Is it me, or did that international break seem to take months? I like the World Cup as much as anyone, but these interminable qualifying rounds are a bit much. Thankfully, we won’t have to suffer another until February or March of next year.

So, we’ve got the blue half of Merseyside coming for a visit this weekend. Everton is not off to the happiest of starts this year. With just 8 of 21 points, they sit at 15th in the table. Last year, we did the double on them, beating them 1-4 at Goodison and 1-0 at home. There was a bit of tension between Cesc and Arteta. If Mikel takes a swing at him, we may hear Cesc scream like a girl “Not in the face!” Since he’s gone and broken his beak on international duty… or from a punch in the snoot from AW after he heard Cesc’s criticism during the week of his reliance on a young squad.

The good news is that r-r-r-r-r-r-Robin vannnnnn PERvesieeeeeeee looks set to play, despite taking a knock while away, and Abou Diaby is back. You read that correctly… Abou Diaby is back. Get out there and kick some ass, Abou. But… we lost William Gallas, Bacary Sagna and Niklas Bendtner. I’m the most upset about Sagna, though. He’s far too valuable at rightback, and we miss him sorely when he’s not playing. I’m not sure who Everton will be lining up against that position, but they’ll probably have Eboue to face there. Gallas, well… I think he needs a break anyway. A bit of introspection, if you will. So, who will be our Capi? *cough* I mean, Captain? My money is on Kolo Toure our current vice-captain, but it would be nice if Cesc got a shot at it. Which, should be pretty funny if he has to wear one of those plexi-glass face holders. Captain Windowpane to the rescue! We’ll see… I’m guessing AW won’t have the stones to do it. But, let’ get to it… the Scurvy Prognostication of The Match for this week is:

Arsenal 2-1 Everton

One for Adebayor, one for Captain Windowpane and an own goal for Eboue. Also, Mikel Arteta will be heard to say something snarky to Phil Jagielka about Cesc’s nose. Phil will respond with something to the effect of “English, mate! Fucking English!”