OK so as you know I'm currently on my hols but as I have a few hours to kill I thought I'd just go over recent events and goings on.
Well let's start with the game on Saturday that sadly didn't get off to the start we all wanted. I didn't watch the game but was getting updates and saw the highlights after. It's always a gutter when you boss the game and create 20 plus chances to end up 0-0. We, in all honesty should have scored and won, the chance the fell to Giroud should have been 1-0 Arsenal but I think potentially nerves got the better of him and he put it wide. I said when we signed Giroud, it had the potential to be a really good buy, but I think he will take some time to settle. Podolski I'm not so worried about coming from a league with a much higher calibre of football, but Giroud may take a bit of time to bed in, let's hope it's not too long. Cazorla looked phenomenal, a real star, he could easily be our best player this season. His real test will come when we travel to middle earth on Sunday and take on that colony of orcs known as Stoke. If he stands up to them and still shines then we know we are most definitely on to a winner.
Unlike the RvP deal, I was really disappointed with Song. Firstly because the deal we struck was pitiful. £15m for someone of his quality with 3 years left, really Arsenal is that the best we can do? I am sad to see him leave after he said "I am happy at Arsenal" but once again greedy agent Darren Dein (wanker) turned his head away from us like countless other players over the last few seasons. I can't see Song playing much this season and it just feels like another deal that Dein had engineered in an effort to spite us fans. However the good news is that Song was our last player tethered to that unbearable fucker so we're rid of him at last.
Finally and I must say take this with a pinch of salt, the Sahin deal seems to be moving in the right direction with 'according to sky sources: a deal has been struck'. I suggest much of this has to do with the fact that the Luka Modric deal also seems to be moving in that direction. But please don't take this deal as done these are the same sky sources that claimed RvP was staying at Arsenal a day before he signed for United so...
Anyway looking ahead to Stoke on Sunday where hopefully we can get our first win of the season. Until then have a good week from a rather stormy Orlando.
Well there you have it, in a way we all knew it was inevitable. The destination wasn't inevitable however and I can completely understand all the bitterness that followed and all the hatred. That's just football...
Where to begin? OK those who know me personally and follow me on twitter
(https://twitter.com/fisher_mr) will know that last night, far from being hurt and disappointed I was actually in a rather cheery mood. I'll explain. £24m for a 29 year old, injury prone player with one year left on his contract, to me is brilliant business. As always we've made an enormous profit and I think United have taken a huge gamble for a number of reasons.
Firstly, with a injury sheet longer than the Olympics bill, there is always that question mark over RVP and his fitness. With his many injuries over the years every time he goes down there is always that fear that he might stay down. At 29, one more big injury could spell real trouble for him. I don't want to wish injury or anything like that upon him, even when a player moves to sp*rs you still don't think like that. But I do have a niggling feeling he may be seeing a lot of the United physio.
Secondly I have real reservations about how he will work with Rooney. I can't see them working together, he won't score 20+ goals I will put money on that. Can he feed Rooney as a Shadow Striker? Is that worth £24m? I don't think so. I'm sure Ferguson will play them side-by-side upfront, but considering they have problems in centre midfield will they get the support they need?
So it's a big risk. In terms of my personal feelings, I don't feel betrayed or angry. Just a little disappointed that he could have been up there with Henry, Wright, Bergkamp and now he'll just be that dutch bloke that scored some good goals for us. He won't be remembered as a legend and I'm sure that one day he'll look back and regret it. But he engineered this move himself and now he has to deal with whatever it brings.
We need to continue our build up to the new season now and re-invest the money that we will get from the deal. A striker should be right at the top of the list, I worry about Giroud coming from Ligue 1, yes he looks promising and he certainly knows how to find the net but it's a big step for him. Podolski I'm less worried about but I don't really think Wenger wants to play his as another striker as such more as a versatile attacker. I'd like to see us buy Llorente but I can't see it, Wenger now surely knows that we need to bring in some players and it's just a case of waiting and seeing what happens.
As I'm jetting off to the USA tomorrow posts will be limited, but I will do my pre-match posts as the new season FINALLY kicks off! In the words of Thomas Vermaelen "Life go's on".
Ah I have returned from my holidays after barely keeping track with all that's been going on I think I'm on top of it all. So we took on FC Koln or Cologne, whatever you prefer, yesterday and as we were expected to do won easily. Again the result comes second to the pre-season preparation but it was nice to see our new boys out, with Podolski grabbing a smart brace against his old club. Giroud had chances too but their keeper made some nice saves. Cazorla looked very impressive, he's fast and very very creative, obviously this is one game and against a side that got relegated last season, but I think he could be a really good signing. Vermaelen scored first with a move that will have (slightly) older fans relieving many goals with a classic Arsenal corner that Steve Bould would have taken part in many times. The flick on at the near post and headed in.
In the second half we made wholesale changes and Gervinho continued his impressive pre-season with yet another goal that was a great piece of individual work down the wing and he finished well from a tight angle. It was a good match and it has really got people excited about the highly anticipated return of the Premier League this weekend, me included! However the main talking point of the whole thing is something that has been rumbling on since the start of the summer.
Robin Van Persie came on after the 69th minute, not the 45 he said he'd play but he still played. I think it sent a message to various people (Robin included), to just say, he's still contracted and he's still an Arsenal player. As expected he came on and played his part, he didn't do anything of note, but he played with professionalism and at the moment that's all he can do. Wenger again re-iterated we want to keep him and that he is part of our plans. What we must remember is that deadline day is not Saturday and if he plays on Saturday it doesn't mean he will be our player for the rest of the season so at the moment, much like the rest of the summer we can only wait and see.
But there are positives to take from yesterday and we look relatively sharp going into the first game of the season. Let's hope for a repeat of the scoreline against Sunderland!
Hi all, just a quick post today as I am extremely busy.
As I'm sure many of you know, this morning Laurent Koscielny has agreed a new long-term deal with us. We have been criticised for our defensive frailties over the last couple of seasons but Koscielny, especially last season, I think has been fantastic. He's really got his head down and got on with the job in hand making crucial interceptions, tackles and scoring the odd goal too including our winner at West Brom. He has really won the fans over and it's great to see him (much like Vermaelen) sign a contract, no fuss, no problems and focus on his football. See Robin, it's not that hard is it?
In other news and these are only rumours I have seen from various sources that we have agreed personal terms for Malaga winger Santi Cazorla. He's a lad I don't know much about I'll admit but he would be yet another addition to our attacking line up. Giving us plenty of depth up front. I don't know whether he's a left or right winger but it means there will be hot competition for one side.
Malaga are currently in a bit of a financial situation. With the new owner piling money in at a rate of knots, there have been issues with players wages not being paid and tax problems. If they don't wipe their debt by July 31st, they will be relegated and banned from playing in the Champions League. This gives us the opportunity to possibly force a sale of around €20m.
Yesterday Wenger also stated that we won't be going in for Yann M'villa, unless Wilshere or Diaby suffer a setback which sadly seems likely. I think it's risky to gamble on Diaby's fitness and bringing in a player as cover would be no bad thing. But we can only speculate until anything else is said.
We play the Malasyia XI later today in our first proper pre-season match, let's see what happens and pray for no injuries. Till next time.
Afternoon all and what a fine afternoon it is here in in the sun! At last. So since I last posted we have revealed our away kit for next season and well. To be frank, it's awful. Firstly, we have never worn purple and there is no connection with purple to the club. Apparently it's to celebrate the Jubilee year with a more regal colour scheme harking back to when we Royal Arsenal, fucking eons ago. Secondly: hoops...really Arsenal? We shouldn't play in hoops because it puts us in the ball park of other shittier teams such as QPR and Celtic.
Anyway the squad have arrived in Asia for their pre-season tour of the continent. Obviously there are 2 main aims of these tours: 1) commercial gain 2) pre-season preparation, but it really is great to see so many fans turn out to see the team and I hope they put on a display to make the fans proud, because at the end of the day whether your a fan living 5 minutes from the Emirates of a fan living 5000 miles away we're all equally important.
The squad has a few omissions including Chamakh, Bendtner; new boys: Podolski and Giroud and of course RVP. I'm not going to go into intense detail about potential bids, or who said what but the interview given by Wenger earlier he re-iterated that he wanted to keep hold of him and that:
As for the rest I will do what is in the best interests of Arsenal
Football Club. That, at the moment, is where we are. There is not a lot
more to say than that.
I'll leave it up to you to judge what is in the best interest of Arsenal Football Club. With bids reportedly made and rejected at £8m, £10m and £12m, it suggests that we are going to hold out for a better price if Wenger does decide to sell him. Which would be good if we actually did that as, lets face it, in recent years we've been a bit of a pushover when it comes to transfers.
One thing is certain is that we need to sort it out, sooner rather than later. The longer this rumbles on the more and more I start to worry that we could be left without a main striker with a few days left of the window. A situation we could do without being in. We either need to decide to sell and do it now or decide to keep him and make it public that hes staying.
I am also beginning to worry that because this situation is dominating the headlines, other areas where I feel we need to strengthen may be getting overlooked. With it looking likely that Wilshere will be out for the start of the season, we need to bring someone in who can give us that edge going forward. Easier said than done I know. I also think we need a defensive midfield player with Diaby being so injury prone its impossible to say whether he will be able to get a consistent run of matches, or even if Wenger will play him. I don't know whether there are more players that we have lined up but with this RVP stuff not going away I can't see anything getting done until its resolved.
That's your latest for now, if there are any developments be sure I will post. Enjoy the sun people.
Well this was reported a few days ago, I debated writing about it then but decided I'd wait until this new round of talks were over, then got bored and decided to write about it.
After the big "I'm not signing statement", it appears that Van Persie may sign a new contract following a new round of talks with Ivan Gazidis. It seemed odd to me at the time to release the statement and for it to be worded as bizarrely as it was. Word on the grape vine is that it was written by his agent, who I will come on to in a minute, with a bit of RVP input. According to Sky's Dharmesh Sheth this was all in the aim of negotiating a more frugal contract, which is entirely believable looking at Robin's agent.
So Robin's agent...well...Kees Vos is the sort of man that gives football agents a bad name, now that's saying something. Everything I read about him is simply that he likes to keep moving players around to earn a nice commission for himself. It was his idea to release the statement with the intention of either: increasing the chances of a transfer or increasing the value of a new deal, thus increasing his commission. Quite why players choose him is beyond me but there you go. So after Kees brainwave, we stand where we do now, knowing nothing more than we did the other day. If you'd like to personally tell Kees what you think of him then use his twitter here.
Now I'm not going to comment on what I think Robin will do, because simply I don't know. Should he sign a new deal he may get a rather frosty reception from some of the fans. A lot of the love we felt for the dutchman has evaporated, myself included. That said I stand by my statement from the last post. There is no way he will be as prolific as last year, that was his peak season.
For now we can only wait and see what comes out of the club. When that time comes I'll be on it!
OK I've just deleted this whole post and I've started re-doing it because what I wrote first just didn't really sound right. So this is take 2. Now I've been saying all season about how we need to sign him up and how we needed to do this, I should be gutted. Quite frankly I'm really not. I don't know why. Possible because I've seen this done a million times with Arsenal, I've seen bigger players leave and more important and honestly better players leave (Cesc, Henry). But mainly because when I wrote this the first time I read it through and thought: but was robin really all that? 8 years and he had one blinding season and now his head has doubled in size.
His statement quite frankly was baffling. I don't understand why he would release it in the way it was worded. The club he spent all season saying he loved and he basically said I've outgrown you. Somewhere up in the crazy dutch mind of his, he thought he was saying the right thing and let us down lightly. That completely backfired. The hero-to-zero tag is definitely what happened in this case. Fans aren't stupid we all know that by saying what he did, he drove his transfer value down, meaning of course when he signs, his wages can be higher. I genuinely thought he was better than that.
I know last season he effectively won us 3rd place, but apart from last season did he really do much? I don't think so. Reports say we're going to be offered £22m, remembering he will be 29 before the season starts, I think that's a decent sum for a player whose reached his peak and has had one good season. But now everyone is asking should we sell or should we hold him to his contract.
Being brutally honest we HAVE to sell now. We've been in this situation before and we know the consequences of holding out and having the whole thing explode in our face. With the new season upon us in around a month and a half, we need to reinvest and we need to do it soon. But will Arsenal re-invest? This is what really gets supporters wound up, we sell these players OK, we don't have much influence over that but the money seems to disappear into some account somewhere. I can already see what the excuse will be this time "We bought 2 new strikers already, what more do you want?"
Staying is now the worst possible scenario for him, does he really think the fans will so willingly take him back? I am saying this now, IF he did stay for the last season, I will not cheer any goal he scores. I'm pretty sure there are many the same out there.
But at a club that isn't built around him I can't see him being anywhere near as prolific. Another name in a team of individuals, we saw it at the Euros, he will flop next season, mark my word!
