Morning all.

Back in the summer of 2000 – French midfielder Emmanuel Petit was approaching 30 years old. He’d been with us for three seasons and together with Patrick Vieira, he bossed our midfield with great success. That summer, he moved to Barcelona. Injuries and playing in defence didn’t help him during his first season, so much so, he didn’t stay a second. Instead, he returned to England. London, Chelsea!

In 2002, on FA Cup Final day, there he was dressed in blue and facing his old club Arsenal. Ray Parlour and Freddie Ljungberg stole the day.

In January 2003, Petit lined up for his Chelsea side and even got on the score-sheet on 86 mins to give his side a hope of a draw having been 3-0 down but it wasn’t to be..

Two unhappy returns against his old side.

Cesc Fabregas – flew off back to Barcelona back in 2011 to his boyhood club, his dream was to only ever play for his home city but after a few years, things not going quite as planned, like Petit he returned to England. London, Chelsea and Sunday he returns to The Emirates for the first time.

Many Arsenal fans wanted him to come back to Arsenal, after all, we had first option on him. Didn’t we?

Well all was not perhaps so easy according to Arsene Wenger when asked why he chose not to bring Fabregas back to the club, when it was his decision rather than the player’s:

We will have to discuss that one day, with all the terms… it is not as clean as that.

I cannot speak to you about that (reasons) now because that will not help us to win the game on Sunday.

Arsene Wenger also suggested that the deal between Chelsea and Barcelona for the player was done long before the summer of 2014 so if true, any summer words from Fabregas about an Arsenal return must have been poppycock as he’d have known he was already heading to Chelsea. Perhaps Arsene Wenger knew that too.

Anyway, I’m not one who cares about who Cesc Fabregas plays for these days and I never wanted Arsenal to re-sign him in any case, all I care about is Arsenal beating Chelsea on Sunday, securing that 2nd spot and of course, Fabregas having an unhappy return to his old club.

But I hope the fans at The Emirates don’t boo Fabregas. Why waste energy on him when fans can use that energy on our own players and our own club….

But I do hope one Arsenal fan find the Chelsea bus keys and drive it away – otherwise it’ll be parked just in front of their goal!

Gossip:

William Carvalho is the midfield enforcer we could sign in the summer. Apparently, Arsenal made several bids to sign the midfielder last summer, but the deal collapsed.

However, Portugese newspaper O Jogo says negotiations have been continuing, and an agreement is now on the cards, with Sporting ready to sell for £21.5 million.

That’s it for Friday, have a good one…