Morning all.
David Dein and Arsene Wenger seemed a match made in heaven at Arsenal. Prior to the Frenchman’s arrival, Dennis Bergkamp had arrived and from then onwards, both Dein and Wenger worked their magic. Dein off the pitch and Wenger on it and for the next few years, Arsenal were the best in England.
It’s widely believed that Dein was the man who got things done, certainly transfers but a long time ago now, he waited too long before making one particular phone call to a certain rather dishy looking Frenchman. 1995 was the year and had his call to David Ginola been made earlier perhaps we might not have signed the great Dutchman. We’ll never know of course but I’m glad we signed Dennis if it was a toss up between the two, that’s for sure. When Dein tried to sign Ginola, he’d already made a commitment to Kevin Keegan and to Newcastle. He wouldn’t go back on his word, even though he gave the impression that no Newcastle contract had been agreed let alone signed. A rare thing these days eh…
I found it quite interesting listening to him explain this missed move on A League Of Their Own last night as he spoke about what might have happened all those years ago.
It looks like Mohammed Elneny will be leaving Arsenal as a loan to Besiktas seems to be on the cards. Monreal too appears to be departing after Sunday’s fixture as he heads off back home to Spain where he’ll no doubt end his career. Not yet though as those reliable legs of his have a few more years in them yet. I wish them both well, how could anyone not really as neither have put a foot wrong during their time at Arsenal.
Finally, it’s the Europa Cup draw today so we’ll find out who we’re up against in the group stages. We’ll avoid both United and Wolves I believe as we can’t play against a fellow English team at this stage but Celtic or Rangers are a possible banana skin. Looking at the Champions League draw which took place yesterday, I reckon it’s highly unlikely any of Chelsea, City, Toots or Liverpool will drop down into the Europa Cup to join us on our attempted journey towards Poland. Good.
Group F: Barcelona, Borussia Dortmund, Inter Milan, Slavia Prague.
That’s a tough group, great for football, not so great for the Europa League those as one of Barcelona, Dortmund of Inter will join it at the knockout stage.
Arsenal women drew a tough opposition in their draw too. Fiorentina, who are a good side by all accounts but then so are Arsenal.
I’d imagine securing a top four spot comes first on the Arsenal agenda this season and only if we cock that up again will we take the Europa route to Champions League more seriously. Or better still, we repeat Chelsea’s achievements of last season by securing third spot before winning in Poland.
All that is a long long way away though. For now it’s about the group draw later this morning and then a little friendly on Sunday afternoon against some club not far from The Emirates.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Uxus0tZu3zM
Enjoy….
Have a good Friday guys, catch up in the comments..
For years we have had reports of Wenger telling us who he nearly bought but now they are coming forward and telling us themselves.
No doubt over his tenure at the club he looked at many differing players , some he got and some he didn’t . It’s not surprising . Had Ginola , Ronaldo et al signed things would have been different and fickle people that we are they would have been loved by us rather than reviled.
Personally I loved the Dixon /Ginola rivalry , it was one of the highlights of the matches but I must admit that I prefered it when Dixon came out on top.
As I said recently both Elneny and Monreal can leave with my best wishes. Neither player has ever said or done anything detrimental to the club and I recall reading that on his arrival Emery was not sure of Monreal but after a few weeks decided that his attitude was spot on and decided to keep him .
Elneny has sat in the shadows , warmed the bench and although probably not happy with that position has got on with it and finally decided that he wants to play the game and who can blame him . With the new recruits and youngsters coming through he has discussed it with Emery and agreed that it’s time to move on.
Good luck to both of them.
To be fair to Ginola, he was simply answering a question put to him by Jack Whitehall who as we know is a massive Arsenal fan, as is Ramesh (spelling) and I think both had enjoyed taking the mickey out of the player. All in good faith of course.
Kind of feel sorry for Elneny, so many years of his career wasted.
An excellent read, Rico, thank you!
The biggest ‘miss’ for Arsenal was Ronaldo. His mother had 3 times confirmed that he would join Arsenal and Wenger thought the deal was done.
Sneaky Ferguson sent his Portuguese assistant coach Queiros (?) to Madeira and hey presto, Ronaldo changed his mind and Manure got him.
True story —– as he told the story himself, years later. Best not to know sometimes.—
Afternoon Rico and the house.
We are in Group F with
Frankfurt
Iiege
Vitoria
Dates to follow
Thanks Ra, Fergie once said we were a few noughts off of Ronaldo’s transfer fee.
Afternoon Rick, nice group to be part of. A few more academy players should get game time.
Liege and Frankfurt, two great cities to visit for the fans and fantastic beer to boot whilst not forgetting Belgian chocolate and German sausage with sauerkraut of course… 🙂
Good venues for our players, quite short journeys.
Portugal isn’t bad as well this time of the year, another good place to visit, some good fish dishes and excellent wine plus a bit of sunshine on our players’ backs as our weather changes in England, three good venues and no Azerbaijan in sight…
Not sure that Emery will play teams full of youngsters as those three teams aren’t pushovers.
But Nelson and Smith Rowe and Saka and Mavropanos and Medley could feature…
U23 are away to Derby tonight
Team is
Hein, Olowo, Clark, Omole, Ogungbo, Burton, NcEeff, Smith Rowe,
Coyle, John Jules Tormey
Subs
Hillson Dennis, Azeez, Matthews and Balogun
No Saka or Holding.
Has Rob finished with the youngsters and back with first team fulltime.??
Derby 1up at h/t.
We have missed3good chances.
Derby went 2up but a briliant goal by Burton and 1 by Balogon
made it 2-2 final score.
I think if Eddy the goal poacher had played instead of JJ
we would have won.
The sad news is that Smith Rowe went off with what looks like another bad injury.
I just do not understand why after he has been out for so long that they would risk
him by asking him to play 2 tough games in 4 days.
He was not the only one who looked like this was a game too much but saying this
it was a very good game of football.
Andrew a great win for the boys tonight I really love it
when we beat Slurrey and Kent.
Next up Lancs Can we beat them???
No Saka, no Holding and no Martinelli, apparently the young Brazilian has been really impressing in training and I’d love to see him on the subs bench for Sunday.
James Anderson will take no further part in the Ashes series after suffering a recurrence of a calf injury while playing for Lancashire seconds in a friendly.
Elneny is on his way to Turkey to join Besitkas on a season long loan.
New post up now