I'm not sure about Fabregas, but I think Van Persie did. He injured himself scoring a late equaliser against United (83rd minute) in 2007, but kept playing with a broken bone in his foot. This was in January and I think he might have been out for the rest of the season - or most of it.

https://c.newsnow.co.uk/A/1103914978?-1 ... entral_top

Get well soon Kola

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football ... s-25452910

Controversy always follows a controversial mouth. Not sure whether to admire him for always speaking the truth. Or wish he would think before he speaks.

I remember van Persie now you mention it.

This was Cesc - http://en.espn.co.uk/football/sport/story/15572.html

Conducting my duties as an unofficial, unauthorized (and most would say unwanted) scout for The Arsenal. I think I nicked one right under Edu's nose.

I give you Everton Ribeiro

Ah, I'd forgotten that one, John. We certainly had excellent luck with injuries during that era.

The video seems far more violent in the tackling than I remembered it. What I do recall was the gaping hole that Giggs missed. Also, didn't realize just how much of a cheating SOB RVN is. One of the best finishers I've ever seen, he's one of 3 players I'll rate as the best in and around the 6 yard box and even the 18 yard box (Fowler and possibly Sherringscum). Dirty as the mind of a 13 year old with a Penthouse magazine.

But you know what? And although it wouldn't ever happen both by Arsenal, Arsenal fans, Arsenal players at the time, RVN himself, when he was no longer wanted by Man Utd, we could have used him. I feel dirty saying that but we could have.

I recall we were very weak upfront using Jeffers. And I vividly recall Edu. Man Utd were at full strength and no one would have predicted that scoreline. I just knew before the game we'd lose after seeing the team sheets.

The football gods smiled kindly that day.

I read somewhere Martinelli isn't happy and wants to leave. I really, really hope this isn't so. I hope we don't release yet another player with great upside and they go somehwere else and shines (Gnabry, even though its said it wasn't totally our fault).

Sorry, AG, that's nonsense about the football gods smiling kindly that day. We won that match easily - 'at a canter', according to The Guardian. During that era, we didn't need anyone smiling kindly upon us.

Yes we did win that game easily. One of the few occasions when playing at old Trafford when we looked comfortable.

When looking at that nostalgic clip 2 things stood out.

Horseface leaves it on Lauren and a blatant red the ref ignored and played on. *%^@ me the refs let united take the mickey in those days.

Vieira then retaliates and is booked. Utterly ridiculous but what a warrior vieira was he literally wouldn’t let us be outmuscled in these games. We really miss a character like him in midfield

With that injury and his contract expiring at the end of the season, one has to assume Kolasinac has played his last game for Arsenal. Interesting that the contracts of Lacazette, Nketiah and Elneny also expire next summer.

My guess is they’ll all be made available for a transfer in January to try and get at least something for them. Albeit I’ve read Lacazette would prefer to leave on a free transfer next summer, even if that means signing a pre-contract agreement with someone in January. Rumours are also circulating that the club will look to sell Pépé. Wouldn’t surprise me.

Disappointing that the Arsenal Women dropped their first league points this season, and only got a draw from getting a late equaliser away to Tottenham.

I don’t see what he’s done wrong really. An equivalent would be if an England game was being played at the Emirates instead of Wembley and Harry Kane said he’d rather the England match was played at Wembley. I’d fully expect Kane to, and understand why he would rather the game be played at Wembley if he said it. That’s all this case was.

Seems a bit of a fuss over nothing really, and the article appears little more than yet another example of clickbait.

Arsenal captain Aubameyang reveals failed Tottenham move

https://www.goal.com/en-au/news/arsenal ... 8e24a980dc

*A bit click baity I know ...

Gidday Zed .... Nah we are such hard arses , we only acknowledge quakes of above 7 ..... our town is built in a volcanic basin called a caldera so minor shakes like that one are a fairly common occurrence .

.
Bored with nothing to focus on last night I watched compilations of our new players ..... Mama Mia .... Nuno Tavares has got some serious tow he'd beat a Porsche over twenty yards .

.
Bad weekend for the poxy little country sports wise ; cricketers got rolled by those %$##@**@ Aussies ....... they do have us by the gonads in that sport

...... then to make matters worse those bloody annoying "advance of the termites " Irish dealt to the All Blacks .

Well done Ireland from the fragments I saw they gave NZ a real tune up .

Only Monday and I'm already nervous about the Liverpool match. I don't think a loss would be the end of the world. 'How' we lose, if we do lose, is what I'd be looking at. We are capable of a draw. A win would be totally out of the blue, but one never knows. If we score, I'll consider that an accomplishment, if we score twice it would be great.

Arsenal is always a big game for them, no matter what form we are in. So, we're not going to have them looking past us to a bigger game as sometimes happen in sports.

Lacazette will be interesting if a decent offer comes in January. It's obviously our last chance to get some money for him so the club will have to weigh up whether the money is worth more than 6 more months of Lacazette.
For example, I'd turn down something like £5-7m because having him in the squad to help us push for Europe is worth more than that. £20m would be a lot harder to turn down though!

Quite a bit of striker stuff to sort out in Jan. Aubameyang is at the African Nations Cup, Lacazette and Nketiah are in their final 6 months and Martinelli and Balogun might be looking for loans - and if we do do some business with the final 4 we might even look to bring a player in.

I find it hard to imagine anyone offering more than a few million for Lacazette, but 20 million would be quite tempting! I wonder what the record fee is for a player in the last six months of his contract.

I agree mcquilkie. To say £20m would be quite tempting must be the understatement of the year. Like you I don’t think we’d get an offer of more than a few million, without defining a few million. But if it is £5-£7m the decision will have to be made whether Lacazette might make a critical difference to us finishing fourth. If he does, it would make losing that worthwhile.

For me signing a new forward of sufficient quality from somewhere should be Edu and Arteta’s biggest priority in team building. Lacazette and Nketiah will presumably be off for smallish fees in January or nothing next summer. Aubameyang will be 32 next season and we’ve arguably already seen may be past his peak. Balogun, as Rich said, would possibly like to go on loan and Martinelli may not be a natural central striker. I can’t see a bigger priority than a new forward. Indeed I can’t see another priority that even comes remotely close.

A few rumours that Ramsdale, Saka and Emile Smith Rowe all might start for England tonight. I wonder when the last time two Arsenal players made their debut for England in the same game was?

I think the area that comes close might be central midfield. Partey, Xhaka, Lokonga, AMN, Elneny. We know Elneny is on a free at the end of the season and I don't think AMN and Xhaka's futures are 100% certain that they will be with us next season. But yes, a glut of centre forward options could shrink quite rapidly soon.

Lower down the 'needs' list will be a new GK soon as I dont think Leno will want to hang around if he knows he's 2nd choice to Ramsdale. I also think a back up RB for Tomiyasu but that depends on moving some players on for sure. I also think a natural wide left player could be on the shopping list. Saka and Pépé prefer the right, Emile Smith Rowe drifts centrally and Martinelli doesn't seem quite ready to start left-wing regularly.

Don’t forget Ødegaard can play central midfield. I’ll be astonished if Xhaka isn’t around next season. He’s only signed a new contract recently, after all. It expires in 2024, two and a half seasons away, with the option of another year to 2025. That’s three and a half seasons away and knowing how Arteta loves him I can see that extra year being taken. I believe AMN’s contract expiry is even further away, in 2026. Hence when and if AMN goes should primarily be down to Arsenal.

If I’m right that makes the longer term central midfield options Partey, Lokonga, Ødegaard, Xhaka and AMN. Now we can all have our own views on the quality of that group. But regardless of that I still don’t see central midfield as having anything like the priority that the striking options have, especially considering our best forward Aubameyang is probably fast approaching the end of his peak, and may arguably already be a little past it.

Good enough Kiwi.

I watched the Josh Kroenke interview on SKY. He came across as erudite intelligent and engaging. He answered some pretty tough questions with what seemed to me to be honesty and integrity.

Not sure why I was surprised, but I was. Didn't expect to like him, but I did.

Even as a weird Swede supporting a team 1000 miles away that is so much fun to see. Two of them products of our academy as well.

I was going to post exactly that yesterday then opted to mow the lawns and do it later .

Clean cut , no spiked / dyed hair , classy suit , clipped to the point answers without a lot of flannel , no over the top "Well now how y'all doin " syrupy American drawl , had a good knowledge of Arsenal ............ I like you was very impressed .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVza4WQ ... tsFootball

Think I might wear this to my parents home for Christmas.

Antonio? Hmm...maybe.

I was going to post exactly that yesterday DH ......then opted to mow the lawns , do it later and got sidetracked .

Clean cut , no spiked / dyed hair , classy suit , clipped to the point answers without a lot of flannel , no over the top "Well now how y'all doin " syrupy American drawl , had a good knowledge of Arsenal ............ like you ; I was very impressed .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVza4WQ ... tsFootball

I've always thought he was much better than his father. I would also go as far as to say, he seems more concerned with winning than his father.

I admit I haven’t seen the interview however if he impresses now it’s to be expected after countless media mistakes.

I guarantee you there’s a strong chance the kroenke mob coined the phrase ‘legacy fan’ as that’s definitely infused with US tech speak so either them or the glazers. It came from Dan roan too who has decent Arsenal connections.

Impressed with our transfer business recently but we still have a plant and stooge as our managing director and Americans giving orders about stuff they know nothing about.

So sorry josh Watch the tv series succession it’s pretty much your life story mate.

Like you I haven’t seen the interview. I’ve noted that DHD and kiwipete were impressed with Josh Kroenke. But apart from coming across well with his speaking and smart appearance, did he say anything about the Kroenke’s ambitions for Arsenal on the pitch to impress so much? Does the ownership regime plan to do everything they can to give the club the best chance to win trophies?

If he’d have said something along those lines with a bit of evidence I might be impressed too. But did he? Look, I accept they let Arsenal spend heavily in the last transfer window. But I’m still not sure whether that was down to Arsenal’s own resources, money lent to them by KSE that will have to be paid back, or financial doping by Stan (if it was the latter I’m sure it would have been at Josh’s request). Only the third would impress me much.

Okay maybe I’m being over-pessimistic but Josh speaks better than his father, is better looking, doesn’t have a wig bought from Asda. It takes a bit more than that to convince me.

Josh has been put in charge of one his dad's team before with the intention of making them competitive. That's not been a concern of his father. His university team is the only one who he has ever shown any passion for winning. He wants the LA Rams to do well only in terms of how it will affect the income.

Billionaires in America buy teams for two reasons.

First, to be part of a very exclusive club. There are over 600 billionaires in America, but only 30 people can own an NFL franchise. Zuckerberg may be a far, far bigger billionaire than you many times over, but he doesn't have an NFL team. He may not even want one. Doesn't matter. If he ever does, he can't. Sales of clubs don't happen ever day. There are many people waiting for the chance to own one and the more financially strapped of the owners are constantly being asked if they'd sell.

Why? Second reason. To be able to say 'you' won a Super Bowl and wear that ring, is one of the biggest, exclusive ego boosts in America. (as an aside, sleeping in the Lincoln bedroom at the White House and having a sitting President visit your residence are some of the other reasons.). NE Patriots and Liverpool owner at one time, had his 'stolen' by Putin (he asked to see it and never returned it), who knew the significance of it and it took a personal request from the President for him to let him keep it.

I say all that to say, neither prompted Stan to buy the Rams. It was a business move. Arsenal was purely a business move. No sporting reason whatsoever.

However his son (and Glazer's son) actually do want to win. This is NOT an endorsement. I'd rather keep Americans out of English football for reasons I named prior posts months and years ago. A bonus of coming to football for me was that it was bereft of American owners who ruined my childhood passion. The only exception is they have a passion for it. AG with tens of billions of dollars if I can be immodest. haha (First thing I'd do to paraphrase Dick in Henry VI, Act 4) is "Kill" (metaphorically speaking) all the dead weight"

Josh will be a better owner than Stan. I have every confidence saying that but I'd prefer to have a non American who grew up with football as an owner over him. I'd take Usmanov over him, to emphasize it even more. I'd even prefer Dein as owner and its well documented on here how I feel about his role in Kroenke even being owner.

Joel Glazer is spending money on the Mancs. His dad would have been more reticent to commit those funs. The Emerati, Saudi, oligarch money in the PL is odious but at least they want to win.

you haven't seen the interview ...and you can come up with all that ....??

Truly amazing you two could write movie reviews without ever watching the film / rule on murder cases without hearing a single piece of evidence .

Fair point, kiwi. I think both TG and Bernard would say they've heard a few pieces of evidence about Josh and the Kroenkes (good name for a band); still, it wouldn't have killed them to, you know, actually watch the interview.

Admittedly, I haven't watched the interview either, although I'm only commenting on those who haven't watched the interview commenting on the interview, rather than commenting on the interview - so I think I got away with it.

I did read your and DHD’s posts though. They seemed to be about Josh’s PR being good rather than anything more substantive. I hope Josh will be a better owner than Stan. I certainly expect him to be. But when and if it happens following Stan pegging it, my views will be based more on the evidence of what he does than how well and likeable he comes across in interviews or how smart his appearance is.

Am I the only one who can see a fantastic business set up amongst a dingy nest of vipers?

Think back to where we were when Kronke took over, look at where we are now, imo on the cusp of a fantastic revolution.

Arsenal are currently the best team in the league, moving onwards and upwards, hopefully.

Yes bring back AW let him oversee the football let him be the shoulder to lean on for Mikel who has to keep his feet on the ground and take us onwards and upwards.

I'm so proud today to be a gooner, through thick and thin the light at the end of the tunnel is there.

We are a business, football comes first, but boy have we done good, so many people to be proud of including Mikel, Mert, the back room boys, Ed and Co etc etc.

I LOVE THE ARSENAL.

[YouTube] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVza4WQlmpc[/YouTube]

Been watching a few Man Utd - Arsenal matches. Hadn't realized we've won a few important matches away there. I really, really hate Rooney, even after he's long gone.