Latest Arsenal news: Two dull sagas continue to be dull

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Another week rolls by, free of blog entries. I’ll happily admit I really have struggled to inspire myself to write much this summer. In June & July of 2009 – the last football-free summer – I blogged 14 times. This year there have been just six posts in the same period. And all this despite having more time this summer to ferret away in Google Docs than I’ve had in a pretty long while.

Is it a lingering apathy stretching back months – a groundhog summer weariness? Perhaps it’s the lack of transfers to date, having been promised fireworks (or at least, that’s how my desperate mind interpreted it)? Or is it the sheer numbing dullness of the Cesc and Nasri flirtations? You know what: I am so bored of those two sagas I’d happily see them both offloaded. I’m a sympathetic sort of bloke as a rule, but I am bored witless of it all.

Yes, I know it would blow a craterous hole in our creativity and experience – Fabregas is a bloody genius – and that selling one or both creates as many problems as it solves, but how can there be any kind of squad cohesion with two wantaway players flicking bits of rubber with rulers at the professor from the back of the class?

I know it’s more complicated than that and that everything, across Europe, is dependent on dozens of variables. If A moves here, I can bid for B, but X won’t come unless Y has gone to Z, and so on and so forth. It’s like a giant house of cards. The question is, would Cesc and/or Nasri’s departure set the whole thing off? It surely would.

But I’m wary of declaring that – finally – something appears to be giving. There’s a feeling, based entirely on my observing the skittishness of both Twitter and NewsNow, that the Fabregas deal might be edging closer – though I’ve seen faster glaciers – and who knows whether the Mata rumours will come to owt or not, but the possibility is being strongly peddled all over the place at the moment.

Bendtner appears closer to a move. Almunia’s still in the window of the local Barnardos charity shop. I walk past him every day. £2 (on the plus side, if you are a UK taxpayer you can do Gift Aid).

Anyway, back to Cesc & Nasri. It would be nice if the smoke cleared, decisively and finally, but I’d go purple if I held my breath. So until then, I’ll just have to carry on inhaling and exhaling as normal.

But I do wish, somehow or other, that someone, somewhere would put a stop to it.

Jim

Arsenal since about 1979. Thick, thin and all that.

This Post Has 7 Comments

  1. Sam Taylor

    “So until then, I’ll just have to carry on inhaling and exhaling as normal.But I do wish, somehow or other, that someone, somewhere would put a stop to it.”

    Dignitas?

    Things are a little dull, but there’s no need to get suicidal over it…

  2. East Lower

    Ah yes… not a stop to that. Counterproductive, that would be, I reckon.

  3. Jeff

    I finally got around to watching the friendly versus Koln, and I will admit that Ramsey looked unready.  Cesc is the perfect option for that spot in midfield.

    With Walcott’s ankle problem, Nasri could be the perfect player to take up one of the wings, opposite Gervinho.

    To keep the quality of play at the very highest level possible, we really should bring in Juan Mata to fill in the gaps when needed.   Barring Mata, Eden Hazard would do.

    A striker to add realistic competition to Van Persie, and an undeniably competent defender who can play central defense and left back (another Vermaelen, basically), and the squad would really start to come together.

    This assumes, in my typical optimistic nature, that Song and Frimpong can handle holding midfield between them, and that signing M’Vila would be an unnecessary extravagance.

  4. East Lower

    Hard to disagree with that. I guess Gervinho can double up – he can play wing or off the main striker. Frimpong, as cover for Song – I’d like to see him more too. 

    One more experienced (in the Premier League) central defender for sure. A replacement for Cesc/Nasri (or both) goes without saying.

    Denilson has gone, Bendtner is off, Almunia & possibly Eboue. I’m encouraged that Wenger is happy to purge a bit too.

    But I think the season will be well underway before all the t’s are crossed and the i’s dotted.

  5. Anonymous

    Probably being boring now repeating myself but…….Frimpong has never played even a minute of competitive first team football.Not even on loan. He is also returning from a serious injury. It is optimism bordering on lunacy to believe that he is the answer. Regardless of what happens with Cesc/Nasri – if we don’t buy competition for Song we’re certain to be 4th at best again.Absolutely certain.
    One win in the league last season with Song missing – and that at Blackpool who couldn’t buy a result at that stage & even then we needed some shcoking refereeing to win it. 8 games in the CL – 5 wins, 3 defeats. Song played in 5 – any guesses which 5 ? Those stats cannot be argued with.

    This why I just don’t buy the ‘if A goes here, then I can get B etc’ argument……the Cesc/Nasri situations have nothing to do with the problems we have at centre-half,left-back & defensive mid. The truth re: our lack of activity I believe is rather more mundane : despite all the evidence Arsene still believes he doesn’t need to address the problems & we will start the season totally ill-prepared to challenge.Again.
    Right now: offer me 4th, a sneaky win in a domestic cup & Arsene ‘moving upstairs’ next May without too much acrimony (& a last trophy to boot) & I would snap your hand off.
    It’s turning into a torturous,depressing end to the Wenger era. Very, very sad.

  6. Jeff

    I’ve just seen Martin Keown in the pre-match discussion (ahead of Boca Juniors), and he’s supported my suspicion that Jagielka might not be good enough.  Gunnerblogger had me questioning my own impression, so I was heartened to have my sanity confirmed.  Cahill could be the better option (although, to be clear, I like Vermaelen and Koscielny).

  7. Anonymous

    Hearing that we’ve made a concrete bid for Jagielka is about the only positive thing for me so far this summer. I think he’s a better player than either Samba or Cahill who we’ve been consistently linked with. And (sorry Jeff) he is simply a much, much better player than Koscielny is.

    Mind you, the fact that we now have a player who has a forehead so large he could control the ball on it & run off with it balanced on it has gotta be a huge asset this season…..

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