So value for money strikes at the heart of many a Gooner’s wishes, as reports indicate Nuri Sahin is close to a deal with Liverpool.
They are prepared to pay 70% of £120,000/week salary, as opposed to Arsenal’s 60%, and a year’s loan instead of a year’s loan with a £14m option for a permanent transfer, so says the Times
One report yesterday said Wenger is having doubts about his suitability for a holding role! Sahin\’s that is not Wenger\’s.
One factor, or alleged factor was that Real didn\’t want to loan to another club in the Champions League!
ANR reader Vivek probably speaks for many Arsenal fans:
Why is it that Arsenal haggles over every last pound, every last penny while negotiating a transfer? Why can’t they ever do it the easy way? They are always going on about the long term… Why couldn\’t they just take this guy on loan, no option for buying him?
Its okay, it was a win-win. Arsenal could have used the quality in midfield and at 2M that was quite a deal. It was okay if he had to leave at the end of the year, Arsenal could buy somebody else and “it wouldn’t stop the development of the youngsters” and they would have an extra spot to fight for next year. But no, they can never do it the easy way. And this happens every single year.
Last year it was about Mata, the year before it was Xabi Alonso (maybe it was a rumour but I can see Arsenal doing something like that). Now, I am not part of the “Wenger out” brigade, but I think this is just plain idiotic. I have been an Arsenal fan only since 2005-2006, so have never seen them lift any silverware. I am proud of the fact that they like doing it the “right” way, but now I feel the club has become snobby, looking down on winning trophies as if it was something beneath them.
It is almost as if Arsenal are waiting for the trophies to come to them once all the clubs around them have collapsed unto themselves. I have been coming to your site for the past 5 years and have often disagreed with what I thought was your cynicism, but I have always admired your integrity. I have read through your archives from around the turn of the century and have tried picturing how it must have been to follow an Arsenal that competed with the best and often came out on top. I doubt we will see those days for a long time now.
Sorry for the rant but it is frustrating that the club and its management cannot see what is so blindingly obvious to everyone else.
But this in the Telegraph: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/arsenal/9496512/Arsene-Wenger-Arsenal-could-make-late-transfer-moves.html may cheer Vivek up.
Wenger says:”We are working [in the market]. We’ll see what we can do.
“The transfer market is open for two months and yet for one month and three weeks it is nearly closed. It wakes up completely in the last week and then every minute becomes important.
“Everybody has played for time for seven or eight weeks and now suddenly everyone is in a hurry. And that is when the most intense activity happens.”
In other news, although the Mail says Celta Vigo are in for Park, on loan, his national paper, The JoongAng Ilbo\’s sports daily said:“ Fulham is contacting Park Chu-young\’s agent secretly [not any more mate] and the two sides narrowed the differences significantly as the talks proceeded.†Fulham are reported to have offered £3m, and want a loan if permanent deal falls through.
They reckon Fulham is already setting up a plan to utilize Park\’s marketing potential and has secured a Korean-English interpreter for him. Celta have offered 3m euros, and Park favours Fulham.
A letter from Ross Wallace in the Telegraph echoes many an Arsenal fan’s current feelings: “I have been an Arsenal supporter since the 1950s, at that time, Burnley Football Club was universally admired because of the quality of the football played…. However, I also felt sorry for the club’s supporters who saw a steady stream of their players, mostly, if not home–grown, then nurtured at the club, such as Jimmy Adamson, Jimmy McIlroy and Bobby Robson, being snapped up by clubs with more financial muscle. Currently, I feel like a latterday Burnley supporter!
There\’s another similarity in that Burnley had a fantastic scouting network in certain areas including Northern Ireland (McIlroy) and the North East (Adamson), much like Wenger in France and West Africa. And it was sad how small town Burnley, champions in that time, faded away badly. But these are different times, and different clubs. Arsenal are one of the richest clubs in the world. Self-sufficiency is largely self-imposed.
The Times focuses on the rise of the little, nimble, highly mobile footballer with Santi Carzorla, one of a quartet including, Silva, Hazard and Suarez. It says: “Santi Cazorla, newly contracted to Arsenal, has a rather less kind sobriquet — Paquirrin or “Fat Boy” — but the same silken touch and heavenly balance, weaving in and around taller, longer legs, the ball never out of his sight.â€
The article says crosses are decreasing, passes increasing in the Premiership. The number of times players will attempt to nip past or around an opponent about 30 times a match in the Premier League is staying the same, but the amount of crosses is plummeting.
“The 2008-09 season, there were 38 crosses every 90 minutes; last season, that was down to 34. At the same time, the number of passes is skyrocketing. When Manchester United won the Premier League title in 2008, matches contained an average of 716 passes; last season, that was up to 854.â€
And finally, in The Guardian, http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/aug/23/secret-footballer-answers-questions-live the Secret Footballer, in a Q&A reveals a dressing room secret at the Emirates:
BreadClub: “Do you have a preference for a type of stadium to play in? As a fan, I prefer old traditional grounds over the soulless identikit bowls clubs seem to favour these days.”
TSF: I know lots of players who thrive on the intimacy of the older, city-based stadiums such as White Hart Lane and Goodison Park. I tend to lean that way too but sometimes when you are playing at the huge, brand new grounds you can’t help but be impressed. The Emirates and the Etihad are both fantastic stadiums and Arsenal even do chicken nuggets in the changing room after! Bonus!â€