Hello then. How are you all? I can be quite sure that you didn’t miss me thanks to Tom’s sterling, if not entirely sober, efforts. I have to say, I enjoyed reading the blog as a regular reader. I even thought about calling him a cunt on the arses if he was 5 minutes late but experience has taught me that morning blogging when you’re off work and have a house full of hooch is never an exact science. So, cheers to Tom.
I had a jolly good holiday, so I did. Lots of sitting in the sun, drinking beer, eating food, drinking rum, eating some more food and drinking mojitos. Gotta love those powerful over the counter painkillers you can get in Spain.
Quite a bit seems to have happened since I’ve been away. We won the Emirates Cup and there was lots to be encouraged about about the way we played. I saw the game against PSG on Saturday (poor Mrs Blogs got dragged around to three closed Irish bars to find Sky Sports and then we found quite a cool place by accident and they had it on Canal+). Our second half was much better than the first but Flamini showed he’s capable of a goal at any time, Senderos was very good at the back, Hleb did very well in a support striker role and Nicklas Bendtner got himself a goal and looked quite good but he has a lot of raw edges that need to come off quickly if he’s going to play a bigger role than, say Aliadiere. Enjoyable all the same.
I caught the goals from the Inter game and again Hleb did well and what more can you say about Robin van Persie? I’m really hoping the extra responsibility he’s going to have this season (which starts in just about 10 days time, woohoo!) will allow him to make the next step in his development. I think, and have always thought, he has the potential to be something really special.
Reyes has gone, finally. I know he annoyed a lot of people, me included, but I don’t think he was ever really a bad lad. Just a bit too thick to adapt to life outside of his own country – you only had to see how his agent turned down a move to Lyon because he might have problems settling. From Spain to the South of France, hardly a fucking million miles, it it? It’s a shame he didn’t work out but I’m glad he’s gone.
Eduardo was denied a work-permit and the chance to play in the Emirates Cup but hopefully that situation should be resolved in our favour on Thursday, I think. Also, the boss has been making promising noises when it comes to transfer moves so let’s hope something happens there sooner rather than later. With the Reyes money to add to whatever’s there already it could be interesting.
So, on to whatever’s happening today and William Gallas says there’s an ‘enormous determination’ amongst the Arsenal squad at the moment. No piece of jewellery will go unfound in the race for the title. All the same, it’s nice to hear something positive from him.
Lukasz Fabianski says he’s after the number 1 jersey so watch out Jens Lehmann and Manuel Almunia. He calls the rivalry ‘intense’ and you can imagine that with three keepers who want to play first team football it will be. I was surprised not to see him during the Emirates Cup but perhaps he’s got a bit more settling in to do first. I do like the look of Almunia at the moment though, he’s sort of like General Alcazar crossed with a crazy person.
Two names we’ve been linked with – Kyle Bartley (a young right back) and Gilles Sunu (a French forward) appear to have signed for the club as they appear in the ‘youths/reserves’ section on the official website (cheers to Richard for the info).
And really that’s about the size of it for this morning. Our next match is tomorrow in the Amsterdam tournament against Italian side Nazio. It should be another decent test for the lads so there’ll be pre-match stuff to get on with tomorrow.
Now, time to settle back into the old chair and catch up on all the email. If you sent something while I was away I’ll do my best to get back to you as soon as possible but because about half a billion of you got in touch during the last week it may take a while and some might get a bit lost along the way. If it’s really important send it again.
So what’s new?
