Rangers v Arsenal the team – and amazing new names for the transfer list.

By Bulldog Drummond

Sports Mole have tipped nine players to be coming to Arsenal in our on-going summer transfer chart but from those already with us they give a line up today of

Hein;

Bellerin, Rekik, Mari, Tavares;

Partey, Henry-Francis;

Pepe, Smith Rowe, Aubameyang;

Balogun

Karl Jacob Hein is a 19 year old Estonian who in 2018 played for Nomme United.

Omar Rekik joined us from Hertha Berlin in 2017 and has played for Tunisia’s under 21s while 16 years old, before moving on to the Dutch under 18s the following month.  (Please don’t ever assume international football has anythhing to do with where you were born).   But then it was back to Tunisia and he played for the senior team this year against Mali.

Jack Henry-Francis is 17 and doesn’t have a professional contract with Arsenal.

Moving on, it is said that Martin Keown compared Folarin Balogun to Ian Wright in terms of movement and speed.  He has played for the England under 20s.  According to Wiki in 2019 he appeared and scored for England under 18s in a tourney in Dubai, and last year for the under 20s against Wales.

He has appeared for Arsenal five times in the Europa League and scored twice.

Meanwhile the Sun has the big bold heading

What is the team news?

Under which it says, “Arteta will be assessing his Arsenal side following the defeat at Hibs.”   Great.

PainintheArsenal are somewhat more coherent in their reporting and give us a team of

Okonkwo

Chambers Holding Rekik Tavares

Pepe. Partey, Maitland-Niles Nelson

Balogun Aubameyang

Arthur Okonkwo  –  Here they are suggesting that the thinking is that dropping him after the last game will destroy his confidence so he gets another half.

Omar Rekik  –  didn’t get a game last time, so it is his turn to start.

Nuno Tavares –  Possibly having a chance because Kolasinac played the last game and no one wants to risk Tierney getting more injuries.

Folarin Balogun played in the last game and seemed to be coming on nicely, although once again he might get swapped with Eddie Nketiah who didn’t seem quite to be there in the last match.

Sports Keeda offer a different approach again

Hein,

Bellerin, Rekik, Mari, Kolasinac,

Partey, Maitland-Niles, Henry-Francis,

Pepe, Aubameyang, Smith Rowe

and so a certain consistency among selections is starting to emerge.

The Daily Canon comes in with

Hein,

Bellerin, Rekik, Clark, Tavares,

Pepe, Partey, Maitland-Niles, Smith Rowe

Ballogun Lacazette

Harry Clark is 20 and came from Ipswich, appearing last season on loan for Oldham and making 32 appearances – so they obviously liked him.

LovebyLife, who I don’t think we have ever featured before offer

Hein,

Bellerin, Rekic, Mari, Kolasinac,

Partey, Maitland-Niles, Henry-Francis,

Nicolas Pepe, Aubameyang, Smith Rowe

including a few interesting spelling variations, but I think I’ve managed to sort those out a bit.

Meanwhile on the transfer front there is the absolutely hilarious line from Fresh Arsenal that “reliable journalist Fabrizio Romano has confirmed that Arsenal are set to complete the signing of Albert Sambi Lokonga [midfield] and also Ben White [full back].  I mean, what is a “reliable journalist”????  Certainly not a concept we have managed to explore on this site.

Still, we have been signing White every day for the past six weeks, so possibly one day someone will actually get it right.

James Maddison (creative midfield) is being talked about again with Football London suggesting that Leicester don’t really want him any more.

Houssem Aouar has been lurking on the list of players coming to Arsenal for ages but now the Express says no, we have five alternatives to him!  And it is none of the targets the Express have noted before – people like Martin Odegaard, James Maddison and Hakan Calhanoglu.

No, they have now gone for Isco, Christopher Nkunku, Lucas Paqueta, Nabil Fekir and Christoph Baumgartner.

Isco’s name like Fekir’s is popping up all over the place, but Nkunku, Paqueta and Baumgartner are that rarity – new names to add to the Arsenal transfer target list which is now gracefully heading towards 125 players.  We’ll publish the new list shortly.

It is getting very exciting – we’ve already reached a record for all the years we’ve been doing the list, but at this rate and with six weeks still to go we might even get to 150 players who are coming to Arsenal.

Allegedly.

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