Good morning Arse fiends. Welcome to another Friday.
If you were asked, Weird Science style, to put together your ideal footballer made up from the bits of other footballers who would you choose? The spirit of Tony Adams, the finishing of Thierry Henry, the vision of Dennis Bergkamp, the ability to spark a 21 man brawl of Anders Limpar, the engine of Ray Parlour, the kicking Ronaldo up in the air of Lauren and, of course, the dreaminess of Robert Pires.
Sure, it’d be a bizarre Frankenfootballer but modern science means the bolt in the creature’s neck would be barely visible and if he suffered like Shelley’s monster, desperate with loneliness and craving love, we could simply enter him on X-Factor where, it appears, the studio audience dish out generous applause to any old cunt. Hopefully that would prevent him taking revenge on his creator which is good news for those around me.
I bring this up because Jack Wilshere has been talking about who he wants to play like, saying:
Liam Brady is my role model. He has helped me a lot and people have said I am a similar player to him.
Yes, this is good. He goes on:
I was on the books when Patrick was still here and I think the way he tackled and intercepted play is something I would add to my game
Oh yes, yes. If this wasn’t a family blog I might touch my special area with excitement. Brady + Vieira = Wilshere. It’s a winning combo. Of course Jack is his own player. At some point he’ll have to say “I’m not the new Liam Brady/Patrick Vieira hybrid, the Brieira if you will, I am simply Jack Wilshere” and we’ll accept that because just being Jack Wilshere will be plenty – but when he curls one in at the lane or when he strides majestically through midfield, juggling the ball past the modern day equivalent of a bewildered, halfwitted Jamie Redknapp, we’ll nod sagely at each other and just say “Brieira”.
Meanwhile the row around Robin van Persie rumbles on. Arsenal, understandably, are somewhat peeved that Robin has been called up to the Dutch national side for a meaningless friendly on Nov 17th. This is because he got injured in the Blackburn game on August 28th and hasn’t played for us since. The Dutch coach, Bert van Marwijk said:
Has there been any contact with the medical staff of Holland and Arsenal? I don’t know. I don’t care, because I spoke to Robin personally and I just made the selection and will wait for any comments to come.
Which is, all things considered, remarkably disrespectful. Surely it wouldn’t take much for him or one of his staff to pick up the phone and speak to Arsenal’s medical team. It’s an example of how skewed the system is that they can completely and utterly disregard the clubs in matters such as these. Robin has been out for 10 weeks now, hasn’t trained, hasn’t kicked a ball, and yet he can be picked for an international fixture which has no importance at all.
Compare and contrast with Belgian manager George Leekens speaking about Thomas Vermaelen (as reported by John Cross on the Twitter). He said:
We are not going to take a risk for a friendly game. His health is most important thing. I have a great relationship with Arsene Wenger and completely respect him and what he tells me about his players.
Bert van Marwijk has every right to call up van Persie if he wants, there’s really nothing we can do about it, but the way he’s gone about things demonstrates an arrogance and lack of class that you would associate with someone who would let Mark van Bommel marry his daughter. Manners cost nothing. That said, there’s a part of me which thinks that we should just let van Persie go play. He’s got to get back on the pitch at some stage and if he injures himself again then so be it. It would happen just as easily playing for us as playing for Holland.
He’ll need a few games to get back up to speed so if the international game can play a part in that, fine. However, that doesn’t mean van Marwijk isn’t a stupendous benny who is not tied to a tree. Just wanted to make that bit clear. Also, Dick Advocaat, a man whose name sounds like a late night drunken parlour game, has been at it as well accusing the manager of ‘always moaning’. Hands up who cares what he thinks? Thought so.
Normally there’s a bit of team news on a Friday as we head towards the weekend’s game but the late arrival back from Europe means we’ll have to wait until today’s press conference to find out who might be back for the Newcastle game. You have to hope that at least a couple of the missing midfield quartet will be back, their experience and quality will be crucial. It didn’t look as if we picked up any injuries on Wednesday night you never know who might have hit their knee off the drinks trolley on the flight home. More on that tomorrow.
Now, onto this week’s Arsecast and I’m joined by 7amkickoff to discuss the goings on of the week, as well as the usual round-up from Internet Joe and a very tough quiz running through the entire show. You can subscribe to the Arsecast on iTunes by clicking here. Or if you want to subscribe directly to the feed URL you can do so too. To download this week’s Arsecast directly – click here (23mb MP3) or you can listen directly below without leaving this very page.
[audio:http://arseblog.com/podcasts/arsecast_episode174.mp3]And that’s about that for today. Have yourselves a good one, free from van Marwijkism and full of Brieira goodness. Till tomorrow.
