Good morning from an indeterminately weathered East Lothian. I’ve just woken up very early from a very strange dream in which I was staying at Mesut Ozil’s house, and we were having dinner, watching TV, but I knew my friend’s house had a grim murder scene under his patio and I had to go out and get the harness off the little donkey because otherwise everyone would find out about the murdered family under the patio, so I went out found the little donkey, and sorted out his harness, but then I was desperate for a wee, so I found a public toilet, where my laptop was inside, which was lucky because the flood water started rising outside the door of the toilets until it was almost forcing the door open.
And then I woke up really needing a piss.
Still. Dinner at Mesut Ozil’s house. That was fun. Me and him were like best buds. Maybe it’s a prophecy. Or maybe my mate needs to take a closer look at his patio before he gets the builders in to put up that conservatory. Or perhaps I just have very strange dreams.
Getting away from my insane dreams and on to more sane Arsenal news, and I’ve got a quick Saturday round up for you.
The Guardian (amongst others) has some quotes from Jack Wilshere in which he talks about his difficulties and frustrations with injury this season, particularly the one from Paddy McNair in November:
I’d come back from the World Cup and my ankle was fine, felt good, and then all of a sudden I got tackled [by McNair]. It wasn’t a great tackle but it wasn’t done on purpose. It was just one of those things. It was a pretty straightforward injury, quite common in football: just syndesmosis, with the ligaments. I just had to respect the time limit the specialist gave me and, since I’ve been back, I’ve had no problems with it; no pain. I got a cyst around it so they took the wire out but that took four weeks and I was fine. My first ankle injury had been different as a stress fracture, and the screws they put in had irritated me
It strikes me as interesting that Jack’s clearly au fait with the specific medical terminology around ankle injuries, but I suppose with his record it shouldn’t be too surprising.
It was a difficult season for Jack, with those injuries never really letting him get going and seeing a relatively settled midfield working well without him, but when he did eventually get back, his work rate and desire to be involved in things was great to see. I think it was the game against Hull where he came on and made a few characteristically surging runs, and but for the arm of some Hull cunt we might’ve seen him score in that game.
He also talks about thinking about changing his game, but ultimately ruling it out, wanting instead to be like Messi and Iniesta:
When I was injured a few people said I should change my game, I should get it and pass it. It did go through my head. I thought maybe they are right and I should. But as soon as I came back and I got on the ball, I just wanted to run with it. Look at the best dribblers in the world, Lionel Messi and Andrés Iniesta, and the ball seems to stick to their foot, so I can work on that when I am dribbling. But I’m never going to change my game.
If there is a criticism of Jack, it can be that he holds the ball on just a little too long, and draws fouls from defenders that are likely to leave him in a heap on the ground, so I know what he means about passing early, but it seems unlikely he’s going to change his game so he’s just going to have get some replacement titanium ankles or something.
Finally on Jack, he says that he wants to sign a new deal with the club, despite having three years left on his current contract:
I’d want to be wanted by a club. I want to be wanted by Arsenal. I’ve grown up at Arsenal, I’m a homegrown player and, as long as Arsenal want me, then I’m happy.
Some sources seem to be trying to turn this into a story that “JACK WILSHERE WANTS OUT OF ARSENAL”, but to that I very much say “SHIT!“. He’s most definitely loved by the Arsenal fans, very much being a fan of the club himself, but first and foremost he’s a wonderful footballer and you just don’t let talent like that go. It’s not like we’re in the same position we were a few years ago, when the nearest oil-rich club waving a wad of twenties at us was enough to make us consider selling our best players, and we’ve won the cup the last two years, which is a solid base to build on and lets players know they can win things by staying. Whether he’s just angling for a pay rise or not, I don’t know, but he’s young, on a long term deal, and I just can’t see any reason we’d let him go, or that he’d want out.
In other news, it seems there’s some irregularities come to light regarding Calum Chambers’ transfer from Southampton. The accusation is that the club spoke to the wrong agent during the transfer, and apparently the FA have taken a dim view, but it seems to me that the murky world of football agents is the real problem. Chambers himself apparently changed representation just last month (way after any of this alleged incident is said to have occurred), and when footballers seem to have anyone claiming they represent them, it must be very difficult for a club to properly understand who is the correct party. Anyway, we’ll see what happens with that one. If the club is found guilty of any wrongdoing, the likely penalty is a fine.
Finally for today, in a story from earlier this week that I must have missed, Alexis Sanchez has illustrated his enormous appetite for success by saying that the club underachieved this season:
I would have liked to have been in the Champions League final, to have won the Premier League title. I believe we have a bunch of skilful players so to not achieve more is disappointing.
As blogger said himself the other day, it’s good to hear these statements of intent from the players, and hopefully bodes well for the coming season. For the record though, if we’d got to the Champions League final, I’d probably have liked us to actually have won it too, so obviously Alexis is going to have to think again if I’m to be satisfied. Get on it, Alexis, baby.
That’s your lot for today. Have yourselves a good Saturday, and I’ll be back tomorrow with hopefully more than a single, stray, Scottish tumbleweed to report.
