Why did Arsene Wenger go for Jamie Vardy?
Simple! He was cheaper.
Wenger wanted a proven striker.
Vardy’s 24 goals had propelled Leicester towards the title and he would only cost £22m.
Other options, such as Higuain and Morata, might have cost £60m.
Vardy’s release clause was £22 million. That’s a handy price and very tempting for any Premier League manager who needs a reliable goalscorer.
When that story broke originally I said the Leicester team should stay together and share an adventure in the Champions League.
And that a centre forward who lives for a ball over top wouldn’t fit into the swarm-football Wenger rehearses every morning.
Mahrez married a girl from Kent, they enjoy life where they are, and he loves playing with Vardy, who makes him look good. Maybe Kante will stay as well.
The Foxes now have six games in a Champions League group where Vardy can score from a Mahrez pass or somebody else’s pass.
At Leicester, Jamie Vardy is a local hero who’s become world famous.
At Arsenal he’d have been a squad player, a new boy, an Englishman often on the bench.
The FA are said to be unimpressed by Vardy having just agreed a new contract with Leicester. Because he’d promised to focus only on England while we were still in the tournament.
Who cares about that? The FA are incompetent fat cats who rarely get anything right.
It’s obvious that the razor-sharp Vardy, a human missile, is exactly the right striker to score an early goal against Iceland on Monday night.
But it’s widely rumoured that Harry Kane will return for the Iceland game.
England need an early goal in that game. They will be very jittery. If they don’t get an early goal they could lose.
Referendum?
As soon as the door of No.10 opened, and the PM came out with Sam Cam, we knew he’d announce his resignation.
52% of the UK voted against staying in the EU.
PS. Sorry about typos in the first version of this piece.
Too much going on this morning.