Ipswich 1-0 Arsenal (Carling Cup): This is why I don't gamble

Yesterday I placed a very minor wager on the outcome of today's Carling Cup semifinal first leg. I bet on Arsenal to win the match, and I bet on the under (with a line set at three total goals). Well, at least I won half of it.

Arsenal played a lackluster match to say the least, and they were not able to escape the deserved result as Ipswich struck again and again on the counterattack and finally were able to score a late breakthrough. Arsenal now will have more work to do in the second leg than they would have preferred.

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The result of the game didn't stem from unfair play by Ipswich or a howler by any of the Arsenal players, and that's what makes it most worrisome. Arsenal lost because, for the most part, they didn't really try. They took the opponent lightly and did not put in the effort necessary to come away with the result. I don't understand why this team does this again and again when there's plenty of evidence to show that doing that leads to a bad end. All they have to do is look at 2-3 West Brom, or 0-1 Newcastle, or any of several other matches. When they bring effort, like they did against Chelsea, they win. When they don't, this happens.

My biggest worry is the fact that the lack of effort appears to me to be centered around certain players, who again and again are given chances to prove themselves, and again and again they fail to do so in fairly spectacular fashion. Nicklas Bendtner has been vocal in the past about wanting more opportunities, but at the moment he's the third-best striker at the club, and that's in a system that plays one striker (and I'm leaving Theo Walcott out, as he plays on the wing almost exclusively at the moment). Andrei Arshavin has been a wizard in the past both in scoring and creating goals, and he's one of the most talented players in the side. But in this game and in the recent past, neither player has impressed in any way.

I can excuse not playing well - sometimes a player is unlucky and just can't come through. But those two players in particular were without any sort of influence at all. They weren't really bad, they were just invisible. When you have players who are out of form with superior talent ahead of them, you would think that when given the chance to play - especially against Championship-level competition - they would make some kind of effort. We had too many players today who did not.

There's really not a lot to be said about this aside from that. Fabregas and Walcott didn't have particularly good games, but they at least were making visible efforts. Sczcesny played relatively well, though he didn't have too many opportunities. Djourou and Gibbs playes well, Koscielny was decent, Eboue was pretty awful. If I think about this much more I may have a stroke, so I'm going to stop here.

Now let us never speak of this again.