Morning.
A quick Saturday round-up for you. At his press conference the manager was asked if he was still in the market for new players. He said:
Yes.
And he was asked if he was confident he’d bring in new players. He said:
Yes.
Beyond that he was his usual inscrutable self when it comes to transfers. He told one journalist that if she checked his phone she’d see he was being offered 50 players a day. I guess all of them have been completely rubbish though. Let’s imagine that’s been going on for even two weeks, that’s 700 rubbish players. It’s no wonder he can’t get anything good done!
He asked about Nicklas Bendtner and said:
The chance for him to leave now is very small. If he comes back well and gets fit, I will use him.
I don’t know how we, as Arsenal fans, can bemoan the lack of options in our squad, particularly up front, and then eschew the talents of The Greatest Striker That Ever Lived. Sure, his career is basically in the toilet but that’s only because he’s too awesome to operate in this crazy world of ours.
Funnily enough, not long after yesterday’s press conference, Sky Sports reported that Bendtner was in talks with Crystal Palace. It’s almost as if Wenger saying he could stay was some kind of threat to him and despite earlier talks with Palace which bore no fruit, he’s gone back just in case some kind of compromise might be reached.
At this point, if there’s an issue with wages, Arsenal should just pay him off. It’s like if you wear a pair of trainers and step in a dog poo and the poo goes inside the all the grooves in the sole of the shoe. You can get rid of most of the smell with good hosing but you’d be quite happy to pay somebody to go at the grooves with a toothpick to ensure everything’s perfectly clean.
We need a poo picker. Any volunteers?
Wenger admitted that he had no plans whatsoever to sign Mathieu Flamini when he came back to the club to do a few sprints and a bit of jogging. He said:
At the start I didn’t want to sign him – I am completely honest about it. I didn’t envisage doing it. Circumstances and his attitude convinced me to do it. He is quite versatile. He can play in different positions and when I saw what kind of mental state and physical shape he was in, it was a no brainer.
I like the idea of Wenger using the phrase, ‘no brainer’ for some reason. Meanwhile, Bacary Sagna has welcomed back his former French colleague, saying:
Mathieu is a warrior. I had the pleasure of playing with him six years ago and he is back and very motivated to play for Arsenal. I am looking forward to playing with him again.
Warrior, eh? He’s also a stereo jungle child shooting at the walls of heartache. He’s likely to be on the bench on Sunday but if needed he could certainly come along and start kicking some of Sp*rs’ collection of foppish looking catalogue models who look like slightly scared Zoolander extras. This is the North London derby, remember? No quarter given.
And as all the focus has been on signing strikers and midfielders, the manager didn’t rule out signing a keeper while backing Wojciech Szczesny. He said:
We forget he is a boy who is only in his third season in the Premier League. He is only 23, for a goalkeeper that is very young. He had a dip in form, but has come back at the end of the season with good form and a good run, overall for me he is back to his best.
And on a new face:
We have Emi Martinez as number three, but he has no experience at all in the Premier League, that is why we always had an eye open, and this position is not completely closed yet.
Personally, I think we should go for Stretch Armstrong, but who they might bring in is anyone’s guess. It could well be a Poomtacular signing, someone with plenty of experience who doesn’t have a huge expectation of playing regularly but can still add some depth to the squad. Anyway, we won’t have long to find out who that is, what with the window closing on Monday.
Right, that’s about that. Back tomorrow with a full preview of the derby against that lot. In the meantime, have a good Saturday, eat and drink well, it’s all about 4pm on Sunday now.
