(The not-so-temporary quite-official) Gooner Thread (Part 1)

Sounds like Man City are all over tottenham, no favours coming there.

It will look very ominous if they take the lead in the league today. 

Agreed with not needing another mid, but another winger / striker would be nice. When asked about Draxler one week, Wenger has said exactly that "you think we need more midfielders?", then a week later, asked about if he would consider changing Draxler in to a striker, says something along the lines of "we don't rule anything out". Not wanting to read too much in to it though.. Link to story here.

On an unrelated note, is Ubergunner still around? Does anyone know if the Backbencher still does Champions League mornings?

Wenger is a cryptic sod

His comment yesterday saying something like "we hope to have something to announce by friday" was very promising though, last time he said something like that was the day before we signed Ozil

Seeing reports we've agreed a end-of-season loan deal with Juve for Vucinic... to me that makes the Drax deal more likely too as we can get a "big" striker in the summer window.

Like.

Man City pump Spurs 5-1

Chelsea held 0-0 by Westham

Leaves us in 2nd, 1 point behind Man City and 2 ahead of Chelsea. They play each other on Monday after we've hosted Crystal Palace the day before. Good opportunity to get right back on top before our tough schedule kicks in proper...

Round could have gone a lot worse for us, that's for sure!

I must say that if we lose to Man City in the title race, it will be disappointing but you can't deny they have been absolutely rampant. Spurs were on a run (excluding FA Cup loss) of five wins in a row I think and they get stuffed 1-5 at home. I really thought they would get a draw before todays game.
We still have to play City at home but will have to be on top of our game and hope we have some players back in the midfield or we could be looking at a similar result. Was surprised at Chelsea being held 0-0 at home by West Ham. Only the 2nd game at home where they have dropped points.

If we can somehow stop their insane goal flood then we'll win... we already know we can score against them just like everyone else can - they've conceded more goals and lost more games than we have

Can't argue against them as favourites but I seriously think an injury to either Yaya or Fernandinho and there will be an opportunity. Continuity in their starting eleven has been huge for them this season, take that away and things would get interesting. 

Add to that Aguero out, Negredo out. But yes, Yaya being out would certainly do the damage.

Haha, José. What about when you're playing Arsenal and the tactic is to sit behind the ball the whole game?

Mourinho is being a right d*ck at the moment talking sh*t on everyone, trying to get the fergie mind-games going. 

Having a whinge about someone else putting 10 men behind the ball is the funniest thing so far though. Hypocrite much? He should write a book on bus-parking. 

Yeah had to laugh about that one from Mourinho...

Quote from John Cross on Twitter, could well be right lol

Looking at Manchester City, I think Arsenal could sign Superman, Spiderman, Captain America, Batman and Robin and still finish second.

FYI Gooners, the club online store have a wee sale on... if you fancy a new bit of gear - and no, it's not a Nike dump (I presume that'll happen later in the year) but there's a couple of bargains... postage to NZ is 10 squid for 1 item and 18 for more than that... anyway - follow the link from the club site and 'ave a butchers!

Looks ever more like we will leave this window with Vucinic from Juventus on loan, he should prove to be a decent backup to Giroud

Draxler and Vucinic rumours keep floating. I wonder if Arsene's got a rabbit in his hate that's an unmentioned name that might come through from no where. We live in hope. We'll know tomorrow I guess!

Very good piece on our finances and why we should be very optimistic about the next few seasons... 

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/arsenal/10601900/Arsenal-have-reached-their-Promised-Land-Why-2014-is-such-a-big-year-for-Arsene-Wenger-and-the-Gunners.html

Will we ever spend money on the right players though?

We desperately need to win a trophy and I still believe the Cup is our best chance. Massive next month and we need more quality with the players out IMO

I can see us just getting Vucinic too... addresses the most pertinent need in our squad AND if we get a 40mil striker in the winter then I can suck it up. Draxler would be nice to have but not imperative - now that other clubs are sniffing he'll probably go elsewhere... we will need an RB/CB too as I'm not confident we'll hold on to BacSag tho for his and the clubs sake I hope I'm wrong.

Having said that, it's most likely I'm wrong.

I agree we do need both a CB and a striker, but need to go big on a striker not another midfielder which Wenger never seems to see a shortage for. Given that we do have a few out at the moment we are still hardly struggling for numbers there.

As good as the sponsorship deals appear, ticket prices are going through the roof (an embarrssment) and we have only bought one top player in 8 years. Would like to see how good Ozil really would be at Arsenal with a better centre forward ahead of him.

I was really looking forward to see how he was going to go with Walcott. That, I believe, would have been a profitable relationship for the two players. Oh well, next season.

I agree that with (if) Sagna packs up, we 100% need both a right back and centre back. I don't believe Jenkinson can make that step up yet. I also think that Podolski will be gone end of the season. He needs game time at this point in his career, and if Bentdner is preferred to start over him, I don't blame him. He must have been guttered sitting there on the bench at Southampton. If we're seriously bringing in Draxler, now or in the summer, then surely he must be off.  

I agree our ticket prices are an absolute embarrassment. I saw a table the other day and even just in comparison with other expensive tickets in england they are out of this world. To me that does need serious addressing and for us to be announcing a price rise in the same week we quadruple our kit-sponsorship deal is just madness. 

A proper centre forward?? Giroud fits our style of play perfectly and would be a huge loss should we put someone else there. A magic super expensive striker will get us more goals no doubt, but less of everything else that we get with Giroud 

I agree we need a centre forward but not as a replacement. Wenger said when he was trying to get Suarez it was because he was a different type of striker to be able to select, and also because he could start on the left and play with Giroud as well. Couldn't agree with that approach more. 

Ozil is going just fine for me and will only improve. If you mean he'll play better with someone quick who runs off the shoulder and can finish, then we already have that but he's unfortunately out for the rest of this season. 

1 top player in 8 years? Despite the lack of transfer funds available Arsene has still purchased a few half decent ones in that time mate... Sagna, Ramsey, Nasri, Vermaelen, Koscielny, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Mertesacker, Arteta, Podolski, Giroud, Cazorla, Monreal, Ozil... 

man i hate the font changes when editing posts, makes them look all messed up

As much as I like Giroud and appreciate the job he does, he's not on a world class level and an area where we could do better. A bit like the players you have mentioned, a lot of decent players but Ozil is still the only top (world-class) player which is now what we need.

Ozil won't fire properly until this time next season as it takes a while to get used to the league, but with a more dynamic player up front he would be even more influential. As Walcott is now out, I'd at least like to see Podolski get more of a chance for them two to link up with Santi on the right.

If we end up winning the league I'll hold my hands up but this year is a massive chance to put us back at the front of the pack and I think more could be done.

Completely agree. Giroud is serviceable but he's not the long-term answer, for mine, even though he's super likeable as a player.

In saying that, there really is no one top-class avaliable right now. We tried our best to get Suarez; didn't happen. Tried for Higuain; didn't happen (though I don't think he's much better than Giroud)

Whoever we get will cost 45-50m+ in this market.

Paulm you got an injury update for us?

John Cross has just tweeted that Kim Kallstrom has arrived at the Arsenal training ground to do a deal. I know very little about him but the Twitter reaction could best be described as "LOL". I guess, after all this time, we have to back that Arsene knows what he is doing but boy he makes it hard to trust him sometime.

Arsene got Kallstrom because we have 3 great CDM's as it is but 1 is injured and the other has a 3 game suspension with some big games coming up he will be great cover in that position and also has a fantastic free kick on him, which is something we lack even on our AAA players. Look at Suarez, Toure, RVP and Rooney they win games off free kicks.

Kim Kallstrom is a name from the past and a suprise, he was a good free kick taker of his left foot back in the day, but haven't heard anything of him in years.

He was solid back in the French league days and if he's still of a similar ability he will be a decent back up to a part of the field where we needed an extra body.

Low risk loan styles, love it, have to say would have liked the Klose loan rumour to have come off too

A crapped load of Papiss Cisse loan rumours, with some going as far as saying Newcastle have turned the offer down, far fetched anyone?

Most of the journos over here suggesting that our failure to get a striker wasn't for lack of trying. We went after Cisse and a fair few others apparently. Very odd.

Seems a fairly sensible loan to me. 

Could have done with another striker obviously but I guess we will go all out in summer instead. If nothing decent is available in January, so be it. 

Palace tomorrow and with Abu Dhabi v Russia on Monday we could see ourselves back on top (although it will take a monumental Mourinho bus parking...). 

Cocks and ChqBooks stumble again

If Ashley wasn't such a prick of an owner....

https://news.arseblog.com/2014/02/extraordinary-kallstrom-injury-story-emerges/

If this is true and our loan signing is injured we have absolutely bottled it.

If the injury is true I can't help but lol