Morning all.
The signs are worrying. Kieran Tierney has already gone into a 14 day isolation and now, the Arsenal Academy has had to be shut down according to a report in The Athletic which quotes an Arsenal spokesperson as saying:
We can confirm that a member of staff from our Hale End Academy has tested positive for COVID-19. The positive test result arrived at 5pm today and the member of staff immediately left the site to self-isolate. As a consequence, six other members of staff are now self-isolating and we have initiated track and trace for the entire site. We are working through our CCTV and attendance records on site in order to continue the track and trace process.
No members of our men’s or women’s first-team squads have been affected which is good news but even so, having the virus around the club is not good news.
In some ways it’s a good thing football has an international break but as the Scotland camp has proved, no one knows who might be carrying the virus within the squads. Arsenal certainly have plenty of players away right now, representing their respective countries.
Bernd Leno, Alex Runarsson, Kieran Tierney, Thomas Partey, Dani Ceballos, Ainsley Maitland-Niles, Bukayo Saka, Sead Kolasinac, Granit Xhaka, Nicolas Pepe and Eddie Nketiah.
Eddie Nketiah has already played one match for the England under 21’s and yes, he scored again.
Whilst every footballer wants to play for their country, or at least they should, I think it’s the opposite for many football fans who dread the thought of any players, especially key players, picking up a serious injury which would have a detrimental effect on their team.
Another annoying thing about these break, this one in particular is that just as the domestic game really got going, along it came. Just as Arsenal finally sign a ‘proper’ midfielder after ten years or more of waiting, we have to wait to see him in action for his new club. Not having seen much of Thomas Partey in action (2018 Europa Cup semi-final aside) for Atletico or Ghana, I read about him and there is very little negative news, if any. ‘A boyhood Arsenal fan’ I read, aren’t they all after signing on the dotted line, a player who always wanted to test himself in the Premier League. I understand why too because there is no other League like England’s top one. One could say there’s no other League like England’s full stop and the lower divisions aren’t easy either. The weather, including the bitter cold, dark and windy days of winter make sure of that. As for the Scottish League’s, no thank you. The weather alone would put me off.
ESPN interviewed Thomas Partey a couple of years ago. He’d had a good season with Atletico, played over thirty matches and had just been awarded Player of the Year for his country. Always a good time to stick a microphone under a players nose.
At the moment, I am happy at my club, but in football, you never know when and where you’ll be in the next day or year. The Premier League is a good league, it’s very competitive and has some of the best players in the world. Hopefully, one day. I would like to play there. My agents are on it so I will leave everything for them. For me, I am happy playing football and I will continue to play where I am now until something comes up for consideration.
Football is a game we all enjoy. What I have done, I enjoyed it but it does not put any responsibility on myself because I try to enjoy the game. I try to do all of the work I’m asked to do and make sure I do exactly what the coach says. I am only under pressure when I am in front of the TV cameras.
Two years later and here he is. In the Premier League. His hope has become a reality. It could be said that the true abilities of Thomas Partey weren’t really noticed until season two years ago. He signed for Atletico in the summer of 2011 but after his time in the second team, he went out on loan until the 2018/19 season, after which he became a household name in La Liga.
A midfielder signed and coached by Simeone means only one thing. Strong, disciplined and defensive. A grafter that’s for sure. But, there’s a different side to his game too. His pace, agility, especially for a big guy and he’s not too shabby with the ball at his feet. YouTube clips, and I’ve watched a few of him in action, can make players appear better than they perhaps are because the bad bits don’t always get shown but I’m not sure there’s much about our new man which is not to like. I’m certainly chuffed to bits that Arsenal activated his release clause, just surprised no other club did before us. Perhaps they thought about it, I don’t know. Or perhaps they realised that Thomas Partey really was a boyhood Arsenal fan after all and we were the only English club he wanted to join.
The fact that he and his then teammates knocked Liverpool out of the Champions League last season is reason enough to love him before he’s even played for us. Shame he hasn’t got his number 5 shirt though. Yet.
See you in the comments guys..
Hi Rico and all Daily Mail claim Arsene Wenger want to change the off side rule a Little bit and in the final 5 minutes throw ins to be changed to kick in’s, If I had my way I would get rid of the off side rule full stop.
Good morning Rico.
Bad news about Tierney but we still have Kolascinac to play left back, or more likely, Saka as wingback.
Ozil has been omitted from our Europa League squad. I guess that means he has probably already played his last game for Arsenal as I can’t see Arteta playing him in the Premiership so he can’t possibly be match fit for either the Caribao or FA cups.
Perhaps now they will just pay Ozil off, Sokratis too.
It makes good sense to pay them both off, if we have sufficient funds available.
Morning Rico and all. The word was that PSG wanted Sokratis but they wanted us to let him go on a free. Apparently Arsenal said no which, as he’s in his last year, means that we get lumbered with his wages. If any of that was true we would have been better off letting him go to PSG.
All of which goes to show that one should never believe anything about Arsenal that you read in the passers.
Or the papers
Afternoon Rico and All
Adam has misspelled that’s a first
Big expectations for Tommy glad we got him rather then tricky dicky with the pencil tash Micky knows how a midfield works as does Edu we have enough pretty boys to slot in between the lines interested in how Micky plays the midfield 2 or a 3 we like we have a bit of pace at the back now
All very exciting
Sorry a bit Stanley Unwin
“Are you all sitty comftybold two-square on your botty?
Fred. I apologise. 😃
I think Ozil’s contract runs to june 30 th . That’s £ 13,300,000 to pay him up and Sokratis or Mustafi would be £ 3,420,000 each whilst Kolasinac £ 4, 560,000 .
Should be able to shift the last 3 in January to save some but Ozil is a bullet biter.
Saka gets his first start for England.
Well I’ve had a really good read of the passers and the Sokratis decision does seem a bit strange especially if getting his wages off the clubs’ books was a major consideration?
Of course it’s a bit rich for an obscenely financed club like PSG to be asking Arsenal to let Sokratis go for free, I mean did they expect us to pay up the final year of his contract so that he could join them for nothing? I don’t know?
Did PSG offer to pay his for his last year, because if they expected us to do it then I think they can go and stick their collective heads up their collective derrière’s
January and the January window is only a few weeks away and it possible that Arsenal can move Papa on then. In the meantime it looks as if Arsenal will need to find a Championship club for Willian Saliba and that should sort him out.
As for the other geezer, Herr Ozil, well he’s only got a few months of inactivity before he can go to play in the Superliga and join his best man in Turkey – and I won’t be sorry to see him go…
The passers are full of shit Kev and you know it 🙂
I mean papers.
Fekken phone.
We need to get rid of Ozil ASAP.
The entire saga has dragged on for too long already and must be concluded.
Personally Scott it doesn’t bother me if Ozil is hanging around, most Arsenal fans have by now pretty much decided on who is to blame for his situation and from my perspective three managers can’t all be wrong?
His PR machine can drop the odd bomb but not many people are listening anymore and his band of supporters are pretty much down to the core now, let him kick his heels because I don’t think those inside the club care much anymore. If they did then he’d have been paid off by now?
It’s a story for the media and Arsenal are always news, but if he’s not in the 25 man squad there isn’t really much point in them continuing to ask why he isn’t playing. If, as I expect, Arsenal are successful this season then he’ll just be a forgotten but very wealthy figure and then by the end of next June he’ll be gone and we’ll discuss him as often as we now discuss Mkhitaryan and Koscielny…..
With all the talk about Arsenal having no money and that we have sacked staff including the mascot and knowing that we still needed to let some players go I wonder if PSG really wanted Sokratis or are the testing us out to see how much money we have in the bank for a future deal on one of our younger players
Kev, I’ll maintain my opinion that we bought Ozil knowing exactly what we were getting, so to try and totally change his game was ridiculous and ignorant, at best.
Emery should’ve done everything he could to sell, him but then, Emery had no idea-he showed that often enough.
Arteta hasn’t messed about.
Scott, I think that Arsenal signed him on the rebound after failing to sign Higuain and Suarez which in essence shows the muddled thinking around that time as we badly needed a quality striker and Arsene ended up getting us an inside forward who rarely scores goals – classic Arsene.
Arsene signed a few that did ok mate.
I do think Arsene signed players he liked rather than players we needed, though.
He was in love with the idea of the beautiful game, no question.
We had Arshavin , Cazorla , Rosicky , Wilshere , Diaby and Arteta on the books at the time , Podolski , Giroud and Chamakh up front . Admittedly the midfielders were at various stages of injury and as Wenger had no idea how to use Podolski and Arshavin we needed a forward not just a name to pacify the crowd.
Potter, Wilshere, Rosicky and Diaby hardly count mate.
They were injured more than they played 🙂
We definitely wasted Podolski and Arshavin, no question at all.
On the subject of Wenger , have you seen his pronouncements on the changes that he would like to make to the rules .
Firstly in the last 5 minutes of the game throw ins in your own half to be replaced by kick ins to allow a team outnumbered because with a player taking the throw a team has one extra player off of the pitch could get the ball forward quicker
Then a corner kick should be allowed to out of play and then come back in , Free kick takers allowed to take multiple touches and changes to the offside law stating :- For the moment, you are offside if a part of your body that you can score with sits ahead of the body of a defender. I would like it to be that there is no offside so long as a (single) body part which a player can score with is in line with the defender
I am not sure what part of the body is unable to score a goal apart from a hand lower than the end of a short sleeved shirt.
Any thoughts and comments on this., ?
Some rule changes have worked but I think that there are too many and that supporters especially those in the ground without television replays are getting lost in what is happening half of the time.
Potter, I think they should test these potential changes out in cup ties or lower leagues for a season to see how they go.
Perhaps the trials could take place down under Scott then the info could be assessed in time to be put into effect, or not, in time for the start of the next season in Europe.
Maybe there is a “language” problem with Wenger’s pronouncements but I can’t see how there is any disadvantage, or advantage, to either side when a throw in or kick in is taken. In both cases there is one player momentarily off the pitch off the pitch.
Perhaps Arsene Wenger should concentrate on simplifying the rules, not complicating them.
Hi all.
A very good point Rico. Good evening to you.
Evening Cicero. Just seems odd when the handball rule is causing problems that other rules might be changed. Ridiculous really.
Actually, one could extend that confusion to the basic tackles too. One week a yellow card, the next it’s red. So much inconsistency is ruining the game. Mind you, we’ve been saying that for years. As was Arsene Wenger.
I hate the idea that players “win” fouls. This afternoon I watched the England / Wales game, the commentators were praising Grealish for his ability to win fouls. I know what he was doing is within the laws of the game, but it’s not in the spirit of a sport.
An old fashioned idea I suppose.
I call it cheating.
Sky announcement Some games to be shown on pay for view On top of the normal subscription
Seems it’s a premier league initiative £14. 95 a game . More details to follow
Diving or systematic fouling is simply cheating and it’s what needs to be eradicated from the game imo.
Cicero,
Our A League starts in December so yes,
Why not try a few of these rules out to see how they go?
Great idea.
I think the throw ins late in the game are more to stop sides defending a lead just having all players in the area to choke the area down where a kick in obviously eliminates that.
I like it, in theory.
Yes, simplify the damn handball rule though, first and foremost!!
Headline
KRONKE GETS HAND BITTEN WHILST IN POCKET SEARCHING FOR MONEY TO PAY FOR PARTEY
According to Edu Stan the syrup contributed a few bob to help to pay for his latest Partey! Allegedly he was happy to help.
Will somebody tell LC as his claim that tight wad Stan has changed his spots.
Still I suppose he thought, ‘speculate to accumulate”, with the view to getting CLsoccer for next season. Perhaps. More cash in his corporate pocket. We’ll have to wait and see how much he takes out of the club next year as payment for his timely loan! (The interest rate won’t be 0.05%, I’ll be bound!
Potter I mentioned about Wenger earlier I not sure how the last 5 minute kick in work but at least try the off side rule or even get rid of the off side rule all together I still have this feeling that Wenger will come back to us in say 5 years and take up a position on the board
Potter, I read that games not picked for broadcasting could be available on BT Sport pay per view for people without a subscription. They will be included free of charge for subscribers.
Arsenal are planning to show away games live at The Emirates for £45 per person in the hospitality areas. Food and drink will be extra.
That last five minute idea of Wenger’s is problematic, does it start at minute 85 or five minutes before the end of playing time including added time?
Sounds to me that the old boy thought that one up after a glass or two too many of Chateau Lafitte. 😉