Monthly Archives: September 2007

Arsenal the best club in the world for a young player

Well, for all his talk of knowing how to beat Arsene Wenger’s sides it was a sad trip back to Newcastle for Sam Allardyce and his team as they went down 2-0 to an Arsenal team that bore little resemblence to the one which beat Derby.

Only Senderos, Walcott and Eduardo survived. There was a debut for Fabianski, a first start for Bendtner and Diarra, a return for Eboue, starts for Denilson, Traore, Hoyte and Walcott and Alex Song at centre-half. Newcastle, as far as I can see, put out their best available team.

Now, like most of you I didn’t see very much apart from a 30 second clip of the goals (some Sky Sports News highlights downloadable here). Bendtner’s was a great header (a ‘real centre forward’s header’) after a great ball in from Traore on the left and the big Dane has done what the boss asked of him. Before the game the manager was lauding his talent but making it quite clear he has it all to do yet. He urged him to take his chances when they came and a goal for a striker is pretty much doing just that.

Denilson scored the second but not before Senderos made a brilliant stop on the line after Martins had rounded the keeper. The young Brazilian’s first goal for the club was a rocket into the top corner after some trickery in the box from Diaby. I’m glad he’s finally gotten off the mark and what a way to do it.

Beyond that I can only go on what people at the game have been speaking about. There’s been a lot of praise for Diarra, Denilson is like Cesc II, the keeper looked reasonably good and Alex Song did very well at the back. That’s a surprise, I have to say, but a nice one. I’m not sure I’d feel comfortable with him there outside the Carling Cup but this will have done his confidence some good. Anyone else who was at the game feel free to let us know more in the arses. For the rest of us there are match reports: Guardian – Telegraph – Times – The Sun – Arsene BBC interview (real player required).

Afterwards a clearly delighted Arsene Wenger said:

We were good and intelligent, and I like that. The game was of the same level we played recently with the players who did not feature, and with a style of play with continuity. We have wave after wave of generation of young players. We work with them and when they have come in, they show top quality.

We did not play against an average team. We played against Newcastle. We have shown technical maturity and looked strong in every department.

And that’s the thing. I know it’s early season but Newcastle are fifth in the league. It seems that we have this ability in this competition to beat good teams, strong teams, with the youngest, most inexperienced players we have. It’s kind of weird really. A good and very enjoyable kind of weird but weird nonetheless.

Arsenal really must be the best place in the world for a young, talented player to be right now. You know you’ll get chances, you know that if you can repay the faith shown in you by the manager then you’ll be part of things, and playing the kind of football that purists dream of. Sure, it doesn’t always work but when it does it’s just great to watch. I mean, consider our goals this season. How many top quality goals have we scored? Not just decent, well worked goals, but top, top quality. Can’t be arsed to figure it out? Well, I did and the answer is loads. It’s fantastic. The better we play the better the goals are. Long may it continue.

In other news there are reports that Gilberto is uneasy about his future at the club, saying he’s not sure if he’ll extend his contract. With 18 months still to run though it’s not a big problem.

Stan Kroenke may attend Arsenal’s AGM in a show of support for the current board, according to the Telegraph. It does appear as if the relationship between Dein and Kroenke has fizzled out with Dein’s new friend Usmanov the flavour of the month. You wonder if Kroenke, whose 12%+ is a considerable stake, shares the same uneasiness that the board and Arsenal fans do about Usmanov’s background.

In an interview with the Evening Standard Peter Hill-Wood suggested that Kroenke, who he described as ‘perfectly decent’ after a recent meeting, had been misled by Dein when he first got involved. It’s thought that it was to do with Dein not revealing the extent of the differences between him and the board and Dein’s ultimate intention of masterminding a takeover which would put him in charge of the football club. It’s little wonder Kroenke was viewed as hostile to begin with.

If you want to read the full interview you can download it here and there’s no question there’s serious opposition from the board towards Dein, leading to this classic line:

When was the last occasion he saw Dein? “The day I fired him” Was it Hill-Wood’s saddest day at Arsenal? “No. It was the saddest for Dein”

Hahaha. If he ever retires as Arsenal chairman there’s a job here for him at Arseblog writing stinging one-liners. More from the Guardian here and an article by David Conn with a classic headline.

And that’s about it for today. Don’t forget you’ve still got a chance to win a t-shirt from Goonershirts.com. Just look at yesterday’s entry for the details and the very simple question. Some of the answers have been making me laugh though. I’ll tell you why tomorrow.

Until then.

A lot of stuff about football, finances + win a t-shirt!

Oh it’s busy busy these mornings. Loads to get through and lots of linkage.

The financial stuff was the story of the day really. You can read the main points of yesterday’s press conference here while there’s been all kinds of talk of £70m war chests for Arsene to spend, snippets from Danny Fiszman and Keith Edelman, and then Chairman Peter Hill-Wood dismissing Chelsea’s ambitions to be the biggest club in the world as ‘bullshit’ and ‘pure fantasy’, which is bang on the money, so to speak. His comments about money being irrelevant to how big your club is are just perfect.

The bottom line is that the club is being very well run and is in very good shape. As I’ve said on here before the reason people like Dein and Usmanov want to ‘invest’ in Arsenal is because they know there’s enormous potential to make money. That’s it. They’re not altruistic, they’re not fans pumping money into the club to make it better, they’re speculators who want to make as much cash as they can from Arsenal. They will take money out of the football club and that’s the last thing we need having worked so hard to get on top of things financially. We don’t need them and the board don’t want them.

Ok, now onto football and tonight we face Newcastle in the Carling Cup. The boss has already said he’ll be making some changes with Fabianski, Bendtner, Denilson, Diarra and other set to start. It’ll be tough opposition though. I can’t see Newcastle making so many changes to their squad, certainly not with such young players, and Walrus looking cunt will be out for another victory over Wenger. He’s been in the papers saying how good a squad we have and how great Arsene is even if he hasn’t shown Allardyce as much respect as he should have.

Pffff, respect is earned, cuntbubble. Sending out cloggers like Kevin Davies to elbow your way to victory really doesn’t merit a great deal of respect. Hopefully the youngsters can step up to the plate again like they’ve done in recent seasons but this competition really has to be our lowest priority this season. If we go through then great, if we don’t I’m not going to be too gutted because I think our sights are set somewhat higher this time around. That said though it would be lovely to get one over on Allardyce.

Full squad listed here and Fran Merida and Henri Lansbury are included – while it seems that Alex Song will be playing at centre-half. Gulp.

Cesc was in the news yesterday talking about how, at the moment, he could see himself staying at Arsenal for ten years because he’s enjoying it that much. And how could he not be enjoying it? He also spoke about Thierry Henry’s departure as something liberating for the young players, saying:

Henry intimidated us. He is a great player but it was not easy to play alongside him. We were a bit inhibited by him – dependent on everything he wanted to do and his demands. Now it is different.

Completely understandable comment, in a way, but at the same time I don’t think it’s entirely fair to suggest all that we’re doing well this season is because Henry has gone. His departure has enabled others to take more responsibility (something William Gallas has commented on) and do better but there’s a danger of painting Henry as this villainous character, twiddling his moustache before deciding which youngster to tie to the railway tracks. Let’s remember Henry hardly played for the last 6 months of the season and it wasn’t as liberating then. I can see where Cesc is coming from though and if the lads feel better without Thierry then fair enough.

Emmanuel Adebayor reckons we’re changing people’s attitudes about this team. After being written off by the press all summer long they’re now creaming themselves over us. A perfect illustration of how the press works. Way too negative when things are going wrong, way too positive when things are going well. It’s no wonder the manager is making sure people keep their feet on the ground. Meanwhile the boss talks about Adebayor’s form and says he scored a ‘Thierry goal’ at the weekend.

And speaking of the Jedibayor, his hat-trick shirt, the one he wore against Derby, went for £50,000 in an auction to raise money for leukemia research. Props to Adebayor for donating and even more to the person who paid that much money,

Now, thanks to Goonershirts.com we have three of these lovely t-shirts you see to your right. Click the picture to see the bigger picture, so to speak. To enter all you need to do is answer the following question:

Invasive, dismal roundhead is an anagram of ‘David Dein Alisher Usmanov’. Is that a) True – ?

Answers to tshirt@arseblog.com. You have till tomorrow Weds night to enter, winners announced on Thursday morning.

And that is entirely that. More tomorrow and come on you reeeeeeeds tonight.

Arsenal finances show up Red and White scaremongering

Well, good Monday to you all. I was planning on having a lie-in today, what with having been up at the crack of dawn on Saturday and Sunday for various reasons, but it was not to be.

You see, what happens in the morning is that the Blogette gets up and readies herself for school. This can take anywhere between 30 and 120 minutes from what I can gather. This morning, I asked her to open up the back door so the Arseblog basset hound could go out into the garden and do what dogs (and men) do first thing in the morning. ‘No problem’, she said and continued to beautify herself for school. Now, the Arseblog basset hound is a wise old hound and he knows that once she stirs in the morning me or Mrs Blogs can’t be far behind.

So he postions himself outside our bedroom and lets these plaintive but quite low volumed cheeps and whines which drill themselves into your consciousness to the point where you have to get up. So I get up, let him out the back, he does what he has to do and promptly goes back to bed. Being a dog he’s then asleep within three seconds and I am standing waiting for the kettle to boil. I have also come to realise that I have the slowest boiling kettle in the world. It takes fucking ages. Still, at least I have coffee now but the sneaky dog is snoozing like a sneaky old dog.

Not much going on really, apart from the fact that Arsenal financial results are out this morning. I haven’t yet had a look at them but the AST has and they’ve released a statement saying:

The AST studies carefully the different models of how football clubs are run. Arsenal’s model, based on sensible borrowing to invest in facilities that generate an increased income stream, is a model we commend. AST reiterates its opposition to any hostile takeover at Arsenal.

Unlike Chelsea who rely on a sugar daddy who thinks he is also the manager, and Manchester United who are mired in debt, Arsenal have a sustainable business model based on offering quality football in the country’s best stadium.

Now, that is a polite way of telling Dein and Usmanov to fuck off and that we don’t need or want your money. The AST being unable to use foul language in its press releases must moderate its language and say things ‘in so many words’. I, however, do not have that restriction so I can quite easily say ‘Fuck off Dein and Usmanov, you pair of cunts’.

It’ll be a day or so before the results can be studied in full but profits are up, cash is up, match day revenue is up, and these results don’t take into account his summer’s player trading (which left us in profit) and the money saved from the wage bill because Henry and Ljungberg have gone. Those two make a saving of around £10m per year, which is really a lot of money. The Chairman, MC P to the H to the Wicky Wild Wild West (dripping in gold and surrounded by ‘bitches’ with lots of junk in their trunk), said:

The best way that Arsenal can continue to deliver success is by maintaining a business that pays its own way. This philosophy helped establish our objectives for the club’s move away from Highbury and Emirates Stadium now provides Arsenal with the increased income, profitability, cash generation and firm financial foundations from which we will continue to build trophy-winning Arsenal teams for many years to come.

As I said it’ll be tomorrow before someone breaks down exactly what it all means but the bottom line is that the club is doing very well and talk about how we need investment to compete is shown up for the scaremongering tactic it really is. We have a manager whose footballing philosophy is different to any manager in the world now. They all want and need money to be able to compete, Arsene wants to build and create. We have a board that has sufficient trust in the manager to allow him to build his team in that way and at the moment we’re seeing the benefits of that. The finances are great and the football, at this moment in time, is even better.

Tell me why we need a fat oligarch and his orange sidekick again?

If you want to download and read the report yourself you can find it here and Keith Edelman talks about it here.

Away from the finances it looks like Denilson is to be offered a new deal. He’s just one of the collection of central midfielders we have but while Flamini, Gilberto and Diarra are more defensive minded the young Brazilian is more creative, more like Cesc. He’s got definite quality and I’ll be glad to see him sign on again. I’d also like us to make moves to get Mathieu Flamini signed to a new deal. He’s been fantastic this season and we shouldn’t allow him to leave.

Meanwhile another central midfielder, Abou Diaby, reveals he feared for his career after that horrendous tackle at Sunderland the season before last. He’s beginning to find his feet a bit now and he does get himself in some extremely dangerous positions although his finishing has been a bit off. Perhaps now he’s found his range with the goal against Derby we might see more from him. You wonder what he’d be like with a run of games in the middle although the way Cesc and Flamini are playing right now it’s nearly impossible to break up that partnership. Maybe he’ll play there in the Carling Cup.

Right, that’s about it. More team news about the CC tomorrow as well as further examination of the finances. Have a good day.

Adebayor uses the force to power 5 star Arsenal

Am I the only one who sometimes feels like they’re about to wake up on the day before the season begins to find out none of all the cool stuff has happened? I can’t remember a start to the season quite like this, I have to say. The results, the way we’re playing, the fact we’re three points clear of Man City at the top of the table. My good old friends, I am enjoying the shite out of this.

Despite wise words of caution beforehand about not being complacent and every game being difficult blah blah blah, Derby were blown away yesterday. I have to say I feel kind of sorry for them because more than any other Premier League team I can remember, they look completely out of their depth in this league. They were terrible against Sp*rs, worse against Liverpool and despite a good performance against Newcastle this week they had no chance yesterday.

Abou Diaby, playing on the left, put us in front with a great goal after ten minutes. He cut inside a defender, then another one and another one and then unleashed a rocket into the top corner. Unstoppable and after the glorious chances he’s missed in recent weeks he’ll have been glad to stick one away at last.

Now, when Thierry left and we only signed Eduardo there were those of us that thought we were going to be weak in the striking positions. With Robin van Persie on the bench the Crozilian started up top with Adebayor and it was the big man who was the star of the show. His first hat-trick for the club was more than merited. A good first goal when he was put through by Cesc and rounded the keeper before calmly slotting home. A second from the penalty spot after the referee rather generously decided Eduardo had been dragged down by Matt Oakley. And a third late on when he leapt brilliantly to take a ball out of the air on his chest and sidefoot home. That’s six league goals already this season for the Togonator. I think that’s what we call good progress and Derby boss Billy Davies called him one of the best strikers in the world right now.

Of course there was another goal for Cesc, making it his sixth goal in six games. Another long range right footed effort which the keeper got a hand to but was unable to keep out. It really is an amazing run of goals from the young midfielder, Thierry Henry is the last player to have scored in six consecutive games before him. There were other chances too. Bywater made a great save from an Eduardo header, Theo Walcott nearly squirmed one in underneath him and Diaby might have had a second just after scoring. It’s no real exaggeration to say we could have scored seven or eight.

And the best part about it all was that we seemed to do it in cruise control. We knew how shaky the Derby defence was. Neither of the centre-halves could get near Adebayor all day and if we’d needed to step it up a gear or two then that was there. I’m not going to go through individual performances but we’re in a nice position where important players are playing well and that’s winning us games. When you consider we’re without both first choice wide players, a first choice centre-half, possibly the first choice keeper and there was no sign at all of Gilberto. Impressive. Sometimes we’ve struggled against teams we should be beating easily. Sheffield United last season was a prime example but this lot are more ruthless now, they believe in themselves more and if they keep up this kind of form then they’re going to make life difficult for any team they come across.

The manager was impressed as well, saying:

This team means business. We are not there to show off. We want to achieve something together. We kept a good concentration on the quality of our game. It was really enjoyable to watch.

On Adebayor:

He is really a lion. He has a huge force coming out of him, basically he had that already before but he looks calmer in his finishing.

From those comments not only is he a lion but he appears to be a Jedi lion, which must be the most awesome type of lion there is. So overall a great win, great performance and more confidence building ahead of next week’s trickier game away to West Ham.

Of course there’s the Carling Cup game against Newcastle during the week, a full preview of that tomorrow or Tuesday when we get a better idea of what the team news is going to be.

Boris Johnson reacts to his website being unavailable due to the Usmanov effect. He’s not happy and there’s still no sign of it coming back, nor any of the other websites on that server.

Anyway, let us not dwell on things fat and ugly, let us enjoy our Sunday and bask in the warm glow of a five star Arsenal performance and the fact that we are top of the league. We could also have a laugh at the complete and utter mess Chelsea are in. Mourinho accusing Terry of costing him his job, Abramovich giving Michael Essien lessons in tactics via interpreter Andrei Shevchenko and a rift between senior players. Hilarious.

Until tomorrow, Arsemates.