is that their market research tells them that more of their viewers want to watch Man United! Sadly, this does rather counteract the comparison with Granada expressed above, since there must be many more Man Utd fans in the London area that Arsenal fans in the North-West. However there's no getting away from the fact that Arsenal are a London team, and it's particularly dumb when we're playing a team such as Barcelona. This is arguably Arsenal's biggest European match since our last final, and also expected to be one of the best matches of this group stage. Carlton must surely be aware of the fact that, in terms of entertainment, they screwed up big-time in the previous week by showing Man Utd cruising against Croatia Zagreb rather than our thrilling near thing against AIK. And now they're doing it again.
- Carlton say they'll be making the decision on a match-by-match basis. This means that, if they're right and most of their viewers would prefer to watch Man Utd, they could be showing Man Utd in preference to Arsenal every week (if our match against Barcelona isn't a crowd-puller then none of our matches will be!). Note that Carlton have said (italics added) "our audience research has repeatedly shown that in the Carlton region more viewers want to watch Man Utd."
  and
  "The decision about which matches we will screen in future will be based on the same criteria. If we believe that the majority of all the viewers in the Carlton region will be attracted to an Arsenal match we will have no hesitation in opting out of the Network."
  So they show Man Utd because more people want to watch them than Arsenal, but they'll only guarantee to switch if the majority of all their viewers want to watch Arsenal (ie not just if more want to watch Arsenal than Man Utd!)
- Of course, while it's easy to belive that there are more Man Utd "fans" than Arsenal ones (by which I mean more people whose narrow knowledge of the game makes them think that a ManUtd game is always going to be better) it seems obvious to me that most football fans in London are NOT Man Utd fans, and all of those football fans who support London clubs other than Arsenal will understand that if Carlton choose Man Utd over Arsenal, then their clubs have no chance.
- Of course, none of this comes as a surprise, as Carlton did it last year
- It is of course very much worth registering your displeasure. As we understand it, they have a legal obligation to pass a record of telephone and written complaints on to the Braodcasting Authorities. Therefore telephone (being immediate) is much the preferred method, but we'd recommedn also that you follow up with a letter.
  The number for Carlton's duty officer is 0171-615-1515.
- Other ways of complaining to Carlton:
  email: dutyofficer@carltontv.co.uk
  postal: 101 St Martin's Lane, London WC2N 4AZ
- It's also worth complaining to the ITC (Independent Televsion Commission). They can be emailed at publicaffairs@itc.org.uk. Please include your postal address as the ITC will need this to reply.
- A list of regional ITC offices can be found here. Go for it!
- For people in other regions, we'd suggest a call to the ITC (national or regional, see above) and to try ringing your local ITV station. If you haven't got access to a phone book with their number in it try Yell or BT.
- please keep your complaints polite and reasoned
- Many thanks to everyone who's written to us on this subject. Please keep them coming.
non-UK TV coverage
Unlike London's Tv channel, many in other countries know an attractive tie when they see one!
- USA: live on ESPN2. 2:30 EST
- Ireland: live on Network 2 (bucking a trend - they chose Man Utd for the last 2 weeks and throughout last season's CL)
- Switzerland: live on TSI2, the Swiss Italian channel. TSI2 usually choose to show Italian games, but have decided that this is the outstanding tie of the night (Carlton take note!). It's also on TSR2 (French-speaking) and presumably on the German station too, although all Gooners in Switzerland (and some in neighbouring countries and elsewhere) should be able to pick up one of the 2 channels listed.
- Belgium and the Netherlands: live on Ketnet/Canvas from 20:40. This is a Belgian channel, also available in many parts of the Netherlands.
- For other countries, and details of the above, see the links on the non-UK TV FAQ
More preview stuff nearer the time. Meanwhile check out the Newsreel for latest and breaking news

Barcelona (1) 1 - 1 (0) Arsenal

Nou Camp. Wednesday 29th September 1999

UEFA Champions League, first group stage. match 3

Scorers: Luis Enrique 16      Kanu 81

Arsenal:
             Manninger
Dixon Adams Keown Winterburn
Parlour (Henry 73) Vieira Grimandi Overmars (Ljungberg 80)
    Kanu Bergkamp (Suker 73)

Barcelona started strongly as against Fiorentina last week, and will be disappointed not to have gone in at half time more than 1 up.

The knowledge that we were comprehensively outplayed up to that point should ease the pain of their first goal somewhat. Guardiola started the move in the centre circle. He played it forward to Luis Enrique who found Cocu in the box. Cocu played the ball goalwards, probably trying to find Rivaldo. But it went too clos eto Manninger and although under pressure from the Brasilian Alex should have done better than to allow the ball to bounce out of his clutches. It came to Vieira who tried to juggle the ball under control on his own goal-line. Luis Enrique saw the chance and bundled the ball over the line. A very soft goal indeed.

Arsenal were under the cosh of the rest of the first half, getting just enough breaks to make you believe that we might be able to score, but looking outclassed at the other end to such an extent that it was hard to believe we'd hang on to the 1 goal deficit. But hang onto it we did, and Arsenal came out for the second half a different team altogether.

If anything we shaded it for the second 45. Rivaldo, whose skill in the first half was quite breathtaking (reminiscent of Kanu, in that he did all the tricks but was dangerous with it rather than just a showman), didn't appear to come out for the second half. I don't remember him doing anything anyway. By contrast Kanu continued to show his class and to show that Wenger was right to play him from the start.

Arsenal were going in hard, and picked up quite a few yellow cards some of which were quite undeserved. The turning point however was a foolish sending-off for Gilles Grimandi about which there can be few complaints. With the ref in spitting distance Grimandi, having won the ball from Guardiola, struck out at him as the 2 of them sat on the ground in the centre circle.

But it was an Arsenal free-kick, from the edge of the circle. Dixon spread it wide to Ljungberg on the right wing and he put a high cross into the box. Keown met it with his head on the far side and it came down to Kanu inside the box on the right with back to goal. He managed to squeeze it back to Suker who hit a shot which nutmegged at least 2 defenders. The keeper Hesp parried it and Kanu was following up to scuff a volley home from the penalty spot.

Rupe.

Other reports

AFCi
Soccernet (and again)
EuroSport
Football365
The Guardian
ANR
Sky Sports (and Wenger/vanGaal quotes)
UEFA
Opposition view (official site, in English, "...has to be considered a very fair result.")
Marca (this links to babelfish, just hit "translate" to get the english translation! Well, I say "English"... eg "To Barcelona it cost to him much to disentangle the hank of exit". Mind you, "Vieira becasme a mess" sounds about right.)
Sports.com
Soccernet piece on how Barca players gatecrashed Arsenal's training session to mock - a prank which backfired in that it help fire the Gunners up in the second half. Also has Tony Adams talking about the other thing which fired them up - his half-time rally-cry.
If you find a web page with a report of this match that's not listed here, please send us the URL. Thanks.

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