Never said I wasn't a prick.
"I really like Arsenal. Do you really like Arsenal, or only Arsenal with trophies?" - Dennis Bergkamp.
"Which Arsenal do they want back, the one Arsene created?" - Tony Adams.
We're pretty quick to hand out new deals to players who haven't performed to be honest, Gibbs has been injured his entire career so it would have been good to see if he can stay fit for one season at least before offering him a long term contract (noone will be after him anyway), Ramsey has been pretty poor, we could have let his deal run down and noone would have gone in for him either.
Wilshere I accept appears to be a bit of a talent but he's relatively unproven and was never really going to leave, plus he's just come back from a year and a half out, Oxo well he's not really delivered thus far but I'm hopeful he will (again seems happy enough here so could have waited a bit longer). Jenkinson well again noone is going to sign him so it's not like we desperately needed him to re-sign.
Be good if we re-signed our top players in the same way we do with the kids. Two of the players we've signed have potentially (that's the key) got big futures, the rest are nothing special IMO.
Has there ever been a bigger feeling of meh to contract signings before? Arguably more reasons why we shouldn't have offered them contracts than there are to offering them. Ramsey - he's a bit shit and has been for a while even before his injury. Jenkinson - had a car crash of a season last season and whilst he's improved this, surely should have waited a bit more before the wage increase. Gibbs - injury prone and still prone to stupid errors. Should get him fully fit for a long time before giving him a contract. Ox - 2 good games since he's joined us. Says it all. Now the main event Wilshere - offered more money than we offered Theo who is far more important also been out for a year and a half and done nothing since coming back to merit such a wage increase.
Clever move by the board, sign them up before the new commercial deals and the top money players arrive
"I really like Arsenal. Do you really like Arsenal, or only Arsenal with trophies?" - Dennis Bergkamp.
"Which Arsenal do they want back, the one Arsene created?" - Tony Adams.