By Sir Hardly Anyone and Professor Billy “The Dog” McGraw, university hospital of the North Circular Road.
On the day when we have been told that Theo is no longer our fastest player (it is now apparently Hector Bellerin) we are once again awash with transfer rumours. After all it is a while since we signed anyone, and with Vermaelen now on a distant horizon and collecting his salary via a tax free bank account in Qatar it is time to move on, turn the page, draw a line under and consider a range of other meaningless phraseology.
So we are going to sign someone to replace Thomas. First out of the trap is Olympiakos centre-half Kostas Manolas who played for Greece in the World Cup. That is in the Daily Mirror.
But, as the various blogs and papers who cover the story report, the problem is, he won’t be guaranteed a place in the first team, what with Mert and Kos being around. So, oh my, everyone is going to turn us down and we’ll never be able to sign another central defender and it is all Wenger’s fault.
I paraphrase, but you get the gist.
But wait, Laurent Koscielny has an Achilles injury so that’s all right. We can sign Manolas after all. And we’re going into the season with our defence missing, and we won’t ever win another game…. (You get the picture).
But none of this matters because we are going to get Daniel Agger from Liverpool to replace Thomas V. That must be true because it is in the Express.
Meanwhile the Mirror tells us that we are going to sign Cheick Tiote, the midfielder currently with Newcastle. He’ll cost £8m, and Newcastle are bound to want to let him go, because that’s how it is. If we don’t get him, it will be our fault totally, and nothing to do with the player not wanting to move or the club not wanting to cash in.
And we are also going to offload some chaps we don’t want. The Daily Star (you really have to see it to believe it – there was more news in the Beano than in this thing) tells us that officials from Galatasaray have held talks with officials from Arsenal with a view to buying Lukas Pod and Joel Campbell.
Don’t go guys! They are a bunch of hearty roughs over there.
Arsenal also want Borussia Dortmund’s midfielder Marco Reus. Now by this time you might be saying “we’ve heard all this before” and of course you would be right. That is true. And we’ve heard that Liverpool and Man U want him – and if either get him, they will have hi-jacked our deal because Ivan Gazidis was having his afternoon nap.
But oh, the story is in the Metro. Say no more.
However Arsenal are close to signing PSG midfielder Adrien Rabiot so we don’t need any of the other people. But, oh, wouldn’t you know it. That story is in the Star. But he’s a central midfielder. So we need him now. Any price. Just buy him Wenger. Don’t be stubborn, and we know you are stubborn because all the papers tell us.
Yet even with this stubbornness of the manager and propensity for dozing by the senior execs, there is still hope. The Independent, a much more serious publication I’m sure you will agree, says that we can have Sami Khedira on the cheap. Yipee.
Meanwhile the “No easy games” site says that Arsenal have been scouting Carvalho “intensively” for the last 18 months, (as opposed to watching him on TV last Christmas when the movie on ITV 4 wasn’t up to much) and “reports emerged” last week that Arsene Wenger had offered £24 million.
“Reports emerged” indeed! That’s rather good. So, we could write a report, leave it under a stone in Santiago’s shopping district and wait for it to “emerge”. Nice one. let’s do it. When’s the next plane? (And planes are good because we are bound to see someone at the airport, and that’s another posting fulfilled.)
The “we know how to make a press release look like a story” Daily Telegraph say that Carvalho has been “put up for sale” by Sporting, with Sporting wanting the cash now. So if we don’t get him, it’s Arsenal’s fault, yet again.
And Wenger is looking to open talks and tempt him into a move to the Emirates.
But what about Nic Bendtner I hear you cry. What of he? He is still (as he might say) “Uden en kontrakt”. But not to worry Olympiakos want him. So Arsenal are going to sign him and then sell him on for a profit. (Actually Billy made that up. But then, since the rest of this is made up, that’s not really news).
And since we have entered the marshland, what of Tottenham? Well, they are quite happy to listen to offers for about 132 players they have accumulated since the sale of Bale. These include Andros Townsend, Aaron Lennon, John Lennon, Roberto Soldado, Nacer Chadli, Sandro, Etienne Capoue, Al Capone, Mousa Dembele, Michael Dawson, Benoit Assou-Ekotto, Kyle Naughton, Vlad Chirichesincluding, Vlad the Impaler, Vlad I Vostok, Vladimer Putin, Vlad TV, Count Dracula, Boris Karloff and Bob the Builder, A couple of likely looking fellas who could have been from Ushuaia United in Tierra del Fuego were thought to be looking to pick up a job lot, but somehow got waylaid into the supermarket site next to the stadium and were last seen wearing hard hats and operating a cement mixer.
But never let it be said that Tottenham are backwards in coming forwards. According to the Independent they are going to buy Morgan Schneiderlin, despite Southampton’s insistence he will not be sold.
Now you know.
The books
- Woolwich Arsenal: The club that changed football – Arsenal’s early years
- Making the Arsenal – how the modern Arsenal was born in 1910
- The Crowd at Woolwich Arsenal
Arsenal to sign lord bentner? Yes please!
Gooner humour is just as low as pikeys!
Haha best piece I’ve seen written in a while on the subject of arsenal transfer activity. It mirrors my own thinking but I could never have put it down so eloquently. Thank you sir. You brought a smile to my face. 🙂
Enjoied tht.
Why would totenham let bob the builder go, don’t they want their stadium built 😛
A couple of my posts in the … best side in years thread, work with what little data was available. But, looking around this morning a bit more (It is not even 8am where I am), I find that CaughtOffside has Bellerin’s time: 4.39 seconds for the 40.
http://www.caughtoffside.com/2014/08/13/arsenal-youngster-breaks-the-walcotts-40-metre-sprint-record-with-unbelievable-time/
GiveMeSport has an article bringing up the Top-20 sprinters in the FIFA-14 game
http://www.givemesport.com/378641-top-20-quickest-players-in-fifa-14
> 1. Mathis Bolly (Fortuna Dusseldorf) – Acceleration: 97 – Sprint speed: 97
> 2. Theo Walcott (Arsenal) – Acceleration: 97 – Sprint speed: 96
The values for acceleration and sprint speed are not SI, I suspect they are just convenient for the operation of the game. I have no idea where Bellerin fits into this.
CaughtOffside is the only article that gives Bellerin’s time that I have been able to find, so one should take that time (4.39 seconds) with a grain of salt. Much like reading the transfer news that Sir Hardly Anyone and Professor Billy “The Dog” McGraw expand on for most of the article above.
I have a question for Sir Hardly Anyone and Billy the Dog, I had seen a news headline describing that Olympiakos wanted Bentner, but didn’t read the article. What is it that Olympiakos wants Bendtner for?
So Spurs are re-signing Ruddock? That’s about right.
It’s good that previous chairman Sugar has come out and said they spunked up the Bale money last season and that we are a good bet to win the Premiership. He calls us “dark horses” I like that.
Lol great write up
Well I’m glad that’s all been cleared up 🙂
Gord: they want him as a mascot
Ah! That explains things then. Something like Gunnersaurus. Perhaps they are going to call him Thrylos?
Thanks Tony.
OT: In The News
Nice story out of Singapore, “Singapore navy amputee Jason Chee receives letter from Arsenal Football Club”
https://sg.sports.yahoo.com/blogs/fit-to-post-sports/singapore-navy-amputee-jason-chee-receives-letter-from-arsenal-football-club-154358611.html
There is a picture of the letter from Arsene Wenger to (Gooner) Jason Chee in the article.
I was at my favourite newsagents one morning and the shop being quiet I chatted with my friendly newsagent man.
Someone came in and bought a copy of the ‘Sun’. As he was doing this I said.
‘I don’t know why people bu the Sun as there isn’t any news in it.’
Surprised at my comment but not undone, he said:
‘Oh I don’t buy it for the news I bye it for the jokes.’
A few minutes later someone came in and bought a copy of the ‘Mirror’, so I said:
‘I dont know why people buy the Mirror there isn’t any news in ir.’
He said I’ er don’t buy it for the news’. Paid and left the shop.
My point is there is no need to tell us there isn’t any news in the media about transfers(not just the newspapers), we know there isn’t.
I for one could not careless what the media says about transfers, (other matters such as false claims about ticket prices etc. yes.) Transfers – no.
However this year the BBC went up just a little in my estimation. The whole the media with the exception of the BBC was saying that Arsenal was going to buy Sanchez, the only variant in ‘the story’ was the price.
On the BBC website there was not a word about this supposed transfer until it could be read on the Arsenal website as fact. Then the BBC gave us an informed article.
To day’s media specialises in ‘no news’ don’t do the same.
@Gord
August 13, 2014 at 5:14 pm
I am glad you found the link to the story. Nice one. Over the years I have heard similar ‘Arsenal Stories’ like this one.
Before any one jumps on me as being bias I have also heard of incidents like this by other clubs.
If the media were atall serious about football instead of carrying endless colums of transfer nonsense, they published stories like this one – ‘The caring side of football’, which goes on year round, the media would have our respect
Billy the dog:
What? No mention of Gourcuff, Howedes, Zaha, Cleverley, Nani, Khedira, Kalou, Guilavogui, Agger, or Silvestre in your article? This must be a joke!
Gord:
They need Bendtner because they have just created a new position for a raving idiotic narcissistic astounding moron (RINAM) on their team.
He will be known as RINAM-TGSTEL. That is eleven letters for one talented bullshitter, one letter for each player on the starting eleven.
@Colario
You’re welcome. I try to keep my eyes open for such articles.
@Ray
Apparently ones of the names for Olympiakos is Thrylos, which comes from their winning teams of the 1950’s. It apparently means “Legend”, and Bendtner seems to think he is one. Your name works too.
—–
I ran across some more 40 yard sprint stuff, including an estimate of how fast Usain Bolt could run the 40 yard dash. It is back in the … our best team thread.
http://untold-arsenal.com/archives/37214#comment-803500
Re-asigning of the great bendtner!!what aday for owen&the rest to have!!
Concrete boots for Bendtner……or perhaps more “fittingly” for Owen? 🙂
LIKE !
@bjtGunner,
And jump in the river?
@nicky
Perhaps an “assist” would be required! 🙂
Perhaps Arsenal needs Falcao than cavani.
I just seen a news article on Google News, which said that Bendtner has signed for Wolfsburg. There is no mention of this on the Wolfsburg web site.
The article doesn’t say what Bendtner would be doing for Wolfsburg. 🙂
In other former Arsenal player news, Frimpong did not get on that team in Austria.
Gord,
Could Bendtner be their “exotic dancer” which is prudish for stripper?
A couple from Wolverhampton recently visited 92 Football League ground, doing so in 92 hours. They drove 2222 miles and got very little sleep. It appears the only problem, was their Satnav still thought Arsenal played at Highbury.
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/499712/Football-Stadium-Tour-England-Charity
Money was raised for charity (Cancer Research UK, and the Georgina Cancer Ward in Dudley, West Midlands). I don’t see the amount in the story.
Oh Ray, some newspaper article called him an “entertainer”. Do you work at a newspaper? 🙂