Saw another article about the players who've left Arsenal and won trophies, this one was Oxlade-Chamberlain. Whilst I think he would start in our midfield and he probably has improved as a central midfielder since he joined Liverpool is he really any better overall

:toothy9:
Morning socrates. It seems ironic that while lamenting Xhaka’s lack of mobility to the point that you still want to see him go, a far more likely midfield departure is Guendouzi who, considering the way he gets round the pitch and his energy, is surely our most mobile central midfielder. Some may want to use the word ‘arguably’ instead of surely, though I’m happy with the relevance of ‘surely’ here.

I believe Xhaka is most likely to stay because Arteta, like all his other managers, appears to love him. I don’t think any other conclusion looks feasible. Furthermore, another point that I feel supports my judgment that Guendouzi is the more likely departure is that according to reports he wants out. Also, I believe the clubs I’ve seen who reportedly want him, which in alphabetical order are Barcelona, Inter, Manchester United and PSG, makes it even easier to believe he’ll go.

As Guendouzi seems to be pushing to get away by not toeing Arteta’s line, why is that? I suspect it could be down to the following idea. He must know of someone he’d like to join who wants him. Players have their agents who work at getting players to clubs they’d like to join. That’s one of their tasks; it’s what happens. Guendouzi’s agent will have approached big clubs and/or received expressions of interest from them already. If the only clubs who wanted him were the French, Spanish or Italian versions of West Ham, or even lower Norwich, Guendouzi would I’m certain be working hard to impress Arteta. He would not be so keen on leaving. My guess is PSG are his most likely destination. He’s French, they’re a huge club, massively wealthy, and the interview with him in the Norwich programme left me in little or even no doubt he supported them.

Going back to Xhaka, I think you’re going to be disappointed. I reckon Arteta sees him as a long way from being a player he’d like to move on. Say Guendouzi does leave, is Ceballos the answer? He was very good last night, but to be brutally frank that was probably his best ever game in an Arsenal shirt. He’s been very inconsistent and I see him not being signed permanently or even not having his loan deal extended for next season as more likely than Xhaka going. I even reckon Torreira could be more likely to go than Xhaka, as there’s not been much to suggest he’s settled well in London.

Even if we look at things optimistically and we get Partey as a straight swap for Lacazette, will Guendouzi’s sale pay for a new forward to replace him? Maybe, but maybe not. Then you also mention how you still want Mustafi to go. To be replaced by who, as you don’t appear to rate any of Mari, Luiz and Holding either (I think I’ve seen you moan about them all). Upamecano would probably cost a fortune, and a damn site more than we’d get for Mustafi or Holding.

As our owner, I don’t think Stan will want to fund wholesale changes to the squad. That’s why I believe people should get used to not seeing a big turnaround in players before next season.

And that's what I meant. We have a lot more younger players with promise now. Blood them in faster.

If Nelson, Nketiah, Willock, Maitland-Niles and Smith Rowe are all first choice regulars next season I think we could be heading for a mid-table finish. Saka is miles ahead of them all.

I don't think any would be first choice but can be used usefully as squad members in a summer where transfer budgets are limited or nil and we need to keep complying with home-grown quotas.
As an aside, and in a 'normal' market how much do you think we'd get for the 5 players mentioned above. Because whilst the point of the academy is to provide top class players for the first team it is much more likely to produce good footballers who can be sold on and those fees used to sign better players. No reason those 5 couldn't raise a combined £100m given age and nationality. That's as long as we don't let their contracts run down

You seem very certain Haz.

We’ve had 50 repeats of Eddie’s challenge but I’ve only seen Vardy’s once in replay. Nonetheless, I think I take a different view.

https://twitter.com/rantsnbants/status/ ... 91361?s=12

Still sure Haz?

Never meant I was sure Vardy didn't mean to kick Mustafi, just that it's two very different situations. The Vardy one is trickier to judge, so I don't think the argument that the Nketiah red card was harsh because Vardy wasn't sent off holds up completely.

The Ref saw both challenges. He gave nothing for Vardy's and a yellow for Nketiah's. VAR than chose to get involved and Nketiah's was eventually elevated to Serious Foul Play - red card and a 3-match ban - because whilst there was no injury, it was a potentially dangerous tackle.

I would suggest there's clear a argument that Vardy's was much more serious foul play. The more I see those few frames, the clearer Vardy's intent becomes and the worse it looks. It was a downright vicious assault. What might have been the outcome if VAR had replayed it 50 times in the slowest of motion from every conceivable angle?

It wasn't a POTENTIALLY dangerous tackle - it WAS dangerous. His challenge resulted in an actual injury that could have been much worse than it was.

Too right DHD.

Just proves VAR isn’t the perfect solution to more correct decisions as has been touted by its developers and backers. The system should either be used consistently and replays looked at of every single incident, or not at all.

Last night was a perfect example of how an inconsistent approach by VAR can alter the result of a game, which is exactly what we had when we just relied on refs to call things as they saw them.

Plus ça change.

VAR is for the benefit of TV companies not the game. It provides constant content for Sky and BT. It works well for close offside calls that the linesman has missed. I'm not talking about the hairline nonsense but the regular ones where a linesman had a blocked view or the move was just too fast. The rest is just nonsense.

Your idea that Nelson, Willock, Smith Rowe, Nketiah and Maitland-Niles could together bring in £100m seems a reasonable estimate. However, with the squad as it is, how many can be sold? All teams need back up squad fillers and unless they can be replaced by others from the academy, Arsenal might need to keep them. Or at least some of them, even if it’s not all.

When VAR was bought in I thought the tag line was for it to correct clear and obvious errors. It obviously has done that many times and everyone is pretty happy with that - a case in point would be Aubameyang's goal at Man U which was at least 4 yards onside being over turn. But as you say, this constant debate over hairline offsides is nonsense. One of the first ones this season was Sterling given offside by I think it was something like 4-5cm. Great that the technology is capable but we're stil relying on a human to stop the tape at the exact moment the ball was played. The foot is in contact with the ball for more than a nano-second so it is impossible to judge. On that Sterling goal they worked out that if you worked out the time delay between each frame of tape against the speed Sterling was running at the time and an allowance for not knowing exactly when the ball has left the assisters foot there was a huge margin for error which could have easily meant Sterling was actually onside by a foot rather than offside by a few cm. And that's just offside.

Arsenal need to use that Tarkowski tackle last night as evidence in the Nketiah appeal they are making.

I think its imperative we have some form of European football next season.
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Disagree. One year with no Mid Week European games helped Klopp and Liverpool immensely a few seasons back..

Can't see it doing any good. These are rarely overturned. I think the only possibility would be if the ref said he made a mistake and that won't happen.

The threat of an additional one match ban is another thing that annoys me. It's like the teacher in school giving extra homework for backchat.

I would suggest it's a waste of time and an unnecessary distraction to even bother appealing. Although it's obviously a debatable point, there is a clear case for a red being appropriate and unfortunately for us that's what happened.

I would suggest it's a waste of time and an unnecessary distraction to even bother appealing. Although it's obviously a debatable point, there is a clear case for a red being appropriate and unfortunately for us that's what happened.

Thought Ndombeles tackle was worse than Eddies. Yellow only

Is Paul related to our Kieran?

Hee hee

We're rumoured to be after Malang Sarr, he's just left Nice on a free transfer. Left footed CB, only 21, over 100 appearances in the French Ligue 1.
As rumours go that sounds pretty believable in the current climate

Why is he a free agent at 21?

The obvious possibilities appear to be as follows. First, that he ran his contract down to leave on a free despite the club’s desire to keep him. Secondly, the club paid up his contract to get him off their books. Thirdly, the club didn’t offer him an extension to his last deal so were presumably willing to let him leave for nothing at the end of it.

To me, the first looks the most likely option.