Don't think we need to worry about injuries for the Spurs game

[Peter]

Apparently he's not actually injured but he's also not actually NOT injured.

The Italians seemed to handle that very nicely, Gattuso showing real sensitivity towards the Arsenal's circumstances. For an important game for him too.

Fairplay.

And they lost 4-1 at home. Maybe he should have been less sensitive.....

[Peter]

That's what I mean. Surely he'll be on his "best" behaviour.

Or, to put it another way, Sunday may give us a clue as to whether we will be allowed to win the league this time

He doesn't have a 'best' behaviour when it comes to us. We get the same arsehole every time.

As you've said before, we are never allowed to win the league. We have to find a way to win it ourselves.

[redgunamo]

We DO want him to play every game but we reluctantly accept that he can't. So we hire a huge team of quacks, bone twiddlers and rub down artists to try and establish what condition our players are in and when they can and cant play.

The point of this, and of rotation, is to ensure they miss the games where we think we can manage without them, instead of losing them for 3 months where we need them most. This increases the risk of overloading their replacements during those 3 months and losing them as well.

If we are just going to play them until they drop we may as well get rid of the medical staff and use the NHS. The savings could be used to buy more players in January, as it is beginning to look as though we'll need some

I'm convinced everyone believes injuries are simply an act of God and even with the best will and medical preparation in the world, they just happen.

In May, every manager tells us they want to get our transfer targets in quickly and as soon as possible, ostensibly because they want them to have a good pre-season. Fair enough. But then their colleagues upstairs blandly spend three months haggling over contract terms; saving our pennies up for the winter knees-up in Nassau, or wherever, apparently totally ignoring their own coach's wishes. Hence poor old Viktor having had no preparation while being expected to lead the line alone in every match for three or four months.

Medical staff are just window-dressing. No-one takes any real steps to ensure players' fitness, health, availability and welfare. Our sports were not invented with super-fit athletes in mind. They're for ordinary people who happened to have a bit of energy left after twenty-hour shifts down a coal mine. Chief is right; these things were once self-regulating. But nowadays, if we found a player who could play one hundred games a season, he would be made to play one hundred games a season. Before going off to the World Cup.

And he would happily do it too because he would make a fortune. Remember that great Brazil side that seemed to be constantly gallivanting around the globe playing pointless friendlies and only slightly less pointless actual trumped up tournaments. And Manchester United schlepping around Asia all summer before returning home and wrapping up titles before Valentine's Day? All while our own squad struggled to survive a fortnight in the Alps in one piece.

Fact is, the best, and therefore the most in-demand, players (i.e. our players) play, must play, the most football.