Our pre-season round of friendlies kicked off in style against a Malaysia XI… and we managed to secure a decent victory over a technically apt team. Liverpool take on the same team on Saturday, so we can gage how well we’ve done with them too… Arsene used the game to take a look at some of his “new” signings, and we saw a start for Jenkinson at right back and Miyachi and left midfield – we also saw a start for Kieran Gibbs, who Arsene confirmed will be our new number three this season. The line up was:

Szcznesy

Jenkinson – Koscielny – Vermaelen – Gibbs

Wilshere – Song

Walcott – Ramsey – Miyachi

Chamakh

Two new players started the game – our new £1m signing Carl Jenkinson started at right back – contrary to some discussions that Jenkinson would play at left back (probably due to his YouTube videos and the sale of Clichy)…  and our new Japanese attacking midfielder Ryo Miyachi started at left midfield. Miyachi played well throughout the first half and showed that he’s got something about him. Jenkinson also fitted in nicely at right back and was quite good positionally.

We scored twice in the first half – the first from Aaron Ramsey from the penalty spot after a good burst of pace from Jack Wilshere saw him brought down – and it was Ramsey again who sent a nice through ball onto the right straight to Walcott who lobbed the keeper to make it 2-0. Only Ramsey, Miyachi and Jenkinson started the second as Arsene made whole sale changes which saw half the team replaced and also saw Nasri come on which was to a loud applause…

The second half saw a change around of the team… with a new XI:

Mannone

Sagna – Squillaci – Djourou – Traore

Frimpong – Rosicky

Vela – Nasri – Arshavin

Van Persie

Vela played a lot up front and there was a lot of movement between the front four – Vela finally getting free from a Rosicky pass and chipped the ball over the on rushing keeper – and it was Rosicky himself who got the fourth after good work from Arshavin from the left… The problem with pre-season is that it questions the need for more players as it’s obvious that we have two teams… but against Malaysia XI, we can do well, but can the best of the two teams really be good enough to beat the cream of the crop? Denilson did originally come on at half time, but was substituted at half time – believed to have an injury – he looked disappointed, so we will see soon whether it was for any other reason…

Arsene spoke after the game and I’d like to pick out two sections… firstly on Jenkinson and Miyaichi…

Jenkinson has shown power and good decision-making. Ryo Miyaichi has shown as well good qualities, he is always available, always keen to take people on, he works very hard. Both of them have shown interesting qualities.

He also commented on Samir Nasri and the fans reaction…

He has always had a very good attitude. We are a big club with many good young players so we are confronted with many rumours and speculation. But it doesn’t affect much what’s happening inside the Club. We have to live with that and you could see when he [Samir] played that he wasn’t disturbed by that.

More recently, Arsene also said that the board stand by his decision to keep Nasri despite him not signing a new contract and I’m not entirely sure of the reasons behind it – for me, we sell now and replace – instead of losing next summer and then having to find money to replace – or not replace! Arsene also commented on Man City’s £400m naming rights deal, which he said was unfair and in disrespect to the FFP rules from UEFA…

He’s got a point and everyone in football agrees too – let’s see if UEFA are man enough to do something about it…

Til tomorrow…