KEVIN DILLON is hoping Arsene Wenger will despise Reading on Monday night.
The Arsenal boss was highly complimentary about the Royals last season, expressing his delight that they tried to play football against the Gunners.
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However, Wenger’s comments came on the back of Arsenal’s thumping 4-0 victory at Madejski Stadium.
And Dillon is hoping the Frenchman, who is renowned for his moaning, has more cause for complaint this time around.
“Arsene likes playing against us because they beat us, so after the game we are hoping he really despises Reading,” said the Royals coach.
“When we played against Newcastle (two weeks ago) it was the first time a manager had come in and said they didn’t like playing against us and we have to get back to that again.”
Arsenal romped to victory at Madejski Stadium last October, taking the lead through Thierry Henry with just one minute on the clock.
And Dillon admitted that early goal ruined any strategic plan that was in place to try and stop the rampant Gunners.
He said: “Our game plan went out of the window after that.
“When they scored the goal they got so confident and the passing was superb and we admired them.
“We had started the season really well, but the goal just killed us because we work on certain things that they do.
“Sometimes you just cannot stop it. It’s easy to give them the remedy to the problem, but it’s difficult when you are playing against world-class players.”
Many pundits wrote Arsenal off in the summer following the £16million sale of Henry to Barcelona.
The Gunners finished fourth for the past two seasons and the prediction was that they could even struggle to qualify for the Champions League this term.
However, such a notion now looks ridiculous as Wenger’s Young Guns look to be mounting a serious title challenge.
His latest crop of stars are unbeaten and top of the Premier League. They appear more of a team now,” said Dillon. “They have a real drive.
“They are young and they seem to have a real bond and you do when you are winning.
“We had a great atmosphere around the club but when you are losing you are not happy and it’s that togetherness that keeps you going and that’s what we need to do.”
Arsenal are in Champions League action tonight as they travel to the Czech Republic to play Slavia Prague, who they beat 7-0 two weeks ago.
Normally that might hand Reading an advantage as Wenger would almost certainly rested some of his stars.
However, as the game is not until next Monday, his players would have recovered sufficiently.
And Dillon admitted the Gunners , who have played seven home games and three away fixtures this season, have been lucky with the fixture list. If we were playing them Saturday then it might have been a different team,” admitted Dillon. “On Monday I think he’ll play a stronger team. Arsenal have an extra two days to recuperate.”
— ADAM FEDERICI has been named in the Australia squad for a friendly match with Nigeria at Fulham’s Craven Cottage on Saturday November 17 (3pm kick off).
Emerse Fae is in the Ivory Coast squad for a match with Qatar, Ulises de la Cruz’s Ecuador play World Cup preliminaries with Paraguay and Peru, Ivar Ingimarsson and Bryn Gunnarsson will play for Iceland against Denmark, Stephen Hunt and Kevin Doyle are in the Ireland squad for a qualifier with Wales, Marcus Hahnemann’s USA take on South Africa in a friendly, James Henry and Hal Robson-Kanu are in the England Under-19s squad for a match with Germany and Oliver Bozanic is in the Australia Under-20s squad.
Nicky Shorey is expected to make the England squad for a friendly with Austria and the must-win qualifier with Croatia, while Graeme Murty is hoping to get in the Scotland squad for a crunch qualifier with Italy.
