Good morning all,
Its Friday and the beginning of the weekend. In 2 more days we will be able to see Arsenal play football again for the first time since the game against Kitchee. Lukas Podolski, Olivier Giroud and Santi Cazorla are all expected to play some part in the game and I would expect to see them play for as long as possible. Robin Van Persie is also expected to line up alongside the new signings amid intense speculation about his future. It will be interesting to see if he starts on Sunday and if so how we will integrate Giroud and Podolski around him. If Arsene is sure he is going to leave I wouldn't expect him to start. We will rather need to give Giroud and Podolski game time before the opener against Sunderland only 6 days after the Cologne game.
There is some good news flying around this morning, or bad news depending on your view of Theo Walcott. He is reportedly on the verge of penning a new contract worth 90k a week. This is great news in my opinion, especially given the Robin and Song situations. He is starting to become more consistent and at only 22 he can only get better. I expect him to improve vastly on his delivery as well as his movement off the ball. His finishing is already pretty decent and he is good at timing his runs. His pace gives us something different and competition for the RW this year will be intense. Alex Chamberlain, Santi Cazorla and Gervinho will all be vying for places in the team. Walcott has no choice but to be on his game at all times.
Apparently Arsenal are adamant that they have not received any fresh bids from United for Robin Van Persie. One might wonder why Sir Alex would lie about such a thing but in my view it is quite transparent. United are going public today on the New York Stock Exchange. What better way to find investors in your club than being heavily linked for one of the best strikers in the world? To poke another hole in their interest, why do they want to invest so heavily in a 29 year old injury prone striker? Surely their money - which is running low at the moment - is better suited in investing in another midfielder or left back? Just thoughts. Maybe I am in denial but I still have that gut feeling that all this is a hoax and that Robin will still be with us come September 1st.
A very reliable source has said that we have paid only 11.7mil for Cazorla. There are no add ons, or any other post payments. We have paid 11.7mil and that is as much as we are going to pay. Apparently the reason for this is that we have given them all the cash up front. Very unusual for transfers to be dealt for in that way but Malaga were desperate for the cash. An excellent deal there and that means our transfers have only cost around 33mil. That's less than an Andy Carroll. Taking into account the TPA was at around 50mil for this summer, I would say we have around 17mil left to spend. I think Arsene wants 2 more players, a central midfielder and a defender. He is looking to get Sahin on loan (we have agreed to pay 60% of his wages - according to reports although the deal isn't done yet) which means he'll be left with 17mil for that defender. Reports from France indicate that Marseille's Nicolas N'Koulou is who we are after. He is versatile and can play right back and defensive midfielder alongside his primary central defender role.
A lot to take in this morning...
'Till Tomorrow
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