- Preston North End v Arsenal lots of goals and tickets from touts
- Preston v Arsenal; the injury recoveries, the young players, and 2 unbeaten teams
By Bulldog Drummond
It is league cup day and so attention of course turns to the ever increasingly exciting Arsenal youth programme driven by Per Mertesacker with lots of special attention being given to Ethan Nwaneri and Myles Lewis-Skelly and Josh Nichols.
And the Academy Manager has been making much of the importance of the Academy, with many websites running articles about him and this work. The Telegraph for example has a piece headlined “For academy manager Per Mertesacker, the biggest signings for Arsenal are eight-year-olds” and this is a theme replicated elsewhere. And a little while back the Mirror had “11 Arsenal wonderkids Mikel Arteta can unleash”
Of course some of the reporting is utterly bonkers, as with the typical “we simulated the clash using EA FC 25 to predict the result,” but the point overall is that this is a pretty impressive group of youngsters and some of them are going to get a game tonight. For what it is worth Football London gave Arsenal a 0-3 victory.
Although to be fair to the academy boss, he did say “Under-9 is almost the most important age group every single year. That is where resources go, and also where I need to present to parents and tell them about the one per cent who make it. I am not going to say, ‘You are going to make it, you are going to be the next Bukayo’. We use that as inspiration but there is an element of reality also.”
It appears that there is a limit on how many under 9s a club can sign – it is 30 – but Arsenal don’t seem to take the full amount, and of course a night like tonight is when we shall see the benefits of this programme. But the interview with Mertesacker is interesting as it goes into the background of considering the player’s behaviour and also the attitude of the parents, all of which goes to build up the players’ “character”.
There is a particular mention of course of 16-year-old Jack Porter, who as the article says, “became the youngest player to start a match in Arsenal’s history.” And from here on there is a lot of talk about keeping the players grounded, and coping with the difficulties that football life obviously brings.
So there is some expectation about seeing Ethan Nwaneri, Myles Lewis-Skelly and Josh Nichols tonight – but also remembering that in the game against Bolton there were eight first-timers in the team who were academy graduates.
But the point is repeatedly made just how many academy graduates leave the club as the standards demanded by the first team get ever higher. And here there is a particular mention for Brayden Clarke who was brought in from Wolverhampton Wanderers and signed a professional contract on his 17th birthday earlier this year. He has since played up to under 21 level, and captained the under 18s.
Football London jumps into the discussion with a prediction of which young players will be part of the squad, particularly picking out
- Goalkeeper – Tommy Setford
- Right back – Josh Nichols
- Centre back – Jakub Kiwior
- Left back – Myles Lewis-Skelly
Which of course makes it a very young defence so they are also suggesting that William Saliba who was unable to play against Liverpool due to the referees’ to get Arsenal top of the red card chart (with three) “will come straight back into the thick of things with so many players out injured or unfit.”
One thing to remember here is that the League Cup is actually a very short competition, and already we are in the round of 16, so a victory tonight leads straight into the quarter finals which are played on 18 December. The semi-finals are on 8 January and 5 February, and the final on 16 March.
And yes I am probably getting way ahead of myself, but I thought you might like to know.
Off topic
I see we have Gillett for VAR duty this coming weekends fixture against Newcastle. It will be the 4th time we have had the pleasure of his company in 10 games, an absolute disgrace.
mick shelly
I’ve said this time after time.
This cheat has a litany of bad calls against us, and this is the PGMOL’s way of saying “well done, that is exactly what we want. Carry on”.
Every bad call that has gone against us, either by him or anyone else, is endorsed post match by all the usual suspects. “Well done, that is exactly what we want. Carry on”
The fact they keep having a bent Liverpool fan involved in our matches is proof beyond doubt that the aim is to screw Arsenal. They aren’t even hiding it!!!
As you say. An absolute disgrace.
How does anybody still doubt that refereeing is bent? How can anyone still embrace the discredited notion that it all evens out over a season.?
I wish clubs would unite and call it out for what it is, rather than leave it to individual clubs (eg Forest) to speak out individually and then be sanctioned.
Let’s hope for club solidarity in this cause, calling out PGMOL for its blatant malpractice, secrecy deviousness and non-accountability. If 19 clubs (ie all except no.115) speak out with one voice, they cannot be picked-off individually and their message cannot be ignored.
Blimey Mick, I suddenly lost my appetite to watch the game against Newcastle this weekend…. we know we are going to be screwed again…
I’ve posted many times about the PGMOL. What I don’t understand about the refereeing situation is the upside down way the whole thing works Classic ‘tail wagging the dog’ situation. These twits are funded and paid by the very teams they screw week in week out. Especially the teams from London and the South Coast. PGMOL is funded by the Premier League, Football league and the FA. But most of the funding comes from the Premier League. It beggars belief that an entity would have no influence over it’s employees. And said employees are shrouded in secrecy. OPEN THE BOOKS! Corrupt, inept bunch. If you go to fan sites of other teams you’ll see AFC supporters are not the only ones calling out the officiating. Seems quite a few are rightfully aggrieved. Once again, these f*****rs are owned and paid by the EPL. Why do they allow the continued ineptitude and possible corruption continue? The fans need to press the Clubs to bring this Frankenstein’s monster to heel. Or disband the PGMOL completely and form a new, transparent, geographically fair entity to officiate.