As you’ll know if you read the wonderful honest excellently truthful British sporting pages, every year every single player from Arsenal is about to leave and play somewhere else.
In fact, what actually happens is that the Lord Wenger manipulates the market in order to move on players that he thinks have come to the end of their usefulness, and replaces them with younger players who play twice as well for half the price.
Anyway I thought I would save a lot of anguish this summer by announcing these moves long before the press, so that when the boys from the Mail and the Excess do run their regular pieces, I could drop them a line and say, “oh this is old news – Untold Arsenal ran that back in March”
Except, lo and behold, as Ian pointed out here the other day, the press has got in early and started to run Clichy to Milan stories in March. That’s over 3 months before the transfer swing doorway swings open and turns round to hit you in the face!
So, time to get a move on, and here it is – this year’s departure board. Needless to say, all of it is made up, and thus fits in perfectly with what the papers will say. And if you have ever read these pages before you’ll know I love these players, and that none of the comments reflect anything I believe. It’s a joke. OK? Right!
Almunia – to Spain. “I need to play for a Spanish club to get into the Spanish national team”
Diaby – to WC Milan “Milan have promised me regular first team football, and Flamini has said it is a wonderful stadium, and I look forward to playing as soon as I have recovered from the injury I got playing for France.”
Sagna – to Inter – he’s a proven full back and is demanding double his salary. “They made me an interesting offer, and I look forward to playing as soon as I have recovered from the injury I got playing for France.”
Fabregas – the Real Mad, as per last year, the year before, the year before. “I would love to play in Spain again”.
Toure – to Manchester Arab. “Where’s Manchester?”
Rocisky – back to fitness and off to WC Milan “I need to get regular first team football”
Nasri – to Barca, of course, he’s the second ZZ, and Real Mad had the last one. “It is a great honour to be compared by ZZ but I am my own man, and play in my own style, and I look forward to playing as soon as I have recovered from the injury I got playing for France.”
Eduardo – to some German team I’ve never heard of. “It’s closer to home, and and I look forward to playing as soon as I have recovered from the injury I got playing for whichever country it is that I play for even though I wasn’t born there but that doesn’t seem to matter under FIFA rules.”
Gallas – to Portsmouth. “Portsmouth are a club going places.”
Van Persie – to Barca “I would love to play with Henry again and I look forward to playing as soon as I have recovered from the injury I got playing for Holland (again).”
Vela – to Spain – “I feel more at home in a Spanish speaking land. What is the French for ‘chip the keeper?’ and I look forward to playing as soon as I have recovered from the injury I got playing for Mexico.
Walcott – to Inter – “all players should have the chance to play in other countries and I have not had that yet – except with England, and I look forward to playing as soon as I have recovered from the injury I got in a training session with England.”
Denilson – Real Mad. “I will always be grateful to Mr Wenger, but now it is time to do this on a bigger stage”
Ramsey – to West Iceland. “I feel the need to play every week at my age, and the talk of their financial collapse is overblown.”
Song – to WC Milan Reserves. “I have a lot I can learn from Flamini”
Silvestre – to Portsmouth – “a natural next step for my career”
Wilshere – to Barca. ” ” [Sorry, but I have never heard him speak in public]
Djourou – to Bayern Munich. “It is such an honour to be linked with such a club and I look forward to playing as soon as I have recovered from the injury I got playing for Switzerland.”
Clichy – to WC Milan as already announced. “It is….” [you know the rest]
Arshavin – the KGB Athletico Fulham. “I miss speaking in my native tongue and I look forward to playing as soon as I have recovered from the injury I got playing for the KGB Fulham manager in the motherland.”
Adbayor – to Portsmouth. “I could fit in well with Peter Crouch and I look forward to playing as soon as I have recovered from the injury I got playing for Togo without ever coming back and playing again for Arsenal”.
Bendtner – to Athletico Madrid. “London was too big a city for me”.
Eboue – to Bayern Munich. “London was too cold a city for me”
So there you have it. All the news from the coloumns of our newspapers for the next 3 months. Now you don’t have to worry, get frustrated, get worked up, get angry, or get anything except a ticket for next season’s opening match.
And you heard it all here first.
Coming soon – the first EPL club to go into liquidation, and the start of the revelations about match fixing – both highlighted here earlier this month. You really did see it here first. My god I am so good at this predicting lark I ought to charge for it. Today will be light and tonight will be dark. That’s another bit of futurism. Right, no more unless you give me all your money and I get a transfer to Tierra Del Fuego Reserves. With M Flamini.
(c) The man from another planet. Tomorrow.
your of your head m8 no way r they all gonna left n especially to some of da shit teams u have named there. we r keeping this team together a not letting our stars go to the likes of fucking portsmouth
It was actually meant to be a bit of a joke, and not a suggestion that they are leaving. I think I did try to say that in my piece.
Tony
ahah, wery good article there, I am going to translate the whole thing in french and put it on my blog. WELL DONE
dude… you left out Monsieur Wenger, who’ll be leaving for Real Mad:
“I feel it is ripe for a move to another club where I will get the full support of the board and the chairman. I am looking forward to the prospect of working with the talented youngsters at RM, such as, i’ve been told, Fabregas, Denilson, Nasri, Wilshere…”
sorry Tony, but I have to say that: that is f*kin brilliant, the funniest article ever! i would love to read the new Feverpitch by Tony Attwood..
you made my day..cheers
Some people need a sense of humour injection.
What a load of rubbish? This time you’ve outdone yourself. Should your prediction be true, I thyink you’d find that at left back the position is increasingly covered by young Gibbs who is not bad at all. He is not awed by big time players and get on with it.
Beside many more players have wised up and realised that its not greener on the other side of the fence. As Wenger once said, many people will be grateful in the future that we ewre easy with spending. Its becoming clear the credit crunch will bite those who spend unwisely.
@ aaron
Whoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooosh
The distant sound of irony as it soars far above your head.
Good predictions Tony. If they do all leave, maybe I’ll get a chance to be in the first team. That is, as soon as I’ve recovered from the injury I got playing for my pub team.
Hi Tony,
great piece, love your blog. Keep up the the good work lol
Dré
thats about the strength of it. Every summer we have to put up with this shit. If that wernt bad enough they have started in spring. leave us alone you vultures
Nice, Love The Injurie Part Hahaha
poor old Aaron. Irony is a word that is obviously stricken from his vocabilarly. Nice article Tony…. more quality entartainment like that and methinks I will be stopping by your blog a bit more.
That was pretty idiotic, i don’t think i even smiled reading that. Stick to your day job.
Sad to say Nicky, writing copy (some slightly funny, some dead straight) is my day job.
If you look back through the comments in response to the article you’ll find a mix of people saying it is funny, and those saying it is stupid… which goes to show how very different people are.
What always interests me is that people who don’t like a particular style of humour and who feel moved to comment often (not always but often) seem to imply that no one under the sun would ever find it funny – while those who enjoy it just accept that it made them laugh.
One of the most successful adverts I ever wrote which had humour in it, not only sold a lot of stuff, it also resulted in me getting a load of abuse, and even an (obviously not carried out) death threat.
Funny old thing, humour. Or not depending on your point of view.
Funny really. You are spot on, that’s exactly what the mails and the suns of this world will be making us to believe once the transfer widow opens.
The truth is, no Arsenal player will leave in the summer except maybe Adebayor and RVP.
http://soccerfanbase.com
u lousy son of a biatch
Hi, Tony. Good work. Anyway it’s interesting that your in the copy writing business and I would like to know a bit more on some of the adverts you have done, if possible. Googling your name definitely won’t help; you share your name with a well known psychologist.
It’s funny because it’s true.
Second one already top of the list…Ade to milan!…for £35.mill…and this is from the telegraph,have they started using this US gooner talk for there scorces(not the uk one)from the news snow or something.Fuck me every day,every day sensationalism transfer headings linked with every player under the sun with that blog,i mean someone must take the time to write this poo every day,and the simple question is WHY FUCKING BOTHER!i would love that blogger to come this quality site,read this,and try to justify his writing.and the worst thing about it,those lazy arse newspaper sports jurno`s uses these feeds to find a headline.
Do some people comment on blogs based solely on the headline??
Surely anyone who read the post would get the irony? It is unmissable.
Very good Tony! I agree with the Brain, it would be interesting to hear what adverts you’ve done!
I work as a copywriter in direct mail, mostly in the market of selling products into schools and universities. Worked for Channel 4, Research Machines (RM), Toshiba, British Gas… TonyAttwood.info for more – but really guys you have got better things to do with your life. As my t-shirt says – “arsenal is life – the rest is mere detail”