So yesterday evening’s 4-0 win over SC Strudel’s collection of postmen, trainee architects and bus drivers really didn’t tell us a great deal we didn’t already know.
Stand out players on the evening for me were Nasri, who’s contuining a fine pre-season, Jack Wilshere and Kieran Gibbs at left back in the first half. Two two Emmanuel’s looked good in parts. Frimpong looks to have the makings of a tenacious defensive midfielder with solid distribution. Jay Emmanuel-Thomas got a goal, might have had a couple more, might have set up a couple (but they’re linked to the couple of might have had), and showed some nice touches.
I can’t help thinking that a season out on loan would be the best thing for both. Frimpong can get a season’s competitive football under his belt, JET can go and learn that the game is about doing the simple things first. Too often he looks for the trick or the showboat and if he cuts most of that out of his game, because it won’t work at the highest level, he’ll make rapid progress.
Theo Walcott got a goal, Marouane Chamakh scored a penalty, Don Vito saved one, and we got our first look at some of the World Cup players as Vela (who got a goal), Eboue, Sagna and Clichy all got a run in the second half.
Manuel Almunia started the game in goal and as captain, he’s been thawed having been so thoroughly frozen out last week. The only slight worry was the fact that John Djourou came off after about half an hour. His ability to withstand injury is always going to be a concern and while we don’t have any news on how serious it might be it’s still most untimely. It looks as if Sol Campbell has decided to go and join Newcastle and good luck to him up there but it means our defensive options are running very thin.
There’s talk this morning of a move for Per Mertesacker but I don’t know how much truth there is in it. A photo was circulated of him yesterday, supposedly in a North London pub, but a quick look at the photo’s EXIF data showed it was taken in 2009, not yesterday. Sure, the camera’s clock could be wrong but I suspect shenanigans and I hope it’s not the basis of any of today’s stories. Signing an experienced German international who is 6’4 or whatever he is sounds rather too good to be true. Maybe I’ve just lowered my expectations.
Whatever about that though, the fact is we need at least one centre-half and we need him asap. Hopefully Djourou’s withdrawal was precautionary but the precarious nature of his fitness really illustrates the need for a top class player who can come in and play first team football straight away. Unusually there was no interview post-game with Arsene, and no quotes either, so what exactly is going on is anybody’s guess. The squad will now return to London to continue pre-season training and for the Emirates Cup, more on which anon.
Now, yesterday further financial revelations regarding Barcelona showed the Catalan club lost €77m last year, amazing when you think how successful they’ve been on the pitch. Remembering as well they had to borrow €150m last week just to keep going it makes their pursuit of Cesc Fabregas all the more ludicrous. It is quite beyond me how any accountants, bankers, financial advisors and even club officials can believe spending another €50m, at least, for a player they don’t really need is good business. Arsene Wenger says:
There are still noises from Barcelona, but that is all it is.
Clearly dismissing their ability to do a deal that would even come close to what Arsenal would require to sell a player like Cesc. And that’s assuming we’d even talk to them. Which, at the moment, we wont. Barcelona’s assistant sporting-director’s lover’s personal secretary, Toni Freixa, says:
Arsenal don’t want to sit down and negotiate with us. It’s not a problem with the wishes of Cesc or of Barca – they simply don’t want to negotiate.
It seems, at last, the message might be getting through. Will it stop their constant blather? I doubt it. Talk is all they’ve got left and making so much ‘noise’, as Arsene puts it, takes the focus away from the fact they’re footballing hobos, out with the begging bowl just to stay afloat. More than a club? Not for long unless they sort their money issues out. They need to go to Ocean Finance and consolidate all their loans into one, simple, easy to manage payment. The cunts.
In case you missed it yesterday I posted an interview with former Gunner Edu. The lads from Arsenal Brasil very kindly offered me the English translation as an exclusive and a tip of the hat to all the Arsenal sites and blogs who have linked to it.
However, once again the despicable fuckers at goal.com, who I refuse to link to, have done what they do best, and that is steal other people’s content. They took a part of what Edu said, made it into a story, and ‘credited’ it as follows:
Now, I know the chaps at 101 Great Goals somewhat, not 101 Goals, and they’re always very careful to give proper credit and links when they use content from other blogs. In this case, however, goal.com has simply taken the content Arsenal Brasil worked hard to produce, between getting the interview, the editing, the sub-titling etc, and ripped it off. And they don’t even have the decency to provide a link to them or to Arseblog, from where they ripped it off. And I know this because they’ve embedded the video at the bottom of their story.
So, just another illustration of why goal.com is one of the worst football websites in the world. Ever. If you’re tired of seeing other bloggers, writers, journalists and media outlets stories passed off as their own, simply go to NewsNow, click on the name of the site and choose ‘hide publication’. They are purveyors of baseless rumours, bottom feeding, hit-whoring click parasites of the worst kind. Don’t give them what they want. Just ignore. In no other industry is it acceptable to so blatantly profit off the work of others, I don’t know why it’s deemed acceptable on the web.
Moving on and to the Arseblog Mailing List. It looks as if Gmail have done something to their spam filters which has meant a lot of people haven’t had their daily edition. If you’ve noticed a lack of Arseblog in your box, log into Gmail via the web (even if you’re using it in a client like Outlook or Apple Mail), click in the spam folder and highlight the Arseblog emails. Then, at the top, click ‘not spam’ and that should sort the problem out. Gmail will remember that from now on. To be doubly sure, add Arseblog as a contact in Gmail – thanks to @engkiat for that.
Finally for now, today is your last chance to win tickets to the Emirates Cup as well as that exclusive stadium tour, with thanks to Emirates Airline. Just click here for the competition, answer the question and you’re in the draw which will take place tomorrow.
And that’s just about that for today. Watch out for further Emirates Cup based competitions later in the week.
Till tomorrow.
