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By Bogus Cheese
My dears! My dears! What a moment, what a day! Welcome welcome! Camembert to you all.
One of the many tricks of the Anti-Arsenal Arsenal web sites is to make endless criticisms while making few predictions.
However several of the old “Wenger is an alien, turf him out now” sites did, through the summer, let their guard slip somewhat when they started predicting that huge numbers of Arsenal season ticket holders would not be renewing this season, because of their dislike of our great Lord Wenger, all praise be.
What a slip! What a Danish Blue! How could they be so careless?
The sources of this eccentric, strange and frankly bizarre story were simple in themselves…
1: People had been writing to the blogs saying, “I don’t want this season ticket any more while Wenger is at the club – does anyone else want it?” Trading in Season Tickets is of course a crime under the Law of the Land, or maybe just the terms of the Season Ticket, but either way it is a Bad Thing.
2: Someone had applied for a season ticket and found he moved up 40,000 places on the waiting list overnight.
3: At every match you see spaces so Arsenal must be lying.
Actually dear reader the “Arsenal must be lying” bit is there anyway, without the first half of the sentence, but the AAA sites felt it a Good Thing to put the two bits together. Oh Koenigsberg!
Any road up, as we say in Wood Green, their prediction was, the club would at last feel the backlash of all right thinking supporters who have Had Enough of this regime and wanted a return to the days of being honest hearty English lads who give their all and speak the language proper.
So, the prediction is made.
Now I am writing this my dear-i-os before I set off on the long and winding road across town to our spiritual home, but I predict that all around me will be the same old faces. A little older, a little more wrinkly (and that’s just Pat Rice – what a lad, what a stayer, what a boy!)
The number of season ticket holders who have given up their tickets will be, I predict, under 2000 across the whole ground. The waiting list really is 10 years (I predict, hand on Cheddar), and the number of empty seats will remain due entirely to people not getting to the games because they live a long way away.
So, my chums, my pals, my dear bit of old Gorgonzola, my Lancashire Blue, why would the AAA make such a wild prediction?
The answer of course is that a lot of the silly smoked Cornish are in fact Man IOU fans who can’t take the fact that in their stadium anyone who wants to can buy a ticket anywhere in the ground, season or daily. In fact I am told they even take Oyster cards.
(Breaking news is that the Glazers are not paying a penny back on any loans and the cost of the loans is going up again, while the little fella from the far eastern shores where reality is unknown has had enough of Liverpuddle and taken his goats cheese elsewhere).
The world is ours, my old Welsh rarebit, we are one of only three clubby type things that has sold all its seasons, and one of the other two (the very tiny totts) don’t count because their ground is so small that if an ant stamped on it, it wouldn’t even notice. And anyway who ever heard of people paying for anything at the far end of Seven Sisters?
So thus we march onwards under our glorious Lord, our Leader, our Hero, our Dearest Pal, our Great and Glorious creator of the Unbeaten.
I look forward to exposing another AAA racket next week. Be there or be square as you hep cats say, what?
Phil Gregory on Arsenal v Blackpool
Billy the Dog’s preview: Arsenal vs the Creature from the Black Lagoon
Sanity
Old Sanity
Very old sanity
By Phil Gregory
Blackpool are welcomed to the Emirates for our first home game of the season. The newly-promoted got an excellent result away at Wigan, though it’s quite easy to over-hype the result. Any 4-0 win, especially away from home is highly commendable, but Wigan seemingly did their utmost to help. A horrendous defensive wall accounted for two of Blackpool’s goals, while Kirkland didn’t really cover himself in glory. Admittedly defence and goalkeeping aren’t our strongest points either, but we won’t be anywhere near as charitable as Wigan were.
It’s tough to guess what approach to expect from Blackpool. Ian Holloway has been full of praise for Arsenal which is nice, but is most likely an attempt to heap the pressure onto us. Which to be fair, is exactly where it should be. Blackpool will likely look to attack us but even if they do ark the bus, they’re not a Stoke by any means so it wouldn’t be playing to their strengths. Hopefully it’ll be an open day with a few goals and a clean sheet.
With the return of the Premier League, we’re once again right back at the top of the injury league table with a concerning five players out injured and a few others not yet match fit.
Frimpong has done his cruciate in what is a massive, massive shame considering the progress he was making this season. Hopefully he’ll bounce straight back and this won’t cost him in terms of his career. Nasri underwent knee surgery (“three weeks” according to Wenger), while Denilson has recovered from an abdominal problem but needs another week of training.
Alex Song is back from a calf strain but given the Cameroonian is just back from injury. He’ll most likely be on the bench.
Ramsey and Bendtner are our long-term absentees.
Predicted line-up:
Almunia
Sagna Djourou Vermaelen Clichy
Diaby
Wilshere Rosicky
Theo Chamakh Arshavin
It’s a bit tricky to try and predict a line-up for this match. Koscielny is suspended but Djourou is back so it’s likely he’ll step in. At home versus the weaker sides, we often swapped Sagna for Eboue to give the Frenchman a well-deserved rest but also to exploit Eboue’s potency going forwards from right back. Arsène may well decide to do that, but I think it’s more likely he’ll stick with Sagna for the greater solidity offered especially when you consider Djourou is coming straight back from injury and may not be 100%.
Diaby continues filling in the holding role, while Rosicky comes in on the back of a very, very promising substitute appearance to replace the injured Nasri. Jack will also hopefully continue in the middle; he should find there’ll be a bit more space with Blackpool playing a more open game.
At home I expect us to be going with Theo ahead of Eboue, and let’s hope the England international can press on off the back of some promising displays. I noticed when he came on as a sub he looks to have filled out a lot more, a stronger core will help him with both balance and power and he doesn’t look like he’ll be bullied off the ball anymore.
Arshavin continues in his inside left role. The Russian wasn’t at his best at Anfield, and reports that he is still playing with an injury is very, very worrying. I’d much rather we take him out of firing line and do whatever it takes to get him fit and firing (for his sake and ours) rather than continue to get 50% from him. Perhaps Wenger will do that once we’ve got players like Fabregas and Van Persie back and firing.
I’ve gone for Chamakh to start up top. Robin may well have something to say about that after he played a good part of the 2nd half at Anfield, but most likely he’ll get the entire 2nd half with an eye on starting at Blackburn away. Cesc will most likely get some minutes off the bench. I’d really like for him to be fit for Blackburn away which is never an easy game, but we’ll have to wait and see on that front.
On the whole, it’s not the most balanced midfield I’ve ever seen, but at home we can get away with it. There’s some big players missing from the starting line-up (including our best midfielder and his next two deputies – only us!) but we should have more than enough to see off Blackpool. I wouldn’t want to be overconfident (Blackpool as a newly-promoted minnow club are just like Hull when they beat us 2-1 at the Emirates) but these sort of games are the ones we should be winning comfortably. However the first consideration is the three points, the second a clean sheet. After that, anything is a bonus. I’d be happy with three or four nil, while if we could make back up the goal difference on Chelsea that’d be great. 4-0 to the Arsenal from me.
I spoke briefly to the people from the Barclays Premier League official podcast on Thursday. Unfortunately they cut one of my answers when asked about Chamakh (“some people say he’s not got the best goals record, but he’s done far better internationally than Wayne Rooney ever has”) but you can listen to the podcast here , I think my part is just after two minutes in if you fancy a listen.
Billy the Dog’s preview: Arsenal vs the Creature from the Black Lagoon
Untold’s Index – see the world through a grain of sand
Woolwich Arsenal - the history of the club from the fans point of view
Making the Arsenal - the book every Italian was reading by the poolside this summer.
Arsenal welcome The Creature from the Black Lagoon
By Billy The Dog McGraw, Landlord of the Toppled Bollard, Islington.
At the heart of the matter there are three creatures. Oysten the Greater, Oysten the Lesser, and the Creature from the Black Lagoon.
All three have a significant part to play in the world of Blackpudlian footballing, and to understand them as they attend our glorious stadium to meet the very cream of footballing excellent, we need to delve into their historic origins, past glories, and occasional follies.
Blackpool has a long and honorable past, being home to the ancient tribe, the Setantii (“dwellers in the water”) who later went on to invent a TV sports channel that utlimately went bust. We shall return to the theme of bust-ness later in the text.
The name “Blackpool” comes from a historic drainage channel called Spen Dyke that ran over a peat bog into the Black Lagoon near the Irish Sea. People from the area were so black from fishing in the dark water that they were known as Blackpudlians or “Creatures from the Black Lagoon”, after a 12,000-year-old animal skeleton (the Carleton Elk) was found at Blackpool Sixth Form College.
A Black Lagoon football club playing in the 1880s and getting crowds of 2000 or so, became founder members of the Lancashire Black Pudding League in 1889 and so the game took on its first alien life form.
For all the while, unknown to the local populace, the Creature did indeed lurk in the Black Lagoon, a sort of Harry Redknapp in terms of looks but with brains.
In these early days the club was seen to be very forward looking as they lost 90% of their capitalization in their first year in the league, and moved into debt, thus announcing to the world they were indeed a proper football club who were blazing a trail for the way football was to be played in years to come.
Wages in that first year were 75% of their income – thus making Blackpool a 21st century club living in the 19th century. Time travel was alleged and they were thrown out of the league and they changed the location of their ground every other week.
Meanwhile over the years the Creature from the Black Lagoon grew in strength, and Adolf Hitler (on hearing of the Creature) ordered that the town should not be bombed for fear of releasing it from its murky pit.
But one bomb did hit the ancient black waterway and the Creature emerged, rampant, dirty, and full of filthy tactics. (A bit like Shawcross really). So great was the subsequent demand to see the Evil Being among demented folk from the north of the country that in 1975 the M55 was built making the Blackness the centre of the original day trip to hell.
It was soon after this that another being, the first of the “Oyston” clan, appeared: Oyston the Grand, Oyston the First, Oyston the Greater – his names were legion.
This new Being, we’ll settle on the name Oyston the Greater, appeared in the shape of an estate agent who gobbled up all the property in the village of the Pool of Blackness, before finally buying Blackpool FC itself in 1988. Oyston the Greater promised the natives a world-class stadium within 10 years. Oh how we laughed, and beneath the waves the evil Creature (that’s the one from beneath the pond, not the Oyston chap) growled its displeasure.
The Oyston grew and flourished buying up radio stations, modeling agencies and the Miss World contest Beauty and the beast (as it were).
But then Oyston the Greater was charged with four rape charges and some indecent assaults. The fellow pleaded not g. and was cleared of all charges save one of rape.
Then rather curiously in 1996 the Oyston the Greater was offered Manchester United FC. Would the fans of Man IOU have been happier with the Oyston rather than the Glaze or would they have preferred the Creature from the Black Lagoon? These are simple northern folk, so who can tell, but the Creature stirred again awaiting its destiny.
In the final rape trial Mr Oyston the Greater denied the charge, claiming there was a conspiracy involving two government ministers, the Fraud Squad, the Inland Revenue, the Drugs Squad, the City’s regulatory takeover body, and the Sunday Times. This last was always fairly unlikely given that newspapers never investigate anything and Oyston the Greater won substantial damages, costs and an apology from the Sunday Times.
But in December 1997 Oyston the Greater lost his appeal against conviction at the Court of Appeal in London, and so had to serve six year jail sentence. The Radio Authority said he was not a fit and proper person to own a radio station. And the FA said, well, nothing at all. Six years inside for the rape of a 16 year old which he denied? No problem sir – you just carry on with your little football club.
And the Creature from the Black Lagoon stirred again, and was mighty displeased.
In fact Oyston the Greater voluntarily stood down as chairman of Blackpool F.C. He was released in December 1999, and he still maintains his innocence over the rape issue, (although he has never spoken on the issue of the Creature from the Black Lagoon.) An appeal to the European Court of Human Things for the conviction for rape to be overturned failed on the grounds that it was “manifestly ill-founded”.
Oyston the Greater is still a director of Blackpool FC (and thus a fit and proper person in the eyes of the FA, and who are we to say that a person found guilty of the rape of a woman aged around 16 is not), and is the majority shareholder in this dinky club.
But then a creaturette from the country of the black Lagoon emerged, (Oyston The Lesser), also known as Karl, and took on the mantle of running the FC and he was chairman until 18th of this month when he resigned from the board of directors.
On the 19th inst Oyston the Lesser applied for bankruptcy – an interesting move since his dad (Oyston the Greater) is reported on Wiki to be a multi-millionaire.
But it seems the Greater does not want to lend the Lesser a few bob to help him out.
And once more the Creature stirs.
But we must note one other point. Much of Blackpool’s recent success has come from the introduction of electric power in the area which arrived in the spring of 2007, replacing the candles and natural gas that bubbled up through the lagoon. Indeed in 1879, the area had become the first municipality in the world to be powered by lagoon mud – which was also used to power the local tram system that still runs to and from the local cotton mills.
By 2008 the town had a population of 1,250 (excluding Creatures and Creaturettes) and could accommodate six or seven sight seers at any one time.
Thus itself today that Blackpool return to Arsenal for the first time in 286 years. But who will be with them? The club did once have a player called Matt Hughes, but he took a day trip once and has not been seen for a while so he won’t be there. A Ball also played for them as well as Arsenal but it is said the Creature once ate him, so he won’t be there either.
So we must be on the look out as to who enters the director’s entrance, past the bust of Herbert C, and on up the golden staircase. Will it be Oysten the Greater, or Oysten the Lesser, or the man from the bankruptcy court, or will it be the Creature from the Black Lagoon, come to watch its relatives out on the pitch do their evil deedsd.
Blackpool FC has yet to enter the 20th century, but meanwhile we welcome the club, its supporters, players and directors with webbed feet. (Actually that sentence could be read wrongly. I will try again when I’ve just finished this pint…)
The Arsenal line up
Almunia
Sagna Vermaelen Djourou Clichy
Song
Fabregas Diaby (Theo, Jack)
Charmakh Van Persie Arshavin (Vela)
The Pool of Blackness team
Creature
Creature Creature Creature Creature Creature
Creature Creature Creature Creature Creature
If lurking near the away fans you will probably hear…
- “Is this supposed to be funny?”,
- “Where’s the visiting supporters car park?”
- “Grunt”.
- “Gfrgshaksdfjhsdfjf”
- “Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh”
What you won’t hear is
- “I say, jolly good shot that man.”
Elsewhere
And then again
Or perhaps
by Tony Attwood
For years there has been a general assumption that there are only three ways of developing a club and two ways of making money out of football.
You can make your club grow (so it was always said) by
Development Method 1) Buying in those who are already acknowledged to be the best players. True you have to pay lots of dosh, but it is obvious, the best players play best, and so you win stuff. This is the traditional English system. Chelsea and Man C still practice it.
Development Method 2) Develop great young talent by running an academy system. This is a lot cheaper than 1) even when it takes eight years to develop a player, but the problem is that it takes a long time to get going. Arsenal are only now seeing the benefits of a youth system set up 8 years ago.
In the past some clubs have hit on a bright group of kiddies by chance (Man U are an example with the Giggs generation, as was Arsenal under Graham when Adams and the rest came through) but doing it year after year was thought impossible – and besides since the average lifespan of a manager at a club is two years or less no one really wants to put his faith in something that won’t mature for eight years.
Development Method 3) Find players who are playing at lesser clubs or in lesser leagues, who you know are great, but whom the rest of the world have not quite recognised. Think Gilberto Silva, bought to Arsenal for £2m, who went on to be captain of Brazil.
This is of course the famous world-wide scouting, and since Wenger’s early triumphs many clubs have sought to use this as a method of recruitment. The problem is that you need a brilliant scouting system and (at the very top) someone who can see the difference between a 16 year old who is knocking them in and who will go on to do the same at the top level, and someone who just looks better than the average kids around him.
So those are the three ways of developing a club – and as we all know Arsène Wenger was the first to make a youth system work (three trophies in the last two years, and the first ever retention of the league by a youth team) and he was the man who invented world-wide scouting.
As for the two ways of making money out of football, these were quite simply
Money Making Method 1) Building up the club, taking on a few debts en route and selling the club on to someone with a load of money. We might think of K. Bates selling to R. Abramovich as an example, although I believe the Chelsea debts at the time of the sale were more than “a few”.
Money Making Method 2) Become a “selling club”. For years clubs in the old 3rd and 4th division never harboured any thoughts of coming up into the first division. Clubs like Bournemouth and Boscombe Athletic were in the 3rd division, had a ground that had not been upgraded for years, and existed on crowds of maybe 6,000 if they were lucky. They survived on the odd cup clash with a big team, and by selling players on.
Occasionally a team did break out of the lower leagues – Southampton left the old third division and made it to the top without changing their ground, and had a long run in the first division – but this was rare. Now it is just on impossible.
But even in the 1960s clubs knew their chances of rising up the ladder were small, so they existed by finding and grooming youngsters, who could be sold on. The old rule was, find a player every three or four years, get a transfer, and the club was secure, and could carry on making a loss.
But now once again everything has changed – and clubs are finding themselves left behind.
In terms of the Development Method, the transfer window is very quiet indeed (remember the days when Man IOU would spend £35m on July 1 and then keep everyone guessing as to who else they would grab in the next two months), the youth project remains a long-term dream which can’t be launched if you are struggling to make ends meet.
So world-wide scouting it is – and as has been often said, ten years ago if you went to a second division match in France the only scout there would be from Arsenal. Today you can’t move for scouts.
In terms of the Money Making methods, selling a club is a great idea, if you can find a buyer. Liverpool are struggling, Portsmouth became a laughing stock as they found four, none of whom had any money, Everton have been for sale for years, Notts County were actually given away by the fans who owned them to a bunch of jolly nice people with (unfortunately) no money, and so it goes on. So the list goes on.
True Man City have been sold – along with QPR, but the number of buyers is always going to be small, not least because when you get to that level it is hard to sell the club on again. Maybe Ahsan Ali Syed will buy Blackburn – but that’s about it for new sales I suspect.
So where does football go now?
The transfer window is grinding along doing very little save the purchases by Man City. Appy Arry Headcase would love to buy his usual twenty odd players but so far has just bought one. And when Arry is not dealing, you know the system is in trouble.
O’Neill at Villa resigned because he couldn’t count on a continuing open cheque book financing his failure to get into the Champs League. Even Chelsea are holding back with one eye on the financial doping regulations.
In effect football economics are grinding to a halt.
But three things are changing.
First, Arsenal’s youth system uniquely is in position and should be producing brilliant youngsters year after year from now on. While Tottenham have headed in the opposite direction and removed themselves from reserve team football, Arsenal have established the new progression system for young players. We know about players like JET and Wilshere coming through this year (and Frimpong until his tragic injury) – but just wait til you see what we have next year!
What’s more, kids and their agents across the world know that Arsenal are doing this, and they are queuing up to come to us. Watch out for Wellington Silva.
Second, although world-wide scouting is now overcrowded, Arsenal’s system is still in position, and is mostly simply looking for younger players who can be matured, rather than ready made players (although as this season’s transfer window shows, we can still pick up some of the established players, with two already signed and one more on the doorstep).
Third, Arsenal are making a profit, and so have the money to buy anyone if they want to.
And that leads to a final point. Some of the kids that Arsenal bring through don’t make it. Jay Simpson for example has just gone to Hull. It’s sad, but it happens. But that is not money wasted. Many of these players go on to make it in football, although not at the very top of the tree, and in every Arsenal sale there is a sell-on clause. Arsenal get their development money back even if the player ends up playing for the Tiny Totts (see Bentley for example).
So Arsène Wenger can spend £10m on Laurent Koscielny and pay high wages to Chamakh and still be looking to buy while others have the bank managers knocking on the door.
Thus once again Wenger has changed the world, and left the other clubs trailing behind him. We make money out of the actual game of football, in that the club makes a profit on each match. We make money in the transfer market by selling on players like Jay Simpson. We have a youth system in place and now producing the goods. We can buy in the transfer market.
And the new world looks like this
Development Method 1) - The Youth System bringing through new players
Development Method 2) - World Wide Scouting with younger players at the fore
Development Method 3) - The reputation of Arsenal as the place to come and learn how to be a brilliant player
Money Making Method 1) - Sell out at every match, top earning club from match day revenue in the world
Money Making Method 2) - Sell on of youngsters who don’t quite make it with extra sell-on clauses
Other clubs are now scratching their collective heads and wondering how to catch up, once again. Liverpool and Man U. are long since gone. But think of clubs like Tottenham, who rely on wheeling and dealing when there is no longer anyone to wheel and deal for, and you have financial doping regs plus the 25 rule are looking over your shoulder.
Think of Man City who have no idea what to do with all these players they have bought, and certainly would not get into the Champs League even if they qualified. And think of Chelsea who have tried and tried to put some sort of youth system in place, and still not done it.
Once more Wenger has changed the world.
Untold Arsenal
Remember the first time you saw Arsenal live
100 years ago, what was Arsenal like?
We’ve got the Jack, Jack, Jack
by Walter Broeckx
Some people who like a bit of hard rock will now where I have got this line from. It is the chorus of an ACDC song which is mostly sung out loud by visitors of their concerts.
As I haven’t been in the Emirates ever when Jack Wilshere has played for us I don’t know if there is a chant for him. If there is none, I would suggest the title of this article. As in the song it can be song a few times and if the whole stadium shouts Jack, Jack, Jack it really should do him some good. Even just the thought of it brings me shivers.
I think it must have been some 2 years ago when I saw Jack Wilshere for the first time. I was so excited I even wrote an article on him on the Benelux website. I called it: Jack, he Will. And I still think he will become one of the great players of the future.
If we all try to look back a few years, let’s say some 5 years we might then remember the then fragile looking Cesc Fabregas of those days. You could see he had something special. But he was still very young and when you look at the Cesc 5 years later you see a completely different player. Cesc has grown in every possible way. Physical, mental, scoring goals, creating goals… Cesc has turned the complete footballer last year. The money Barceloanus offered us was totally ridiculous.
When I see Jack Wilshere these days he reminds me of the Cesc of five years ago. And if I try to imagine I think it is impossible to even have any idea on how good Wilshere will be when he is 23 years old. If Wilshere keeps up his work and his ability to learn he could be one of the best players from the next generation.
Some people said it was stupid of Wenger to have him start at Liverpool. Now we have seen in him being impressive in pre-season. We have seen him play a number of games at Bolton last season. We have seen him in CL games, we have seen him in Carling cup games, we have seen him in FA cup games. I think it was about time that he got his first start in the EPL. And the mark of a great player is that he can perform anytime, anywhere, anyplace.
If you think I don’t see his mistakes I must tell you that I actually do see them. I even mentioned his name in my match review and his involvement in losing the ball which lead to the Liverpool goal. So I am well aware that he made a mistake and that in the coming years he will make more mistakes. Just name me one footballer who never makes mistakes.
But what I did see in the game was that he has learned from his former games he played for us before his loan spell. In those days he wanted to take them all one and dribble his way past them. On occasion he still is doing this and I would say, “Jack don’t stop doing it”. You’ve got the skill to do it and to run past people and trough defenders. Just keep doing it.
What I also liked about Jack is that he has that bit of venom in him that we sometimes miss in some players. He was facing a midfield with Gerrard, Mascherano and Kuyt and those are three full internationals for their country. Kuyt even reached the world cup final this summer. So you cannot say that they are bad players. And Jack didn’t look out of place against them. He fought with them and battled with them. He even came in with a tackle I don’t like to see but this is just showing the fact that he is fighting for his place in the team.
I also noticed that he didn’t play in the position he usually plays and which is very much upfront where he can be at his most dangerous with his dribbling or with his nice passing of the ball. And what I was most impressed about was the fact that in the first half he was always well aware of his position and the position of the rest of the team. When Diaby ran forward, he held back a bit to give some protection to the back four.
I think to have a 18 year old in the team who can think in that way is great. Most young players at that age run around like headless chickens but Jack was trying to read the game and the position of this teammates.
In the second half Jack was substituted after almost one hour of playing time. He didn’t set the world on fire with this game by scoring some goals or providing some assists. But he did show that he, at 18 years old, has what it takes to become a really good player for Arsenal.
So it has been an eventful week for Jack. Making his England debut, making his EPL debut for Arsenal at Anfield of all places. And he has done very well for an 18 year old youth product. So I will be looking forward to seeing more of Jack. Which makes me think of Aaron Ramsey. Last season he was at the same point in his career. And during the season you could see him getting stronger and better. Cesc said that Ramsey looked better than he was at the same age. I wouldn’t be surprised if in a few months the same can be said of Wilshere. Being better than Cesc at that age. Can you say something nicer about a player?
So my last problem is with whom can you compare Wilshere? Is it with Brady, the left footer with his great vision and passes? Is it with Bergkamp for the way he picks out players and for the way he has curled in a few goals in the past for the reserves? Is it with Cesc because his potential of becoming on of the best midfielders of Arsenal and thus of the world? Or will he be pushed out on the right side of the attack to play some kind of Messi role?
I’m sure that if Jack keeps his head down, keeps on working, keeps on fighting like he is doing we will have a midfield to dream about. Can you imagine, Cesc the stayer, a fully recovered Ramsey and we’ve got the Jack, Jack, Jack in midfield playing for us. I must say they could be better than Xavi-Iniesta-Messi from Barceloanus. Now only hoping some “not that kind of player” wants to stick it up to him in the next years. God let that not happen.
Sometimes one web site is all you need
Sometimes you need a bit more
Sometimes you need the book
By Tony Attwood
Untold Arsenal doesn’t do predictions about who we are about to buy, but if we did I might be tempted to say Sébastien Squillaci.
Squillaci is a central defender who was with Monaco – with whom we know that our Lord Wenger has many contacts. He went on loan to AC Ajaccio before getting established in 2002, as Monaco won the League Cup and were runners up in the league. He was also there in the champs league final of 2004 – wherein he scored against Real Mad in the semis.
He then went on to Olympique Lyonnais with whom he won the league twice, before joining Sevilla in July 2008, winning the Copa del Ray last season. He was in the French squad for the jolly world cup jaunt in South Africa but didn’t play – he’s got 20 caps which he keeps in a hat rack.
I suspect there might be something in this tale of a transfer because this is exactly the sort of player Wenger likes to bolster the back four – experienced and able to step up when needed, but not going to make a big fuss if he doesn’t get a game for a while. And besides that Young Guns reckon its a goer, which is usually a fair indication.
And there’s the dinky fact that he was withdrawn from the Sevilla team in the first leg of the Champions League play-off tie this week.
Quotes, as we know in football, are gibberish, but here’s one anyway….
“The player asked us not to play this game due to an important offer from a team, although for the moment, we consider the bid to be inadequate and Squillaci remains a Sevilla player,” said Sevilla director Ramon Rodriguez.
Here’s another: “I read ‘Making the Arsenal’ by that Tony Attwood guy, and I have to say that any club that has supporters who can write such stuff, well, you know, I have to be part of it,” said the player.
Which is probably closer to the truth than the Spanish press which are predicting “developments” on the transfer today which means nothing will happen for the next ten years.
Untold’s Index – see the world through a grain of sand
Woolwich Arsenal - the history of the club from the fans point of view
Making the Arsenal - the book every Italian was reading by the poolside this summer.
One of these statements is not quite correct, but well, this is football. Know what I mean?
The Twinkle of a Fading Star
By Tony Attwood
Trotting off to Italy for a week and a bit is rather an interesting experience. My Italian verges on the non-existent side of useless, so my attempts to glean footballing information from Corriere dello Sport in its native printed form is limited.
Fortunately there is an English edition – of which today’s headlines are
which shows you that their prime interest is, quite reasonably in Italian football, and by and large they don’t give a pig’s ear about the EPL. All that talk every day about the EPL dominating the world – maybe, but there are limits.
Which means that in Italy they haven’t actually noticed that Liverpool, one of the three most successful teams in English football in the past half century, are about to go plop. (I would say “go bang” but I think this is a case of TS Eliot predicting the future perfectly.)
“This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper”
Those lines come from Eliot’s “The Hollow Men” which starts
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
How perfectly that describes Liverpool FC. It won’t be at all long before the memory of Liverpool 1 Arsenal 1 is a dim and distant memory, replaced by thoughts which if not as perfectly written as TS Eliot’s below then at least carrying the same sentiment.
This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man’s hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.
“The Twinkle of a fading star”.
How perfectly that describes Liverpool FC
Before I went to Italy I wrote a little piece saying that I thought that all the talk of 6 bids on the Liverpool tabletop, (the Chinese, the Malaysians, and that bloke who runs the fish and chip shop outside Everton) were just chit chat, and nothing would happen.
I was wrong in one regard – something did happen.
The Royal Bank of Scotland have let it be known for sure that they will call in their debt of £237m on October 6, rather than agree to any more re-financing deal. What is more, that the jolly duo of Tom Hicks and George Gillett now have to pay RBS £2.5 million a week for being in default.
Shall I do that again, just in case you didn’t see it? No, allow me to move for a moment into boasting mode and say that I and a handful of others were writing about this two years ago. Then, when the auditors failed to sign off the Liverpool accounts I was writing about it again.
Of course I know it is just finance and just economics and just plain boring old guff that has nothing to do with Arsenal – but let me try it this way.
Let us say that the average EPL player of merit earns £25k a week. The money being paid to RBS each week for no reason other than the fact that the club is in default, could alternatively be used to pay 100 extra players at Liverpool. (OK I know about the 25 rule and they couldn’t use 100 players, but you see what I mean. They could buy and pay the salaries of a complete new squad week by week with that sort of money. It’s a sort of metaphor – without the metaphor.)
All of which shows you that if your names are Hicks and Gillett’s and you feel like borrowing £237m from RBS make sure you can pay it back when they ask you to. Which was actually April. (Eliot again: “April is the cruellest month”).
So by October 6 when RBS call in the loan, they will have added a neat little extra £60m to the bill making £200m since February 2007, when RBS stuffed £185m into the back pockets of those pesky Americans.
As for all those bids I was talking about before I went for my little pilgrimage to the Italian Lakes (so refined at this time of year don’tcha know what?) Yahya Kirdi’s,the ruling family of Sharjah, Sheikh Sultan bin Mohammed al-Qassimi, Kenneth Huang, uncle Tom Cobbley and all… sorry guys, they haven’t paid up.
So what of Arsenal? Those of us who are members of the club got our membership packs some 10 days or so ago, (complete with the 3.5 seconds of me on the DVD asking Arsene Wenger to define himself) and within were details of the new share purchasing arrangements for fans. The idea hit the papers yesterday, and got a very positive response.
It doesn’t mean that you or I own the club through the new system, but it is a positive step, and interestingly was welcomed by everyone on the board and the big shareholders off it. (Good move Mr Usmanov – more of the same please).
So let us compare and contrast Arsenal and Liverpool. Arsenal – total disaster, no trophies for five years. The model clearly doesn’t work, let’s do something different. I know, let’s follow the Liverpool model, except that they now have a chairman who is a season ticket holder at Chelsea, are paying £2.5 million a week to the bank in default payments, and can’t find a buyer – and so will become the property of the bank.
If you want to know what happens next look at Rangers in Scotland. They are run by the bank, and yes indeed they won the league last year, so maybe it isn’t such a bad idea after all.
But just take a look at what is happening to that club, as every asset under the Rangers banners (from players to the club shops) are being sold off. No one wants to buy them, and soon there will be nothing left. Absolutely bugger all.
Arsenal meanwhile are still under the board’s control, still making money, and very slowly giving some control over to the fans. Not a full Barca model (thankfully – they are bust too) but a step in a more reasoned direction.
There is so much excitement about the new Share-Save scheme that the Arsenal Supporters’ Trust website crashed for 90 minutes yesterday.
We are on the edge of having a debt of just £240m – the outstanding debt on the Ems. That debt has an interest rate so low that the chances are that if you have a mortgage on your house, you’d do next to anything to get such a rate.
That is good news, because since there is no doubt that the debt will be paid off then the club will become worth more and more over time, and the shares will be worth more.
Actually it is really really amusing that some of the Anti-Arsenal Arsenal sites are telling us not to touch the shares – what with the ground being half empty on Saturday for the Blackpool match because of the all the season ticket non-renewals. They will, as always miss out while the rest of us have quite a nice day out.
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May I express my sincere thanks to Walter for running Untold during my time away – challenging articles, vibrant conversation… that is exactly what Untold Arsenal should be. An antidote to the Anti-Arsenal Arsenal sites while publishing articles of the type to be found nowhere else.
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Untold’s Index – see the world through a grain of sand
Woolwich Arsenal - the history of the club from the fans point of view
Making the Arsenal - the book every Italian was reading by the poolside this summer.
One of these statements is not quite correct.
by Waleed Ahmad
The so-called “art of tackling” is great and all, but what is it good for? Absolutely nothing.
As someone who loves winning, I think players who can’t tackle are better for a side than players who can win the ball perfectly well.
I honestly believe that at Arsenal there is too much emphasis on doing things the right way. Who cares if you tackle the right way or not? A good tackle only wins you the ball, but we need to aim higher than just winning a ball, we are Arsenal FC and our aim should be to win trophies. The lack of ambition at the club is startling.
Besides wasting our young players’ time trying to improve the timing of their tackles, they also needlessly practice how to “pass” the ball. Passing is something that should never be taught to anyone. Why should we teach our kids to defer their problem to someone else? And Wenger has our players doing some strange things, like having our players run with the ball tangled in their feet. It is frankly embarrassing to watch.
To win trophies, you first need really big and ugly players that remind the opposition players of trolls or goblins. It is important to instantly put the opposing players in a negative state of mind by giving them negative images.
Next, the trolls need to be violent. They should be experienced in the art of getting stuck in. They need not know where the ball is, they should just have a keen eye for the attackers’ ankles. That is all they need to be able to do. If we field 11 of these types of players, our opponents have no chance. It is so blindingly obvious that I can’t believe that Wenger doesn’t see it.
It helps if these players can hack down attacking players without conceding a foul or getting booked. Usually the refs play by the book but sometimes they make the mistake of blowing the whistle. You can’t always trust the ref to make the right call so your players have to be good at putting up a facade of innocence. A sad puppy face doesn’t look pretty on a troll but it works well enough to fool the ref. Complimenting the referee’s outfit is also a good idea.
But most importantly you need the media on your side. If the media is on your side, you can get away with anything. Everyone laughs off Paul Scholes’ every lunge because he’s a nice bloke who never learned to tackle. Then there’s Shawcross who gets away with breaking a 19-year-old’s leg because he’s not that sort of player.
Having English players in the team also helps keep the journalists and pundits happy. Everyone knows that you need an English spine to succeed. I think everyone in our staff and squad, starting with Wenger, should replace their existing spine with a superior English spine in order to be more successful.
So let’s give up our crazy ideas about technique and tactics and training. Honestly this whole act of doing things the right way smacks of elitism. Are we really too good to do things the way everyone else does?
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This article was send to us by Waleed Ahmad who has his own Arsenal blog since recently.
Waleed Ahmad is a 21-year-old gooner from the United States. He has been following Arsenal since 2005-2006, so despite some close calls, he hasn’t had the priviledge of seeing Arsenal lift a trophy. Regardless, his faith in our Lord Wenger and the Arsenal remains strong. Follow his thoughts at http://goonerhead.blogspot.com/____________________________
If you have an article in you, and you think it would fit with the Untold Arsenal philosophy, we’d love to receive it. If we publish it, you’ll be on a web site read by around a quarter of a million people a month.
The main point to remember is that Untold has a point of view – that we support Arsene Wenger and the club come what may – so if you want to argue that Wenger should go now, we won’t publish your piece. But don’t worry, there are many blogs that share that viewpoint, so you are sure to find a publisher.
Our areas of interest are: the positive nature of the Wenger revolution, corruption in football, football finance, the need for reform, the cretinous nature of most football journalism, the players at all level in the club – including the ladies’ team – and football humour.
Please send your article written as a word file, by email to Tony@hamilton-house.com
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And for those who have been missing Tony a bit he will be back very soon. In the mean while you could read:
something about our new signings
something about old things
something about all things
By Walter Broeckx
In my match review I didn’t talk much about our two new signings. I did this just because I wanted to think a bit more about their performances and to have a look at a few situations in the game.
So let us start with our goal scorer Chamakh. On Arsenal.com he was voted man of the match and I must admit I didn’t vote for him. Not because I thought he had a bad game but I really thought that Rosicky was the most impressive player on the pitch. He did more than all the other players of the two teams had done in the whole 90 minutes.
But on the Chamakh. The way he forced the goal was a very untypical Arsenal goal. A cross from Rosicky from the left and Chamakh was the quickest on the ball and was unlucky to only hit the post. Lucky for us Reina made justice happen by flapping the ball in his own goal. I loved the way Chamakh attacked the ball and I think that we will see him score a few goals this season when he gets some good crosses. I think one of his problems is that we haven’t had a striker like him for a while. So the team has to adjust a bit and has to practice on different crosses to give him good service. But let us not forget he made his EPL debut away from home at Anfield. Not the easiest game to play for your first match. But the fact that he forced the goal will give him a big boost.
The only thing he has to work on a bit is some of his close passing. I think he has a very good technique but playing a team that parks the bus, like Liverpool did for the majority of the game, is something that hardly is ever seen in Europe. Or it should be in Italy but I don’t watch Italian football unless there really is nothing else at my TV. This is something he will have to learn to play against. But this can only be learned by doing it.
Let us pass on to Koscielny who had a very mixed afternoon. His first half was really great I thought. Liverpool never really could come near our goalkeeper. Some good interceptions and stealing off the ball at times. Sometimes he missed but he was always back to smother any possible danger.
I also noticed that he is a player who is staying more behind than Vermaelen. I think this is good. He looks to be more a real defender than Vermaelen. Vermaelen could easily play in midfield but Koscielny looks to be a player who is more comfortable in taking the ball away and then hand it over to another player and keep behind to guard the defence. Just the thing we needed I think.
When he was bought some fans looked at a picture and said he would be blown away by the top strikers in the league. He was too thin. Yes he is not a big fat lump kind of defender. But certainly is not a player that is quickly intimidated. The tackle on him would have been enough to put most people off the field. According to Wenger he had had big lump on his shin after that. The doctors feared even a broken leg but our too thin defender raised himself from the stretcher in the dressing room, looked at his leg, felt he could walk, felt he could run and he came out in the second half. Much to the disliking of the Liverpool fans but much to my delight. By doing this he proved he is not a soft player. No he just escaped a broken leg but he just came out on the pitch and continued his game.
When Torres came on he did two great duels with the Spanjard who was fresh on the field. On both occasions Koscielny outran and out battled Torres. These were really fine pieces of top defending I thought and much needed. And that is what Arsène Wenger has bought him for. Leave the fancy football to Cesc and Robin and Koscielny will do what is needed behind.
To make his game ever more memorable he coloured his debut. The first yellow tackle was a very well deserved one. I think Mrs. Kuyt will have had a very quit night. I surely wouldn’t want to be in the place of Kuyt when his boot hit him where you don’t like it up there. But his second yellow card was a joke from the ref. Yes Koscielny handled the ball, but the ball was 1 foot away from his hand when the Liverpool player tried to hook the ball over Koscielny’s head. The ref gave a yellow card for it. Now you can only give a yellow card if you think it is a deliberate handball. In this case it was very doubtful. The other very deliberate handball I saw, from Ngog when he tried to nick the ball away from Clichy was not sanctioned with a yellow card. What do we always hear about refs: they have to be consistent. Well in this case the ref made a mess of it. If you give a yellow card for handball than you must make sure you hand them out to all the players who do this. And not just one player in the final minutes of the game with a handball that was not deliberate and it also was in Liverpools own half so it was not that Liverpool was on a scoring opportunity.
So the ref spoiled his debut by sending him off. So, it looks that nothing has changed during the summer when it comes to referees in the EPL. Same old referees, always cheating….
Anyway, it is just only one game played. An away game at Anfield so a difficult game. We were without many important players and with 3 debutants in the team, with a player who hasn’t played a minute this season like Diaby. With a player who is out of form. And we got a point. Our debutants did good, some of the players who came off the bench showed they are also ready. Some big players coming back soon. So, why worry there will be sunshine after rain, there will be another 37 games to be won.
Oh and don’t worry about that other EPL debutant Wilshere. I will bring my view on him later on. I think as one of our own youth project boys he deserves this.
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Asking fore some real support
Keep an eye on this one in the future
All from Untold when Tony was gone
By Walter Broeckx
The wise lessons I learned from “De Croc”
I must apologize because I have to start with talking about someone who isn’t related to Arsenal at first sight but someone who has told me some interesting things that many Arsenal fans should listen to or take notice of. So to start this article I must explain who “De Croc” is. As I live in another country I have supported in my childhood days my local team, still do from a distance. In those days I was a supporter of my local team who played half of the time in the First division (what is the EPL in England) but half of the time we went down, to only come back the next year or so. So it was mostly a rollercoaster ride with a sad finish at times but also with the fun of becoming champions the next season or gaining promotion.
And as a kid I had the luck to be living close to one of the last legends we have had in our team: De Croc. De Croc was the nickname he got and he was one of those players who only knew one team in his life: as a player and as a supporter. He was a few years older than I and he lived around the corner. All his career he stayed a semi-professional player. He was a plumber and had a company together with his father and it was not unusual that at 3 pm he came off the roof of a house to go to the stadium and to play a game in the evening.
De Croc was a boy from the neighbourhood, always had time for a chat, very down to earth. In those days I was helping our supporters club with their own magazine by writing articles and doing interviews of players. So I had the luck and the chance to speak with first class players and could ask them a lot of questions. I was between 14 and 18 years old at that time, just to give you an idea. Now come to think of it, I’m still doing what I did as a kid….
Anyway I have spoken on many occasions with De Croc when I was waiting at the bus stop and he came to get his morning newspaper and you could always ask him questions and he would answer it. I also did an interview once with him for the magazine. And I learned how a player is looking at things. So once the question was asked: Do you hear what people shout at you and does it influence you?
And this is what he told about it: “When we play away from home at Anderlecht, Bruges or Standard Liège as a player you feel the hostile atmosphere. But for me this was something that made me more determined. I wanted to spoil it for them. (Editor note: It mostly didn’t work out that way to be honest) Some players were affected by this but I loved it every second.”
And about the own fans he said: “When the fans are getting behind the team it really gives you wings. At times in a game you almost feel sick from the running you have done and you want to slow down but then the fans shout the team forward and you just want to please the fans and you forget the upcoming cramps in your leg, you forget that you hardly can breath anymore, you just keep running. It is inspiring and it is something that makes you work harder, run faster, dig deeper.”
But about the years when it was all doom and gloom, when we finished at a relegation place he had this to say: “When the stadium is rather empty it becomes painful at times. If there are a lot of fans there is so much noise that you cannot hear what individual fans shout or say. You here the noise of the crowd and that’s it. But when there are not many fans, and when you play not at your best, when you are struggling you sometimes hear nothing. You only hear silence as if the fans are just waiting for bad things to happen. They know you will screw up at some time in the match, as it happened all these times before. And then you can also hear what the individual fan is shouting. And when your own fans are shouting at you or at a team mate: ‘you useless piece of sh*t’ or even worse insulting things, you hear this and it hurts. Nothing is more worse for a player than having your own fans having a go at you. It cuts like a knife and hurts. And there have been times that I wanted to come off the field during the game and speak to such a fan and ask him to support us and not to tear us further down. When you are giving it all on the field and they call you names, you just wonder at times why you are doing it and for whom.”
So this is one of the reasons why I cannot stand it when people boo or insult our own players. It will never help them. And I know that when one fan in the Emirates calls one of our players a piece of sh*t, this player will not hear him. As there is too much noise in the stadium.
But now the shouting at your own players is not done in an empty Emirates. Now it is done at the internet stage. Where people keep on insulting our players and our manager. And let us just forget the manager. But concentrate on the players. The players are young, they all have the technology available that we have. They will surf on the internet and who knows which sites they visit. Just imagine one moment being an Arsenal player and coming on to some sites where you see your own supporters abusing you, calling you names, telling you that you are worthless, telling you should be given away, and so on….
Doing all those things on the internet is the modern equivalent of what “De Croc” has told me about hearing the individual fan shouting and pulling you down on the playing field. It will not help a player. It only undermines his confidence. So I will not throw abusive words to my own players as I know it will not help them in anyway. If you don’t like a player or even if you think you know more than the manager and think a certain player is not good enough, fine. But just say things like: Well I would play with player X instead of player Z, as I think that X is better against a defending team. You don’t just have to shout X = sh*t. Just imagine being X and have to read it every day on the internet. Yeah you could imagine that it would make you feel good.
And I don’t want to say that from now on you must adore each player we have and you must like them all. No, I also have my favourite players in the team. I also have players I rate higher than others. But De Croc taught me that bringing your own players down will not help that player at all. And this is one of the reasons my blood is boiling when I see our own fans having a go at our own players. Just get behind your team who ever the manager has chosen to play for us in our colours. Just support your own players and let us save the abuse to players from other teams.
De Croc taught me that players do need to know and to feel that the supporters are behind them, so lets just be real supporters and get behind our players, all of them, as long as they have our shirt on.
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What would we do if Wenger would leave?
The past will come alive in the future over here
More of the same
By Walter Broeckx
When Tony started this blog he was doing it mostly because he had enough of the stream of negativity that surrounded the blogosphere around Arsenal and Arsène Wenger. He wanted to balance it a bit with this blog that since then has supported Wenger in what he has been doing for this club.
This blog has shown the problems we faced when building the Emirates, when moving to the Emirates, when adapting to the Emirates. And it also has highlighted that we had to do this on our own. No rich American owners who promised a lot but most of all delivered a lot of debt on some of their clubs. Or rich Russians who got the chequebook out and paid lots of money for all the superstars of the moment in order to win the Champions League. In which they have failed thus far. Or Arab millionaires who wave around their money as if it is monopoly money and also buying all the money greedy players on this planet that don’t give a thing about the colour they are playing in as long as they get the most money each week. Oh and even with spending all that money even Manchester Sheiky couldn’t qualify for the Champions League.
On this site most of the writers AND COMMENTERS saw the bigger picture of things. And we should be happy about the fact that many Arsenal fans are also able to see this bigger picture of things. Maybe it is time to say thanks to all of you who comment with such well thought replies to what we are trying to say.
How ever we cannot be blind for the fact that there are other people on the internet. People who want us to win now. For the moment I am not going to call them fans from other teams who just are trying to bring unrest to our fans. I am willing to believe that they are real Arsenal fans but that they are people who are impatient and want us to win a trophy today and so I will call them the impatient fans. They disagree with the youth project which in their eyes has failed for 5 years now. A youth project that is only starting to bear its fruits if you look at the fact that players like Wilshere and Gibbs look to have made the needed step up. Players like JET, Frimpong who are very close to do the same. But for those impatient fans it doesn’t go fast enough.
Those fans want us to buy players without trying to give that fine young prospect the chance of becoming a better player. If we would have let them have it their way we would have sold Song long time ago. Or even have given him away to any team that would take him. Now those people are asking, impatiently: “when will Song be back”. If we would have bought Melo like they had insisted we would have been first in the red cards table maybe last season and we never would have seen how Song developed in to a very important player and possible one of the best defensive midfielders in the coming seasons.
Many of the impatient fans have been asking Wenger to be sacked. They blame him for everything that went wrong. I think we all know what those impatient fans have been saying the last years: “he has lost it, he knows nothing, he is filling his pockets, blah, blah and more blah”. You can even read it here on this blog every now and then. They all hoped that the board would throw him out or that they wouldn’t give him a new contract.
Since Saturday however there is no doubt anymore. Arsène Wenger will be our manager for at least another 4 years. The board has underlined the fact that they are on the same wavelength as our manager and want the approach that we have started many years back when they knew we were facing a difficult time ahead will be continued.
This approach is based upon building our own superstars from kids age up and only adding to the squad when needed and nothing could be found in our own youth to fill up the gap. Wenger’s wet dream some have called it but it turns out to be the wet dream of the board also.
So here we have it in the open and clear for all who want to see it. This is not just a solo project from our manager. No the board is fully supporting it and want it to continue. Whatever the thoughts might have been in the past, this is now the Arsenal way. This is our way. And this will not be liked by the impatient fans.
At times we have been called AKB (Arsène knows best)-people. They have said to us that we only support the manager in person and what would we do if the manager would walk away? What would we do? Still support the club or follow the manager to wherever he goes? They threw it at us and wanted us to look like bad Arsenal supporters. We didn’t support the club, we supported the manager was their opinion. They made it look as if we are not real supporters of the club. They were the only true fans of the club and we were just Arsène Wenger fans.
But now it seems that the manager and the board of our club support each other and have the same goal and the same approach to reach that goal. In fact it is now clear to see that those who have been supportive to Wenger are the one that support the long term vision of the club, not just the vision of the manager. By offering him a new contract and by Wenger signing it they have told the fans: you can say what you want, you can think what you want, but this is the road we have taken en the road we will follow together. In fact it looks like that the way to look at things this site has always taken, is about the same way that the board is looking at things. And as the board (like it or not) is the owner of Arsenal and it is the board that is deciding on the direction of the club, it looks that we on here are the real followers of the club. And it seems that we are not “just Wenger fans” as they have accused us.
So for those impatient fans it must not have been a pleasant news that Arsène Wenger signed an extension to his contract. And then the questions comes up: What will they do? Will they still support the club now knowing the way it is going? Will they walk away now it is clear that the club is going further in this road? Or will someone of them buy all the shares, impatient as he/she is and do it in another way?
I think this is a time in the history of our club that some fans will have to think about being a supporter or not. Are they supporters of Arsenal with all what it represents and for the moment this is the Wenger + board approach, or are they Arsenal fans who only think about winning things and if possible today. A real supporter would choose for staying a supporter and supporting the club and the players. Someone who only want to win things will have other options if he wants to.
But to answer the question they have been throwing at me in the past: I would have stayed an Arsenal fan if Wenger would leave us. I have been an Arsenal fan since long before Wenger came along. I admit, I became also a Wenger fan for what he has brought us and for the way he has kept us at the top in those difficult years. But no matter what if Wenger leaves I will stay an Arsenal fan. So the question is, will the impatient fans stay Arsenal supporters if Wenger stays? And he does stay.
So time to choose: support the club and support the players and the road we are going, like it or not. Or you could leave and call it a day. But don’t complain if at the end of this decade or so the Arsenal supporters who have supported not only the club but also the board and the manager appear to have chosen the right path. Let’s do it our way, The Arsenal Way! And let us show some pride because we have the courage to choose another way. It takes courage and a brave man to go on new paths.
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Win it now for us
Did we win it in the past
All and more
by Waleed Ahmad
Why We Won’t Win The Title Until The Season Is Over
It is because we wait until the very end to do things. What’s the point? We should sneakily rip a few pages from certain Italian clubs’ books and win the title before anyone else can.
We need to learn to spend wisely. Too much money goes into paying our players. Why do we even bother when Barcelona won the treble with their players playing for free? Some of the things we do boggles the mind.
The money should be going not to the players, but to the people that really matter. I don’t mean Wenger should pay himself even more, because as we’ve seen with England, paying the manager a lot of money doesn’t help much. The people we should be paying are the ones that can help us win the title before the first kick of the round thing.
As you know I’m trying to be as vague as possible. Being too explicit about things can hurt you, as Joan Laporta found out. Saying too much never helps. So I hope anyone who reads this and Arsene Wenger himself understands what I am on about, even though what I’m saying may not make sense.
I read somewhere that the highest transfer fee ever paid for a referee was 27 million pounds. It is not a lot of money. It is good value. Just saying.
The problem with us is that we’re all too nice. I remember Walcott saying he won’t be a nice guy anymore but he’s still nice. He obviously lied, which isn’t a nice thing to do, but it’s certainly not dirty enough. While our rivals have players like you-know-who and you-know-what (that plays for the Totts), we’re stuck with these nice kids who like to play “good football.” I don’t want to see good football. I don’t even like football. I like winning things. Win for me, Arsene.
I am a lot of things but what I am not is a waiter. I don’t like waiting until May to see my club lift a trophy. I am ambigious enough to say that I demand success now. Do what you need to, Arsenal. Trophies don’t grow on trees, and only the early birds can catch them.
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This article was send to us by Waleed Ahmad who has his own Arsenal blog since recently.
Waleed Ahmad is a 21-year-old gooner from the United States. He has been following Arsenal since 2005-2006, so despite some close calls, he hasn’t had the priviledge of seeing Arsenal lift a trophy. Regardless, his faith in our Lord Wenger and the Arsenal remains strong. Follow his thoughts at http://goonerhead.blogspot.com/_______________________________
If you have an article in you, and you think it would fit with the Untold Arsenal philosophy, we’d love to receive it. If we publish it, you’ll be on a web site read by around a quarter of a million people a month.
The main point to remember is that Untold has a point of view – that we support Arsene Wenger and the club come what may – so if you want to argue that Wenger should go now, we won’t publish your piece. But don’t worry, there are many blogs that share that viewpoint, so you are sure to find a publisher.
Our areas of interest are: the positive nature of the Wenger revolution, corruption in football, football finance, the need for reform, the cretinous nature of most football journalism, the players at all level in the club – including the ladies’ team – and football humour.
Please send your article written as a word file, by email to Tony@hamilton-house.com
If this brought a smile on your face, how about this one
Or if you really care about our club and its future
Or if you care about our past
By Tony Attwood
Why would anyone want to put money into football? Why would the Chinese want Liverpool, the Arabs want Manchester City, and anyone want Leeds United?
The people who have continuously talked about why (although not directly) are the Glazer family who suggest that all will be ok soon because the new internet and media roll out of football. It might not do much for Manchester United but it certainly could save the Glazer family (or so they say).
Football in modern times has been about endlessly finding new sources of income. In the old days there was only one source of income – the gate money. I doubt that Arsenal’s books in 1919 looked much different from their books in 1959 – income from matches, outgoings the wages and the ground.
But then along came TV, and there was a rush to grow the income and everyone thought it was wonderful. Except that all these growth scenarios have a way of coming to an end – and because by then the clubs have all built their business on growth, they get desperate to find the new source of cash. (And because most clubs are run by the Silly Gang, they always think each one will last forever, and costs will never catch up.)
Just think how it has gone:
1: The Cup Final on TV and that was your lot.
2: Match of the Day and that funny programme they had on ITV.
3: Live football instead of recorded highlights, but with only BBC and ITV to bid for it, the income stayed low.
4: Lots and lots of live football - because Sky was in the scene – initially with analogue and then with digital. This is the latest source of revenue to reach the top of the mountain at just under £600m a year for the EPL.
5: International television rights still shooting up and now at £460m. In the UK watching overseas football has never been big time (Channel 4 started it showing Italian TV, now the Italians can hardly give their rights away, and with Spain becoming a pale imitation of Scotland, the interest there has gone too). But the EPL is on the up, and it might well go on rising – but again there will be a limit.
6: Europe. The Champs League has the money as is where everyone wants to be. Without it, you have no income. But, imagine this… supposing the clubs sponsored by benefactors (Man Arab, KGB etc) say, “we don’t really care about the Champs League – the EPL is bigger than the Champs League” and don’t even bother to curtail their buying in order to qualify, then at once the Champs League gets devalued.
7: Matchday income - static or declining for many. Arsenal are one of the few who have managed to push this up to new levels with the Ems, but the Ems is full, so there is nowhere to go, except with more on-site retail.
8: Shirt sales - the way that Real Madrid was supposed to buy C Ronaldo. I can’t work out when shirt sales started, but putting out two or three new shirts every season looks to be the end of the line. Sales can’t go up much more, and once the fashion ends they decline. The notion that a player could be bought by income from shirt sales was so silly, it must have been based on marketing experimentation – as in,
Marketing Director: “I know the punters are cretins, but do you think they are so stupid to go for this story?”
Chairman: “Only one way to find out – let’s try it.”
9: Clubs’ own TV stations – Arsenal have just announced that Arsenal TV is to become Arsenal Media and, according to the blurb that means “different broadcast and media channels. In English, HD broadband. And that is what Stan Kroenke knows about, and why he is there. There’s no point in thinking about take-overs and Kroenke going to 30% ownership – he owns half of Arsenal broadband – and that’s where the club thinks the next round of money is.
We will be offered background programmes in the UK and Ireland via Arsenal Media, and actual games for the rest of the world. Forget the crummy pictures from Austria this summer – this is HD, once the cables are in place.
It starts this season (although not in HD) with a step up in terms of programming but I suspect it would be a mistake to consider whatever is put out this season as anything other than a modest start. “The new Arsenal Media brand reflects the paradigm shift from a traditional television-centric approach, to one that is focused on creating broader, multi-platform content and programme formats that can be effectively delivered and re-appropriated across different broadcast and media channels,” says the blurb. Make of that what you can (and if you have an English translation, please do let me have it).
10: Bang. There is a problem with all this. I love Arsenal, but even when Arsenal TV was on Setanta I only watched it sometimes. I liked the reserve games and occasionally an old match, but not much more. I only have 18 hours a day to play with, and I have books to write, a family to love and enjoy, dances to go to, movies to watch, books to read, friends to visit… There is in fact only one thing missing at the moment in football terms – and that is the away match which is not televised live on Sky. Once I have that, that’s it.
Marketing around the club is huge in the US, and it could be so here, and that is what people are banking on. If it happens Arsenal will be there, worldwide. If not, fortunately we are not dependent on it, and we can go back a step.
Remember, nothing grows forever – just as our friendly high street bankers forget, and then found out, but never had to pay the price for.
Untold Arsenal – all the bits than most other people think are rather pointless and silly not to mention trivial and occasionally boring but we think are part of the essence of the whole equation if you see what I mean
Woolwich Arsenal – just the same but without electromagnetism.
Making the Arsenal – beyond everything you could imagine
by Walter Broeckx
When the fixture list comes out in June every team is anxious to know what the first match will be. An easy home game against a new team? Going away to a team that should be struggling to avoid relegation? But one can be sure that one thing most teams don’t like to see is a trip away to one of the top 4 teams. But for Arsenal it was no home game against a new team, no away game to a possible struggling side. No it was being thrown in the deep end and make sure you can swim: an away trip to Liverpool.
There are easier things to start the new season. With the world cup we had quite a few players missing and with our early injury crisis we also had some players who hardly have played in preseason. Cesc came back with a soar throat from Mexico and wasn’t even on the bench but Robin Van Persie was. Together with Song who also hasn’t played for us in preseason.
Liverpool with their new manager wanting to show he can do better than Benitez. Now we can all not agree with the spending of the money from Benitez but he played normally some kind of attacking football at home with great passion, the way they like it up there. Hodgson was not a bad manager at Fulham but when I saw them play against us in the past seasons they always played a very defensive line with always some 9 players behind the ball and one or 2 players who sometimes tried to start an attack. Let us say mostly mid table or lower table tactics, well against us anyway.
After half an hour I was thinking: are we playing Fulham at Anfield? Because at that moment a statistic flashed on my screen telling me that we had some 3 or 4 shots on goal but at the other end of the statistics it said: Liverpool : 0 shots. Zero, nothing. I checked again and noticed that it really was Liverpool who was playing at home. If I remember right it took them another 6 or 7 minutes before the first attempt of Liverpool at our goal was seen and it was a shot very, very wide.
So yes we were very on top of the game, had more possession and kept Liverpool away from our goal. Was this Anfield? It seemed so. The only thing that was missing for us was a goal. We had a couple of possibilities but Reina made a good save on a Vermaelen free kick to deny us an early goal. Right at the end of the first half Liverpool tried to attack themselves which resulted in Joe Cole being a true red. If Atkinson is drawing the line there, fine with me. Intent or not, I think Cole went in with both feet to Koscielny. Always a foul, and always at least a yellow card. The ref did what more refs should do: show a red card until these dangerous tackles stop.
The reason why he gave the red card was that Cole went in a frontal way in to Koscielny. If it would have been a sideways tackle and he would have hit him he would have come away with a yellow card but I told you on a few occasions that a frontal tackle is the most dangerous tackle there is and should be out of the game.
The second half started with two shocks: Koscielny back on the field and Ngog scoring a goal. We lost the ball where we shouldn’t have lost it. Wilshere and Nasri had a misunderstanding and Ngog could score. Those things happen. Part of learning I guess for Jack who showed that he can become a great player but also that he has to learn a few things. But I think I will let him have the time to learn it as he will be a great player for us. I think it was great from our manager to go for him and let him start at Liverpool. It was a big example on how Wenger gives a young player the chance to prove himself.
After the goal we lost our composure a bit. But with bringing on Walcott and Rosicky we turned it around. Rosicky had a great half our and showed what a great player he can be. If he hadn’t lost some 2 years with injury we maybe would have more trophies as he is a player who can play many positions and is experienced enough. It was no coincidence that it was from his cross that Chamakh showed that we have other options now. All he needed was one great cross to give us a goal. Yes I know it was Flapreina who pushed the ball in his own net but it was Chamakh that beat Reishit for the cross and made him look poor.
Could you imagine if it was Arsenal that had conceded such a goal? Some would have asked the head of Wenger, of our goalkeeper, tell that Wenger hasn’t got a clue, tell that the board are filling their pockets, tell that well you know the usual stuff when a keeper makes a mistake. But now we have a laugh with Reina and find it great. And that is the difference with our keeper making a mistake and the other. When we suffer the mistake it hurts so much we can lose perspective. But those who have seen the goals in the EPL this weekend will agree with me when I say that a lot of the goals were down to very bad mistakes by the keepers.
So saying that our keeper(s) is(are) the worst in the EPL is very hard on them.
By the way did I mention the fact that we need another centre back? I just did so if you comment by saying that we don’t want us to sign another defender only prove that they don’t read the article, or at least not until the end.
If you look at some match statistics we won them all. We had more shots on goal, in fact we had the double of the shots that Liverpool had and it really was them that played at home. We had more corners, we had more of the ball, we had more territorial advantage as we played mostly in their half. Yes, we played away from home and at Anfield but the way they defended in 75 minutes it looked as if they was a scared team and didn’t dare to come at us.
So the first game is done. One point at Anfield is always a good point. I still feel that we should have won the game. We were the better team but Liverpool defended in their Fulham style and we have struggled against the Hodgson tactics in the past.
Can’t wait till next Saturday when the Emirates becomes more a bit Highbury but bigger. The North Bank, the Clock End back with their old names. Will be great to see the Highbury history getting a new live in the Emirates.
By Walter Broeckx
When I leave this place of sorrow
To another world I will go
But if there’s no Arsenal in heaven
I will be going down below
If my friends I have to leave you
Someday we will meet again
I will return and never leave you
Being a Gooner to the end
This has been a day to die for
And after the game we have won
Then we hear the choir of Gooners
Signing till the day is done
And when the evening dawn is calling
all the ground is coloured red
And long after the night comes falling
all the final words have been said
We have enjoyed the game together
Shared our passion for a while
Walked the barren roads together
And have travelled many miles
This has been a day to die on
And if my life is over and done
Here my shirt will lay beside me
Together with, what’s left of me
If my friends I have to leave you
Someday we will meet again
I will return and never leave you
and be a Gooner to the end
__________________
More from Untold Arsenal
More from the Woolwich Arsenal
More more more more more more more
By Phil Gregory
Liverpool away, a great opener that the fixture computer has given us there. It’s going to be tough, an away tie with a side looking to make amends for a truly shoddy showing last season. I’m not the world’s biggest fan of Liverpool FC, the fans do my head in with their constant harping of past glories, while my girlfriend’s dad was lauding half the team as world class as of last Wednesday, so we really must pick up the three points.
The team itself is still up in the air. Wenger was cagey in his press conference when asked about goalkeepers, which was to be expected. In the run-up to the Liverpool game, he hardly wants to undermine the confidence of his keepers by saying we are openly looking to sign an alternative, so with the season kicking off I wouldn’t expect any official information on the goalkeeping situation until a signing is unveiled. I’m expecting Almunia to be the man given the nod, but it could go either way with a good few blogs expecting Fabianksi, The Pole had the opportunity to perform in pre-season and establish himself as number 1 after Almunia’s uninspiring form last season, but he hasn’t taken it, so Manuel it is (for now).
Song sounds like he’s 90% ruled out, Denilson could make it while Diaby is available. I’d be delighted if Denilson was available, him and Frimpong hold would be a good combination. Denilson’s game intelligence and positional awareness would compliment the youthful exuberance of Frimpong and would leave us much more secure. Such a team set-up is unlikely however, given Denilson seems more of a gamble than Diaby, so the Frenchman seems likely to get the nod. It’s not his favoured role, but he’s got the physicality for the role and will need to show a little discipline.
The back four is as expected, Koscielny replaces Gallas to maintain our francophone back four. Nasri will start in lieu of Fabregas and hopefully continue a run of good performances over the last couple of weeks.
Walcott has looked sharper than he has for a while (no doubt a summer of rest and then a decent pre-season will do wonders for his fitness) and is a man with a point to prove, as he has said himself. Chamakh fills in for Robin up top, while our Anfield specialist Arshavin will continue his familiar inside left role.
Cesc and Robin are highly unlikely to start, though a lack of match fitness shouldn’t preclude them from appearing on the bench. Even if the pair of them are unfit, they’ll still be capable of twenty or thirty minutes off the bench if we need them. With the pair of them having trained for at least a week or two, you’d hope involving them wouldn’t pose an undue risk in terms of injuries.
Predicted line-up
Almunia
Sagna Koscielny Vermaelen Clichy
Frimpong Diaby
Nasri
Walcott Chamakh Arshavin
The goalkeeping situation isn’t ideal, but we’ll have to get on with it for now. Hopefully Wenger is simply being thorough, and come the end of the window we’ll have a new man in the gloves. For now however, we need to get behind Almunia. He’s not the best, but he’s steady and has played in the big games many, many times so Anfield won’t hold any fear for him. I’m expecting Rosicky to be on the bench, as while he’s fitter than Diaby, he won’t offer us as much defensively and ideally I want a balanced midfield. Eboue may feel aggrieved and there is certainly a case for his inclusion, given he’d offer more defensively than Walcott, and would allow Theo to come off the bench which seems to yield the most from the Englishman. Wilshere too is most likely to be on the bench, but certainly has plenty to offer going forward. If we’re struggling with creativity, he may well be a substitution to provide a bit of spark.
With Torres out (or at best playing terribly unfit and off of a poor World Cup) I’m not convinced they’ll trouble our defence. Not having Song isn’t ideal, but Frimpong is no respecter or reputations and will be looking to make a mark in the first team. As long as he is adequately supported, we should have enough to silence Gerrard. The rest of their midfield is very uncreative; Poulsen is barely integrated with the team while Mascherano may not wish to risk an injury jeopardising a potential move (if he even appears, given his desire to leave).
We won’t be lacking in creativity. As long as the middle is anchored adequately, the fullbacks should be able to push on and stretch the game out. Theo’s pace should help him get at Insua, who’s head may not be in the right place after seeing a transfer fall through over wages. Arshavin will have Glen Johnson for breakfast, and will inevitably score an absolute cracker. Their defence is generally lack in pace and none of their centre backs have particularly impressed in recent times so Chamakh could well get a debut goal.
All in all, I’d say we’re a superior team over the majority of the pitch. We’ve had our defensive shakes in pre-season, but I just don’t see them having the personnel to take advantage of that. Then key is the midfield. They may have the better of the personnel there, but as long as we are calm in possession and solid when out of it, the midfield has enough to offer a platform for the rest of the side to get us the points. 1-0 to the Arsenal.
_____________________
Untold it all
Arsenal the past
The future for our children
By Walter Broeckx
No Billy the Dog opening of the season for the moment. Since his last article he hasn’t been seen around in the country. Maybe the witchdoctor has put him under a spell and he still has to recover. Or maybe he has gone with Tony to Italy and look for a new signing or so? So you have to do it with me.
So here we are one day before our opening game of the season. An away trip to Liverpool which is never an easy start of the season. Some fans moaning and telling us it is already over before we have kicked a ball. A bit early if you ask me and even if you don’t ask me I will say it anyway: it is a bit early. A bit like the situation last year. After our loss at Valencia in a preseason game some fans, I think the same fans, told we didn’t stand a chance to even qualify for the next Champions League. Now since we have turned a 3-0 down situation after some 35 minutes round in to a 5-6 win at Legia Warsaw some think we are doomed again.
Is everything bright and sunny? No it isn’t. The main reason I’m not happy is the fact that even before we played our first game we are back at the familiar injury crisis we have known in the last years.
Cesc and Robin Van Persie, our world cup finalists, could be in the squad but haven’t played for Arsenal in preseason. So I am very unhappy with the fact that a world cup can interfere the preparation of a team. But I don’t blame Arsenal or Wenger for this. I blame Fifa who should have known better and should have started the world cup a few weeks earlier and who should have made sure that the world cup should have ended at the end of June or on the first Sunday of July. If that would have been the case then Cesc and Robin would have been fit and ready to go with the rest of the team. Now we can hope that they get a place on the bench and if they are needed they can show us what they got inside them. But we cannot expect miracles of these two players this weekend.
Then we have the injuries. We have Ramsey who according to Wenger could be back around November and wouldn’t that be great. He would be like a new signing. The only worry that I have is how he will react when he comes back on the field again. I really, really hope that does manage to get it out of his mind and play as if nothing has happened before.
And then we have out and doubtful a nice list of players: Song, Denilson, Diaby, Djourou and Bendtner. Add those to the 3 already mentioned and you get a normal Arsenal injury list I would say. Is it a coincidence that of those 5 players there are 3 players who have been at the world cup? I really don’t know but if you look at the length of their absence it looks that the more games played at the world cup the longer the injury period.
The only exception is Denilson who hasn’t been to the world cup but who has injured himself in the first training week. He is one who is facing a late fitness test on Friday or Saturday to see if he could join the squad. But even when fit he hasn’t played a minute. Djourou has played a few games but he has hamstring problem and will miss the Anfield game.
The other injured players also haven’t played much for Arsenal in the preseason. For Bendtner I would say that the world cup has cost him a lot. Even a blind man could see that Bendtner was injured when playing for Denmark but their coach kept putting him on the field. As a result we will have to wait until October to have him back. Nice work, Morten Olsen. Song and Diaby both have a calf problem but the latter could be available as he is back in full training this week but hasn’t played a game in preseason so far.
It will also be nice to see how our two new signings perform. Chamakh has shown that he is a player who is great in the link up play and someone who is not afraid to work hard for the rest of the team. He will be a threat on crosses and he will score some goals. He linked up nicely with Nasri so far so I’m confident that he will make it.
Our central defender Koscielny has shown why he was one of the best in the French Ligue last season. He reads the game well, is good in the air. I think he also will become a good player for Arsenal. Those who want to blame him and the other defenders for all the 5 goals against Legia Warsaw should look at the video again and try to look at some missing defensive work from our midfielders. Defending is a matter of the whole team, not just the 4 defenders.
But as we know it Arsenal is a team that goes on the field to score more goals than the opposition. So let’s just do it.
Some players came forward in preseason. One could have expected Jack Wilshere after his loan spell last season at Bolton. He has improved a lot and looks ready. I don’t think he could play all 38 games but I hope he gets as much chances as possible. With Frimpong we have a young lad that came on the scene like a rocket. We seem to have a backup for Song this time around and at only 18 he has a lot of room for improvement. He also will only get better is my hoping. Gibbs also is back to full fitness after his injury last season and also looks strong. Nice to have a youth project somewhere running, isn’t it?
The most important news today was that Arsène Wenger has signed an extension to his contract until June 2014. For those fans who want Wenger out it will be another 4 years of standing on the sideline and moaning about it. Well it is clear to all fans now that Arsène and the board are on the same wavelength about the future of our club. Growing our own superstars of the future and adding when and where it is necessary if we cannot grow our own players. Being prudent and not overspending money is the word. The way this site has defended it since Tony started it a bit. So yes, you could imagine that this person is happy with this.
The people who don’t like this have the choice:
1) accept it and just enjoy the game and our beautiful play
2) don’t really like it but just support the club and show support to whoever is on the field in our colours, said in other words: be a real supporter.
3) leave at the next exit and support a team that does buy and spends lots of money. Once that club is thrown out of the European championships or has gone bankrupt you can always come back.
I am a happy Gooner for the moment. Yes I don’t like the injuries, but hey maybe our luck is turning. Maybe we have our injuries now at the beginning of the season and not at the end when you really cannot afford many injuries.
But for the rest : we still have almost the same squad that was close to the title at the start of April last season. We have some young talents showing what they can do and I know they will make mistakes as they are young, but that’s part of the game. We have a squad that hates defeat and even in a friendly game when nothing seems to be working can turn a 3-0 deficit upside down and win the game. And yes our young squad is a year older, wiser and more experienced at top level.
And yes we still have Cesc Fabregas despite all the efforts made by Barceloanus, the media, the English press and some Arsenal fans. And why not enjoy the fact that our neighbours from around the block lost their first points at home. So let’s just start the season.
By Tony Attwood
Running a football club is about two things: surviving and winning. Obviously if you can’t do the former, then the latter is out of the question.
So far, only one club in the modern era has fallen from pretensions of greatness to a desperate attempt to survive: Leeds. Other supposedly big clubs have fallen from the top to the bottom however – I recall Manchester City in the 3rd division in 1999, and Wolverhampton and Portsmouth in the 4th (I watched them at Torquay when living in Devon for three years).
The fact that it hasn’t happened for a few years now, and the fact that Manchester City has recovered, and the fact that somehow Portsmouth don’t really count (two cup finals and they don’t count – an interesting thought), means the thinking is, top flight clubs don’t go bust.
Let’s just pause on Portsmouth. They won the FA Cup, and we haven’t won anything for five years. So if winning is everything, we should be like them, spend and spend, and then notice that there is no club left…. Maybe not.
I seem to recall Sky saying that Manchester City has bought £78m worth of players this summer – and it is this that dominates the thinking, not survival. For some people the thinking is that we have to keep up with them, no matter what.
But the truth is that survival is not a God-given right. Liverpool and Manchester United are on the edge. Manchester City are just a change of mind (or a coup, or a heart attack) away from total collapse. Tottenham are utterly dependent on the continuing largess of a man hidden in tax havens and a policy of endlessly buying players and flogging them at what any sane person would call a loss, but which for accounting purposes is a profit.
Aston Villa are dependent on Randy Lerner (although I doubt he would walk, given the profit he is making out of his loans to the club), Everton are dependent on one man who is desperate to sell. So it goes on.
What we are looking at is a pack of cards. If one topples, the banks and the owners are going to get very nervous, and all hell springs forth.
Survival is not given, it has to be earned, and most clubs are not earning it. Except at Arsenal where we seem to be able to go around posting half yearly profits in excess of £35m.
But even that doesn’t give the full picture, which is this: Arsenal are coming to financial dominance just at the moment when all the other clubs are either dependent on one man who is irreplaceable, or are already entering collapse mode.
And that is before we factor in the new anti-doping regulations.
What Arsenal have done, and indeed what Arsene Wenger has done, is redefine English football – not just from the point of view of how the game is played, what food is eaten, how we train, worldwide scouting and everything else in that arena, but also how the game is financed.
When Wenger was interviewed for the job at Arsenal Danny Fiszman asked him about his ambitions. He is reported to have said, ‘That when I leave, it will be in a better state than when I arrived’.
The stadium, the youth arrangements, the scouting system, the 12 years in the Champions League, the doubles, the unbeaten season, and the continuing profits – I think he’s done that a dozen times over.
The fact is that the expenditure of Real Mad, Man Arab and Barca-loan-us is unsustainable, as witness the fact that no one can unravel Real Mad’s accounts and Barca ran out of money this year. Although some, like those three, live in a world of total madness, most clubs are trying to claw their way to sustainability, but for most it is extraordinarily difficult, and will take years.
Of course we now want to return to the era of winning trophies as well - and we will do so, of that I have no doubt. But the main thing is to make sure that the sustainability of the club is assured, for without that we can slip backwards.
How different is our position from Man IOU.
For the last ten years the most profitable sporting club in the world has been Man IOU, making profits of between £40m to £80m a year – the sort of figure Arsenal is now moving into.
But in Man IOUs case almost all of that money goes to service the debt. Now it can be argued that this is a special case – but the fact is that the previous owner sold to the Glazer Gang knowing that this was the ploy. What Arsenal has sought to do is diversify its ownership, and thus attempt to stop such a buy out. Had they not done so we could be exactly where Man IOU is. Boycotts, turning up in a funny mix of club shirts and 100 year old scarves, unsold season tickets…
Chelsea of course are in a different position – although they are dependent on the mental and physical well-being of one man, and their ability to adjust to meet the anti-doping regulations.
But supposing we had had a pre-season like Chelsea’s. The cries of anguish when we won in Poland could be heard across the ether – what would the Anti-Arsenal Arsenal blogs have done with a defeat? (Actually I am not sure that many clubs have fans who would so berate their players for scoring six in a pre-season friendly, but that just shows how deep the AAA has got.)
Back at Man IOU the bond issue they had revealed to us that the Glazers will take out almost £130m in cash from the club this season. That is in addition to the straightforward payment of interest on the bond of around £45m – a total of £172m out of the club a year.
Compare that with the dividend paid to shareholders at Arsenal this year. And last year. And the year before. Zero.
So what we have is the best stadium in the world, a club that is making a profit and in no danger of failing to pay its players, a club that has set up magnificent training facilities, world-wide scouting on a scale other clubs can only dream of, and not the slightest problem with financial doping, and 12 years in the champions league.
I want this club to be here for my grandsons to enjoy, and under this regime I think that is likely to happen.
Untold Arsenal - Arsenal for this year, next year, and another 100 years.
Woolwich Arsenal, remembering 100 years ago
Making the Arsenal - from the day the club went bust, and vowed, never again.
by Walter Broeckx
In the game against Legia Warsaw we saw once again that some teams don’t know the rules at all. Or better said intentionally try to break the rules. Now that is not a big surprise for me as a ref as I have to see the same attempts every week and hear a lot of rubbish being said about the rules by players and spectators. And even by most pundits who get paid to give their thoughts on the game but know almost nothing when it comes to the rules.
But the worst thing is that many referees don’t seem to know the rules at all and don’t give fouls for something where there should be no discussion. I refer to the second goal Legia scored against us and every corner kick where they packed the goal mouth with lots of players to prevent the keeper to come and claim the ball.
So let me start by quoting the Fifa rule book and guidelines on page 113:
LAW 12 – FOULS AND MISCONDUCT
Offences committed against goalkeepers
• It is an offence for a player to prevent a goalkeeper from releasing the ball from his hands
• A player must be penalised for playing in a dangerous manner if he kicks or attempts to kick the ball when the goalkeeper is in the process of releasing it
• It is an offence to restrict the movement of the goalkeeper by unfairly impeding him, e.g. at the taking of a corner kick
So there it is in clear written and understandable English for all to see. Managers can see it, players can read it and refs should know this by heart. Now I really do think that most refs know this. But the problem is that many refs don’t dare to take action when it is needed.
This is certainly the case when we play away from home and the crowd is breathing in the neck of the ref. Tests have shown that refs are influenced by the noise the crowd makes and so it is more difficult for a ref to give a foul against the home team when they restrict the movement of the goalkeeper. But this isn’t an excuse for a ref for not give the foul. If he can’t stand the pressure of the crowd he has to stop being a ref.
Piling players in front of a goalkeeper is what should be punished according to this rule as it always will unfairly impede the keeper to come for the ball. You are only allow to obstruct a player when you have the ball in your reach. So when the ball is flying from the corner flag to the goal at that moment you are not allowed to impede or obstruct the keeper.
In the past we have seen so many times that other team use this tactics against us and get away with it. So what can Arsenal do about this? What can they do to wake up the referees and remind them of the rules. Now it may look silly that I tell you that we should remind the refs about some rules but I can tell you that it isn’t. As you can see there are a lot of pages in the rules and guidelines to the rules. And sometimes you lose something. It can happen as a ref that you don’t remember a rule at all or not correct. So how could we help the refs in this?
First of all I think that in the Emirates in the dressing room of the refs Arsenal should make sure that there is a rule book lying around. But they also should make it sure that they paint some of the rules that are used against us in an unfair way on the wall of the dressing rooms. They can copy parts of the rule book and put them on the wall in some kind of art form. You could compare it with the Arsenalisation of the Emirates. Why not call it the referalisation of the refs dressing room. I don’t think there can be any rule against this. How could one forbid displaying the Fifa rules in a football stadium?
So the refs will have to look at them even if they don’t want to do this. When you are a ref and when you are waiting before a game and there is something on the wall the refs will have the habit or reading it. And if the refs every time read for example the article in the rule book I have written above it could well be that they are more aware of this rule and will apply it on the field. They could have the feeling : hey that’s right it is black on white in the rule book. And on the field they could even tell a player if he is complaining about it: ‘Now look son, it is in the rulebook on page 113, check it out this evening’. It does make you feel smart as a ref and it will shut every player up for a while. They will be thinking: “wow, this guy knows the rules really well.”
And Arsenal could do another thing about it, on the field. Now when such a team puts 3 players around our goalkeeper we respond by putting also 3 players in there. This is so totally wrong in my opinion for 2 reasons.
First of all by putting your own players there you restrict the space even more. Then there is some kind or wrestling competition between the players and the keeper can be tripped over by his own players. As it happened in Warsaw last weekend. So by pulling the defenders a few yards out you also will create room for your own keeper and make it easier for him to collect the ball.
And the second reason is that if there are only attackers surrounding the goalkeeper it is clear to see for the ref that they obstruct the goalkeeper at the taking of a corner. If the keeper moves himself to go for the ball and an attacker impedes him the ref can see it clearly and blow the foul. But if there are as many body’s from both teams in there it is much more difficult for the ref to see who did what.
So I would suggest that Arsenal does the writing on the wall thing in the refs dressing room at the Emirates. When away they could give the ref a short reminder on those things and we know which teams apply those tactics and if the Arsenal official meets the ref before the game he can tell him: “don’t forget the rule book page 113 about impeding the goalkeeper when a corner is taken.” And as you catch a bear with honey and not with vinegar you can also add: “but we know that you will apply those rules as we know you are a good ref”.
So if Arsenal reminds the refs and the pundits of these rules every game it could well be that the refs do apply those rules far better. I know that there are some rules that you tend to become negligent after a while as a ref. But if they don’t do their job then Arsène Wenger should come out at the press conference, take a paper out of his pocket (page 113) and tell the journalists that you don’t get it that a ref is not knowing these simple rules at all. Give the paper to the journalists and ask them why these rules are not followed even though they come directly from Fifa.
It sure will add some live in to the press conferences and if you act like this you cannot get fined for giving a bad name to the ref. You just can say you are dissapointed about the ref seemingly not knowing the rules who are available for all.
Football has a rule book and all the rules must be followed and when they are not the ref should act. That’s all we can ask. But will the refs do this? Come and see from next week. I will be having a close look on it.
by Tony Attwood
The Arsenal History project, organised by Arsenal Independent Supporters Association, and (I think it is fair to say) welcomed by the upper echelons of Arsenal FC, has taken on a new direction.
We are starting to publish memories of fans – and at the moment we are focussing on memories of the first time each of us saw Arsenal live.
This series of articles has started to appear on the History of Arsenal web site at http://www.blog.woolwicharsenal.co.uk/ – and the first couple of articles are going up now.
Even if the project doesn’t instantly overwhelm you with enthusiasm I would suggest you take a look – because the opening stories will just take your breath away.
The site, run in association with Arsenal Independent Supporters Association, charts the history of Arsenal FC but not in the way that it has been done before.
At present we are focussing on three areas – but that is not to say we don’t welcome contributions on other topics.
1: Articles from supporters on seeing Arsenal live for the first time.
2: Woolwich Arsenal 100 years ago
3: Articles on the history of Arsenal which tell stories which have not been told, or have been mis-told elsewhere. Examples are the promotion of 1919 and the move to Highbury in 1913.
Other ideas for features are welcome – as for example with the recently completed series on all the managers of Woolwich Arsenal, and the relationship with Tottenham H across the centuries.
All the articles are on the History of Arsenal web site, and if you are a supporter of the club and have something to say about our history – particularly if it is a story that has not been told before – please do get in touch.
Tony Attwood
Untold Arsenal
Making the Arsenal
The History of Arsenal
by Walter Broeckx
Yes this is Untold Arsenal but to start this article I will have to turn your eyes to one our rivals in London as Ajax will loan their Serbian striker Miralem Sulejmani out for one season and give him to West Ham United. A fairly modest headline in the transfer period. The fact that West Hame is taking him on loan is yet another indication that there is not much money around by most of the EPL teams. There is not much movement in the transfer market and apart from City who doesn’t need to care about money the other teams are not buying like mad. No real big super stars coming in for the moment.
But this loan-transfer is somewhat important and could teach us a lesson.
Ajax is certainly for those who followed football since the seventies a name that rings a bell. It was a team that with Johan Cruyff had not only one of the best players in the world in those days but also a team that was built on an new and fresh style with attacking football and based on skill. And most importantly it was built on their own youth. For years Ajax showed the world how you have to educate young players in a certain style and play the same tactics from the youth teams up to the first team.
They had great players and they formed the foundations on which Holland played and lost unfortunately, two world cup finals against both the host teams Germany and Argentina.
Ever since that period Ajax has developed great players and some of the best in the world. Our own Dennis Bergkamp was one of them. Van Basten another all time great. Rijkaard, De Boer, just to name a few but there are many, many more starting from the seventies. But the most important thing was that whenever one of the big names left another youthful player was standing ready to fill the gap.
Don’t worry I will link this with Arsenal in a moment. Back to Sulejmani. He is a Serbian striker and international and he was a player for whom Ajax paid 16,5M euro in 2008 to buy him from Heerenveen. He was the most expensive player ever bought by Ajax in their entire history. He was very untypical Ajax that still is relying on their youth program for most of their players. But somehow in 2008 Ajax felt the need to act like the big boys and pay lots of money for a player.
16,5M euro in the Dutch league is an enormous amount of money. I think you could compare this with the double in the EPL. But Ajax did it and the result was that in the two years he played for Ajax he never lived up to this amount of money that was paid for him. In total he played 68 games for Ajax and he only scored 10 goals. You could say that each goal cost Ajax more than 1,5M euro.
But now Ajax decided to let him go on loan. In a way it is like admitting failure. It is saying: Well, after all he wasn’t worth the money. We made a mistake.” To make things worse Ajax have had some bad financial results over the past years. They are losing a lot of money (some 30M euro last season) and they are having trouble to keep their head above water. And that for a team that was known all over the world for the good education they give their youth, just look at Vermaelen.
Maybe Ajax will return to the way they have operated in the last 40 years or so and will be looking more to bring in their own youthful players and give them the chance to become good and not the highly paid for player who doesn’t deliver. And by doing this they could be hoping to have better financial results in the future.
So what is the link with Arsenal the impatient reader will be asking himself. We could learn a few things from this. The first thing we can learn from this is: demanding the manager and the board to break transfer records is not a certain guarantee for success. They did not win the league with buying Sulejmani.
Another thing is that you can never be sure that a player is a success or not. In this case Sulejmanin had played two years before in the Dutch league so he was familiar with the league, everybody knew him, he didn’t have to adapt to the league and still he failed.
Another thing is that Ajax is suffering one of its biggest, if not the biggest, financial crisis in their existence. How long they can survive is in doubt. If they don’t qualify for the champions league they could be in very big trouble in the near future. Is it a coincidence that they suffer this crisis shortly after paying the biggest amount of money ever for a player?
Am I saying that we shouldn’t buy any players? NO. I’m not against us buying players. But what I’m not doing is to start crying and order Arsenal to buy players and to splash the money around. No I am asking to be very careful with spending the money. There is an old idiom in Dutch which is saying that you can only spend your money once. Once you have spend it, it is gone.
So once again I underline that I am not against us buying players. But those thinking that if we spend 50 million in one transfer window and all our troubles would be gone are believing in fairy tales. It could go terribly wrong. And what then?
So I just trust the people who are working on the transfers at Arsenal. They look at players for more than 1 minute on a you tube compilation, on which even I could look great. No forget this, I wouldn’t look great not even in a 7 second you tube clip. Oyr scouts will see if a player not only has the required technical skills but also the right mentality to play for us and to blend in the team. The management has to see if he is affordable and worth taking the risk.
So let us not pretend to know who to buy and at what price a player is available. The numbers mentioned in the papers is just what it is, paper talk to fill up the “Cesc is going to Barceloanus” gap.
And let us take a look at Ajax to finish this article and remember that their biggest success was in the periods when they almost completely trusted their own youth system. And then look at our own youth system and look at the fact that 3 players who had a big part of their education at Arsenal have just become internationals for England. Two of them almost learned everything at Arsenal. Why don’t we give them the chance to become better. A chance that could be lost when we buy player X, player Y or player Z for a record breaking amount of money. And with those 2 or 3 at the start of their Arsenal career AND an international career how can anyone dare saying that our project youth has failed.
Like we have said over here on a few occasions before: it is only just starting!
by Phil Gregory
With the new Financial Fair Play rules all over the papers along with a sackful of misconceptions of how they’ll actually work I thought it’d be worthwhile to have a look at them and see what’s what. Without further ado….
The new Financial Fair Play (FFP) criteria assess the financial situation of a club according to the profit and loss account. That simply means that the amount of debt itself doesn’t matter, what is important is the impact of the costs of the debt (interest) on the bottom line, along with all the other costs common to football clubs.
The FFP however doesn’t just simply go by the losses that the club makes, it has a system of relevant income and expenses. This means that a substantial loss on the club accounts doesn’t necessarily rule the club out of European competition, what matters is whether the costs are considered relevant (and of course, the income streams too).
Relevant income is fairly self-explanatory, it includes matchday, TV, commercial and other operating incomes (the latter is simply a blanket term for all the small operations a club may run that doesn’t fit under the first three criteria). Relevant expenses are also as you’d expect and they include amortisation of player registrations (more on that later), finance costs and dividend payments.
What it doesn’t include is depreciation of assets that a club hold (not usually too substantial), but most interestingly the costs of youth development and community schemes are exempt (whether Barcelona’s other sporting ventures are included under community schemes I’m not sure, but if they were excluded as an expense it would improve their bottom line by over £20m). Naturally the exemption for money spent on youth development is attempting to instil an attitude of “train your own youngsters” as opposed to throwing cash around every summer, a move I fully back.
The rules themselves are staggered in their implementation, with a EUR45m loss the maximum allowed in 13-14 and 14-15, which drops to EUR30m for the three seasons following that. At that point, a new lower amount will be implemented, to be decided by the UEFA executive committee at some point in the future.
Once the proposals are fully in place, a maximum break-even deficit of EUR5m deviation is allowed, which makes sense for clubs at the mercy of exchange rates. However would it be too much to expect clubs to make sure they are sufficiently inside the criteria so they don’t get undone by the ebbs and flows of exchange rates and/or revenues? Budget conservatively, and plan for worst-case scenarios etc? Maybe I’m just a traditionalist…
The FFP criteria don’t solely base the break-even verdict on the previous season’s profit/loss result, it is actually calculated as the sum of the three years’ results. If the FFP criteria were in play for upcoming 10-11 season, the considered period would be 09-10, 08-09 and 07-08 accounts. The idea of using the sum profit/loss over the last three years makes sense: if a club have turned substantial profits for the previous few years, spending a substantial amount on a player in a single year could be argued to be sustainable, despite tipping a single year’s result into the red. If for those periods, a clubs relevant expenses were greater than their relevant incomes by more than EUR45m, the club would be referred to the “Organs for the Administration of Justice” for action according to UEFA’s disciplinary rulebook. I’d hope that failing to meet the criteria would gets clubs summarily expelled for European competition, but that remains to be seen.
A point to note is that actual transfer spending itself doesn’t come into the break-even calculation, it’s the cost as a result of the loss of value of the players’ registration (amortisation) that is considered instead. This has a big impact. Remembering that amortisation is calculated as the transfer fee paid for the player divided by the length of the contract , then any significant transfer spending is actually spread out over a number of years. If a club spent £100million on players all of which were on 4 year contracts, the club would be charged £25m per year, meaning that if a club were to be breaking even, they could afford significant one-off transfer spends, as the cost is spread over the lengths of the players’ contracts. Another point to note is that you only pay amortisation for players you sign: players that come through the academy have no value on the books and so have none of the associated costs.
While that does leave a bit of a sour taste in the mouth, it does throw up an amusing situation: despite what most pundits and sportswriters seem to think, City can’t just spend big before the regulations come into play. All City are doing is storing up massive amortisation charges which, as they are charged over the length of the players’ contracts, takes a good while to shift.
The break-even result is converted into Euros, so exchange rates will have a role to play for Premier League clubs considering the impact of the proposals. There’s also a good idea in there that the Financial Control Panel can request more information from the club if the yearly account show debts as being more than 100% of turnover or wages account for more than 70% of turnover (I’d have gone for 60%, personally but there you go).
A club can also fall foul of the criteria if their auditors believe there is a danger of the business not being able to continue as a going concern (hello Liverpool) while you’d be hauled in for disciplinary proceedings if you had overdue tax or transfer payments.
So far so good. Now we know how the FFP will work, let’s have a look at some of the weaknesses. Despite the break-even calculation being calculated as the sum of the previous three years, there is a caveat whereby if they fail to meet the criteria during that period, they will consider the financial results of a further two years ago in the aggregate. To me, that’s a bit shoddy. Sure, you can argue that if they made the profits four years ago then they can service the current deficits, but the way that a further two years are considered only if you fail to meet the criteria smacks of watering down the proposals to me. If they want to recognise profits in the more distant past, why aren’t they also recognising the losses?
It’s just a shame too that it isn’t spelled out in black and white that failure to meet the break-even criteria, having any overdue payables or having any doubts over your ability to continue as a going concern results in a denial of entry into European competition. Otherwise there is always the concern that the rules have an element of flexibility that will be extended to the big names but not the smaller sides.
My other concern with the break-even condition is the fact that it is an arbitrary number of EUR45m. Whether any level of losses is dangerous to a business is dependent on the size of the loss compared to the club’s turnover. If Arsenal, Barcelona or Manchester United turned a EUR45m loss, it wouldn’t be anywhere near as worrying as a smaller side such as Villa or Everton turning a similar sized loss. EUR45m is a number set to stop the big sides turning losses of any more than that, but this is European competition: is it not much, much more serious if a Polish team can enter Europe despite turning a loss of let’s say EUR10m, perhaps equivalent to it’s entire turnover?
If it was up to me, there would be an upper limit, a figure beyond which losses cannot go as well as a condition whereby the break-even criteria is a deficit of no more than let’s say 10% of relevant turnover, with a maximum loss allowed up to EUR45m limit, regardless of turnover. So smaller sides couldn’t get away with smaller losses unless their turnover was sufficient to support it, while the traditional European powerhouses would most likely still be bound by the upper limit. This would help deal with debt in the smaller European leagues, as well as the smaller sides within the big European Leagues, but would it risk creating a closed shop? Smaller sides have to make losses in order to reach the promised land and then break even from the additional revenues, but by this model, they wouldn’t be granted the revenues, and so the top four would sit comfortably at the top of the table. I’m certainly in two minds.
Anyway, that’s enough on the FFP proposals. I don’t profess to have touched on everything, but I hope that’s given you a solid idea of what they’re about and what the issues are with them. The big one is to remember that transfer fees aren’t considered in the criteria, it’s the cost resulting from the player acquisition, the amortisation. I’m sick to death of UEFA’s pdf’s, but at some point in the near future I’ll do the sums for a variety of Premier League sides and see who’ll meet the criteria and who won’t.
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They don’t like our youth in the youth teams
Fufa’s IQ, and we are not talking about the woman
Being at Arsenal in 1955
For England, that was the Golden Generation. Actually the last two world cups and the euro thing in the middle were the tournaments of the Golden Generation. England were about to win everything.
After it was all over in South Africa, Sir Trevor Brooking, the FA’s director of football, made a statement. He comes across to me these days as a charming old buffer. Not always 100% but generally at least looking roughly in the right direction (as opposed to investigating ways to cheating the Italian tax authorities like others I could mention).
Here’s one of Sir Trev’s forays….
“There is an immediate void in the standard of the team. World Cup 2014 will be difficult for England,” he said. “I don’t think there are the obvious quality coming through who can replicate what we have currently, unless we can fasttrack one or two of the younger ones – and that’s asking a lot.”
England at the world cup sent their oldest squad in history. No one was impressed.
So the world cup is over and we prepare to play Hungary at Wembley. Fortunately for me I shall be in Italy, trying to catch up on what the Milanese papers are saying about their situation. Mr Cappuccino however is still earning £6m-a-year managing England.
Meanwhile we know why England is rubbish at football – and two simple changes could resolve the problem.
In saying this I reject that England’s problems go back to 1992 and the fact that the FA lost control of the top flight of English football. That really is irrelevant – the issues are quite different.
First, we have only about 10% of the number of top qualified football coaches in England as they do in Spain, Italy, Germany and France. Even Holland out do us.
Second, we refuse to let top clubs enter reserve teams into the lower leagues as they do in countries such as Spain and Germany. I don’t say this is a panacea in its own right, but I do think it could help.
The reason for both failings come from the earliest days of footballing history in England. The FA, responsible for England was founded as a gentleman’s amateur club, and such groups never have much interest in the clever-clever ideas of proper training. Indeed to them, training was almost cheating – they revered natural ability. As the game spread they gave the coaching of young players over to school teachers, who may well have been well meaning awfully nice people, but generally their expertise was elsewhere.
As for the non-appearance of the reserves in lower leagues, if you keep up to date with Arsenal’s history on AISA’s Woolwich Arsenal site, you will know that after being banned from playing other London teams, and having turned professional, Arsenal tried to start a professional Southern League. This failed, and Arsenal joined the Football League two years later. But then the Southern League came into existence and Arsenal applied to put their reserves into that league. The league management committee found the idea “insulting”, and it has been banned ever since.
So that’s why international football is such a mess and why it will stay that way. Even the great god Rooney ended the world cup swearing at fans and refusing to speak to the media!
And the other excuses continue. Rooney wants a winter break. Everyone wants a pop at Arsenal for playing foreigners. But really we only need look within. While Sir Trev worries about our youth team coming through Mr Cappuccino is so dedicated to his task that he refused to go and watch the European Under 19s championship this summer – where England managed to get to the semis. He was busy playing golf.
It was also a shame the FA were not out in force to watch the France Spain final of that competition. The game was great, the kids were great, and quite honestly France under 19s could have swamped England’s first team.
Actually the too many foreigners bit has now had its day, quite simply because England has shown just how much it hates Arsenal by picking only one of Arsenal’s real golden generation for the under 19s – Tom Cruise. There were two Arsenal players in the final – Coquelin and Sunu, and as you might know, Sunu scored a brilliant goal. Problem is those are the only two Arsenal players at that level who don’t play for England.
So now we enter a season where we have the “homegrown” list, but where England’s under 19s don’t want to know about Arsenal’s homegrown talent.
And what do the FA do meanwhile? They manage to lose a chairman and a chief executive in the space of three months, following a stream of other defections. Oh and they get worked up over the Cappuccino Index.
And they worry about Wembley. £757m it cost, with the FA churning out £20m a year to keep the loan repayments going. The TV deal is up for renewal in 2012 – anyone fancy buying it?
But of one thing we can be sure. Just as one defeat (or even a 6-5 win) is enough for the Anti-Arsenal Arsenal to say “this is a disaster” so one win (that is all it will take) one win, for England and the press will be talking of England winning the Euros, being “up for it” and “ready to take on anyone” and we will be looking at the new “golden generation”.
Billy Wright, Stanley Matthews and Alf Ramsey… we’ll be back among the greats, forgetting that those three all played in the team that was knocked about 3-6 by Hungary.
Hungary revolutionised football tactics in the 1950s, just as Johan Cruyff and the Netherlands did in the 1970s, and just as Wenger has done at Arsenal in the last 12 years. But we don’t like revolutions in England, we don’t like radical ideas, we don’t like lots of professional coaches, we don’t like the Arsenal style… We want to keep it the English way, even in defeat.
And this is the problem for England. They don’t have many young players they are willing to pick. They won’t pick Arsenal players (despite all their obvious abilities) because they are now seen to be not purely in the England tradition.
Being traditionally English is what we are after, it seems, even though it doesn’t actually win us anything in a world that moved on 50 years ago.
How many defenders have we lost so far this close season?
Cesc signs for Barcelona
Being at Arsenal in 1955
One of the most depressing things about being an Arsenal fan
By Walter Broeckx
I really would like to know how much the average IQ is at Fufa’s headquarter. Reports mention the score above but I’m not sure it is really that high. But I’m sure they know a lot more about making money and on corruption than I do. But when it comes to things that really matter like intelligence I think a well educated chimpanzee wouldn’t come up with the idea of having a set of international friendly matches at this time of the season. If I have offended a Chimpanzee with this, please accept my apologies.
Who on earth can come up with the idea of having international friendly matches just 4 weeks after the end of the world cup.
I think almost all the national teams have played 3 or 4 friendly games before the world cup. Even the teams that didn’t qualify for the world cup have played friendly games as sparring partners for the teams that went to the world cup.
And still 4 weeks after the end of the world cup they want the teams to practice for the coming qualifications for whatever tournament they come up with next. 3 days before the start of the next season we have 12 players who are going away with their national team.
And in a way we have been lucky. It could have been 14 players. But as Sagna and Clichy were in South Africa when France had their world cup disaster they weren’t asked this time. It will only be Nasri who is risking his legs for France.
But hurray for them and unfortunately for us Capello has called up Gibbs, Walcott and Wilshere to play against Hungary. It would be great for those 3 if they play a part but it will be heart in mouth stuff for us and hope they don’t get injured in this fixture.
Vermaelen will also be playing for his country Belgium in Finland and another experienced player like Rosicky will be playing for the Czech Republic. Arshavin can try to avoid the smog in Russia when he plays against Bulgaria and to think that he had a little muscular problem and didn’t travel to Poland for the game in Warsaw. So it will be with fear in our heart waiting for him to know if he is fit or not after that game. Imagine Arshavin missing out on the Anfield game.
Eboue who seems in good form is also going to play for Ivory Coast against Italy, lucky the game is played at West Ham so he will not have to travel far.
Chamakh will travel to Morocco to play and if he would be injured this would be a massive blow for our attack in the first months. If there is a good God somewhere, please protect him. Fabianski also got a call up for the Poland team and this is kind of funny that our most controversial keeper is the only full international in fact.
We also have Lansbury and Manone who have been called up for their U21 teams but to be honest this wouldn’t harm us much at first if they would get an injury. And I don’t want them to get any injury, please don’t get me wrong on this.
But the icing of the cake is presented by Mexico and Spain. Vela is going to play for Mexico, like he usually does and then he is suffering from jetlag for a week and recovering from an injury that he mostly get when he plays for Mexico. But the fact that Cesc also has been called up by Spain is really beyond me. He has hardly trained with Arsenal, he hasn’t played a game but must travel to Mexico to play for Spain. I don’t know if Cesc is having much trouble with jetlag but this is almost funny if it wouldn’t be that he could come back with an injury. In fact it isn’t funny at all but my mother said to me once that it is better to have a laugh with your misery than to cry as it will change nothing.
So Cesc has not only missed our pre season preparation because of the world cup but now he has trained 2 days with us and now he is back with the Spanish team for 4 or 5 days. He will be back on Friday if all goes well and then it is up to Wenger to decide if Cesc could play for Arsenal at Anfield.
And we can call ourselves lucky that players like Diaby, Bendtner and Song are already injured so they haven’t got a call up.
In fact the only national team coach that has behaved in a decent way is Bert Van Marwijck, the Dutch coach. At first he had told the Dutch federation he didn’t want to play in the Ukraine a friendly game at this time of the season. But the Dutch federation then got noticed that refusing to play could mean that they could get expelled from the European championship in 2 years time.
Van Marwijck then said : “I refuse to call up the players that have played in South Africa, I think it is mentally and physical unacceptable to let them play now in a friendly game.” Holland will travel with a some kind of reserve team to the Ukraine.
Given his record with injuries sustained when playing for Holland it is a big relief that Van Persie will stay at Arsenal and not play in these stupid and useless international friendlies. For once we could have wished that all the coaches had the same level of intelligence like Van Marwijck has shown this time.
Van Marwijck showed by doing this that he has more intelligence and brains in the top of his left pink than the whole international football federation has in their combined brains together.
For now we just can sit and hope and pray and wait for the first injury to appear. With already some 5 or 6 players out for the moment I think we will need all the luck in the world to overcome this week without any extra injured players before the opening of the season.
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PS: Reports suggest that after a new test the IQ level has dropped again at Fufa’s headquarter. Researchers have discovered that in the first set of tests the cleaning lady had participated. In a second test she wasn’t in at the time and IQ now has gone down to 40.
PPS: On the CT-test, which stands for Corruption Test it has gone up from 95 in the first test to the maximum score of 100 in the second test. The cleaning lady was not in for this.
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If your IQ is high enough you will like this
If you don’t like Fifa just say Fick Fufa
Read the rest
Something new about the past
By Billy “the Dog” McGraw. Our man in a spot.
Arsenal are sending a witchdoctor and exorcist to Wembley to help the three players picked for Wednesday’s game. It appears that Arsenal are worried both about the influence over young players of such malign forces as A Cole and Fabuloso Cappuccino and so will be taking preventative measures.
“We shall use the horse’s foot and the ostrich leg, mixed with some herbs,” said Arsene Wenger. “Put that in the pre-match bottle of scotch that A Cole likes to drink and I think our young players will be protected.”
Arsenal will also also be using a little muti which the boss picked up while working for French TV at the world cup.
Muti however is dangerous as it is used as an aphrodisiac. Give it to A Cole and he is likely to move after anything that moves. “Of course we don’t want A Cole to catch anyone, that would be too unpleasant, but a bit of chasing will distract him from anything nasty he might come up with,” said a spokesman.
Many teams around the world now employ their own sangoma—a traditional healer with powers of divination and Arsenal expect this move will help reduce their three year old injury crisis. Arsenal’s sangoma will smear muti on the walls of the dressing rooms and bury animal parts in the soccer field.
“This is no problem at Wembley,” said a person, “as the pitch is so bumpy no one will notice the odd pig in a trench.”
However there can be problems. In 2002, Cameroon’s assistant coach was arrested after being accused of using black magic ahead of an important game against Mali. In neighboring Swaziland a new artificial turf field was damaged when chicken feathers were buried in the center of it before a league match.
In Italy muti is used by managers like Mr Cappuccino as a way of winning games. “How else do you think I do it?” asked the coffee maker. “You think I know about football?”
Actually no, but he can dream.
Irvin Khoza who was chairman of the World Cup organizing committee took muti to Ivory Coast in 1995 to help his team become African champions. The FA were impressed and a bunch of old bods with their bits of stuff on the side have been looking into the matter ever since.
“It’s a goer,” said Sir Hardly Anyone, when I asked him last week. “We shall use every methodological methodology for to help the lads begorrah, and if that includes giving them a football to practice with so be it. We are an experimental nation, and you will never find us sticking ourselves in mud. Never!
“The recent sacrifice of an ox at Very Old Trafford was a blessing for our great Shrek and included rites designed to help our great and glorious motherland succeed in the next match against McDonalds Restaurants United. I am a member of the Traditional Healers Organization and my wife fully understands my needs. This is, after all, north of the A406.”
But Sir Trevor Brooking said, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
How well muti works is open to debate. In February, the chairman of the medical committee at Fick Fufa, called on anti-doping authorities to investigate traditional medicine. But World Anti-Doping Agency Director General David Howman said the matter was better left to local officials such as Sir Hardley.
Winton Hawksworth of the South African Institute for Drug-Free Sport said stimulants are common in traditional English drinks, and therefore it might be hard to spot who has and who hasn’t. Asked to elaborate he left the room.
However it is true that before most internationals various players are (as Sir Hardley put it) seen “putting something in their socks or their underpants.” When asked if it was money received as a bribe to throw the game he replied that he felt England’s players didn’t need bribing.
Lord Hedgehog, chairman of the FA said that foreigners don’t like it up em.
Don’t worry if you don’t believe most of this, only part of it is true.
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