Despite being written off by much of the media going into the 2009–10 season, Arsenal made a bright start in the Premier League, aided by a new attacking formation and added defensive steel, in the form of holding midfielder Alexandre Song of Cameroon and new signing Thomas Vermaelen of Belgium. Arsenal's title challenge looked set to end in late November, following losses to Chelsea, Manchester United, and Manchester City, but an impressive run of games in December, aided by Chelsea and Manchester United both dropping points, restored momentum to Arsenal's title challenge going into 2010. In December, Arsenal were eliminated from the League Cup at the quarter-final stage by Manchester City.
After being written out of the title race once in the 2009–10 Premier League season by pundits. Arsenal headed into a tough period of matches from 27 January through 10 February, in which they faced Aston Villa, Manchester United, Chelsea, and Liverpool all in a row. After losing to Stoke City in the FA Cup 3–1, Arsenal drew Aston Villa 0–0, got thrashed 3–1 at home by Manchester United, and lost at Chelsea 2–0. At the time, it left Arsenal nine points behind league leaders Chelsea. Again, Arsenal were written off in their title hopes, only for it to be resurrected once again, after Chelsea lost to Everton 2–1, Manchester City 4–2, and drew with Blackburn Rovers 1–1. Meanwhile, Manchester United also dropped points, drawing with Aston Villa 1–1 and also losing to Everton 3–1. Following Arsenal's 2–0 loss to Chelsea on 7 February, Arsenal went on a good run, winning all of their league games up to 20 March. On 27 February, however, a major injury to Welsh midfielder Aaron Ramsey occurred, it was eerily reminiscent of Eduardo's injury against Birmingham City on 23 February. Whereas Arsenal, however, drew against Birmingham City that year 2–2 following a penalty call against Gaël Clichy in injury time (in which James McFadden converted the penalty and left then-captain William Gallas kicking at an advertisement board and in tears and questioned Arsenal's fragile team mentality, Arsenal managed to rally against Stoke City 3–1, having scored a penalty from captain Cesc Fàbregas in the 90th minute, and defender Thomas Vermaelen scoring a third in injury time. As of 25 March, Arsenal are in third place with 67 points, two points behind league leaders Manchester United with 31 games played.
Arsenal's Champions League match against FC Porto in the first leg did not go so well; played at the Estádio do Dragão in Porto on 17 February 2010, the first goal was scored by the home side. In the 11th minute of the match, stand-in goalkeeper Łukasz Fabiański (for the injured Manuel Almunia) pushed a cross from Silvestre Varela into his own net, resulting in a quick 1–0 lead for Porto. In the 18th minute, however, Sol Campbell, making his first Champions League appearance for Arsenal since the 2006 Champions League Final, scored a header from Thomas Vermaelen's headed flick and Tomáš Rosický's headed setup from a corner delivered by Cesc Fàbregas. This gave Arsenal a possibly vital away goal; things, however, got worse for Arsenal, as miscommunication by Campbell and Fabiański led to the goalie picking up what was judged a deliberate back pass to the goal keeper inside the 18-yard box. As a result, the referee gave a free kick to Porto inside Arsenal's penalty area. Rúben Micael took the resulting quick free-kick directly, catching the Arsenal defense and goalie off-guard and squared a pass to the Colombian Falcao, scoring an easy goal. The game ended with the score at full time Porto 2 – Arsenal
Arsenal's second leg against Porto fared much better. Played at the Emirates Stadium on 9 March, Arsenal needed at least one goal and a clean sheet to advance, with the aggregate score 2–1 for Porto and away aggregate 1–0 for Arsenal. Things started off brightly for Arsenal, as Nicklas Bendtner scored in the 10th and 25th minute, before Samir Nasri scored a fantastic goal in the 66th minute, dribbling past three defenders on the far right side touchline before scoring from an acute angle, hitting the goal keeper's right post and into the net. Three minutes later, Emmanuel Eboué managed to score on a counter-attack, dribbling past goalkeeper Helton before tucking the ball into an empty net. The night ended with Bendtner scoring a penalty in the 90th minute, thus giving him his first senior professional hat-trick, and Arsenal advancing to the quarter-finals of the Champions League 6–2 on aggregate. Ironically, Bendtner had missed a number of easy chances the game before Porto against Burnley; Arsenal, however, managed to win 3–1 in that game.
On 19 March 2010, Arsenal drew FC Barcelona in the UEFA Champions League quarter-finals. The first of the two-legged match was played on 31 March at Arsenal's Emirates Stadium; it marked Thierry Henry's return to the Emirates Stadium for the first time as an opponent of Arsenal. The second leg was played on 6 April at the Camp Nou and marked Cesc Fàbregas's return to the Catalan giants, where he played in their youth squad. If Arsenal prevailed past Barcelona, they would face the winner of the CSKA Moscow – Internazionale match. In their first leg match at Emirates, Arsenal drew 2–2 with Barcelona, with goals from Theo Walcott and captain Cesc Fàbregas. The second leg at the Nou Camp did not go as well, even though Nicklas Bendtner scored early on. Lionel Messi scored an impressive four times to end the game with an aggregate score of 6–3 in favour of Barcelona, ultimately knocking Arsenal out of the Champions League.
Arsenal finished the season in third place, their 15th successive top-five finish and the 13th successive season they had achieved qualification for the Champions League. It was also their fifth successive trophyless season, however, something of a disappointment considering this trophyless spell was preceded by five trophy winning seasons from a possible eight (including two seasons where they won the double.
2010–11 saw Arsenal perform well in the Premier League and compete strongly in a title challenge, alongside Manchester United. To prove such a challenge, they faced struggling Champions Chelsea on 27 December and mauled them 3–1 at Emirates. Good form continued in the following months and in February manager Arsene Wenger was awarded Manager of the Month Award. Notable events in this month was the 2–1 win over Barcelona, in which the team came from behind to seal a win, and the 4–4 draw against Newcastle that is widely regarded to be one of the most bizarre and great games of the Premier League era. They progressed to the final of the League Cup but were beaten by Birmingham City, ruining their chances of winning a trophy. After this embarrassment, the Gunners went to the Nou Camp to play the second leg of the Barca tie, where they were beaten by the three time winners and eventual victors. Their FA Cup quest ended with defeat in the quarter-finals to Manchester United. Also, completing a miserable couple of weeks for the Gunners, their title hopes were ended when they lost 2–1 to Bolton away in April 2011. After challenging for the title for the majority of the season, Arsenal ended up finishing fourth after losses at Stoke and Aston Villa.
The 2011–12 campaign commenced for Arsenal on 13 August 2011 against Newcastle United in the midst of two major transfers sagas concerning the clubs biggest assets: Fabregas and Nasri. The game finished 0–0 and neither of the said players were in the named squad, but new signing Gervinho was sent off for violent conduct. However, the team did muster up a 1–0 win over Italian outit Udinese in the first leg of a Champions League Playoff.
On 15 August, Francesc Fabregas departed the club for Barcelona at an estimated €35 million and, in addition to his loss, Samir Nasri left for Manchester City on 24 August 2011, ending a protracted transfer saga. The latter had played for Arsenal in their game aainst Liverpool on 21 August, in which Arsenal lost 2–0, placing them 14th with one draw and one loss. However, they managed to muster up qualification for the UEFA Champions League for the upcoming year for the fourteenth time, the only other English Club to boast such a record in recent years is Manchester United. With mounting injury problems and suspensions, the season was already looking bleak for Arsenal, and this was epitomized by an 8–2 mauling at Old Trafford at the hands of Manchester United.
Arsenal were placed 4th in 2010-2011 season of Premier League and are gearing up for 2011-2012 season. Arsenal Premier League Tickets are available at FootballTicketExchangeOnline.com at affordable price. Football fans can buy or sell Football Tickets especially Arsenal Premiership Football Tickets at FootballTicketExchangeOnline.com conveniently.
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