Morning all.
The big clear out at Arsenal is taking place according to reports with six of the old Arsène Wenger favourites being shown the exit. Physio Colin Lewin, who’s been at the club for 23 years has been told his time is up, as has first-team coach Neil Banfield, goalkeeping specialist (cough) Gerry Peyton, fitness coach Tony Colbert and equipment manager Paul Johnson. Finally, and at last, Boromorac. Steve Bould and Jens Lehmann are set to be offered roles within the new setup. The academy is having it’s own shake up too which is also good. There’s nothing confirmed on the official website as yet as over there they are still saying goodbye to Arsene Wenger.
A clear out was needed because most of the backroom staff seemed to have become as stale as Arsene Wenger, although it’s a surprise that so many are being told to leave before any new manager is appointed but I guess it’s a case of a new broom, whoever it maybe, really will be sweeping clean.
Should Steve Bould accept any new offer, I guess it keeps an Arsenal man within the camp and with Lehmann, the Invincibles memory remains alive and kicking. Freddie is coming back to the club to join them apparently which I think is great news. Can’t think why though.
Bould, not a local Arsenal boy by any means as he was born up north in Stoke-on-Trent, but he was an Arsenal player for eleven years forming part of the famous back five which Arsène Wenger inherited. In 1999, he headed back up north to play for Sunderland but arthritic problems saw retirement soon follow. He soon earned his coaching badges and in 2001 he returned to Arsenal where he joined the youth setup. Seventeen years later, he’s still at the club. Did you know he scored our first Premier League goal goal? Of course you did, not that it did much good as we lost the match, funny enough on the opening day of the season, but back then, losing at home didn’t happen very often. It still doesn’t today, well, until the likes of City, Utd or Osterunds turn up. I guess his decision to stay or go depends on what position he’s offered.
Jens Lehmann, footballs own nutty professor. A top notch keeper with a bit of an edge. A liability at times wasn’t he, but unlike Fabianski, Almunia or a few other keepers we’ve seen at Arsenal in the last 22 years, it was his personality rather than his goalkeeping qualities which sometimes let him down. Jens sIgned for Arsenal back in 2003 and his first season was a memorable one just as it was for everyone connected to the club in whatever capacity, the following season was far from good for him though. Replaced by Alumina, who in turn was equally as bad, he soon returned though and in the FA Cup Final against Man Utd, he was back to his best. To this day I still don’t know how we won that match.
Unlike the other four who have been told they can depart, the above two guys know what it’s like to play in the red and white of Arsenal and they know how to win trophies on the pitch, an experience money can’t buy. Winning takes effort, pride and determination to succeed. Qualities which a number of our players seriously lack. Qualities which Arsène Wenger ran out of too and subsequently, as a group of men together, they didn’t achieve all they could have. Should have even.
Only time will tell if this group of players, or rather the ones who start the new season aren’t as bad as they’ve so often looked because as we all know, the new manager syndrome can often raise players attitudes, workrate and performances overall. Mind you, whoever comes in will have a tough job trying to convince Mesut Ozil that just because he has a bad game, it doesn’t mean he gets a week or two off. Just as he’ll struggle to convince Alex Iwobi that tackling is part of the game or any of them that it’s ok to shoot instead of looking for one extra pass to add to the fifty gone before..
Anyway, as always I’ve rambled on far too long. Hopefully we’ll find out soon who that new manager will be because I’m sure the suspense is killing us all..
What a nasty snide piece!
Why?
Perhaps if Arsene had changed some of his coaches and listened to their ideas, his career would have been more successful than it it was…
Snide indeed…
Arteta deal agreed according to Ornstein…
Good morning Rico, as Wenger appointed all of his coaches, I suspect they only told him want he wanted to hear.
According to some reports, Bould is in line for the Stoke City job. Good luck with that!
Morning Cicero. That’s a surprise re Bould but yes, he’ll need good luck too after the way that club has gone. I hope it works for him..
Rico, are you sure about Ornstein’s pronouncement? I can’t find it anywhere, ( I don’t do twitter!). If it’s true then that’s search over. We’ll know on Friday, mark my words. It may also explain the mass clear out of the support staff. Arteta knows them all, their weaknesses especially. Also their allignment to the old chap and their probable reluctance to change. New broom indeed. Not a bad thing imo.
Ivan said change was on the way and it would seem, after years of inertia he’s flexing his muscles and making it all happen. Hopefully the desired result will ensue, this time next year we’ll find ourselves back in the top 4! Arteta’s first ‘trophy’!
Well, well who’d have thought it?
Lovely day here again on the azure river bank!
Snide he says… another bell on the end of a keyboard….
Wavey, can I point you at one of Del Boy’s favourite sayings, “this time next year we’ll be millyonairs” ?
Wavy, I have a twitter email most days and his tweet was within the email..
And never to they return to back up such insults Wath.
*** Please ignore my Ornstein tweet re Arteta, the tweet was from a fake account. Sorry. ***
Idiots on Twitter!!
If he does go to Stoke and they suddenly find out how to defend then that will be one question answered.
Thanks Rico. I knew it was too good to be true!
Did the tweet come from Trump or Putin? They deal in destabilising fake news! I believe.
Very true…
Ha ha Wavy, no, just some other idiot…
Afternoon Rico and all, is there anything more snide than leaving a contentious comment and refusing to back it up or arguing your standpoint?
I just think that the club has drifted for too long, change has been non-existent, new methods slow to be integrated and a new approach badly needed.
Arsene felt comfortable surrounded by familiar faces who didn’t question his methods and there seemed to be staff who just were happy to earn a wage and not modernise or look to evolve. A new way and change was essential after two years out of the top four and a dozen years out of contention for the League.
It was always going to be messy.
From the moment Gazidis put his three wise men in place, the writing was on the wall for Wenger.
Far from sitting on their hands, they have been busy evaluating both the squad and all aspects of the coaching, medical and other ancillary staffs.
It’s reasonable to suppose that the recently announced departures are part of a well thought out plan for the post Wenger era.
If I’m right, and there is a plan in place, then the appointment of the new manager/head coach will be announced in the next seven to ten days.
Afternoon Kev, exactly. Brave eh..
Have we signed anyone yet… ? 😉
hi rico and all,
I am just glad that the clear out has started and we are finally getting rid of all of AW backroom staff and coaches.
Can’t believe they’ve been there over 20 years .
No wonder we got served the same shit year after year. .
Im most happy to see the back of boro primorac, that arrogant brick who called the fans ignorant and ungrateful because they dared to question wengers authority.
Good riddance all of them. .
Now when Jardim is going to be announced!??
Hi Kk, me too, long overdue. Wonder why Lewin is going though unless the club really do want a total clearout…
Is he a doctor or a physio rico?
Physio Kk..
https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/next-arsenal-manager-mikel-arteta-arsene-wenger-successor-santi-cazorla-backroom-team-transfer-plans-a8353036.html
Cicero, I reckon so too re the appointments of Raul and Sven. Fahmy too.
Evening all………..some fine rambling on there Rico, although I think you all are a bit lousy for not enquiring how my Digital Rectoral Examination went ! 😆
Anyone interested on how Wenger`s daily OCD………………sorry…………..routine was ?……………….it`s a bit long but worth it……………………….
Unless he breaks the habit of a lifetime, the first thing that Arsène Wenger will do when he boards the Arsenal coach for the final time, in Huddersfield tomorrow, will be to ask the driver to put Levante v Barcelona on the television. The Frenchman may indulge himself with an Italian meal at the Cocorico Italiano restaurant in Totteridge when he gets home a few hours later, but not if Arsenal have lost his 1,239th and final game of a remarkable reign.
“He won’t go out after a defeat, and even if people come round to his house he won’t talk,” a long-serving colleague explains. “He will pore over the game finding excuses for the defeat, until two days later he finally acknowledges that the opposition were the better team.”
Those who know Wenger best paint a fond picture of a man who has essentially lived the same day over and over again for his entire 22 years at Arsenal, a groundhog day existing with the only slight variety coming on match-day, which even then is dictated by the team’s results. “He’s a football hermit,” explains a close friend. “His car would be the best second-hand car to buy in London as it doesn’t go anywhere. It goes from his house to the training ground every day, and then once a fortnight to the stadium.”
Wenger’s daily life has run as smoothly and efficiently as the best of his Arsenal teams over those past two decades, with his dedication to football matched only by his commitment to maintaining his own health and fitness. At 75kg the 68-year-old’s weight is exactly the same as it was when he joined Arsenal in 1996, the result of a rigorous exercise regime and strict diet, with small portions of salad enlivened by the occasional glass of red wine and a single chocolate for dessert. “When he gets up every morning the first thing he does is put on his stopwatch,” another regular visitor to the Wenger residence says. “He’s like a Swiss clock, everything is timed to perfection.”
Wenger’s day always begins with a 45-minute workout in his home gym, which is supplemented by a swim or a bike ride in summer when the weather permits. The Frenchman’s cycling around the leafy lanes of south Hertfordshire was briefly interrupted last summer when he was knocked off his bike, although thankfully he was not seriously injured, with the driver responsible for running the Arsenal manager off the road getting more of a shock than he did when he rose to his feet to reveal his identity.
Such is Wenger’s desire to start the day with a dose of exercise and fresh air that during his early days in London he developed the habit of sneaking into the nearby Totteridge Tennis Club before it had opened to hit some balls, although this practice had to end when he stopped being “Arsène Who?” and became more famous.
Wenger leaves home at 8.30am on the dot, arriving at Arsenal’s training ground in London Colney just before 9am to begin work. The serious business starts with a staff meeting in which he outlines his plans and goals for that day’s training, which begins at 10am with the manager a very visible, hands-on presence. A long-serving member of Wenger’s backroom team claims that he has never missed a session in 22 years, such is his dedication to the cause.
“The boss sets the session up, walks out with a purpose and always watches the whole session,” he says. “He doesn’t leave things to the other coaches. As the session goes on, he’s walking around and you can feel him watching players, asking questions. He’s always out on the pitch.”
After lunch Wenger watches a recording of the entire training session and has meetings with his staff and players, who are welcome to drop in at any time. The door to his office is open most of the time with the manager conscious to make sure he is accessible, although, rather than holding formal meetings, many of his conversations with the players take place as they are walking out to train or during the session. In recent years Steve Bould, his assistant manager, has held most of the team meetings, with Wenger preferring to offer his guidance one to one.
Wenger was responsible for lobbying the club to build the new training ground 20 years ago, as well as being instrumental in the construction of the Emirates Stadium, and his pride in the place and respect for all the staff remain obvious. His gift for diplomacy is such that he has managed to stay on good terms with all the competing factions at Arsenal, including Stan Kroenke, the majority shareholder, and Alisher Usmanov, his great rival, who sends Wenger several hampers every Christmas, the contents of which he gives to workers at the training ground.
“He makes a point of walking around the training ground checking everything is immaculate,” a staff member says. “When they planted some new trees recently he was always talking to the groundsmen, asking them how they were doing. He gets on very well with the head groundsman and they have a laugh and a joke, with the boss asking him how many tractors he buys every year. He has got a real human touch. He talks to all the security staff and gets on with everyone.”
Wenger also makes a point of making himself available to all of Arsenal’s academy coaches, who are based at a different site, at Hale End, as well as welcoming back former players such as Thierry Henry and Freddie Ljungberg who are looking for guidance on how to develop their own coaching careers. Such is his enthusiasm for talking football that he has frequently had to be ushered away from an informal chat with a group of youth-team coaches because of his first-team duties.
“He comes to life when us old boys come back in, you can see the spark in his eye,” one former player says. “He just loves talking about football and always tries to help people out.”
Wenger’s evenings are similarly set in stone and revolve around watching football, with the odd documentary or political programme thrown in. With his eye always on the future, his house is not the footballing museum that one would imagine and there is no trophy room, with Wenger’s nostalgia limited to having a few photographs of old teams in his study, with one of The Invincibles most prominent.
“He generally arrives home at 6.15pm, when he’ll make himself some salad or go to the local Waitrose,” a friend familiar with his routine explains. “At 7.45pm he’ll settle down to watch the first game, and afterwards he’ll catch up with highlights from all the others.
“For the first ten years I went to his house I only ever saw him watching football. It’s always on. He has a massive screen in his lounge, flicking between games. He watches the games for pleasure, but will also analyse them. When the football is all over he will watch a political programme or read a biography.”
Wenger’s appetite for football is such that once one game is over his immediate instinct is to find another one, even after Arsenal have just finished playing.
“As soon as we get on the coach after an away game the first thing he says is, ‘Get the Spanish football on’,” a member of his team says. “It’s football, football, football. I’ve never brought up a game that he’s not watched, or a player he doesn’t know. Sometimes the staff try to test him by talking about an African game or scoreline and he says, ‘Yes, I watched that’. His knowledge is remarkable.”
Despite what is clearly an obsessive approach to the game, Wenger is well read and knowledgeable about a wide variety of subjects, particularly politics and economics.
While he gives little away about his own personal politics, friends characterise him as a liberal whose natural home is on the centre left, and he made a point of dashing back from a game to the French embassy in London at the end of last season to ensure that he could vote against Marine Le Pen, the National Front candidate, in France’s presidential election.
“He talks about politics a lot,” an Arsenal colleague says. “He doesn’t give a lot away, but I think he’s a socialist. He talks about animal rights, geography, finance. He must read a lot and watch a lot of documentaries. He follows the stock exchange quite closely and seems to know a lot about the financial markets.”
Wenger is an atheist but, despite this, was profoundly moved by meeting the Pope while refereeing a so-called peace match in Rome four years ago, insisting on fulfilling his commitment to attend even though it clashed with the final day of the transfer window when Arsenal were negotiating the purchase of Danny Welbeck from Manchester United.
He also enjoys travel and gets regular invitations to speak at events all over the world. He receives offers of non-executive directorships from global companies and is particularly fascinated by China. On one trip to Beijing he was asked to have a go at karaoke with Jackie Chan, but politely declined.
Such is Wenger’s commitment to work that his only regular holiday is a two-week break in the south of France each summer, often with his ex-wife Annie. The pair remain extremely close with Annie attending his final match at the Emirates last Sunday with their daughter Lea, who is studying veterinary science at Cambridge University, followed by a dinner for 40 close friends. His personal circle is relatively small, with most of his closer friendships stemming from his time in Strasbourg and Monaco. Despite generally shying away from large social events, Wenger hosts a meal for his back-room staff at the team hotel during pre-season, as well as having Christmas drinks on the day the players go out for their Christmas party. Typically he does not venture far, with the festive celebrations limited to a few glasses of wine at the training ground. “Arsène has lived in London for 22 years but couldn’t drive from his home to Piccadilly Circus,” is how one friend puts it.
A whole new world will open to Wenger from tomorrow evening, never mind just this country’s capital city, but as he attempts to re-organise his life, his first instinct will be to get back to work.
Arteta it’s then ..
I have to say I am not entirely convinced, but hey anyone would do 10 times better than AW did last season.
He might be a good coach, but can he manage a team like arsenal in at least 4 compitions for a whole season?
He should’ve gone and learnt his trade first in Southampton.
He could well turn out to become a guadiorla or a Zidane. .but could also be a shearer or a neville!
I think gazidis and his amigos are taking a huge and unnecessary risk.
And if you are wondering what Arteta may be like here are some quotes from Arteta a couple of years ago ……………………………..
My team-mates are always going “What are you going to do Miki? You’re going to be a manager, you should be a manager!” I know what the job means and I know how hard it is, especially when I look at the boss and see how many hours he puts in here. You need to sacrifice your family all over again, which I’ve done since I was 15. But I would love to manage a squad of players and staff – I’ve got it inside me, it’s true, and I want to do it. First of all I want to make the most of my playing career, because I’m 32 and in this game you never know whether you’ll end up carrying on until 34, 35 or 36. After that, I’m certainly going to stay involved in football because I think I’ve got something to add. I would like to prove myself, and prove my ideas about managing and encouraging people to do things in the way I believe is best.
My philosophy will be clear. I will have everyone 120 per cent committed, that’s the first thing. If not, you don’t play for me. When it’s time to work it’s time to work, and when it’s time to have fun then I’m the first one to do it, but that commitment is vital. Then I want the football to be expressive, entertaining. I cannot have a concept of football where everything is based on the opposition. We have to dictate the game, we have to be the ones taking the initiative, and we have to entertain the people coming to watch us. I’m 100 per cent convinced of those things, and I think I could do it.
I think you need to adapt. You can have an idea of a system, but you need to be able to transform it depending on the players you have – how much pace you have up front, how technical your team is, what types of risk you can take and whether your players are ready to take those risks. It’s important to analyse your players because you can’t always play the same way. There have to be different details and changes in how you approach things, and you have to look at how you can hurt whoever you are playing against. Is there something they don’t like to do? If so, we’re going to make them do plenty of it. Then the most important thing for the manager is that, the Friday before the game, you imagine what’s going to happen on the Saturday. And if what happens on Saturday is not what I had planned, then it’s not been good enough from me.
Transfer window opens on Thursday, could be an interesting one for us for once.
Lc, no chance and no to answer your questions…
After Simeone, I championed for Arteta quite a way back I think……………………….Arteta and Santi !…………………bring back Cesc aswell and Puyol (spelling ?………the Barca thug !) as the defensive coach !…………………dream team if Kroenke puts his hands deep inside his pockets !
🙂
Come on Rico, you must be a little bit curious to how Arsene`s groundhog day went ! 🙂
I take it then that no one would be curious if Wenger brought out a book to spill the beans !!!
🙂
This comment went into moderation because I accidently pushed a wrong button or something……………….
Come on Rico, you must be a little bit curious to how Arsene`s groundhog day went ! ?
I take it then that no one would be curious if Wenger brought out a book to spill the beans !!!
?
I’d probably read his book Lc..
Yes I’d read it too…..if I could get it cheap on Amazon.
I would wait until it arrived in the library.
I would find it somewhere in ebay!
Come on villa,
I certainly don’t want to see pulis in the PL again!
Ebay for me too, not paying full price… lol
Night guys.
Night rico
1/0 on aggregate for the villans.
bye bye pulis ??
Final play off against fullham
Morning….
Morning Rico…
Morning Bt, you well?
Morning Rico, BT and all. Has Arteta been sworn in yet?
Morning Adam, not yet..
Good morning one and all.
Looking at the back pages today it seems Arteta is firmly in the box seat in the race to be our next head coach. Vieira is apparently p****d off because he’s heard nothing after having preliminary talks with Arsenal. Lowe has signed a contract extension with Germany, Allegri says he’s staying put and Naglesmann’s boss is adamant he will be staying for the coming year.
Rico. I wish they would sort it it all out so we’d have something to moan about. 🙂
Doing fine Rico thanks, hope all is well with you.
Morning Adam and all.
Adam, i take it you enjoyed your trip…
My money is on Arteta Cicero, unless he’s a smoke screen and Jardim says yes… 😉
New post up now.
I did BT, thank you. It was just a few days but it made a break. We go there reasonably often. I like the Dutch and Amsterdam, apart from the tourist places like Dam Square, is very nice. I think I could live there actually.
Good morning all. Salut Rico! I have to say a big thank you to LeCoq for his comments. I thoroughly enjoyed reading them. Now, all I played was amateur football, but I know some people have the ability to play, coach and analyze best than others. Arteta was a late bloomer on the playing front, but he has a great mind and that is what is most important for a head coach. http://www.goal.com/en/news/all-you-need-to-know-about-mikel-artetas-importance-to-pep/1sb79795r2ige1uo5984djkey4