Morning all.
Andries Jonker has not yet officially started in his new post at Arsenal but my goodness, he’s not sitting around on his butt waiting until the 1st July to get his sidekicks in place.
No, he’s already swooped in and made a few signings, one’s which he clearly believes will finally take our Academy to another level.
From July 1st, current under-18s coach Carl Laraman will join Steve Gatting to work with the club’s under-21 players.
The under-18s will be managed by new arrival Frans de Kat and former Arsenal player and current under-16 coach Kwame Ampadu.
The under-16s will be under the leadership of Jan van Loon.
Who??
Well, Dutchmen Frans de Kat and Jan van Loon bring with them a wealth of experience from previous roles at leading clubs and the national association in Dutch football. (According to afc.com)
Frans de Kat has vast coaching experience with the KNVB, (Royal Dutch Football Association) where he was a coach at both under-15 and under-16 levels. He has also held positions at Dutch clubs Willem II Tilburg, as head of scouting, and ADO Den Haag, as head of youth academy.
Jan van Loon joins Arsenal from the KNVB where he is currently a coach for his country’s national youth teams. He is a vastly experienced youth coach and, as well as representing the KNVB, has worked at Dutch clubs Willem II Tilburg and PSV Eindhoven.
Of course I nicked all of that from the official site because I have never heard of either but they are Dutch, come on, they have to be good! Don’t they?
Finally, Arsene Wenger has been giving an update on our injuries and returns:
Aaron Ramsey…
Aaron and Nacho Monreal are back training with the squad, so that is good news. Hopefully they will be available for Sunday. Diaby is back on the pitches, so that is good news.
On the others…
At the moment that is all because the other injured players are not back, not Wilshere, not Ozil. Everybody else is alright.
Laurent Koscielny…
He is still out. The earliest [he will be back] is next week, the latest is the week after.
Wilshere and Walcott…
They are alright, they are doing well. It is still early for them, of course for Theo the season is finished and Jack is progressing well.
Mesut Ozil…
The FA Cup will be too soon for him, but he will hopefully be back soon after that.
Just six league fixtures are left of this seasons campaign, hopefully eight matches in total if we can secure a place in the FA Cup Final next weekend.
Barring Theo Walcott, we could just end the season with every player being fit…..
Yes, even Abou Diaby….
That’s it for another day….
Morning Rico. Surely Loon and Kat were April fools! If they are not, what are to expect? A team of juniors that purr or a team that play like men/boys who are possessed!
* are we
And as usual too bloody late for AFC to benefit from them. They will ALL be back just in time for a nice long summer holiday….what a joke! Every year its the same and we never hear of an enquiry into the massive injury list every season do we?
Morning Wavy and all..
Oh no, have i been had 🙂
Pete, most will be heading off to the WC but yes, something needs to be looked at re our injuries, they are indeed a joke, especially the amount of setbacks when they start to return…
Phew, the new coaches were announced yesterday and not the 1st. lol
That’s ok then! Are they our first signings of the new TW? I bet they were free!
Ha ha. Hopefully they might give something different to the Academy training and we actually start seeing some younger players making it instead of going out on loan, not playing and then vanishing into a dark hole somewhere…
AW has confirmed Ramsey in the squad for Everton, what a huge boost.
I believe that the prefix Van means son of , does that mean that 1 tackles like a kitten and the other runs around a lot.
That’s too clever for me to work out Potter. lol
Diaby…..
What does Persie mean then?? I better not answer that for fear of getting banned!
Lee :- It’s a soap powder typo !
Morning Kev..
Lee 😆
Fido has to have her wash cut and blow dry today so I’m off for a while. Catch up later…
Good Morning to The Lady of the House and all fellow Gooners in residence.
I take the appointment the new director and coaches in the Academy as a favourable sign of things to come for the club as a whole. The Dutch have always taken the development of their youth players seriously. Hopefully they will bring a breathe of fresh air to the Academy and the club.
Lee – There are as many answers to your question on the meaning of Persie as there are Arsenal fans, but in the end they all mean the same thing. Anyway van Pursestrings is history. We all, our club included, need to move on and look to the future.
Afternoon All.
Afternoon Rico…
The prospect of the ‘Media Darlings’ Liverpool, winning the EPL, has got all those MotD presenters, the Press, the BBC/SKY and professional Scousers everywhere, in a right old tizzy of excitement…
It’s enough to make ya wanna throw-up…
Well there’s a lot more twists and turns to go in this season, and despite the Usual Suspects predicting an Arsenal defeat at Goodison Park, I have a hunch that there could be a few other more interesting and surprising upsets in store, both this weekend and beyond….
The result at Selhurst Park last weekend, could well be an indication of what is in store as those clubs down the bottom, fight for survival…
Kev – Amen to that.
CG, Bless You My Son… 🙂
Kev, have you noticed that the “professional scouser” doesn’t live anywhere near Liverpool……
Do I detect the return of the defrocked Reverend Kev, the impertinent but pious alter-ego of Allez-Kev? Is there truly hop for the Arsenal world?
tsb hope
Good move on the youth selection…
As Dev and a few have previously stated on here, the coaching is very poor at the club certainly after 16 y.o it will be too late to instill the tactical awareness the top players have which is mostly missing in English football imho…
Having the likes of Gatting at u-21 will add to the kids development in a different way too…something maybe an European coach may lack to round of the education process needed for this jungle called EPL…
And with Super bionic Diaby coming back… life is complete… 🙂
Afternoon Rico and fellow HHers..
How did the soccer session go Scott?
Lee, all the professional Scousers either live in London or in Salford, and work for the BBC.
Anyway mate, now Scott (Jonah) has gone home we can get on with winning the Double… 😉
Nailed on…
Barney Rubble…
Diaby will be Arsenal player of June!
we are at 19th position in the U-21!!!!
and at the 9th position in the U-18!!!
Afternoon all, what a silly old day….
Still we could have bought Soldado to fire blanks for us…
Hiya Rico.. Howdy?
Hi Ts, shattered if i’m honest….
Dinner needs doing.
Later…
After a cursory look at Newsnow and other feeds I really have to ask why out of all the managers in the premiership Wenger needs to make a statement about Barcelona’s transfer embargo. Why can’t he just say that It’s not his concern.
That’s Arsene potter!
All quiet here so I’m off for the day…
Night all, enjoy your Friday evening….
Yes Arsene had an opinion on everything Potter…
I wonder what his opinion is on from learning his mistakes?
Also, what his opinion on our preparations for 12.45 ko
And, what is his opinion on our continuing injuries and what he can do about it?
Maybe he should focus on those issues before commenting on Barcalona…
Barney Rubble indeed Lee, luv it… 🙂
Other opinions I would be keen on is Arsene’s opinion on his inactivity during the Summer transfer window?
Lol. Kev AW and his opinions…
Interesting motd and the bbc did not feature AW in their ‘be inspired’ /ides of march’ commercial… subliminal Kev may have the answer… 😉
If anyone has not seen that commercial they should youtube it… spooky as F@@k…
Micko is right I am getting more paranoid…
As Sp1, says the whole league most probably is rigged anyway…if anyone is a betting man they should be putting their money on the scousers winning the league me think…
Liverpool v Manchester United. Match of the day. BBC 16th March 2014. and the bbc motd… said it all! That was beginning of the new order…
As one posh boy said to me recently… why bother… football=’Panem et Circenses’ to deceive the public.
Morning all from a sunny but cold Earls Colne…
Is Santi injured?
Why waste anytime commenting on those scum bags?
Wonder where we’d be in the league if Ramsey,Walcott,Diaby and Ozil we’re fit all season?
Morning Lee and all.
I’d say we’d be top, just as we were when most of those you list were fit and Diaby would have. Even a bonus…
Oops lol
There you go our last remaining Saturday home match goes to 1.30 Sunday morning on the behest of Television. For this reason only the season ticket renewal comes under more threat.
Up at the crack of dawn , no time for a drink before the match with our mates and after , the caravans and day trippers to Norfolk for the overnight before bank holiday Monday . Utter bliss.
No-one cares about the fans do they, as long as the money is coming in from the television coverage eh….
5 league home games this season on a Saturday at three oclock and 2 at 5.30 . Not bad out of 19 eh.
Can’t the club say ‘no’ to these kick off time changes?
But I doubt they would because I strongly suspect they earn an awful lot of money from Sky/BT
I believe that the year we got to the Champions league final 2006 , we earned £50 million from t.v. . Must have gone up pro-rata albeit we haven’t been near the final since.
That’s a lot of money. An awful lot of money, still, at least we have seen it all invested in the squad! lol
New post up now…