I’m writing this post after work on the train from Tokyo to Yokohama, so I’m not sure how long it will be. Yesterday was a quiet one in terms of Arsenal related news so I decided not to post anything as there really was nothing to say. I’m still trying to figure out if there is much to say today. One thing that did happen, in a didn’t sort of way, was the passing of the deadline which the Star set on Sunday for Joe Cole signing for us.
It seems like there is a real interest in him from both ourselves and ManUre. Given that he is a London lad and hasn’t ventured outside of the capital to ply his trade, you would have to figure that we would be slight favourites for his signature, if that side of things plays a factor in his final decision. Would signing both Chamakh and Cole serve to help Fabregas decide to stay for another year or two? His signing, while not entirely desirable, would certainly help to boost the strength of our squad. Luckily, he isn’t as c*ntish as some of his fellow Chelsea teammates.
Xavi moved one step closer to being a fully-fledged member of Mensa by saying that he predicted a whole two years ago that Cesc would one day rejoin Barcelona. Well done, Xavi. It is clear that you shouldn’t be playing for Barselona, you should instead by working at CERN. Nothing new or earth shattering in his quote and it’s just more of the usual Barselona skullduggery of trying to get a player to do their tapping up for them.
Arshavin has described Arsenal’s season as being nothing special, even pitiful. I’m assuming that he has been misquoted and that he actually was referring to his own performances and overall contribution to the team over the season. Maybe that is the reason we are interested in Joe Cole….taxi for Arshavin? He owes us a really good season next year, if he is still at the club.
Gallas missed the end of May deadline that he had been set by Wenger for the signing of a new contract, so it’s time for us to forget about him as an Arsenal player, though I get the feeling that some of us have felt that way about him for a while. Time for our former captain to go and sit sulking on a pitch somewhere else. It never really worked out as we had all initially hoped that it would. Good player but a bit of a mentally imbalanced loon, too.
The newspapers are becoming really, really lazy with regard to the Cesc transfer story as we are just seeing the exact same quotes turning up again and again with nothing new to add to the story. It’s all a bit tedious and boring, to be honest.
Almost at Yokohama, so it’s nearly time for me to wrap this post up. I’d just like to thank those that sent me messages on Twitter yesterday regarding newspaper (tabloid and broadsheet) reporting and portrayal of UK born players versus foreign players. I’m doing my MA thesis on whether or not racism, xenophobia or unfair bias is used when portraying incidents involving UK and foreign players. If you can think of any specific game/incident where you remember newspapers doing this, please leave it in a comment below. Eg: Ryan Shawcross ‘isn’t that kind of player’ after nearly taking Ramsey’s leg off, but Gallas is ridiculed for a slightly late tackle against Bolton. Oh, it can be about ANY premier league team or player, it’s not Arsenal specific. Thanks in advance.
Have a good Tuesday.
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