Oh yes he is. Oh no he isn’t. Oh yes he did. Oh no he didn’t.
The José Antonio Reyes pantomime continues with yet another hastily issued denial after his comments to Marca. He says:
I did not say these words. I’ll tell you once again, I am happy at Arsenal and I am looking forward to the coming campaign. I do not want to leave Arsenal.
And Arsene Wenger said:
I certainly want to keep him. It has come to a stage now where you cannot lose a player everyday. There is nothing new as they are quotes that have come up from a website.
Well, that is true but people have heard Reyes say those words on Radio Marca which is where the quotes have come from. Now, don’t get me wrong. If Reyes truly wants to stay I’m happy to keep him because our squad is thin enough as it is and the hassle of trying to find a replacement this close to the start of the season is the last thing we need but I’m getting a bit tired of it all now.
As it stands it strikes me that Reyes wants Madrid far more than Madrid want Reyes, so the chances of a move are probably quite slim. I’d prefer not to hear any more about it now though. If he’s staying he needs to make sure his focus is on Arsenal and not engineering a move bac home. He has a contract until 2010 so Arsenal hold all the cards.
He played last night against AZ Alcazar and Arsenal ran out 3-0 winners with goals from Gilberto, Adebayor and Robin van Persie who had an excellent game. It looks like that team will porbably be the one to play Zagreb on Tuesday with maybe one or two small changes.
Meanwhile at Borehamwood an Arsenal XI won 4-0 with 2 goals from Arturo Lupoli, one of the interestingly named Nacer Barazite and a debut goal for Fran Merida, the young Barcelona boy Arseblog told you was an Arsenal player months before anyone else.
Jose Mourinho has been speaking about the Ashley Cole situation. He says:
This approach was made in a more than fair way. Arsenal know we are interested. They know we made an offer and, if they accept, we can negotiate with the player and try to bring him to us. But if they don’t accept, we won’t approach the player — and so it is over. Everything is clear.
Nice to see some people learn from their mistakes. Cole was not in Holland last night with Arsene Wenger claiming he was ‘sick’. I doubt he’ll be included in the squad to face Zagreb and it must surely just be a matter of time before he’s sold. The sooner he’s gone the better.
Young Danish striker Nicklas Bendtner has joined Birmingham City on loan joining Seb Larsson and Fabrice Muamba. Unlike the other two though his loan finishes in January.
And last night I had a dream that I met Arsene and asked him about transfers. He told me he didn’t want to bring in anyone, he was happy with his squad adn then we played 5-a-side with one of those plastic indoor golf balls. I scored a cracking goal too. Then a river appeared in the middle of the pitch and I went off in a hot-air balloon.
Just like real life, eh?
