Morning guys.
This new three week international break format was meant to help players but in all honesty, it’s kind of backfired on all but the international scene. European footballers have suffered injuries, perhaps more than ever before although I cannot be bothered to see if the facts support my theory. From an Arsenal perspective, Kai Havertz, Christos Tzolis and yesterday, Ezri Konsa, have all returned to Arsenal because of injury. Three players crucial to Mikel Arteta’s team selection so far this season.
Viktor Gyokeres played his fourth game in three weeks last night which might not necessarily be a bad thing as he’s not exactly played much football for Arsenal so these games will have done his match fitness the world of good. But will he return knackered? Hopefully not…
Four games in three weeks so soon after a World Cup is really not thinking about players welfare is it? Nor is it thinking about domestic football clubs who a) pay the players wages and b) have managers who are under enormous pressure to do well at their respective clubs. It’s hard enough for them dealing with injuries throughout a domestic campaign let alone all the additional ones suffered whilst playing international football. There will always be international fixtures, of course there will be otherwise no country would be prepared for the Euros or World Cup but why not just play one fixture every 4/5 weeks so just one weekend is affected each time. Also, why not increase the number of substitutions international managers can make too, wouldn’t that show football cares about footballers welfare?
I know there will always be a temptation to suggest players need to just get on with it because they are paid well but no amount of money can buy perfect health and fitness. If only it did eh..
What about the fans who pay extortionate amounts of money on season tickets, match day tickets and all which goes with it, especially travel costs in this day and age? Don’t they/we deserve to see our club players in the best physical condition possible?
As I said earlier, it’s not just Arsenal who have suffered injuries during this break. Alex Scott played 70 minutes for England a couple of days ago and now he’s rumoured to be missing for Bournemouth for 6-8 weeks. Erling Haaland limped out of Norway’s last match and before then, Nico O’Rielly had already left the England camp. Liverpool’s Gakpo and Isak suffered injuries and despite being in pain, allegedly, Fernandes has played on for his country. Sunderland’s Ballard and Brobbey have picked up hamstring injuries. I’m pretty sure the list doesn’t end there…
I know this extended break has led to more lower league club fixtures have been shown on television which is great for them financially but surely in this day and age, access to these matches should be available anyway. Same with the women’s game because believe it or not, fans want to watch them. Many of us pay hefty fees for broadcasting subscriptions so why aren’t we able to watch more football? I digress..
Last night’s fixtures saw Italy beat Turkey 3-1 with Riccardo Calafiori coming on in the second half to score Italy’s second goal. Viktor Gyokeres scored yet again for Sweden as they defeated Romania 1-0. Our striker has been in great form during this break and just two goals behind the top 10 scorers in Sweden’s history.
Tonight is about Arsenal’s English and Spanish players, all six of them. In an ideal scenario, none of them will play but we know that isn’t going to happen so the next best thing is none of them play 90 minutes.
Lastly, Arsenal announced yesterday that Myles Lewis-Skelly has been nominated for the 2026 Golden Boy Award after having a fantastic 2026 for both club and country. In my opinion, this is no more than he deserves, other than to actually win the award of course. He was brilliant for Arsenal towards the end of the season and played a big part in ensuring Arsenal lifted the Premier League. He was pretty good in the Champions League Final too wasn’t he, not to mention the Community Shield Final and his sublime pass to Riccardo Calafiori to open the scoring in the opening minute.
2026 Golden Boys nominees:
Pau Cubarsi (Barcelona, Spain), Ayyoub Bouaddi (Manchester City, Morocco), Warren Zaire-Emery (Paris Saint-Germain, France), Yan Diomande (Real Madrid, Ivory Coast), Luka Vuskovic (Brighton & Hove Albion, Croatia), Victor Froholdt (Porto, Denmark), Myles Lewis-Skelly (Arsenal, England)Rayan (Bournemouth, Brazil), Jorrel Hato (Chelsea, Netherlands), Lennart Karl (Bayern Munich, Germany), Estevao (Chelsea, Brazil), Endrick (Real Madrid, Brazil), Junior Kroupi (Bournemouth, France), Gianluca Prestianni (Benfica, Argentina), Konstantinos Karetsas (Borussia Dortmund, Greece), Said El Mala (Cologne, Germany), Jon Martin (Real Sociedad, Spain), Marc Bernal (Barcelona, Spain), Kerim Alajbegovic (Juventus, Bosnia & Herzegovina), Finn Jeltsch (Stuttgart, Germany).
Catch up in the comments.
Good morning all.
I hope Arsenal tie Rice down longer than two years, three minimum would be better.
We have a few coming through too Merlin, two of whom are already playing international football at senior level.
I like the football we’re playing this season, obviously not the Brighton performance.
New post up.
I have to hold my hands up and admit to being a little confused about Arsenal’s narrative around Mikel Arteta.
He has one PL title in seven years, he’s nowhere near the same level as Pep or Klopp, he isn’t capable of producing expansive attacking football, and pound for pound there are quite a few managers at smaller clubs who have regularly out-performed him over his time here, we all know who they are.
His whole reputation is based around Josh Kroenke’s blind belief that he is the best Arsenal can get, and he has supplied Arteta with truck-loads of money to prop-up that claim. His failings and his brand of football have been glossed over with almost unlimited transfer funds and the line that ‘he’s an exciting young manager…’
Elite managers just don’t play the Arteta way, it isn’t sustainable over a long period. At some point you have to prove that you’ve got more in your locker than pragmatic fine-margins. How about setting up an attacking unit to destroy your opponents? After all this time we’re still very much waiting for that.
His new contract is beyond disproportionate in relation to his ability, and many of his signings have flopped.
Willian was a disaster, as was Pablo Mari, there can’t be many of us celebrating the Arsenal careers of Zinchenko or Jesus.
Take William Saliba, Bukayo Saka, Miles Lewis-Skelly and Max Dowman out, and you’re left with the most expensively built squad in PL history. There would be something deeply amiss if they weren’t champions.
Arteta has put so much money into the slot-machine it was only a matter of time before the jackpot paid out, and that in a nut-shell is Arteta’s management strategy.
I am completely underwhelmed and unimpressed with his contract extention, and I just do not believe he is a great manager. He will certainly never be elite.
Is he good enough for Arsenal?
Not for me.
a 2-year deal for Rice would be good, as that would make him 29
Declan Rice is close to signing a new deal which will see him on a par with Saka at £350,000 per month. According to the BBC.
His current deal runs out in 2027.
Great opportunity for Arteta to build a dynasty and cement his legacy.
The Core of his Team for the next 3/4 years had signed on:
#1 – Saka
#2 – MLS
#3 – Gabriel
#4 – Saliba
#5 – Guimaraes
Negotiations on-going and players indicated they are happy to sign-on:
#6 – Rice
#7 – Odegaard
#8 – Timber
Next, Berta should move on to continue negotiation with:
#9 – Raya
#10- Havertz
#11- Calafiori
Dowman will be rewarded in December when he is eligible to sign a professional contract.
Nwaneri had signed a new contract, but his future is a bit in the air.
I believe that with Arteta confirmed that he will stay till 2030, giving Arsenal long-term stability, Arsenal will be an attractive proposal to attract worldclass players.
It was claimed that Arsenal had the financial asset to buy marquee players like Haaland. Let’s hope it is true. A bit of pie dream, I think.
I would rather have him than Alvarez.
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Do you have a WordPress account? Having one saves your login details each time.
Agree re looking back, there’s little point.
A question for admin , why do I have to enter my user name and E Mail address everytime I try to post
We can argue all day and night about who we might have signed and who we didn’t . Which ever way you look at it there are always reasons why deals don’t come off . and they are not always obvious .
You can offer all sorts of incentives but sometimes it comes down to personalities or something equally trivial or just an inkling like things might not be right . One thing a lifetime of selling taught me is that there is no point on looking back because the circumstances don’t change and you just move on to the next deal.
He still had a choice. Every player has a choice.
He wanted to stay in London, Rico, and City wouldn’t match our financial package.
They offered about £90m but quickly withdrew when Arsenal went above £100m+.
But yes, he made it clear he wanted the Arsenal move.
Because Rice had a choice between us and City. He chose Arsenal.
So you said before I believe re Bellingham. It didn’t happen so I’ve moved on.
Why did you mention Declan Rice, Rico?
Arsenal paid a premium price three years ago (and without any serious competition for his signature, City already had Rodri), and yet three years later, refuse to pay just £10m more than they paid for Rice, to upgrade and improve their attacking options.
Sometimes our approach to squad-building is very unorthodox to say the least.
Jude Bellingham’s parents were quite literally waiting for a phone call from Arsenal, who had sent representatives to Birmingham to watch him for a few games.
Arsenal delayed the call for so long, Birmingham City put a contract on the table which he and his parents were happy for him to sign.
Finally, when Arsenal decided they did want him, he was under contract and settled, and Arsenal missed out on one of the most generational talents England has ever produced.
I doubt any PL club could afford him now.
When you look at what he has done at the age of 23, Bellingham is a massive miss for Arsenal.
I see in Jack Wilshere’s BBC interview, he agrees with me over the length of time it took Arsenal to win the PL title under the chosen one.
I don’t think so Dennis, footballers make their own choices. Just as Rice did and others before and will after.
Lumping all the blame on the club is far too easy imo.
We have a habit of missing out on these huge players, though Rico, the most recent being Jude Bellingham.
To keep repeating mistakes suggests something is deeply flawed in our decision making.
The consequences of one incredibly short-sighted decision for which he will never be held accountable, nor ever have to justify.
Brady definitely took more from Arsenal than he gave.
I know Dennis. I read it. Lol
Personally, I think it hard to criticise something which happened so long ago just because Kane became a good player. It must happen a lot in the game, an awful lot.
Even Fergie and Wenger laughed together about the Ronaldo move and agreed Arsenal were a few noughts off of the price. Again though, from the outside it’s easy to say we “should have or could have” but the reality is no one knows what wheeling and dealing is done behind closed doors. This case against Man City has seriously highlighted that.
He was head of Youth Development under Wenger for a couple of years, Rico.
It’s a little unfair to criticise Wenger for missing out on Cristiano Ronaldo.
We were always behind United in the race, they had good Portuguese relations with Sporting Lisbon through Carlos Queiroz, and the Emirates didn’t exist at the time, so he was shown around a shrunken Highbury, compared to the 60,000+ Old Trafford (as it was 2003).
United had huge global presence, much bigger than Arsenal.
We’d have only got him if United didn’t want him. We were among his second options, never his first.
You’re right, it’s on Kane’s wiki page that Brady decided Kane was a ‘bit chubby” and not “very athletic”… Kane would have been 8 or 9 years old at the time.
It was Liam Brady who decided Harry Kane wasn’t good enough for Arsenal, Kev.
And the Start of Step #5 – Build a Dynasty.
Arteta has signed his new contract. It’s official..
As long as Rice plays for us I don’t think he is good enough to play for England as a matter of fact I don’t think any of our players are good enough to be selected to play for their country, 😉
One thing of note about all our games, there were no time wasting, excitement spoiling and controversy creating Var interruptions.
No doubt the weekend fixtures will be cursed by the unwanted officialdom.😒
I wonder how long it will be before “pundits” suggest England are better without Rice.
So glad all that international nonsense is over and we can get back to proper football, although I thought that England looked a really good team.
Every cloud.. Maybe Tuchel won’t bother calling him up for one match.
MLS booked and misses next England match, against Croatia in November but will be back for Spain . That’s one benefit I suppose.
Don’t believe all you read Geoff. Lol
image our how lineup would have looked back then if we had Kane – Ronaldo and Robin Van Persie
Glad Saka got a rest; he needs it also on the positive side he may also look at as I am not guaranteed to be in the starting lineup whether it be for Arsenal or England
Poor Arsene he was there for Kane but he also went money pinching so misted out on Cristiano Ronaldo before he went to Man United.
At least Saka got a rest but MLS did the whole ninety minutes.
Mike Merino scored twice in Spain’s 2- 1 win over Croatia, his second was assisted by Zubimendi.
Arsene was manager…
I wonder who was the guy at Arsenal (because he surely can’t be there anymore) who decided to release Harry Kane when he was 11 years old?
Good re Saka.
Eze and MLS start, Saka on the bench.
I reckon those who didn’t go away all had the first week/ 10 days in the sunshine. Including the staff.
From what I’ve seen only Saliba, Havertz and Tzolis are definitely out so it’s probably down to a late fitness test for the rest…
Assuming of course that our Spanish and English players get through this evening unscathed….
I did read that Declan Rice went away for a holiday during this window, a week in Dubai or something like that, so that might explain his absence from training ground footage. Mosquera apparently spent a few days away and had some treatment in Valencia at his old club whilst visiting family. Maybe Arteta even had a few days off?
Brazil are still the poster boys of world football and will go anywhere if the price is right so I guess that the price was right.
Yes I agree, I think if EUFA and FIFA want to increase the players’ workload then more than 5 subs in club and international football should be allowed, maybe 7 subs in four separate substitution windows during a match.
Morning Geoff, exactly.
Why Brazil travelled so far and wide for friendly fixtures is beyond me.
Morning Cicero, thanks.
I can too and who could blame the players?
Morning Rico and all,
Sometimes I think people forget that it’s not only 4 matches in 3 weeks there are other factors to consider (1) matches (2) training (3) traveling (4) putting more pressure on them self to play better for their country (4) missing family
Good morning Rico, a fine post thank you.
Four games in this Interlull, plus more in the November break will inevitably cause even more fixture congestion for the rest of the season.
I can foresee quite a few no shows when Tuchel names his squad for his next jamboree.
It is in addition to the domestic and European campaign. What about the travelling too, especially Brazil.
I think getting real is for you rather than me..
4 games in 3 weeks is hardly taxing. Get real.