Morning folks – there’s no better place to start today than that dramatic late winner for The England Women’s team who last night progressed to the final. I find it lovely and heartwarming that these ladies have (once again) captivated the nation through their grit, determination and never-say-die approach to this tournament. That’s two rounds in a row that they’ve left it exceedingly late, but this time around there was no need for a horrendous penalty shoot-out.

Because the Arsenal Women did the job.

Yep, we get to claim this as an Arsenal victory last night, because Michelle Agyemang is an Arsenal youth product and one of our registered players (even though she played for Brighton last season) who salvaged that last-gasp winner. Then Chloe Kelly, another one of our lot having been on sabbatical at Man City for so long until January this year, bagged the winner after her penalty was saved by the Italian goalkeeper.

Made in Hale End folks, made in Hale End…

I felt ‘somewhat’ sorry for the Italians, because they’d played quite well and as underdogs they were seconds away from a big upset in this competition, but that feeling was tempered somewhat by the gamesmanship. Time-wasting, going down with cramp and then getting the medical team on (instead of one of your own players) to adminster it, some of the theatrical falling to the ground, well whenever a team does that it always feels like a little bit of karma when they get their comeuppance. So from that perspective I was happy. Had there not been as much falling to the ground on their part, there might not have been the seven minutes of added time…

So they will once again represent at a major final and let’s hope they can do the business again this weekend.

As for the men’s side, we got the expected and anticipated Ornbomb yesterday with regards to Viktor Gyokeres, with the noises being that the two clubs has finally struck up a deal and the Swede will now head out to Singapore to complete his medical and sign for The Arsenal. It’s probably going to be about a week later than Mikel would have wanted, but if it’s all done by this weekend then that still gives him plenty of time to adapt to his new environment in and around the Arsenal team, which I think is key really. In a normal business environment I would say – in my experience – you don’t really ‘get it’ with regards to your new company until about at least six months in. There are ways of working, systems, relationships you need to forge with key stakeholders, etc. It takes time and whilst football is of course very different to the world we live in and the adaptation period doesn’t need to be nearly as long (or in some cases isn’t allowed to be with the media that surrounds the game and the players), if he signs within the next couple of days he’s got a couple of weeks to start meeting people and sussing out his place in this squad. I think that is invaluable. It means that by the time that United game rocks up he’ll also have got a bit of rust out of his boots from the summer off, he’ll have been exposed to a few friendly matches in which his teammates will see the types of runs he makes, what his strengths are, etc.

I also think it’s lovely how people like MLS are reacting to this possible arrival. There’s a video doing the rounds of Myles smiling and saying ‘here we go’ reacting to Fabrizio Romano’s message on social media and I think this also tells you what the players think of this arrival. We as fans have ourselves questions as to how he fits in, there’s obvious questions about how the return in the Portuguese league translates to the Premier League, but sometimes the response of players themselves tells you a lot too. It’s why I’ve warmed a little bit more to the Madueke stuff. It wasn’t a signing I was overly enthused by, I was confused as to why we’d shelled out that amount of cash, but when you supposedly get glowing reports from all of the England lads in the camp, it gives you pause for thought and hope that Arsenal have unearthed a gem.

In the Gyokeres instance it is players who have played against him and I think that will also tell its own story when the Swede finally links up with them.

There will be more to come over the upcoming days as this one plays out, no doubt, but the good news is that this protracted saga appears to bear nearing its end. And I’ve heard (and been in on WhatsApp groups) where people have jokingly (half so – and half seriously) said “now bring me Eze. I also listened to the Arsecast from earlier in the week where Andrew and Phil Costa talked about whether the Gyokeres and Mosquera deals along with other players we’ve signed ‘is enough?’. The gents pondered on that and concluded that we probably need one more in the creative spaces and I get that we’d all like to see that. But I also think that we are 100% stronger than last season for sure. Zubimendi is an upgrade on Partey, Gyokeres will be an upgrade on Gabriel Jesus (if nothing else, hopefully on availability), Madueke will 100% be better than Sterling was and Ethan and Myles are a year older and better. When you factor all of that in alone, we are in a better place than last season and if Trossard and Martinelli remain as our attacking options on the left – as well as Madueke – I’m still good with that and think we will still be competitive.

So whilst I would love to see an Eze-shaped signing for us, I still think we’re going to be very good, we’re still going to be up there and I will go into the season full of excitement.

Back tomorrow for some more musings.