Some serious rumblings that we're working on a loan deal for Coutinho where Barcelona will pay some of his wages. Have to say I'm all for it under those conditions, it seems like a good way to make us more competitive in the short term while making sure most of our budget is saved for signings that are a better fit for our long term plans. I know fans generally look down on loaning in players, but again we have to be pragmatic this summer.

https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soccer/der-spiegel-report-casts-doubt-over-man-city-s-cas-appeal-1.4318118

Arsenal legend Cesc Fabregas
https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football ... d-22447008

It is all broken. People will delve in to emails and contract and football law and FFP intricacies but the reality is if we all take a step back and look at what has been done. You have the company owned by the owner of a football club sponsoring that football club for huge amounts of money, more than their status and more than pretty much any of the huge marketing machine football clubs in the world.

If Arsenal broke off their deal with Emirates and instead put KSE on the front of the shirt and named the stadium The KSE stadium and were paid 5 or 6 times whatever Emirates had been paying you'd just look at it and say 'well clearly the owner is just pumping in massive amounts of money in to the club and FFP was set up to stop that happening'

It is all so pointless

That 'needs it more' is an understatement in and of itself. Won't bother elaborating here.

He has to be diplomatic.

American, I did accept in my earlier post that Dein can be seen as introducing Kroenke to Arsenal. I’m sure I did say that he presumably saw him as a way of Arsenal competing with Chelsea under Abramovich. As I also suggested this was a silly decision making me give that tongue in cheek observation that he must have stuck a pin in the Forbes’ Rich lList of multi-billionaires with him not doing adequate research on whose name the pin struck.

But, and as I also implied earlier it’s a very big but, it was not Dein who sold the club to Kroenke to give him majority control of the club. The major blame for that, I believe, should firmly be attached to Fiszman who apparently at the time basically dominated Bracewell-Smith who he also told (a word such as ‘convinced’ may be preferred by some) to sell, a decision she apparently now regrets.

So the main blame that Kroenke owns Arsenal in my view should be attached to Fiszman who basically drove the selling of the club to him, rather than Dein who introduced Stan to it. Think of the example I gave earlier. Do you blame a goal conceded on a defender who made an awful error to present an easy chance to an opposition forward, or do you blame a forward who initially lost possession up the other end of the pitch? The general principle looks fairly similar to me.

By blaming Dein, you seem to want to blame the forward up the other end of the pitch. I would suggest it’s more sensible to lay the primary blame on the defender. If in one sentence the choice for attaching blame is between Dein for introducing Kroenke to Arsenal, or Fiszman for driving the sale of it to him, for me the primary blame should definitely be attached to Fiszman.

Arsenal apparently demanding £8m for Balogun. Brentford bid £5m for him in January

Özil is in Turkey.

Have you ever seen him Rich? I haven’t. Is he any good, or at least as good as he’s supposed to be? He’s 19 and not played a single minute for the first team, even in the League Cup when he’d have been 18. Nketiah, AMN, Emile Smith Rowe and Nelson, who arguably fall short of top quality as some have suggested any or all should be sold, all made their debuts at 18. Saka, who is surely even better and nobody had suggested selling, made his debut at 17. Might that say something?

I admit I don’t know because I haven’t seen him. So I need advice about him.

No Guendouzi for FAC final. Özil is in Turkey.

Hmmn

Woke up today with a feeling we might win this one for some reason. Once more into the breach

Good luck guys

Sorting out a transfer (hopefully) or some sort of break or holiday?