Arsene has as much money as he wants this summer

Happy Friday to you all and Thierry Henry spoke yesterday about how he reckoned things would have been different if our strikers had stayed fit last season. He says:

Getting everybody injured in the same position does not help. A lot of teams had to suffer that during the season, but especially here it is maybe not the same when you miss some key players. We have a young squad and we missed at the important time of the season key, experienced players.

True enough but even down to bare bones we did have Baptista and Aliadiere who were hardly two novices. I think the key is the quality of the back-up you have and if our quality was measured in breakfast cereals those two are sugar-free Alpen, nature’s most disgusting combination of ingredients. Thierry talks about his own season and injuries and all that too.

MAYHEM – screams the Mirror. BOLLOCKS – screams everyone who has even half a clue.

Last night Arsenal Managing Director Keith Edelman met with Arsenal shareholders and some of the topics covered in the meeting include:

• Highbury Square and two other developments are expected to bring in significant profit when completed
• Arsene has as much money as he wants this summer
• Arsenal TV should exist by the end of the year
• A 2 minute bell at half-time could be introduced (just like the theatre, how posh!)
• The club are working on a new anthem to help improve atmosphere and it should be ready for the new season
• Arsenal has more female fans than any other Premiership club

And those were the main points that came from the meeting. Lots of them are worthy of discussion, don’t you think? That’s what the arses are for, go mad (in a good way).

Now, onto all things audio.

And on this week’s slightly shorter Arsecast, brought to you in association with OleOle.com, there are season reviews from Adebayor, Talkshite Radio and William Gallas’ penis, there are some outtakes and the Man in the Bar has another player history. There’s also a bet of the week from Bluesq.com which involves Samuel Eto’o.

To subscribe to the arsecast in iTunes – click here. To download this week’s arsecast directly – click here (17mb MP3). You can find the arsecast archives here. And you can listen directly below without leaving this very page.

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So there you go. More Arsey goodness tomorrow.

"Heaven must be missing an angel", says Alex Hleb

Morning Arsechums. I am most relieved this morning as I dreamt I had broken my arm last night and it was all a bit painful and inconvenient. I’m sure it was just Mrs Blogs bashing me to stop me snoring or something.

Alexander Hleb has spoken about Arsene Wenger saying he has a gift from God. The Belarussian talks about he knows he has shortcomings in front of goal and that the boss has him doing special training to try and improve his finishing. Perhaps we need to send him to finishing school in Switzerland.

“Finishing school? Great!”, says Alex.

“Yes”, I say before turning to the man beside me and whispering, “finish him.”

The Independent has some transfer speculation. They say we’ll let Freddie Ljungberg go on a free transfer if someone picks up his £70,000 a week wages. Here’s a revolutionary idea, why don’t we actually get a transfer fee for Freddie if we’re going to sell him? He’s only 30 years of age and frankly this habit we’ve got into of letting players go for free doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. They also say our interest in Ryan “Towerof” Babel has cooled and that the potential fee for Frank Ribery might be too much for us. Then they throw a new name into the mix, a 19 year old Brazilian called Renato who, if I recall correctly and I think I do, might just be a bit too portly for Premiership football.

Not much else happening. I seem to have received, overnight, a number of emails about Arsenal planning to erect 32 mobile phone masts on the top of Ashburton Grove which is causing some concern for local residents as mobile phone masts are like mini-Chernobyls or something. Anyone got any info on this?

Now, I’m off to try and record an Arsecast. Could be a short one this week. A very short one. Like “Hello – goodbye” short but no “Say hello, wave goodbye” short.

Season review – Eboue – Djourou

Oooh, it’s starting to get quiet, you know. The most exciting thing that happened this morning was me nearly spilling my coffee all over my keyboard having tripped over the dog who had got up to say good morning.

The long promised season review of 06-07 can be found here. Feel free to discuss, agree, disagree or whatever. Just always remember that Phil Collins is a cunt and everything’s good.

Emmanuel Eboue has signed a new ‘long term’ contract with the club. This comes not long after Justin Hoyte signed a new 4 year deal so obviously the boss is creating competition for the right back slot. Up until now Eboue has been first choice when it came down to picking between the two of them but what Hoyte lacks going forward Eboue lacks defensively. If you could somehow creat a mutant Hoyboue or Eboyte then things would be sweet.

Johann Djourou is happy with the way last season went for him, saying:

I am very proud of my season. I am only 20 and I have played a lot of games in the Premiership. That is all good for my experience and I hope I can keep going now, to play even more.

He did well, for sure, but for me he needs to add more aggression to his game. I think it was Djourou who made an awesome sliding tackle on Robbie Fowler at Anfield, wasn’t it? That’s the kind of stuff we need from him and the rest of them. Sliding tackles are cool.

Barcelona are still talking about Henry and are trying to get written assurances from him that he’ll join them before they open talks with Arsenal. Zzzzzzz.

And that’s about that. UEFA Cup final tonight. Sevilla v Espanyol – could be a cracking game, so it could. Can Sevilla retain it? Can Espanyol stop them retaining it? Those are the big, big questions.

Oh, and Sam Allardyce at Newcastle. Prepare to utterly hate the Geordies and their ghastly long ball tactics. What’s the bet he signs Kevin Davies? Fat prick.

Anyway, there you go. More tomorrow.

So who's going to leave Arsenal this summer?

Morning all. I do hate when your alarm clock becomes part of your dream and you spend ages putting it on ‘snooze’ thinking you’re doing something else entirely.

Not much going on, as you’d expect, but Arsene has been talking about getting players back fit for the start of next season, saying:

If you look at the number of players who were not at Portsmouth and the quality of our performance, we have the right to be optimistic. The biggest transfer I can make is to try to get everybody fit by the start of next season. If I manage that I have done 80% of the job and I will be pleased, the other 20% is optional – whether I buy or not.

Now, there’s no question that a fully fit Henry, van Persie, Rosicky and even Theo Walcott would give the current squad more depth but the manager has more to do than that. Realistically he has to replace the guys who are going to leave but who are they? Who has played their last game for Arsenal.

Mathieu Flamini – Not everyone’s favourite and certainly he was a limited player in many respects but he brought workrate and energy to the team that other players don’t have. Like Parlour he made up for what he lacked technically with sheer effort. I liked him, I have to say, and he scored some important goals in the league for us this season.

Jeremie Aliadiere – Has been at the club longer than MC P-Diddy H to the Wood but has never made his breakthrough. Has scored some goals but injuries and just not being quite good enough have hampered him.

Manuel Almunia – With Fabianski arriving it seems like Manuel will be on his way back to Spain where he should get first team football. He certainly improved over the years and I think he’s a decent player but he’ll be off. Fabianski will replace him and Mannone may step up as third choice if Mart Poom, as expected, leaves the club in the summer too.

Baptista/Reyes – After a season of sheer ineptitude there’s no way Baptista will be staying while Reyes has made it clear he’d rather drink a glass of Satan’s piss than return to Arsenal again. We missed his directness and pace this season but we didn’t miss his falling over and being injured every time he got touched although Eboue tried to keep his spirit living on. If José puts himself in the shop window between now and the end of the season in Spain then there should be no problem finding a buyer for him.

Freddie – The man has been an absolute star for us, scored so many vital goals and put in so many great performances down the years, but I think it’s time for him to move on now. For two years he’s been plagued with injuries and he’s always been a player who has needed a run in the side to get motoring. I’ll be sad to see him go but I think he will. Spain or Italy would suit him.

Alex Song – If Arsene is serious about challenging for the title next season then we need a squad without players like Alex Song. Sure, he works hard but he is so fundamentally limited as a footballer than he has no business being in a team that wants to challenge for the league or the Champions League. No doubt he can have a decent career in a mid-table club here or back in France but simply not good enough for Arsenal.

Those are the players I see moving on. If I was manager there might be another couple in there but there really is only so much business you can do in a summer. So, if he gets the injured players back then he’s got to replace the ones who have left – in particular we need someone to replace Reyes/Freddie, who can play in the wide areas and a central midfield player although it would be nice to see Diaby get a run of games in there. Perhaps more options in wide areas will make AW play his central midfielders in the centre.

I honestly can’t see the manager buying a striker in the summer. He’ll look at Henry, van Persie, Adebayor, Bendtner (who has just signed a new contract to take him to 2012) and Walcott who can play there as well. There’s no doubting the quality of Henry and van Persie, despite what some people think I reckon Adebayor will be better next season, Bentdner can score goals but will need to improve other areas of his game while hopefully the rest and lack of injury will see a different Theo next time around.

I think this goes back to the quote the other day where he says he doesn’t need more quantity but if he wants to keep the squad the same size then he’s got a bit of buying to do. Quite when he’s going to do it all is another matter entirely. Keep your eyes peeled.

The season review is underway and may be published in the columns section either later on or tomorrow.

In other news it’s congratulations to Fran Merida but commiserations to Rhys Murphy, Gavin Hoyte and the injured Henri Lansbury as Spain beat England 1-0 in the European Under17 Championship.

Just to remind you that if you want Arseblog delivered to you each morning by email you just need to click here and sign up. There’s no spam or anything like it. Just a steaming Arseturd slapped into your box bright and early each day. Or if you prefer to read Arseblog via RSS simply click here. As I always say if you don’t know what RSS is then don’t worry about it.

And that’s your lot for today. More tomorrow.