Mid-summer is a time to be reflective and objective.
Football is all about the matches, what players do in the matches, and when there are no matches we can sit around with time to look forward as well as back.
Some of my favourite players are about to move clubs.
Kevin De Bruyne, 24, is a big talent who hasn’t done big things yet but I think he will.
PSG need him more than Man City do.
Is Raheem Sterling a big talent who will have a huge career? We don’t know yet.
He was electric with Suarez but had a rubbish season last year in a bad team.
Sterling is 20 and doesn’t want to go on Liverpool’s tour of Australia but hasn’t made a written transfer request.
Man City want 22-year old Paul Pogba, an athlete who can make decisive interventions in the front third. He can get to balls to score or make a goal. That’s his game, I reckon. He is a match-winning gladiator, mainly.
That’s why I wonder if Pogba is like Martin Peters with muscles.
Peters was the West Ham player that Alf Ramsey said was 10 years ahead of his time. And that comment wasn’t Alf trying to be enigmatic.
Latest news, apparently, is Juventus want £71m and Citeh are losing interest.
2016 is a big year for Pogba because he’s French and ambitious and he will be playing for Les Bleus in Paris or maybe another French city.
Is Arsenal an ambitious club?
No. Never has been.
Arsenal is a profitable business fronted by a savvy French businessman in a tracksuit.
Occasionally I wonder whether Ivan Gazidis is more ambitious than Wenger.
We read this week that Jose Mourinho has signed a new four-year contract with no pay increase.
So he’s on £8.5 million while Wenger’s on £11.5.
I’m not saying that Wenger is overpaid.
But he’s never beaten Mourinho’s Chelsea and I’m convinced he never will. Even with Petr Cech in goal.
You can quote me on that.