Ha, L_C, you think you’ve been busy in the transfer market.
Leicester have made 10 signings (or is it 11 now, I lose count). Including Les Ferdinand, which I still can’t get my head round.
I’ll just say that I used to work with a bloke from Alderley Edge who switched his allegiance from Liverpool to Man U, so it’s not just the faraway fans who are fickle.
I also thought it was Helena Christensen Bartez was shagging? I get confused about that kind of stuff tho’, not being a tabloid reader.
My lot are having a strange close season – scoring freely against Austrian second div teams and failing to beat English ones. We go to Ibrox on Saturday and have a visit from Bologna a couple of weeks later, so that might give a better impression. No signings here either yet, which doesn’t surprise me 'cos there’s nothing in the kitty.
With a fit squad and a following wind we should manage something similar to last year’s effort, but I’m not expecting anything more. Nice easy start at Highbury.
Final score: 3-0 to Bohs 
OK, L_C, I already put up with this “you’re not a real fan unless you’re local” attitude from London-based Gooners; I’m not going to take it from you Spurs supporters too! Maybe if Tottenham had actually won the league in the past 42 years, this glory-hunting 31-year old Floridian might have started following them instead. 
I may support Arsenal from afar, but I’ve stuck with them and my loyalty hasn’t wavered over the years.
I’ve also spent some time in London (about two years), and have attended matches at Highbury. I’d love to live in London and see more of Arsenal in the flesh, but it’s hard enough finding employment in my field in the States.
Know anyone in London who needs a decent art history instructor? I’d be willing to be a tour guide, too.
Yep, I hadn’t realised how busy Mickey Adams had been. Looks a little like a ‘never mind the quality feel the width’ policy but I suppose it’s the financial restraints, etc . … For anyone interested, this isn’t completely up to date (no Ben Thatcher, for example) but it’s okay
http://www.bbc.co.uk/leicester/sport/clubs/lcfc/2003/06/25/leicester_city_new_players_profiles.shtml
And good luck with getting your head around Sir Les. Matron says he’s a big boy but, for a girl like you . . . .
Well, if you’re not too bothered about money, teaching jobs of any description are ten a penny. Really, it’s not a problem finding work, even for non-EC Americans.
Around £11.00 an hour as a temp doing inner city general classroom crowd control stoof - burnout rate: High. Available all areas.
for the LOVE OF OG, MARTIN, BUY SOME FUCKING PLAYERS. If the board doesn’t realise we need to strenghten the squad after our gubbing by Man Utd yesterday, then you should be writing it backwards on their foreheads.
On our shopping list should be
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A defender that doesn’t have the turning circle of the Spruce Moose and the pace of Oprah Winfrey.
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A midfielder that can take hold of a game by the scruff of the neck and stamp his authority on it. the LennBert connection are past their prime.
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A right winger that isn’t afraid to use their pace and is able to help out in defence.
Even the Forces of Darkness have managed a few signings, and they are £80m in the hole! £80m! not even one signing and the transfer window is getting closer every day.
I’m looking forward to seeing more of Liam Miller and Craig Beattie. Alot of promise for the future.
A SLAP for London_Calling.
Actually, for Mickey Adams it’s sheer bloody relief at being able to sign anyone at all, leading to a bit of a signing frenzy. Start of the season just gone we couldn’t even pay wages to new players. But yes, Chelsea are buying everyone expensive, and we’re buying everyone cheap.
Another London Yid here…
I’m well pleased with events at the lane, zamora (who has looked simply AWESOME in pre season friendlies), postigol ( a real coup) and Keane is as good a front line as anyone else in the league. And unlike the other really good one they don’t look like horses or be ginger
Our back 5 isn’t too shabby either, Carr, richards, Gardiner, King, Ziege is top six material. So there’s just the one small problem…
We’ve got a bermuda traingle in the middle. No midfield to speak of, certainly no ball winner. I think we will miss Freund, and may have made a mistake here.
Still I believe in the power of Hod and hope that there is a plan B after failing to get Parker. Blondel is no slouch, but not a defensive midfield attack dog.
looking at the other teams:
Surrey United: The loss of beckham, the failiure to land Ronaldinho (wouldn’t he be good playing with Luke Chadwick?) weakens them. It will interesting to see how things go. Also I think that fergie is losing the plot.
Bindipping Mickeys: Could surprise people this year. Kewell is a smart buy (and nice work for his agent).
The other mickeys: One season wonders. Will do sod all this year.
Chelski: God alone knows. I hope this will all end in tears and I think it might. Please please please!!!
The Nike-Pikeys from woolwich: About to hit the bumpers very hard financially. A very good article in the telegraph this morning about their money - they’re stuffed. Serve 'em right
And to go down? Leicester, Portsmouth and Bolton. Wolves to hang on.
Oh and to the Leicester fan…
“Gentle” Ben Thatcher and Sir Les Ferdinand?
Bwahahahahahahahahah!
Another Gooner checking in. The sooner we get this Keeper stuff sorted out the better. Personally i’m hoping that Wenger will do what he has hinted at - rotate between any new guy and Stuart Taylor.
I think Taylor has the potential to be a cracking little keeper given some experience.
I’d also second this as an opportunity to let a few of the other kids through - see how they do. I would be a bit happier though if we had another decent defender.
We should never have let Upson go…
garius - I know ArseHole Wanker is God and everything but he has done some pretty strange stuff in the transfer market. Had some luck (Anelka), used his French connections but maybe dealing is his achilles heel . . .
owl - I agree with quite a lot of what you say. I think we have shape, balance, width and are going to be dynamic and unpredictable up front. All good. Actually, all very good.
Unlike you, however, I worry for the defence actually defending. Great moving out, average at set pieces but not so clever against movement. And without Richards (as we will be quite often), we leak like Matron on a Friday night.
Agree midfield remains a problem. And hence Glenda’s interest in Parker, etc. Even the creatives are problematic (Sick Note and Redknapp won’t play the full 38 games between them). But Glenda let Freund go so, one assumes, there is a cunning plan for a holding hard man . . .no idea . . .
But, there’s still Davies and co . . . nice, nice width . . .
I’m quite optimistic. Glenda seems to have outed most of the ‘non believers’ and I’m willing to put my grave concerns about his man-management and tactical awareness on the back burner. Until November.
I think the team and squad is stronger, he’s done well in that regard, as has the Board and the Curb Crawler. But, ultimately, I wonder if the new manager will just inherit some good transfer dealing and unrealised potential . . .
btw, I haven’t been near the Paxton since ‘the old days’ . . . <sigh>
Actually its the west stand upper, with the other fat rich people ,for me these days. It just didn’t look so good on the sig.
I stay away from the paxton these days. it’s still a bit “lively” there. noworrimean? And you can’t get a beer at half time there.
And we do still hold the contract on Rebrov. That was £11m well spent by pleat and the gooner double agent.
And the robbing sods want £25 for a friendly game. Robdogs.
Hm. You make it sound so attractive. I guess it depends on what kind of students I’m willing to teach–I’ve been teaching university undergraduates thus far, and I find those kind of teaching positions are highly competitive in almost any field, but particularly so in art history. I don’t particularly care about making heaps of money (I’m in art history, after all), but I’m not sure if I’d be professionally or emotionally prepared for the “crowd control” situation in the classrooms that you describe.
Damn stadium problems. We can’t pack as many people into Highbury as Man U can with Old Trafford, so we’ve been missing out on a lot of potential money… but the Ashburton Grove project has been far more expensive and time-consuming than the club first projected. Hopefully we’ll recoup the losses once (if??) the stadium ever gets built.
It sounds like the media has really been harping on Arsenal’s financial problems (not in the American media, of course, which only has spotlighted Beckam in recent months on the few occasions that they talk about real football). But if we can keep the current squad for a few more years and keep winning things, maybe the situation isn’t quite as dire as people are making out. We’re lucky right now to have a group with such camaraderie–it really brings them together as a team so that they’re playing for each other as much as they are for themselves individually (look at how many assists Henry was involved in last season, compared to, say, Ruud). It’ll be a pity when the team breaks up, as it inevitably will–hopefully much later rather than sooner.
So I wouldn’t count Arsenal out yet…
Agree. I think Wenger’s been focused too much on replacing Seaman and overlooking the need for a new centre-half. Senderos may have potential, as Ivar pointed out, and I think bringing in some of the younger talents could help out a lot. But I’d feel more secure if we had a least one other fairly experienced centre-half back there, since I expect Keown (who just turned 37 today–happy birthday, Martin!) will soon be joining the old defensive line in retirement (Nigel finally announced his retirement yesterday).
I agree that we shouldn’t have let Upson go. I’ve never been able to comprehend that–one of Wenger’s few blunders, I’d have to say.
London_Calling - i think Wenger is pretty good at dealing - “some luck” is i think a tad unfair on the man who brought Ljungberg, Vieira and Henry (amongst others) to the club.
I think the problem is more that Arsenal (as a club) still can’t really do the cash-waving and name-pulling that the likes of ManUre, Real and Barca get up to, yet still need to draw players of the highest quality.
It’s so ironic seeing the no-necks from the library bleating on about money, when you think about how they came to be in the league in the first place.
What goes around, comes around.
Kharmic owl.
Well Leeds did manage to stay up, if not and aloat if not terribly dry but that’s what happens when the ship starts sinking.
Shame on Liverpool and the way it behaved in the Kewell transfer.Seems they were talking to Kewells agent six months ago, without approaching Leeds, and during the time that Leeds were half looking at that offer from Barca.
Houllier generally is a disciplinarian, maybe he should look at his own ethics.
Not that Leeds have much to be proud of in the ethics dept, after first publicly backing that boorish thug Bowyer, then shuffling out O’Leary with some dodgy press releases and now signing up another thug in the shape of Morris.
What is going on with the Highbury rebuild, whole thing seems a dashed mess, complete lash up too, will it ever be built ? Is the money still there ? I gather the company responsible for the new Wembley have an interest in Highbury and not enough cash to complete both and they might have to priorotise.
Re; Highbury/ Ashburton Grove/Lough Rd/Wembley etc: THe arse have been trying to raise £317m on the markets, they’ve been trying for over a year now, and so far have had no luck.
THey are trying to raise money on the back of football revenues just as these have tanked. They are deeply in debt - estimates vary, but £50m would seem to be a ball park figure. They do have some assets in tradable land at Lough Rd to balance against this.
They are also at the very limit of their spending power, with the like of Viera, Pires and scumbell on huge contracts.
So mystic Owl looks into the future and sees the following scenario:
There are two clubs in N London constrained by 36,000 seat stadia, there is a huge cash hungry 75,000 stadium up the road in Brent (and lets not forget possibly an Olympic stadium in NE London - somewhere around Stratford I believe).
I can see either ground share (very unlikely) or possibly the nomads moving yet again to wembley and THFC underwriting the Olympic stadium (its too big for West Ham). This was always the thinking behind the Picketts Lock debacle - we were supposed to be going there).
Strangely enough thats exactly what me and the guys decided would happen when we talking in the pub on friday.
Then we got bored and went back to taking the mick out of my brother (a Spurs Fan).
muahahaha
Celtic have drawn MTK or HJK in the third round Champions League qualifier (that’s assuming we get through the second round, of course, I’ve learnt after Basel not to be too cocky!).
We had HJK Helsinki a few years ago. Dunno anything about this MTK mob except they seem to be Hungarian. In either case it’s a decent draw for us.
The huns have Copenhagen or Sliema (Malta).
No word yet on Bohs, Chelsea or Newcastle.
Bohs/Rosenburg v Deportivo La Coruña (gulp)
Zilina or Maccabi Tel Aviv (isn’t that the team a few Chelsea players refused to travel to last year?) v Chelsea
Partizan or Djurgardens v Newcastle