Morning, afternoon and evening all… Before I talk about the main subject of today’s article, I’d like to touch on a few other Arsenal related matters first…
To kick off, news has come about today that Niklas Bendtner has decided to change his squad number from 26 to 52. Realising that many people many have bought shirts already, he’s offering a refund for anyone who has already purchased a shirt. Little did he know that there only five sales of his shirt compared to Arshavin’s 8,312. I really wonder why Bendtner changed his shirt, was it under a romantic influence, was it related to an event – the number of pints he had prior to the “trousers down event” or the number of misses he had against Burnley last season. Whatever the reason, it’s 26 x 2 – so he’s really to double his effort, double his goal scoring and hit 30 this coming season.
News coming out of the Norweigan FA and Wikipedia (if you believe either) is that we’ve agreed to sign Brede Hangeland from Fulham but considering his is cup tied, is this really something Arsene has done considering if we did it a week or two earlier, the player could play for us in the Champions League… I’m not too sure, maybe just paper speculation. Paper speculation like the £45m bid that Barcelona are about to offer us from Cesc – the only worry being that they did the same thing for Ibrahimovic – but surely they don’t have another £45m waiting somewhere to be used, it just doesn’t sound plausible.
Back to the subject and today’s piece is about “A Player’s Regret” and how often do you here about players leaving Arsenal looking for pastures green and coming unstuck. The departures of Overmars, Petit, Flamini and Hleb are prime examples of where it has gone wrong. Both Overmars and Flamini fading into somewhat oblivion being benched by their respective clubs. Petit became a nomad and went around the circuit, whilst Alex Hleb has done a full circle and ended up back at Stuttgart.
The former Arsenal winger saying this in the press today:
“Of course I regret leaving Arsenal. I was playing every week for one of the most exciting sides in Europe, a team that was always in the top-four in the Premier League and were Champions League contenders. Also, I was being guided by one of the best coaches in the world in Arsene Wenger. I owe him a great deal.
“I developed a better all-round game under him and I became more robust physically, learnt to look up more and play better passes and generally improved greatly as a team player. No player ever gets worse under Wenger. For me, leaving Arsenal was not a good move.”
His time at Barcelona did not come to fruition like he imagined and it was something that he lamented.
“Barca were my dream club as a kid, but I couldn’t continue with them if the chance to play was not coming. I’m 28 and who knows how much time I’ve left in the game. I needed to move on, and the chance to go back to a place that I feel happy in was the best solution.”
At least he has had the guts to come out and say what he’s said and we know Flamini must be feeling the same thing. I actually thought after a season pretty much on the bench and the fact that we needed a defensive midfielder, that it would be mutually acceptable if he returned to the Emirates on loan or by purchase – something that has had no fire in it whatsoever. I did like the attitude of the player on the pitch and thought he was a perfect compliment for Cesc in my favoured 4-4-2 but the player is out to prove himself and it will be interesting how he fares this season.
In other news, England drew to Holland 2-2 after going 2-0 with mistakes from two of the favoured boys Rio Ferdinand and Gareth Barry – Sp*rs player Jermain Defoe coming to the rescue and salvaging a draw. Van Persie, I believe, was unscathed by the game. One player who seems to be out injured is Johan Djourou and you felt that he’d most likely play against Everton this weekend if fit. It looks like we’ll have to do everything we can to get our summer signing Vermaelen ready. It’s touch and go, but early reports suggest the Belgium International will be ready.
Only 3 days left until the start of the season and another Summer looks to have gone past (yipee)…
Let’s hope we have a fullish compliment tomorrow when the boys return and are very much ready for the weekend…
Til tomorrow…
