Hello there everyone,
It’s been quite a hectic week so far, it’s not often that it can feel like so much is going on when in fact not much is taking place at all; transfers in (or lack there-of), audacious stunts during kit reveals, and brilliant Danish strikers negotiating moves away from The Emirates.
Casting an eye first towards some of the ongoing transfer saga’s involving the club, Arsenal have apparently made an offer of £30M to Liverpool for the services of a certain cheaty, bitey, racist, buck-toothed forward who may or may not want to leave England due to the English media reporting on him being cheaty, bitey, racist and buck-toothed. There has been much made in the last 24 hours of Arsenal’s supposed interest in Suarez, and I personally don’t know how to interpret this news. There has been some discussion about whether or not Arsenal are trying to manipulate Real Madrid into hurrying along the sale of Higuain by bidding for Madrid’s apparent first choice target, but I’m not sure I buy into that. If every man and his dog that visits an Arsenal Forum/writes an Arsenal Blog can see through that plan, then I hardly think that Real Madrid would have any issues coming to the same conclusion. I’m not quite sure whether I believe our supposed interest in signing him is genuine either. Let’s be honest, Suarez is a stunningly brilliant footballer, with talent that is deserving of wearing Arsenal colours, but his horrific on-field behaviour leaves him rather tainted, and it would seem very out of character for Wenger to sanction spending such a large amount of money on a such a high risk return. Regardless, between Twitter and the hundreds of Footballing websites/newspapers, I’m sure we’ll hear plenty more about the situation in the coming days.
Staying on transfer news, when The BFG and I spoke on Episode 1 of the Gunners Down Under Podcast, the Higuain deal looked like it was in a very good place, and I personally was very confident that we’d have our man in the coming days. Since then it seems the situation has become a little more complicated than we may have liked. There have been reports that Madrid had upped their offer at the last minute, and more recently Florentino Perez (the Real Madrid President) has claimed that there has been no bid for the player. Now I think most of us have been through enough transfer windows to know that the official stance clubs take on their players is often very far from the truth and are there can be a bit of brinkmanship involved in what is leaked out to media/stated in press conferences. I think Perez’s statement should be taken with a pinch of salt as it certainly comes across to me as Madrid playing the media game. I think it’s quite clear that there has been established contact between the teams, as Higuain senior’s comments would suggest. I still feel it’s very likely that Higuain will find his way to the club, and am confident that we may hear some more news about the potential move over the next couple of days. Unfortunately, the current saturation of the media (both social and otherwise) with transfer nonsense has taken some of the fun out of the window that was previously quite prevalent. Gone are the days when you’d wake up one morning and find that a striker named Eduardo had signed for The Arsenal, with almost no-one having any previous knowledge of the deal being in the works. We’re now no longer waiting for a new player to have his picture taken with the Boss holding up his new kit, but to hear about what plane he’s boarding, what the possible destination may be, and what Taxi company will be delivering him where, it’s all a bit of a shame in my opinion.
On a more positive note, Arsenal revealed their new Away Kit for the 2013/14 season yesterday with a public unveiling of a new mural on The Emirates and a presentation of the ‘British Core’ modelling the kit for all in attendance. The reactions in regards to the kit have been largely positive, and I must say that I absolutely love it. I’m a big fan of our away kits being blue and yellow, and I think that Nike have designed a beautiful kit which is a fitting tribute to the Invincibles. The mural itself is also a nice touch, with the club further marketing what looks to be a very talented future core of the first 11. A very interesting aspect of the whole event was the journey of Carl Jenkinson, who only three years ago was an Arsenal Season ticket holder playing non-league football, who now finds himself pulling on the jersey he loves every week, with the added bonus of having his face splashed on the outside of the stadium, a great story really, Carl is living every Arsenal fans dream.
Finally, reports coming out of Germany today suggest that there may soon be resolution to the Nicklas Bendtner saga on the horizon, with Eintracht Frankfurt claiming that ‘final talks’ have between held between the two camps, and that a final decision should be forthcoming within the next two days, whether this decision would result in a loan or permanent transfer is still unclear, we at Gunners Down Under do know one thing though, The Great Dane will definitely be missed……
Until next time,
Matty B
Gunners Down Under 