Fabregas and Adebayor Speak Out, Scudamore to be Chief Exec? and Eboue Analysed

Thank God! It's been a while now since we've had any real news to report on, and even though today's isn't anything that special, it makes a change from constant Nasri and Hleb transfer talk. Apologies for the lack of a blog yesterday, but I couldn't face covering new variations on the same stories yet again.

The most important news I have come across today are statements of loyalty from both Cesc and Adebayor. Fabregas is in talks over a new deal at the club, which would take his pay from 60,000 to 90,000 a week. Bear in mind though, that the information comes from the Telegraph's "source at the club", so is more than likely completely made up. What is more cheering is Fabregas' interview with Radio Marca, in which he committed his future to the club, and stated his desire to win the league here. He said:

"I am staying at Arsenal. I have given my word to my coach, he asked me and I told him that he had my confidence 100 per cent and that is the end. He has asked for unity in the team and I am the first one who is going to stick by him so there is no problem. I want to win the league and I am one of those people who fights for what they want until they get it."

And isn't that just music to your ears. Barca and Real can piss off, they're not getting their hands on Cesc! Adeabyor has come out with similar sentiments in an interview with the Sun;

“I came to Arsenal with a mission to succeed, I have assured the gaffer Arsene Wenger I’ll stay because I believe in the team and I want to assure the fans my concentration is here.I have no reason to leave so I’ll stay to ensure that together we’ll win silverware."

It's great to have to players who are both so important to the team state their happiness and loyalty to the club, especially when other players have been more critical. It proves to the doubters that this Arsenal team will not fall apart, and that they will be back, even stronger, next season for another attempt at winning the title.

Apparently, Richard Scudamore, current chief executive of the Premier League is at the top of our list for David Dein/Keith Edelman replacements. I don't know if there is any truth in the rumour, but it is an interesting one. One one hand, Scudamore knows football very well, and has been able to increase the profits of the Premiership hugely. On the other hand he does he does appear to be a conscience-free kinda guy, who wouldn't be averse to changing anything for extra cash (witness the 39th game proposal). I think he could potentially do a very good job at the club, but as long as the other directors kept a close eye on him to ensure he doesn't turn out a twat in the mould of Peter Kenyon. I don't know nearly enough about the financial side of football to say for sure what kind of impact he could have, but I would be cautiously optimistic if he was appointed, though slightly concerned he could turn the club into the kind of corporate sponsorship whore Man Utd have become, constantly going on tour around the USA, Far East and Middle East to raise the clubs profile instead of concentrating on footballing matters.

Finally, I have done a bit of work analysing the contribution of Emmanuel Eboue to the club this season. I, along with almost all of the fans, think he has been rubbish for pretty much the whole season, but Wenger has defended Eboue, claiming that he helps balance out the side's attacking instincts. Someone may well have done this before, but I decided to put Wenger's claims that Eboue helps the team to the test. Basically, I have worked out the average number of points the team won in games the Eboue was and wasn't involved in. I have counted him as involved if he has played over 45 minutes of a game. When Eboue was in the team, we got an average of 1.95 points per game, whilst we got 2.5 points per game without him. Obviously there are a huge number of other factors I could take into account, but, honestly, I can't be bothered. Despite this, the statistics do seem to show the negative effect Eboue has on the team. However, the situation isn't as clear as it seems, because Eboue tends to have played in some of our trickier games this season; featuring both home and away against Liverpool, Chelsea and Man Utd, and this is bound to skew the figures somewhat. So there you go, the figures I have come up with are inconclusive, though I suspect lean to the side that says "Eboue is completely useless!".

I may not be blogging much over the weekend, as I am away, but I'll try to find time. I'll be back Monday though, so never fear!

Van Persie on the Wage Structure

I'm not going to bother covering another lot of transfer rubbish today, as nothing has come up that strikes me as even remotely likely. Instead, I would like to focus on a story based on comments by Robin van Persie.

Basically, van Persie has come out and said that he thinks Arsenal lose their top players, and will continue to lose their top players because they won't match the wages offered by other top European clubs.

To a degree, I agree with him; if we had matched AC Milan's wage offer, Flamini would still be at the club. However, Flamini aside, there are notably few players who have left Arsenal due to higher wages on offer elsewhere. The recent high-profile departures, Henry and Vieira, were already on huge wages at the club, and left for other reasons. Henry for a new challenge, and Vieira who was encouraged to leave (it seems) by Wenger. The club has shown before, notably in these two cases, that for exceptional players it is willing to offer wages way outside the normal structure. The rest of the squad are probably on lower wages than they would be on at a different team, but (again, excepting Flamini) those who do leave tend to leave for other reasons. This season, Diarra left because he didn't have the balls to fight his way into the first team, and Hleb is very likely to leave, though we are not yet sure exactly why.

In my opinion, van Persie's comments here are a veiled threat. He wants more money, not necessarily now, but when he negotiates his next contract, it seems fairly probable he will ask for a big pay rise. As the club has shown before, if it feels a player is worth these higher wages, it will offer them. Van Persie has a lot to prove before he can expect to be paid more than he is now; we all know he is a quality player, but his ability to stay fit for more than a couple of months at a time is really under question. Arsenal don't pay players more than they're worth to the club, which, to me, seem eminently sensible. Van Persie needs to realise that he has to prove he deserves higher wages before he gets paid them.

Other than this we have Johan Djourou telling people that he's best as a holding player. Could he be the player to replace Flamini? I doubt it, but I'm often wrong.

Flamini didn't make the final France squad for Euro 2008. I know a lot of people are getting kicks from this, but it does seem really unfair on the player. Diarra, who is a far inferior player, is in the squad and Flamini isn't.

UPDATE: The EU has come out against Fifa's proposed 5+6 quota system. Fantastic. Let's hope that this puts all this talk to bed for the next few years.

Sepp Blatter - Idiot.

Apologies for the lateness of this blog, and the lack of the normal news and transfer gossip round-up, but I have been busy and tired today, and I can't be arsed. What I would like to do is to provide my thoughts about Fifa's and Sepp Blatter's quotas system for foreign players. This issue has been around for a while, and has resurfaced today because of reports that there are fewer players qualified to play for England playing in the Premier League than ever before. Fifa has outlined a plan to limit the number of foreign players in any team, which it believes will help strengthen national teams. The plans are outlined in more detail here.

To put it succinctly, the plans are complete and utter bilge. They are unworkable, illogical and against all (that I believe) football should stand for. There are several main reasons why I feel the quotas system will fail; I will discuss each of these separately. These reasons are: it is illegal under EU law, it will dramatically lower the standard of the top leagues, it will, contrary to its claims, make these leagues less competitive, it will cause most clubs huge financial problems and it will not strengthen national sides.

Firstly, and most obviously, the system must overcome huge legal obstacles to its introduction. In the EU, it is illegal to discriminate between workers from the EU on the basis of the country they come from. I don't know even nearly enough about EU law to go into this in more detail, so if anyone knows more, please let me know in the comments section.

The Premier League stands to suffer more than most from this potential system. If it was implemented, almost all of the clubs currently playing in the league would quickly have to find more English players. As there are very few English players playing overseas, there new players would have to come from the country's lower leagues or the clubs academies. Whilst there may well be an advantage to giving youngsters more experience at an early stage, I believe that most of the deficit would be made up by players playing in the Championship or at a lower level. Anyone who has watched the Championship on a regular basis will understand that filling the Premiership with players from that level would be hugely detrimental to the quality of the football played.

If the quotas system was imposed, the value of English players would increase hugely. Even today, English players tend to be vastly overpriced, but in a league operating a quotas system this trend would be increased dramatically. It is basic economics of supply and demand; if the demand for English players surges (as it would if most of the league desperately need to find new players) then their values would increase. I believe that this would end in a situation when only the top few clubs would be able to afford the best players (even more so than today). The current stars of the England team (i.e. Jole Cole, John Terry, Frank Lampard) would command ridiculous transfer fees, if they were ever sold, whilst second-rank players such as Gareth Barry, Ashley Young or Jermaine Defoe would cost as much as world-class players do today, so that only the biggest clubs could afford them. The monopolization of the top few places in the league, and thus entry to the Champions League would increase, as only the big clubs could afford good English players, decreasing the competitiveness of the league.

The system would also lead to a massive devaluation of most club's squads. If a club has too many foreign players, these players become effectively worthless. Other clubs will realise this, and if a team tries to raise money to buy more English players by selling of its foreign ones, they will receive only a fraction of the price they would get in the current market. This would mean that club's would lose huge amounts of money, and many, with their budgets already overstretched, would be left in financial crisis.

The English national side would not benefit from these changes. The best players make it to the top regardless of their nationality, as evidenced by the high percentage of the England squad playing regularly in the Champions League. A system of quotas would not create more Steven Gerrards or Wayne Rooneys, players with that amount of potential are already identified at very early ages, and, if injuries and behaviour allow, almost always fulfil their potential. All that a quotas system would achieve would be increasing the level of mediocre players playing at the top level.

I feel that Fifa's motivations for this system are less altruistic than they would have us believe. I believe that their main interest is actually to lessen the world-wide commercial, and European footballing domination of the English Premier League, which is, by far, the most popular league in the world, and has proven to be the dominant force in European football in recent years. I urge all football fans to understand the potential repurcussions this scheme could possibly have, and to resist it by all means possible.

Rant over, back to normal service tomorrow.

All Transfer Rumours and no News makes Gooneriffic a Dull Blog

It's true, once again, nothing has happened today. We've been linked (again) with the same players we have been being linked with since the season ended. Couldn't someone at least come up with someone new we might be interested in. If this carries on much longer, I'll have to start making things up myself. Eboue to Spurs for £1 billion anyone?

The only actual interesting news articles I have come across today are these two:

I have included this article, although it's mainly about Liverpool, because it really annoys me. Not only is Benitez already making excuses about why his team will again fail to challenge for the titles (of course it's not because of his rotation system), but also because he says:

"It's more difficult [to win the league] because after two years of Chelsea winning the league and spending big money, United needed to do the same. They started spending big money and Arsenal were also spending big money on young players. We are trying to do the same but because they are continuing to spend big money, it makes it more difficult to catch up ... We will try to do our best and the key for me is to not talk about the title."

The implication that Liverpool aren't able to keep up with our (or even Man Utd's and Chelsea's) transfer spending is completely ridiculous. Whilst we have operated at a net tranfer profit for the last few years, Liverpool have spent huge amount of money. Last season alone they bought Torres, Mascherano, Skrtel, Babel, Lucas, Benayoun and various other youngsters. It's pathetic from Benitez and does Wenger a disservice.

In happier news, we have an interview with Theo Walcott in The Times, in which he comes across as a great lad really. He doesn't seem to have any of the laddish preoccupations with partying, cars and girls that other young English players his age seem to. He also reveals that he turned down the chance to join Chelsea, so that makes him a double-legend. Theo is probably the player I am most excited about watching next season, Vela and Nasri (probably) included. He looked so promising at the end of the last season, and I just hope he gets a regular starting slot over Eboue next time around.

Does anyone have any interesting Arsenal news? Let me know! I'm bored out of my skull!

Same old, same old.

Basically, nothing of great interest has happened today. The most interesting that I have come across is a piece about reported Arsenal target Clement Chantome by Gunnerblog, who watched PSG play Lyon in the French Cup final yesterday. From the sounds of it, he'd be a decent squad player, but nothing more.

Other than that, we have Wenger confirming on French TV that he thinks Nasri will be signed before the Euros begin. I think we can safely say we saw that one coming, though it's good news nonetheless, and hopefully it will stop some of the moaning that has been coming from some quarters. There is a nice article about Nasri on Footballing World, that I enjoyed reading.

In other news....

Sadly, my six-a-side team, the Heartbreak Kids lost today, which makes it virtually impossible for us to qualify for the knock-out stages of the competition. And this time, we didn't even have the excuse of being incredibly hungover...

We have been linked again to Mario Gomez, of Stuttgart. This just doesn't make any sense to me, and I sincerely doubt there is anything in it, as we have more strikers than we need at the moment. The same article also links us to Blaise Matuidi and Mouhamadou Dabo of St Etienne. These are two names that have been floating around for a while, but I suspect that they've just been picked from the promising young French midfielders bracket and linked with us for no more reason that that.

And finally, more proof that, as we all already knew, Lassana Diarra is a twat. Who is he to talk to Wenger like that? A player who couldn't make the grade at Arsenal or Chelsea, so had to settle for Portsmouth. Twat.

Let's just hope for more exciting news tomorrow.

Should we all be more like Spurs fans? Hleb, More Nasri and Gilberto.

Should we all be more like Spurs fans? In one sense, possibly. I'm not suggesting that we all go out and try to become stupid, ugly, foul-smelling morons, but there is one aspect of the Spurs fan that might help us all out; the eternal optimism. Every year that I can remember, the whole summer has been ful of doom and gloom from Arsenal fans, predicting the clubs imminent decline and demise, whilst the fans of North London's other club seem certain that they are about to displace us and charge up the league table. Now this seems to happen every season without fail. Also, every season without fail, both sets of fans are proved wrong. We keep on up with the big four, Spurs sit in mid-table, but that doesn't stop either set of fans. If we think about things, we have much more reason to be optimistic that the average Spud; we're in the Champions League, we've got a load of great players, and the prospect of more on the horizon, and our best player doesn't want to leave. All they have is Jermaine Jenas. And they're the optimistic ones? Obviously, our moods doesn't have any effect on the clubs themselves, but it might cheer people up a bit if we were just a little more optimistic, if people weren't spending the summer writing of Wenger for not signing hundreds of new players, and instead were just thinking about how we're going to beat Spurs, home and away, again, next season.

In the news today, there's not much we haven't seen, or expected to see, before.

We do, however, have more from Hleb's agent:

"I can officially confirm that a short time ago Alexander decided that he will leave Arsenal and join another club. "Of course Arsenal and Arsene [Wenger] wanted him to stay but they have accepted the player's choice."

So he's definitely off, at least we have the waiting over. He's a good player, but easily replaceable. I look forward to see him struggling to break into the first team of whoever he joins, and then frustrating a new sets of fans with amazing passes that just don't quite come off and a complete refusal to shoot.

No more official news on Samir Nasri's transfer, but as I have said before, that's nothing to worry about. What we do have however, is a few words from our transfer target of last summer, Franck Ribery, who seems to believe Nasri is on his way here:

"It is good for him. It [Arsenal] is a good club with many young people.

"But the English championship is completely different, he will have to adapt in order to impose himself."

Finally, Gilberto has revealed that our players suffer from the same anxieties as the fans, and he wants Wenger to bring in new players to help keep morale up in the squad. I'd tell him what I'd tell anyone us. The signings will come, it's early days yet, and Wenger has never let us down before. At least it proves that none of the players are closet Spuds.

'Till Tomorrow

Jean II Makoun to Arsenal? Clichy, Nasri and Calm Down!

There's very little news of note to report today. Everywhere seems to be rehashing the same transfer deals that have been circulating for the last few days. It's a shame we haven't heard any more about Nasri, but I imagine the club are still negotiating with him and his agent. As I said before, it would be much more worrying if we had his agent coming out with different statements as to the progress of the transfer, which would suggest he was trying to encourage other clubs to bid, and thus drive up his transfer fee and wages. Give it time, if we haven't heard in a week or so, then it might become a little more concerning.

The biggest thing I have come across today is this report from L'Equipe about Jean II Makoun, the Lille defensive midfielder who has been quite heavily linked with the club. For those of you who don't speak French the article says something along the lines of: Jean II Makoun has confirmed he will leave Lille in the summer, there are a number of clubs interested in him, particularly us (who are his preference) and Juventus. Makoun says that he "needs to move to a bigger club, he believes Lille will understand, and it could even be a good thing for them". He may also move to one of the bigger clubs in Ligue 1. From what I've heard, Makoun is a good player, and could possible make a good Flamini replacement, but there doesn't seem to be too much reason to get excited yet.

We've also news from Gael Clichy, who has told the press that we will not make the same mistakes we made this season in our challenge for the title next time around. Clichy was already one of my favourite players at Arsenal, but the way he has committed his future to us this summer, and the positive things he has to say about the club just make me like more and more. Not only is he a better player than Cole, he's also not a whinging, money-grabbing, syphilitic, twat.

There seems to be a lot of people getting very stressed with the lack of solid transfer activity at the club so far this summer. There's no need to panic! Take a couple and deep breaths and remember... The Summer has only just begun, and there's over three months until the transfer window closes, so there is plenty of time for Wenger and the club to sort out all the transfers we need. It should be even easier this summer, as he has already come out and told us the kind of player he wants to buy. It is almost certainly a positive thing that we are taking our time about this; Wenger wants to make sure he gets the best possible players for the best possible prices. There's no point in rushing, or in fans worrying about the lack of action.

That's all for today - but if anyone knows anything more about this Chantome bloke from PSG, other than he's a 20 year old defensive midfielder? If you do, let me know in the comments!

Transfer Roundup and Good News For Mad Germans

Once again today, we have various spurious transfer rumours flying around that link sveral different players to moves to or from Arsenal. There has been a lot of talk about Real Madrid's interest in Hleb, and quotes from his agent back this up:

"For any player in the world, it is always a great honour that a club like Real Madrid is interested in him.

"This confirms the good work that Hleb has carried out in the last years is being recognised by one of the greatest clubs in the world. Nobody can doubt that the interest of Madrid is a privilege for the player."

However, there has been nothing from either club or the player, so it may well just be a case of Hleb's agent trying to drum up interest in his client. While I accept that this is an agent's prerogative, I just wish Hleb would just come out and say something conclusive himself; does he want to leave the club? The only other commenton this issue comes from ex-Gooner Julio Baptista, who said that Hleb would be "good reinforcement" for Madrid.

Another story floating about the internet and papers today is of Milan's interest in Emmanuel Adebayor. This is just your usual load of transfer bollocks - we're not going to sell Adebayor, and he doesn't want to leave.

As per usual at this time of year, we seem to be being linked with pretty much every young player under the sun. As well, as all the Nasri stuff which is still circulating - the transfer seems no nearer conclusion, although I guess the less we hear at this stage the better - we have apparently signed Francis Coquelin, who I know nothing about other than he's a young French player (apparently a defensive midfielder). We have also been relinked with Hatem Ben Arfa here, although there doesn't seem to be any source for the story. The same page also links us to another player I've never heard of, PSGs Clement Chantome. I doubt there's anything in it, but who knows?

There is on piece of news that I was delighted to hear today, and that is that our very own Mad Jens is likely to be Germany's #1 for the Euros this summer! He's had a tough season with us, but is still a quality player. Will I support Germany now? I don't know if I can bring myself to, but I will most definitely be supporting Lehmann! He is a true Arsenal legend, and deserves a good send-off, as I wouldn't be surprised if he ended up retiring this summer.

The Glorious Heart-Break Kids, Nasri Update and GSSRP3

I am back, battered, bruised and a glorious victor. My 6-a-side team just won for the first time in ages, 3-1 against Scope in my university college's tournament. This means that if we win the next 3 games, we should qualify for the knock-out stages!

Anyway, back to more Arsenal-related things, according to J. Sanderson over at Young Guns, Samir Nasri's agent has confirmed that he is in contract negotiations with the club, but is holding out for more money, claiming that other teams are in the running too. To me, it just sounds like an agent trying to boost his client's (and thus his own) paycheck. Hopefully we'll here confirmation that the transfer is complete in the next few days.

and now, the moment you've all been waiting for...

Gooneriffic's Super Season Summary

Part 3:

What lessons have we learnt from the past seasons? What problems are there at the club and how can they be addressed? Obviously, a 20 year old guy with absolutely no information from inside the club that everyone else has, limited football skills and no coaching/management experience knows what's best for the club. To me, the main problems at the moment seem to be:

• Centre-back pairing.

• Lack of depth in midfield and defence.

We know that Wenger plans to buy a tall, powerful defender in the summer, which should help in defence – we often have problems dealing with high balls into the box, as both Gallas and Toure are 6'0” or less, and an experienced player over 6'2” should see this problem solved, whilst also giving valuable advice and guidance to the likes of Philip Senderos and Johan Djourou, who are both tall and strong players, but maybe don't quite have the experience yet to be first team regulars.

The most pressing problem, which was especially notable towards the end of the season is the lack of depth to our midfield and defence. With Flamini and possibly Hleb leaving, we not only need to replace them, but also bring in another couple of players. Whether this should be done through buying new players or promoting some of our youngsters I don't know, as I haven't seen enough of the likes of Merida, Randall and Gibbs to tell if they are ready yet. As we seem to be on the verge of signing Samir Nasri, we either won't need to buy a replacement for Hleb, or we will be one midfielder better off. Even if Flamini didn't leave, we would still have needed another central midfielder; effectively, for us, him and Cesc (with occasional help from Gilberto) were doing the same job as Anderson, Scholes, Carrick, Hargreaves and Fletcher at Man Utd, Ballack, Lampard, Mikel, Makelele and Essien at Chelsea or Lucas, Gerrard, Mascherano and Alonso at Liverpool. Again, I don't know if Denilson or Diaby would be able to fill this role next season, but I hope so. We really need more than four or five top-class players, who we would be happy to see in the line up against any of the big teams to compete throughout the season. This year, especially with the injuries to Rosicky, we have too often had to play not great players (Eboue!) in important matches. A versatile defender to provide cover across the back four would be very welcome too, as would a genuine winger (though it looks like Theo Walcott could be just this). One position we don't need to strengthen is striker, as next year we will have Adebayor, Eduardo, Bendtner, Van Persie, Walcott and Vela.

I hope that we will not have to actually buy in too many players during the summer, that our youngsters will be ready for the step up to the first team, but I don;t know whether this is the case. If not, it would be foolish not to bring in a couple of faces to remedy what was our biggest weakness last season. I don't necessarily want to see big name players aged around 22-26, but rather a couple of older heads, maybe 28-30, who will be good first team players but who will a) cost less and b) be a bit past it in a couple of years, and so not prevent our youngsters getting a game when they're a couple of years older.

Nasri, Robinho and other Rubbish

Good Afternoon Gooners!

A lot of exciting news today, according to l'Equipe, the deal for Nasri is going to be finalised in the next couple of days. From all I have seen and heard, he is a great player, and would be an excellent addition to the squad. I don't know how accurate the Zidane comparisons are, but if there's any truth in it, and we do sign the guy, this could be a huge deal for the club.

Also, In Marca, we have been linked with a deal for Robinho, who we all know is a player Wenger has long admired. If it's true, fantastic, but the story also links him to Spurs, which is just ridiculous, so I doubt there's much in it. Admittedly I can't speak Spanish at all, but I can make out the words Robinho, London, agent, Arsenal, Chelsea, Spurs, and that his contract release is 150m Euros. I reckon it's just another player angling for a new contract.

In other news, Lyon president Aulas has said he wants Ben Arfa to stay in France, so us singing him looks very unlikely. Juventus have been linked with a £5 million deal for Big Phil, Real Madrid are linked with Hleb, and Van Persie thinks he'll be fit to play for Holland in the Euros, which means he'll come back injured and we won't see him play till December. Probably.

I was very pleased yesterday to see the site smash through the 100 hits mark, and it's now well on the way to 200! How far can we go today? If we can improve on yesterdays 73 unique visitors ... who knows? Thanks to Chris from Gooner talk to be the first to comment on one of my posts!

I'm just off to play a game of 6-a-side, but I'll be back later to post the third (and final) part of my season summary. Adios...

Toure and Senderos, and GSSSP2

Some worrying news, and some good news this morning. Starting with the good, Phil Senderos has committed himself to Arsenal for the rest of his contract. Though he has his detractors, he has shown he can play well when given a run in the team, and is still young. Hopefully in the next two years he can fulfil his potential and prove his doubters wrong.

Less positively, Kolo Toure has apparently voiced his concern at playing second fiddle to Gallas. Now I could understand his actions if this were true, but none of the sources I have seen contained any quotes from Kolo, who is a very professional player, and Arsenal through and through. To me, this just doesn't seem like the kind of thing he'd do.

And now, moving on...

Gooneriffic's Super Season Summary!

Part 2: Player-by-player summaries.

1.Jens Lehmann

Not the best of seasons for the mad German, deservedly lost his place to Almunia early on, ranted (a lot) unprofessionally in the newspapers, but played well when called upon. Still love him.

2.Abou Diaby

Clearly not a left winger, but didn't do too badly there when he was fit. His constant niggles are frustrating. I hope he gets more time playing in central midfield next season. He has lots of potential, but I don't think his long term future is at Arsenal, as much as I like him. He plays in almost the same position as Cesc, and so, unless we move regularly to a 4-5-1, I can't see him getting enough football here to achieve his potential. I would be very sad to see him go, but unless he somehow becomes a first team regular over the next season, he owes it to himself to move on really.

3.Bacary Sagna

Absolutely fantastic. This has all been said before, but he slotted perfectly into a new team, and played very well almost all season. Sagna barely had a poor game, defending very solidly and attacking effectively. Proved me wrong completely by proving just how far superior to Eboue he is (last summer I didn't think we needed a new right back. How wrong I was!). I hope he is able to recover fully from his injury, rest up during the Euros, and continue his form into next season.

4.Cesc Fabregas

Rightly acclaimed as one of the best midfielders in the world. There's not much to be said about Cesc really. He played very well at the beginning of the season, dropped of a little in the winter, and then picked up again later. The most interesting this to note is the harder edge he seems to have added to his game. To put it succinctly, he has become a right bastard on the field. His tackling is good, though the diving and exaggeration (see the Arteta incident against Everton) are slightly less welcome. Not a big problem yet though, he just needs to cut it out before it becomes one. Cesc really looks like future captain material, he drives the team on and it doesn't look the same without him.

5.Kolo Toure

Like many others, started very positively, forming a very effective partnership with Gallas in central defence. Looked tired and out of form after the ACN, but did all right at right back when he was called on to play there. Wenger's claim that he is going to sign another centre-back may cast some doubts over Toure's first team spot, but I am sure he will fit in somewhere next season.

6.Philip Senderos

Doesn't even nearly deserve the majority of criticism that has come his way. Yes he didn't play too well in the second leg against Liverpool, but when Kolo was away at the ACN, him and Gallas played very well together. He has shown before that he can play well when given a run in the side, and now is not the time for Wenger to lose faith. Swiss Tony he can still become.

7.Tomas Rosicky

Immensely frustrating. Looks good and really adds to the side when fit. Is hardly ever fit. Can he stay fit after the operation he's had recently, who knows? Let's hope he can, as a healthy Tomas would be a real asset to the side.

9. Eduardo

You have to feel sorry for the guy, just starting to adjust to English football, scoring goals, playing well, and then he gets one of the worst injuries I remember seeing. I hope he recovers fully and continues his progress next season.

10.William Gallas

In football terms, Gallas has had a good season. Played well other than a few matches, and was a key part of a defence that played very well in the first half of the season. The defence as a whole didn't perform quite so well in the latter half, though I don't know how much of this can be attributed to Gallas. As a captain, Gallas has been a mixed bag. When everything was going well earlier in the season, he seemed to be doing well, but as the tide turned, his captaincy was called into question. The Birmingham incident was worrying, as were rumours that his team mates had to give him a sorting out. To be honest, I don't have enough behind the scenes knowledge to say what should happen next season.

11.Robin Van Persie

See Rosicky. Great when he is fit, but can he stay fit? One of the best players in the league when he can play, so let's keep our fingers crossed.

13. Alexander Hleb

Similarly to many other players – first half good, second half not so much. Played very well to begin with, then started to look tired, and maybe hungry for ice-cream later on. By the end of the season had reverted to the old Hleb of the previous two seasons – very frustrating. I would still like to keep him a the club, as he is a very good player, but he is definitely replaceable if he does leave.

15. Denilson

I haven't seen enough of him this season to say too much, but he looked good in the Carling Cup and decent when I saw him in other competitions. After improving so much over the previous season, this his slowed (admittedly largely due to injuries) this season. We should see more from him next season, especially with Flamini leaving.

16. Flamini

Great season. He's leaving now, and will need to be replaced, whether from within or without the squad I don't know. Let's move on.

17. Alexandre Song

Very good (apparently) in midfield in the ACN, looked good at centre-back in the tail end of the season for us. I would have liked Wenger to give him a go at replacing Flamini, but it seems he will be a defender. Good luck to him – he was proved he can be a very useful part of the squad and looks set to play a significant role in 2008/09

19.Gilberto

It's been a tough season for Gilberto as well, being displaced by Flamini, and only getting intermittent time on the pitch. He has acted very professionally throughout, and, although his performances were very poor for most of the season, more recently he has played fairly well. I hope we can hang on to him for next season, as he is one of our few very experienced players, and with Flamini gone, we can't afford to lose another player in his position.

20. Johan Djourou

Apparently disappointing in his time at Birmingham. I've only watched him play one half of football for us this season, against Spurs, and he was awful. So was everyone else to be fair though. Chalk this season off and start afresh in the next, he has a lot of potential to fulfil.

21. Lukasz Fabianski

Showed enough in the Carling Cup and at the end of the season to suggest that he will be a good back-up for Almunia next season.

22.Gael Clichy

Player of the season. Absolutely brilliant. Barely puts a foot wrong, works harder than almost anyone else on the team. His final ball could use a bit of work, but other than that he is the complete package. The way he bombs up and down the left hand side until the final minute of a match is just incredible, he must have about 5 lungs and three hearts.

24.Manuel Almunia

Big step-up for the Spaniard this season. Didn't do much wrong, and appeared comfortable in the role of first-choice keeper. Not world-class, but very decent.

25.Emmanuel Adebayor

The stick he gets is incredible. Second top scorer in the league and he still gets slated. According to Opta he has the second best shots/goals ratio as well, which, considering that the main criticism of him is his finishing, is impressive. He has looked a bit lazy at times in the second half of the season, but I would put that down to fatigue. He pulled us almost single-handedly through the early part of 2008, and has every right to be exhausted. The next test is to prove that he can keep this up next season.

26.Nicklas Bendtner

Didn't get as much playing time as I'd hoped he would, but looked promising when he did. Decision making is still a bit dodgy, but works hard, has good technique, is great in the air and has scored several crucial goals. If he continues to improve next season, he will be challenging for a regular first team spot.

27.Emmanuel Eboue

Redeeming features? None. Useless. I don't care if Wenger thinks he gives the team defensive balance. He is awful. He did break John Terry's foot though.

30.Armand Traore

Didn't look great at left-back for much of the season, but apparently his future is on the left wing. I haven't seen him play there apart from 20 minutes against Everton, during which he looked promising. Lets see how he does on loan to Portsmouth next season.

31.Justin Hoyte

Decent player, good to have as a back-up, but he's never going to be a first team regular, and if he doesn't leave this summer, you have to question his ambition.

32.Theo Walcott

Looked extremely promising, and performances at Birmingham and Liverpool showed how much he has improved after recovering from the shoulder injury that dogged him last year. Deserves a starting spot at right midfield, especially if Hleb leaves. I look forward to watching him more next season.

Sorry about the length of that, I got rather carried away. In the next instalment I will be discussing what, in my opinion, we should do to improve next season, as well as a round up of all the news.

News Roundup + Gooneriffic's Super Season Summary: Part 1!

Good morning boys and girls.

We'll start with a little of bit of news and gossip today, then the first instalment of my three part season summary.

Lots of exciting transfer rubbish today, we have been linked very heavily with Samir Nasri of Marseille in the last couple of days, in much the same way that we were with Hatem Ben Arfa this time last week. He is a very good player, so it would be good if it's true, but well, the isn't how Arsene normally conducts his transfers.

Other tired hacks wanting easy copy space link us to: Roque Santa Cruz, who is apparently coming in to replace Adebayor, who is Barcelona bound. Bollocks. The usual crowd of Jean Makoun, Lilian Thuram, Kranjcar, and a lot of reports suggesting Alberto Aquilani of Roma is on his way for £23 million. That's another I can't see happening, as far as i recall, he plays in pretty much the same position as Cesc, and so is not a player we need really. Sounds like an agent trying to help with contract negotiations to me.

Interestingly, we have some news coming from Tony Adams at Portsmouth about everyone's favourite gutless mercenary, Lassana Diarra. It seems there may be more to his departure than we imagine. Admittedly the only source is Tribalfootball, but there are direct quotes from Tony. I can't think what this other reason might be, unless either Wenger decided he wasn't going to make it here, or he somehow discovered that he goes under the nickname "Diarra the Ripper" for a reason.* Any other suggestions?

And now, drum roll......

Gooneriffic's Super Season Summary!

Part 1:

First things first. This has been a very good season for Arsenal F.C. The way it ended may have been very painful, losing out in the latter stages of both the league and the Champions League, followed by the loss and potential loss of two important players (Flamini and Hleb). However, considering that the majority of (admittedly moronic and ill-informed) pundits and journalists predicted that our season would end only in the ignominy of finishing below Spurs, it can only be regarded as a success. The CL quarter-final second leg against Liverpool seemed to encapsulate the season in about 5 glorious, and then heartbreaking minutes. The squad as a whole performed far better than in either of the two previous seasons, and many players improved dramatically.

In my view, there is only one reason why we were not able to continue the high level of football we played right through until the end of the season. Referees decisions were not to blame (not to say that we were not at the sharp end of quite a few dodgy ones), nor were embarrassing, but ultimately isolated cup defeats to Man Utd and Spurs, and neither was the Birmingham game, with Eduardo's injury and Gallas' antics, that many have pointed out as a turning point. The lack of depth in our squad was the key factor in the loss of form that saw us drop crucial points to Middlesbrough, Wigan and Villa. At that late stage in the season, key players were not performing at anything near their peaks, most obviously for me, Hleb, but due to the fact that we had a few injuries to big players, we were not able to shuffle the squad around and bring in on-form players. At either Man Utd or Chelsea, if a player is not performing, they normally have the squad depth to replace them, even if they have a few players injured. Yes we were unlucky to have players like Van Persie, Eduardo and Rosicky out for large parts of the season, but we never had more than a few injuries at a time. To compete domestically and in Europe these days, you need a bigger first team squad than we (currently) have.

Despite all this, I feel that there are far more positives than negatives to draw from this season. The players have shown a great team spirit, and proved their doubters wrong on many occasions. We recovered from the late 2007 slump that many of our doubters thought would prove the end of the title challenge, we proved that we can cope with teams who try to bully us out of games, as well as showing that we can mix it up a bit if necessary. The team is still a work in progress, but it has come on so much over the last season. Even with the possible departures, it won't take more than a couple of tweaks to see us in the silverware this time next year!

Coming up next: player by player squad summary!

Don't go changin'!

*I have no evidence to suggest that this is Diarra's actual nickname, or that he is a mass murderer of any sort. On the other hand, I have no evidence that he isn't....

Like a Phoenix from the Ashes.

Well, it's been a long time since I last even looked at this blog. Basically, I had a very dull job over the summer, so I started writing the blog as a way to pass with time. Sadly, the office was then rearranged, so I could no longer get away with doing very little work, as my supervisor could always see over my shoulder. Since then, I've gone back to uni, been very busy and had a whole series of internet-related problems, which were finally resolved a couple of weeks ago. As I once again have some time on my hands, I decided to have another go at this. Though that was a couple of weeks ago, I thought it would be best to wait until the end of the season to start afresh.

So, coming in the next couple of days: Gooneriffic's 2007/8 season summary!