Especially as we've been here before with van persie.
All avoidable by showing some ambition.

I think it was dec who made the point you do. I'm fairly sure david.d thought Sanchez joining City would win them the league, but dec suggested it wouldn't make much difference because City are already so strong going forward and it's their defence that needs improving.

There are plenty of useless local politicians too.,.I've dealt with a few professionally...but they tend not to last for very long unless they are just at councillor level, in which case there isn't that much they can do. The good ones definitely exist, but there is a problem now of politics being seen as more important than what politics is actually for. Being a good politician is often more important than being good at being in office. There is a problem with a lack of short-medium term accountability, but ultimately, the ones who stick around for donkey's years without getting a sniff of a big posting are often decent.

We spent £100m last summer. Sanchez is all about Sanchez. He has never renewed a contract anywhere. While we have offered him a very generous deal, other clubs can pay more. That will likely be the decisive factor.

At this point it looks like the summer window is unfolding exactly as per the norm.........an early signing to raise the expectations of supporters followed by rumours of big bids for high profile players which make it look like we are serious but in reality are unlikely to succeed even if true.

I really don’t get what people expect us to have done so far. By all accounts we look like we’ve made a world record bid for the most wanted talent in football, what more are we supposed to have accomplished by now?

We could at least have signed Salomon Kalou and Sebastien Frey by now.......

Hi Dec,

The problem is that we are probably going to lose him for below his market value and where do we find someone equally as good who isn't coveted by bigger clubs?

We will be playing catch-up again

New fixtures out in an hour or so. Seen one 'leak' showing us away at Bournemouth on the opening day.

Leicester home, Rich.

We spent £100m last summer. Sanchez is all about Sanchez. He has never renewed a contract anywhere. While we have offered him a very generous deal, other clubs can pay more. That will likely be the decisive factor.

I'm not arguing with your view of Sanchez, but he was employed by Udinese for five years from 2006 to 2011, despite having loan spells for two of those years. When he left Udinese to join Barcelona in 2011, they paid a transfer fee for him so he presumably wasn't at the end of his contract at Udinese. I don't know when his last contract at Udinese expired but I'd have thought it must have been 2012 at the earliest. In 2006 did he sign a six year contract at Udinese, because if he did that's a lengthy deal? Or after signing his initial contract with Udinese in 2006, did he renew it with them later?

It slipped my mind that we play Chelsea in the Charity Shield match again. Statement match? There are always a few matches that are circled first, main derbies (Tottenham and Chelsea) and matches against the title rivals.

Aug 26 Liverpool away...dicey
Sept 16 Chelsea away...very dicey
nice run of matches that if we are on form should see us be at or near the top of the table. Winnable matches.
then...
Nov 4 City away ....the only good thing about these being away is we get them home in the 2nd half of the season
Nov 18 Tottenham home which I hope we at least get some pride back and win this one.
Dec 2 Man Utd home...lets not make beating Mourinho a fluke.

Hi Soc,

I don't think the club could have done much about it. He has been offered a very very good deal but has continually stalled. He is a tremendous player but I really don't think he has any particular bond with Arsenal so he is just going to go where he gets the best offer.

We will replace him too. As good as he is, this isn't like trying to fill the gap after Henry or Vieira.

Heartbreaking scenes at Grenfell Tower. Apart from the loss of life 2000 people have lost absolutely everything. All the little bits and pieces. Old photos of life and love. Family stuff left by departed relatives. Much loved pets. Absolutely everything.

I once had a house we were renting torched by the landlord for insurance. The whole downstairs was incinerated and everything upstairs was badly smoke damaged. We didn't lose anything important but it was devastating at the time, especially as we had a baby. But we were lucky - we lost nothing that mattered and weren't hurt at all. I can't begin to imagine what these poor souls are going through right now.

What is really sickening is that this could have been prevented. the resident committee are fairly well known and have been campaigning for years warning that just this sort of thing could happen whilst being ignored by the council and the (so-called) residents group. Add the gross reduction in fire services and already you have a disaster waiting to happen before the further legal neglect from this government. Tory MPs have filibustered both the fire safety bill (more red tape according to the Mail) and the bill to ensure landlords make homes fit for habitation, and also they delayed the review into fire safety in tower blocks against Fire Service advise. Truly sickened.

If you can do anything please do. There is/will be a donation line no doubt but if you can get to any of the places below to directly donate please do - these people are in their nightwear and have nothing so even a few bits of clothing would be wonderful.

As for the offer for Mbappe it is just clearly a smokescreen to tell the fans they tried.

...Yeah I am a negative prick I know...

The tories literally have blood on their hands over the last few weeks.

My heart goes out to those lost

Thankfully there are people with more brains than you. Corbyn bit his lips and didn't attack the Tories or blame them. There will be an investigation then you can criticise whoever is at fault. Till then stfu you *%^@.

All in the name of austerity. Disgraceful

https://youtu.be/UN3e-aYUusc

How old are you? This had nothing to do with cuts. Two years ago 12million was spent on upgrading the property. It's possible the plastic cladding wasn't fireproof it's possible the contractors removed some protection. The investigation will find what the problem was and hopefully someone will be charged then with Corporate manslaughter. Whoever was at fault they will pay and pay heavily.

As exiled pointed out earlier the tories filibustered the new fire and safety bill. Seriously, if you're life is this empty that you have to protect the wrong doers and evil within our world then please do society a favour and kill yourself.

I hope those responsible for this tragic loss of life get wiped out and removed from planet earth because their existence is pointless.

Dumb and dumber. The response to the Bridge incidents and the response to this fire were all excellent. Blame the Tories for a lot of things but in these incidences you're just spitting in the wind.

Earns?

Anyone notice Mbappe wears the No.12 for France - just like Henry

Indeed .... you can't blame the player , they just let their agent haggle with the powers that be to feather both their nests but in terms of what Theo puts out and gets ; compared to your Joe Average worker it's sickening .
Walcott seems to happily chirp on social media about wake up calls etc ... he'd earn more respect by saying "this week because I was a complete passenger in the game I'm going to donate 20,000 of my wages to the blind foundation " or similar .

Not putting myself up for canonisation here but about twenty years ago I was making some large farm gates and making a complete ****&^%$ of the job . Out of square , hinges on the wrong side if it could be cocked up I did it .

Took four days to finally get the suckers right .

Such was my embarrassment at my output I said to the bloke concerned pay me for two days

Gaz you really are. And it is so boring when you go on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on,and on, and on, and on, and on,and on, and on, and on, and on,and on, and on, and on, and on with the stirring of the same old stew. Liven yourself up, will you?