It's all a load of Cannonballs in here! This is the virtual Arsenal pub where you can chat about anything except football. Be warned though, like any pub, the content may not always be suitable for everyone.
Well, there isn't any super super quality coming out of the French 2nd Division or Kenya at the moment. At least not of the type that we'd like to offer £80k a week to.
I'm sure at 11.59pm on January 31st, Botswana's 5th finest left back will be ours
I sense a new Wenger player category will be employed for the subsequent news conference;
"Super Ultra Quality".
"SUQ", pronounced "suck", will be the new definition of our glorious leader's last minute signings!
"Wee haff sahned Oomfoofoo Mgambondo from ze Bertswahner fefth division - he deffanahtly fits in ze category of playerz zat I werd conzider SUQ."
DB10GOONER wrote:
"Wee haff sahned Oomfoofoo Mgambondo from ze Bertswahner fefth division - he deffanahtly fits in ze category of playerz zat I werd conzider SUQ."
You read it here first.
There's something about reading DB10's quotes in a funny voice that tickle me every time. Superb sir!
“At the moment we are not close to signing anybody.” Wenger said. “The transfer market is internal for us. We recently played with ten players out, to have only two or three out would help us a lot, much more than the transfer market.
“You can look around at all the big clubs and who bought players? Nobody, because you can’t find players at the moment who can strengthen big clubs.”
...then Chelsea signed Gary Cahill for £6m and Newcastle signed Papiss Cisse for £8m
Cut and paste similar Lord Wenger comments for January 2013. I love the internal market
Well, there isn't any super super quality coming out of the French 2nd Division or Kenya at the moment. At least not of the type that we'd like to offer £80k a week to.
I'm sure at 11.59pm on January 31st, Botswana's 5th finest left back will be ours
I sense a new Wenger player category will be employed for the subsequent news conference;
"Super Ultra Quality".
"SUQ", pronounced "suck", will be the new definition of our glorious leader's last minute signings!
"Wee haff sahned Oomfoofoo Mgambondo from ze Bertswahner fefth division - he deffanahtly fits in ze category of playerz zat I werd conzider SUQ."
You read it here first.
I can imagine it now...And on Ther Arsenal bench tonight we have ramsey, flappyhands, etcetcetc and Oomfoofoo...in the pink boots, overcoat, gloves and balaclava !
"We have two markets: one is internal and one is external,” said Wenger. “Internal is the young players that we have - players who are inside the club are very important."
TWO TRANSFER MARKETS.......THERE'S ONLY TWO TRANSFER MARKETS......BUT....
"We have two markets: one is internal and one is external,” said Wenger. “Internal is the young players that we have - players who are inside the club are very important."
TWO TRANSFER MARKETS.......THERE'S ONLY TWO TRANSFER MARKETS......BUT....
....THERE'S ONLY ONE ARSENE WENGER
Get a contract killer in to Whack this fella now !!
So loads of debate raged on the interweb yesterday about Cavani. One minute we’re sniffing around the dustbin of Europe for a diamond that accidentally slipped in after the Sunday roast (see that clever City reference there?), the next, rumour of a £30m signing hits the web… and everyone is entirely certain it could happen.
Why so certain? Because a website reckons City didn’t bid for him last summer and the Napoli chairman is a bit of a liar when it comes to, well, everything.
Now, it might be true that you could land a player of Cavani’s talent for a decent price. You know, a proper market price, like, say, £30million. On top of that, you have to accept that players who consistently score 30+ goals over 4 years command big wages. You’re easily looking at £150k a week for a man of the Uraguayan’s talent. He’s going to be 26 this year, he’s on for his last big deal. Why would he command any less? He’s playing for a team who are top quality. They’re third in Serie A at the moment. Napoli are a Champions League team and when he plays in that elite competition, he scores. So it’s not like signing a Fellaini here… you’ve got a ready made weapon.
Last summer, he was my number one replacement for Robin Van Persie. He’s agressive and nasty in the same way Suarez is. He can sniff out a goal from anywhere and he has a fantastic mix of pace and power. He really is out there as one of the stand out strikers in Europe. We could afford him, no problem. We’d have to offload some deadwood, but we could definitley absorb his salary and transfer fee without a problem.
Trouble is, this is Arsenal we’re talking about. The story hit the web, the journalists took it to Wenger… and he teased.
“I like him as a player,”
Ahhh… he likes Cavani. Kind of like the guy running the local chip shop saying he likes Mila Kunis as a woman.
‘Will he cost a lot of money? That’s for sure. Nobody would deny that. Our banker lives just next to me at the moment and he is ready if we find the right player.’
The tease… ‘we’re in for BIG MONEY players, so don’t fret Gooners’
“We can spend the money that we have decided to spend if it is for a player we think gives us a plus. But I do not want to speak about Cavani because we have not made an inquiry for him.
No inquiry? But Twitter said a bid was launched?
“You speak about Cavani … Napoli are playing for the championship and the Champions League [places] in Italy. What is the interest of Napoli to sell Cavani? None. Unless you come there and say, ‘OK, we pay twice the price of what the player is worth’.”
The justification. The reality. The truth. It was all an exercise in spin.
‘We can strengthen everywhere,”
“You can come out of any game and think [that]. We gave away cheap goals against Manchester City [on Sunday]. At the moment, it is more important that the team remains focused. If we find something, we will do it.”
So what have the clever people at Arsenal achieved here? The same thing they managed last year. The creation of breathing space for Arsene. It’s Cavani today, last year it was Eden Hazard… how many times have we been here with the promises? Now 90% of Arsenal fans who can’t follow history will look to the summer… they’ll think Wenger has it sussed this time around… they’ll snap up all those season tickets, only to be hit by the same process we go through every year.
The promise of change
The acceptance of mistakes from the previous season
The hyping of the war chest
The lack of action
The hype of the youth
The average age of the squad
The pearler about this being ‘the best squad ever’
The reality that you’ve just been duped… again
At the end of the day, you never find something if you’re not looking. It’s apparent that Capoue is one of the hottest properties in France, he has had the most touches in the league, from what I’ve been told his performances and stats outside that last one are exceptional. He’s available… Simple fact is that there are lots of players available who could add depth and quality to our squad. We’re just not interested. That win against Swansea will serve as temporary vindication and we’ll most likely roll on without bolstering. If we do, I’d imagine it’ll be a last gasp snatch at someone we probably haven’t targeted. Whatever we do, it won’t be enough. We’re 21 points off for a reason… and it’s not one player.
Finally, a pretty sharp reminder to me, as to why I wouldn’t want David Dein back at the club in anything other than a Chairman type role.
“People have got short memories. They seem to forget what Arsene has achieved for the club,”
“Arsenal is respected around the world and much of that is because of Arsene with the results and the players he has brought in and developed.
“People underestimate him. He has transformed the club. He has done a phenomenal job.’
“I always used to call him the miracle-worker. He waved his magic wand and he delivered.’
“But it’s getting tougher because the competition is getting stronger’
We don’t need to bring in Arsene Wenger’s friend. We need to bring in someone who is modern. We need to bring in someone who can be the David Dein of 20 years ago. Someone who can do what he did, but younger. The board needs fresh blood. We need progress, not to fall back to what worked in yesteryear. The problems at the club don’t stem from David Dein leaving… they stem from not evolving and kicking things up to the next level when he went. Great companies don’t dwell on sentiment, they strive to create a new history. Arsenal need to create a new successful chapter with new people with fresh ideas.
DB10GOONER wrote:
"Wee haff sahned Oomfoofoo Mgambondo from ze Bertswahner fefth division - he deffanahtly fits in ze category of playerz zat I werd conzider SUQ."
You read it here first.
There's something about reading DB10's quotes in a funny voice that tickle me every time. Superb sir!
Well, there isn't any super super quality coming out of the French 2nd Division or Kenya at the moment. At least not of the type that we'd like to offer £80k a week to.
I'm sure at 11.59pm on January 31st, Botswana's 5th finest left back will be ours
I sense a new Wenger player category will be employed for the subsequent news conference;
"Super Ultra Quality".
"SUQ", pronounced "suck", will be the new definition of our glorious leader's last minute signings!
"Wee haff sahned Oomfoofoo Mgambondo from ze Bertswahner fefth division - he deffanahtly fits in ze category of playerz zat I werd conzider SUQ."
LeGrove sums it up well Hlebby, agreed. Particularly about Dein - I love what he did for the club and his clear passion for football and the Arsenal: but he's Wenger's mate. I would hate for him to come back and line up with the rest of the fools. Besides, the board will only ever appoint somebody else with the same views. Are they going to appoint somebody to challenge the status quo and strive for success? About as likely as turkeys voting for Christmas.
Wenger doesn't even need to be clever with his spin any more. He can praise Cavani but essentially say we're not signing him in the same press conference and yet so many brainless morons on Twatter will jizz their pants about how we're in for him and by the time they realise they've been mugged off the window's closed for another few months. Come summer, it'll be a case of rinse and repeat.
I can't believe he thinks it's a great idea leaving everything til the last week and last 48 hours specifically of the window. His quotes about the prices always going up, but also sometimes down in the last week of the window is funny but what it really means is that clubs who want to ship out average players might be more willing to listen to offers but clubs don't want to let quality players go and certainly not on the cheap because they'll have no time to replace them. Why would Napoli, for example, be keener to let their star player go on Jan 31st when they have no chance of replacing him? Sums up our targets.
