By Myles Palmer

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THIERRY HENRY has a slight groin strain and misses tomorrow's Premiership match at Middlesbrough.

He should be OK for the Champions League next Wednesday.

Sol Campbell is not ready yet.

And Freddie Ljungberg will be rested.

ARSENE says he would have liked to rest Hleb as well, but with Henry and Ljungberg out, that may be impossible.

First-goal Freddie has always been a reliable gladiator for the manager in European games, as Lazio and Juventus will testify.

All across Europe the big clubs are preparing for a league game, closely followed by a Champions League game.

Everybody wants to start well in the Champions League, and everybody needs to win their home games, whether it's Arsenal against Thun or Lyon v Real Madrid or Werder Bremen v Barcelona or Villareal & Diego Forlan v Man United

THE ENGLISH TV MARKET is the richest, so Premiership clubs earn big money if they do well, or even if they don't, like Arsenal, as this table shows.

Arsenal's other group opponents, Ajax and Sparta Prague, only earned £5 million and £2 million last season.

Uefa's prestige competition helps the rich clubs to maintain a monopoly of the best players

Distribution of £££££££££ in 2004/05 season:

CLUB Earnings Final position

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Liverpool England 21.5m winners

Chelsea England 19.8 semi

AC Milan Italy 17.5 final

Arsenal England 16.7 last 16

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Lyon France 13.6 quarter

Bayern Munich Germany 12.3 quarter

Werder Bremen Germany 11.4 last 16

Man United England 11.6 last 16

Barcelona Spain 10.7 last 16

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PSV Eindhoven Holland 10.5 semi

Juventus Italy 10.1 quarter

Inter Milan Italy 10 quarter

Valencia Spain 9.7 group

Monaco France 9.2 last 16

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Real Madrid Spain 9.2 last 16

Leverkusen Germany 9 last 16

Paris St-G France 8.3 group

Roma Italy 7.1 group

Celtic Scot 7 group

Deportivo Spain 6.6 group

Fenerbahce Turkey 5.5 group

Porto Portugal 5.4 last 16

Ajax Holland 5.2 group

Panathinaikos Greece 5.1 group

Olympiakos Greeece 4.9 group

Rosenborg Norway 4.1 group

Anderlecht Belgium 3.9 group

CSKA Moscow Russian 3.8 group

Dynamo Kiev Ukraine 3.3 group

Macc Tel-Aviv Israel 3.2 group

Shakhtar Ukraine 2.9 group

Sparta Prague Czech 2.6 group

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The Czechs may be small in money, but they are big in spirit and skill.

Those two games will not be walkovers.

September 9th 2005.

PS : I wish we could do tables !

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