lol. Malcoms people were in London last night so soundslike this stuff should all be wrapped up by next week.
and it looks like Keita will arrive in January putting his transfer free to 75 million.
lol. Malcoms people were in London last night so soundslike this stuff should all be wrapped up by next week.
and it looks like Keita will arrive in January putting his transfer free to 75 million.
Current rumour is Naby will be ours by tomorrow.
So we'll have pretty much swapped Coutinho for Keita and Van Dijk. It does feel like we've addressed some team needs better, but it's hard to feel like it's forward progress when you've just sold one of the clubs best players.
Coutinho is great in flashes but I’ve never seen that much in him really. I don’t think he’ll be missed as much as Suarez was, or, for that matter, Salah would be. His stats (which I know don’t tell the whole story) don’t mark him out as particularly great, do they?
Good moves for Liverpool.
Let Lallana play in place of Coutinho, Keita and VvD come in for Can and Klavan.
Probably only a keeper and a defensive midfield destroyer away from something special.
We're supposedly looking at Alisson from Roma. I can't really claim I know anything about him though. We are getting there, but until we get that defensive minded midfielder in, I don't see us quite making the next step.
I can see why Arsene Wenger thinks he can take the piss, having done so in his own manor for years, but Anthony Martial mate lol come on grow up.
I thought Keita was meant to be a defensive midfielder?
Apparently Kante to PSG is on. How much money can the French government give them?
I'm a twit
French government? I thought Qatar owned PSG?
There surely isn't enough money in the world to get Kante out of Chelsea. They're bad enough with him. Without him they'd be back to peak Mourinho meltdown levels of shiteness.
We'd be a 9th-12th mid table outfit.
All seems a bit of an overreaction tbf.
He’s only going in summer anyway. Plenty time for Chelsea to sign Tolisso from Bayern.
I'm a twit
I see Liverpool are 'in the hunt' for Sanchez.
Doubtful. £350k a week? Fucking lol at that.
I know Arsene is all over his player swaps at the moment so how about one for Sturridge?
In today’s market Kante must be worth well over £100m, which, considering he’s not a glamorous striker/winger, I can’t see anyone paying. He does an important job, but he’s not going to shift merchandise.
I can't see Marina agreeing to sell him for anything short of world record amounts. Same goes for Hazard.
Madrid will probably shit the bed and refresh the entire squad this summer, and United getting 'Alexis' frees Bareth Gale up as an Eden Hazard makeweight, so that one seems more likely as time passes.
I read a Salah makeweight today.
No thanks.
Looks like the rumours were bollocks and Keita is staying in Germany til the summer.
Sanchez and Ozil both not playing for Arsenal surely means they've decided to cash in?
You'd imagine Sanchez to United. But who has suddenly come in for Ozil now? Not waiting would suggest a Premier League team.
Ozil’s injured I think, Fox, rather than left out like Sanchez has been.
I’m struggling to see where Ozil will end up, really, but I suppose him being a freebie at the end of the season opens up lots of places.
Apparently Javier Hernandez's agent is on the phone to anyone who will listen.... BUT, they aren't willing to listen to offers less than West Ham are currently paying him.
A loan to the MLS isn't out of the window, but would be a last resort. That said, the West Ham board don't wont a loan deal that means they still pay a percentage of his salary.
I guess that means he's probably staying at West Ham.
This Aubameyang thing seems real, why it's necessary now but wasn't 6 months ago makes no sense to me.
I get the slightest sense of panic from my club at the moment.
If the club has any sense they will be buying whoever the replacement manager wants ala City buying Guardiola’s favoured players prior to his arrival. Heard that the Greek defender and Malcom are scouted by Diamond Eye instead of Wenger so hopefully that means they’re decent and also indicates the end of Wenger’s reign approaching.
He's 6 months younger than Alexis Sanchez. Project Youth
Meanwhile AS are trying to stir shit up by putting the RONALDO TO UNITED train back on the tracks.
Who or what is Diamond Eye?
I said the same thing when reading this:
Mikhitaryan would be shite.
I do think Martial is a little underrated in the amount of game time he gets, always looks quite good to me on the wing and more natural there than Rashford for instance. Of course he's not a "replacement" for Sanchez, but would add something to Arsenal anyway if given the chance to play a bit more.
Abuyamang makes so little sense to me though. He's essentially the same type of player as all the strikers already at the club - All pace and various levels of finishing skills. Granted, he's very much likely better than them all at it, but he also is a super pacey striker playing for a rampant counter-attacking team where he always gets space to run at. He's essentially a good version of Vardy in Leicester - and he would probably struggle at Arsenal. And also - Lacazette has looked off in the past games, but he's also getting supplied fuck all - how is he supposed to score when noone is creating any chances for him? I know that's partly on him as well, but his finishing and running has so far looked good enough that it makes little sense to buy a replacement already.
If we agree to throw Martial into the Sanchez deal then we are retarded.
It's quite clearly a 4-4-2 with Aubameyang and Lacazette up top, Martial on the left, Mkhitaryan on the right with Mezut Ozil and Aaron Ramsey holding down the centre of the pitch.
How could it go wrong?
edit: Forgot about Malcom. He can find a place in the middle (wahey!).
Playing with Abouyamang and Lacazette (or Giroud) up front in itself wouldn't be a terrible idea really.
I think Arsenals best formation they could currently play (without Sanchez) would be a diamond midfield like this, diamond:
Lacazette - Giroud
Ozil
Wilsher - Ramsey
Maitland - Niles (probably)
Kolasinac - Fuckup1 - Fuckup2 - Bellerin
That formation would only work if Maitland-Niles was actually Maitland and Niles, the hitherto unknown deadly defensive duo. Otherwise good luck ever having the ball.
Amazing story about Mahrez whoring himself out to get a move. It turns out the stories about him being in Barcelona/moving to Liverpool etc. were all made up by some guy on WhatsApp messaging journos with scoops in exchange for VIP tickets to games and signed shirts.
Absolute legend.
That may be true, but he also seems like the best option there currently is for that role.
So yeah, good luck on ever having the ball indeed.
Sometime less is more.
I suppose, at the very least, there are less people to fuck up.
I dunno that it would help either, but in my world I'd say it's more like playing one more defender - I feel like Bellerin and whoever is on the Left are more like wide midfielders in a 3-4-3.
But anyway, the idea I know is that they should be falling back into fullback positions on the defensive effectively making it some sort of 5-2-3, what what keeps happening is they go a little too far up, and the "wide centerbacks" come up covering for them a little too high as well, and they get found out.
When the cross to Calum Wilsons goal came in yesterday, there were 3 (arguably 4) fucking arsenal players surrounding/chasing whoever crossed it for Bournemouth:
Now, it's also a mystery how Chambers and whoever else was in the middle didn't manage to together mark the guy, coupled with Cechs timing - so literally half the team managed to fuck up there, but still - I feel like these sort of things keep happening in this formation when Bellerin and Kolasinac effectively are playing like wingers.
In a team like Chelsea they get away with it basically because they have Kante to cover in midfield, and partly because Moses and Alonso are a little more conservative.
So in a nutshell - I think at least a 4-man-defense is something Arsenal (remotely) knows how to play, so it might be better.
But again - it is probably all beyond hope anyway.
Stick Jack 'The New Rio Ferdinand' Rodwell at centre-back.
Arsenal dont know their best formation or team at the moment. Some real bad decesions over the past 6 months. New regime come the summer. They team is totally off balance
Reports of radja off to china.
Proper waster if he takes the money.