Morning guys.
The weekend of Premier League fixtures started as expected with Man City beating Crystal Palace on Friday night but then yesterday threw out a few strange results. I saw some of the Totts highlights and they could have easily gone at least a couple of goals up and would have but for the Newcastle keeper but then Newcastle scored two and left north London with three points. At Anfield, Nottingham Forest very nearly cause the shock of the weekend by beating Liverpool but the home team grabbed an equaliser in the last ten minutes. Coady Gakpo looks set to leave Liverpool for Man City, no doubt making room for new signing Barcola but he’s not going to help them defend. In the other two games, Hill City beat Coventry City 1-0 while Bournemouth conceded a late goal against Everton as the game ended 1-1.
More fixtures today of course, the best perhaps coming at Stamford Bridge where Chelsea take on Brighton. Come on you seagulls…. It’s far too early for me to be ridiculing the likes of Totts and Liverpool because we of all fans know that the opening fixtures of any season, especially after a World Cup can be tricky. If de Zerbi gets his players ticking, they won’t be bottom of the league for long although enjoy whilst they are….quietly..
I don’t like Monday night fixtures in fact I’m pretty sure very few fans do. It’s a work night for starters and it’s unfair on away fans who probably don’t get home much before midnight but the game doesn’t think about the fans much because as long as the money keeps rolling in, everyone is happy. Other than travelling fans that is. Still, at least tomorrow it’s a shortish trip to Birmingham so I could be a lot worse. Hopefully we won’t play on a Monday again for a while because there’s something about playing after every other club I’m not so keen on.
It looks as if the Julian Alvarez saga is over if David Ornstein’s view of the situation is correct.
Yesterday, live on TNT/HBO Max, he said:
Atletico have closed the door to Barcelona, that won’t happen. They would do a deal with Arsenal. Arsenal are prepared to reach an agreement club to club, but they would want the player to want to join them and he’s shown no indication of wanting to at this point.
He’s spoken to Mikel Arteta and said he doesn’t want to come. That could change – could he soften in the days ahead? These situations are always moveable feasts, so I don’t want to pin my colours to the mast and say it won’t happen, but right now it’s not developing in the way that some have suggested.
Things change in football, we all know that but if Ornstein is 100% about Alvarez telling Mikel Arteta he doesn’t want to join Arsenal, that in my opinion should be the end of it. We need players who jump at the chance of playing for us, not those who see us as a way out of a bad situation with the view of getting to another club as soon as possible.
What do Arsenal do now I wonder. Vinicius ended up staying at Real Madrid, Alvarez could end up staying at Atletico and Arsenal, if reports have been true, haven’t signed either of their alleged two targets. The logic solution would to be to keep Gabriel Martinelli but football and logic seldom go hand in hand.
Catch up later.
Morning Rico, morning champions, Alvarez has made his position clear and so the Arsenal should move on immediately and do whatever last minute business they have in the pipeline, one would imagine that Berta has at least one other plate spinning, possibly two, that he can pivot towards between now and Tuesday?
I did hear a rumour that the Real Madrid fans have been vocally over critical of Vini Junior regarding his performances of late, so instead of being the hero of north London he’s the whipping boy of Madrid. Consequences my dear boy.
Alvarez is going to be in for a tough few months, just as well that he has his extended family around him as he’ll probably need every one of them…
Good morning Rico, there’s a list of ins and outs on the Arsenal website, it seems a little early with a couple of days to go in the transfer window, no mention of Martinelli in the outs, could it mean our business is done and dusted?
One option on the wing which has been banded around in the papers is Iliman Ndiaye
but it looks like he’s off to Totts.