No Bid For Arteta, Wilshere Signs Pro Deal, Wenger Going Nowhere

Morning all. A pretty good bit to get through today so let's get right down to it.

We've been linked with Mikel Arteta quite a bit going into this transfer season, but Wenger says no enquiry has been made. Now this could just be trying to throw off potential competition for his signature or he could really be serious about, and I have a hunch that maybe they really aren't interested in Arteta. The rumor was made up first by News of the World or something first, which gives it about zero credibility, and has just taken off from there. I still think he would be a good signing, but as of this point there is no move for him.

Wenger was a little more clear when asked about Andrey Arshavin, saying that there is no progress on him, not saying that we haven't put in an offer or an enquiry. I think Arteta would be a better signing than Arshavin as I've said but many people think he is the answer to our problems. I just think the price tag is too high and the standard of league he has been in does not make for a quick transistion into the Premiership. However, as Wenger said, there has been no progress towards signing him so we'll have to wait on that, which is the usual way Wenger operates. Usually when we buy a player we wait till closer to the end of the transfer window so that we can get the price down a bit.

Moving on to some good news, yesterday was Little Jack Wilshere's 17th birthday, which saw him sign professional terms with the club. It is believed to be up to an eight year deal, which is fantastic. I'll confess that I'm a bit obsessed with Jack Wilshere in a completely not-gay way, but just the same way I'm obsessed with Cesc Fabregas. He's just really, really awesome. I think we can expect huge things from him in the future if all goes well, and I sincerely hope that it does. In other young gun news, Jay Simpson has gone on loan to West Brom and Gavin Hoyte has gone on loan to Watford. It'll be nice to see how Simpson does with the Premiership matches and I'll be looking forward to Hoyte's development as well.

And the latest Arsene Wenger rumor is that he is leaving Arsenal for Real Madrid and taking Cesc Fabregas with him. However, Wenger has rubbished these rumors saying that nobody can doubt his commitment to the club.

“I don’t think anyone can doubt my commitment here. You can question my decisions and I accept that, but not my commitment.

“No [no one has spoken to my representatives], because I represent myself.”

So that clears that one up. He's had the chance to go to Madrid before but I really don't think he wants to. Arsenal gives him the freedom to essentially run the club how he wants to whereas Madrid or say Barca he would always have to be bringing in big names and he would have to take a lot of input from others as to how to run the club. I just don't think that is his thing.

And the last piece of news today is that Shay Given is not a target for Arsenal. It has been rumored by many sources that we would pursue him this January but Arsene says he is not interested in signing Shay from Newcastle. Personally I am a fan of Almunia and think he's proven that he is good enough to win. Is he as good as Petr Cech? No, but only two other people in the world I'd say are as good as him, so what can you expect? I'd rather spend the money on a defender or a midfielder personally.

So that's all there is today. Quite a lot going on, or not going on depending on which way you look at it. Maybe we'll get a new signing today, but then again maybe we'll have to wait three more weeks. We shall see. I'll keep you updated right here though. Cheers.

Arsenal Transfer Window Preview Part 2- January 2009

Morning all. Last day of 2008 has come and I'm still alive and if you're reading this so are you so congratulations on making it through another year. Yesterday I ran down the first half of our January transfer preview for Arsenal and today I'm going to finish that off with the second half of who we should buy and maybe even a little who we should sell. We did central defenders and central midfielders yesterday, so that leaves us our wide and attacking players for today.

Let's look at what we have so far out wide. We have Nasri, who is certainly a quality player as long as he can stay healthy, which hasn't been as much as you'd like. There is Eboue, who is really a right back and has been forced onto the wing and really isn't very effective out there. Rosicky is ALWAYS hurt and probably won't play for us anymore barring a miraculous recovery from his injury that has kept him out for a year. And of course we have Theo, who is out for a couple more months but he really looked great at the start of this year until the time of his injury. Diaby is also used out wide occasionally but he is a central midfielder and we really shouldn't accept having to play someone out of position so much.


So it is clear that we really could use a wide player, at least to add some depth while Theo is out and hopefully to create some competition for places with say, Eboue. There has been a ton of talk about Andrei Arshavin ever since Russia's run at Euro 2008. He was good at the Euro's, yes I'll give you that, but do we really know how he would adapt to the Premiership? He's 27 years old and would command a huge fee, yet he hasn't been tested in a top flight league. I'm going to come right out and say that I don't want Arsenal to buy Arshavin. Sp*rs bought Pavlyuchenko because of his performances in the Euro's alongside Arshavin and he hasn't worked out great for them. I just don't see him as the best option and I hope we look somewhere else. That somewhere else could be Mikel Arteta of Everton. Reports are in already that we will make a 12 million pound bid for him, which could be enough to get him from Everton. He's a huge player for them who they won't want to part with but for the right price they would have to accept, especially since the player would most likely want to come play for Arsenal. He's been playing in the Premiership for a long time so he has that needed experience which would hopefully mean he could make an immeadiate impact. He is very versatile as well meaning that he could play in Cesc's role while he is injured and move out wide or alongside him when Cesc returns. He's also good on set pieces and he really just looks like a better option to me. Another option I could think of hasn't had as much talk as the other two but as I said yesterday, Valencia are strapped for cash and a very good player on their team just happens to play on the wing. I'm talking about Silva, who plays with Cesc for Spain. I have no idea what kind of fee he would command but he is a great player and would surely benefit any team he was in.

Moving on to the strikers and you'd have to say that if we were totally set for players in a posititon then it would be at striker. We have two good strikers in RvP and Adebayor who can get the job done at the top flight as well as Eduardo, plus some youngsters like Carlos Vela and Nicklas Bendtner in waiting. I'll admit though that I'm not a big Bendtner fan. I think he gives off the impression that he is not trying hard a lot of times when he is on the pitch and it really bothers me. A lot of times when he plays it is up front by himself and when you're up top by yourself it really requires a lot of movement from you, which he doesn't seem to have. Sure he scores the odd good goal sometimes but I think his attitude of entitlement is a problem and if we received a decent offer for him I suggest we take it. If we were to bring in a striker, which we won't, then my personal choice would be Sergio "Kun" Aguero.

Last but not least we need to talk about which players we want leaving if we had our choice. Players that are not Arsenal calibre who are playing for Arsenal and should not be. Alex Song immeadiately springs to mind. He's not good enough in midfield or in defense to ever be a first eleven player and really makes me nervous even when he comes on in reserve or as a sub. When you look at other top clubs do you see players of Alex Song's skill level? Not really, and if there is one, then they don't play nearly as much as Song does for us. I also think Eboue would do well with a change of scenery. He hasn't really improved on the wing ever since he was moved there and he certainly won't ever be better than Sagna at right back. He's decent cover but even when Sagna has been out the boss has chosen to use other people instead of him at right back, which should tell you something. As I mentioned, I don't think Bendtner has much of a future here at Arsenal and I think an offer for him would see him gone.

Now by point behind this is that we can't afford to sell ANY players without having signed or having every intention of signing quality replacements for them. Our squad has shown that it is too then and we really need to grow it not sell more. We sold Hleb, Gilberto, and Flamini (I know, he left, he wasn't sold) without really bringing in any replacements and we can't have that again.


So that's about it. The transfer window opens in 12 hours, while we'll all be ringing in the New Year. I hope all of you have a fantastic 2009 and that Arsenal do as well. Everyone drink up, hook up, do drugs if that is your thing, just make it a great start to the New Year! Make sure you check out the forums if you never have or leave a comment and let me know what your thoughts are! Cheers! I'll leave you with this video to go into the New Year. Warning: Semi-offensive and also hilarious material.