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If there are no decent offers on the table for the youngsters I'd be tempted to send them on loan to hopefully get regular minutes and boost their value.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mac76
The Xhaka situation has me :banghead: though. We just can't get rid of him!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mac76
Exactly. There's not too many positives to the market right now, but we do at least have the luxury of being able to axe 3x as many players as we need to recruit due to our bloated squad, so just the savings on wages alone could be enough to finance the deals we want to get done?
Willian, Xhaka, Kolasinac, Bellerin, one of Laca or Auba, Elneny, Torreira, Nketiah, Nelson, AMN and maybe even Cedric and Willock could all easily get the boot with only 3 or 4 needed coming the other way.
good call, how could i have forgotten Willian? :doh:Quote:
Originally Posted by I am invisible
they just need to get rid of the lot, fuck the transfer fee
The greatest trick Willian ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mac76
Confirmed that Partey is a major doubt for the Brentford and Chelsea games.Quote:
Originally Posted by Chippy
This means he will probably be out until Christmas :sulk:
This guy is the new Diaby :banghead:
:lol:Quote:
Originally Posted by I am invisible
Well it looks like we've given up on this season we're going to offer Xhaka a new contract <_<
at least everyone in row Z behind the goal will be safeQuote:
Originally Posted by Chippy
why not just let him run the his current contract down - jesus effing christ how stupid is this clubQuote:
Originally Posted by dazthegooner
like you say that's this season over with basically - more slow play, giving needless FKs away and sendings off
This tweet is unavailable :bow:Quote:
Originally Posted by GP
:unsure:
Spurs 1 - Arsenal 0 in “the Mind” series :lol:
Didn’t watch it, but sounds like the story of our preseason so far: controlled large parts of the games; created some chances; either couldn’t put them away or no one in the middle.
Our better players are looking good, but we're still without a lot of them and we become average very quickly when we swap in the supporting cast. The striking problem isn’t going away either - a move there is starting to look essential now.
On the plus side Sambi and White sound like the absolute business - Sambi is ready now, no 6 month settling-in period needed, and White is showing that a CB of his profile was absolutely a priority. Mari and Holding look painfully limited when stood next to him, apparently.
Happy with the 3 moves we’ve made, but man! There’s a lot of work to get done in the next couple of weeks!
Need a new striker for sure, Auba's poor form is continuing on from last season, he's gone off the edge of a cliff in terms of his career.
Definitely need a striker.
And a CM.
And an AM.
And a RB.
And a keeper.
Would be surprised if we get more than 3 of those. The Xhaka and Bellerin whispers suggest there won't be much movement in those positions.Quote:
Originally Posted by GP
3??? I would be surprised if we got 1 more signing.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gooner23
Failing to get rid of the dross and in particular offering Xhaka a new contract shows Arteta and Edu are a couple of fucking clowns
Let's hope the team really tanks and that they're gone by Christmas
And bring in who? The club is a joke from top to bottom. Getting rid of these two will make no difference.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mac76
Yeah, it does feel like too much to happen in a couple of weeks now.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gooner23
If it is a max. of 3 then one of them has to be a keeper - I can’t even begin to think about how fucked we are if we lose Leno! Question is who would you prioritise for the other 2 buys?
I think I’d go for the creative midfielder and a RB - I desperately want the striker, but adding another AM / 10 would solve a lot of problems with Laca and Auba, and I think a right-sided Tierney could be transformative for us. Whenever we lost Tierney last year we instantly looked a different, poorer side, but at least we had him available here and there - down the right we had nothing all season.
Wouldn’t it be better to hope that we’ve underestimated them and we have a good season? :unsure:Quote:
Originally Posted by Mac76
I'm fairly confident we will get a keeper, they know Runarsson isn't up to it. If Sheffield don't drop their asking price for Ramsdale (still not sure why we are so keen on him) we'll have to move on to other options. Personally I'd get Johnstone and Onana, combined price less that Ramsdale and that sorts us for when Leno leaves next summer as its rumoured he will.Quote:
Originally Posted by I am invisible
Agree that the most urgent one is another creative / attacking midfielder, and desperately hoping we don't have all eggs in one basket on this. If we can shift Laca a striker might be possible but not confident on that at all.
I don't see a right back coming in now. We have 4 players who can play there so would realistically need to sell 3 of those..
To be fair to Ramsdale, he has been voted his club's player of the year for the last 2 years (at 2 different clubs), so we probably don't have much to worry about in terms of ability. Plus he's only 23, which is very young for a keeper, so there's loads of potential for growth there (Emi didn't really start making a name for himself until he was 27/28). It's just the price - for that kind of money you have to be talking about a first choice keeper, and I'm finding it hard to square those sums away with our struggles to sign players in other areas? Maybe money is less of an issue for us this summer than freeing up space?Quote:
Originally Posted by Gooner23
Sadly, I think you're probably right about the RB - can't see anything happening there unless one or more of the current 4 options move on. I'm desperate to upgrade that area, though - this team will always feel lopsided and in constant need of workaround solutions until we're properly balanced, and our attack will always be fairly easy to predict until we can hit teams left, right or centre.
Chambers is underrated at RB IMO, he can provide a good attacking option from there
He’d be the one I’d keep out of the 4, and I agree he’s a solid option who provides a lot of interesting tactical flexibility. I’m not unhappy with Chambers.
But for me the difference between Tierney and all of our RB options is stark - I don’t think we’ll fully appreciate what we’ve been missing there until the right player comes in and makes it clear.
Chelsea signed lukaku. Decent player. I think they might finish above us this season
100m for a 29 year old player they sold for a fraction.
Great business.
98 million quid and 450k a week? Football's just a racket. It's all about the money now and absolutely nothing else. You couldn't pay me to watch any of these bastards.
I’d probably watch if they paid me £450k a week to, tbf.Quote:
Originally Posted by Niall_Quinn
Basically correct though. As I noted before, every sodding FB post these days has tags to merchandise now. They couldn’t be making it any clearer that they are just a business now and we are their customers. And we (I mean the local fans) aren’t even the ones they’re primarily marketing to any more. Most of the people who comment on those FB posts are from Asia or Africa.
I’ll keep an eye on Arsenal this year but am more likely to go to watch a local amateur side.
Genuinely thought about cancelling my ST but will see how it goes, lockdown's changed my attitude to some things, so this could be the last season though, agree with the non-league football ideaQuote:
Originally Posted by Letters
Some journos saying Auba and Laca will be unavailable for the Chelsea game as well, in a weeks time.
Something fishy there. Either Covid or there's been a bust up.
Arsenal chocolate
https://arsenaldirect.arsenal.com/Gi...glCurrency=GBP
Overpriced and presumably nowhere near a good as 20 years ago
Ten quid??
I just saw this in Sainsburys for a fiver.
And now the Spuds win 😔
What a shit weekend for football.
Complete shitshow of an opening weekend and while I've never been one to overreact to one off games, after the last few seasons this all feels so familiar.Quote:
Originally Posted by Chippy
Yes, we'll have some good days but it's almost certain to be another mediocre season while the Spuds finish miles above us and the usual suspects tussle over the major trophies while we bumble around in mid-table
:ilt:
I'm afraid we have to hope it gets worse so Arteta gets sacked in time to stave off relegation
At least Norwich are certs to go down so that's one place taken...
Well now you're being a bit silly!Quote:
Originally Posted by Mac76
I dont think relegation is going to happen but for quite a lot of last season, there were times were we were not that many points above it. It was never a real risk but if we go backwards as we seem to be doing under Arteta, suddenly that 15th/16th place comes into playQuote:
Originally Posted by Letters
Probably won't get relegated, but why is the season looking doomed after on bloody game FFS.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ollie the Optimist
Not many of us put St Totterings day on our predictions, I wonder why?
We won't even finish above West Ham.
I must admit close to last Christmas I did start to think "holy shit, we could get sucked in to the mire here!"Quote:
Originally Posted by Ollie the Optimist
It literally was relegation form in that run. But then from Boxing Day onwards we sorted ourselves out, I suspect we'll have some decent runs again this season which will mitigate any real risk of relegation. But I can't see us doing any better than bumbling around in mid-table. Given our resources it's completely pathetic how far behind the contenders we are, and how many clubs have overtaken us.