As we're unlikely to see terraces again at football, this is the virtual equivalent where you can chat to your hearts content about all football matters and, obviously, Arsenal in particular. This forum encourages all Gooners to visit and contribute so please keep it respectful, clean and topical.
Yeah One Bard, (hopefully) you could easily see multiple Ozil type situations developing over there, players on massive money and long term contracts who just decide to phone it in creating massive disharmony in the squad and turning the dressing room absolutely toxic.....fingers crossed!
They’re like a dodgy used car salesman buying expensive cars and hoping they appreciate in value while selling his old shitters off to balance the books,no marque horrible club,hate them more than the Sp*ds and the Victims
What does seem to have gone unnoticed is Gabi signing a new 4 and half year deal. Whatever your feeling in January and I really wanted Mudryk we have adapted quickly and got in some decent cover. Our mosst important signings will be our three youngsters , one down two to go.
Has that actually been officially announced yet?, I saw a few stories about it in the rags but don't remember seeing it on .com or the club's socials. Hopefully it's true anyway and the other 2 follow suit soon. Saka I don't see any issue with, he'll definitely sign but Saliba I wouldn't be so certain about, I always have that sneaky feeling he'd rather be back in France.
Apparently Benfica wanted the cash up front as they were worried about Chelsea imploding before they had been paid in full. A release clause has to be paid in full to be activated which is why it went on for days. Chelsea were prepared to pay over the release clause if in instalments. Benfica said, no we want it all upfront. God knows what was agreed in the end but clubs are wary of them as this could very easily unravel quite quickly.
These things get noticed very quickly by other clubs and if that's the case then something must be known about them and their financial affairs. They aren't backed by a sovereign wealth fund with endless resources like the two in this country or PSG but are throwing money around like there's no tomorrow. This might get them a little bit of success next season but I reckon within 18 months they'll be on their third or fourth manager and loaning out 25 players every six months to other clubs just to keep the costs down. In addition, it won't be long before other Premier League clubs start asking questions and the powers that be will need to do something. This smacks of a desperate, reckless and snide load of spending with the prime motivation being do it before anyone catches them. What they will never understand is that nobody actually gives a fuck about them and not a single football supporter has anything other than pure contempt for them and what they've been doing for 20 years and more.
Apparently Benfica wanted the cash up front as they were worried about Chelsea imploding before they had been paid in full. A release clause has to be paid in full to be activated which is why it went on for days. Chelsea were prepared to pay over the release clause if in instalments. Benfica said, no we want it all upfront. God knows what was agreed in the end but clubs are wary of them as this could very easily unravel quite quickly.
These things get noticed very quickly by other clubs and if that's the case then something must be known about them and their financial affairs. They aren't backed by a sovereign wealth fund with endless resources like the two in this country or PSG but are throwing money around like there's no tomorrow. This might get them a little bit of success next season but I reckon within 18 months they'll be on their third or fourth manager and loaning out 25 players every six months to other clubs just to keep the costs down. In addition, it won't be long before other Premier League clubs start asking questions and the powers that be will need to do something. This smacks of a desperate, reckless and snide load of spending with the prime motivation being do it before anyone catches them. What they will never understand is that nobody actually gives a fuck about them and not a single football supporter has anything other than pure contempt for them and what they've been doing for 20 years and more.
For all the cups and trophies they won they may as well throw them all away, cheated their way to success
What does seem to have gone unnoticed is Gabi signing a new 4 and half year deal. Whatever your feeling in January and I really wanted Mudryk we have adapted quickly and got in some decent cover. Our mosst important signings will be our three youngsters , one down two to go.
Has that actually been officially announced yet?, I saw a few stories about it in the rags but don't remember seeing it on .com or the club's socials. Hopefully it's true anyway and the other 2 follow suit soon. Saka I don't see any issue with, he'll definitely sign but Saliba I wouldn't be so certain about, I always have that sneaky feeling he'd rather be back in France.
Apparently Benfica wanted the cash up front as they were worried about Chelsea imploding before they had been paid in full. A release clause has to be paid in full to be activated which is why it went on for days. Chelsea were prepared to pay over the release clause if in instalments. Benfica said, no we want it all upfront. God knows what was agreed in the end but clubs are wary of them as this could very easily unravel quite quickly.
These things get noticed very quickly by other clubs and if that's the case then something must be known about them and their financial affairs. They aren't backed by a sovereign wealth fund with endless resources like the two in this country or PSG but are throwing money around like there's no tomorrow. This might get them a little bit of success next season but I reckon within 18 months they'll be on their third or fourth manager and loaning out 25 players every six months to other clubs just to keep the costs down. In addition, it won't be long before other Premier League clubs start asking questions and the powers that be will need to do something. This smacks of a desperate, reckless and snide load of spending with the prime motivation being do it before anyone catches them. What they will never understand is that nobody actually gives a fuck about them and not a single football supporter has anything other than pure contempt for them and what they've been doing for 20 years and more.
One of the guys on sky was asked if the chavs spending was wreckless, he said no, they have a structure and want to be the biggest club in the world, bigger than real Madrid he said
I do take the point that Jorginho is not intended to be a marquee signing, but to provide better quality cover for Partey and Xkaka in midfield. He is, evidently an improvement on both Elneny (who is in any case injured, possibly for the rest of the season) and on Sambi Lokonga. I imagine the contrast between the first and second half performances at Man City were a large contributory factor behind Arteta shipping him off on loan to Palace despite Elneny and Partey's injuries.
But I am nonetheless concerned that we missed out on Mudryk. I don't want or expect us to go round mindlessly blowing money on everyone as Chelsea do. It is unrealistic, and probably counter-productive. But where we want a player, and all the evidence is the player wants to join us (as Ngolo Kante did in 2016) we should be willing to pay the going rate, or even slightly more to prevent them joining a rival. .I don't buy that signing him would have "killed Martinelli". If we aspire to be a top club competing on all fronts, we need quality competition and Martinelli has arguably needed to be rested and rotated more than we have been able to with the likes of Smith-Rowe and Jesus out.
I accept that for the money we paid this was a sensible short-term signing to get us over the line for the title this season. But I stand by the point I made yesterday: all of the options in our engine-room are now in their 30s (or in Partey's case, very nearly). The priority in the summer has to be to recruit a top-draw central midfielder: primarily a ball-winner "box-to-box" type. Rice or Bellingham would fit the bill nicely, as would De Jong (a Man United target).
Last edited by Bob Bayliss on Wed Feb 01, 2023 1:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Social media is never a good barometer of things but we really have returned to the AKB days with some of these people. This season has been incredible and title or not, a top 4 finish is a great achievement but does that mean everything has to be universally positive. If we sign a finished Chelsea player then it can be called out without the "go support another club" nonsense.
Social media is never a good barometer of things but we really have returned to the AKB days with some of these people. This season has been incredible and title or not, a top 4 finish is a great achievement but does that mean everything has to be universally positive. If we sign a finished Chelsea player then it can be called out without the "go support another club" nonsense.
Why do you say he is finished? Give him a fucking chance to come in and do the job he has been signed on a short term contract to do, then if he plods around like a player who is "finished" then call him out!
I remember sperz thinking Pat Jennings was finished
Social media is never a good barometer of things but we really have returned to the AKB days with some of these people. This season has been incredible and title or not, a top 4 finish is a great achievement but does that mean everything has to be universally positive. If we sign a finished Chelsea player then it can be called out without the "go support another club" nonsense.
Why do you say he is finished? Give him a fucking chance to come in and do the job he has been signed on a short term contract to do, then if he plods around like a player who is "finished" then call him out!
I remember sperz thinking Pat Jennings was finished
Yeah and I remember manure thinking silvestre was finished and the chavs thinking helmet head, gallas, sideshow bob and will i am were finished too - hold on and forget I said that
Understand the frustration as we are having an incredible season the title is a real possibilty not a dream, i believe if we had made a quality midfield signing such as the fella from Brighton that would have been the boost needed to get us over the line for a league title
Have to trust Arteta on this one he rates Jorginho highly and tried to sign him previously, but from what i have seen and heard understandably hes not quite the same player as 5/6 years ago, has he still got the fire in his belly or is he another stinking chav freeloader....time will tell
We are now stuck with what we have, some great young players....and a manager whos doing the buisness.....with the fans totaly behind the team
I think our transfer window has been reasonable. Nothing extraordinary but I think we’ve ended up with a stronger squad than we had first half of the season.
We now have good quality back up out wide in Trossard and hopefully better quality back up in defence with this Polish centre half (not that I’ve seen him play but he’s surely better than Holding and means both Saliba and Gabriel can be rested when required)
Whether Jorginho brings a winners mentality or has given up remains to be seen but again gives us more squad depth with hopefully a more exciting, younger signing made in that position in the summer.
We shall wait and see. We’ve been doing a hell of a lot better this season than I expected so long may that continue
Social media is never a good barometer of things but we really have returned to the AKB days with some of these people. This season has been incredible and title or not, a top 4 finish is a great achievement but does that mean everything has to be universally positive. If we sign a finished Chelsea player then it can be called out without the "go support another club" nonsense.
All I saw on twitter yesterday was negativity and Edu out trending. The end of the day he's joined now and will obviously get behind him in the ground even if im not happy about it until he fucks up of course.
We have no excuses not to go big on one if not two CMs in the summer though as the rest of the squad is pretty much set apart from maybe a right back.