Morning all.
Riccardo Calafiori is the latest name linked to Arsenal. He’s an Italian left-back/centre-back and apparently, he had a good Euros. Italy didn’t mind you but hey, one player doesn’t make a team.
Back in 1995 was the first time an Italian stepped foot into Premier League football when striker Andrea Silenzi joined Nottingham Forest. Only 82 Italian footballers have followed in his footsteps. Compared to Spain 165, France 234, Netherlands 149, that figure is quite low but it’s more than the 79 players who’ve moved to England from Germany.
Would be fair to suggest that Italian footballers don’t always do well in the Premier League? Off the top of my head I can only name a few who have. The obvious being Zola then there’s the late Vialli, Balotolli and Di Canio – now I’m struggling although I recall Middlesbrough signing an Italian although his name escapes me. I could look him up but I can’t be bothered. Those I’ve listed were attacking players but defensively, Jorginho is the only player which springs to mind.
Takehiro Tomiyasu was signed from Bologna but that doesn’t mean Arsenal are going back to the same club for another defender who only joined the Spanish club a year ago.
Arsenal have been quiet so far this summer with just exits from the academy being the main transfer news and I think it’s fair to say that fans expect Nketiah, Nelson and perhaps Smith-Rowe to be on the move this summer too.
I found this this morning from David Seaman who has hit out at Financial Fair Play, slamming the impact it has had on academy graduates being sold for ‘pure profit’.
I don’t like to see young players moving clubs for profit and sustainability reasons, Seaman told Betway. “I don’t think Financial Fair Play is working, and it’s a negative on the game. It’s supposed to level things out, but why do we want to see things levelled out? We like to see success, and it’s stopping clubs from buying players they want to buy.
The last January transfer window was almost non-existent, because of FFP and the points deductions for Everton and Nottingham Forest. I don’t think it’s making the game better. There has been talk of Eddie Nketiah and Emile Smith Rowe leaving Arsenal, and for me it hurts when homegrown players leave the club. They aren’t getting game time, so they’re going to be frustrated, and fans will be frustrated if they leave because they love singing songs for homegrown players.
When the academy is successful, it means something at every level of the club. When I coach at Arsenal, I see what the youth players go through to get to this level, and then when they get into the first team it’s a celebration for the entire club.
I agree with our old keeper but I don’t necessarily think it’s FFP alone which is ruining the academy players careers. Cream will always rise to the top IF managers are prepared to give them a chance to shine but, with the pressure on ‘top club’ managers to be successful, playing younger players can be a risk. We all want the next academy player to come through and be a success story but not since Saka has one truly succeeded at Arsenal.
Just as I tend to think one is about to burst onto the scene, he’s gone. And yes, when sold, they are 100% profit barring what’s its cost the club throughout their journey through the academy.
Every football fan wants their club to be successful and of course, that level of success varies throughout each league but other than in domestic cups, ‘top club’ managers are unlikely to give academy players much of an opportunity, not if they’re challenging for trophies. After all, if that manager ‘fails’, it’s his job on the line.
Catch up in the comments.
Arsenal to sell striker
Arsenal are ready to cash in on highly-rated striker Mika Biereth in this summer’s transfer window.
With his Arsenal contract reaching its final year, the Austrian club’s director is keen on keeping Biereth post-loan deal and has stated that the player is for sale.
Speaking to Kronen Zeitung, Sturm Graz director Andreas Shicker stated: “Mika is in the last year of his contract, and the club wants to sell him, so we now need to find a solution with Arsenal.”
This may well be a bit contentious but , when you look at the amount of money being pumped into the women’s game perhaps a similar amount of effort was put into the boys game young players might not have to be sold off to balance the books. Back in the day there was the South East counties league for the kids and The Football combination for the reserves . I can remember being in crowds of more than a few thousand watching the reserves play at Highbury and there was a competitive stepping stone to the first team as the fringe players got to play against stars at the end of their careers or coming back from injury.
I saw Matthews , Billy Wright and Finney amongst many others and surely with the technology on pitches nowadays there could be a league where when the firsts are away the reserves play in front of a crowd at home .
If a similar amount was pumped into it with similar exposure it would take off and would no doubt build a following.
Discuss.
F F P is a double edged sword, it can help level up the clubs but could also cause serious harm to some. I’m in favour of reigning the clubs that are involved in financial doping, but for others struggling to survival docking points can lead to possible relegation and eventual obliteration.
Back home now from the clinic where my wife successfully underwent her second cataract operation so hopefully it won’t be too long before her life returns to normal.
Are you talking about leveling up Potter? On election day 😂
Glad to hear it went well Cicero.
Thanks Rico, Swift and efficient
In barely a couple of days Arsenal have stepped up their interest in the 22-year-old
Calafiori, and are “increasingly close” to completing a deal, according to reliable transfer expert
Gianluca Di Marzio.
Is there an election Rico? Looking at the television over the past few weeks you would never believe it. 😉
FFP has to stay, otherwise the small clubs will have no chance of compeating against the likes of Man C were money is no object.
I wonder where this rumour came from. I can’t see it myself but who knows..
😂 Cicero, I didn’t realise until I looked at the news earlier. Guess I’m too late for a postal vote…
I doubt it’s going anywhere Geoff.
Sturm Graz agree fee with Arsenal for Biereth
Sturm Graz have agreed a fee with Arsenal to sign striker Mika Biereth.
The Denmark youth international spent the second half of the season on loan at the Austrian club scoring nine goals in 22 appearances.
He is now set to join Sturm Graz permanently after the two clubs reached an agreement on a transfer fee thought to be in the region of £4m.
The deal for the 21-year-old will make Biereth a club record purchase for Austrian champions Sturm Graz.
£4 million, that’s a derisory fee, we must be desperate to accept that.
Good Afternoon Rico, assembled members and Goonerstan. Yes, whatever happened to Stan and is he still creaming his pants?
Calm down Stan, just in case…
Selling William Saliba, now that’s a thorny issue ladies and gentlemen.
Personally I wouldn’t sell him at any price, we don’t have to sell and if we start winning trophies he won’t want to leave anyway.
Arsenal can pay anything Madrid can pay but we need to start winning silverware!
I’m not even going to consider a price because losing him would be a disaster but I can tell you all that any figure for Saliba would need to be considerably more than has been suggested already before I could feel comfortable about it.
Yes Devil I totally agree, players developed in Italy are serious professionals who are technically among the best in the world. Serie A to me is the best league after the EPL despite what the Spanish say imo and any player you get from there is going to be top notch.
I also agree with Devil on the thinking behind the Bologna fellow, a mirror image of Ben White are my thoughts exactly and as we switch from a four to a three at the back throughout games is therefore perfect for our system. Italians don’t like leaving Serie A but England has a long tradition of assimilating Italians into our culture so I don’t see any problems there. Forza Gunners
Yes Cicero I agree, £4m, if true, isn’t that great at all, although sell-on clauses, clauses on appearances and goals might also be included in any deal.
My only question would be why there was so little interest from other clubs in Mika Biereth and that’s on the back of his exploits at Graz last season?
Also I wonder if Arsenal have to pay a percentage to Fulham?
Potter talking sense.
Agree that the reserves league was a better proving ground than the U21 league. Seasoned pros playing for a place on the 1st bench, not letting the fancy dan kids do their tricks for the cameras.
Bring the reserve league back and ban multi-club ownership, where the only interest is hoarding talent for sister clubs.
“I don’t like to see young players moving clubs for profit and sustainability reasons, Seaman told Betway.”
Big Dave getting paid to give his views to a betting company about finance. Oh the irony
Hi Rico
Did you read that Omari Hutchinson has moved to Ipswich for £20 million? Chelsea desperately needing to shift players to meet the FFP deadline. Ipswich the willing participant in the deal.
Chelsea get £15 million up front for their accounts. Ipswich pay £4m per year for 5 years. Arsenal get £5m for the sell on clause.
Apparently he did well in the Championship for Ipswich, but Arsenal and Chelsea didn’t think he was Prem level. £20m is amazing business, but also seems extremely fishy, like many of the dealings of Chelsea, Villa, Everton and N Forest of late.
Easy come easy go Cicero…
Good Afternoon Rico and all
Good post Rico especially the summary about Seaman and his FFP opinions. I never read them on NN since its just the opinions of past players on something.
I agree fully with FFP and feel it should be enforeced across all divisions across Europe. It stops clubs like city bending everything in sight to win and also it stops shady deals, like the George Graham kickbacks.
Kev, Calafiori is a good defender and I feel he will play mostly at LB and invert in midfield instead of overlapping. In Italy he is a top defender so I hope he settles in well and cements his place.
There are other defenders and midfielders from the Italian Seria A which we can buy. One of the reasons is that they are tactically sound having been bought up in in it since being kids. With regards forwards that’s another story since atm forward players in the serie A are slighly poor compared to forwards in the EPL and other European countries like Portugal, Germany, France, Spain etc,.
Afternoon Kev. Apparently he’s a bit of a history with injuries.
Hi Pete, I did read that, I guess Hutchinson being on a longer contract gave Chelsea some power in the sale. £20m is a lot though and I bet we wouldn’t get that much for Nelson..
Afternoon Devil, thanks.
I too think FFP is a must although it’s a great shame that like VAR, it’s not been implemented very well. I know the rules were relaxed around Coronavirus time but the fact that it’s 2024 before City are to asked questions about their spending, is ridiculous. Especially as smaller clubs have been dealt with rapidly.
I just hope the team investigating now, have enough evidence to support the charges.
Arsenal are expected to table a £46.5million bid for Riccardo Calafiori by the end of the week which will be impossible for Bologna to turn down.
The player already has his suitcases packed for England with a move edging closer.
David Raya signing is now official..
Arteta on transfers:
Arteta told ESPN: “We are looking to improve in every possible department.
“With the new regulations, there are certain things we have to respect and be conscious of and then obviously the Euros and Copa América are slowing everything down. Hopefully now it is going to pick up a little bit.
“There are things that we have to improve, that’s for sure and we are going to try to. But the market is tricky.
“We have been very aggressive, we are very determined and we have a clear idea obviously of what we want to do. It will come down to finding the right agreements at the right time.”
Arteta also answered questions on his own contract situation. The Spaniard’s current Arsenal deal has one year left to run but the 42-year-old says he “doesn’t expect any issues happening.”
“There is no update at the moment,” Arteta said.
“The thing that hasn’t changed is how happy I am and how valued I feel here and how much I love representing this club.
“Things happen in a natural way and our relationship is that good that I don’t predict any issues happening. But things have to develop in the right way and it will happen.”
Kev,
You’re my Arsenal youth expert and I know you like Biereth. I was surprised to read someone above say he only had a year left …
That’s the main reason we didn’t get 10 million that I thought we might it would seem.
I never felt that our club rated him good enough for England, but letting his contract run down to a year is disappointing. We should at least have been talking about extending him now, to put a little pressure on buyers. We were too transparent about plans to sell him. Sturm know they just need to be patient. That’s why only 4 mil if true.
Just read that the calafiori deal is now very close at BP42 MILLION, which is what Bologna want, that is, Eur50million. If Arsenal agree to that Calafiori is as good as ours.
Hopefully we get Timber mk2 or Colpani (you heard it from me first, he is a Monza midfielder), a box to box midfielder.
Seems labour has won with a 410 chairs majority in your elections. Opposition is obliterated.
Just been watching some clips of Calafiori, he seems very quick and confident defending, while not shy to take a shot at goal,
Arsenal’s £40 million bid for Calafiori has been labelled a “disaster”. A disaster for the Italian league says a senior member of the Italy F A, who regrets losing such a promising young player from his home country league.
DG>
There is only one “chair” in the UK parliament’s House of Commons and that is the Speakers,
All of the members have a “seat”, but that “seat” is on a bench. Our parliament is a very traditional sort of place.
The Norfolk dwellers of this manor might bump into Liz Truss down the local pub…pulling pints maybe, as she has some free time in her diary now.
“I was Prime Minister of this country for 5 minutes”
“Really…a pint of ale and some pork scratchings please Liz”
😂
Sounds like a deal has been done then Cicero.
I prefer that to the poor people of Clacton who are likely to be knocked over by their newly elected M P as he stumbles out of the pub smothered in milk-shake or something worse.
The deal’s not done ’til it’s done Rico. 😉
The snoozefest that was the General election is over for a few years,a low turnout indicates a lot were as lacking in enthusiasm as I was.
Looking forward to the Premier league season,it starts only 6 weeks from tomorrow,which means even if our players go out,they won’t get a proper pre – season,or a proper break,both probably. They could have another 3 games and another week. That’s why I wouldn’t be sorry to see any of our players lose,same goes for those in South America,although they aren’t really playing.
Today’s first game features the best 2 teams we’ve seen,Spain have been outstanding. I wouldn’t be surprised to see more penalty shoot outs though.
I’ve voted in every General election since I was old enough to do so, I have always voted for the same party but this time I struggled to put a cross in the correct box whilst holding my nose.
In a few months I shall be dusting off my old bumper sticker “Don’t blame me, I Voted Tory!”
I’M getting bored waiting for us to sign someone,
I wonder if the ladies fans are happy that Vivianne Miedema picked Man c but at the end of the day good luck to her
It certainly isn’t Cicero.. lol
Good evening everyone
Bologna have accepted Arsenal’s Eur 50 million offer according to Italian media.
The game has come to life in the second half and Spain have taken the lead. It’s much more entertaining now, and I have a nice bottle of Spanish red to enhance the enjoyment. 😉
Germany equalise with 88 minute goal. Spain gutted. 4 minutes to play.
Extra time to be played
I’ve had a German non alcoholic beet 😂
Great header to win it for Spain..
Germany out 2 – 1
If your going to consume non alcoholic items try beer or wine or spirits but surely beet. 😉
Oops, beer 🤣
Hmm, Portugal / France is a bit cat and mouse, trouble is they are both playing the mouse role. 🐱 🐀
They’re playing to their strengths Cicero….or more appropriately to their limits
Kai Havertz can have a bit of a rest now…
Aren’t we linked with the geezer who scored the Spanish winner?
The form of Saliba just puts into perspective how dumb Deschamps has been…
Ah, some entertainment, a penalty shootout
Come on Portugal, help Saliba, he needs a rest…
Portugal didn’t win because playing with Ronaldo was like playing with 10 men for 120 minutes. They worked their tails off just to cover for him to be able to be a static glory hunter up front. If it was 11 vs 11 it would have been a win for Portugal in 90 minutes. I’m sick of this “French” team.
Good morning all, Arsenal have agreed a five year contract for Calafiori but have NOT agreed a transfer fee with Bologna, according to Fabrizio Romano.
Morning all.
That might be a problem then Cicero. 😜
Funny how the media are calling Xhaka one of the best midfielders in the game yet not so long ago, they despised him. He’s always been a very good player, just played in the wrong position.
New post up.
Just a site refresher.