English players don’t dive and other observations from the 2009/2010 season
English players don’t dive!
Arsenal started the season off with a bang, just not the one we were hoping for as Eduardo’s penalty award and subsequent media furor moved non-English player’s diving habits to the top of everyone’s wish list for top things football’s governing bodies should “stamp out.”
The anti-diving crusaders were whipped into a further furor when UEFA’s own official, watched the replay and testified that there was indeed contact between Eduardo and Boric. He then ruled, again, that he would have called it a penalty which should have exonerated the Arsenal forward but instead drove people bat-shiat crazy.
Ordinary people, people I used to enjoy watching a football match with, now watch every match and unless there is leg-breaking contact in the box they scream “dive! dive! DIVE!” every time a player goes to ground. Even when contact is definitively proven, such as Karl Henry’s absurd tackle on Rosicky which video evidence shows left stud marks on Thomas’ calf, the claims are raised that the player has dived in order to get the opponent sent off.
And frankly, that trend is the most disturbing outcome. Never mind the xenophobic remarks of PROVEN serial diver Wayne Rooney, who is on record saying that he has never dived and yet there are multiple videos proving conclusively that he has without a doubt dived. The really disturbing outcome is that diving is the one thing most fans want to see eradicated from the game, while insane lunges like Ryan Shawcross, Karl Henry, and Craig Gardner go not only relatively unpunished but defended to the hilt.
You can lose to the other top teams, but you can’t lose to Wigan
Arsenal managed to lose to Chelsea twice and Man U twice but it wasn’t those losses which killed the season, it was a game against Wigan away. Despite all the hyperbole in the press saying that clashes between title contenders are “6 point games” a loss is just a loss.
Where Arsenal went awry this year is dropping points on the road. Arsenal’s away record was an abyssal 8-4-7 with multiple times the team dropping points from a secure position. Improve the away form and concentration and win games like West Ham, Burnley, Birmingham, Wigan, and Blackburn for a combined 12 points. Do that and we are champions.
People REALLY want Arsenal to play in a red shirt with white sleeves.
I’m still getting hits over the Arsenal 2010/2011 shirt rumors. It’s a bit strange I have to say.
The rules ARE different in England
Arsenal fans, and Arsene Wenger, have two choices: keep complaining that the rules are different in England than the rest of the world or embrace it and buy 3 Ryan Shawcrosses and deploy them to break Wayne Rooney’s leg when needed.
The notion of “intent” is not in the rules and yet intent is all that anyone talks about. If a player lunges studs up, knee high, as John Terry did on James Milner it’s a red card because it is excessive force, see for yourself:
How that tackle is not “use of excessive force” is a mystery only solved if Howard Webb decides that “John Terry isn’t that kind of guy” and deems the tackle “reckless.” But the fact is that is a career ending tackle made by an England international (and former captain) and that is the kind of thing we saw Chelsea players like Ashley Cole, John Terry, and Frank Lampard get away with all their careers.
If Terry tries that same challenge at the World Cup, he will be sent straight off. Everyone knows it. The rules ARE different in England and Arsenal, despite their valiant effort to drag the EPL into the 21st Century need to embrace that with some English leg breakers of our own. Save the tippy-tappy for the Champions League.
Defense wins championships but offense is crucial too!
The best defensive team in the EPL was Man U this year, but they ended up scoring 17 less goals than top finishers Chelsea and themselves finished second with just 1 point difference. Meanwhile, Liverpool had the third best defense in the League, scored 42 (!!!) less goals than Chelsea, and finished in 7th place. And Arsenal edged Tottenham to third place in the League by having the same defensive record but scoring 16 more goals.
Defense nearly won Man U the title, nearly.
Never underestimate Manchester United
Speaking of which, how the f*ck is it possible for United to lose Ronaldo and Tevez and go on to score 16 more goals than they did last year, where they finished 1st? I mean, Ronaldo scored 18 League goals for United, Tevez scored 5 and the team scores more?
And don’t tell me it was Own Goal. I know he was United’s second leading scorer but he still scored less than Ronaldo and Tevez combined. I’m still puzzling this whole thing out.
Perhaps, just perhaps, the quality in England is so poor this year that the title was really up for grabs and Arsenal let it slip though our fingers?
Liverpool in much, much, much worse trouble than I thought
According to the guys at Untold Arsenal, Liverpool are unable to repay their debts and are now living off the largess of the banks. Not only that, but clubs are eyeballing their top talent, fans are threatening a season ticket boycott, and they are out of the Champions League.
You Scouse better hope that some fool buys your club.
Sol proves you can teach a young dog old tricks
Sol Campbell was a revelation both on the pitch and, hopefully, in Arsene Wenger’s thinking. Wenger had previously promised never to pick up a former player and famously passed on Anelka and Patrick Vieira over the last few years. So why the change of heart about Sol?
I think Sol has the right attitude and I’m not sure the other two did. Vieira has looked very, very poor since signing with Manciti in January but Anelka has been crucial to Chelsea’s rampant scoring and the only knock is on his sulky attitude.
With Wenger shipping off trouble-makers like Adebayor and yet keeping other trouble-makers like Gallas while re-hiring Sol and leaving Anelka out, I’m left wondering what it is that he really looks for in a player?
I don’t know, but I do know Sol has been brilliant and deserves another year. If nothing else, to give the young players some heading practice.
Nigella Lawson? She’s nice.
No reason, just saying.
November is odd, you’re my firing squad
Wenger mentioned November as the time which makes or breaks Arsenal’s season and it’s no wonder, that’s when Arsenal’s youth team go off to have their legs broken in meaningless international friendlies!
I’ll always remember that November was when Arsenal lost van Persie, the team returned tired from their international travels and then lost 1-0 to Sunderland, and meanwhile Chelsea’s internationals all had “knocks” or got “cramps” and were well rested for the busy Winter schedule.
Cesc is irreplaceable
Sorry, but Nasri can’t do it. We saw that as the season wound down.
You could say the same about Robin van Persie.
Basically? You don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone. Hang on to it with all your might.
Arsenal 5-0 Porto — The Perfect Day
If you get a chance, get over to see a Champions League match. I hear that they are all magnificent.
Comments
Man United – Rooney had 14 more league goals than he did last year, which comes close to the 18 league goals from Ronaldo the year prior. Berbatov and Nani collectively increased their league goal total by 5 (equating to Tevez’ contribution the prior year). And I know you don’t want to hear it, but Own Goal is the other difference.
I thought going into this past season that Liverpool was going to get knocked out of the top 4, mostly because Alonso left, but also because they seemed to have all the luck in the world in the season prior, getting goal after last minute goal. Man United, similarly continue to have luck on their side seemingly. But I think their success also validates the usefulness of experience. Guys like Giggs, Scholes, Van der Sar continue to get it done (unfortunately). At some point their luck has to run out, but they might spend a fortune this summer to load up again on new luck.
Speaking of United and English players, how the hell is it that Ben Foster will command 6MM pounds from Birmingham? Wasn’t Shay Given sold to City for 5MM?
It was absolutely disgraceful that the co-commentator almost defends Terry’s tackle. Absolute disgrace. I for one hope England get knocked out early at the World Cup.
@Bektas,
they wont do anything at the world cup. their squad looks very average. the media in england just hypes them up every time. they’ve said this has been there best chance to win the world cup every time since ’66. i will laugh my ass off if the U.S beat them
@Bektas,
He didn’t “almost” defend that “tackle” he justified it. He said if the ball is in the air, your studs are going to be up, and that’s a fact of life! What a load of horseshite!
arsenal should always have red shirts and white sleeves. its our tradition going all the way back to Herbert Chapman.
I will be glad to see the white kit go.too much like a tottenham kit.
Cesc really is to blame for all this media speculation with barca for his comments last week even though we dont know for sure if they were translated correctly. its absolutely crazy how the media jump on this and just fabricate these stories. today i’ve read yaya toure & 25 mill, then arsenal want 50mill, cesc wants showdown talks, barca have begun talks with arsenal, barca will offer ibrahimovic. it really is pathetic.
my opinion is cesc just wants arsene to guarantee some quality signings and that will be the end of it.
I can’t see Cesc staying without assurances from Wenger that money will be spent. We really need Cesc to stay at least another year, ideally two more years. We need to get Ramsey back on the pitch and fully healthy, as I think he’s our next general in midfield. In the interim, I think we really are 4 upgrades away from having as strong a chance as any team to win the premiership next season. And Wenger has to sell Cesc on taking this one last big run at silverware with Arsenal after some big investment in personnel is made.
ramsey is look ok..but i think its better if wenger can buy ireland from Man City if in case fabregas goes to barca.
Tim, I know this is all just speculation right now, but having Guillem Balague (who is usually very reliable) saying that Cesc is meeting the Gaffer in London about his future, it worries me a lot.
First, doesn’t matter whether Cesc goes or not this season. The fact that he’s going to ‘discuss’ his future means that he’s unhappy right now. If he stays, and then we go another year without trophy, then in all likeliness I think he’s going to leave us.
If he does leave, then I’m afraid we took one step forward, and 21389612 steps backward. I cannot imagine us winning without Cesc. I also cannot imagine anyone who can replace him, and yes, you mentioned it, Nasri isn’t the answer.
The captain of the club always meets with the gaffer at the end of the season to discuss the way the season went.
Everyone calm down. It’s the first day of the transfer window and a lot of things are being reported via one source.
Jesus, I can’t wait to see what the hell happens next week.
@Tim, I hope that’s the case. But 99% of the time, I tend to ignore these rumours. I know it’s rubbish. But I assure you, this is that 1% bit where I get worried. I hope it’s just the whole paranoia of Cesc is leaving and we’re all doomed that’s bothering me. ‘
Irregardless (sounds familiar?), let’s wait for the end of the week for something conclusive.
I don’t think you can say definitively that Cesc is unhappy. I think Cesc more than anything wants to avoid the next two months addressing the same Barcelona questions he gets several times a day. Regardless, it sounds like we might hear something conclusively on this issue this week. Hopefully we won’t have to shift away from goalkeeper speculation to discussing how much it’ll take for us to buy Mikel Arteta.
@ArseChicago, Well can you imagine him wanting to discuss his future if he just finished the season with a double? I struggle to believe anyone from Chelski wanting to discuss their future. If so, it’d prolly about being a bigger cunt by asking for a pay rise to feed their cuntiness.
I think if we’d have won this year, particularly if we had beaten Barca in the Champs League, there’d still be the Cesc to Barca stories. Stuff like “Now that Cesc’s won at Arsenal, he can go to Barcelona and accomplish the same”. I just think more than anything, he wants to avoid being persistently pestered about the issue this offseason and have fun at the World Cup. Seems like the media likes to wind up Arsenal fans more than other clubs.
@ArseChicago, I mentioned this the other day, and no one seemed to even acknowledge it, presumably taking it for another “a friend of mine said” rumor. But the thing is, my very best friend (insert sarcastic sigh right here) had an interview with Mr. Alfons Goddal, who is the vice president of Barcelona and Laporta’s right hand man, and above all, a pleasant little chap. And Goddal said to him, off the record, that the Fabregas and Villa are both done deals, they will be confirmed at the beginning of June.
You can attribute this to the upcoming elections and a way of getting votes, but neither my friend nor I will definitely be voting, so I don’t see this being the reason for it. Besides, this was not their first interview or conversation, and this information about Cesc and Villa was put out more like a frendly chat than an official reply to a journalist, which my friend is.
So, that is that. Like I said, you can take this with all the reservation you want (or need), but frankly, I am really beginning to think Arsenal will lose Fabregas this summer.
I honestly pray that I am wrong, and that I end up being just another shit-stirer, but I guess the good thing is we won’t have to wait too long before we find out.
@Teampossible, Barcelona have these “done deals” almost every year. Last year, the rumors were that Ribery was a “done deal” but he ended up staying in Bayern. This is the Spanish circus that we should all be accustomed to seeing every summer and with specials offered on the table during every election year.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Tim. Tim said: English players don't dive and other observations from the 2009/2010 season @ http://www.7amkickoff.com/2010/5204/ [...]
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Oh my. Was someone at the airport when he flew in? Did they read his mind as he went to pick up bags? No sources but a lot of smoke and mirrors. Doesn’t help that Cesc has not come out with another denial after his latest interview. We do have phones, email, etc. and all one has to do Joan is communicate directly with Arsenal.
Henry’s “denial” of the Red Bull story is not really a denial.
@ctpa, There’s probably no statement by Cesc because he’d be on holiday or preparing for the world cup. So It’d be safe to say that nothing will happen before the World Cup.
The other thing to remember is that we are financially stable and have no reason to sell. So unless he is really, really unhappy he won’t go.
Also, he has said before that he is indebted to Wenger, so he may also be trying to assess whether Wenger will be staying around or not.
Yaya as a make weight doesn’t cut any ice with me. Ibrahimovic is overrated. Pedro + cash, maybe.
Pedro or Bojan could be worthy make weights, but at the end of the day, I want our club to have players that want to be Arsenal players. Is there anyone on Barcelona (other than a regretful Hleb) that wants more than anything to be on the Arsenal? You’d forget that Arsenal is one of the most prestigious clubs in the world, one of the most valuable clubs in the world, by reading about how every half decent player for us is going away to some other team. WTF??
@ctpa, I’d prefer 60-80 million.
But, I don’t belief all the useless speculation.
Guillem Balague’s claims are hit and miss. mostly miss. he’s predicted wenger leaving a bunch of times even though everyone knows he refuses to break his contracts.
but if fabregas wants to leave lets drag it out all summer and milk barca for every cent we can get
If Fabregas want’s to leave why doesn’t he just come straight out and tell Arsene Wenger that he want’s to go back to Barcelona, where he can earn his money just by warming the bench or coming on as a 5 second sub, because that’s all it will be, he won’t actually play, it’s just a PR job by Jean Laporte who want’s to get elected again. But if he actually wants to go let’s get as much money for him as we can, not do a swap job like we did with Chelsea and Cashley Cole.
So Foster’s going to Birmingham.
http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=788234&sec=transfers&cc=5901
Is that the first domino? Are we playing dominoes?
Would it make sense for either Hart or Given to sit on the bench at City? I think most City fans probably want to start the Hart era. Not that they need the money, but they could sell Given to us. Given’s got some good years left and could retire just about when Chesney’s ready to take over.
How about we get a ton of cash plus Yaya Toure for Fabregas?
Not my idea (read it on BBC’s 606) but it’s worth considering, eh?
What’s up Boners, I was wondering what people think (or demand) Cesc is worth. A poorly translated AS says that the Arsenal want 70m+.
I think that Toure + Pique + 40m would be special. We could get a keeper and another Striker/CB with that money, especially if/when Chamakh comes over. I don’t want to see Cesc leave (obviously) but we could build an amazing team out of this deal.
With a 4-2-3-1 formation and players like Toure/Song/Pique working as the two DM’s, we could have a better looking/more balanced team than we’ve have since Gilberto left. Cesc is a world beater, and his leadership, even more than his skill, is simply irreplaceable in a position swap. Xavi don’t have the scoring ability, Gerrard lacks the awareness, and Arteta isn’t the finished article.
Having said that, what would you like to see in return?
@dooley, dream line-up (if he leaves)
hart
sagna – campbell – tv5 – clichy
y. toure – song
nasri – diaby (or arshavin) – rosicky (or walcott, or rambo)
rvp
@dooley,
akinfeev
sagna-hangeland-tv5-clichy
song-yaya
nasri arshavin
rvp
chamakh
@TonyM, wow. yeah. akinfeev is awesome. hangeland is awesome. yes. one billion times yes.
this cesc story is turning into a frenzy. ibrahimovic, marquez, bojan and yaya being linked with us. all 4 and 20mil i might consider
all these stories today are being caused by guilliem ballague. i wonder how long before the club comments on it
@TonyM, yeah, it’s all gotten a bit out of hand. Arseblog is tweeting about people going after Cesc’s sister, but he isn’t explaining what that’s all about.
I think Z is a silly player when we have BIG GAME BENDTNER. not really, but Ibra isn’t really worth Cesc, especially with Chamakh coming. Marquez seems like a player at the end of the line, and would be a perfect replacement for Fisheyes Silvestre. I’d rather not, thank you. Bojan? Shit yes. But he’s tiny. And he doesn’t want to play for the Arsenal, so, not thanks. Yaya would be good. That’s about it.
I’m not sure how much Cesc is worth, but why should we take any player in return if they don’t want to be here? Get in players that want to wear the Arsenal shirt, not players that look at Arsenal as a stepping stone.
@dooley,
agree on marquez, bit past it, bojan too small. i think zlatan would be good in premier league. yaya also big physical guy. i said before on here i think we are technical enough already, i want to see us sign 6ft+ physical guys that can compete in premier league. yaya,hangeland and akinfeev realistic targets i think. didnt want to lose cesc obviously but we’ll see how this plays out
I agree, IF Cesc is leaving (IF – which I need to see it to believe it), then any Barca player in a make-weight exchange will not cut it. Yaya Toure is not good enough – sorry. I am tired of everyone wanting us to pick up cast offs from good teams… if they aren’t cutting it on Inter (Balotelli), Barca (Toure) or Man City (Ireland) why are they suddenly good enough for us? If we believe ourselves to be a top flight club, we shouldn’t settle for reclamation projects from the other top clubs.
I wonder though – supposedly one of Cesc’s best friends was Senderos who was poorly treated. Hleb was also a good friend, Flamini too… now Almunia and Merida, his fellow Spainards are on the way out. Maybe Wenger has mismanaged the social side of things for our captain – he might be feeling isolated on the team, and sees in Barca the guys he played U-16 with; Messi, Busquets, Pique and hears that Barca are in pole position to replace Henry with David Villa (what an upgrade btw).
But if I’m Wenger, I wait until after the World Cup to sell him, if that’s what I’m going to do. If Spain wins it, and Fabregas plays a role, his price will inflate.
Exactly. Barcelona ‘flyweights’ can not add any weight to a Fabregas deal. Pedro is a nice finisher but he and Bojan are midgets. Why would we want to Ibrahimovich’s 3rd club in 2 yrs? Besides there’s a rule that says you can’t have more than one oversize Scandinavian striker in your squad. We had Yaya on trial and we didn’t bite then and what’s changed to make us bite now. Besides there’s a rule that says you can’t have more than one Toure in 2 years in your club.
I have a knot in my stomach over this Fabregas story. I think the there is validity to this story because since it broke a couple days ago, there has been nothing from Arsenal’s side. Fabregas normally comes out to say this story is BS, especially if a story grows this big. I think he will be gone and I hope we don’t take Yaya and $. Take $ only and spend it wisely. Take 40M and buy 3 quality then just one big name. It will be a huge blow to lose Fabregas but if his heart is set on Barca, it’s set on Barca. We wont get a great season out of him if he is guilted into staying.
@TxGun, Do you seriously expect Cesc to come out and dispute every news story that comes out about him?
@nycgunner, No but this story seemed a bit more real, caught more steam and where some of the stories he has come out to refute lacked substance, this one doesn’t. And it’s just a little strange that NO ONE on the side of arsenal has come out to say anything. Not players, not management, not even old legends. It’s makes me believe that it has substance which as a gooner scares the sh!t of me. Fabregas is the heart of the team.
Hey maybe this is all a clever rouse from Fabregas to make sure the gaffer brings in some real players not 15 yr old potential.
@TxGun, Well then that is quite diabolical of him don’t you think?
It’s not a surprise that this piece of news have gathered momentum. 1) There is no other relevant news around 2) Barcelona will keep pursuing him hoping to unsettle him and 3) our season has ended and most of the Arsenal team (including non-players) are probably on vacation – you already saw the pics of Arshavin on this site.
It you are getting nervous from this piece of story then you are in for a real long summer my friend, because it’s only going to get uglier.
@nycgunner, Thanks for putting it into perspective. Guess from the type run in we had to the season I have little faith. Ah well, time to turn my attention to Spain, Mexico, USA, Denmark, France and Netherlands…oh and England too i guess. Where you watching the world cup in NYC? Nevada’s?
@TxGun, Are you familiar with the footy bars in NY? I think I am seeing the Argentina-Nigeria and the USA- England games at Felix. During the week days, I will try to sneak out of work and catch some footy action at Central which is a couple of blocks around the corner from Nevada Smith’s. I try to stay away from NS because it has too many drunk Chelsea fans and they piss me off – but the WC atmosphere there is usually pretty good so if it’s not getting packed like a can of sardines, I might try to catch a game there too.
@TxGun, Yeah grew up on Long Island. I agree with Nevada Smiths, only went for England national games. i haven’t been in about 4 or 5 years but i remember a great German place called Heidelberg Restaurant. Went for the 2002 world cup final drinking at 6:30am with ex-pats. Very fun time and that is a place to go root on Germany
People are boycotting Nevada Smiths. They got busted in a selling alcohol to minors sting and had to pay a fine. One of the two owners said the bartenders involved had to pay the fine and they refused. The second owner told the bartenders they could still work and he didn’t feel they should be responsible for a several thousand dollar fine. The senior owner fired one of the bartenders and that bartender now works at Lunasa.
NS now cards at the door which they should have been doing all along rather than putting the onus on busy bartenders who were crowd favorites. The place was a ghost town when I saw the Wigan game (and was ignorant of the boycott-my excuse).
Akinfeev is 6’1″, Shay Given type of keeper. He knows no English. What Arsenal need from a goalkeeper, irrespective of size,is presence and command of the box. He would have neither for a very long time and I guarantee you he would struggle mightly a la Huerelho Gomez last year.
Hangeeland? Serionsly… I have more pace than he does, and I have had three knee operations.
And Campbell in the starting line-up? For real. Dooley – that “dream” line-up you just listed finishes no better than 8th in the EPL. We’re supposed to be competing with Man U, Man City and Chelsea, not Birmingham.
@Brahmabull, zing! I think you’re way off. Campbell is a quality CB who will give us another pretty solid season. If the option is between starting Song at CB and Denilson at DM or Campbell in the back four and Song where he belongs, I think we’re stronger with Campbell. He cares an awful lot and rarely went missing in the way that Nasri, Arshavin, and many others managed to in the second half of the season.
Would you rather than Akinfeev than Flappyhandski or Almunia? No? Why the fuck not?
I’d rather have Hart or Lloris than Akinfeev, but we need SOMEONE.
I also think that it will (still. maybe. tentatively.) be a huge blow to the team to lose Cesc, but creativity is the thing we have in bunches. We have half a bench full of players that want to prove themselves in a more central role, and at times, they did. Ramsey, Nasri, Arshavin, Rosicky, (Merida? Wilshere?) all will have a chance to prove themselves. If we lose Cesc and don’t bring in much better players we won’t be an 8th place team. I think that’s bullshit, quite frankly. We were an injury savaged team and still nearly won the title, without much of a back four (five) and without a striker, or a defensive midfielder.
Akinfeev is a huge talent but ya it may take him time to adjust to premier league. but he’s only 24 and was phenomenal in champions league this season and his considered in same breath as buffon and casillas. and he’s bigger than casillas who is an unreal keeper.
i would be shocked if we got hart or lloris. city will need hart for start of the season unless they get buffon, and they may be reluctant to sell to us. and as tim pointed out before, lyon will want 25million for lloris so we can forget about that.
realistic suggestions for CB partner for TV5?
I was not impressed with Lloris against Bayern Munich. He needed to stand on head and was just average.
Campbell is 35. OK – he’s in great shape, but he’s a big man and that’s not easy to carry game in, game out. He’d be good for 15-20 games tops if we needed him as a starter, and remember last year at Portsmouth, he was considered a liability not an asset to that team. Don’t get me wrong – I love Sol, and desperately want him back next year. But he’s going to be back up and mentor to Djourou, not starting in front of him.
No, I agree Tony, we won’t get Lloris. We probably won’t get Hart either, as I would bet my house on Manciti deciding they need two quality keepers, and they certainly don’t need to sell.
Why don’t we all wait and see. If Cesc does go, we have a whole new era on our hands, because things will be so much different than any other time a player has left us – Henry, Toure and Viera were on the downsides of their careers, Adebayor was useless, Gilberto past it, Flamini mis-managed. This will be the heart of our team leaving before his peak years have even gotten started. We’ll be in complete re-build mode.
Teampossible why don’t you signup to be Alfons Goddal’s facebook friend. The nman was running for president then Laporta withdrew his backing. They then kissed and made up but Goddal still withdrew ssaying that the “Barca project” was more important than his election.
@ctpa, First of all, I don’t have a Facebook account. Second, and I’m sorry if what I said insulted you i some way, but unfortunately this is what the man said for a fact. Now, it could be plain BS, used to strengthen his position in the elections, and that is what I said you can believe what you want. I just wanted to share this with you because this is the first time I hear a first hand info about Arsenal, which is coming from the top and the man himself, and not some shabby tabloid (which doesn’t make it better anyway). Honestly, for all I care, Goddal along with any other Holy-Arsenal-Protective-Jumping-on-anyone-that-dares-to-say-something-slightly-betraying-about-the-club can go bugger off. I wasn’t trying to be negative, I wans’t trying to attack the club, I was simply saying what I heard. For all I care, you can signup to be Pat Rice’s facebook friend.
@Teampossible, Goddal does have a facebook account and I wouldn’t mind being Pat Rices face book ‘friend’
It’d be nice if Cesc had a facebook page, complete with frequent status updates.
@ArseChicago, It would probably be filled with comments like: Pique just poked you…like the time at the Barcelona-Arsenal game, and Laporta just sent you a house in Spain:)
And probably: Wenger dislikes this.
Alisher Usmanov invites you to play Mafia Wars….
@ArseChicago, oh man. oh you win.
The BBC article today was titled “Barca ponders move for Cesc”. Yeah? well I am pondering a move for Messi for my Saturday pick up game. Gimme a break! I wish Arsenal fans would stop getting this paranoid over Cesc leaving every summer. It’s nothing new and with elections looming in Barcelona, you can fully expect more of the same. They will probably get even more ridiculous: “Cesc misses his parents in Barcelona”, “Barca thinks Cesc is the perfect long term replacement for Xavi”, “Cesc says he wants Arsenal to provide him with food from Catalonia”. Yep – they will keep on coming. So all of you worrying about Cesc leaving, do yourselves a favor and stop worrying. Whether it’s now or later – he will leave one day but till that day comes what is the point of speculating? You will only end up giving yourself a headache. Remember there was an Arsenal before Cesc and there will be an Arsenal after him as well.
Barcelona paid 66mil euros for Ibrahimovic. 3rd most expensive transfer in 2009 and they ‘gave away’ Eto’o in that deal. Barcelona now are rumored to negotiating to bring in Villa. If I’m Valencia, I don’t even get out of bed unless Barcelona starts the bid at 60mil because Villa is a routine 20+ La Liga goal scorer and Ibrahimovic has been an expensive bust. Then they have come up with another 40mil? for MF who is not, I repeat not going to start at Barcelona. Alot to ‘ponder’ if you’re Barcelona.
Skysports led with the Fabregas to Barcelona story (which now trumps Lord Triesman steps on his dick stories) tonight. It was flesh out with a reported quote from meeting where Cesc says “who you got coming in to bolster the team” and was met with silence from Wenger. Then you get fan reaction from outside the Emirates and some sound bites from Parlour and Davis (the only 2 ex-Arsenal players not at the beach apparently). They also interview Guillem Balague who is the ‘source’ for this latest conflagration.
Let just say this. We’ve heard this before. Spcifically when Henry was in his should I stay or should I go mode. He asked that same question of Wenger we all know how that went. Problem is that Fabregas is not 3 yrs away from playing in the MLS
“Barca ponders move for Cesc” or how I stop worrying and love Gourcuff.
woooooah, reading the comments, we are speculating far too much. remember, barcelona want cesc. i’ve talked with many barca fans, and it’s embarrassing that they let AW come in and swoop him up. they want him back. they’d be willing to give a lot, and we have all the leverage in this deal. hopefully, it’s no deal.
Tim, Keown all but confirm that Cesc wants to leave.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/teams/a/arsenal/8691143.stm
“Not so fast, my friend” Lee Corso, (sports analyst).
No official or unofficial approach has been lodge.
Respect the contract my friend.
Troubling to read about some Arsenal “supporters” going onto the Twitter site of Cesc’s sister and harassing her and her brother. Hopefully it wasn’t to a crazy extent.
Seems Barca’s finally taking a tone respectful of the fact that we still have this player under contract. I think it reflects that they might not have a spare 45MM pounds lying around to buy Fabregas after buying Villa. So what happens if Cesc is here for the opening match next season? Are the fans going to boo him? Is he going to be a professional after possibly Arsenal not granting his wishes? Can he be a good captain if everyone knows his wishes? Even a good outcome of him staying for another season now might pose some unfortunate questions. Not sure how Arsene and the club handle all this. Maybe if they go out and invest big dollars this summer, Cesc may be applauded for forcing the club’s hand.
@ArseChicago, I read about that on Arseblog and it’s disgraceful. All it does is make Arsenal fans look crass and unworthy of having a classy player like Cesc.
I don’t think the purchase of Villa will deplete funds for Cesc at all. Remember this is an election year – funds will come from all directions, people will chip in. If they really want to buy him, they can arrange for the money by hook or by crook. It really just boils down to us – can Wenger convince Cesc to stay? Can he show some ambition for a change by buying players? There is some story about Cesc asking Wenger about strengthening the team and Wenger staying silent. Now I don’t know how anybody could have gotten hold of that story – unless some super journalist/spy wiretapped the room and listened it. Besides, he had already said earlier that we were going to buy some players this year so why would he stay silent to that question? It simple doesn’t make any sense. So I am inclined to think that most of this story is just BS. The media is out to cause hysteria among Arsenal fans to sell more paper or get more website hits and sadly it working.
David Villa sign for them for 40M.i suppose they cannot afford cecs for now.Barca have not any players really to sweeten the deal with,only if they sell Ibra to city.only real Madrid could do that but cecs dont want to go there i suppose so one more season with the gunner.
Brother can you spare 40mil so I can buy a MF?
Ibrahimovic: “WTF just happened?”
Fabregas: “they love me, they really love me!”
Wenger: “unless Lord Treisman’s hotty has me on tape, I deny ever being asked THAT question”
I’m hoping Tim didn’t go ahead and get all those ‘Cesc La Vie’ t-shirts printed…….
@ArseChicago, HAHAHA
@ArseChicago,
I don’t like this silence from Tim. I fear that he got a better offer from another blogger and joined forces.
Arsechicago,
If there is fire behind all this smoke, the best scenario is the one you outline. The only way to recover the situation and keep Cesc at Arsenal is for Wenger to go out right away and sign class players of real experience and quality at CB, DM, and GK to go with Chamakh.
If Wenger does that, Cesc can stay on as captain next year in good faith.
What I cannot abide are people who claim that Cesc wouldn’t even be good enough to get into Barca’s first eleven as the logic behind denying he could leave Arsenal for them. These people include our own idiotic chairman, Peter Hill-Wood, whose comments to this effect I expressed my great anger about on this blog. I think it very much offended Cesc and was a big deal, though Tim tried to dismiss the importance of the episode by noting that PHW is a blowhard whom no one takes seriously. Be that as it may, the issue is a serious one. Do you appreciate your best player and captain enough to surround them with a team to fulfill his ambitions or do you content yourself with keeping him (and stating so publicly) because another team has players who you think are better? Is Arsenal a selling club or a great club with real ambitions of winning trophies and titles?
The team will survive and continue to be fairly good, but real moral damage to the standing, status, and reputation of the club will be done if Arsenal lose Fabregas before getting the best from him for a couple more seasons and actually win.
I think that is why so many of us Arsenal fans are skittish and paranoid about these sorts of rumors. We are vulnerable because of the youth policy and a long, five year drought (six if you count trophies the club really values and competes for). Symbolically, this is a significant problem and a real fear. We can’t expect to progress as a club if we lose our best players during (even before) their prime.
As for his apparent desire to leave, I think there are more things at play here than the PHW comments, though that certainly couldn’t have helped. I really do think the lack of investment in the squad the last few years has likely been disappointing to Cesc as well. Fabregas and RvP and obviously Arshavin have been making comments over the last few years about how they thought we could afford to strengthen the team. And by strengthen they likely mean go out and buy more players. I, for one, have wished we’d have been showing more urgency in the transfer area knowing full well that we wouldn’t be having Fabregas here forever. Why not take advantage of the situation with us being blessed with one of the best players in the world at one of the most important positions on the pitch?
We’ve all known he wants to go to Barca some day, and I’m also wondering how much their domination of us in the CL really drove the point home just how far this Arsenal squad is from competing with lineups like Barca’s. I think all Wenger can do now, if Barca doesn’t hit the bid on whatever price, if any, Arsenal has set on Cesc, is to get Cesc to commit to one or two years if he, Wenger, commits to spending the money that’s been accumulating over the last few years amidst debt paydown at Highbury Square. We can talk about whether 40MM is the right number or 30 or 60, but really Cesc is fairly invaluable. With him here we can get other star players around the globe to come to the Emirates. With him here our chances of staying in the top 4 next season remain good. Without him here I’d be feeling a lot worse about our chances to finish in the top 4 next season. Without him here, we lose tremendous star power (have we replaced the “star power” we had with Henry? With Adebayor(the c*nt that he is)?. If you add Cesc to that list, how does that make us feel? How will that make RvP and Arshavin and others feel?
If he does stay, again, I’m not sure you make him captain and I’m not sure the fans really embrace him that warmly; I’m just not sure how much fans would attribute a Wenger spending spree to any urging on the part of Fabregas (we were expecting it anyway). I guess we’ll see. Regardless of what happens, this Cesc thing has added much more complication to the task at hand.
@ArseChicago, If Cesc stays he stays on as captain. I don’t think too many gooners begrudge him for wanting to move to barca. At least no sensible gooners do. Ofcourse you get a handful of morons who do things like writing smut on his sister’s twitter page. I think most arsenal fans understand why he may want to leave.
@nycgunner, I think we as fans have a right to be mad at Cesc in some respects… He did sign a big and long contract with arsenal. That is a comitment. If he was even only half unsure about his future he should not have signed the contract. If he does move on I will wish him all the best but will be dissapointed that he did not finish the job. Toally different than the Henry move. I am also not justifying the vile actions of the few that attacked the Twitter accounts. They are fools
@Josh, Ofcourse you do and it’s natural to feel a little cheated or disappointed or even angry – but we both know contracts have little value these days. They only serve as means to leverage your negotiating power in the transfer market. Cesc has played over 300 games for us and yet Arsene has failed to build a proper team around him. One step forward has too often been followed by two steps backwards. Even us fans were very unhappy with him last January when he didn’t strengthen the squad, so it shouldn’t surprise anyone that Cesc was unhappy too. Add to it all of the trophies that his childhood friends have been enjoying at Barca – if I were Cesc, I would want to be a part of that too! It’s really upto Arsenal to make sure that our stars believe in the team but most fans will tell you that they realistically didn’t believe they would win anything this year. It was more hope than expectation. That tells me there is something fundamentally wrong at the club. As far as Cesc goes, we still don’t know what the real story is. He has been a great leader for us the past year, carried the whole team on his shoulder on a number of occasions, and has constantly fought for the team – so I am going to give him the benefit of the doubt. There is more to the story than what you read in the press.
On the flipside, if players like Cesc would only sign one year deals, they could continually leave for free. By locking himself up, he’ll at least (and that’s a big “least”) put Arsenal in the position to collect 40MM. The contract thing is meaningless. If he were to stay, he’d have to come out and say something to Gunner fans. Even then, there’ll be a lot of people feeling spurned. We’ll see. It still feels like he’s a goner, which obviously effing sucks.
@Limestonegunner, yes and no.. In Barca’s 4-3-3 formation, there are two attacking midfiedlers… xavi and iniesta. cesc is not ahead of either of them in the spanish national team so what makes you think he will be ahead of them in the barca team? he will definitely be warming the bench for xavi or will be used sparingly when pep wants to change up tactics.
Isn’t it odd that things are so quiet? Usually there is a rebuttal of some sort, formal or informal at this point in the transfer talk crescendo.
I think everyone who is calling him names and tweeting his sister etc. are disgraceful humans, and hardly fans. I’ve not heard anything directly from Cesc Fabregas’s lips – so what kind of fan are you to go off on a player who has given 300 games and 6 years to the club, on the basis of media hype? Shame Shame Shame.
I can’t believe Barca have 40-45 million this year; there are planned upgrades to Nou Camp, they just bought Villa and they have other needs – particulaly a back up CB, right and left backs. They are rich in midfielders. Maybe if they sell Ibrahimovic, but who is dumb/rich enough to pay 40 million for him? (oh… wait… his former coach up at ManCini).
Anyway, all we can do is wait and see.
PS – I’m really surprised we haven’t had the Chamakh announcement yet.
The whole silence on the matter by the club, at least on the website, looks really silly when you consider this bollocks they keep posting every day about who’s being transfer linked with us. I’ve sent an email to the website saying that it’s really a bush league thing to be doing, and I hope/suspect others have been doing likewise.
@ArseChicago, I sent one to them last weekend. I guess PWH came out and said we are not selling h im and wenger is on Vaca. I am suprised we have seen pics of Fabregas in london if he is actually there. I think this whole thing is totally cooked by papers to see copies
@Brahmabull, I read somewhere that Arsene is on vacation. Hardly surprising that we have kept quiet on the issue when he is not around – I have a feeling he proof reads the press releases.
@nycgunner, hmn, that doesn’t bode well for the transfer dealings he wanted to complete before the World Cup…
@b, Did any of us honestly buy that statement from him? The only deal I expect to see before the world cup is Chamakh
http://www.tottenhamblog.com/2010/05/19/spurs-must-capitalise-on-their-rivals-getting-weaker/
Guess who smells blood in the water? Spuds. There is no ‘real’ news to get excited about and they are already creaming in their pants about our “weakness” and taking advantage.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/may/19/barcelona-cesc-fabregas-arsenal
:O :O :O :O
I now believe that Arsenal’s silence is an ominous sign. There is absolutely to much news noise coming from Barcelona for there not to something going on behind the scenes and not have a response (preferably a denial or a threat to file a “tapping up” charge) from Arsenal at this point. The Barca sporting director’s statement today seems to me to be a face saving statement for Arsenal. As in Arsenal did not cave in easily to our first ‘flirtatious’ advance.
If Fabregas wants to go then Arsenal are in a tenuous position and must absolutely gut Barcelona on the fee to maintain some credibility with their fans. Arsenal will still face the most unprecedented fan backlash since Luis Figo went from Barcelona to Real Madrid.
As I said, Gourcuff anyone?
@ctpa, I’ll take one please
The only hint that something is going from at Arsenal actually comes from Sol Campbell. He’s ready to sign his 1 yr deal but is not in a hurry since Arsenal have to deal the Fabregas thing. What Fabregas thing would that be Sol?
@ctpa, Maybe they are trying to building at court case to sue the pants off Barca… I am clutching at straws here.
@nycgunner, let’s try that again:
Maybe they are trying to build a court case to sue the pants off Barca… I am clutching at straws here.
The other problem with this Ceasc “thing” is that does it take Arsenal’s eyes off our transfer ball?
Barca – if you want Cesc, come get him…but if you paid 49M for Villa, you’d better be willing to pony up at least 70M for Cesc! Cesc is one of the highest rated performers in a league which from top to bottom is better than La Liga. Personally, I hope Cesc stays for many years as he has shown he can be dominant in the EPL and there’s no guarantee a replacement for him can be anywhere near as dominant.
@GoonerMD, Villa is basically 34.5 m and some add ons coming to around 40M