Morning all.
Well that’s it for two weeks and it’s going to tough for us as we have been on a very good run.
Our players have been withdrawing from international duty. Already Lukas Podolski, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Theo Walcott and Santi Cazorla are absent but now Bacary Sagna and Tomas Rosicky have joined them.
Apparently Arsene Wenger called the Czech national team director Vladimir Smicer about Tomas:
We have been asked to excuse Rosicky for health reasons.
Arsene Wenger got in touch with me and we agreed not to take Tomas to the qualifiers.
Tomas played over 30 minutes on Sunday afternoon so this decision was a bit of a shock for me but I’m glad. The Czech side look highly unlikely to qualify in any case so Tomas, at 33 years old, would be simply playing for the sake of it when in all honesty, he’s much better off staying in London and getting a good rest. He is such a good player and he brings something very different to our side, it’s better now that he’s wrapped up in cotton wool a bit and kept fit for us.
In fact, I’d say it’s probably a good time to tell his country that Arsenal come first and in order to prolong his domestic career, he wants to quit playing for them altogether. Hopefully his health and fitness are in a good place and he’s just more focussed on remaining that way ahead of the visit of Norwich.
Talking of the internationals, Kieran Gibbs has been called into the England squad after Ashley Cole limped out of the Chelsea game at the weekend and Carl Jenkinson has been called up for the under 21’s which can only be good news. He was a bit rusty at the weekend but that’s inevitable having not played much so far this season. If he can get two more games under his belt he’ll be better equipped to face Norwich as it’s highly likely Bacary Sagna will still be on the sidelines.
Of course many other of our players will be away with their respective countries and all we can hope is that they return as fit as they left, in fact fitter having not played too many minutes.
Bit of transfer stuff:
Will Hughes is a player who has been linked to us for the last couple of summers and now it seems Derby County are ready to cash in on their prize asset as soon as January according to The Daily Star:
New manager Steve McClaren has hinted that the time will come when he will not be able to keep Hughes at Pride Park.
Our job is to make sure he makes it. Eventually he will be too good. What we need behind that is players coming through to replace him.
Many clubs are reported to be interested in signing Hughes who is described as being has been described as ‘a “flair player” who uses through balls and mazy runs to create space for team-mates and beat opposition defences in attacking positions’.
We have midfielders and many of them but Arsene Wenger loves young British talent.
Could this Surrey born teenager be the next to join the ranks at Arsenal?
One who is heading to us in the summer is 15 year old year old Swede Kristopher Da Graca. He was with us back in the summer on trial and it appears that the move will go ahead this coming summer when he’ll be 16 years old.
This is what the defender/defensive midfielder told Fotbolltransfers:
Arsenal are a big and good club. I’ve had a chance to become a good football player later, it feels good. At first I will have to train with my own age group.
I move there in the summer of 2014. Me and my dad wanted me to finish my primary education first.
The only thing left to do is complete the paperwork next summer.
So that’s another one to boost the Academy after their summer clear out…
Hopefully there’s one or two in mind to boost the first team in January…
That’s it for another day…..
Nice and quiet here this morning 🙂
After such a lean summer during the TW, we signed 3 players now we hhave already signed one for 2014! Such planning! Will Draxler or Bender or Ted Drake be the next pre-season signing to the follow the child into the Arsenal?
Morning all.
Rico, how do you find something relevant to write every day? Another interesting post. You must eat a lot of fish, Jeeves swore by it!
🙂 Wavy, thank you – funny enough I do eat a lot of fish 🙂
Draxler has been in the press, and suggestion is he won’t be going anywhere, certainly not in January. Maybe the summer, who knows, many things can happen before then.
Park could be heading to Wigan on loan which is good for him.
I just want to see a striker in the door on Jan 1st. Oh, and Bendtner out on the same day.
Good Morning Lady, Sir, Gentleman and Ladies.
Good Post Lady.
Wavy….fish do not give you intelligence. young tender chicks do though 😉
Just a short hop today. will enjoy reading your posts later on today though. hope I can hop in another time this evening.
Arsene Wenger receives the Manager of the Month award from Sky Sports and Aaron Ramsey wins Player of the Month….
Well well……
Morning Devil, thanks and you have a good day….
aye lady. thanks.
I have so much work at the moment. out of 800 kids I have already drawn the basic profile of around 550 and that is over half way. but still got a lot more to go through.
good to see AW and Aaron get monthly awards.
And another thing…………its thefirst time in many seasons that we have gone into international breaks sitting on top of the pile. that means we are the weakest team in the league.
The spuddies meanwhile are stronger than us seeing that they are holding around 5 or 6 others above them.
Crikey Devil, best you get on then 😉
Morning all…
Congrats to Arsene and AR16 for winning their awards… I hope this new found resilience breaks the jinx that comes with within that accolade especially as we are approaching our habitual dodgy patch…
Good post btw
Morning all.
Nice post Rico, hopefully are ours come back fit and ready to play.
Looking forward to the link up of Ozil and santi, it could be a beautiful thing!!
Don’t mention dreaded November TS.
all ours*
Mark Halsey has put the cat amongst the pidgeons this morning, his comments on the PGMOL should keep Untold in posts for a couple of days.
Thanks Ts & Lewis.
Not really looking forward to November but we’ll really know just where we are after it…
Big couple of months for us imho..
God I hate interlull, but it may have helped us this time. few of our lads needed a rest by the looks of things.
Whats he said potter?
Indeed Rico, should show us exactly what this lot are made of and imo, we shouldn’t fear any of the fixtures we have coming up. I have a feeling they should be fearing us!
New Puma kit is nice.
I agree there too Lewis, respect others but don’t fear them, ….
Haven’t seen the new kit..
🙂 Lewis;
Defining moment… the squad as well as AW ability to rotate properly will be tested no doubt.
I think so far as we are not more than 5 points behind any potential league leader come end of January we have a strong chance as we normally improve after that…..
Basically that the standard of many refs in the premier league are not good enough and despite this being the case the PGMOL are complacent and doing little or nothing to make things better as Riley and his cohorts are too busy building their own little empires and don’t want anything to disturb their positions.
https://twitter.com/th14Renato/status/387528645918859264/photo/1
Halsey is spot on… I’m looking forward to reading his book which is sat waiting for the 25th Dec to arrive, together with Dennis 😉
Hi Potter-I am still awaiting/expecting a major ‘revelation’ about corrupt refereeing within the next 2 to 5 years…
Hi everyone, took a break , had a week’s holiday
Sunday’s game was tricky, Wenger toyed with selection, Clarke guessed right and frustrated our tactics.
If Wenger was going to use the formation we used against Napoli then he should do so 100% but he left Rosicky on the bench, unless he was not 100% fit.
Thank God we got a draw, after Rosicky came in though and he was involved in the goal as well.
Giroud looks tired and unfortunately he is France’s hope right now because Benzema is Sh**t nowadays.
I think Wenger should have gone for Gnabry on the right and Manuel on the Left wing at 2nd half after it was clear we had no width and Wilshere kept coming in the middle.
We still need more players, Podolski looks like a better version of Diaby, will still get injured before the end of the season.
I think we shoul have gone for Michu in the summer, he has been called up now so he will be super expensive now, I see Real Madrid coming for him in the summer if he keeps his form up .
Bendtner coming in for Giroud was a no drainer like for like.
Well Wenger knows best, but had a good weekend altogether when the Spuds lost 3 nill 😀
WoW- Songinho completed 100% of his 102 passes last wekend starting for Barca…
I saw Ozil missed a pass and it felt strange to see, such is the quality of the man.
If Bacelona should swap Spanish league for EPL for a season , will they win the cup ?
Imagine them competing with Arsenal, Chelsea, Man Utd, Man city , Liverpool and even Spuds, it will definitely drain them.
my take is , they can’t win and will take then 3 seasons to master the league.
Hi Sd, hope you had a fab time..
Have to pop out for a few hours now, catch up later
I did Rico, watched loads of movies.
Got to agree with SD. Michu would have been a good buy. Long time since i have seen a player who has his ability and finishing, but also works hard for the team, would fit into our style of play perfectly.
Coach, you layabout, stop bloggin’ and get on with your work…. 😉
Anyone got a picture of the new kit?
It’s only a rumour so far but :- http://www.arsenalinsider.com/9534/revealed-new-arsenal-shirt-next-season-1415/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=revealed-new-arsenal-shirt-next-season-1415
Is showing a photo tweeted by Linford Christie
Yep rico, the next couple of weeks are gonna be a long ole slog !!!
Aren’t they just Micko…
I’d be happy enough if we signed Michu too…
Afternoon anyone 😉
Boo, rico, how are you? Ca’t believe interlull is upon us again… 🙁
http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/news/liga-real-madrid-chief-perez-deceiving-fans-huge-083758614–sow.html
Boo to you agag, am well thanks, you? I know, I really don’t like them but maybe this one has come at a good time for our injured..
Their debt is staggering Gdna, how they are allowed to run in such a way beggars belief.
I’m good rico. 🙂 You’re right, of course. But the knackered ones are still playing at intersnooze.
GDNA, I think many clubs are in the doodoo financially. Barcelona and Madrid have been spending madly, without regard at ll for the economic conditions in Spain.
But they may not all play for as long as they would had we been playing agag 😉
I was hoping Giroud and Rambo would have found a way to withdre, rico. 😛
Dinner calls, back shortly
Everyone else has pulled out of the Wales squad so it looks like Ramsey will get the full monte. Perhaps when Norwich come to town it would be better to bring Santi back in and give him a rest.
So was I agag, and Merts 🙂
Has Ramsey gone off with Wales after his injury on Sunday?
Jenks:
“Arsenal’s my priority, I got to focus on my club football, but of course playing for England last year was fantastic.
“It’s the highlight of anyones career their debut for the national team, it was fantastic for me and the opportunity here now is to get involved in the 21s and hopefully play some games.”
I’m off for the day folks, catch you tomorrow sometime..
Night all…
Don’t yer just love all those transfer rumours, especially during an international break…
Even rumours as nonsensical as Arsenal’s supposed interest in Brad Guzan…
Why on earth Arsenal would be interested in Guzan isn’t explained, and I certainly cannot understand it, but there ya go.
Another pile of transfer excrement to dwell over.
Or not, as the case may be….
Night All…..
Morning Rico and all from Amsterdam. Just off for some breakfast then it’s museum day with the Van Gogh first.
Morning all,
Good to see AW back/out with his wife and guess what the team is playing better…lol
Morning Adam, 6.38 in the morning, guess you must be an hour ahead of us here then 😉
Morning all by the way 😉
Unreal’s debt stands at an astonishing €541m…
Absolutely mental imo….
It is Ts, Gdna posted that yesterday, I don’t understand how they are allowed to operate in such a way.
Morning all.
Real spend what they have not got….funny that….
Off for a little holiday….our 10th anniversary on friday, and god knows how i found anyone to put up with me for that long 🙂
Very nice Scott, where are you off to?
New post up
Lucky you Scott… you are not bad after all… 🙂
Rico, they even owe the Spanish government whilst the rest of the EU pays for them to buy more Bales…pfff
Good morning all!! :)Everyone’s off on hols, it seems. 😉