The North Bank – “It’s got va-va-voom” (An Arsenal blog)

Not a lot going on today. There is still a little bit of fall-out following the stitching-up of Cesc by those Barcelona Bastardos. Arsenal themselves are remaining a dignified silence, as they have done throughout the entire summer with regards to the whole Cesc situation. The player’s father had this to say about the incident:

“It was a day of celebration and anything goes. If anyone misinterprets it, they have to see that it was part of a celebration.

 
"Cesc has it very clear what Arsenal has been and is for him. He is super grateful to them and it has never crossed his mind to do something wrong towards them.

Cesc said what he wanted to do the day after the end of the league so that Arsenal had time to react. It would have been nasty to say it today, when they are almost on the verge of starting the pre-season. But he always did so thinking about Arsenal. It remains to be seen how everything turns out.”

From those statements it is clear that the entire Fabregas family has a great deal of respect and affection for Arsenal. While none of us really knows what was said at that meeting between Fabregas and Wenger at their meeting at Colney just before Cesc went off to meet up with the Spain squad before the World Cup, you do get the impression that is was indeed to say that he was thinking that it might be time to move home. There is no evidence that he said he definitely wants to move home this summer, he may just have said that he was thinking about it but that he would leave it to Wenger to decide when the time was right for him to move home. The one thing we know for sure about Cesc is that whatever happens, he will do it in a mature, classy and very respectful manner.

One final thought on the Cesc situation is regarding Cesc’s sister. It would appear that some people may have gone over the top in their reaction to the Barcelona shirt incident and may have sent her some messages on Twitter that were out of order. These people should not be doing this and they should feel ashamed of themselves. Cesc’s sister has nothing to do with his career and she should not be getting grief from Arsenal fans, though to be honest I think that those people that sent her rude messages are not true Arsenal fans, they are just idiots.

Wenger has spoken about how he still sees Eduardo as part of his plans and that he has high hopes for him in the coming season.

“Eduardo is an Arsenal player and I am expecting a lot from him this season. He had a terrible injury – he went through hell – but I think his work rate is fantastic and his determination, which is exceptional, will be of great use to Arsenal.”

I would love it if Eduardo could stay with us and have a great season, but part of me feels that he will never be the same player that he was before his shocking injury and that we should let him move to another club in order to try and revive his career. If he does stay, let’s hope that he can stay free of the niggling injuries that have plagued him since returning to fitness following said injury.

As an aside, one thing which is still really annoying me since the World Cup is the praising of Suarez for his handling of the ball on the line in the Uruguay vs. Ghana game. The reasoning for this championing of his actions is given as something along the lines of “his handball wasn’t cheating because he was caught.” Well, I’m sorry, just because he was caught doesn’t mean he didn’t cheat, or attempt to cheat. To use that line of reasoning, Jeffrey Dahmer wasn’t a murderer, because he was caught and sent to prison. Cheating is cheating, regardless of whether or not it was seen by someone. Just because he was caught cheating, doesn’t mean that he wasn’t cheating. Venting done, sorry to drag that up again, but have just been listening to the 5Live Football Daily podcast… The same people that are praising Suarez lambasted Henry. Pricks.

Right, that’s that for today. I’m not going to talk about the Frey link as that is a link we have been seeing for years.

Take it easy.