Well, the injury count on last night's 2-2 draw with Barcelona was pretty horrific. Cesc is done for the season with a broken fibula, Arshavin yoinked the calf muscle, and Gallass re-crocked his calf. How often do you see a Champions League match where a team loses that many players?

It was inspirational to see the Arsenal Captain refusing to come off the pitch, despite having a broken leg. I have to think that a lot of credit for Arsenal's newly found resilience that they've displayed this season is down to the competitiveness of their captain. Now, we've got to hope that the team rallies around Fabregas to make a run at the Champions League and Premier League titles.

Around the 20th minute of the game I commented to my wife that Wenger's game strategy was clearly to let Barca have all the possession they wanted so that they would wear themselves out. Strangely enough, it almost loooked that way in the end. By the time, Arsene subbed Walcott on, the Barca players could only look on as the kid blew by them like...well, like Messi, perhaps. 

I also was struck by how badly Arsenal needed to play very un-Arsenal like and get stuck in on Barca, a point that Robbo Robson makes in his always excellent blog:

Why do we Brits get quite so awe-struck by Barca? It seems ironic to me that Wenger has spent the season complaining about how teams are being too aggressive against his side and yet here the Gunners were up against a team that played the Arsenal way, only about five times better and Arsenal desperately needed to get amongst them. 

I reckon if Tony Pulis had given the tactical team-talk they might have had more of a chance. Instead Guardiola's team left Arsenal's players looking like a particularly tormented bunch of toddlers learning the rudiments of piggy-in-the-middle.

Perhaps they'll figure that out by next Tuesday.