almunia

this is manuel almunia, the arsenal goalkeeper who played against spurs last saturday. it's taken a long time for the arsenal fans to warm to him. he has been our second goalie, behind jens lehmann, for quite a few seasons and hasn't really looked secure when he's played in the first team. then again, being a goalkeeper is a tough gig as whenever you do make a mistake it's invariably costly. this season has been slightly different with lehmann only playing the first two league games before being injured/dropped in lieu of manuel. since then he hasn't been out of the side and has been pretty steady at the back. this culminated in this match where, at 1-1, he saved a penalty that would almost certainly have surrendered our unbeaten home record. he deservedly had his name sung throughout the stadium as the final whistle went.