Ahh, it’s good to be back blogging again. Sitting around in the sun all day drinking beers and gin and tonics is nothing compared to staring at a computer screen. I think I got too much sea water in my ears though because I can’t hear very well and everything sounds like it’s 20,000 leagues under the sea.
Thanks to Tom for keeping things going so excellently. He’s going to have to work on his boozing though.
I did miss the story of the summer so far, Sol Campbell’s not at all unexpected departure from the club. Regular readers will know exactly how upset I am about this.
Firstly I should acknowledge his contribution to the successes we’ve had since he joined the club. On his day he was a truly excellent stopper with a deceptive turn of pace for such a big man. He played a big part in what we achieved, winning championships and FA cups and going unbeaten that season.
However, the first signs that all was not well came last summer with the rumours that Arsenal were actively trying to move him on. Perhaps Arsene had seen something of what was to come. He began to struggle with injuries and never recovered physically well enough to reach any kind of form.
It became obvious as last season progressed that maybe his heart wasn’t in it any more. His performances were lazy and sloppy and then we discovered his head wasn’t in it during the West Ham game. He gifted them two goals then the drama came at half-time. As the team was readying itself for the second half Campbell asked to speak to Arsene and told him he wasn’t going to play in the second half. That meants we had to play Seb Larsson at left-back and we lost the game.
Campbell fucked off to Belgium, has never once apologised to the fans for his behaviour, made it quite clear that his motivation was England’s World Cup campaign and his time at Arsenal was well and truly up. From board level to the manager there was an unequivocal agreement that he had to go. Sadly an injury to Philippe Senderos meant that Campbell’s ‘reward’ was a Champions League final after which he crowed about how much the goal meant to him and him alone.
I’ve written enough about him in the past but for all the good things he did for me he’ll always be the big, fat cunt who walked out on his young team mates, on the manager who gave him the trophies he so wanted, on the club which paid him a fortune to play for them and the fans who supported him after his move from Sp*rs.
Portsmouth or Fenerbache they reckon. They can fucking have him. Cheers Sol, don’t let the door hit out on the way out. You’d break it with your big fat arse then run off crying.
Then there’s Ashley Cole. What can I add to what Tom and many others have said? He gets to a stage where even his fiercest critics are more or less willing to forgive and forget he says he’s going to reveal the ‘shattering truth’ about how Arsenal let him down.
What a fucking knob he is. The shattering truth is that he and his cunt of an agent went to see Chelsea in mid-season, just before we were to play Manchester United (if I recall correctly), lied about it, got found out to be the fucking liars that they are then instead of taking any responsibility for their own actions went through court proceedings bleating about ‘human rights’ and any other shit they can think of.
It’s a real shame what’s happened to him because he’s a great left back but after this new bullshit it’s hard to see a future for him at the club no matter what Arsene Wenger says.
Personally I think we’ll sell him to Chelsea which will make a mockery of Cole’s statements last year. We’ll wait and see about that but given his push to turn himself into some kind of King Chav with his showbiz wedding and a fucking book we’re be better off without him. Christ though, an Ashley Cole book. What next, Jermaine Pennant reinterpreting Vivaldi?
I think Liam Brady said it best when Cole and Jonathan Barnett were moaning and complaining about how badly they’d been treated by Arsenal.
“All Arsenal did was offer to double his wages”.
That’s not enough though when Chelsea can triple them. The comments in the papers this week were bang out of order. He could have said nothing and stayed at the club but his agent is no doubt the driving force behind this as a £16-£20m fee for Cole is his big pay day. He’s wanted this since the club did him after the meeting with Chelsea and it looks like he’s got what he wanted.
Is he looking after the best interests of the player? No. Instead of being an Arsenal legend, with a chance to play for the club he supported all his life long enough to break appearance records Ashley Cole will leave with not too many fond wishes from the fans and he doesn’t deserve anything less, the little prick.
Anyway, leaving those two cunts aside there’s not much going on. We drew our first pre-season friendly 0-0 against Barnet. A match report here. Very much a second string XI though as most of our lads are on extended holidays because of the World Cup.
After the Juventus scandal (heh, take that you Chippy stealing bastards!) AW said what everyone else has been thinking; that the problem has been going on for years. However, despite the obvious availability of Juve’s players he’s more or less ruled out any moves for them because of the money they earn. He says:
It is very unlikely we will make a move for the players because the wages are too high for us.
The only obvious target is Buffon with lots of rumours suggesting we’re interested but the players will have to cut their cloth perhaps. If they price themselves out of moves to a club like Arsenal, who pay very good wages, then they may find their options very limited.
Not much else happening this morning so it’s thanks again to Tom, the mailing list will be back in action from today and I’ll be back tomorrow.
