The Hale End Region bids adieu to Alexis Sanchez, Lukas Podolski, Francis Coquelin, Alex Iwobi, Nwankwo Kanu, Shkodran Mustafi, Denilson, and Petr Cech today. As the Arsenal academy, you’d think it would be accustomed to seeing players move on, but it’s still tough. Onwards and upwards, victoria concordia crescit.

Second round voting is underway in the Emirates Region and the Highbury Region. First round voting is still open in the London Colney Region. For those of you on AMP and Apple news, you’ll need to go through a browser to be able to vote because our polls get stripped out by those services.

HALE END REGIONAL

SECOND ROUND

#1 Thierry Henry vs. #8 Kolo Touré

It’s a battle of Invincibles in this second round matchup. Thierry Henry cruised to 98% of the votes against Alexis Sanchez. Kolo Touré defeated Lukas Podolski by 8 votes, the smallest margin of victory in the round. This one will probably go more like Henry’s matchup than Touré’s; I don’t think the tally will be close.

#4 Gilberto Silva vs. #5 Sol Campbell

Another Invincible-on-Invincible battle. Silva and Campbell both won their first round matchups convincingly, each picking up more than 85% of the votes. That Invincibles defensive setup (that included these two) was something, conceding only 26 goals in 38 matches. Silva was the shield and Campbell anchored the defense. I guess after this matchup, one of these two gets downgraded to plain, old Vincible.

#3 Freddie Ljungberg vs. #11 Nacho Monreal

Freddie coasted to a 97%-3% victory over Shkodran Mustafi. By besting Kanu, Nacho Monreal scored what will equal the biggest upset of the first round, barring a late-miracle for Emmanuel Eboué against Mathieu Flamini. La Cabra is a cool nickname, but Ljungberg is flat-out cool. I think this pairing goes about as well for Nacho as Freddie running at him with the ball would — that is to say, not well. That’s not a knock on Monreal; Ljungberg went around or through pretty much anything that stood in his way.

#2 Santi Cazorla vs. #7 Mikel Arteta

This is a doozy of a matchup, a battle between countrymen, former teammates and midfield partners, and two guys who are incredibly popular among Gooners. It’s the marquee pairing of the second round, for sure. Both guys picked up more than 200 votes in the first, and their opponents stayed in the single digits. For all the other matchups, I’ve had a good idea of how the voting would go. I’ve got no clue on this one.

Here is the overall bracket for reference.