Flamini: ‘I will be ready for Chelsea’
editorial@islingtonexpress.co.uk
10 December 2004
Doug Gratton
mathieu Flamini is used to dealing with pressure. Forget Tuesday night's win-or-bust Champions League match with Rosenborg, that was petit fromage for the Frenchman.
The 20-year-old may have played just over 30 games in just over a year in professional football, but before he had even signed his first professional contract he had played and lost a UEFA Cup final and copped a vicious verbal attack from his former coach.
But on Sunday, he will face the biggest test of his career when he is paired with Cesc Fabregas in the centre of midfield against Jose Mourinho's rampant Chelsea.
Arsenal's midfield pair will have a combined age of 37 - just six more than Chelsea's experience anchorman Claude Makelele. That's without mentioning Tiago and Frank Lampard.
"I have played in the UEFA Cup final, so if they ask me to play, I will be ready," Flamini told Ham&High Sport matter-of-factly. But surely he is worried about coming up against so much experience? "I think that it's up to us to do what needs to be done.
"It's not age that makes a difference, only what you do on the pitch. It's up to me to show that I deserve to be playing."
In any case, it is clear that Flamini is mature beyond his years off the pitch. He has already settled into life in England, joining the French set in Hampstead and talks easily about his new life. He likes the fact that the village is self-contained and that he can just walk out to go to the shops.
But it is on the pitch where his adaptability will be most needed. Even if he has done it against a half-fit and half-interested Rosenborg - although in an otherwise faultless performance he still managed to pick up a rash yellow card - Chelsea will be different. For a start there is Makelele.
"He's a player who I look up to and try to emulate, because he is one of the best defensive midfielders in the world - like Patrick Vieira," he said. "So it's true that you learn a lot from playing against players like that."
The atmosphere is unlikely to intimidate him. He is used to taking flak. When he left Marseille for little more than compensation, his manager Jose Anigo accused him of "treason", saying he had gone for the money.
Flamini's decision has been vindicated, not least after the last fortnight in which Marseille have redefined the worst "crisis", with manager and president both resigning.
Flamini laughs when it is mentioned that Arsenal are also supposed to be in crisis.
"I've obviously followed the situation at Marseille, and it's a bit of a crisis at the moment," he said. "But I hope the team will recover and get back to winning ways.
"Arsenal are the best team [the Premiership champions] at the moment, so there is no comparison at all. Arsenal are a stable club and we have a manager who has been here for a long time, with continuity.
"At Marseille we know that since forever it has been like this, trainers come and go and there has been this atmosphere. It's not comparable."
But after his former coach Anigo told him he would never get a game at Arsenal, he must feel like he is answering in the most emphatic way.
After all, while they struggle to deal with life after Drogba, he is playing two of the most important games of Arsenal's season.
"It's true that when I left Marseille it wasn't in very good circumstances," he said.
"But if I play on Sunday it will not be in response to my old club.
"I've nothing against anyone there. If I play it's not for me, but for the club and the supporters."
Arsenal just need him to show that same maturity on the pitch on Sunday.
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[此贴子已经被康康于2004-12-11 15:43:29编辑过]
