Arsenal

[Steve007]

If only the players cared as much as the fans.

[The Fox]

Struggling to drum up praise for a grown man reacting like that to league loss away to Stoke tbh. Everyone's different when it comes to emotions obviously, but...nah, it's not for me.

Wenger got it wrong yesterday. The first XI was too conservative and too slow; he presumably got suckered in by how this team dominated Sunderland, but the difference there was Sunderland couldn't be arsed, and we were at home. He also waited way, way too long to change it up, as usual. Podolski, Wilshere and Giroud were absolutely terrible.

I'm getting really fed up with Giroud now. Sanogo showed yesterday that his finishing is...um...a work in progress, but it's not like Oli is any good on that front either. But apart from his standard crap finishing and non-existent movement, yesterday he was also acting like a complete fanny against Stoke's rough physical treatment. You wouldn't think he was a fucking massive unit of a bloke based on his attitude yesterday. He's good when the team is set up around his skillset, but when we're unable to do that he's pointless.

[Steve007]

Sanogo shouldn't be allowed anywhere near the first team. The guy should be loaned out for a few years and once proven he should then be in the first team squad. The only reason he's playing for us now is because we simply don't have anyone else. Which goes back to my critisism of the club, Wenger and the transfer policy.

[The Fox]

Too early to say IMO. At least he moves up front.

On strikers: I don't mind that we didn't get one in January because I don't think anyone was available, but not signing one last summer has really cost us since Theo & Ramsey were ruled out and Giroud's limitations were exposed.

[Steve007]

He does show potential. But he should be loaned out next season, ideally in England. There's no point sending him to somewhere daft like France or Belgium. He needs to adapt to the English game if he's going to be an Arsenal player.

[Swallow]

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2014/mar/02/liverpool-john-henry-luis-suarez-clause

So, what do we think?

[Jonathan_Kerr]

I think it shows that if a player wants to leave, we don't have to sell them.

I can imagine that Suarez would have had some apologizing to do after the transfer window but people got over it when he banged in the goals.

[The Fox]

Fair play to Liverpool, that's ballsy. I suspect they only took that position though because the clause was poorly worded and/or vague, as that's what Gordon Taylor indicated when he'd seen the paperwork.

[wev]

I think there's a positive there to be honest, all too often the player has had too much power in these situations and as the article suggests a contract has meant next to fuck all to the player, its become less an agreement between two parties and more like a series of demands made by a player upon his employer

[Silent Runner]

I think it shows that if a player wants to leave, we don't have to sell them.

I can imagine that Suarez would have had some apologizing to do after the transfer window but people got over it when he banged in the goals.

We've always known that, but the hassle of fighting it out with RVP or whoever wasn't worth the effort. I have a lot of respect for Liverpool for the way they handled the whole thing.

[Jonathan_Kerr]

I see your point but what was our hassle with RVP any worse than what Liverpool had with Suarez?

[Steve007]

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2014/mar/02/liverpool-john-henry-luis-suarez-clause

So, what do we think?

The £40m + £1 was insulting to Liverpool and made the club look like small-time mugs when the deal didn't go though. Almost as stupid as the bungled Higuain pursuit.

When David Dein was at the club, more often than not the deal was signed, sealed and delivered before anyone knew we were actually interested in the player. I miss those surprises.

We've always known that, but the hassle of fighting it out with RVP or whoever wasn't worth the effort. I have a lot of respect for Liverpool for the way they handled the whole thing.

I like how they told us to fuck off and stop bothering them. If only we took the same approach when clubs came in for our players, instead of dropping the trousers and assuming the position.

[humdrum]

Kind of different situations, when we sold RVP he was approaching the last year of his contract and would have left for free, I am pretty sure that wasn't the case with Suarez.

[toythatkills]

The £40m + £1 was insulting to Liverpool and made the club look like small-time mugs when the deal didn't go though.

Hardly. Clubs try to take advantage of buy-out clauses all the time and this one was particularly hilarious due to the +£1. Sure, it didn't work out, but then tons of transfers don't work out in every single window for every single club and it has absolutely no bearing on how we're perceived except by a mental minority whose opinions hardly matter anyway.

Especially with Suarez coming in the same window as that fucking bizarre Herrera deal.

[The Fox]

You can't compare Liverpool's stance to ours over RVP -- the contractual situations are completely different. If Suarez had 12 months left on his deal and could walk for free imminently it would have been a totally different story.

I agree with Steve on the £40m + £1 thing; it was needlessly inflammatory. I wonder if their resolve would have been the same if we'd just bid £42m or something.

[Gabe]

You can't compare Liverpool's stance to ours over RVP -- the contractual situations are completely different. If Suarez had 12 months left on his deal and could walk for free imminently it would have been a totally different story.

I agree with Steve on the £40m + £1 thing; it was needlessly inflammatory. I wonder if their resolve would have been the same if we'd just bid £42m or something.

It would have been, without any shadow of a doubt. We were stung very badly with the Torres affair; sure, we made good money on it but it was an unsavoury period. I actually don't blame Torres, because he was misled by the wonder of Gillett & Hicks, and it's been sad to see his decline to bit-part player. Still, I think from that point - and the new board and management - a line was drawn in the sand - that we don't want to sell our best players if we want to progress.

I think the only thing that would have changed that situation would have been if Bale not gone for his massive fee. That set a benchmark for Suarez's worth to the club. Had Bale not gone, we may well have done business - though I still don't believe you would have seen any change from £50-60m (given the Cavani and Falcao transfers).

Had you paid that, though, I do believe you'd still be sitting very pretty at the top of the table right now. Suarez would have added a genuine craft to your play and the amount of work he puts in every match is tremendous. Even during his recent mini-drought he's assisted and generally linked play in every performance. He's been phenomenal this season, and I have never been his biggest fan (not even counting his various indiscretions).

[The Fox]

I don't necessarily mean you'd have sold at £42m; just that it wouldn't have pissed you off so much, and you could have been willing to negotiate.

Ah, what could have been...

[Rev]

Almost as stupid as the bungled Higuain pursuit.

As bad as that seemed at the time, I very strongly suspect that we "bungled" that transfer so we could get Ozil when Bale moved. I really don't think Real would have sold us both and I'm not really sure we could have afforded both either.

[Lucky]

Quite surprised Adam has been charged by the FA. I didn't expect him to be.

While he's a cu*t and I'm certain he meant it, (I'm not defending him) but as a stand alone case it doesn't look totally clear that he definitely did mean it.

Quite brave of the FA to take the stance of using a bit of common sense and charging him regardless and just going with the idea that they think he meant it because he's a cu*t.

[The Fox]

New 5 year contract for Ramsey by the looks of it, on big money too. Good move to get him tied down. Cazorla and Per have signed new deals too, but still nothing on Sagna worryingly.

[Dude Ranch]

Given that Rosicky has also been announced it seems like curtains for Sagna which would be very sad and unwise, IMHO. Although I did read he wants £100k for three years which is a bit too rich - if true. You'd think a nice two year deal would tie him down, we'd easily get two years good service from him which would allow Jenkinson to get up to speed or allow us to take our time finding a really good replacement. Considering how well we're run in most ways our contract renewal business can leave a bit to be desired. Mertesacker signing an extension makes me happy though.

[pinholestar]

I can't help but feel that we would've heard something by now if Sagna was staying, unfortunately. This is his last chance for a new challenge elsewhere, so I understand it from his perspective, but he'll be a really big loss to us if he goes. Jenkinson is a decent squad player but he's a long way from offering what Bacary does defensively.

[The Fox]

I can't think of any right backs who would be remotely attainable and wouldn't leave us a fair bit worse off compared to Sagna. Going with Jenkinson & Bellerin would also be madness. I've seen people suggest Piszczek a lot on Twitter but for me he's pretty overrated.

The other issue is we need someone in the team to win defensive headers; none of our deep lying midfielders are particularly good at that, and it's a deficiency in the squad that Sagna helps cover up by being totally amazing in the air.

I really hope he stays, but it doesn't look great at this point.

[Rev]

He must be PSG-bound. We won't be able to come close to what they're offering and he's never seemed massively tied to the club - not in a bad way, more professional.

Jenkinson isn't good enough to take over from him now. Maybe in a year or two, but it's going to do him more harm than good if we put that on him next season.

[BlinkyBear]

All this talk about contracts and no one seems to be mentioning that the manager of the team is out of contract in 3 months. It was said ages ago that he'd be staying on, and whilst there are many issues with his handling of the team in recent years, it really worries me that we've not tied him down to a new deal.

In more positive news-would Rosicky's new contract see him through to 10 years at the club? Because A. we haven't had a player do that in ages and B. because I fucking LOVE Tom Rosicky and be all over a testimonial for the fella.

[Silent Runner]

Given that Rosicky has also been announced it seems like curtains for Sagna which would be very sad and unwise, IMHO. Although I did read he wants £100k for three years which is a bit too rich - if true. You'd think a nice two year deal would tie him down, we'd easily get two years good service from him which would allow Jenkinson to get up to speed or allow us to take our time finding a really good replacement. Considering how well we're run in most ways our contract renewal business can leave a bit to be desired. Mertesacker signing an extension makes me happy though.

That's 15 million quid for one of the best players in his position in the league. I know he's pushing on a bit, but that still strikes me as cheap considering how much it will cost to replace him with a player as good.

[Lucky]

Just goes to show how crazy football has become when paying a right back £15million for three seasons seems like a good deal.

[toythatkills]

Well it's that or buy a right back for £15m and pay him... nothing?

Adam's been banned for three games for stamping on Giroud. This is all well and fine but it does nothing to change the result, which may well have been different if he'd been sent off at the time.

Also, Kim Kallstrom might be in the squad for Everton. Did anyone else completely fucking forget that he played for us? I read it this morning and was like "... who... oh yeah."

[The Fox]

Adam's been banned for three games for stamping on Giroud. This is all well and fine but it does nothing to change the result, which may well have been different if he'd been sent off at the time.

Would never have been better than 0-0 the way we played.

[Lucky]

Scary stuff with Wilshere

Looks dead