Apologies Decaf. My intention certainly wasn't to distort your post. I agree that it would be entirely different had we brought in another striker. The thing is though, we didn't and we are now down to a squad that is more than threadbare. For me, it is not a good sign that the manager excludes players to the extent that they leave the club.

I also grow weary of all this stuff about time-keeping, discipline etc. We are talking about adults. I've known people who were quite brilliant at what they do, but were regularly late. It's not really a huge deal.

Interesting thing about that list is that four players who scored some 500 goals between them for Arsenal never got a full international cap - Brain, Lishman, Lambert and Lewis.

I didn’t know Brain, Lishman, Lambert and Lewis never won a cap. But if they didn’t it presumably offers even more support to the idea that it’s now much easier to win an England cap than it was. I knew Simpson and Armstrong didn’t as they were in my time. Both were outstanding players.

Do you think there is Any truth in the story in the Times that Arsenal actually paid Aubameyang 7mil to leave?

It’s an amount that’s repeated in various reports, not just the Times. My natural reaction is to take seriously stuff in the traditional broadsheets (Times, Telegraph, Guardian, Independent) more than what I’ve seen called the gutter press (Sun, Mirror, Star). But that doesn’t mean everything in the broadsheets is right and everything in the gutter press is wrong.

I’d be surprised if Arsenal didn’t pay Aubameyang something to go. They’re saving a lot on his wages (if he was on £300k a week that’s £15.6m a year) and with him excluded from Arsenal’s team, his salary was dead money. Aubameyang’s agents would know that and I’m sure would be wanting some sort of pay off for him to terminate his contract. £7m sounds as realistic as any other figure.

Yes it does seem remarkable, but of course there were far fewer internationals when those guys were playing and no substitutions. Of the 1028 games played by England since 1872, well over half have taken place in the last fifty years - many competitions and friendlies.

Both Armstrong and Simpson were unlucky to play in an era when there was a lot of talented men in their positions. Geordie had the energy and selfless game that Alf Ramsey must have admired, but he preferred men who were not traditional toes-on-chalk wingers, such as Alan Ball and Martin Peters. When he did pick wingers he used guys like Connolly, Paine, Callaghan, Thompson, Tambling, Hinton and Summerbee. To my mind Geordie was better than all of them, save Summerbee.

I have no such qualms. :) Henry was our best player ever.

My main worry is that if the re-building takes too long and we're not competing for trophies then our best players will leave and we'll be stuck in a perpetual refresh cycle.

That’s such a valid point. I’ve mentioned the case of Saka. His contract apparently expires in 2024, a little over two years away. He’s going to have loads of big clubs with large wallets hovering around him. If he thinks he has more chance of success on the pitch with them, might he be tempted to go? Who knows, but if Saka does moves on in the next couple of years, I think it could put Arsenal’s project back years.

That’s one of the reasons why I thought getting fourth place was so important as well as achievable this season.

Situation with Aubameyang has to be so very bad for us to let him go despite our desperate need for a striker. It will be an interesting read when details finally come out.

Ok - Next time you see a link and can't open it, can you quote the post then draw my attention to it please ?

I suspect it might be your web browser not able to see the truncated links the forum creates for long links.

When it says 'copy', you should be able to copy the link then paste it into a browser.

Also, did you say that was an iPhone with Safari ?

So the club is really saying we have saved 22mil by getting rid of him. Sounds great, however lets interrogate that statement a little further.

If he'd gone to the gulf team with a payment of 8mill by them (and lets assume the 7million payout) as was suggested then we would be in a lot better position but lets look at the Barca deal.

Now this saving presumes that we don't replace him at all. Say we replace him by buying a 30mill player on a three year contract : one year(next year) costs us 10million in sign on fees and say he is on 100k per week, then add 5.2million. So you might say we are still ahead by 7 million. But do you get a replacement at that cost and on those wages : who is capable of being one of two strikers who will succeed at this level.

The club spin is just that. Was I sick of Aubameyang - yes. Will we get a striker that Arteta seems to want : someone who scores regularly from our small number of clear chances and drops back into midfield like Lacazette to assist. I look forward to identifying him.

Saka was definitely one of the ones I was thinking of as an at risk target for other clubs. Especially given that he's probably still on quite low wages given his age.

I hadn't actually thought about 4th that much because at the start of the year I didn't think we'd be there this season. But I think you're right that getting 4th is now becoming vital to improving our prospects in the market. We can't live on a big club reputation forever.

No problem, Dec. I was just wondering if Aubameyang's happy go lucky attitude was something that developed recently, or if he as always been like that but it was found to be tolerable when he was playing well.

Indeed. We seemed always to be 'rebuilding' in the mid- to late-Wenger years. This when we were qualifying every year for CL, but never quite making the investment in the right players that was needed to kick on. CL qualification would be wonderful, but it will only be meaningful if we have a proper strategy to build on it.

If Rupert says it's true, that's good enough for me.

I love that my club is seen as a family, home to all types of players. Becks could have trained with any club in London but he chose us. It's not just the facilities its how we do things.

Wilshere, like a lot of every day folks, sometimes had to learn where home is by leaving.

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=36485 ... aggr_v_ids[0]=364852202120260&notif_id=1643865640871565&notif_t=watch_follower_video&ref=notif

I don’t think that Jack chose to leave. It was circumstances and injuries (and a loan period) that caused that.

Yeah, his injuries. Still the gist is the club is seen as 'home' to many players. Even if their career didn't go as well as expected. I would guess Anelka, Petit, van Persie, and others with very few exceptions (Nasri, AOC) would say that their happiest moments as a pro was with us.

Our postponed home game against Wolves has been rescheduled for Feb 24th, which isn't bad. Five days after our home game against Brentford, and ten days before we play Watford away.

It's a little bit worse for Wolves; they have one day less rest before the game, and play West Ham three days later.

I really enjoyed that Wilshere interview, AG - thanks for posting it. Still, regarding your comment, depending on how far back you go, I can think of a few (hundred) exceptions: Gnabry, Gallas, Bennacer, Willian, Čech, Silvestre, Suarez D., Mart Poom ...

Martinelli is being touted as the possible Striker for us. I would welcome this. Believe he will do well there.

My concern is that we are asking too much of him. Maybe we will be forced into this but I would prefer for him to progress by learning the left side role.

He might surprise us with his abilities. Looking at the glass, half-full (perhaps misplaced optimism )
That said, didn't like that we did not get anyone in to strengthen the squad

Aubameyang's interview whebit of a lack of re he said he 'only had a problem with Arteta' shows a lack of self awareness. As far as I'm aware Aubameyang has had indiscipline problems virtually everywhere he has played and has fallen out with most coaches he's player under. He even had discipline problems when he was at AFCON when he'd been sidelined by Arsenal for discipline problems.
I'm not suggesting Arteta gets every call right but a good point I saw yesterday was however inexperienced Arteta is he spent 3 years right at the heart of what truly elite looks like, and alongside one of the most discipline focused managers in the world. Anyone recall the story Henry said that Pep subbed him at half time even though he had scored because Henry was wandering off his position that Pep had prescribed to him.

If Arteta is bringing in and demanding a culture of ultra professionalism, respect, discipline, commitment and work ethic then that absolutely has to be a good thing.

I’m not disagreeing with you but there are levels to this issue. I’m not convinced it would be healthy to completely kill any chance of independent thought or autonomous decision making in players. Otherwise you might as well have a bunch of yes men or robots in the team.

His personality seems to be 'happy go lucky', 'don't take things so serious' and perhaps a little bit of immaturity and lack of judgement mixed in.

I'm curious to know if his issues with past managers were the same issues he had with Arteta. He and Lacazette seemed to be buds but seem opposite in how they approach the game. Lacazette seems far more focused and possibly more hardworking in training and a better professional is my guess.

Anyway, I like Aubameyang, wish him well, and its a shame he couldn't eke out a career of sorts with us longer.

With the huge amounts stripped out of the wage bill I looked up our highest earners list and 4 of the top 7 have question marks on their future.
Lacazette, Pépé, Xhaka, Leno - their combined salaries are £520k per week.
Aubameyang's salary pays the wages of 3 new players in the summer with the current wage structure. Or leaves plenty of change after sorting new contracts for Saka, Martinelli and Saliba - crucial we tie these 3 down this summer.
The summer after that you want to be looking after Ramsdale, Ødegaard, Partey, Tomiyasu, gabriel and Tavares whose deals expire in 2025

Certainly agree on that, not to keep bring Pep + Henry back in to the conversation but I remember Henry saying Pépé had a very structured way of moving the ball forward UNTILL it got to the final 3rd. 'I get the ball to you in the final 3rd, and then you score the goal' Creative freedom in the final 3rd has to happen, balancing that with a more structured approach moving the ball from back to front would seem sensible

A few more links to this Djed Spence kid who played so well against us at RB in the Cup. Forest play Leicester at home in the next round live on terrestrial tv in the UK so another chance to see how good he is.
Fee is rumoured to be £10m, which for a young english RB who can be a good back up to Tomiyasu whilst offering something a bit different would be a good deal......IF we consider him to be good enough

Spence is actually on Middlesbrough’s books. He’s on loan at Forest. Lots of rumours that Tottenham want him as well. Considering Arsenal already have the very impressive Tomiyasu as the first choice right back, if Spence would walk into Tottenham’s first team it wouldn’t shock me if he’d rather go there than start off as a squad back up at Arsenal?

Tonights FA Cup game on Sky is Man Utd v Middlesboro. Worth a watch as Balogun might get a game.

My mistake, it's on ITV and he starts.

Ooops Man U knocked out of the Fa Cup by Boro on pens

Omari Hutchinson with another stunning goal for the U23 tonight. He could find himself on the bench for the first team in the run in. Left footed winger who plays wide right, wears 7 and likes dribbling and driving infield and shooting. Sounds like Saka. He’s very talented.
Salah Edine also scored a great goal

Pleased about that, but what a terrible decision to let Boro's goal stand - inexplicable.

Worth watching the highlights: Our man had a few good moments going forward, Ronaldo missed a penalty in normal time and they missed some easy chances. Its a feeling our man won't get too often in his career - being in a side that wins at Man U. They put out a good team.

Good ol' VAR eh ?

Premier League without VAR: Arsenal in Champions League places; Everton soar to safety

https://www.espn.com.au/football/englis ... -to-safety

"But ESPN can reveal that without the decisions of the VAR, Arsenal would already be sitting pretty in fourth spot and dreaming of that place back among Europe's elite."