That's where what your eyes see and what the stats show can be quite different. I wouldn't say he was 'mediocre', when he played well he was by far the best midfielder on the pitch but also had some sloppy games, but the stats show that he was one of the higher performing midfielders in Europe last year and better than many of the highly rated CM seemingly on the market for the biggest teams this summer.

Prem fixtures come out at 9am today.....if that is still exciting to anyone

First 6 fixtures of the new season. Really tough start again. It seems like we have played a couple of really big sides in our opening handful of fixtures for a number of years running now
14/08 - Brentford (A)
21/08 - Chelsea (H)
28/08 - Man City (A)
18/09 - Burnley (A)
11/09 - Norwich (H)
25/09 - Tottenham (H)

Top 6 sides we've had to play in the opening 6 fixtures for the past 4 seasons. Compare to Man U who don't play a top 6 side until they face Leicester in week 8.

18/19:
MCI (h)
CHE (a)

19/20:
LIV (a)
TOT (h)
UTD (a)

20/21:
LIV (a)
MCI (a)
UTD (a)

21/22:
CHE (h)
MCI (a)
TOT (h)

Looks like a tough start. Then I looked beyond that and kept seeing tough matches. Then I realised that we now have a lot of tough matches because we’re not very good right now.

I wish I was more confident that we're going to be back to 60,000 crowds and proper away fan presence. Seems like a pretty big leap from where we are now.

With only the Carabou Cup to distract us up to Christmas - and those 4 games needn't involve key players - there's no real excuse for non-performance. Well, apart from being a *%^@ team, of course. There's always that one.

We always get a tough start for some reason.

I thought he played well to be honest it’s just that he didn’t come across like the Kante type transformational midfielder. I’d like to see him for a second season with better players in the middle of the park. Also it was worth pointing out his dominant performance at Old Trafford where I hadn’t seen a player dominate the park for us like that since Patrick Vieira.

Feels like there’s more to come from him.

The ACN means we will miss our African players for Burnley at home and Spurs away I think. It seems like those are the only games missed because of the mini winter break window in the league

That’s worthy of a smiley.

To be honest I sometimes think it’s beneficial to have a tough start as it gets some difficult fixtures over and done with. In theory shouldn’t that make periods later in the season more comfortable? I can’t help wondering If it’s too easy to see ourselves as hard done by all the time?

Ornstein reporting we've rejected a £25m bid from Villa for Smith-Rowe. Probably a sign that they know they will lose Grealish, if they're buying Buendia and trying to sign Smith-Rowe. We should not sell him under any circumstances of course.

Also reports that Brighton have rejected a £40m bid from us for Ben White. Hopefully it doesn't spell the end of Saliba's career with us, but I do like White a lot as a player.

Tough start.....hmmm. If it's any consolation we're not the ones playing in any Euro comps, to be sandwiched in between those other tough games the clubs in the Euro comps do have. No freezing Thursday night's out in Belgrade.

Yep. We'll also enter the League Cup at the 2nd round stage instead of the 3rd round that all clubs in europe do

£40m rejected for Ben White
£25m bid from Villa for Smith-Rowe rejected.

The Villa bid is interesting. They must know that is a ridiculous bid. People can talk about whether we are a 'big' club or not but Villa bidding for a young english first team player from a bigger club for such a small amount - especially when they've just spent £40m on Buendia is just strange. If Arsenal made a bid like that (ie: £35m for Mason Mount) we'd be ridiculed - and have been in the past. "what are they smoking over there at The Emirates". I assume we'll react with more class publically but tell Villa to not bother coming back as this isn't a negotiation.

I think Villa are still on cloud 9 after seemingly 'beating' us to Buendia when they simply offered £10m more and agreed to a 10% sell on clause and want to try to underline their ambition to their fans by taking our place in the big club status. Or they've just very clearly shown their hand that they know Grealish is off.

Wow. This season is going to feel really weird after so long at the top table.

Imagine how it feels for those of us that started following the club seriously in 1995.

With the home grown quota - or foreign limit - whichever way you prefer to look at it there really is the need for any top club to have the very best english players in their squad - otherwise you are carrying too many passengers.
This is a lot easier for mega rich clubs because these players come at a premium. But the academies of the top clubs are producing excellent young english players as well.

When you look at the current England squad and identify those young players not currently at a big club the list is: (I include the two Dortmund lads on the basis big english teams will want to sign them)
Johnstone
White
Bellingham
Phillips
Rice
Calvert-Lewin
Grealish
Sancho

No doubt that those 8 are very real targets for the big 6, and I'd expect most of them to end up at a big 6 club in the next year or two.

Good point, and sadly you have to overpay to get English players. I think a deal for White could possibly be reached at around £45m which is too much for his current ability, but at least it's better than £80m for Maguire...

25 mil for Emile Smith Rowe, what a joke

So apparently we’ve bid £40m for White and at the same time are in the process of selling Mavropanos to Stuttgart for £7m.

Now, Mavropanos was one of the most promising young defenders in the Bundesliga last season, a regular starter for a relatively high profile club, getting plaudits for his performances and just capped for Greece.

Why are we asking a measly £7m. I’d expect to pay that for a young defender in the English League Two or Ligue 2 in France.

Ramsey nearly scored. Should have done better.

Good open match between Turkey & Wales. Turkey Captain Burak nearly scored.

Followed up by missing a sitter.

I like the movement from the Turkish players. Always moving the ball forward with one touch football.

I think one thing that's being overlooked with Mavropanos is his injury record. By all accounts he was excellent for Stuttgart when he played, but he was once again hampered by injuries and only started 19 of 34 league games. Since his breakthrough season in Greece he has only played 56 games in 4 seasons, which isn't a whole lot - just 14 games per season, and a lot of that is down to him being injured.

If an English team was in for him we'd probably get £10m or more, but clubs in Europe are strapped for cash at the moment so I don't expect to get much more than the quoted £7m.

Followed by scoring a sitter.

And now he's scored with a perfectly timed run and a neat finish.

And Ramsey scores on the third attempt! Always loved him as a player, and this is one of the reasons - no matter how many times he misses he never lets his head down and always keeps trying.

Ramsey scores

I've said the same thing many times. Of course we don't know exactly what the 'asking prices' really are, but why are our asking prices reported so often consistently lower (or reasonable) than any other club.

I'm hearing we're interested in Ramsdale the Sheff Utd GK. The rumours say £20m but Sheff Utd bosses want £40m because of his england call up. Ramsdale has had back to back relegations and I didn't see anything in the last two seasons that suggests he's any more than a £10m GK. He's only in the England squad because of injuries to Pope and Henderson.

If the interested club is a prem club then it seems fair game to set the price sky high. So Nketiah has 3 english clubs after him, why aren't we saying it is £25m to start the bidding? Brewster and Solanke went for that sort of price and Nketiah has a better record than both at club and international level.

Chris Wheatley (football Journalist )on twitter
Told that Arsenal have made offers for four players in the past week.

They're confident of wrapping up two of those deals soon - believed to be Ben White and Albert Sambi Lokonga.

Xhaka, Mavropanos & Guendouzi leaving, with Eddie Nketiah also for sale.

Bale missed his penalty. Shockingly poor penalty.

Yeah, a lot of signs pointing to us going big this summer. Need to get the deals over the line of course, but encouraging start to the summer.

Despite the early misses, Ramsey is playing a blinder

He is indeed (or at least he was until he went off).

Most entertaining game of the tournament so far.

Referee is pretty useless and officious.

Cracking finish to a cracking game.

God, who was the co-commentator on BBC1? What an annoying prat!

Bale is fantastic. Man of the match.
Worth staying up to watch. Fast moving football.

Is that tongue in cheek Bernard and you do know who it is? Robbie Savage, a prat at the best of times, adds nothing insightful and is even worse when he commentates on Wales