The good news in Arsenal football’s world on a morning when I must admit news from elsewhere makes it hard to focus and write, (and this isn’t news at all, only that I have just woken up to the fact) is that we don’t seem to be losing anyone to go to the Orange Africa Cup of Nations Equatorial Guinea 2015 from 17 January to 8 February 2015. In the past the competition has given us some grief with its call ups, but not, it seems, this year.
The slightly interesting news is that according to CIES Football Observatory research into what they deem to be the current market values of the world’s leading players we have this top ten…
- 1. Lionel Messi £172.6m,
- 2. Cristiano Ronaldo £104.3m,
- 3. Eden Hazard £77.6m,
- 4. Diego Costa £65.9m,
- 5. Paul Pogba £56.4m,
- 6. Sergio Aguero £51m,
- 7. Raheem Sterling £49.4m,
- 8. Cesc Fabregas £48.6m,
- 9. Alexis Sanchez £47.8m,
- 10. Gareth Bale £47m
So Fabregas has gone up, Sanchez has gone up, and Bale has had his value cut in half. I wonder how they do it.
There is one bit of real transfer news. Kristoffer Olsson has been transferred to FC Midtjylland, where he has been on loan since September.
That’s about it. Elsewhere…
The Legia Warsaw story about Krystian Bielik won’t go away. The Daily Express made up this quote, “I hope that the two clubs come together and I go to London to fulfil my dreams. He [Mr Wenger] knows I have the skills, that I’m determined to win and he wants to sign me as soon as possible to start working with me.”
Allegedly interviewed on Polish website, he said, “I believe in him, because I know that he is not afraid to play the youngsters. Remember in the last game against Galatasaray in the Champions League, in which he put three 17-year-olds onto the pitch in the second half.”
The latest on Sky Sports is that Legia have rejected a second bid from Arsenal. They want £2.3m having paid Lech Poznan £9,500 last July. Bloody inflation.
The Metro, seeing this, made up another quote. “I’ve made a decision [to join Arsenal] and I’m not going to change it. I am looking forward to an agreement between the heads of the clubs. I realise that the negotiations may take some time. I am, however, confident it will happen soon.”
Borussia Dortmund have tossed away Manchester United’s bid for Mats Hummels, who the Star said Arsenal are interested in. The Daily Mail says that the player doesn’t want to go to Arsenal.
Borussia Dortmund however said that no one has made an offer for Marco Reus despite the fact that the Star says that Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester United. Presumably the Star and its readership think the fault is with the clubs for not getting their act together, rather than that of the journalist who made it up.
The Star has also, despite the lunacy of its approach, continued with the concept that clubs can be on deep sleep, sleep, transient wakefulness, alert and high alert. Arsenal, Manchester United Stoke and Liverpool are on high alert over Xherdan Shaqiri now that a bidding process is on the way for the player.
Stoke?
And still the childish “newspaper” won’t give up. They say, “Paris Saint-Germain star Yohan Cabaye has made it clear that he wishes to remain at Parc des Princes. And thus, Arsenal can now sign Moussa Sissoko from Newcastle United as he will not move to PSG until Cabaye moves. What a tangled whatnot.
In fact, the more I look at this, the more it seems that every single transfer story has its origins in the offices of or public houses near The Daily Star where transfers are always “a race”.
Valencia have “joined the race” (told you so) to sign Dinamo Zagreb midfielder Marcelo Brozovic, alongside Arsenal, Everton, Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur. And Torquay United.
OK I made that last bit up.
And the Star don’t just do the comings, they also do the goings. Aston Villa, Sunderland, Crystal Palace and “French side Bordeaux” (in case you thought Bordeaux was a suburb of Blackpool) are “desperate” to land the Frenchman (that’s Sanogo to you) on loan.
Joel Campbell is off to Villarreal or Real Sociedad or (in a parallel universe) both. Not least because the Daily Star report that Campbell “is set to” (another key phrase) sign a contract extension.
Arsenal are interested in signing Atletico Madrid’s (the Star calls him “an ace”) Mario Mandzukic, as an alternative to Edinson Cavani, who was presumably out to lunch when they called.
Petr Cech is wanted by Arsenal, according to the Daily Star as is Hugo Lloris (according to the Metro, which is the pretty much the same).
Palermo star Paulo Dybala wants to move to Arsenal, and will not go to Manchester United or Liverpool because they are far too silly, said the Daily Express which isn’t silly at all.
That’s about it for gibberish. Something more substantial anon…
LOL Tony. I think the race is mostly about getting drunk first in the pub and then invent the next silly transfer rumour.
Can you believe that I haven’t spend any thought about all those rumours this month? I rather focus on the imminent return of Ramsey. And Özil. And Arteta. And Flamini. And Giroud.
By the time I come to the Emirates on the first day of February I want them all to be in super form and give a spanking of Aston Villa when my wife comes over for her first ever live match from Arsenal!
Just got the confirmation about her ticket this week so here we come. 🙂
The media love to make rumours of players Arsenal are going to buy and then when we don’t, rejoice in the fact that players turned us down for not being big enough.
Dear Untold,
Ignore the Star and all the other pub pundits, here’s the very latest: The race is on for Serb ace Igor Borozomovinividi-Vici currently with Super Camel of Ulan Bator.(Mongolia) . His agent Paulo Poundstretchervitch is married to the daughter of our postman who swore me to secrecy, but when my club is involved I feel I owe it to my fellow Gooners to keep them informed of REAL news.
Apparently its between Us, Barcelona and Accrington Stanley.
Keep everything crossed chaps.
Walter, I share your view completely.
I believe the news when its on Arsenal.com or spoken by Mr. Wenger.
In the meantime, I try to avoid all the press rubbish, about “targets”, “linked with”, “snubbed by”, “eyeing”, “keeping tabs on”.
It was simpler in the old days, when managers just “swooped” for the occasional “transfer coup”, usually after a “motorway dash.”
Another player, Justaine Fountaine who plies his trade in Luxembourg is set to sign for Arsenal. Justaine who has been on the radar of the Arsenal scouting team for a while plays in the much needed DM position that has caused the team so many points this season. He’s touted as an upgrade over Nemanja Matic of Chelsea and goes by the nickname ‘The White Viera’.
According to our very reliable source, the announcement is set to be made on the club’s official website before the week ends. This underlines the fact that Wenger is resorting to plucking players from obscurity and obscure leagues once again which brought him so much success during his first nine years at the helms of affairs at Arsenal.
With this acquisition, Wenger has been quoted as saying ‘now Arsenal have genuine chances of winning the triple this season’.
The only snag is that the tight-fisted Wenger is drawing his feet in agreeing to the transfer said to be in the region of £900,000. Although the player has a preference for Arsenal, however, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester United and a host of other clubs are waiting to hijack the deal. This will not be the first time that Wenger has failed to tie down a star player to a deal. Ronaldo, Yaya Touré and Ibrahimovic are recent examples.
(I guess I have been reading The Daily Star and Daily Express so much lately)
In my first comment I got mixed up between English and Dutch but as Van Gaal is s professional in this who am I to not do this. Anyway I first wrote it completely wrong (Dutch word order one could say) but reading it again I actually could have been understood saying that I wanted them (the listed players) to give a spanking of my wife and not Aston Villa. 🙂 🙂 In order to keep Tony’s adult rating of the site low I then changed it but it was rather funny so wanted to share it anyway.
I don’t think however she would be open to it…. 🙂
Hey – things are moving. It is “seen at the airport” time.
Loic Perrin has arrived to Emirates Stadium.
There you are. You read it here, well, maybe, second, or third, or…
Steady on Walter. This is not that kind of site.
Let the fun begin Tony…. “seen at the airport time”…. probably he passed Jovetic on the airport who was seen/spotted leaving for London/Arriving in London… when was it again … 2 years ago? 🙂 Time flies… Which brings us to the question…how does time flies? By plane?
Apparently City are up for signing Bony. I liked him before he came to England and if we’d have signed him we’d have made a nice profit this month as City will have to probably more than 30 million. What happend to our business acumen?
Spanking each other?The cult of UA gets juicy! Balls to going to bed at 9pm, Im looking forward to us all dancing around the fire and at dawn sacrificing the Tottenham shirt (c1981) to the football God “Splatter” and then to be abducted by aliens to the planet Icke(pronounced Ickie)where we will eat mung bean sandwiches and learn lots of drivel.
Anyway back to the transfer rumours, I heard we are getting buying a bloke called Willie Jung, hes the new Willie Young apparently.
It may well be that Arsenal buy Pique from Barcelona, especially as there has been no mention anywhere, and the club do like to keep cards close to their chest until all is completed.
Ive still got my money on Bielik being secured 😀 Whilst i know that 99.9% of these rumours are made up from nothing, surely they arnt allowed to just completely make up quotes?
Robert Cook – you are funny. If we had signed Bony (as you wished) why would we be selling him to City now, unless he was no good…
Tony, is the Barca ban in place or not. Just for Bob Mac’s benefit, I wonder if you might settle this debate…
now, back to work
Now on the Guardian web site
Arsenal close to sealing deal to sign Krystian Bielik from Legia Warsaw
• Midfielder’s agent confident move will go ahead
• Bielik: ‘I’ve made a decision and I’m not going to change it’
If we take all the players that have been rumourly connected with Arsenal by the print media as true. Then Arsenal are going to have nothing less than 10 new players in their squad before the season ends. But having noted this print media exaggerated Arsenal transfer rumours, I personally believe Arsenal do need to strenghtens their holding and striking department unfailing with 2 top quality players before they play City at the Etihad in a must win a big game by the Gunners. Who will those CDM and Top striker be? I leave those options for the boss to make his choice. The only top strikers we hv are Sanchez and Giroud. We certaintly need another top in our front line to properly complement our striking force. Walcott who suffered that big injury will need time that is essense to reach height again. Welbeck is not that reliable to score goals for Arsenal. Arsenal can’t afford to be waiting for a particular player to hit tops nd also can’t sacrifice victories on d alter of lengthy form rehablitation time.
@Rupert,
And if we bought Bony long ago, and sold him to City, you would be the first one to say that Arsenal are a selling club!
Because that’s exactly what happened when we sold Nasri, RVP, Cesc, etc.
RVP: bought £2.75 million Sold £22 million
Nasri bought £15.8 million Sold £22 million
Cesc: bought Free Sold £35 million
I know what positions I would like filled at Arsenal but I don’t get excited to I see the player holding up the shirt.
On a similar vein. Anyone here remember the Campbell press conference? All those players signed and then HIM. Lovely day.
Walter – you are a gem. Lots of fondest love to your wife. I hope she has a wonderful day out at the Ems & enjoys the football.
Haha…
Sunderland have pulled out of the race to sign Virgil van dijk, advantage Spurs and ARSENAL.
What the effing efff!!!!!!!!!……
Just heard that Wenger has signed Blatter & Mourinho to do a turn at half time. They will be joined by our best fan Morgan (Piers) who is going to do some trick shooting with arms courtesy of the American Rifle Association. Now thats news!! —–uk media style.
I saw this list of “leading players” published too. It’s good to see that Sanchez is valued higher than Bale but to be quite honest this list seems more than a little bizarre. Sterling – the 7th most valuable player in the world…………………really?!!!!
Why didnt we sign Bony. Who knows, maybe we didnt want or need him. Maybe he didnt want us. Or maybe a rival club with, it is rumoured, considerable influence over his former club, Vitesse Arnhem didnt want him coming to Arsenal
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/26847853
Personally, whatever the reason, I am quite please with who we have already
Vitesse story is a major concern…
As for Bony, he is a decent striker for a mid-table PL team. Is he really the player he will improve our strikeforce? No!
As for his move to Man City, it stinks. The guy will probably quadruple his wages but will likely play only occasionally. It shows many things that are wrong with current day football.
I see Adebayor is up for sale
Can I interest anyone – Anyone at all ?
It’s a race!!! It’s a race!!!! (Free to Rowan Atkinson in the movie Rat Race) 😉
Great news Walter. Hope you have a great day. And you are very excited I can see by your replies today ;). Rightly so. 🙂
Does it really Arvind? 😉
It’s nice to see that we have for a change targeted our transfers early and made the bids for them rather than the trolley dash that goes on on the last day to save £5 quid.Mind you how could you improve our squad the way that our team and manager have set out so far..No one this year can blame bent ref’s can they…
Oh and aniloll5 is this a website where you post a picture of your unshaven grandad on for good luck like you walter and tony have done!!
Oh dear, the racist Zombie haters back.
I suppose that means his little chum will soon be sauntering in to back his every word.
Good to know that Mrs Broeckx will be at The Arsene Wenger Ems Stadium to watch Arsenal play live for the first time. Meaning her health has greatly improved. Praise God on her behalf.
Arsenal spanking Aston Villa she will definitely see.
Cant wait for the first:
Jampot….so funny
I’m being bullied.
I’m entitled to my opinion.
I’ve supported Arsenal since I was knee high to an ant.
I’m being abused.
You’re all insane.
I’ve been supporting Arsenal since I was a tadpole in my fathers sack.
you’re all mad.
You foreigners make me sick.
Did I mention how long I’ve supported Arsenal. ?
……………Honestly. I just cant wait for it !!!!!!!!!
lol@jambug
I’m fairly sure there were articles dedicated to AAA behavior. That link should just be posted everytime. It’ll probably be more concise. Maybe I’ll search for it sometime 🙂
Yes Walter – it is super super super obvious.. to say it in AW’s words 😉
Nick Lee,
It’s not up to me to lecture you but should you be serious, Tony and Walter are grand-dads. You should show some respect.
Here’s a revelation lads and lassies, if it isn’t on the Arsenal website….its bullshite!