Man City looking to get David Luiz on loan - ex Villa guy now at Juve. We've been linked heavily with Luiz - maybe that was Edu pushing for him rather than Arteta, not a specific area we need strengthening but if the loan is an option it wouldn't hurt us.

I can also see both sides of the striker signing battle.
Arsenal should correctly see our striker signing as a crucial piece that could push us to major trophies, they can't afford to get it wrong, but they also can't afford to do nothing. If Sesko or Gyökeres or Isak have been identified as The ONE but there is no chance of any of them moving in January then what do the club do, do you go and sign a lower target knowing that it may scupper your chances of getting your No.1 target in the summer or do you drop even further down the list and look for loan signings only? Or do you go in to your list of young raw strikers who are a massive gamble if they will offer anything right now but wouldn't necessarily damage the chance of getting your No.1 in the summer.

From everything I've read I would predict that Isak would be the dream signing but the club probably realise that its a nigh on impossible transfer to do at any point soon, so Sesko is the one they've set their sights on.

I think the winger situation with Nico Williams and the def mid situation with Zubimendi are also very similar. We were willing to wait for our top target and gamble that the team that scored 91 goals last season could do so again this season

Perhaps when people these days refer to football history they really mean since The Premier League was founded? In that respect Amorim is probably right. Before this week I wonder if he and his team knew who Denis Law was?

edit: the top of this should have said DOUGLAS Luiz not David...

Leipzig apparently want £67m for Sesko. We were ready to pay his release clause in the summer of £55m, he signed a new deal which apparently got rid of the release clause but he had a 'gentleman's agreement' (whatever that is worth) that certain offers would be entertained.
If its £67m then that really is the going rate for very good young strikers - cheaper than Solanke, Hojland, Muani. We'd probably be paying a slight premium for getting him in January rather than the summer - but also he may have many more clubs wanting to buy him in the summer but can't do it now. What if he bangs 20 goals in the second half of the season he'll cost a lot more. If we've done all our homework and decided he's the one then you pay the £67m now.

Ben Jacobs (decent journalist not some in the know fan account) says Wolves would only consider selling Cunha for a silly offer this window - the figure is put at £80m. That is indeed silly. But I really get the appeal of Cunha. He's a profile we don't have in the squad. Able to play multiple positions but a real direct central runner, creator and goalscorer.
Considering Ødegaard's injury and his real lack of form since the injury we must consider alternatives in our squad to him because currently far too much of the creative burden lands on him and Saka alone - the balance is too far off. Our full backs don't really create (although I think MLS could change this - and think White is underrated in this respect maybe) and then we have 2 midfielders who aren't really creative types - and then our collection of forwards are more types who get on the end of moves rather than thread the needle.

https://x.com/Carra23/status/1881429651119357979

I think Carragher has some very bias takes on football but when he does these segments on monday night football and he's had time (or help!) he does make some decent points. No one in our team taking up those little pockets for quick one touch exchanges. I wonder whether Ødegaard is really the No. 10 playmaker or whether he's better as a deeper dictator of the play - maybe its just the loss of combinations with Saka. Also I wonder whether a defensive mid who really excels at snapping passes in to the feet of players in pockets and the striker will help (Zubimendi?), and finally a striker who doesn't drift in to wide positions but can in these sorts of situations just come towards the play by 5 yards to take up those pockets of space and either go one touch, or take it on the half turn - I don't know if this is Sesko but it is definitely Isak.
They showed a graphic that last season Ødegaard only had 1/4 of his touches on the flanks (assume they divide the pitch vertically in 3rds for this purpose) but this season it is 1/3 of his touches on the flanks

but then on the other hand how long do you want VAR deliberating ?

Sometimes [ not sure whether it is the soccer or the Aussie rugby league ] VAR goes back and forth checking this angle . that angle , another angle back to the first ......... and everyone is thinking FFS get on with bl***dy the game .

The ref might have had his view obscured ; hence he didn't call it ....you're saying " VAR shouldn't get involved" but isn't that exactly what the introduction of VAR was intended to do ?

While Arse fans may compile a comprehensive list of wrong decisions I'm sure fans of other clubs could do similar .

Officials grow up supporting a certain club and maybe have a slight bias at times but to claim Arsenal gets more sh***t decisions than other clubs ... I think is fanciful

Okay this is where I should abandon my usual cool calm demeanour ; have a Chernobyl type meltdown ; tell the crusty bed wetting Greek philosopher to go ***&&%%%$$ himself

..... claim everyone is picking on me ; threaten to flounce off and never darken the Halls of Gleiber again .

Problem is ; that is exactly word for word what the wife said .

Seems I've been pronouncing it wrong all this time.

For goals and penalties it is a price worth paying. There are certain decisions that are not subjective at all: whether an attacker handled before a goal was scored, offsides, and ball out of play. If an onfield decision about one of those is overturned, the evidence can't be open to debate.

They can't be getting those wrong, because when there is contrary evidence that everyone can see, it simply undermines the credibility of officiating and exposes them to suspicion.

We simply have to get used to deferring our celebrations for a minute. Yes, the VAR check does detract from the joy of the moment, but I don't think that is because of how long it takes.

He's only fourth in terms of big chances for Arsenal created (6), behind Trossard (8), Rice (12) and Saka (19).

Partly that is because of Saka and Rice taking our set pieces. However, Ødegaard set piece delivery hasn't been up to scratch (let alone Saka's quality) either, which is not what one would expect.

Same here ; my old hat bought in Port Hedland 1999 is in a real bad state ; crown has a 120 mm rip stuck with tape , brim has lost its stiffness .

Everyone in Western Australia wears them ; wish I'd bought three

This Akubra Cattleman retails for about $320 ... so pretty stoked with the $3 price tag if I can get the SOB to fit

Think about the value, not the price. Take Melania yesterday. Her hat probably cost a small fortune but was worth every penny. She was able to hide under it for the entire duration of that awful inauguration ceremony, and when the big orange oaf swooped in for a smooch, it repelled him. Worth its weight in gold.

I was getting so frustrated with his set pieces, they loop in rather than the lower flatter trajectory that Rice and Saka get on them. Nwaneri was taking them ahead of him when he was in the team. I think I’d like to see Rice take all the attacking free kicks now and even Trossard to put left footed corners in

With Saka out, Rice is by far the best ball striker in the team and arguably the best ball carrier. He's a fantastic player and I still think we are not getting the best out of him with our slow buildup style.

You're right Dec. Trump emits too much in the ultra-orange electomagnetic spectrum to face hatless. Given the state of my hat, I was forced to give the whole thing a swerve.

It's somewhat frustrating to see us struggling squad wise, largely because we are actually being honest and not cheating FFP.

The wages and fees are artificially inflated because so much financial doping has been done, and honest clubs like us are then paying the price for others inflating the market.

Look at City, we all know what they have done and are doing to cheat FFP.

Chelsea are a disgrace, and frankly the PL is feeble in allowing them to continue to cheat by selling a hotel and selling their ladies team to their holding company. Plus the way Abrahmovich ploughed millions in and then the debt just got magically written off when he sold the club to the fat corrupt Americans......

The financial rules are a shambles and the richest and most corrupt will always find a way to wriggle out of a fair competition.

Nwaneri and Calafiori back in full training.

Cunha situation is being reported as him agreeing terms on a new deal with Wolves but not yet signing it, and that he’s also agree terms with us and is now holding out as he hopes to join us.
Who knows what’s going on but he’s certainly a talented player who will improve us

https://x.com/afcstuff/status/188174208 ... -j6VVZXEoA

Valid question to Arteta. But I can’t recall Pep being quizzed like this over his team selection when City don’t win.

Arteta knows his players better than anyone and he may decide some players load is too high but the options are to use Kiwior at CB or Zinchenko at LB and move MLS to full back (I think he’d be fine there)

You can be forgiven for making such a boob...

Talking of hats it was funny to see Trump unable to kiss his Mrs. because of the shape of her titfer.

RIP Garth 'Honey Boy' Hudson the last member of The Band - all gone now but so much left behind.
https://youtu.be/NKu0OTDvQ-w

Good news if true. He's a cracking player.

You are not wrong ; I gave it [ the inauguration ] about forty seconds then my stomach started to heave ;

but I wouldn't single out Trump alone ; the Clintons , Bushes , Obamas , Bidens , Pelosi ...all of the US elites are a corrupt steaming pile of **&&%$@**

" and we are going to change the name of Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America " ..... sigh ...." what a beautiful name "

..... that's when I nearly lost my comfrey / dandelion / chickweed smoothie all over the computer keyboard .

Back from a stag doo in Tenerife with 26 Scot’s and few Irishman. I’m broken and will never be the same again. I recall vaguely in the middle of the carnage Arsenal blew a 2 goal lead and might have got robbed again. If anyone can confirm it would be handy

On ole Donny I watched the inauguration and executive order charade in full whilst recovering and whilst I don’t like the guy and some of the policies are utterly mental I can see why the Americans voted for him. I mean the WHO thing for example ? How can china contribute less than the UK and US. I mean literally a quarter of the contribution. Thats nuts with their amount of people. Now dont get me wrong it’s a disaster and the lack of funding could end up killing people in Africa where they get weird viruses like Ebola. Defending women from gender ideology extremism. You can hardly say that’s a bad cause right? I know some of this stuff is just aimed at his base but it doesn’t mean it’s wrong all the time.

Ignoring some of the more loopy stuff like the Gulf of Mexico thing I can see why so many people would go down that route. There’s a lot of poor people in the US.

So what this is, is Pep telling the press that Ake’s good form earns a recall and also that the formation he picked in the previous game, a 3-1 win over Villa with just 3 natural defenders in the line ups, is going to be rolled out again. I don’t see any challenge or criticism to this from the press - why would they when Pep could just point to him having won a game with it. Completely different situation.

Billionaire football owners who don’t care about losing money because they are in football for bigger reasons than to win trophies may be hampered by FFP, although there are some rather gaping loop holes around that as we’ve seen with City’s dodgy sponsorship, Chelsea selling a hotel and women’s team to themselves and Newcastle paying £15m for a single 5p share….but the multi club ownership model is a huge cheat mode for these owners. Buy up 4-5 other clubs in europe and then hoover up absolutely shed loads of promising young players - paying decent money but not extortionate money because these players are potential only - all of that money can go on the balance sheet of your sister club - then if any of them go on to become great players you sign them for your main club at an absolute knock down rate that none of your competitors would be able to.

Timber has been incredibly robust this season. To play 28 times after coming back from an ACL is just not normal. You’d typically get a number of minor niggles in other parts of your body as your body adjusts and compensates for the knee. It would never have been the plan for him to have to play so many games consistently, injuries has meant he has to. Every time he steps on the pitch I’m fearing a break down for him but he’s ploughed on.

We have a right as fans to criticised performances but I can’t criticise the effort of the team. I can’t think of a time they’ve given up, or not pushed every part of themselves in every game. They just desperately need some help now

Yeah, but the global system as a whole is biased strongly toward the US and Europe.

For example, France and the UK have seats on the security council but India (with a billion people) and the whole of Africa and South America do not.

IMF voting shares: China has 6% despite having 17% of the world population. The US has 17% despite have 4% of the world population.

US benefits hugely by having dollar role as the international currency. Trump's policies are going to seriously weaken the stability of the dollar and drive people towards crypto and another currencies.

America isn't powerful enough any more to cherry-pick which parts of the international order it want to change so as to benefit itself. The BRICS will start to become a serious alternative to the Washington institutions if the yank continue to act with such arrogance.

Trump is either just playing to his base, or is an idiot, or has an inkling but is enjoying throwing his weight around and lining the pockets of his buddies. Probably all three.

Question: Have you ever seen your wife and Socrates in the same chat room?? Have you ever seen Soc at all?? Who knows what your wife is posting in the dead of night…

Arteta has never been criticised over team selection. ALL managers get quizzed when their team loses.

Important to win tonight but we could also go with getting a few goals to boost our goal difference, it’s good at the moment but there are lots of teams bunched on the same points and goal difference could easily decide who is in or out of the top 8 as it currently does in the table

If we fail to make top 8 with the 2 remaining games then that would be a total collapse by the team. I know you don’t like the words ‘ bottle it’ but that’s what it would be.

Sesko scores for Leipzig v Sporting. Leipzig are already eliminated from the CL for this season

I agree, it can be called ‘bottling it’ if that’s genuinely what it is, but I just think too many defeats for many teams are put squarely down to mentality.
It also seems that if you win something at one time then you can’t be accused of ever ‘bottling’ anything in the future

Sesko on now tnt4 alteady scored 1 goal liepzig beating Sporting 1-0

Gyokores playing for sporting too.

Raya, timber, Kiwior, Gabriel. Zinchenko, Jorginho, rice, Ødegaard, Sterling, Havertz, martinelli

No MLS in the squad, must have joined the countless players who pick up a knock and can’t play the next game. Always injuries this season