And we all knew that he possibly wasn’t going to be part of the team this season, too. His output domestically had fallen off a cliff; many people – me included – had questioned his longer-term future, some had lamented why he was still here during last season, and I think all of us thought at the start of the season he would make way for a star left-wing signing if we could get a good deal. As we all now know, that ‘big signing’ never happened, but what has happened is that Arsenal have got a club-record transfer fee for a guy who has been at the club for seven years man and boy, joining for £6million and leaving for £60million. It is, as they say, “pure profit”.

But it isn’t pure satisfaction for his exit, from my point of view. Yes, it was probably time to move on, and yes, it was right for all parties. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt a bit. This was a guy who burst onto the scene as a kid, scored a couple of goals early on in the Europa League, at one point we thought he might evolve into a striker, but beyond his sparkling form in the first title charge of 2022/23, in which he nabbed 15 goals and six assists in a brilliant season, it never really materialised the way we thought. Regardless of that, he still proved his worth. Energy, effort, pace, and a willingness to adapt to Arteta’s style of play is what has seen him become one of the last survivors of Mikel Arteta’s original side that he took control over back in 2019. That, in itself, is testimony to the player, but also his willingness and ability to adapt.

I loved the farewell video the club posted here. Had me a wee bit choked, if I’m honest, because he’s grown up so much and it really is sad to see him go. He’s always maintained he never wanted to leave the club, he loves the club, the club and the fans love him.

But it was the right thing to do. We needed to move on from Martinelli and Trossard and I think, if you asked every Arsenal fan at the end of last season what the one position was we really needed to go to the next level on, 90% of them would have said ‘left wing’. The only problem is that we haven’t really done the incomings that we expected. Indeed, I even said 11 or so days ago that I’d be fine with keeping Martinelli if we couldn’t find a replacement. But I don’t think it’s right that you essentially tell a player his future lies elsewhere, he prepares himself mentally for an exit, he gets on a plane to Saudi, then gets called back because Arsenal haven’t brought in cover. Martinelli would deserve more than that, he doesn’t want to be the dad that is still at home just because the parents are paying the mortgage and doesn’t want to upset the kids.

So the move had to be made, and whilst I do agree with those who suggest we are now short there, I do think Arteta will need to lean into Eze on the left. What it also means is that those Sky Sports and Football365 articles talking about ‘net spend’ and having us as the fourth or fifth biggest spenders, actually need to drop us down to around about the middle of the table now. And yet we’re STILL favourites for the title, and we’re STILL looking good right now in terms of our squad depth and strength. That also should mean that the ‘PSR headroom’ (or whatever they call it these days) that we have gives us room either in January, or to go big in next summer’s transfer window.

So whilst we can be sad that we’ve loved a guy who has been with us so long, whilst we can have fond memories whilst at the same time realising it was best for everyone for him to move on, we still need to be mindful of making sure we address this issue in the medium or the long term. For now though, we have to wish Martinelli well on his new adventure. Personally, I think he should have gone to a more competitive league than the Saudi Pro League, and I think he’d have smashed it in Italy or Spain, but I guess those clubs probably don’t have the cash funds to pay what Arsenal wanted – which also includes his not insignificant wages too, which are rumoured to be close to the £180k-per-week, which we also have to factor in to any accounting situations. Last summer I wondered on here how Arsenal have stockpiled and got so many players in, but I wonder now if some of the knock-on effects have been felt this summer? If that’s the case, the balance has been re-addressed, so let’s just see how the football shakes out in the coming months.

Right, I think I’ll leave it there, because we have a Chelsea game coming up, but there’s always tomorrow for us to do the match preview for that one, as well as Sunday morning too. So I will take my leave for today. Wish you and yours the best, then catch you on the socials and on here tomorrow.

It’s funny because I’ve spent many a summer transfer window over the years feeling frustrated with our business – or lack thereof – and have written about that on many a post-Transfer Deadline Day lament. “We always leave ourselves one player short” I feel was the mantra every season. And whilst I think all of us can appreciate that the left-wing spot that we all wanted feels like it is just one player short again this summer, I really can’t get myself worked up at all.

As a bit of an aside – I really like this “Who won the summer 2026 transfer window?” piece on the Cannon Stats site. Adam, who wrote the piece, is a very level-headed Arsenal fan from the States and I echo his sentiments exactly.

It’s the reason why, for this summer right now anyway, I’m kind of happy with where we are at. It was perfect, of course. But you can’t say we aren’t well-equipped to have a proper go at both the Premier League and Champions League. Look at all of our domestic rivals; they have all had quite a bit of upheaval, and you can’t tell me that every single player they have signed is going to absolutely ‘bang’ – it just doesn’t happen. In fact, to assess that, I had a quick look at the transfers from Man City, Aston Villa, Liverpool, Man United, Chelsea and The Scum from last season, to see which ones were successful. I’ve decided to – completely subjectively, I’ll admit – group them into ‘success’ or ‘failure’ in my opinion:

Apart from United, who didn’t make many deals, you can hardly say that’s been a glowing rap sheet from any of the so-called ‘big clubs’. So getting worked up over the volume of signings is just not something I can get behind. Would I have liked us to get that winger in? Sure, but not any old blagger; we are not in that space right now.

I certainly think Berta has some questions to answer, however, but that is more about his ‘plate-spinning’ style that I think a few of us are a little concerned with. And I think that is right; there’s a very real argument to be had that the reason we lost out on Morgan Rogers was that we didn’t strike super-quick. The noises that I heard were that Arsenal were led to believe that £80million gets him. If they’d have acted sharpish and gone for him before the Anderson deal became the yardstick by which every club measured their big players, I think we’d have seen him in an Arsenal shirt. But we waited, and the result was that Rogers now rocks up at that reprehensible club, Chelsea. Anderson signed for City on 23rd July – that is more than enough time to move for the player. But Berta’s approach has always been more measured, and perhaps that has had an impact.

But I’m nitpicking here, because you can’t argue that our squad isn’t deep and strong. Even in that left-wing position, we’ve lost two players, but we still have Eze and Madueke as well as the new boy Tzolis. Plus, with a September extended international break which goes on for three weeks, then by the time the season starts going you’re in to October/November anyway. The January transfer window then becomes a few short weeks away and if the need is really that pressing by then, you can pull the trigger. I know it sounds very ‘The Neverending Story’, and it used to wind me up when Wenger would give us the ‘Judge me in May’, then we’d finish fourth, and repeat the cycle in that summer, but I do feel like this team were judged last May, as Champions, and they are now stronger in the areas of our team that really made the biggest contributons to our title defence – at the back and in midfield.

As a reminder, our signings last summer were:

• Zubimendi – success (despite the end, he was brilliant for 75% of the season – so that counts for me)
• Eze – success (just – he got important goals and contributed to some big games, including the two NLDs)
• Gyokeres – success (just – we all know he’s a bit of a wardrobe, but still bagged 21 goals, even if he probably should have had more)
• Madueke – success (just – I think the jury is still out)
• Mosquera – success
• Norgaard – failure
• Kepa – failure (based on the League Cup final
• HIncapie – success

So I think our recruitment was pretty spot on, and I think this summer’s additions will only demonstrate that further, which will ultimately mean we are in a stronger position than we were last season – where we finished as Champions.

Honestly guys and gals, I’m not drinking the company Kool-Aid here; I think we’re in a great position, a great squad, we’re set up for success and now it is about delivering it on the pitch. So let’s all get back to focusing on that.

Catch you all tomorrow as we start to look ahead to Chelsea and the weekend’s fixtures.

Ethan Nwaneri has gone on loan, which I think most Arsenal fans are happy with, because we want him to come back having done (hopefully) a season at Dortmund and played plenty of football. If he has a good season in Yelow and Black then maybe he can come and challenge for an important squad place. I also think that, if Madueke hasn’t kicked on, we should be looking at him again as a wide forward.

So let’s break this down into the individual deals – including Martinelli – then finish off with fan reaction and where I’m at today, right?

Fabio Vieira

Probably the easiest and quickest one to get through. He had been on loan to them last season; he’d been on loan at Porto for the season before. He never felt right for our league and always struggled to really make an impact. I remember when he made what I think was his first start for us against Brentford, because Martin Odegaard was missing, and I thought that he might well go on to be a superstar at the club. But it never really happened, and I don’t think that is down to his size. A lot of people talked about how he wasn’t physical; he was too slight, he needed to bulk up, but I never really truly bought in to that. Bernardo Silva isn’t a big bloke, David Silva wasn’t, Tariq Lamptey is small, so there’s plenty of examples of players who can go on in the Premier League despite a smaller and less physical frame. I just think that, ultimately, he never really kicked on and showed the promise he did at Porto and then in the initial time at his career at The Arsenal.

That being said, I do think we’ve been shafted a bit on the fee, which is supposedly £8.6million. TransferMarkt has his value at €18million (£15.43million), he played 31 times, got seven goals and six assists for Hamburg last season, playing nearly 2,500 minutes. He was a regular for Hamburg and they’ve lowballed us there, so the only hope we have to have is that Arsenal got a chunky sell-on fee to ensure that there might be a bit more cash coming our way in the future.

Slight aside – Flo Balogun’s collapsed move to Everton was a bit of a pain in the arse for us, we apparently have a 17.5% sell on clause, which would have netted The Arsenal £7million, so that’ll be a bit of a kicker for the club and the coffers.

Gabriel Jesus

It’s funny how the impact of the details around a transfer can affect your mood on it, because I think most Arsenal fans are happy with the £8.6million we received for Gabriel Jesus from Barcelona. Bearing in mind how much Barca as a club are pretty much arseholes to deal with (think Auba transfer for free a few years back, or Cesc, Petit and Overmars, etc, etc), the fact that they’ve given us ACTUAL MONEY for Gabriel Jesus feels like a bit of a touch from an Arsenal perspective. We know the club were touting the whole “£15 – £20million” at the beginning of the window, but that was never realistic, and I think most Arsenal fans would have been happy with any fee. So in that respect, you have to give some kudos from the club for getting what they got. But it’s not just that, because the rumoured £265,000-per-week wages are also now off the books. If that number is true, then keeping Gabriel Jesus would have cost the club £13.78million for a year. Admittedly, we’re in September, so maybe it would have been close to 44 weeks wages they’d have had to pay, but that’s still £11.66million. So to go from that as a cost to money coming in for that fee is a £20million+ swing for the club. That’s not an insignificant amount. And for a player who has missed 80 games for us since he joined, and found himself a peripheral player this last season gone, you have to be happy with that.

Gabriel Martinelli

Whilst this hasn’t happened yet, I think we all know it probably will, and at £60million I guess that’s decent enough. The hyperinflation of the Premier League and dodgy dealings of some of the clubs in this league has distorted the pricing for players, because before all of this nonsense kicked off with Elliot Anderson, you’d have probably have said £60million for Martinelli is good work. He has served his time, we all still love him, he was a hard worker, but his output in domestic competitions fell through the floor last season and I think that’s why the club have decided to take this deal, despite it clearly leaving us short in attack. Which brings me to the final discussion piece for today…

The transfer window as a whole – for fans and for me

Personally, I’m quite chilled about everything. I think we’re stronger in defence with the arrival of Konsa, I think we’re stronger in midfield with the arrival of Bruno, so it is just that attack that might be problematic. The options on that left wing are the biggest challenge and risk, because in total when you look at the numbers from last season, we have Martinelli and Trossard’s minutes that equated to a combination of 5,306 minutes across all competitions, 19 goals and 18 assists across the two players. That’s what supposedly needs to be found, but I don’t think it needs to be as analogue as that, because whilst Tzolis and Eze will share those minutes, we are all also hoping that Havertz, Saka, Madueke, plus Merino, can all contribute more than they did last season. If you take the attacking group as a whole, and just those players who played in the main attacking positions (so I’ve included Martinelli, Trossard, Saka, Havertz, Jesus, Gyokeres, Merino, Madueke) – you’re looking at 16,347 minutes, 72 goals 40 assists. We have to better that. If you’re moving Eze to that left-wing position, he’s got to better his seven goals and two assists last season. I think he does that, easily, but I also think Saka – if fit – beats his seven goals and five assists, too. I think Havertz – again, if fit – beats his seven goals and five assists. I think Tzolis should at least be able to match one of Martinelli or Trossard’s outputs, plus we have Merino who – again, if fit -will surely better his four goals and three assists. I haven’t even factored in that Max is a year older…

The point I’m trying to make is that whilst we all know we need to strengthen, whilst I wanted a high-profile left-winger to come in, I am not minded to spend cash on players just to make up numbers – Fofana, as an example, probably would have been that guy.

We have a talented squad that can cope with the new season. They just need to stay fit. I’m hopeful many of them will.

Catch you all tomorrow.

Quick PS – we did the Same Old Arsenal pod last night, which you can re-watch on YouTube (or wherever you get your pods) here if you are so inclined.

We kicked off with a lovely, comfortable, impressive 3-0 win at home to Coventry on Friday, then yesterday were treated to Man United losing the early game of the day to Hull. Lovely stuff.

I hope this doesn’t come back to bite me on the arse, because hopefully we beat Hull home and away, but losing to them and having their fans do that embarrassing ‘mauling’ gesture has to be the footballing equivalent of having your nose rubbed right in it. What the hell, man, that’s just cringe on levels that I didn’t think of before. And seeing Man United fans having to endure it is absolutely amazing.

On the pre-match preview of the season pod we did on Thursday, Cookie talked about United coming second. Yesterday the guys did a post-match pod to discuss the Arsenal win, but if they’d have waited a few hours longer and not podded in the morning, they could have had double-bubble fun, both celebrating our win, as well as laughing at both United and The Scum. You can check out the pod here though if you’re looking for something Arsenal-related to consume.

Our attention now turns to seeing what’s going to shake out in terms of transfers this week, and you’d have to think that there will be a Martinelli exit and a left-wing incoming. I have to say I agree with what Wrighty was saying on Friday night about the respect needed to be shown to Martinelli. Here we have a Brazilian international, somebody who scored a winning goal to put them through to the next round of the competition in the World Cup, who has bagged important goals for us and been a brilliant servant for many years. Yet he’s not even making matchday squads. Hey, we didn’t need it on Friday night against Coventry, but you can’t convince me that we won’t need him this season if we’re not signing a replacement. And if that happens, I’m fine with it; Martinelli is a good player. Yeah, he’s had a bad season from an output perspective last season, but he’s also had good seasons too. We know the type of player he is, we know his limitations, but we also know that there isn’t exactly a wealth of options out there at left wing. Julian Alvarez has played as a left winger six times in his whole career, so he isn’t that guy. Plus, I don’t want a guy who is only interested in Barca; stick around at Atleti, mate, if that’s what you think about The Arsenal. We’re nobody’s second choice these days; we’re champions of England and Champions League finalists. We need players who see Arsenal as a dream move.

So for me, like I already said last week, I’d be more than happy to keep Martinelli and have him and Tzolis – who everyone is rightly raving about – share the minutes on that left-hand side. But to basically ostracise him from the group is a strange one, because Arteta has always loved to use Gabby, he’s always been appreciative of his work rate, so I would have thought he’d be happy to have him in matchday squads as an option.

Perhaps it’s a diktat from Berta and the club? I know Arteta is the main man, that whatever he decides, he can have, but if Berta has told him he’s going out and getting him a left winger, but we can’t risk a possible injury to Gabby Martinelli, so to just leave him out of the Community Shield or the first league game of the season, maybe Arteta is complying on a short-term basis. Because if we can’t get a player in, I find it hard to believe the club won’t integrate Martinelli back into the team when the window closes. You’d have to, because the other options away from Tzolis are all square pegs in round holes. He’s been reluctant to use eze there, Madueke has failed to impress and it’s not his favoured side, Ethan seems to be no longer seen as a wide forward, and Max is probably too young to be fast-tracked into a position he hasn’t played there yet as, either.

One way or another, at least we’re coming to the end of the window this week, the end of the nonsense, so we can focus on the proper stuff that happens on the pitch. Maybe we get some noises todday about some movements, but I’m happy enoough to see us easy winners, see those Spurs and United fans unhappy, and we can all just drink it in knowing that we’re looking like we’re in good shape.

Right, I’m going to call time on today, I have to get out into the Portuguese sun and enjoy some R&R. catch you all later.

I don’t know about you, but I immediately put two and two together and made myself four. That sounds to me like Arsenal are gearing up for an exit of either Ethan or Myles, and after Myles’ performance in the Community Shield on Sunday, coupled with the fact he broke into the side in midfield and played in the Champions League final, I have a bad feeling we’re losing Ethan Nwaneri this summer.

That would make for sad times for me, because I think we’re missing a trick. I listened to the Arsecast Extra this morning on my run, and James and Andrew were talking about the situation with these two players. James’ point about Myles kind of forcing the hand and making him kind of unsellable by the way he’s played. Hey, that’s how all of us want Arsenal players to play, because if they’re all doing it, it makes for an amazing headache for Arteta, and it will almost invariably mean we’re winning football matches. But what is frustrating, I think, is how we seem to be prioritising the financial side over the football side. James and Andrew talked about the fact that both Zubimendi and Madueke, as examples, would not actually bank much cash in terms of the financial regulations, because their amortised values are still so high (i.e., the book value hasn’t been spread out over several years because they only signed last year). If that’s true, that the club is thinking about how they have to make this kind of ‘pure profit’ sale so they can give themselves headroom for other signings, it just makes me more frustrated about the Madueke deal last summer. He got eight goals and four assists from 43 appearances and 2,200+ minutes. In 2024/25, Ethan bagged – from the same position – nine goals and two assists in 37 appearances and 1,300+ minutes. Nearly 900 minutes less for Ethan, and he delivered one fewer goal/assist.

There’s nothing you can do about the past, this is all hindsight, but I’m just looking at the data, the two players, where they are at, and the fact that we wouldn’t bank much regulatory headroom for new signings because we decided that Ethan wasn’t a right winger (which I still don’t understand) and that Noni was a better output and outlay at £50million. I think Noni did alright for us last season; my issue isn’t personal to him. I just think we made what is perhaps not the right move there – to my very untrained eyes.

I guess we are where we are. But for me, if somebody gives me the option of not signing another player this summer, which means we keep Ethan but send him on loan next summer, I think I’d be ok with that. There are probably a few people who would choke at that, but I’m looking at what all of the pundits are saying with their predictions, and most are saying we should be favourites for the Premier League title by a mile. Now, last season, because Liverpool spent the GDP of a small island on players, everyone had them down to walk the league. And for the first five games, they won all of them (including against us) and Liverpool fans in particular were already booking days off after the season had ended for a blinder of a bender in Liverpool. But it didn’t pan out like that. So I understand that you can’t hang your hat on pundits’ predictions, but I think pundits got too hung up on the transfer business, and not enough on some of the other factors that impacted Liverpool’s position as defending champions. Slot had ridden the crest of the Salah and Van Dijk wave; at their ages, the age curve was always going to hit. They also picked up injuries – like everyone else did last season – and found out that Slot’s “injuries are excuses for losers” chuntering on from the season before was suddenly a crutch they wanted to lean on. Plus, and I remember saying this multiple times in his first season, I just don’t think Slot was really that great from a tactical and man-management perspective. Why bring all of this up? Well, think about where Arsenal are now compared to where Liverpool were:

• Where are our ageing players who just had a blinding ‘season for all seasons’?
• Where is our litany of mega signings that are going to over-index our ability to walk this league?
• Where was our season of having barely any injuries last season?

None of the above applies to us going into this season. On top of that, there are a host of new managers who are unknown quantities. One or two might end up being the second coming of Fergie or Wenger, but as of right now, there’s a lot more uncertainty on that front. We have the continuity manager, the settled squad, the team that everyone thinks is going to win the league. It doesn’t mean we will; things might conspire against us, but we’ve got a squad that is already championship-winning, plus we’ve added one of the best midfielders in the league and a Greek lad that many think might be the surprise package for the season. So yeah, when I think about it like that, I don’t want to roll the dice by exiting Ethan and using that money to fund a random left winger that could just end up being the left-side version of Madueke (i.e., good, but hardly massively needle-moving).

We’re in good shape. Let’s not blow it up by exiting one of our most promising youngsters.

So for all of that posturing about figures well north of £80million, that it’s going to have to be close to the near £100million the Scum paid for Tonali, it appears as though the fee is ‘relatively’ more reasonable for the player. It’s probably more than Arsenal would want to pay; the original links that came out made it sound more like £60million, and if you go by TransferMarkt, that’s his realistic value. But we know that in this window, this summer, those two utterly wretched clubs Man City and Chelsea have inflated the market with their grossly overpaid fees for players. And so I guess we were always going to overpay a little for this one.

It feels like – as Ornstein reported yesterday – we’re nearing ‘end game’ here and, frankly, I’m sure we’re all glad. Get it done, let’s have some pics by the weekend, maybe have him paraded at the Emirates for our friendly against Dortmund on Sunday, then let’s start to look seriously at what we do on that left wing position. Because by then, we should have an indication on the Vini Junior situation, for which I suspect it’ll end up being a renewal on better terms.

Certainly, if you listen to a few of the Madrista vloggers, like this John Terry-looking guy, they’re starting to get twitchy. The Madrid official social media accounts are doing their best to put their fans at ease though; Vini Junior interviews, “day in the life of training” clips, interviews on him talking about the new season, etc, etc. There’s two ways you can look at it; one is that they’re confident he will sign, or two is that they’re pumping out this content so that if it comes out he won’t sign a new deal, they can turn to their fans and give it the ol’ “we tried” narrative. That’s fair enough, although I suspect he will ultimately bow to the pressure no doubt being exerted on him and take the deal.

For Arsenal, that means getting the Bruno G deal over the line should result in Berta focusing the mind on who we can get instead of Vini Junior. Where’s plan B, C and D? That’s what I want to start hearing rumours of the second we hear that Vini Junior is staying. Let’s not have any protracted chase of him all summer. Madrid have supposedly said they want an answer this week, and I think Arsenal should push for that too. No deadline day shenanigans, please.

Speaking of shenanigans, how about those RB Leipzig jokers, eh? Just offloading Diomande for £100million, now they supposedly want Ethan Nwaneri for €40million. That article i’ve linked to also references the possibility of a buyback clause, which I’m sure we’d be fine with, but if Arsenal countenance selling him for €40million/£34million, I’d be pretty cheesed off, I have to say. Let’s remind ourselves that we had to pivot away from Sesko last summer because RB wanted too much. Well, this time the boot is on the other foot, motherf*****s, so pay up. And pay well. Or you can get in the bin.

As can, it appears, the Arsenal IT technical team, as the club has announced they are refunding everyone who bought a pre-season pass, following the technical difficulties on the website at the weekend. Eek. And in a move that may well cheese a lot of fans off, it doesn’t look like the Betis game in Dublin tonight will be televised either. man, I’d hate to be in the team that is trying to fix that mess. I suspect they’ll record the match and make it free to everyone tomorrow if they can’t get it working today, but if you’re going to the game tonight, you might be in one of those rare privileged positions to be watching a game that very few people can see live in the flesh. I guess that’s a little like how we used to feel when we had a 3pm kick-off on a Saturday. Very novel indeed.

I’ll be plenty of people are annoyed, but I can’t get too wound up about it, if I’m honest, because I don’t really watch these friendly games. I mean, I will if it’s on one of the many TV platforms I already pay for, but with a season ticket that also sets me back a grand, I’m not forking out over a tenner (or whatever it is) to watch pre-season matches. Sorry, that’s a ‘hard no’ from me.

The club has released some images of the players training, and I suspect we’ll get a bit more of a smattering of involvement from more of the first team regulars. I’m interested to find out how many minutes Ethan and Max get, but I also want to see (probably in hindsight after the game) what Kai’s looking like. Let’s not forget that he spent most of last season injured, plus half of the season before that out, so having him fit and firing for the new season is something I have everything crossed for.

Right, that’ll do me for today. I’ll be back tomorrow, hopefully having been able to watch the highlights of the Betis game, for which we can all completely over-index the significance of. You have yourselves a good one.

Makes sense; Arsenal have an unhealthy obsession with getting that stain of a football club out of jail with big transfer fees. We did it with Noni, with Kai, we took Davidf Luiz off them, plus Petr Cech. So that wouldn’t have surprised me at all if we’d have had a little nibble at that one. He’s signed a new deal at Chelsea though, so that’s that one off the table – which I’m very ok with, if I’m honest.

I thought about it though. I mean, he certainly looks a lot more of an aesthetically pleasing footballer than, say Viktor Gyokeres. I tend to sway towards the Joao Pedro-type player, because I can ‘see’ what he does when he’s not bagging. But if you look at the two players’ numbers respectively, if you’re telling your striker to bag 20+ goals in a season, you’re probably saying that’s more likely with Big Vik. Last season, in 3,694 minutes, Joao Pedro bagged 20 goals. In 3,481 minutes – that’s 213 minutes, which works out to be just under two-and-a-half full 90-minute appearances, by the way – Viktor Gyokeres got 21 goals. Big Vik registered three assists to Joao Pedro’s nine, so perhaps that gives you an insight into the differences between the players, but it does show you what the identities of the two footballers is. Big Vik does goals and pretty much nothing else. There’s a little more to Joao Pedro’s game. The second question I had when thinking about this, is that Joao Pedro was in a pretty crappy Chelsea team, so does he bag more in a title-winning Arsenal side? Possibly.

As Arsenal fans, it’s really interesting to see that relationship between Big Vik and the fanbase. Some think he’s just a wardrobe that is useful for bundling in tap-ins against weaker sides; others see a player who is ultimately all end product, which is exactly what we missed the season before last. At 28 there’s not really a lot more for him to evolve into, and I’ll be honest he wasn’t my preferred choice last summer, but I do think he grew into the side more after the Christmas period. From January onwards he registered nine goals and an assist in the Premier League, including a brace at The Scum. In all competitions it was 14 goals and all three of his assists, so you could tell that after the initial bedding in period, he found his place, and his teammates were able to get him into positions to score. So for next season, we should definitely be looking for an uptick in the volume of goals if he’s able to contribute from the start.

Unless of course he’s moved on. It’s quite surprising – unless you’re somebody like Chelsea – to be moving a player on after one season. But with the departure of Norgaard for Everton, I don’t think any of us can rule it out, and there’s certainly been one or two rumours about Big Vik being used as a makeweight for certain clubs. Personally, I think he’ll stay. Arsenal are, as we all know, going ‘all in’ on Vini Junior and if that somehow does happen (I don’t know any Arsenal fans who are more than ’50/50′ on that one by the way), then I doubt the club are going to be looking to disrupt too many positions. But if we get noises this week that Vini Junior is set to stay at Real Madrid and sign a new deal…well…I do think Arsenal will pivot to Alvarez. Mikel Arteta will be sad if the Vini Jr door closes, but if you offer him a player he previously worked with, and Arsenal just decide to go big on the Argentinian, then I suspect one of the more regular players from last season is getting nudged out the door.

I guess the question would then become “Who?”. I think most of us thought it would be Gabby Martinelli who is on his way. His career seems to have plateaued, his goal contribution domestically last season wasn’t good enough, plus there seems to be a very public courting of left wingers this summer. But Julian Alvarez played almost exclusively as a number nine last season. Yes, we know he can play across the front three, but if you’re spending that kind of outlay that Atleti are demanding, you need to have a proper plan for the player. If that plan is centre-forward, then surely Martinelli has to stay and duke it out with Tzolis on the left? If it’s to be on the left – which I highly doubt because he’s played there a total of four times in the last four seasons by the way – then you would look to move on Big Vik. So despite some of these rumours about the Swede’s potential exit, it doesn’t feel very likely to me.

I do wonder how many minutes Gyokeres will get though. We saw Kai bag a very tidy goal in Girona on Saturday night, and the German was favoured for the Champions League final. If he can finally stay fit for most of the season, then it feels like he’s going to be Arteta’s main man for most of the bigger games, so what will that do for Gyokeres’ chances of hitting 20+ goals again? I’d wager it would be tough for him to bag that volume of goals with 1,000 minutes less in the season, for example, but if you’re looking at the Everton game at home as an example of where he can be dangerous – off the bench to grab the winner late, before the now-legendary Dowman goal – then maybe he can be the kind of marksman who finds a place in this Arsenal side as a rotational gunman? I think if you’re telling the Arsenal fans who are still a bit unsure on him, that he’s going to be used in that way, I think a lot of us would therefore prefer to keep Gyokeres around for another season.

One things for sure, though, I do think we need to keep Kai fit. If so, I think that’s massive for our chances of retaining the league.

Back tomorrow.

Why I’m talking about it is obvious; Bruno Guimaraes is clearly edging closer towards an Arsenal move. And that’s good news for us. Yesterday on the Arsenal Opinion Podcast show Johnny and I talked about the player – as many of us have on numerous pods – but I went as far as to say Bruno G could have a more transformational impact on The Arsenal than Vini Junior would. That’s not just a soundbite designed to raise eyebrows; I believe it, because of the style of player he is. And I’m getting a bit hot on him, I have to say. He’s a tempo-setter; he’ll be the person to pick the ball up deep, distribute, but also win the ball back and provide goals too. He bagged nine goals and eight assists in all competitions last season. He’s also fairly robust. He missed 14 games with a hamstring injury last season, but according to TransferMarkt, he’s only missed 22 matches in the last six seasons. That’s the kind of record I can get behind.

He’s prime age too. He’s a leader; Eddie Howe had him as his captain, so his leaving Newcastle tells me that the manager has had enough, because this deal is nearing completion.

And, in classic transfer ‘peaks-and-troughs’ style news yesterday, we also got some competing views from the Sky Sports news at the beginning of the week, with the latest noises around Vini Junior that maybe this deal isn’t as dead as Gary “let’s have dinner together Jose” Cotterill would have you think. Supposedly, there are more talks this week; there is a big gap in the wage requirements and image rights, and that doesn’t seem like it’s changing any time soon. I guess from the clubs side, it’s probably about Vini coming more to them than them getting closer to his wants. If that’s the case, maybe this deal goes from ‘fading’ to “well, maybe it’s a 25% chance it happens”?

Again, we’ll just have to sit here and wait.

At least we have something else to talk about, though, because Mikel was interviewed on the official site , and he’s talked about how he’s back and ready to go. I loved the video and his take on how we have all gone through a ‘story’ together. His reminder of where we were when he took over is timely; we’re all still euphoric about being Premier League champions, but let’s never forget that it was Mikel who has steered us through this journey. Through the bad times and now to the good, he has been the driving force. No matter what happens in the future, I am going to remember that and always be thankful to him for that. Like, I was thankful to Arsene for what he did for the club. Yes, it got a little toxic towards the end; yes, it kind of fizzled out rather than ended with a bang, but with the benefit of time, I can be appreciative of what Arsene achieved at Arsenal. I choose to only look at the positives now. Mikel Arteta has etched himself into Arsenal history, and although one day it will come to an end, in the fullness of time, I’m sure all Arsenal fans will choose to only remember the good things.

Look at me, I’m talking as if he’s on his way out, which of course none of us want. What we want is for the team to be ready to go come that first game of the second in a few weeks, and it sounds as though the players are chomping at the bit. I liked his comment about Declan Rice saying “I could come back on this date, then be ready to play on this date” – yes please, let’s have some of those vibes from the players, because it’s easy to think they’ll all be a bit football-ed out having played so many games last season. But they need to rest up, then take advice from the club on when to be integrated back in. The fact that Mikel referenced having three different pre-seasons for those players returning also shows you just how challenging it is going to be for him to kick the season off. He needs to get the balance right and not rush players back, but equally, if they are showing all the signs of being ready, he has to make sure he re-introduces them at the right time to maintain the energy in the group. We’re the champions. We have a target on our backs. Everyone will want to knock us off our perch. So we need to be ready for that, because they’re all coming for us.

Back tomorrow.

All jokes aside, whilst I have no problem with them bringing in elder statesmen like Henderson, we all love a bit of Welbz. Seeing him in the shirt of that reprehensible football club might sting a bit.

What we need is a bit of that good ol’fashioned transfer dopamine, but it doesn’t sound like it’s on the immediate horizon. And when it does come – possibly in the shape of Bruno G – we’ll have all been so saturated by the news and how it has rumbled on, that it doesn’t really ‘hit’ when it actually happens. I’m pretty sure every summer for the last five, maybe even ten, years I’ve written a blog like this. But that’s because every summer at some point it just feels like it. That time is now, and it’s with the Bruno G transfer, although I suspect the Vini Junior stuff might be the same if we don’t get some kind of black-and-white answer soon.

Supposedly that will happen this week. I think Arsenal just ned a call which goes something like “oh, ok, so you’re signing a new deal. Cool, we’ll move on”, or a Real Madrid WhatsApp sent to Berta saying “let’s start talking, because Vini Jr ain’t to us” type thing. Yesterday the news was that Real Madrid are looking at getting an answer one way or another this week. We all know how this works with these Spanish clubs; they set a deadline, the deadline is missed, they end up getting what they want anyway. I’m pretty sure it’s happened with a few of the Barca transfers, which is why I suspect Alvarez will end up there. Atleti say “no”, Barca set deadlines, but come August 31st, they’ll go back in and pay the money. It’s what just tends to happen.

John Stones was another one speculated on as a possible makeshift incoming whilst Saliba is out injured, but it looks like he’s off to Inter Milan, which makes a fair bit of sense. Slower league, less intensity, plus he’ll be more of a first-choice option than he would have at The Arsenal. The pitch to him from our side would have basically been “you’ve got until October mate, then it’s dead rubber Champions League, League Cup, or early-stages FA Cup games” – so I kind of get it.

It probably would have been higher wages anyway than we’d want to pay for a veteran England international who spends half the time on the treatment table. No, as I’ve said all along, we should not be looking at taking minutes off Mosquera. It’s time to give him the keys.

I do hope they are properly stress-testing both Timber and White’s robustness too. If both of those players even give us two-thirds or three-quarters of a season each, as long as they both aren’t out injured for the same period, then we have enough to cover. And besides, why not think Marli Salmon for some of those dead-rubber games, or League Cup, etc? He’ll be a year older; we all heard last season how the club rate him highly, so let’s have him in there as the third-choice understudy. I’d be cool with that.

I did read one rumour this morning which left a bit of sick in my mouth. Step forward, The Metro, with this abomination of a link to Christian Romero. Can you imagine? A complete nutcase, who isn’t even a great defender, is a walking yellow card, plays for ‘The Bad Guys’ of international football in Argentina, plus he has a really shit nickname – “Cuti”. Bleugh. Last night’s linguine feels like it’s coming back up to say hello.

Please – Richard Garlick, Mikel, Stan, Josh, and anyone who has anything to do with transfers – I beg you to not even countenance such a move. I can’t think of one Arsenal fan who would want this – even if he’s a third-choice option. The Scum probably wouldn’t sell to us anyway, but for £42million+? Give over.

I need a palate-cleanser after that. How about this interview with Szczesny saying that he’s still an Arsenal fan and loves The Arsenal. I know it’s in Polish, but you still get the gist. Why can’t we buy him off Barca for a couple of mil? They can have Kepa, then we can bring Moj back home to understudy Raya? That would be a wholesome move that, in an inverse of the Romero links, would have the nostalgia gland activated for any Arsenal fan.

Look at me, 800 words in and all I can talk about it a reserve keeper at Barcelona saying he loves The Arsenal. Shows how slow the news is.

Tomorrow I might do a book review I’ve been sent. Will come back to you on that. Until then, stay awesome.

1. Mbappe
2. Vinicius Junior
3. Rodrygo
4. Endrick
5. Diomande
6. Brahim Dias
7. Franco Mastantuano
8. Gonzalo Garcia

They’ll let the latter two go out on loan/sale, but you’re still talking six players for three positions. Now, you can understand those numbers, because it’s two players for each position, but when you look at the top of the above list, they don’t seem like names that are going to be fully up for bench time, do they? You could do Mbappe up top, have Endrick as the understudy, then Diomande wide right, Vinicius Junior wide left, then give Rodrygo those understudy minutes. But would he be happy with that?

Of course I’m still riffing off the Ornbomba from Saturday, hoping that this arrival instigates a bidding process for Vini Junior, but I still think we’re a long way off that yet. But maybe the Diomande news starts to chivvy along some of the other moves this summer. PSG are having a laugh if they think they’re getting €170million for Barcola; that’d be a British record fee, for a guy who is second fiddle in the PSG team and won’t sign a new deal, so I think that saga will be dragging on too.# It’s not getting solved this week, although it does sound as though Liverpool are the hottest contenders for that one to get done. If they move, it probably puts Barcola off our radar, and whilst the plan to try and get Vini Junior out of Madrid doesn’t come off, we’re suddenly looking at the options coming off the table and we’re gambling on dislodging a guy who a lot of people think will just sign a new deal.

I hope you know what you’re doing, Arsenal, because the stories about him wanting to sign a new deal are already starting to pop up. If they gather pace, all this weekend’s noise would basically have been a fun bit of chatter for the weekend, and that’s it.

Our attention needs to therefore turn to alternatives, once again, and I suspect we’ll find ourselves back to square one at that point. Perhaps the Bruno G stuff hots up, and that can be a bit of a distraction, but it does feel interesting that we got this ‘Arsenal are exploring a Vini Jr’ deal from David and James, who are very respected, and then very quickly it could turn to people wondering whether or not both were played a bit.

I think Arsenal probably were looking at this. They probably would like to explore a deal. They probably have done the finances and started to reach out to a few intermediaries. But I also think, given how restless the fanbase is starting to get, it kind of suits the club for everyone to spend the weekend being excited and talking about the ambition they are showing this summer. It’s an adrenaline shot for the fanbase, so who better to deliver that adrenaline shot than two respected journalists? Normally, David doesn’t drop messages like he did at such an early stage in the transfer process. So to me, it feels a little strange, almost pre-planned from the club to let this news get out. But the problem with that, is that if we now start getting news about him about to sign a new deal, or it all goes quiet for a week and then he signs on to stay at Real Madrid, then people are going to be doubly angry.

It suits Vini Junior to have this news too. His agents and ‘people’ confirming that they’d maybe have a talk to Arsenal if needed sends a message to Real Madrid that he wants what he wants. They don’t want to lose him for nothing, but he doesn’t want them to just assume he’s going to accept any deal, so having Arsenal sniffing around is good for all parties. Arsenal get a fanbase who are starting to get restless back onside; Vini Junior shows a little leg in order to force Real Madrid to get what they want; Madrid do a deal for Diomande and then have him sign a new deal, which keeps their fans happy too. Everyone wins in the end. Except the Arsenal fans, who got a taste of something special, only to have it taken away.

Heck, what do I know? I’m just a simple blogger who drops whatever thoughts I get every morning down on virtual paper. But if it plays out as I have suggested here, Arsenal won’t be winning any kudos points from the fanbase for ‘exploring’ stuff. We need to start hearing noises about a left winger. And soon. It’s been over a week since the World Cup. That’s plenty of time for rumours to start coming through, and given Berta is meant to be a plate-spinner, I was hoping that we’d see a few more names linked than just this one.

The Arsenal squad are in Spain at the moment as we prepare for Girona on Saturday. My hope is that we can start to see some training pics, hear from Arteta, etc, because I’m getting a little bored of the speculation and the repetitive nature of it. Let’s see what happens today though. Eddie Howe has spoken over the weekend about Bruno and how he doesn’t know the future of their captain, so perhaps that means that Arsenal and Newcastle can finally get around the transfer table and get to talking.

Back tomorrow.

Did you see that coming? I certainly didn’t, but Messrs Ornstein and McNicholas dropped an Athletic Bomba on our social media feeds, and yesterday was spent with Arsenal fans recalibrating their ‘dream starting XI’ for next season, with the Brazilian superstar firmly placed in it on that left wing.

It’s exciting, isn’t it?

There seems to be two schools of thought here. Two ways in which Arsenal fans are reacting to the news that Arsenal are ‘exploring the possibility’ of a deal. The first group – of which I’m choosing to be in for a change – is just excited at the prospect of this happening. The second group, of which I have a few mates whose feet are firmly in that camp, are saying that it’s never happening in a million years.

That may well be true. It will be a very difficult deal to pull off. Real Madrid do not want to sell one of their prized assets. We’re used – as Arsenal fans – to seeing players join Real Madrid or Barcelona, not exit them. The only time players leave those clubs is when they are surplus to requirements. The Ozil deal was amazing; we all couldn’t believe it, and it was a very exciting transfer, but ultimately he was being moved on because Real Madrid wanted to find room for Gareth Bale. This time it would be different. This time it is Madrid not wanting to lose Vini Junior for free. We’d have a statement signing that would blow anything else out of the water. I’d go as far as to say that it might be the biggest transfer the whole of the Premier League has ever seen.

And that’s probably why so many are sceptical, which I totally understand, because the financial numbers behind it would probably be eye-watering. The rumours are that he’s currently on €400k-per-week at Madrid, or that he’s turned that down. Arsenal would have to make that a pound instead of a euro, for sure. But then you’re getting a higher tax rate in England than Spain, so the Brazilian would end up being worse off with take-home pay. But does that matter to these players? I read something a while ago that talked about the way players use weekly wage as a benchmark of their own value. They all meet up with their international teams, and those who are on the highest weekly wage are the big dogs in the team. They are already multi-millionaires; they don’t need the money, but they do need the kudos from their fellow pro’s. So perhaps that would be something for Vini Junior? Perhaps what this situation is, is not about money, but status?

If that is the case, maybe Arsenal’s interest does mean that it is possible, because coming to the Premier League – the biggest and best in world football – and being ‘the guy’ is his aim. As has been pointed out on social media by a few people on my timeline, at Real Madrid he is in the shadow of Mbappe. The Frenchman is the superstar, with Vini Jr the wingman, so a move to The Arsenal will put him in a top team, but as the guy. He’d be joining a team that made the semi-final of the Champions League two seasons ago, the final last season, only losing out on penalties, having just won the Premier League. He will have watched that Champions League final. He might have even seen over a million people line the streets of London for the parade. He’ll be looking at The Arsenal as one of the most exciting teams in Europe to be in, and he’ll have had a few Brazilian’s named Gabriel who would be talking to him about what it is like at The Arsenal.

He might even be looking at the fact that a certain Brazilian could be about to sign next week. If he and his representatives are speaking to Arsenal about the possibilities of a signature to play in red and white, he’ll be well aware of the talent at the club, plus he’ll be well aware of how strong we will look with both him and Bruno Guimaraes joining the team. This is a good time to be joining The Arsenal, and with Mikel Arteta just having won the Premier League title, there’s proof of concept that Arsenal can go the distance and win trophies.

Real Madrid must be thinking about this too. As already mentioned, they don’t want to lose him for free. They want him to be at their club and so will no doubt offer a new deal on better terms. They’ve also entered the race for Diomande. As I speculated yesterday, that deal is supposedly a message to Vini Jr, or so some have suggested. But Madrid do have a surplus of attacking players if Diomande signs. I don’t think the two are related, personally, because Diomande plays on the right and Vini Jr on the left, but if that deal gets done, then there will certainly need to be movement out of the club, and that could give Arsenal some opportunities – even if it isn’t with the Ballon d’Or runner-up.

And with all that said, suddenly it does seem like this could be an achievable deal, albeit one that I doubt gets moving any time soon. It feels like there needs to be some more moving parts for this to start to actually move along. What Arsenal can’t afford to do, however, is chase this deal all summer and then find out he signs a new deal and we have left ourselves without that left-wing position being solved. So I hope there are some clear plans around ‘Plan B’ or ‘Plan C’ if we find ourselves with a week before the transfer closes and we are still nowhere with the signing. Aim for the moon, Arsenal, but if you can’t get there, have yourselves something else lined up, please.

That’s it from me today. Back tomorrow as usual, as we start another week, hoping for some big Arsenal news. Catch you then.

I do wonder if, certainly from a winger perspective, something big needs to shake loose for all of the dominoes to start falling though. The reason I’m thinking that this morning is that I saw that Diomande is the subject of a bid from Real Madrid, for which Leipzig have rejected around £85million. A couple of days ago Fabrizio Romano was saying that we had enquired about the Ivorian, but given he wants to go to PSG, Liverpool have previously made a bid and I’m sure I’ve seen that City had a look, that one feels like it is going to be a little beyond The Arsenal. I saw some stuff saying the players’ representatives have been a bit of a pain in the arse, and when you’ve got the likes of PSG and Real Madrid involved, you’re getting in to a bidding war that I think Arsenal just need to steer clear of.

What we know about The Arsenal and Arteta is that he wants a level of commitment from any joining player. We’ve heard on countless occasions that “Play X only wanted Arsenal” and that is not something you’d say would be obvious from Diomande. We also know that Arsenal won’t get drawn into overpaying on the valuation. The Morgan Rogers situation showed that. But going back to my original point, it feels like there needs to be one big move for a player, to shake other players out. If Diomande goes to PSG, then surely Barcola gets clearance to move. If he decides that actually he fancies a bit of Real Madrid, then does a Vini Junior become available? Possibly not, but does Rodrygo become available? It’s funny because we were all looking at him last summer, but there’s been little noise about him this summer, which is strange because he played just over 1,100 minutes. For a player of his quality he won’t like that. But if Madrid get Diomande, then you’d think that somebody like Rodrygo would be on the market for a move. He did his ACL in March, which of course ruled him out for three months, but even before then, he was hardly a regular. If he’s still not fit then that might be a problem if any club is interested, but I’ve seen some suggestions that he’s stepping up his rehab, so perhaps something could happen there. Madrid have Mbappe, Vini Jr, Endrick, Rodrygo – could they afford to have Diomande as well and have enough minutes for them all?

What we need to be careful of, however, is not making our move at the right time. It seems to me like the big clubs are all after left wingers this summer. That’s problematic for us because it means competition. It means bidding wars. But it also means that if you don’t get your deals done, you run the risk of being left behind and searching round the back at the bins for players. We’re the champions, Champions League finalists, semi-finalists the year before, so there’s no way we should be doing that; players should be banging down our door.

That means making your decision, making your move and going for it. Come on Arsenal, let’s move. Now.

The one I haven’t heard of for a while, is that fella Yildaz from Juventus. He’s rated by TransferMarkt as one of the most valuable left wingers in the world, and they put him at €75million. That’s a tidy sum, and I’ll confess not to know tons about the player, as I don’t watch Italian football. He got 10 goals and 11 assists in 47 games and 3,600 minutes. That’s a modest return in a worse league than the Premier League; Martinelli got 11 goals and seven assists for us last season, so whilst I think we all know we need an upgrade, is Yildaz the man to be that upgrade?

What he does have in his favour is that he’s just 21. That means he’s still building his game. If we’re going to go young, however, why not try somebody like Said El Mala, who has been doing numbers at my German club FC Koln. He’s 19, has just bagged 13 goals and five assists in the Bundesliga, and I suspect he wouldn’t cost the earth. TransferMarkt has him at €45million. The German Bundesliga isn’t the Prem, but it is still one of the top three or four leagues in world football, and if he’s doing those numbers at 19, could it be worth a punt?

I guess with that one he probably needs another season to show his consistency, and that he hasn’t just run hot for one season. We had that one season from Martinelli in 2022/23 in which he bagged lots of goals and assists, but he’s now not been able to replicate it for three subsequent seasons – the same could be true of this kid.

But it does feel like we need to see some names popping up now that aren’t just Barcola or Diomande. I feel like the Barcola stuff is just going to rumble on, so why not just start looking elsewhere? We all hear the stories of how many plates Berta likes to spin, how many fingers he likes to put in different pies, but it all seems a little quiet on the winger front, so what’s going on, Andrea?

Maybe something will shake loose this week, but it does seem alarmingly quiet. Then again, perhaps that’s just what Arsenal want.

Back tomorrow. Maybe we’ll get something exciting today.

Laters kids.

It’s a good move. It’s a sensible move. Only time will tell if it’s an upgrade, but at £34million – and it still feels crazy to say this – it’s not a bank-breaker. In a summer in which fees seem to have gone mental, on account of the financially doped/shady clubs inflating prices, this represents the kind of value that you hope will turn into an Eduardo.

We’ve known about this one for a while, so of course it doesn’t come out of the blue, but there’s been enough scouting reports of the player over the last few weeks to knoiw what we are getting, which is a young lad, at perfect age for a winger, who is both-footed and looks like he has an eye for goal. I’m not going to get too over-hyped on this though; he looks like a good player, he’s said all the right things, but let’s not forget that the Belgian league is very different to the Prem. It’s regularly seen as the sixth or seventh most difficult league in Europe and, having seen Big Vik arrive last summer from the Portuguese league, qwe need to be mindful that Tzolis is not going to find himself bagging goals and assists with the frequency he did on the mainland.

That’s ok though, because I don’t think any of us believe he will, but I guess our expectations need to be that he delivers enough end product to match Leo last season, at a bare minimum. In 50 appearances and just under 3,000 minutes, Trossard bagged eight goals and 11 assists, which I think most of us would think that Tzolis should be able to do depending on how much time he gets on the pitch. If he matches Leo’s minutes from last season, I’d be hopeful that he could get into both double figures on goals and assists, and I think that’s certainly an achievable target to set.

The good news is that he is fit and ready to hit the ground running. He said as much in his interviews with the club when the announcement was made yesterday, and given that we have a number of players not back from their extended leave due to the World Cup, having this guy ready for Girona next week can only be a positive thing. I liked the player profile on Arseblog from Phil Costa that went up yesterday. I particularly like the idea of him being a ‘shift and shoot’ player, and with that being something we often saw Trossard do, you can see why the club have moved quickly to secure Tzolis’ services. I like the sound of his two-footedness too. I don’t want to put unfair expectations on him, but I hear ‘two-footed,’ and I immediately think of our former magician Santi Cazorla, so if Tzolis had a similar level of output to the little Spaniard, we’ll be absolutely laughing.

The squad augmentation can’t stop there though, and the noises of Guimaraes continue to rumble on. We’re now at the ‘set to bid‘ part of any big transfer. At some stage we’ll make a bid, which will of course be rejected by Newcastle, as they try to hold on to their captain. It’s a funny one because you just know that whatever Arsenal go in at, it will be rejected, but equally you don’t want to piss off the selling club with the old class ‘derisory’ bid. The noises are that between £70 – £80million gets this done, so I suspect we’ll get wind of some kind of opening salvo over the weekend. Ideally, if Arsenal are going to get this over the line, you want it done this week, so he has a few games to bed in during pre-season. He’ll still be on holiday following the World Cup, but these players these days spend most of their holiday staying fit and training anyway, so I suspect getting him up to speed won’t take that long.

In the meantime, we can watch all the videos of Tzolis and what he will bring, whilst also trying to work out whether we should all part with our hard-earned cash to buy that new away shirt. I can’t work out just yet whether I like it or not. I’m not really that fussed about the new home shirt, but the bruised banana always taps in to the nostalgia gene, so I can’t say I won’t be swinging by the local sports store to pick one up at some stage in the near future.

Right, that’s me done for today, I think. I’m nursing a bit of a hangover so I need to go and find some paracetamol. Back tomorrow with more rambling. see you then.

We all already knew, in reality, because we’ve been hearing the stories from the French press. But as an Arsenal fan, you still await to hear about it via the official site, which is as expected in its vagueness. I get it though; they’re hardly going to say “we have no real idea of an exact timeline, but we’re saying around three months”, because if it’s more than that then the club will just get a pasting for misleading people.

The frustrating thing above everything else is that back injuries are notoriously difficult to predict. We all remember how his injury derailed any hope we had of winning the league in 2022/23. That injury sustained at home to Sporting Lisbon had him out from 16th March 2023 until 20th June – a solid 97 days – and had him missing 15 games in total. Now, I guess the good news out of this is that surgery is not needed, because if it was, I would be guessing that we wouldn’t be seeing him until February next year. Heck, it could potentially derail his whole season, so we have to look at some small measures of positivity here. But it is still a massive blow. He’s one of the world’s best defenders, and there is no way to replace him. But, much like with Kai last season, the club has to find a way to augment the squad so we can mitigate that loss somehow. Last season the club moved quickly to switch their thoughts towards Eze and getting the job done, when it was clear Kai would be out for an extended period too, so if we can do the same again here that would be useful. If Saliba’s back injury is similar to 2022/23, circa 100 days puts us at 31st October from today. So we’ll be needing somebody for the first nine games of the season the Premier League, plus League Cup and Champions League games.

I’m still a fan of giving Mosquera a go. And, as I said on Tuesday, if Timber and White are fully fit then I still believe we have the numbers. I also think that for some games last season – admittedly only one or two – Norgaard was an able third-choice centre half. So we have numbers. But many Arsenal fans will ask about quality. Personally, I can’t be having a 28-year-old Ezri Konsa for circa £40million. That sort of money needs to be reserved for the big purchase if you ask me. But what I could get behind is a deal for free-transfer John Stones. James from Gunnerblog reported that Arsenal would be looking at somebody like that, and the Standard has backed that up with words Arteta has talked previously about the centre-back here. If Stones can be persuaded – and I say that only because he’ll know that he isn’t first choice here – to join us, I think it would make perfect sense.

For Stones, he joins the Champions, reunited with somebody he knows well, playing right at the top level having left Man City.

For The Arsenal, they get a Premier League-ready centre-half, good ball distribution, a very accomplished player with plenty of experience of winning things, who can provide decent cover.

The questions that stop this from being a ‘no-brainer’, however, are:

• Will Stones get more game time at somewhere like Chelsea, with whom he is also linked?
• What does that mean for Mosquera’s pathway?
• What sort of shape is his body in at 32, given that last season he missed 24 games through injury, the season before it was 34, and the season before that it was 14 again.

That final bullet is the big one for me. It’s all fine and dandy if Stones starts the season and is fit for the first 15 or so matches, because that takes us into around October/November and hopefully a returning Saliba, but if he plays two or three games at the start and breaks down, we’re lumbered with another player on the treatment table and the same situation we are in now.

It’s a tricky one for The Arsenal, but I’d still be tempted to do it. If it’s low wages, he plays backup to Mosquera or he’s used in the ‘smaller’ games, then I’m kind of ok with it.

The other news was the leaked image of Christos Tzolis from HandOfArsenal, so I expect we’ll get something either today or tomorrow, because he appears to have done his medical and pictures, so we just need the announcement now. Will be interesting to see what he says about joining the actual biggest club in London.

There’s some stuff from yesterday about Newcastle being ‘frustrated‘ with the Guimaraes situation, which I understand if Arsenal still haven’t opened talks, to be honest. Last summer we loved a bit of Berta plate-spinning, but we’re at the stage now where he has to pick a plate and grab it. It cheeses all parties off by the sounds of it, not just the Arsenal fans. If the deal’s there to be done at £75million, just do it I say. Then let’s focus on that wide-left forward position to complete our summer stuff (after the centre-half replacement.

Right, I’m going to leave it there for today, as I have a busy one in the City. I may or may not blog tomorrow, depending on how sore my head is – if you know what I mean…

So catch you either tomorrow or Saturday. Have a grand one, peeps.

Mate, pull the other one, it’s got bells on. The club you just joined finished 10th, you act more like a trading platform than a football club, and this “we’re bigger than you” nonsense is exactly what you  do when you know it isn’t actually true. You crack on. Everyone knows it isn’t true.

What I will say, is that Arsenal need to ‘crack on’, because even I’m starting to get a bit ‘hmm…’ with our lack of movement. I’m in a few WhatsApp GCs and it does feel like a few groups are starting to get restless. I get it, we’re champions, and we don’t want to just over-pay for players. Arsenal tend to do things ‘the right way’ when it comes to how our club is run; we don’t set up dodgy deals between other sides in financial trouble so we can cook the books. So we have to do it the right way, and that means we cut our cloth accordingly, but it does feel as though the cloth we’re cutting is a little dated. Sure, we’ve got Tzolis to be announced, which will be great, but there needs to be more, because everyone is starting to make their moves.

Or are they?

Let’s have a look at which teams are stronger or weaker at this point – Wednesday 22nd July 2026 – in the transfer Window. I’ll go from top to bottom, based on the Premier League. The biggest club in London will be towards the bottom of this list, for that reason, plus I won’t include every club, as it’ll take me ages.

Arsenal

Trossard out. Let’s say Tzolis is in, because it could get announced any day now. Meslier in. I would call that at best ‘on par’, assume Meslier isn’t replacing Kepa. So we haven’t really shifted the needle there.

Man City

Elliot Anderson in for a crazy fee. Mathys Detourbet (yeha, me either)  in from Troyes. Jeremy Monga in from Leicester. Out has gone John Stones, Nathan Ake and Bernardo Silva. I’d say City are actually weaker at this point.

Man United

Tielemens, Andrey Santos and Karl Darlow. Out has gone Casemiro (who I believe had a decent finish to the season), Rasmus Hjoland and Jadon Sancho. I would say they’ve bumped their midfield up for sure, so you have to say they look a little stronger. But not a ton in my opinion. Plus they won’t be playing one game a week this season I doubt.

Aston Villa

The other club gaming the system, have lost Rogers, Tielemens, but have gained an impressive-looking Manzambi, Joao Gomes from Wolves, as well as Modou Kéba Cissé, who is clearly one for the future. We know we have Saliba out for the start of the season, but they’re missing Amadou Onana after an ACL, so I wouldn’t say they are stronger. Gomes replaces him, does Manzambi replace Tielemens? That’s a tough one. There’s noise about Villa getting Garnacho (of course there is), or even Nicholas Jackson. I don’t think that makes them stronger.

Liverpool

Jeremy Jacquet joins to replace Konate, so there’s a question mark there. Victor Munoz joins from Osasuna as a left winger, but the fee suggests that’s a bit like Tzolis from Genk for us. They’ve lost Konate, Salah and Robertson, so I’d say they’re hardly massively improved.

You then have to go all the way down to 10th to find Chelsea, then 17th to find the Scum. So let’s give them a little sentence or two. Chelsea have signed Rogers (see what self-confessed Chelsea fan Paul Merson feels about that here), Palestri to replace Cucurella, a right winger Geovany Quenda from Sporting for €50million, then a young Brazilian from Corinthians for €10million. They’ve lost Santos to United and Cucurella to Real Madrid. I’m not really sure if, having spent nearly £170 million this summer, they’re even better than the 10th-place finish last season. Xabi Alonso might be a good factor; not being in Europe might help, but to have them as Arsenal’s ‘main’ rivals is, well… a bit weird if you ask me.

Then there’s the Tiny Totts, who have spunked £200million and I would say certainly have improved their team, but then again they nearly got relegated, so that was going to be hard not to.

So having looked at those other six clubs and where we are, whilst we’re all not happy about the lack of movement, I personally am not completely losing my sh*t. However, I think by the end of next week, when we’re knocking on the door of August, if we’re talking about only seeing Tzolis in pre-season training so far, I think it’s fair for some serious questions to be asked. Our kick-off to the season is not an easy one, we will be without key players who went deep into the World Cup, so the club needs to arm Arteta with the tools needed to succeed.

Right, I’ll leave it there, because I need to get out for a run before the day starts to hot up too much and I melt. See you all tomorrow. Be good.

For starters, most of the Arsenal boys got on to the pitch, with Rice, Saka, and Eze all starting. And lo and behold, each of them had an impact on the match; Rice bagging a good goal for the first, Eze providing an assist to Saka, who also netted a hat-trick and promptly declared afterwards that he was fit and wish he’d have played more.

Great stuff. Now go spend two weeks on a beach somewhere, mate. Get those Achilles rested and ease yourself back into pre-season with The Arsenal. Same goes with Rice, Eze and Madueke. You’re all going to be needed.

Saka’s performance won’t help Tuchel’s cause, though, I don’t expect. He decided to drop Saka for Rogers, and let’s be honest, aside from a good ball in for the Gordon goal, he was hardly sparkling against Argentina. I guess the counterpoint to that was that nobody was, but this was still a good example of showing why you put Saka in your team. He is a game changer. Hopefully, he can continue to be for us next season, too. He even said that Arsenal fans have nothing to worry about. Super duper stuff.

What’s not super duper, however, was the Ornbomb we got, in which David declared that once again, Chelsea have gazumped Arsenal for a player, and Morgan Rogers would be a Chelsea man next week. Chelsea fans will be delighted. Villa will be delighted. There are some Arsenal fans on social media who are a bit miffed at this.

I am not one of them.

I have said it a couple of times over the last week, but the price matters, especially when you are operating in these PSR times. Chelsea are gamers of the system. They will pay £117million – probably about £30million more than what he’s worth – just to get this guy in. Their fans will laugh at how they’ve poached him from us, but the reality is, they have to make some kind of statement after a season in which they finished 10th, have no European football, and still have a squad that is so packed to the rafters with other players they over-paid for, that they’ll have to offload this summer, I’d expect. I call them gamers to the system, because I have no doubt that they’ll have paid Villa this fee because Villa need it for PSR and accounting ‘creativity’, whilst Chelsea will probably need the same in reverse, so Villa will probably ‘pay’ them £50million for Nicholas Jackson. We’ve seen Newcastle and Villa do things like that, and Chelsea and Villa are also in the same boat.

For Arsenal, I’m pleased they stood firm, because frankly I was a little confused as to where he was going to play. If it was as a wide-forward, then I’m looking at this and saying that perhaps this will allow Arsenal to focus on somebody like a Barcola? He’s spent more time playing wide-left, so why not have a proper go for him now?

I do think that Berta might be under a bit of pressure now, because whilst the fans are a bit restless, I suspect the manager will be too. Arteta said after the Champions League final that we have to be ambitious and we have to be fast, and here we are on 19th July and our main target (or so it seemed) is heading elsewhere. That won’t be a good look for Andrea, so I suspect he and Arteta will be having some choice words about what happens next.

Chelsea did this to us before with Mudryk, so we pivoted for Trossard and that worked out very well indeed. We have to hope at this stage, that the club have an alternative target in mind and are going to pull the trigger sooner rather than later. Could that be a Barcola? Maybe. Could that be a left-of-field option like a Nusa, Lookman, or Nico Williams? We know Arteta loves the latter, so I don’t see why we couldn’t have a punt at one of these names.

I do wonder if Arsenal will want to make a ‘statement’ this summer, but the challenge they have, a bit like the striker market last summer, is that there just doesn’t seem to be the profile of elite wingers who have been burning it up in mainland Europe this summer. And what of the Premier League? I’d certainly be having a look at Kroupi, and if Mitoma was a bit younger, I’d have a go for him, but his age and some injury problems in the last couple of seasons preclude us from going for him, surely.

The challenge Arsenal are going to have, if they don’t strike soon, however, is that targets are going to start moving elsewhere. There was talk about the Scum making moves for Kroupi, Liverpool are also interested in Barcola, whilst Barca have already moved for Arteta’s other favoured player Anthony Gordon. If we hold on to our playing cards too long, there might not be too many great options left.

This is where Berta earns his coing now – and we need to see Arsenal starting to flash theirs at clubs with players we want.

Back tomorrow with more news, as we contemplate where to go next with all of the players having done the World Cup and the transfer merry-go-round gets into full force. See you then.

Sure, he faltered in Norwich, but given that he was 19 when he moved to Norwich, you can hardly blame him for not quite hitting the mark. It happens. What I do have faith in, however, is that Arsenal and Arteta have done a fair bit of work to make sure that he’s going to be given the best chance to succeed. Sure, there have been a few that haven’t worked out, like Fabio Vieira, but even he had some moments. Hopefully, Christos can hit the ground running, and we start to see some positive sparks in pre-season.

I think for him, too, having that pre-season with the team by virtue of the fact that he’s in through the door ‘relatively’ early, is a big plus point. He can get himself settled in, have a full Arsenal pre-season, then try to hit the ground running from day one of the proper kick-off to the season. I read somewhere that he’d already started his pre-season with Genk, so the fact that he’s maybe already into some form of training now can only stand him in good stead.

And if you believe what Fabrizio Romano says about Morgan Rogers, then Arsenal are going to chivvy that move along now too, with noises that Villa are lining up replacements for the England international as well. I guess that’s what needs to happen if this particular domino needs to fall, but I hope that if Villa do get their replacements in, that we can see Arsenal suddenly have a bit more of a position of strength in the bidding process. £130million – which is what I saw quoted as what Villa want a month or so ago – is ludicrous. If they’ve already made their signings and replacements, then Arsenal don’t have to pay that amount. They got a relatively modest fee for Tielemens, which won’t massively help their attempts at whatever they call PSR these days, if this article is to be believed, as well as this article too. Villa have apparently had an offer accepted (or will be) for £38million for Joao Gomes. They’re about to sign Manzanbi for £50million+, so if they do that and then they want to try and hardball Arsenal, they could just walk away and leave Villa with a conundrum to solve.

That won’t happen, I don’t think, but if we’re talking about a deal around the £100million mark, then Arsenal will probably do it. The transfers have gone crazy this summer, so it wouldn’t surprise me at all, and when Mikel Arteta is hot on a player, we know he usually gets him.

The questions will still remain where the hell he’ll play. He’s not a left winger. He played against Argentina as a right winger, but I haven’t seen that too often from him to suggest that wide forward is where he can take it to the next level. There’s no doubt he’s a quality addition to the squad, but I’m still doing a little bit of mental gymnastics on how this is going to work.

It feels to me like his arrival all but secures an exit from a central player. That ain’t gonna be the captain, I doubt it’ll be Eze after just one season, and Mikel Merino has shown this World Cup how he can be valued as a rotation option. All eyes are on Ethan then, unfortunately, and I suspect that when Rogers arrives, we all might have to face some hard facts about a player with whom we all had so many hopes would break into the first team.

I don’t know about you guys, but it does feel to me as though the wheels are now turning with regard to transfers. It was always going to be that case with the World Cup getting in the way, but all of a sudden the transfer window is springing to life and, with pre-season and friendlies still a few weeks’ away, that’s positive to hear. There was plenty of hand-wringing going on a week ago over our lack of signings, but personally, I always felt that we’d see movement once we get to this part of the summer. That’s how it’s played out and as long as we start rolling along in the next week or two, I suspect most Gooners will calm down a bit.

Right, that’s me done for the day – I’ve got a bunch of household chores and a weekend of golf to think about with the family, so better get myself prepped – I’ll be swinging like a rusty door when I pick those clubs up later.

Catch you all tomorrow.

The Egyptians went nuclear afterwards, with their boss hinting at corruption by saying that the game was stacked for Argentina to win, and with a couple of those decisions, I do think they have a bit of a point. But I doubt it’s a conspiracy. The problem is, after the stuff with Balogun, Trump and the USMNT, you’re going to get that with this competition now. There’s an easy direction in which you can point your fingers because of FIFA’s actions, so this game and the situations that unfolded were always going to draw some attention.

For Zico’s disallowed goal, I think you probably do have to give it as a foul. There’s a shirt pull, and if the Argentinian player doesn’t have that, he probably wins the ball back. It’s slightly soft, but it is foul. But this is where it gets murky, because there was at least that level of foul that happened by Mac Allister just before Argentina scored the winner. What should probably have happened is that the goal was disallowed and a penalty was given to Egypt in stoppage time. What a dramatic end of a dramatic game that would have been!

Sadly not, however, and we find ourselves with our quarter finals now decided. It’ll be France against Morocco, England versus Norway, Spain against Belgium, and Argentina against Switzerland, after they zeroed each other out in what I’m assuming was a bit of a snooze-fest.

If I’m picking a route from here, I’d probably say the bookies’ choice for a pathway would be France, England, Spain, and Argentina in the semi-final, then I’d probably go with France and Argentina getting to the final to duke it out. France still feel like outright winners to me.

Champions, if you will. Which reminds me to remind you that the Premier League Champions – The Arsenal – are about six week’s away from kicking off the defence of their title at home to Coventry. And what shiny new players do we have to ready ourselves for that defence?

None. Nada. Zip. Zilch, Zero.

We can argue the toss over HIncapie if we want, but he was with us last season, so it isn’t a new face. And it seems like the only new face on the horizon right now is Illian Meslier, who is joining us on a free, which will apparently enable Tommy Setford to go out on loan. This is a weird one, because Meslier has tasted first-team football, and Premier League first-team football at that, so why would he want to come in as a potential number three? It’s so far removed from actual playing time, that it really only makes sense to give a guy the third-choice ‘keeper role the gig because he wants to train with the first team and be given a Champions League seat on the bench, owing to that weird rule where you have to have two back-up ‘keepers in each matchday squad.

He never made it on to the pitch for last season, and for a lot of it he wasn’t even in the match-day squad, so Leeds didn’t think him good enough to be a number two, so why should The Arsenal?

I suspect we don’t. I suspect he’s the ‘in case of emergency’ offer if a club comes in on deadline day and activates Kepa’s £5million release clause. I’d expect that to be fair; Kepa did make a high-profile error in the League Cup final last season, but in the season before that, he did well for Bournemouth, so I’d expect him to be able to find a club interested in his services this summer. And at just £5million for a guy with his experience, for the right club, it’s going to be a no-brainer.

So I guess my question is whether Arsenal has a backup contingency in place, in case of the Kepa situation, seeing his clause triggered. I would hope that part of the agreement would have some kind of failsafe; imagine a club like Wolves, or Ipswich, deciding on deadline day that they wanted to trigger the clause, leaving Arsenal without a recognised and experienced number two? We can’t have that happen. We simply shouldn’t. So I hope those failsafes are in place. I personally would be fine seeing Kepa as the backup next season. He’s going to get early rounds of the FA Cup if it’s against lesser opposition, a few League Cup games, maybe a Champions League dead rubber. I get it – if Raya gets injured, we have a challenge – but given how he’s generally been plenty fit for us so far, I don’t see that not continuing for next season.

All of this ‘keeper talk, and yet we still have less news about outfield players. There will be more and more heading home now that we’re in the quarter finals of the World Cup, and whilst some will take a little holiday now, my gut feeling is that we’ll start to get more and more movement now. We kind of need it. We’re playing Girona in three weeks, as the pre-season friendlies kick off. Let’s hope we have a shiny new outfield toy for then.

Catch you all tomorrow.

I’ve got no love for France, from an England perspective you probably want them out, but not to Paraguay. Football like that can’t be winning out.

In the other game we have ourselves our first hosts who are heading home and, with Morocco looking like they gave a proper schooling to Canada, you have to say they look like a good side. They’ll give France a proper match when the two teams meet next week.

The other final set of round of 16 games is tonight and, with a lot being made of the altitude stuff, I think we’re going to see Mexico progress against an England team who haven’t really impressed at all during this competition. There was one half against Croatia that looked alright, but that’s been about it. We talked about the World Cup and the altitude stuff yesterday morning on the Same Old Arsenal pod, amongst other things, and my assertion along with Amanda’s was that it will definitely have a material impact, coupled with England’s unimpressive form. Last night I had a dream that Stuart Pearce was sitting on a park bench round the corner from me, and I asked him if he thought the altitude would make a difference. He basically told me that England had ‘no chance’.

So there you go. Cheese dream Stuart Pearce has spoken, and so I’m debating whether it’s even worth watching the game to be honest with you.

In the Arsenal world, the big talking point is Leo Trossard potentially heading off to Turkey for £17million. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, for a guy who turns 32 in December and with one year left on his contract, that’s not a terrible fee. His profiling at the World Cup will inevitably help, because he’s been the Belgians best player, but that in itself has me pausing for reflection. He finished the season really strongly for Arsenal, he got the all important goal against West Ham, and the next day we were crowned champions as City drew with Bournemouth. Crossers has his place in history as a Premier League winner and he’ll have that forever in the history books.

His profile is going to be a tough one to replace too. Very good in small spaces, a guy who can turn a man on a sixpence, plus he’s come up with big goals against big rivals. He will definitely be missed for sure.

It’s a real conundrum because you can make the case either way.

This exit does at least confirm that the club are going hard for a replacement. I suspect it also probably means that Martinelli is the one to stay and duke it out. Given his age, his contract length, that probably makes sense to be fair, but his contribution in the Premier League was pitiful last season, so we 100% need to see more.

I wonder if – when this deal is confirmed (probably after the World Cup) – we’ll see clubs doubling down on their asking price for their players when Arsenal come knocking. It does feel as though we’re being given inflated numbers in this market, but when clubs also know we have a need, there’s suddenly an opportunity to try to get an extra couple of mil out of us because they know we have to pull the trigger on a wide player. Who that player is, beats me, because the only big link we’ve had is Morgan Rogers. He’s a good player, he has played on the left for Villa before, but to my mind that’s always been as an auxiliary option, rather than his best position. Maybe Andrea Berta has a left-of:field (pun intended) option that nobody has heard the details of yet?

I’d take that Kroupi lad, and not just because it appears Spurs are courting him, and it would be funny. No, I’d take him because he’s rapid, he’s good on the ball and he showed twice against us across two games, that he knows where the goal is. He even made a joke about winning us the league after his goal against City, so I suspect that he might have a soft spot for The Arsenal.

If Arsenal want to move, however, you do wonder if they’ll have to do it relatively quickly. There’s a few reports out there suggesting The Scum have already held some preliminary talks with the player and his representatives. Whether that’s true or not is kind of irrelevant; if Arsenal want a player, they showed last season with Eze that they can move quickly to get him. But I wonder if they’re looking at that fee and thinking they can get somebody like Barcola for similar, and given that Barcola has played at the highest level already, and is part of the current French World Cup squad, Arsenal might be waiting for the dominoes to fall with other players coming in to PSG first.

All a lot of “ifs” and “buts” though, and having drunk a shedload yesterday at a bbq, I don’t think I want my brain having to work through those kind of permutations on a Sunday morning. So I’ll put a pin in thinking about Arsenal speculation for today, and I’ll come back tomorrow with some more thoughts.

Catch you all then.

From an Arsenal perspective, the Women announced the signing of Georgia Stanway, which is a pretty big coup, and, given there have been a few high-profile exits this season already from the ladies’ team, this will be a boost to the squad.

On the men’s side, all is still quiet on the western front, although I think the natives (Arsenal fans) are starting to get restless on social media. It doesn’t help when you hear that the young lad from Leicester – Monga – is now going to Man City. By all accounts, he looks like a wonderkid, but Arsenal weren’t willing to go the £10million+ for him to sign, which I think is fair enough. Yes, he’s a very good talent (so I hear), yes, he plays in a position we are all looking at as needing a pathway and evolution, but the reality is that he’s 16 and there’s no way he’s impacting this Arsenal team for the immediate future.

And that’s what we have to be looking at now. We need to make proverbial hay while the sun is shining. We are the champions, we have a bunch of teams around us who all have uncertainty and new managers, and there is a lot of change and transformation happening. Chelsea is having to reshape their team under Alonso. Iraloa needs to work out how to turn Liverpool back into a title-challenging side. City doesn’t have Pep, Bernardo Silva, and there are questions over Rodri. Villa looks like they might need to sell before they buy. Bournemouth have a new manager and another bunch of players who have exited. Then, at the bottom, you have The Scum, who have picked up some decent signings that will probably help to lift them above mid-table. We are in a ‘now’ moment, and so we probably need players for ‘now’. It’s why the Guimaraes signing makes sense, although I suspect it is incredibly unlikely. With Tonali and Gordon both gone, their fans will have the pitchforks out if they let the Brazilian go, so I suspect that one will be dead in the water. But going back to the original point, Monga from Leicester isn’t going to be a player whom we need to bring in to strengthen. He’s for when this particular project reaches its natural conclusion.

I did see the Telegraph linking us to Ezri Konsa from Villa, but I think that feels like a Berta “casting the net wide” jobby to me. He’s just turned 28, he’s a right-sided centre back that can also play right back, and he’s got a deal that runs until 2028. Villa might be tempted to cash in on him, but given how much they’re asking for Rogers, they’d also probably want the earth and the moon for him, too. Plus, there’s the English premium to take into account. Add to that the fact that he’s not overtaking William Saliba for that position. We have Mosquera as the deputy to Saliba, who can also do that, and besides, isn’t that just who Ben White is for us? He’s converted to a right back who can play centre half, whereas Konsa is the other way around, so this one doesn’t really feel like a deal that has any real value in it from an Arsenal perspective.

And yet…we know Arteta loves a defensive signing…so I guess we can’t really rule it out.

Other than that, there’s not a lot really going on, unless you count Marcel Desailly’s words about Saliba moving to Real Madrid. To be fair, he did say that it would happen ‘one day’, but with the way Madrid are right now, and having just got Mourinho on board, I couldn’t think of any club worse to join. When you also factor in the point Desailly made about Gabriel only being the player he is because of Saliba, I guess I probably shouldn’t have even brought this conversation up! But, when it’s all quiet, we’ve got to talk about something together, right?

Ok, that’ll do for me for today. We’re gonna do a bit of a ‘check in’ pod tomorrow morning on the Same Old Arsenal pod at 9.30 am UK time, so if you fancy coming along and saying ‘hello’ – pop in here.

Firstly – and quickly, as I didn’t watch the US game last night – you’ve got to feel for Flo Balogun this morning. The man has been building up to this as his World Cup ever since he declared for the USMNT back when he was an Arsenal player, so to have it (probably) cut short is a bit of a kick in the balls. It’s a difficult one, that one, because in real time it doesn’t look like anything. Then it looks clumsy on the replays, but you can’t be raking your studs down an opponent’s legs and not expect there to be any repercussions. The US went through and now plays a Belgium team, who I wonder if they’ve used all their ‘get-out-of-jail-free’ cards in one go based on last night’s game. They were, frankly, a bit crap. But Senegal’s keeper had a mare for the second goal they conceded, and within five minutes the Belgian’s had been gifted an extra 30 minutes of this competition. Even then, they got a contentious pen to see them through. I have no skin in the game for either side, but it feels like karma and justice didn’t quite go the way you’d want with that Tielemans late penalty.

As for England, well, that wasn’t too impressive at all, I have to say. The Management asked me if England stood a chance of winning the whole thing, before a ball had been kicked last night, and my response was “probably not – France look too good”. My response has changed a little this morning; it’s not that France, Spain, or Brazil look so good that they will thwart England, it is that England looks so crap that they might thwart themselves. At first, for that first goal of the game for Congo, I thought that Spence was at fault. I’ve softened that stance a little bit, but the fact that Spence is playing right back at the World Cup is kind of bonkers. He’s just been part of a terrible Tottenham defence that nearly got relegated last season. He’s good going forward, but can’t defend for his life, and was part of an England back line that was all over the place.

The fact that Harry Kane bailed them out leaves a very bad taste in my mouth, but as I said to my brother after he’d hammered in the winning goal, maybe it is time for me to admit that he actually is a bit good. I’ve spent a very long time convincing myself that, for England at least, he is a master stat-padder with all the penalties he gets, but both of his goals last night were those of an elite marksman, so fair play there.

As for the Arsenal boys on display:

1. Rice – Thought he was decent enough when playing in midfield. Against an opponent like that, though, I would have liked to have seen either him OR Elliot Anderson, not really both on the pitch. Congo surprised a lot of people by not just sitting in a low block and showing no adventure. They were impressive going forward and could/should have buried the game with Wissa’s shot off the post. That’s a real sliding doors moment that I suspect he’ll be having a few nightmares about for some time to come yet. When Rice moved to right back, he actually looked good. Having Saka in front of him and Eze playing in the right eight position probably helped that, because the Arsenal connection was enabling those players to build on the relationship they already have, but whilst the press are now speculating whether that is the answer, I doubt Tuchel will see it as a viable long-term solution. It didn’t really get the best out of Rice on the couple of occasions he played there previously, so I’m not sure it should be considered now.
2. Madueke – A very Noni game, that one. In patches looked good; in patches, he just ran down blind alleys. He’s one of these guys that you think, “If he can just do x, he’ll be an elite superstar,” but, as I think Arsenal fans found out last season, I wonder if this is just him. His inconsistency drove Chelsea fans nuts; it had a little impact for us last season, and I suspect England fans who don’t watch enough of Arsenal will probably be feeling it too.
3. Saka – On for Noni, and you can just tell that a not-fully-fit Bukayo Saka is still better than Madueke, even if it is just 30 minutes that he can do. He just does the simple things so well, or he at least makes complicated things look simple, and although he won’t be credited with the assist for the first goal, it was his involvement to dig the ball out to Gordon that made a key impact yesterday. His jobsharing situation with Noni probably works well for both England and Arsenal, but it is a shame that Saka can’t play the full 90. I think we’d have seen a lot more joy on that right-hand side if he did.
4. Eze – Not a ton of things you can say. He came on, got a few touches on the ball, but other than a nice little interchange with the Arsenal boys on that right-hand side for Kane’s first goal, I can’t remember too much. I’d probably have to re-watch the part where he came on. Which I have very little intention of doing!

And that’s about it, really. England go through, but I can’t see them making it past Mexico at the Azteca stadium, where they play at altitude, and Mexio have lost like two games in something crazy like 50 years. But there you go.

So, to wrap up, a little on the transfer stuff, as Tonali is on the verge of joining the Scum for £100million. Decent player, would have been good at The Arsenal, but I just cannot fathom that price tag. It;s an overpayment of around £30million. I’ve seen a few Arsenal fans getting antsy because they’ve spent over £200million already, and there’s rumours they’re after Kroupi too, but I don’t think any Arsenal fan should be looking over the garden fence at that lot. If you are, then just remind yourself that this Scum team finished a point above relegation last season. They have bought some decent players, but we are talking about the need to be elite to challenge for the Champions League spots, and I just don’t see that from what they’ve purchased. And if they go after Kroupi, I suspect Arsenal will go and have a chat to Bournemouth as well, so we’ll just have to see how that tree shakes out. It’s early days yet.

Right, I’ll be offski. Have a good Thursday and I’ll be back tomorrow with some more musings.

Yesterday, we got Matt Law telling us that Villa view Rogers at £130million, whereas the French outlets are also signalling that they want similar monies to the Elliot Anderson fee, as the tax for being an English club starts to kick in following City’s move.

It’s a funny one, because part of me thinks in conspiracy theory, and thinks that the reason City have gone this early and this high on Anderson, is because they want to over-inflate the market and make it difficult for other clubs. It is not outside the realms of possibility; they approach legal situations like the CAS stuff a few years back, as well as the 115 charges situation, by throwing as much lawyer money to jam up the system as possible, so why not try to hike up the transfer market?

It feels a little like the summer of the Neymar transfer to PSG in 2017. That was around £200million then, and the knock-on effect was that everyone benchmarked transfers against that fee. Barca used that money – albeit a year later – to sign the overrated Philippe Coutinho for a staggering £108million – a price he was never worth in a million years. But that is what we are seeing unfold right now in the early stages of this transfer window. PSG are briefing that they want mega money for a guy who is not a regular in their side, won’t sign a new deal, plus has question marks over his ability and physicality for the Premier League. There’s no doubt he’s a talent, but is he a sure-fire hit? That’s what Declan Rice was, which is why we paid £105million for him. I don’t think you can say the same about Barcola.

Equally, Villa briefing to the press that they want £130million for Rogers is an example of another player who is very talented, but never worth that kind of cash. I do find it amusing, though; clubs say “he’s not for sale” one week, then the next week they’re briefing a price. Hang on a minute…wasn’t he ‘not for sale’ a second ago? So you’re now saying there IS a price?

It’s all just postering, as we all know, and it’s always just clubs trying to save face. The reality is that if Rogers wants Arsenal, if Arsenal wants Rogers, then a deal can be made to happen, and at a fee that suits both parties. Villa have the control on paper, but we all know that players can make life difficult if they need to, so we’ll just have to see how that shakes out. Personally, I’m still not convinced, because I just don’t think his style and where he plays is right for us. We need a better left-winger option than what we have right now (despite Gabi Martinelli being the hero and scoring last night for Brazil in injury time).

That goal that Martinelli got might help inflate his price a bit, but whether or not we have a buyer remains to be seen. I’ve always thought that one day he might head over to Spain and to Real madrid – just a hunch I had – but ith Vinicius Junior and Mbappe playing on that left-hand side of the attacking positions, that clear isn’t going to happen. But that doesn’t mean that there might not be a fair bit of interest from other clubs. Maybe Atleti fancy it? Or one of the German or Italian clubs? Martinelli could be a very good player in a team that has more space to counter attack in to, so maybe a Premier League side like Newcastle, or dare I say it, Aston Villa? I bet he’d be brilliant at Everton, for example. The question would then come down to fee and wages.

Elsewhere in the World Cup yesterday, both of my surrogate teams (due to family connections), The Netherlands and Germany, went out on penalties last night. I don’t get it, as somebody who was born in England, I’m used to penalties being the exit stage. But to happen to my second team Germany? They LITERALLY never go out on penalties! Honestly, with this, plus these ad breaks turning football into quarterly games, I’m about getting done with this bloody competition

The Germans were crap too. misplaced passes, overhit crosses, Muisiala losing his mind in extra time. The only good thing about it was Kai getting on the scoresheet, then getting to go home and prep himself for the new season. The German team will get back to Germany probably today/tomorrow, then it’ll probably be a ‘get your heads down for a bit, lads’ for a few days, then he probably gets two weeks off. If you think that by mid-July, he’s probably ready to get back into the swing of pre-season training with The Arsenal, that timing works quite well. And although Jurrien won’t be happy that his country went out, and that his brother missed a pen, maybe at the back of his mind he’ll be thinking “well, I wouldn’t have been in the tournament that long anyway!”

That’s about it for today I think. Ivory Coast against Norway could be an interesting one to watch later this evening, whilst the winner of Ecuador and Mexico will have some interest for England fans, because if we beat DR Congo (I keep calling them ‘Doctor Congo’ in my head every time I see it, like some kind of evil Bond villain), then that’s who the England team will be up against next.

Back tomorrow with some more World Cup / transfer window musings.

This morning, I had a look, and it seems Brazil versus Japan is the first game on, which actually kicks off at a very reasonable 6pm. That’s being played in Houston, Texas, which means it’s five hours behind and a 1pm kick off, so I will definitely whack that on tonight as I’m prepping dinner. Feels like it could be a fun one. Big Gabi, future Arsenal star Bruno Guimaraes ( ) and maybe even a sprinkling of Gabriel Martinelli too, perhaps? Of course, we’d have to deal with Cunha, Alisson and Casemiro, but at least there’s no Richarlison at this competition. That frigging chicken dance is too much for one man to take.

Japan impressed a lot of people when they came to England and tidied up a bit after themselves, but their football is pretty good too. I suspect they’re probably going home tonight, but you never know. An upset could be on the cards.

Actually, how often are there ‘upsets’ these days, when it comes to the finals? I just had a look at the 2022 finals to see, and low and behold, the Japanese dumped out the Germans in the group stages of the last competition. Belgium were also yanked from the competition at the expense of Croatia and Morocco, whilst in the knockouts, Croatia did over Brazil and Morocco overcame Portugal. So I guess there are upsets to be had. I just assumed that in the World Cup, a bit like the Champions League, the bookies are usually spot on.

At the moment, the bookies are saying France, Argentina, Spain, England, Brazil and Germany (in that order) are expected to go the distance, and when you look at the French side, you can see why. Big Bill Saliba at the back, Mbappe, Olise and Dembele up top…sheesh, that’s a good side. I don’t like Haaland one bit – I think he’s an incredibly arrogant twat – but his candour when he said “they’re probably gonna win the whole thing” was appreciated. Most of the players at this tournament know that they’re probably not making it to the latter stages.

As for England, I’d be surprised if they get to a semi-final again. I just don’t see it. They should have enough for Congo, and to be fair, also Mexico, despite the home advantage they will have. I don’t see them getting beyond what will probably be Brazil in the quarter finals, though.

All of this World Cup waffle, and I’m nearly 500-words in without a drop of Arsenal goodness. That’s probably because I’ve not seen much going on, to be honest with you. The Bruno G stuff has a slight angle to it, which is that his agent has been using Arsenal’s interest to secure a new £200k-per-week, which I think is fair enough. A few peeps are speculating that the Diomande stuff to PSG will set the chain-reaction for a Barcola exit, but I think it’s probably a little too soon to be going into the weeds of that one. Both players are still at the World Cup, although the Ivory Coast play Norway tomorrow, so if Odegaard et al progress, perhaps Diomande’s future gets sorted and he does head towards PSG. I remember Liverpool’s pursuit of Zubimendi, though, which ended up with him joining us a year later, so despite what’s being read right now, it does feel like that deal could have a few swings to it.

If it does swing that way, I expect Barcola to probably have a look at his situation, but what’s interesting is that Diomande spent most of his time last season as a right-winger fro Leipzig. He played 25 times on the right and 10 on the left. PSG have Doue on the right, who played 24 times on the right last season – so would those two be sharing positions? Both players can play on both sides, but you tend to find players have a side that they are preferred in, or that they perform better in. Just look at Martinelli. He’s better on the left, but he has had some games for us on the right wing. If a side wanted to buy Martinelli, but they already had the left-hand side sewn up, so they wanted him on the right, do you think that would be a good move for the player and the buying club? I don’t. So I wonder if the same needs to be said about the Diomande/Barcola potential exit. Just because Diomande could arrive, I don’t think it necessarily drives an exit for the Frenchman.

If it does mean Brcola wants to move on, the good news about Arsenal is that we have shown that we are willing to move if the player is right. Just look at the Eze situation; that shifted almost overnight from him joining the Scum to joining us, as a result of the Havertz injury. Five uears ago I’d have been concerned that if somebody like Barcola came on the market, a club like Liverpool could steal a march by just acting quickly. Now, I’d back our boys at Highbury House and London Colney to act if they needed to act. So let’s see how this one shakes out.

Right – that’ll do me for today. I’ll be back tomorrow with some more musings – be interesting to see if any Japanese players stand out tonight.

Catch you all tomorrow.

Tuchel said that as the opponents get better,  so will England, which I suspect will happen. But I still doubt they’ll be better than a Spain, Argentine, Brazil or France.

The next game they’ll have will be the Democratic Republic of Congo, for which England will of course be favourites, but I suspect what we’re also going to see is a game akin to the Ghana and Panama matches; England will dominate territory, possession, attempts and field tilt, but Congo will get one or two chances and if they take those it could be an uncomfortable evening for the Three Lions.

My family background also enables me to claim a stake in Germany and, loosely, the Netherlands. For the Germans it’s Paraguay in the next round, which I suspect they’ll overcome quite quickly, before probably playing France in the Round of 16. The Netherlands have a tricky time of it next, with a game against Morocco, but if they overcome them, I think they’ll get through one of Canada or South Africa quite easily.

As for the Arsenal news, I didn’t get the chance to pen any thoughts yesterday as we were busy for most of the day, but the big talking point is Bruno Guimaraes, as I’m sure you already know and have been thinking about like I have. At 28, going on 29, he’s at the upper end fo the age bracket, and I keep flip-flopping on how I feel about this. I think ultimately I’ve landed on this being a good deal, but probably based on the fee. You can’t be paying north of £80 million for a guy of his age. He’s a very good footballer, very talented, but that represents a hefty ol’ outlay for a player who will soon be knocking on the door of 30.

There is another way of looking at it though, and that’s when you think about the lifespan of this current ‘Project’. Arteta has been manager for six-and-a-half years now. He’s done a great stint, I hope we get a few more years and a few more trophies, but if he has the longevity of Pep at City, that’s ten hyears, which means he only has another three or four seasons before he probably starts to think about doing something else. If we have one more trophies in three years time with Arteta at the helm, I think it is almost inevitable. But he’ll have a bunch of his players who have grown up with him, all getting to the age in which renewal will be needed. Rice will be 30 in three years, Odegaard too. Saka will be 27, if we kept Martinelli he’d be 28, Big Gabi will be 31 and Saliba will be 28 as well. So for me that ‘feels’ like the duration of ‘The Process’ will reach it’s natural conclusion.

So, that being the case, Arteta and Berta might be thinking “do you know what? This guy is good for three seasons, so let’s have him”. It feels like it would very much be a signing to ‘top off’ this current project, rather than build for the next five to ten years. It would certainly make our midfield more imperious, and if you think that Rice has just spent some time for England with a big strapping on his calf, this Bruno potential signing is perhaps an acknowledgement from the manager and the club that we can’t keep flogging Dec with 4,000+ minutes each season. Sooner or later, he’s gonna break.

Do I think if you’re looking at this potential deal through the lens of ‘great player who adds to the ‘win now’ attempt at getting another Premier League or two, in addition to perhaps getting us over the line in the Champions League, you’re probably taking that.

A lot of this is conjecture though, because it is Newcastle we’re dealing with here, who will want to play hard ball despite note being able to offer Champions League – or any kind of European football, actually – to their players. But I doubt they’ll allow their team to be purged, and with Tonali probably off to The Scum, I don’t see the Mags letting us have their captain as well. They’ve lost Gordon too, so there’s no way they offload both of those midfielders.

But it’s a good start in terms of the vibes of the players we are after. Of course, we need to start seeing things go a little more concrete, but we can’t complain too much with the calibre of player we are after.

Right, that’ll do for today I think, as I’ve got a fair bit of gardening to be getting on with. have yourself a lovely Sunday, and I’ll catch you tomorrow – might be later in the day as I have a few more bits and bobs to be getting on with.

Ciao folks.

Why am I telling you this? Well, obviously, because that’s what’s happened today, but it’s also a question I’ve played with in my head. That question is:

If you could only guarantee one signing this summer for The Arsenal, what would it be?

It’s the sort of ‘in the pub’ question that is always an interesting one to start a debate, and whilst I can’t exactly start said debate through this one-way medium, I hope that if you are reading this today, or any day, that you pop your thoughts in the comments. It’ll be interesting to know what you’re thinking.

First, some ground rules, though, like any good ‘in the pub’ chat. You have to pick a realistic player. Somebody that Arsenal might actually sign. We’re not getting in a DeLorean and signing peak Messi. We’re not going to pay Mbappe’s wages and fee (and, frankly, I don’t think Arteta would want him if I’m honest). We can debate over how much a player will cost, but it’s your choice as to who you’d like in that one position, as it is my choice to dump down my thoughts onto this page here today.

But, as I am my mother’s son (she was an A-Level maths teacher), I will endeavour to at least walk you through my thinking as best I can, exploring all my options, before finally settling on my one choice. I did this for The Same Old Arsenal podcast the season before last, in which I got my mates on the show to talk about one player they’d want to sign, one to sell, and one that they thought would ‘bang’ in the upcoming season. This is a bit of a shorter version of that summer series.

So, firstly, the position. Where do we need to strengthen the most? There’s no doubt that if Ben White disappears, we’ll need another right back. Mosquera is a good option, but it feels like a third-choice option, much like Myles is at left-back, now that he’s found his home in central midfield. Mosquera is number two at right centre-back, number three at right-back, and I think that means plenty of game time for him. And, if the noises of Kepa having a £ 5 million release clause are true, somebody might punt for him, and we might find ourselves needing a new ‘keeper. But these don’t feel like the most pressing problems. Remember the summer in which we only signed Cech? That’s kind of what I am thinking about, and if that’s the parameters of this game, I can’t be going for a backup right-back, even if the news about Jurrien Timber being sent home from the Dutch National team are true – we just need to get Ben fit and ready for the start of the season at this rate.

***As a quick aside from our ‘pub chat’, that is a bit of a concern, because if they don’t think he can play a part until the latter stages, which would be mid-July, Arsenal must be more than a little worried about his participation for the start of next season***

I think the emergence of MLS as a central midfield option secures that part of the pitch. I also think that Merino being back adds versatility across multiple positions, including in attack, so whilst my first instinct was that I think we need somebody to replace Gabriel Jesus and shift Gyokeres one notch down on the pecking list of strikers (I still think he gets plenty of game time, by the way), I can’t stop looking at that left-wing position and thinking that’s where we need to have our number one priority.

Which is why I’m still more than a little confused about the Morgan Rogers and Morgan Gibbs-White rumours that have emerged. Two fine players, Rogers particularly bagged plenty of goals for Villa last season, but neither of those players has spent any significant time in at left wing. We’ve seen that Arteta is unwilling to shift Eze there last season, and given he’s only one year into his Arsenal career, I doubt he’ll be jettisoned after a pretty decent season last time out. The only other option if you’re signing somebody like Rogers or Gibbs-White – who has not played left-wing at all last season – is if there’s going to be a big sale like Odegaard being moved on. I just don’t see that. He leads our press, he’s the captain, and whilst I know Arteta is a ruthless man in the pursuit of success, I just don’t see this being a thing this season. It feels more likely that Arteta would phase Odegaard out over time, rather than completely cold-shoulder him.

So for me, personally, I hope these are red-herring news reports, as Arsenal look to pull off some kind of mega deal on the left wing. But what are the options? Well, according to TransferMarkt, we’re looking at:

• Khvicha Kvaratskhelia
• Vinicius Junior
• Yan Diomande
• Kenan Yıldız
• Matheus Cunha

That’s the top five, for which I think, if we’re all honest now, we’re unlikely to get at least three of those. I don’t see a world in which PSG part with Mr Unpronounceable-to-an-Englishman, Vini Junior isn’t moving from Real unless pushed, whilst Cunha is at United and even they will fight to keep him. This fella Diomande looks good though. Rapid, good with the ball at his feet, 13 goals and 10 assists and a ‘Rookie of the Year’ award in the Bundesliga. My initial thoughts on somebody like that are that the Bundesliga doesn’t really fully translate to the Premier League, but at 19, he’s going to get better, and given we haven’t had an Ivorian for a few years, I’m starting to like that as an option. He looks – by his numbers, like he’s a dribbler and somebody who can beat a man, and it does feel as though we need somebody like that on that left-hand side. Martinelli seems to have lost that verve when it comes to creating a bit of chaos, so perhaps it’s time that we did look to somebody new, fresh, with a new approach and ideas.

The challenge we might have is that it sounds like Liverpool have been close to this for a while, so I suspect they’ve already done enough groundwork. It doesn’t mean we can’t ‘swoop in’, but Liverpool aren’t Tottenham, so it might be a little too late.

I’m somebody who always leans towards that younger talent that you can then mould and, if it doesn’t work out, sell on – which is also why I’m not as hot on the two Morgan’s. They don’t play in the position we need the most, they are a little on the older side, and it does feel like we might need somebody to stake a claim in that left-wing spot as their primary position. I do think one of Martinelli or Trossard might go this summer, so if you’re asking me to pick my choice, it’d be this fella at Leipzig.

But what’s your call? Who are you thinking might be ‘the one’ that you want this summer? Let me know in the comments.

I was going to start looking ahead to the United game on Sunday, but given Ethan Nwaneri has essentially signed for Marseille on loan for the rest of this season, I figured we need to say something about that.

It appears Big Bill Saliba has had his say before departing to the South of France, calling them one of the ‘best clubs in the world’ and certainly, he’ll get a vociferous home support that will no doubt back him. Big Bill had a very impressive loan spell there a few years back, so much so that I think Marseille were quite open about the fact they would love to sign him, but Arsenal were steadfast in their view that he must return to the club. Didn’t that turn out to be a shrewd decision, eh?

Another key part of this puzzle is Roberto Di Zerbi and Nwaneri soecifically mentioned him too, for good reason, I suspect. We saw how Di Zerbi could adapt his tactics, would play on the front-foot, as well as improving a number of the Brighton players in his time, so he will have probably sought the council of somebody like Leo Trossard before making the move too, I suspect.

For Arsenal and Nwaneri, it also represents a bit of a U-turn. The noises coming out of the credible sources online were that he wanted to stay and learn what it is like to be part of a title challenge. That suggested that whilst we were all worried about his lack of minutes, the club and the player were probably a little more realistic; he’s 18 years old, he’s had a breakthrough season last season, sure, but that was built on a heavy injury crisis, as well as less depth than Arsenal have today. He is a guy whom I think Arsenal have massive hopes for, so I suspect that the conversation about the remainder of this season was open, positive, and focused on his development. The hope he – and we – all have is that Arsenal will be competing for the top honours for many years to come, so there will hopefully be other title run-ins that he will be part of. But at his formative age, he needed minutes, which was clear when they had the conversation at the training ground, probably ended with a collective acknowledgement that he just wasn’t going to get them this season. He’s missed a few of the match-day squads of late, which shows the level of competition that there is this season, as we fight on multiple fronts.

The benefit of keeping him was because of the fear of the injury crisis going nuclear this season; we’ve already had a ton of injuries, but they have all been in the same position, which hasn’t tended to be where Arsenal want him to play. Had we lost Saka, Madueke, Martinelli and Trossard all at once this season, I suspect he might have played in the wide positions, even though Arsenal supposedly don’t want to see that. But he can do that job, and I wonder if he’ll be asked to once or twice by Di Zerbi? Part of me hopes so, because it will mean that Arsenal might just reconsider their viewpoint that he isn’t quite suited to the flanks, with next season in mind.

According to Romano, there are clauses in there which mean the fee for the loan changes depending on game time. That makes sense; both the player and the club need him to play. We can’t have a West Brom/Pulis/Gnabry situation on our hands. So if the club have set a structure, something like the below, it makes sense for all parties to get him minutes:

• Plays less than 10 games = £4million
• Plays less than 15 games = £3million
• Plays less than 20 games = £2million
• Plays 21 or over = £1million

Of course, it’ll probably be mapped out a little more precise than my ‘ignorant fan who doesn’t know the inner workings of football finances’ example above, but this loan is designed to get us a player back in the summer who has grown and improved and can come back next season ready to challenge, so having clauses that reward the game-time investment Marseille put in, absolutely work for us, him and them too, I suspect.

I think the different culture and style of football might also allow him to grow as a man, too. Maybe he’ll pick up some French, maybe he’ll find sides to his game he didn’t know he had, maybe he’ll even be able to iron out some of the kinks that have meant Arteta will be much more willing to use him than he has this season? Who knows? But in William Saliba, we have a case study that shows that this pathway has been trodden before and done so to great success in our Rolls-Royce centre-half we have. Let’s hope the same happens for Ethan.

I’ve seen some speculate that we might go into the market for somebody now, but frankly, I just don’t see that. The reason we let Ethan go is that he wasn’t making match day squads. Why bring somebody else in to have the same situation? Plus, if we’re talking about him as a future star, why put another barrier in the way by signing somebody?

The jittery amongst us might worry that another injury crisis is bound to come up around the corner, but these are human beings with careers, so we can’t just stockpile to the extent they are not even making match-day squads. And you can’t do it on the ‘off-chance’ of injury ravaging this team. At the start of the season we had injuries, but some of those were long term like Jesus and Havertz (who can also play in at eight – where Ethan was earmarked), but those guys are back now, so the pathway is even more crowded for the youngster.

So for me, this is a good move for all involved, and I hope he absolutely smashes it and comes back ready to fight for The Arsenal next season.

Back tomorrow as we start to stare down united on Sunday. See you then.

Let’s start with Hincapie, who last night I decided to watch a bunch of YouTube clips of as we were awaiting the announcement and I have to say, he looks a tidy player. I guess if you’re paying around £45million for him (eventually) he probably should be. But then again we did sign Skhodran Mustafi for £35million all of those years ago, so money clearly isn’t everything. There’s been some suggestions that there are similar characteristics between the two and I’ve seen a fair few clips in which he goes to ground and wins the ball, but the faith I have in Arsenal’s scouting team and Mikel Arteta is such that I don’t think they’d be dumping that amount of cash – next season as we’re at loan stage for now – on a player if they weren’t 110% sure of his mentality and his quality. And by all accounts, I’ve heard some analysts talk about how he’s aggressive, he’s one of the most impressive young defensive prospects in Europe and having played nearly 50 times for Ecuador at only 23, he’s clearly got a bit of South American pedigree about him.

How much game time he gets will be interesting. He’ll have had plenty of offers and if we are led to believe the Spurs interest was real, he certainly would have been going there with a view to playing. Chelsea were interested too and given Colwill is out for a long period of time, there would have been more minutes for him there too, but instead he’s another one of these players who has had his heart set on joining The Arsenal and that is a really interesting development for this summer I think. When news has been breaking about each of the players we’ve brought in this summer, it has always been that the player wanted Arsenal ‘and nobody else’. That’s the kind of dedication and drive that Arteta will love and I suspect he is thrilled with the squad composition that has been built. There has been a lot of money spent, there has been significant overall investment this summer, you have to say the Kroenke’s have backed him and Berta and now it is time for us to deliver.

Of course we’re not the only ones, as Liverpool confirmed Isak’s signature last night and what I enjoyed yesterday was seeing the hypocrisy of that club, with a former manager talking about how Liverpool can’t afford to spend that big and making them out to be plucky underdogs. Welp, they’ve spent over £415million this summer, more than any club this summer and you can talk about ‘net spend all you like in comparison with us, but I won’t be convinced there wasn’t some shenanigans going on with them. The money they got for Nunez from Saudi, as well as the cosy Leverkusen inflation of two sets of fees (Wirtz for Leverkusen, Quansah for Liverpool), plus the money they got for Harvey Elliott yesterday – all very suspect if you ask me. I wonder if the media will still treat Liverpool with the same demands they appear to be putting on us, eh? I highly doubt it. A final one on Isak – there’s no way that you could convince me that a £125million+£5million deal would be sensible for us. We needed to build out our squad and getting in an injury prone player on that kind of money and wage would be crazy for us in my opinion. He is already a guy who misses around six weeks a season on average, so at Arsenal you could at least double that and whilst he’s a very good player when on the pitch, that kind of money would worry me. Maybe he’ll have some ‘magic’ inhaler stuff at Liverpool that will keep him fit, but with that record and as he gets older, does his body suddenly realise that he can stay fit for a whole season? We’ll see.

As for us, we’ve had a great window in the end, I think. You’d like to have got a fee for Nelson, Zinchenko and Vieira, but the wages for all probably made it a little more complicated and we have to hope that each player does well and allows us to get a good fee when the 2026 summer window comes around.

The balance of the squad looks better too I think. We had some senior players who were just nowhere near the match day squad and whilst there will still be some players missing, there won’t be those who would spend the entire season nowhere near the starting XI or even the matchday squad. Up until the Zinchenko announcement by Arsenal and Forest, we had the very real prospect of a player playing Kieran Tierney no minutes whilst on a huge wage for the whole season. The rumours are that we have the wages paid for by Forest, as well as a small loan fee too, so whilst he won’t come back to The Arsenal again because his contract will have expired, the fact we’ve got the wages off the book and have at least some money for the player, has to be a good thing.

Arteta now knows what he’s got to work with and he has an international break to prepare for the visit of Forest, as well as opening up our Champions League account. With the value and quality of squad we have at the moment, most of the players will be heading off to be with their international teammates now, but at least we get the chance to take stock and assess where we are at and from my perspective, we’re in a good place. We have upgraded across a number of positions, we’ve got coverage for the inevitable injury crisis with significant depth and although we suffered defeat this last weekend, I saw enough in the way we set up and the bench options we had to make me excited for what’s to come. It now just needs to be translated to wins, goals and points.

Let’s hope we get those. Back tomorrow with more post-window thoughts.

Why dedicate the first 75-ish words to another team today? Well, we’re up next against them and if they are as defensively suspect as they have been for these first two games this season (and also the Community Shield), then there will be opportunities for us to exploit at Anfield next weekend.

As I said on the Same Old Arsenal podcast that we recorded yesterday morning, I’m not particularly confident of us going there and getting anything (no win since 2012), but based on the small sample size I’m looking at so far, it is not a Liverpool team that look like they’re going to sweep everyone aside and whilst we know they have goals in them, we also know that defensively they are not looking rock solid.

Of course that’s one of the areas of the pitch in which Mikel Arteta has prioritised for some years now and with the news that we’re supposedly in for this Hincapie fella from Ecuador, whose plying his trade for Bayer Leverkusen, it seems as though Arteta and Berta aren’t quite done with their spending spree. This one looks predicated on the outgoings of the likes of Kiwior and Zinchenko it seems, but given the money that is supposedly on offer, you do have to wonder where we’re getting the cash from. Supposedly Porto want to give us €20million for Jakub Kiwior.

I’m sorry, how much?

We paid £22million for him, he’s improved since arriving, he’s a Polish international and he still has a few years left on his contract. How are we having the poverty card flung at us by Porto?? We need to be telling them that €20million is the loan fee, then they have the obligation to buy him next summer for another €20million. As somebody from my social media timeline remarked yesterday “If this was Chelsea they’d already have £40million for him in their back pocket”.

We’re all loving the decisiveness with which Arsenal have moved in the market to get the incomings this season, but that outgoings situation is still problematic and as I sit here today and type out these thoughts, we are still to make a significant sale. Remember when we all thought that by being good again teams would naturally come and take some of our rotational option players? Whatever happened to that? That’s what City and Liverpool have done for years as the two best teams in England. I thought we’d be able to get on that squad player gravy train, no? But instead we find ourselves with one week left of the window and still quite a bloated squad.

Do you know what though? Maybe it’s not just us? I’ve just seen this article on Football365 about the size of each Premier League teams’ squads. We’re joint 12th. We’ve got 28 along with Newcastle and Liverpool whilst Sunderland have 35, Burnley have 34 and Brighton have 33! So perhaps there’s been a trend of stockpiling this season anyway and this is a natural consequence. I suspect it is just that some clubs seem to be covered with deals across the media and one instantly projects that they are doing fantastic business whereas we can’t find clubs for any of our players, but the truth is probably a little more distanced from that I think. Many of these teams have been setting their squads up now and only the likes of Villa, Fulham and Everton are those that need to pick up some bodies as we hit the last week of the window. Fulham might try for Reiss Nelson again I suspect, but I do wonder if what James said yesterday might be the name of the game in the last week of this year’s summer window; lots of loan signings with options to buy from clubs both in England and overseas.

I suspect homes will be found for Fabio Vieira, Sambi Lokonga and Reiss Nelson, but whether there is a permanent nature to them or not remains to be seen. Stuttgart want to pay us €20million for his signature when TransferMarkt has him at 22. That’s probably a fairer price but for a player who is still 25 and cost us £34million (€40million), that’s quite some tanking in value. If Arsenal end up accepting something like that, you’d have to think they’ll be putting a fat old sell on clause in there too. It’s how we’ve managed to make our money back on Nuno Tavares, but with Vieira I think that’s a hopeful pipe dream to claw back all of the money outlay that we did back in 2022.

But we need to do something. Zinchenko isn’t being shifted because of his bug wages and so I suspect that will be an overseas loan where we pay a chunk of them, because I can’t see a Fenerbahce coughing up all of his £150k+-per-week wages. So we’ll have to find a solution that doesn’t mean we have a guy on our books who will take the cash and not get anywhere near the first team. I’m sure he will want that solution too, to be fair, because no footballer wants to be left to just rot in the reserves when he could go somewhere else and play regularly in the autumn of his playing career. Zinchenko is still only 28 and so has plenty of time left in his career, so I’m sure a solution can be found.

That’s me done for today. One step closer to the weekend thanks to the bank holiday yesterday, so I’ll be back tomorrow at the mid-working-week point with some more Arsenal musings as always.

Catch you then.

We talked about the magnitude of it on the Same Old Arsenal podcast last night and I think it is fair to say that James and I had a fair bit of fun. This has been a fun transfer turnaround, further encapsulated by the excellent Kimmo on social media:

These past 24 hours have shown us all the 4 stages of being a Spurs supporter. Let’s put it together
1⃣The fan fiction
2⃣The reality
3⃣The anger
4⃣The envypic.twitter.com/NkYf4AOSpx https://t.co/vNeZgjUsuW

— kimmoFC (@kimmoFC) August 21, 2025

We’ve had a swift resolution and decisiveness from The Arsenal, we’ve had fan meltdown from the Scum, then last night as the stories on how the deal came about started to emerge, we found out that what Tottenham thought was the reason for the delay – to let Eze play in their Europa Conference League game against Fredrikstad at Selhurst Park last night – was actually mostly likely a delaying tactic. Whether it is from the club or the player we don’t know, but the fact that Oliver Glasner admitted on Channel Five last night that Eze called him to say he was ‘not well’ and therefore couldn’t play in their first leg, shows that perhaps it might have been a delaying tactic in the first place.

Personally I think it is a shame. It would have been a lovely book end for Eze to start and star for Palace in their first European match ever, before waving a goodbye to the fans, but in the cold light of the next day I’m sitting here thinking that it makes sense that he pulled out. He’s supposedly got a medical today, he’s about to sign for the club he supported as a kid, his head will be a million miles away from Selhurst Park and just imagine if he’d have picked up a knock. There’s nothing in the world that is going to prevent him from making sure he can’t get through that medical and given the size of the transfer too – £60million+ add-ons (funny how add-ons never get included or reported when Liverpool sign anyone, eh?) – you can understand why playing in that game would probably not be the smartest move. Arsenal and Arteta may, or may not, have wanted him to pull out of last night. I am thinking not however, because Arsenal have always wanted to do the right thing by players, broadly speaking and so I suspect this is somebody from the agent side thinking that they should probably protect the player in this process.

If the deal can be done and medicals confirmed today, there’s every possibility he could be at the ground tomorrow, but knowing Arsenal as we do I suspect that the media team will want to have themselves a real kick-ass launch video. I think if we all know Arteta as I think we do, he won’t want a match day dominated by a transfer. He’ll want focus, attention and every detail observed for Leeds, which means he won’t like any circus around Eze. Let’s see what shakes out.

And what should be shaking out apart from Eze today is the focus on Leeds United. Amongst all the furore, we have a game against a Leeds side with a win already under their belt and with nothing to lose tomorrow, so we need to be focused on our opponents, who apparently have been dealt a blow because the guy who looked like the star in their team, the guy who made everything tick against Everton Ethan Ampadu, is reportedly out. Daniel Farke confirmed he’ll be out until after the international break and that is certainly a boost for us and blow for them.

So, how are their fans feeling, ahead of this one then? Well unsurprisingly most of them are predicting a loss, but quite a heavy one as well, which is quite unusual for this early stage in the season. Usually the hopes of fans – regardless of where they are or whether they are newly promoted or not, means that you see a few more of them predicting favourable results. But a quick scan of a couple of forums tells me they are thinking 3-1 losses, 3-0, 4-0, there’s a 1-1 in there I spotted and a smash and grab 1-0 victory from one person predicting Gnonto as the scorer (good player – I thought he was impressive for them last time they were in the league). You can understand why; newly promoted, but also they also have a style under Farke that he has apparently been criticised of when it comes to adapting it. Having marauding fullbacks like they did in the Championship is going to result in Saka and whoever plays left wing having a lot of space to work with. Against Everton Leeds dominated territory, possession and in the first half basically reduced Everton to nothing in an attacking sense, but Farke isn’t silly enough to think they’ll be getting that much time away from home against us. The challenge we and Arteta has, however, is that the sample size for analysis at this stage of the season is so small. I sit here today genuinely not sure if Farke is going to go balls out and try to attack Arsenal, or whether he’ll change his approach, sit in to a low block and see if he can frustrate. You’d have to think it’d be the latter, but the Premier League is an elite sporting division and just flipping your style within a week – a style in which you’ve basically played for two years in the Championship – isn’t going to be easy. You can’t really train a side in a few days to become a peak-Dyche Everton, can you?

I hope not, which is why I am hoping that we can take advantage tomorrow of the season being in it’s infancy, or Leeds missing their main man and captain, as well as us needing to make a statement victory after the questions of last weekend.

I’ll come back tomorrow with some more thoughts on how we line up, but for today, you have yourselves a good one and let’s stay glued to that timeline for Eze news.

This time yesterday I was writing about the Trossard deal, trying to justify what felt like quite an odd move from the club, as it appeared as though we were unlikely to be doing any more business. I pondered over what we needed from the trio of Martinelli, Trossard and Madueke in terms of goals and assists.

By lunchtime – or just after – that had become even more important, because the news was breaking that Havertz had suffered an in jury and was due to be out for a ‘significant’ period of time, as reported by David Ornstein. That was the counter-signed by a few journalists and as the club took part in an open training session in front of the fans at The Emirates stadium, the absence of Kai was very noticeable and a worry for us all.

Cue the hand-wringing from us all. This is what happened last season and this news meant that, like last season, a big player for us suffered an injury that would cause big ruptions in our aspirations this season. Our attacking options were supposed to be Big Vik AND Kai, not just Big Vik.

So I think it’s fair to say that the mood was pretty low. We’d been dealt another accursed injury and the season hadn’t even got going. And spare a moment for poor Kai; he’s had a knock in pre season, having missed a massive chunk of last season, yet here he is with another spell on the sidelines. An important player for us, loved by all of us, who can’t do the thing he’s good at. I’m gutted for him.

And yesterday afternoon I was gutted for us, because the news that was permeating from various sports journalists who had clearly been briefed, was that Arsenal were looking for loan options or something to replace Kai that would be on the cheap. The chats started. Vardy at 38? Nico Jackson? Asensio on loan?

None of them were optimal, none of them were Havertz, few really inspired.

Then it dropped.

Ornstein and Fabrizio, not long after each other, with a Bomba and a Here we go.

Eberechi Eze. The Arsenal. Fee agreed. Player wants move.

The online explosion was amazing. It was like a set of beautiful fireworks were going off across Arsenal social channels everywhere. This was the one we wanted. An Arsenal lad, a player who has been the talisman for a rejuvenated Palace side towards the end of last season. A guy who should have been the match winner last weekend.

Eberechi Eze. A Gooner.

Jobs not done, player still has to go through the medical and tonight he’ll be playing in the Conference League at home to Palace, but by the sounds of it Arsenal have moved swiftly to conclude this and he may be an Arsenal player by the time the weekend is done.

Honestly, the level of decisiveness that has been shown in this deal really is quite something and dare I say it, quite un-Arsenal like. We like to take our time on these types of deals. Just look at what happened with Gyokeres. Clearly a lot of that was down to the Sporting Chairman and clearly Steve Parish is a man who is loyal to ‘Ebs’ and wanted to do right by him. There was a fee and Palace were happy to go with that fee. And so he should – hopefully – become an Arsenal player.

The deal was ‘dead’ apparently. I heard through a mate that it was off a while ago and I don’t think any of us really batted an eyelid. The Scum had a pressing need, we were looking at our front line and left wing, there needed to be some sales and clearly we weren’t pulling the trigger on a ‘nice-to-have’ player unless we had space for him. The Havertz injury has clearly changed that and, worryingly, it makes me wonder if this is a really bad one that means we might not see him until at least 2026. If that’s the case, he will take time to get fit and so most of his season is probably hanging on a knife-edge, because there’s no way you sanction a £60million deal for a player like Eze as quickly as we did unless there is a big problem with Havertz. I am delighted we have moved, we have a versatile player in Eze who will fill a number of positions, but that joy is tinged with a little bit of sadness for the German.

There will also need to be a re-jig on how we line up now I think too. Eze for Havertz is not like-for-like. Eze can play left eight, left wing, I think he’s done right wing once or twice and he plays in the pocket as a 10. That’s a lot of spaces that Kai might have taken up, but if we’re looking for a rotation option for Gyokeres now, it feels like we’ll have to find an alternative solution. Martinelli? Trossard? Merino? None of which are optimal, but perhaps in some games we will need more from those wide players.

Whatever Arteta has planned for Eze, one thing is for sure now, which is that we are well stocked in those attacking positions. And we’ve brought in players who like a shot, like a dribble and can play more direct. That should make us much more unpredictable this season and given some of the stodgy stuff we saw last season, that is welcome news to all Arsenal fans.

Finally, before I sign off today, perhaps the juiciest of cherries on the cake, is all of the #content out there from Spurs fans. They came in their droves. They posted on TikTok, they gloated on X, they lorded on Threads and they chuckled on BlueSky. Facebook was awash with mems and the joke was, supposedly, on The Arsenal.

No no no my friends. Whatever happens in life, the joke is always on you.