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I don't want a Spray On Tan or a Five Blade Razor - I Want Trophies

2008-09-26T00:39:00.002+01:00

These days you're called a glory hunter for saying you want trophies and the world is left dumb founded at how illogical that is. When you try to muster words to the effect of the illogical nature of the stupidity of the non-trophies love passing football, football fan, you are directed towards the leader that is Arsene Wenger in whom all faith and belief must be devoted in exchange of a - leader, I guess. It's supposed to be genetic, DNA, a symbolic, idol, icon that signifies survival...

...and what is modern day football support if not a metaphor for survival of our semen yet these days survival does mean that and it appears we believe that. While the true beauty of football is destroyed because "we want to be entertained" and what is wrong with being entertained they muster, whilst forgetting there was hundreds and hundreds of years of non-Arsenal football where by ratio, by percentage, there were more attendees are football grounds around the world.

Football is now a spray on tan. Football is now a ditch your 3 blade razor because the new 5 blade razor is closer, not closests, is closer than the legendary, brilliant, dependable, Ryan Giggs, Frank Lamparard, Patrik Vieira, Paul Scholes of Razors that is the Mach 3 - that is the plain jane girl with no spray on tan - almost virginal but ultimately, substantial a better night out than somebody who paints themselves in the hope of grabbing a mate - or cheap sex... I don't know. Too old for that and too young to be drunk with Arsene Wenger love. or too old and too young... one way or the other.

There are some things in football you cannot change. It would be like selling your mother to idolise Sam Fox because she represented the surge of modern glamour in all things football. Be it whatever, we all want to look sexy and with it and Arsenal brand themselves as this beauty and everybody thinks bagging a girl becomes easier if you associate yourselves with the Gucci type Branding the hidden realms Arsenal PLC give us.

...but we haven't got any trophies. For all the plaudits we've given ourselves this week for fielding a team of kids that won 6 nil, we've seen it all before, We have. It has happened over and over again and it is nothing new. Even back then people thought this team will do something special because it was a first, it was new, it was fresh and it was substantially great football.

...but ultimately it was an advert to the world of football, saying "start your bidding now".

We must pay players. We must pay agents. We must pay sky high fees. We must kneel to the demands of all the furore that comes our way with a squad of sports company sponsored prima donnas which Arsene wouldn't do because he is a business man and he is limited in his abilities. He is not Alex Ferguson, therefore he cannot create a team like Alex Ferguson because Alex Ferguson is a far better manager. Dammit, the guys got Paul "ginger" Scholes and Ryan "woolly chest" Giggs who are hardly magazine and Nike fodder these days but they keep the beauty of football alive.

For all the fans calling United fans glory hunters, no you're wrong. You're the glory hunters because United have had an outstanding attendance at Old Trafford. Far greater than Arsenal could have imagined before David Dein revamped the club. So no it wasn't a bunch of benefactors who did it - but Dein. How pathetic we are in this light. We are nothing more than a very carefully branded and engineered machine to make money and we haven't won anything yet.

Right now to the point.

We could beat Chelsea, United and Liverpool. We could dominate teams and destroy people but if we don't win a trophy this season, we're in the shit.

Was the Ferguson/Wenger rivalry a publicity stunt?

2008-09-24T20:09:00.002+01:00

We should never believe anything we see on TV. In fact, we should never believe anything the media give us. I think it only takes the most deluded of football fans to fall for the massive media machine that clubs have these days. Imagine the advert. Wanted, Press Officer with a minimum of 3 years experience with High Profile media clients...

...and so we have this staff of people looking through masses of information. Papers, Satellite TV, press releases and Sky TV, Setanta and talking events over with other clubs. Come on... we can't be that foolish can we. Can we?

Information is of course power and a well run company, with a good flow of information that brings in money is what we need.

I would go as far as saying a lot of high profile games and their events are well orchestrated. Fights, scuffles and everything else. I think there is so much money involved in this and so many jobs and so much security of jobs and security of money it would take one stupid person at Chelsea, Liverpool, United and Arsenal to think... hold on, let's do things our own way.

The ability to break into the "top four" as they are called will take a massive clout of power and influence. As big as the money coming in from Russia and the middle east right now should just about do it. As we've heard from our own leaders at Arsenal that they wouldn't deal with Usmanov but the tact changed very quickly when the leaders at Arsenal felt the time was right to test the waters. Let's see what a press release with our true intentions - (to sell as a profit) will work.

It didn't go down too well and thus, Peter Hill Wood, oddly, bizarrely, confusingly, weirdly, changes his tact and says, "oh we want to keep things English...". Which just makes him look less serious than he once was.

The logic is, with the money coming into the game, it will and must happen at Arsenal. What is different at Arsenal is, we were in a transition. No no, not as a team from youth experience because we all know that is a business now (thank you BBC, The Times and Monsieur Platini) but the transition to a new stadium and the balance of finance.

Part of the huge transition of energy we have right now we desperately need the funds from that energy to be placed into the European Union in whichever way possible. 30 million pounds being placed into club and into work and to be spread into banks, multiplied by 100s and 100s of players we are talking billions of pounds being transferred through football.

So back to football - what an illusion. It's foolish for anybody to think that this isn't about money. It would be foolish for anybody to think that the players and the club aren't under business rulings. It would be foolish for anybody to assume this is all true and every loss and every win is constructed by hard work, when in fact we're stealing players from whatever scenario we can - as Platini put it. Quite rightly so.

Now Ferguson and Wenger are pals. How did we ever think that these two, grown men, would have an argument, immaturely, chilidishly in the face of the public? Whoever came up with this scenario is a media genius and clearly understood their audience very well. The rivalry of football fans on the TV between the leaders of the rival football fans.

Oddly such professionalism is all about money and how much money is in fact involved and therefore they need to expose sorry, exhibit behaviour that will keep football fans interested, keep the divide between fans stronger and therefore make us watch more.

It makes me wonder now - what exactly does this all mean?

All things considered, it's a case of told you so. This was outlined by numerous people but fans would hate to thing the whole footballing world is contrived to make money but if a club/team is making money I don't think they're going to ponder what next.

I do think Platini is right. With the whole G14 power at the top of European and maybe world football, the last thing they want is a new club coming in and making rules. Of course now, that team will be Man City who, well it's not just a case of money but who is providing that money and these people are powerful.

Big deal though. 6 nil. We've seen it all before.

Will these players make it into the Arsenal first team? Will they be sold? Is the Carling Cup used by the club as an exhibition of players for sale?

The competition in the world is rising and I guess it doesn't matter if you win 1 nil, 2 nil, 10 nil or 20 nil.

A win is a win, unless you want to sell some players and make some money.

Arsene Knows: You Reckon? Part 1

2008-07-31T15:32:00.001+01:00

This was sent to me over a month ago but since I haven't been checking my mail ( due to being busy) I never saw it.

By Stubby225

I have let considerable time pass so as not to be labeled a turn coat or dare i say an anti Arsene type. Yet there comes a time that one feels its time for an explanation to what i think is really going on at Arsenal.

Now you will say "what do you know" but we all know something about Arsenal even if its no more than watching them on TV but you get to see the ebbs and flows and can make a fairly objective summation of the clubs attitude and forward looking plans by the way they have panned out over the past decade.

Well here's mine, I feel Arsene is the classic example of absolute power corrupts absolutely. He has been given so much power that it has, i am sad to say, gone to his wonderful head. I believe he really does believe what he is saying and that worries me more than anything.

If this is the best technical team he's had then somethings up because why would he have thrown away the Carling cup and the fa cup? he would have done a Chelsea and gone for it all.

By not doing that he has shown he didn't believe his squad could do it and said i will chuck these and go for the two big ones. Now that "ain't faith"

That shows a distinct lack of faith in so many areas its not true.

One the squads not strong enough and two the squads not deep enough to go the whole way as constituted.

But my friend's the worst thing of all was his total lack of care for the fans feelings and goodwill.

Just allowing to throw the game to the spuds I will never understand but letting United hammer us and gain the ultimate phycological advantage i still to this day cannot fathom.

I believe that the real case against Wenger is the pushing out of David Dien and the subsequent falling away of Arsenals record as his influence faded. Remember he brought Wenger to arsenal not the board and hes the one saying Arsenes plan cannot make it in the post Abromavich era.

Side Bar (You need a Multi billionaire and with his or there deep pockets an entity would be able to bank roll the enterprise.

You see the income from the club pays the rich mans overheads while his money buys and increases value, ie players and assets.

Let me state one truth found while meeting with the world bank Representatives. Rich men never, never, never waist money, its always for a greater reason).

I don't know if i agree with his/Diens analysis but with my background of building international law cases i think he not Arsene is the one who is seeing the bigger picture. Why would a devout arsenal loving man sell his shares ( and don't say just for the money, please) to an outsider , because he is seeing the writing on the wall. Wenger is being outspent into obscurity and that's the fact of the matter.

Winning has to be consistent to bring sustained increase.

The old days of him getting first looks at players are over.

Now we are told we have plenty of money, but the clubs actions in the transfer market do not jive with a prosperous clubs rhetoric.

I will be writing my second part of this piece soon, relating to Hleb, Ade- couldn't trap a bag of cement-byore and the nightmare that is watching clubs just keep on spending and bringing in the best talent.

Like how the hell can the spuds just keep spending even though up to now they haven't panned out and united still out there buying.

Well till next time.

Stubby 225 Out.

NEW rubbish KIT and Ljungberg states what Real Arsenal fans have been saying

2008-06-04T15:57:00.003+01:00

We have been saying this for a while and this amidst the massive influx of commercialised hungry, Sky Sports masturbating football fans that have arrived to support their team. Actually scratch that. There are a lot of Arsenal fans out there who are well in their 50s and 60s who still behave like they're 8 years old and in a play ground - like puberty just did them no favours and football was the only release of testosterone they could get.

But you could never release.

I am glad Ljungberg came out and spoke. Yes we got the same response from the press office, like we did with Adebayor stating "oh he didn't say that, he meant this" but you can't really run away from facts and facts stated by fans, finally spoken by an ex-player. But this has all been said before but we tend to ignore it but it just echoes in masses after a few seasons of complete neglect where only the board members win.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?xml=/sport/2008/06/04/ufnfreddie104.xml

It's time to learn.

As stated above, a lot of fans will deny this because they don't know much about simple science. In fact, I know some Doctors in the NHS who are completely super thick when it comes to science? Why? Well these days doctors are glorified mechanics or spokesmen for pharmaceutical companies. A friend of mine, Arsenal fan, working in a private practice told me he was offered to return to the NHS when they started offering inflated wages and out of principle, morals and ethics - he did not. Also because he is his own boss and doesn't have to sell his soul to the devil.

So if people exist on self glorification built on the credit crisis we have now, we do have a lot of Arsenal fans who joined during this prosperous period we gained through the easy lending of money.

In simple terms - anybody can be wrong and anybody can fool you with a facade.

We all wondered why we messed up this season. Read some Arsenal fans who aren't afraid to say what they see. Who aren't afraid to point out something is wrong, when it is wrong and who are eventually right when it comes to the inefficiency built upon deceit.

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New Kit

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and something else

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Catenaccio and Catenaccio today - A Good Read (Ronaldo - Fabregas)

2008-06-03T00:44:00.004+01:00

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catenaccio

This is an article to Catenaccio.

We always complained about teams holding their own against us with our assumed "ten man defence".

It's technique vs technique. We have the money to buy the best. They have the managers to try and subdue the best.

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Nasri and all about the media - Caution or Risk

2008-06-02T12:18:00.004+01:00

I'm not really a great fan of this player, in fact any player that I am a fan of is very quickly sold by Arsenal before he can get a testimonial or become legendary. BOOM BOOM.

I do expect Fabregas to disappear in times to come. I expect the changeover of agent to Dein's son to be fundamental in this and I believe this is all down to how we do business as a club - more so cautious than risky. Although with big risks you get big returns, with caution you guarantee the same return, which we have had over the past few seasons.

The media knows this because as a journalist you will find that, not only will you look for information but people will come to you with information. Has Nasri signed? Well I guess he has because a lot of the media have reported this and it's been passed around through the right channels.

It works like this these days. That anything that is being passed around is done systematically. You all work in a modern office environment so you'll know about the file and check and forward and storage system that exists. Check being important as this guarantees that a piece of information is moving forward and due to this certain legal factors and financial factors have to be stamped.

But it is through this channel of file and check and forward and storage that somebody will get in contact with a journalist or a paper to earn themselves a quick buck.

Yet we have to couple this with the fact that Arsenal's contract negotiations are like War and Peace. I am sure everybody gets involved as boring as life is at Arsenal - as clinical as a renowned plastic surgeon's theatre before he goes to work on Michael Douglas' brow. Must look his best for the young and fair wife of Wales.

Besides that though... Who cared if we've bought a new player. Unless he has super human powers our rivals will be in that same position as us. They will be buying new players and unless you buy an outstanding player and you ALSO change the way you play as a team - you have no chance of making huge differences.

Nasri is a cautious buy.

The last time we took a risk was with Flamini but Wenger is far too cautious. He didn't expect Flamini to go the distance as a full back and I doubt he could cope with a player who grew so fast. He had to deal with a team of great players in the past (Vieira, Campbell, Cole, Henry, Bergkamp, Ljungberg, Pires, Wiltord) and it became beyond him.

He should really learn from his mistakes and work out how he could manage an elite unit rather than regrow from the bottom up again.

The important question is (besides saying the above players were greedy for money), were the above players hungry for success... I would think so right? Also are our current team out of their depth? They could be. Experience is an important facet in all this and unknown to us in a world of doom and gloom shrouded with "Arsene Knows" rhetoric - I think we said the same about Tony Blair and New Blair and many a Cult around the world live in faith.

But it's stupid to apply this Political Religious notion into football which is a game we all understand.

Do you know why people would only come to see the Arsenal? Well it's very simple and that is because we had some great players who would demolish teams. It's not how we play but it's these players who can perform so brilliantly. United have great players, Chelsea and Liverpool do too but we push our rhetoric just that little bit further because it's the most cheapest publicity campaign ever.

This is what the media knows but it doesn't make much of a story does it because Arsenal are cautious and when you're cautious, year after year, you will be the same team - unless we don't replace Flamini... but we have the money and remaining cautious is a factor in all that. You could use the money to take risks or remain cautious. Everybody knows big name signings make a difference in a team, even though you don't win the league, they will make a difference but the cautious route is to just buy any old player and cope.

The ultimate facet is - you can't make a story from all this - yet.

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Diarra points to players losing faith in Wenger

2008-05-26T14:19:00.002+01:00

Diarra is in a long line of Arsenal players who have left the club and have had to speak out at the manager hitting back at ex players. Soon as somebody leaves our manager has not given a moments thought before hitting back at players but in this supposedly passive message Wenger gave, illustrating Diarra was impatient (operative word), Diarra had to speak out at what had happened at the club.

If we look back, numerous players have had to wait in line and then been lambasted. Many fans believe players who leave don't do well but then again, we've only won 2 titles and three FA Cups with two different teams since the turn of the century. What I am saying is - let's weight up what we have done and let's also weigh up the fact there are only a handful of trophies out there for players to get.

That being said, our ex-players have done fairly well in the majority. Many of whom have won trophies or had international call ups. They do go on to play in the major leagues and most if not all, are in teams that are in the top half of their respective leagues - if not at the top.

So that doesn't really wash does it.

But the important thing is what this illustrates about the fans and what they say about the players. First of all, they hang on to, well not only hang on to every word Wenger says they also make that word their own in faith and understanding to the point of a deluded belief system that holds no evidence at all. Secondly it illustrated that the fans think we are the best club ever, that the world has to offer. We exaggerate and demonise the debt situation of other clubs (ignoring the credit crisis, property sales and debt we personally have - although in our favour) and also ignore anything that illustrates that clubs and football are based upon millions of people who will continue to pay into the system. Meaning the system of football, football as an industry will always be healthy.

In other words, it is the only industry in the world where debt appears to be a sensible approach - massive debt, to making quick money.

It's bizarre but oddly true.

This principle therefore is what keeps fans beady eyed and interested but also gives Arsenal the elitist tag.

Importantly, lets look at the players. How would you feel if your manager played a weak team in order for you to win the league and Champions League. In other words he is saying, you are incapable as individuals to win the title (after being 6 to 8 points ahead) unless you drop the League and FA Cup. When we won nothing, would you have faith in this manager?

Flamini has stated that losing out on the title was the most hurtful thing that happened that season. People lambast him for being a glory hunter. So does that mean if he didn't put in the effort, he is not a glory hunter and would stay at the club? Or would you have expected him to go to Birmingham because he's not Fabregas or Van Persie? Well most of Europe wanted him now so we can shut our pie holes about that one.

Diarra said things were promised. We have heard this one a lot of times from ex-Arsenal players from Henry to Campbell to Vieira to Ljungberg to even Pires, Ashley Cole - numerous ex players have said that they were told that experienced and mature players were coming in and the club would grow.

This not only points to problems of lack of professionalism at the club and obviously as titled, people losing faith but also how the players were told to train and develop and play on false pretences. In other words - they were lied to.

Let's face it. What else is there.

OK - I'll play devil's advocate. Either the players lied or Wenger lied but at present it is numerous ex-players to one man's (Wengers) press releases.

Now even Hleb is on the way out.

So let's cut to the chase. If these players had faith in Wenger, would they hang around? Yes. But if a manager does not deliver at all then what is that faith worth?

Let's really waken up what I am saying with... what if Fabregas leaves and also Adebayor? Are we really saying that the Nike relationship Fabregas now has will not drive him elsewhere if they think his profile will increase with a big move to a club that are building more so?

He is one of Nike's special guys now.

If, we had taken the view of people at the beginning of the season which wasn't good and just had won the league or FA Cup this season. Fine. Players would have been driven by the impetus to win more next season. But we are aiming high in a situation where we are losing ground. We are losing players. We have to replace players.

The only way we can make new ground is to win trophies. Not beautiful football. Nope. That will not do it. You need to win trophies. Runner Ups? Nope? Statistics about coming in the top 4 or Champions League football (Oh shut up, we wouldn't have even had Champions League football if they didn't change the rules!!)? Nope.

Trophies. That's all.

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It's going downhill but hey isn't it GREAT! Hleb Flamini Hleb Fabregas Flamini Eboue

2008-05-24T19:19:00.002+01:00

This has to be the funniest season ever.

You release major players and then you talk about building. You can't even hold on to them either. The whole point is... Hold on to them? OK, let's say, by the rhetoric we use - we made Flamini. We built him. We made him what he is (forget that he was great at Marseille and what he had done throughout his time at the club) so why are we selling him? Why has money become the issue here? Where is this principle about building a team?

Nike hotshot Fabregas is still here but I bet we sell him too... and how about Hleb? Another Flamini?

In a world of crazy Religious types, you will always have people who will go the distance to demonise them. Everybody wants to be that little bit closer to perfection and this kind of mentality has built nations, empires, Religions - everything. If you say to your people, you are the best, they are stupid, we're intellectually, technically, physically, mentally superior but they don't understand; you could fool the masses and the more people you have on your side - the further you will go.

I administrate a few forums and when I first got into this thing, I felt like this biggest B****** in the world. I had to do things to people, I had to treat people in a way and control them in a way to gain something for the greater good. There had to be damage and blows and control and dominance that made people look up to you as a controller and you were the worst of the worst because you were controlling people's lives and they were hanging onto your every word. It is also the same once in management or in any sphere of responsibility where, you have to pick somebody to lose. There has to be some collateral damage in every scenario to make things work.

Yet, to the people who look up to you,who think you are the God of the situation they will deem this as RIGHT, as CORRECT as MORAL and ETHICAL because it's like a form of ethnic cleansing. Where anybody who remains have been the chosen ones and those that are the better.

Now, ok, I can't deny there are some egomaniacal admin in the world and they strive on this and create different ranks and stratifications for their users in order to look down upon them from high and in their benevolent glory they give the same power to some of their users as well. Forgetting all the time that the true purpose of all this is to provide a place of discussion for the users. Forgetting that, you're supposed to be doing this for people in general and everybody is equal rather than instilling your own principles of human conduct on others.

It's this that is so funny about the Arsenal season. We will demonise the press, harass them and hate them if they say anything wrong to us but if they say good of us, we will say, yes the press are right, they are on the right track. They are doing good things and hallowed be their name etc etc. We are so unbelievably full of it, it's unbelievable.

Yet, we can't forget that this season was bad. It was real bad. Now I know there are some people out there who have found some reason that it was good, like "yeah but, we improved here and er... we're building and this is a transition and oh it was fantastic in defence". Oh it just makes me laugh even more.

Do you know who were better than us this season? Well Liverpool did better than us in most competitions, so did Manchester United and Liverpool. Portsmouth won the FA Cup and Tottenham won the Carling Cup.

OK... now this is the funny bit because some people are saying either:

a) The Carling Cup and the FA Cup aren't real trophies (LOL)
b) We played the better football
c) The officials weren't on our side
d) We scored more points on a cheaper squad then last year
e)
f)
g)
h)

I DON'T CARE!!!

All I care about is the fact that we are probably the most stable football club in the world and we hang onto every bit of twisted communication from the club and believe it and then we say "No we can't buy players. No we can't pay players more. Oh we are so heavely pure that our board are really great." It makes me laugh how not only the board but now even our supporter groups stick to charities controlled by ex-Arsenal players or staff like we're some disgusting insular cult.

People are dying from diseases and suffering from life threatening illnesses and can't walk or are mentally scarred or even unhealthy but when we want to choose a charity, we pick one controlled by an Arsenal player.

We could go on and on about the problems in our own train of thought but let's face facts. No we are not all that.

The club made massive mistakes, either be it by choice or otherwise and Wenger made mistakes but to cut a long story short - the next time Arsenal cock up, not Liverpool or any other club but when Arsenal cock up - it's about money because unless you're stupid and/or a deluded Arsenal fan - we have tonnes and tonnes of money everywhere and NO, we don't have to spend it all and throw it away but we can at least make it work for us.

Let me do the maths for you. Let's say we buy a player for 8 million. Let's say we play him but if it doesn't work out, let's sell the bugger and not wait around and see if he will develop for around 5 years. If Wenger is so shit hot - let's find a player at a club where they won't come running at us saying we're corrupt and unprofessional because we stole their clubs - I.E. Let's find a kid that is crap and see if Wenger can make him into the new Ronaldo/Pele Hybrid player.

But we can't do that. Why? Because if we bought a player for 8 million, we can only sell him for more if he is a good player - but hold on... didn't we do that with a number of our players like Anelka, Overmars and Petit? What happened after that? Well agents sussed it out and our contract negotiations started to go to pot.

But hold on - I just realised something else. If we're shit hot shrewd and we find some great talent - why don't we sell these great cheap buys Wenger gets for more money. Nope, we're letting their contracts run out now so we don't have to pay agents fees.

What a cocked up system we have. It's so deluded bonkers that at this point I think only the really brainwashed Arsenal fans are holding on to the club's every word.

Now we have problems in the board, we have problems between players, we have problems amidst the staff and I have no idea how this is going to get fixed but let's face it the only reason we have so many problems is because there are people at the club who know they are sitting on a big massive cash cow that was made by David Dein and Danny Fiszman. Not by the Carr family. Not by Hill Wood and family but by two people only and there is no doubt that anybody from the Carr family or from Hill Wood's family would have been down at the country club glorifying themselves in their own loved up world if Dein hadn't popped up and thought about making this club into something bigger and better.

We seem to forget amidst all our self glorification that there are clubs out there with fans as well and they are happy as Larry but they still work as hard as they can to make something good of what they have. Some of our fans jump on any little tit bit to attack other clubs but it's hilarious that with all our real, tangible successes, we can't make anything else of it. When Tottenham won the Carling Cup which is something we should have won - we mocked them on their night out. We laughed at Portsmouth players losing their medals. We mocked United for being in debt when the won the Champions League and Chelsea may go under if Roman disappears.

Who cares. Our, your problem is Arsenal. If they go under - somebody else will take their place and you'll mock them.

Logically, if we had won that Champions League this year then there would be nothing to mock but we didn't. We lost out. We lost out on every trophy and it wasn't of our own making. It was made of complete and utter greedy motivated stupidity but we ignore that.

The Champions League should have been ours, the Premiership should have been ours and if you think about it - it is not ours because we're stupid. So we quickly mock other clubs in order to greaten our own but dammit we're full of cock ups and we can't push that little bit further to do better.

The Champions League is important to every club, right? If so, why don't we give the money to Wenger to buy players or keep players in order to win it? What? Oh it's about the youth policy? Yeah right...

We have our flaws and it's all apparent in what we missed out in a huge way this year.

This unit of Hleb, Fabregas and Flamini just says - one thing.

We are not building anything.

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Wenger - Diarra was a big fan of Fizzy Sweets and Choccy Bars

2008-05-23T16:26:00.004+01:00

Wenger - known as a master of motivation and strategy and brilliant tactician and man manager was unable to subdue Diarra's spoilt tantrums due to him visiting the grocery shop across the road from the Emirates Stadium. Diarra became a big fan and couldn't let go of the idea of failing to make the Euros after too many Fizzy Sweets.

Wenger stated ""I came to the conclusion that Diarra could not cope with the fact that he was behind the other players here in midfield,"" Highlighting the fact that lots of sweeties and sugary products made Diarra into a Euro Finals obsessed monster which almost led Wenger to call in Super Nanny or Gok Wan to show him how to look good naked in order to take his mind off things.

Wenger added: "I bought Diarra in the summer because I thought Flamini might leave at the end of the season and if he was able to be patient, he would get his chance." indicating, maybe Flamini's super speed and endurance were due to his personal addiction to fizzy cola bottles and Lollipops - which he introduced to fellow French team mate Diarra.

"I did explain when he joined that he might have to be patient, and he acknowledged it, but he couldn't cope with the situation, and also did not want to go on loan anywhere either." said Wenger indicating Portsmouth would be a perfect destination in light of it's low adult to sweet shop ratio.

Diarra has won an FA Cup (which was duly filled with cola bottles and white chocolate mice as part of contract negotiations) and secured a place at the Euro Finals alongside fellow Sweety fan Mathieu Flamini who are now looking forward to filling the Euro Cup with a Mars Bars and Coca Cola mix.

It is yet unknown if Wenger can manage to entertain Nasri's craving of Bacon covered in fudge and sprinkles.

When asked whether Wenger was just doing another one of his shoddy reasonings for players he'd lost, he said "I am Wenger, the fans love me. They'll hang on to my every word anyway so, who cares"

EXCLUSIVE - Nasri contract negotiations!!

2008-05-23T15:58:00.004+01:00

Stardate 34534 -

Peter Hill Wood is gallavanting around the Stadium with Nina Bracewell Smith (hired nanny and carer) hurriedly running behind him with morphine, whisky and paint stripper at hand to subdue his madness.

"Where is this meeting!!? Where? We don't want his sort around here!!" (cue canned laughter)

Switch the boardroom where Nasri is seated alongside agent with optional extras of lapdancer, sack with pound sign and gold teeth, pimp coat, diamonds, jewellery and reject ladies with big asses from Hip Hop video.

"Rightee Ho! So let me get this right, Nasri will get paid 5 cans of lager and a signed Thierry Henry Football shirt to sign on. He will get paid 40k a week, in order to keep Fabregas happy and stop Matt Lucas of escaping from talentless David Walliams again. Now we're stuck on minors but...

- if Nasri scores a goal that is assisted from Gilberto - you will pay 3 thousand pounds and a goat from Adebayor's farm.
- if Nasri scores a goal that is assisted from Fabregas, he will get a post goal lucrative hug with Fabregas, a letter of condolence from Flamini for leaving the club and a lock of Sagna's hair
- if Nasri gives an assist to Eboue, you will guarantee his departure to act as messiah in a civil war of Nasri's choice in Africa
- if Nasri runs more distance than Flamini in any one game, he will get a bonus of 1 thousand pounds, a letter from Henry stating he loves Arsenal, he really loves Arsenal and he really wants to come back and a raised eyebrow from Wenger
- if Nasri scores a hat trick he will get an evening with Hill Wood and the Carr family at their home and then later a selection of hired women that are usually left for visiting Arabs to be used at his discretion in the Carr family mansion and Hill Wood's special wing at The Priory
- if Fabregas is pleased with Nasri in any game, he will get a free shopping spree at Harrods
- if Nasri scores the first, second and fourth goal in any game, that is an extra 5k for the week
- if Nasri does a press release stating the club is fantastic, built on great values and they play beautiful football and it's better than winning, he will get Adebayors parking space for the week
- if Nasri mentions the term beautiful football in any interview for the club, he will get 500 pounds
- if Nasri scores his own assist and his own goal, he will get an extra 3 thousand pound
- if Nasri does not return hired women after his hat trick, he will get an evening of Hill Wood giving him "what for" in his own private underground bunker beneath the stadium
- if Nasri even speaks to or looks at David Dein, then Danny Fiszman and the Carr family will not be happy and can deflate his tyres or swap his shirt for Adebayor's
- if Nasri does an Ashley Cole type goal save, he will get a smile from reptilian Peter Hill Wood and he will personally hug him and promise not to go anywhere near journalists for the next three months
- if Nasri mentions Charlie George at any point he will get a gold star
- if Nasri plays in a winning team, Wenger will cross his arms and look vaguely into the distance a la achilles on a mountain top
- if Nasri runs over to the fans and kisses the badge after a goal he will get an extra 7k that week
- if Nasri can develop a cure to stop Hill Wood coming within 5 miles of the stadium, he will get to own the stadium for a year
- if Nasri can develop a dialogue/rhetoric to persuade Arsenal fans that Usmanov is a nice bloke he will get an oscar and a bust at the stadium

Wenger strokes his chin and runs over to the whiteboard like an excited schoolboy as he has found a way to motivate Nasri

"if you do zis den zis den zis after zis and zat and zis zat but not zis - I will make sure you vill have 5 thousand pounds"

Nasri ponders the the scribble on the white board, scratches his head and says "we'll return tomorrow..."

Contract negotiations stalled for another day. Nasri goes to Mayfair to live it up.

Returning the following day Nasri states: "I cannot do zat... it is only a scribble"

Wenger strokes his chin and looks at Fizsman and Friar. Wenger nods his head at Fizsman and Friar. Fizman and Friar look at each other and shrug their shoulders.

"He is not ready for zee beautiful football"

Cue angry interchange in French and Spanish between Nasri and Wenger.

Contract negotiations stalled for another day. Peter Hill Wood returned to Sainsbury's to buy another bottle of whisky in order to avoid altercation between Hill Wood and Press and any occurrence of "We don't need his sort!".

Returning the following day Nasri states "zis beautiful football is foolish"

Fizsman jumps in and states "beautiful football is football woight? That's what Wenger tell us!". Unfortunately before Wenger can respond, Hill Wood enters the room, goes mental and talks about the war a lot, leaving Nina Bracewell Smith no other option but to hit him over the head with a bottle of Coke to sedate him.

Wenger adds Nasri must score 10 goals this season to get hugs and kisses from Adebayor and Fabregas otherwise he will use his mind games to make them say indirect demotivational slurs about him in the media but will offer him a flat in Highbury for enduring Hill Wood for a year.

After several Mon Dieus and Sacre Bleus, Nasri, his agent and several reject women from Hip Hop videos leave the room, leaving Wenger to concoct a justification, sorry, leaving Wenger to assess the situation and work out why it didn't work out, sorry, and work out how to shrewdly bring Nasri to the club.

Ring Ring - Wenger phones Nasri and tell him he can have an extra 1 thousand pounds for every goal, an extra 1 thousand pounds for every assist, 2 thousand pounds for every Champions League game played, 1 thousand pounds for every Carling Cup and FA Cup game played and 5 thousand pounds for every goal in the Champions League and 4 thousand for every assist and 2 thousand if there is a clean sheet.

Nasri is interested.

Wenger is back on the phone to Gary Lewin to make sure Nasri is injured for the rest of the season, because, he just is and the contractual factors are only binding for this season not the next and if his shorts are covering at least 2 thirds of his thighs.

The negotiations continue. Nasri is chatting up one of the birds from Girls Aloud, his agent just sent his bill to Wenger - Hill Wood doesn't know anything about it.

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Football is diseased. People who own clubs make it like that. More on Ashley Cole and others... Jens Lehmann

2008-05-23T06:08:00.005+01:00

If anything makes football as pleasant as it is, it's the fans but when a fan falls for spin like it is coming from the closed environments of a boardroom - then even we become puppets for multi-millionaires. What I am saying is, I don't believe that a lot of people care about the finances or the politics of football? No...

In recent times, since the sexual revolution people have created demigods, idols of footballers as they've openly used beauty enhancing products - be it brylcreem or some nice threads. Prior to this not even black and white chic can save how ugly footballers were.

There are two factors against Ashley Cole. One is he asked for another 5k a year. The second is he met Chelsea as arranged by his agent.

For the first one we made that scenario just as public as anybody else and we have a very long routine of how we treat players in the game. If we can't hold on to players we will make it known in the press that they are judas' like we are our own version of the gossip mags at Ashburton Grove.

As for the second, it's unbelievable for me to consider that people don't believe that negotiations and meetings between players and agents and other individuals don't occur on a regular basis. There are a few really good books out there about this and if you go to a local bookstore and check the sports section you will find them.

So was I surprised when I heard that Ashley had met staff from Chelsea? No.

It was another story the press grabbed hold of but the most surprising factor in all this is how the press knew about this because somebody must have tipped them about this. The ultimate problem in this is, the contract negotiations and how we're either not very good at it, but our shrewdness is in fact quite - diseased.

Before the Ashley Cole meeting with Chelsea, a contract had in fact been signed but (now this next bit is important - it might not seem it but it is) Arsenal didn't want to pay the agents fees.

Now the problem with this is - they would have had to pay them anyway. Now, whether on suspensions Cole's agent got the fees or not is another question. Maybe he didn't. It does deeper though... This is what I mean about diseased.

Not so long ago there was a problem at United with agents fees going to Alex Ferguson's son - and therefore this being a problem then we had Sam Allardyce's son and then Dein's son in the Thierry Henry saga. OK, it's all sons and it kind of bites Dein on the bum considering what he always talks about but this is how diseased football is when you keep it in the family.

So the problem is, since Arsenal didn't want to pay the agents fees but had already signed a contract with Chelsea and stalled because of that - how much was all this in Arsenal's favour? I'm not sure. Well you always have an inkling though... try the sports section in your local bookstore.

Gallas' agent is Pierre Frelot who is also Drogba's agent as well. Now in the end the agents fees appear to have gone in Gallas' agents favour as well but also Cole's?

Odd?

So when Cole says "they hung me out to dry" and the problems with libel these days, it makes you wonder what is going on and what do we mean when we say the word "shrewd". Does shrewd mean Wenger is some form of Jedi Master in the board room able to say "these aren't the players you are looking for", and then be on his way? Or is it that you can go into the whispers in the corridors of power and get people to work in your favour with the promise of favours at a later date.

This is why, Flamini who went on a free, made me wonder a lot more about this. What did Arsenal get from this? Probably zilch but Flamini's silence spoke volumes because the law was on his side and Arsenal only had the press to go crying to - again.

The inevitable extension to this is Vieira, agents fees for over 30s we have sold. The extending of contracts to see how much Arsenal would have to pay in terms of agents fees if they bought other players in. How much if they sold players. How many would be favourable to them in the long run.

On a simple footballing level though Cole like other players at Arsenal weren't happy with the mass exodus of players that was occurring. A club that was doing dramatically well was suddenly selling important players upon whom a lot of success was based. The constant shout of experience and more experience with some players even being told that experience will be bought in but left dwindling when nobody arrived was also a regular story.

So quite simply we were releasing talent. We all know that football is ugly behind the scenes; in fact scratch that. Not all of us, just some of us. In our case, we sold great players and didn't even replace them - so rather than the fans saying "what the f*** is going on?", we were saying, "oh, we're going through transition and rebuilding". In a squad that is barely a 2 years old and we're still selling players?

OK at this point I hold my hands up. Since the releasing of Edelman it appears those of us realistic (or cynical, however you want to put it) enough were in fact right about a lot of things going on but how right is yet to be seen.

The next time you start to attack ex-players, be they Anelka or Cole or others, try to read between the lines and do as much research as you can on the subject.

Or you can just understand that Agents exist because players got crappy deals.

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Why Mathieu Flamini? Why Ashley Cole? and the massive piles of denial -- Juventus Eduardo

2008-05-22T23:22:00.004+01:00

Manchester United don't appear to be buying. Chelsea don't appear to be buying but we're associated with a lot of players but have as yet bought nobody. One player we believe we need (another youngster) appears to want to go elsewhere?

Who have been our most important signings over the past few years or even in Wenger's time? Most of them are either established players or even well known players. Henry and Vieira were well known - it was extremely strange that nobody had heard of these players and fans were saying "ooh, Wenger has unearthed a gem". What? Didn't you watch the World Cup Final in 98 or were you just avoiding it because England didn't get through?

We could say it's strange but... we're just in denial. There is no denying football is about socialising but it's when that socialising overtakes the football. Where is the football that remains? Many of us, know people in our lives who aren't even Football fans.

One of the strangest things I noticed lately was on Graham Norton when fans of the TV series, "Hart to Hart" were on the show and they followed "the Harts" everywhere. Now when you heard "the Harts" talk, they talked about their average life, doing everyday people things. The fans on the other hand, knew the shows better than that Harts, had some strange questions about their lives and adored them, put them on pedestals and believed they were demigods.

In my experience, a fan has been, well the real Arsenal fan I have met are those that don't take it too seriously but understand the football better. They understand the team and the club and they know the club are in it to make money. They know there isn't much of a legacy there other than people in the board room who are looking after their investment. They know that the club will evolve over time. They know that players will move on and change. They accept that.

Then you have other fans who are completely, psychotically it has to be said, "if you're not with us, you're against us". A surrogate family of sorts develops. Anger at their own family. If somebody is at the club, then they are alright and have never done any wrong. Soon as they leave, they're evil. Religious terminology of demonic type characteristics and behaviour are given to them. It's completely the chav level approach to football. The lower rung of the ladder and a complete display of the lower end of football and not what built it to what it is today.

Flamini, was a player that was needed by clubs because he was bloody good. You have to blind or staring at Fabregas far too much for comfort to think he wasn't. He played a huge part in numerous cup competitions and when he wasn't in the squad we struggled. God knows what we will do without him but the reason he was wanted by many clubs was because he was shit hot and this is why he is in the France squad and Gael Clichy is not.

Gael Clichy was a mistake. OK, he's good but he's not great. Unfortunately we're stuck with him now. The belief has been since Flamini stopped playing at left back that he said he doesn't want to play there? Is this another one of Wenger's post occurrence character assassinations? Flamini's behaviour post leaving has been impeccable. Previous players who have left Arsenal, after hearing what Wenger has to say have attacked back in the press but Flamini simply said, nope, that didn't happen, this is what happened and was done with it.

On the one side we have another Wenger character assassination but on the otherside you have a player saying, well think about it, a lot of clubs wanted me, they gave me more respect - Arsenal were more interested in securing Fabregas until they can make 10s of millions for him, so I went where some of my heritage is. Makes sense to me.

But if you are a fan who is completely engrossed in projected the demonisation you have for a mother or father who didn't parent you or a guy at work who got promoted ahead of you, or the girl who spurned onto football players and staff members that leave Arsenal - then you'll murder them. Now come on, your life isn't so completely important that these people are vicious animals who have done complete wrong. We all live under the economy built on blood that is the Western World - so none of us are that innocent.

The other player is Ashley Cole. What the hell did he do wrong? It's become completely apparent, evident, that our contract negotiations are a complete sham. Over and over again. So why blame Ashley Cole? In simplistic terms, the scenario went "Can I have another 5k please?", our club (as per usual) run around to every paper and say he is a greedy bugger and concoct some nonsense about the player and then "no, we'd rather pay a defender that is struggling to get passed our plus 30 ageist employment rule, 75k a week instead". Yes that makes complete sense and give Gael Clichy (somebody who people don't want to say he does a thing wrong because of all the venom they have for Ashley Cole).

The thing is, being introspective is very hard in a world that is full of alienation, where people do struggle to find surrogate families that they have to be drunk and around a false illusion of romantic lust with a football club to have one. If you're introspective, you're going to fall over backwards and you'd probably stop being an Arsenal fan. I read a while back how some Arsenal fans questioned another Arsenal fan for letting his son become a Liverpool fan.

I always thought, well, it's nice to let your kids or force your kids to be Arsenal fans but this is just an extension of how you're trying to replace a family that spurned you to become football fans. I reaised this when I met an Arsenal fan whose Dad was a United fan and he was one for a while but then he became angry at his father for his relationship with his mother and his grandparents and spurned him by becoming a United fan. The funny thing is, he had a unique perspective of football and atmosphere and that Arsenal fans didn't create the atmosphere that other fans had.

In time you realise, this is who you are and it's not about atmosphere (although fans who invest a lot of time in this, will tell you otherwise. A bit like people who invest their time in anything in life) an anything else. It's like that bit in the Empire Strikes Back where Luke is sent into the Dark Energy part of the Dagobah swamp and he asks Yoda "What's in there?" and Yoda says "Only what you take in there..."

There is obviously more to life that encompassing and finding all of life's needs in football, but like the film, the Nanny Diaries, if you keep your eyes and ears open, Football will give you an insight into life and people that you will get nowhere else and you'll find a lot of insecure people trying to meet their "goals" in life by lots of possession or different ways to attack a defence - depending on what team you watch or which manager you would date if you were gay.

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Manchester United 3 - 0 Arsenal (Tottenham 4 - 5 Arsenal)

2008-05-22T11:43:00.003+01:00

Now if Chelsea had won it, it would be Chelsea 1 - 0 Arsenal.

We still haven't won the Champions League. For all the plaudits and the praise we give ourselves and all the credit we have and we say how great our football club is, we have not won the Champions League. Let's face facts here. I have heard a lot of praise and vindictive attacks on Chelsea now that United have won it but we're forgetting that they are in the final and because of our unprofessionalism (shown by lots of dancing, giving away penalties, lapses in defence in an important game) we weren't there.

So it's very strange to see the behaviour of some fans who are more interesting in mocking Chelsea than looking at their own club as though mocking another team is far more interesting than what is occurring at their own club.

To add to this we are associated with more kids and more players and obviously, they are fairly decent but how is a player going to change the team so much? How? We lost because of the way we played not because we didn't have the players.

Most of our players came onto the pitch demolarised and made absolutely no change to the way we were playing. When was the last time a player made a difference to a team? Well I do remember Flamini coming on in the last season for Justin Hoyte a lot but we could have put on an empty pint glass for Justin Hoyte and he would have made adequate difference.

The other problem is, faith. We have faith in our keepers. I like Almunia as well, just like the next Arsenal fan because he's a nice guy but I'm not going to put Barack Obama in our goal just because of that. We need a good quality keeper.

What I think would be interesting is, if we spent the money but do we really need to? What we have been doing is, not shrewd but cautious. We have been cautious and therefore we buy A LOT of players who will be good instead of buying some great team players with the odd outstanding world class player. Far too many egos who now want more money as well.

So a lot of the transfer news is boring me. We won't know what is what until these players play and show us what they've got OR if Wenger changes the way he plays the team and plays them differently. On top of this we still have United to contend with and Chelsea and a stronger Everton team and we have to see how we cope with Flamini and other players who leave as well.

How is this all favourable to us right now? We don't know anything, nothing at all until the next season starts, well until 2009 now when the season is well under way. Until then, we're just buying players but unless we get some decent defenders and a decent keeper - I'm not going to be completely sure about this at all.

Arsenal Double 0102

Tottenham 4 - 5 Arsenal

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Then What? Kreonke, Dein, Usmanov, Henry, Reyes, Edelman, Flamini, Hleb, Adebayor, Fabregas - Then What?

2008-05-14T19:14:00.005+01:00

Like anybody reading this, we're all football fans but in football, it goes beyond kicking a ball around now. So much is involved in the game when everybody is buying, everybody is selling and everybody is trying to survive by mainly buying and selling.

If it's not the Manager buying and selling it's new investors and if it's not our manager, it's somebody elses.

First of all, I want to question, how good is Wenger, in all honesty? What about our club? Are we really worthy of being at the top when we can't even win the Champions League? Are we worthy of giving ourselves accolades of being big and mighty when we sell great players, we use excuses that we have replacements to sell great players. We don't even attempt to win games. Managing Directors leave due to a slump in the season. Players leave because, let's face it, they have no faith in the manager.

I think if we go back to Kreonke, we have to work out, why was Dein interested in him?

OK, let's go back to Dein. Dein came to the club and transformed our fortunes and we started to pump money into the club and win trophies. We got George Graham on board and he started to win things for us. It started to become about money. We transformed the North Bank and brought in more money, for more players and success and profits were ours.

Wenger came in and spent a load of money and the days of profit returned (after spending loads on Bergkamp and making losses after Bung 1990s, we returned to making profits and building and developing which has been Dein's basis after being the main catalyst at a club that was dominated by Carr and company and Hill Wood looking after their investment.

Like all things, the more the money came in and the success, importantly the success came in, more and more people became interested in the club and wanted a piece of things.

A group of individuals like this, with Edelman at a later date - started to raise the value of the club - importantly, at the detriment of the supporters and the fans who have gained in return 4 FA Cups and 3 Premier League trophies and a huge stadium to enjoy Football in. Bar that, Ticket prices have increased again as we report record breaking profits year on year with no help back to the supporter.

Henry was paid a huge amount to stay for one year, orchestrated by one, son of David Dein which led Henry to Barcelona, in total gave us 6 million if we take off what we paid him for that final year.

Oh yeah and as Dein was removed because he brought in Kreonke and after leaving he brought in Usmanov.

Any which way we look at it folks - the truth is - the next step, the whole attack on the club has all been about, where the club goes next.

You'd be stupid to think it doesn't get confusing here.

Let's say we won the Champions League this season. No, I won't start there.

Hmm... let's say, year on year, we'll make 40 million pounds, over and over again. We'll actually make over that sum every year. Now... some of this will go on transfers. We will also sell players too.

So let's say, on average, we will spend 10 million on transfer buying and selling every year. That leaves about 30 million pounds doing nothing every single year. But hold on...

...everybody says Wenger does it on the cheap. If he does it on the cheap, then there is money somewhere because we have made profit after profit after profit, besides a dip in and around 02 to 04 where we lost in total 24 million pounds in total but don't worry about that, we've made about 70 million pounds over the last 14 years.

Don't believe me? Thought not.

Let's take a look at this here from http://www.footballeconomy.com/stats2/eng_arsenal.htm :

In total, pre tax this is - 84.456 million between 93 to 06 and then we could add the 30 million we made over the previous tax year, then this tax year too and we're talk a lot. :)

Maybe this 75 million is the war chest they're talking about if we need to spend it but we are losing players. We are actually being taken to the cleaners by players too and as much as we are trying to decrease the wage on our players, some are asking for more and more?

We have lost Flamini now. We lost Reyes who was fantastic for us and I guess he went after having problems post the Aragones incident. Now Hleb may be going too.

Soon, I do believe, Fabregas will go too.

Now the above for me is a management issue, not merely for Arsene but for the board as well. How do you keep a balanced, tight, ship shape company if you can't keep everybody happy? Do we have the intention to keep everybody happy or to just fob them off until they start to complain?

Then let's consider, the problem could not be with this player situation but what we pay them because our best players are invited over to other clubs with promise of more money. Now this is business. You unsettle your competition and make them release players and it won't only be the club who is buying your player who will be laughing but all your competition too.

That's business. You have to hold on to your players. You have to keep them happy and how you do that, with trophies or with other things - who cares, just keep them happy. This I think is the key to success at the club. We need to hold on to players who will bring us success, or make them happy among each other. Make a good unit... if you can.

The last few weeks have shown a situation that is not favourable for us. How will we return next year? It all depends how we plan out the coming season and how we intend to win games.

I'd sell Adebayor. He's becoming like a player who is too big for us and may give us trouble later on but apart from that, I'd get rid of Eboue - he's the only person who does that stupid dancing with Adebayor. Try and get Flamini back and give him Adebayor's wage. Use Van Persie, Walcott, Bendtner as our major strikers. Try and hold on to Hleb. Buy a Winger, buy a defender and hope for the best.

Pay the players. There is money around. Get some success, in any form whatsoever. If you think about it, we could have won both the FA Cup and the League Cup this year.

People talk about hindsight. Wouldn't it have been great and all that, thinking it's nice we got 83 points. Well, we would have got 90 plus if we played our cards right and didn't make school boy errors.

I'll give you a what if though? Would you have accepted a Cup double of the league and FA Cup? Would you have accepted the the Premier League on the back of the success of that?

Three trophies that could have been definite. So stupid. Fighting to achieve one definite trophy we lost everything - that's why this season has been so stupid, so anybody who says this season has been a success, is very thick or is the manager of a football club trying to put on some spin.

People are ignoring that Edelman has gone, Fiszman has gone, Henry has gone, Flamini just went and nobody talks of a crisis.

The power of publicity and spin is quite evil isn't it.

Strange

More Strange

Is a Mercedes a status symbol?

2008-05-12T13:04:00.002+01:00

Or does it just clearly show what you don't have?

I saw a guy the other day and he was short but groomed, dressed as well as he could and he was getting into a Black Mercedes. Never had a Black Mercedes looked so less appealing and a family car look so inviting.

All this reminded me of a quote from the new Apprentice series stating that one of the characters had small man syndrome, meaning they were trying to compensate for something they didn't have.

By showing something that shows what they don't have?

Another way I could put it is all these different types of one type of product that exists. For example, if I wanted to buy a DVD Recorder, I would look at all the options and all the extras and then consider what I need and pay accordingly.

In a 70mph road and gridlocked cities, what use is a car other than to show what you don't have, or is that what you do have or is that what you don't have.

You buy a Mercedes to show what you do have, right, but it shows what you don't have as well - right? It shows that you wanted more and what you had to settle for instead?

This may just be because Mercedes are quality but if you balance it out - who cares?

Say you bought a new house, in the best of areas. Everybody around you has a status level job. Doctor, Consultant, Lawyer, Businessman - blah blah. This shows you where you are, who you are and what you have.

It also shows you - where you are not, who you are not and what you don't have as well.

For instance - a big yacht or maybe a nice community that is based upon knowing rather than knowing because the price in the area is relative to each household.

So... I think this encompasses everything about life (and football for that matter) that our observations and assessment tell us everything about what we have and what we don't have and what we want. In a world lacking community, it's all about selling yourself. I think I jumped the gun there. I mean in a world lacking community, it's all about trying to work out who these other bipedal people are what you are being the first thing you do to make a community.

In recent weeks we've heard two things for Arsenal

What we have

What we don't have

Some say we have points, we have wins, we have everything.

Others say we should have points, we should have wins, we should have everything.

So on the one hand we have people who say this team and this club can be better while others are saying that we should be happy with what we have.

I think the fine line is, as a fan, you are happy with what you have which makes me question those who say that others should be happy. Because I don't think they are happy and they are completely controlled and tested by those who have a criticism who have the nerve to analyse.

Some people will boast about what they have but soon as you advertise yourself like that, you are open up to people saying, but you don't have that.

How often have you found people who say, they have this (think Gossip columns) suddenly being scrutinised for their failings?

For many years now Wenger has been his own publicist and exhibited himself in the light of no tangible success, by illustrating his own personal intangible benefits the club have. Yet, while we see Ryan Giggs, a 30 plus football score a goal to keep United as winners of the Premiership - it makes you wonder why Wenger couldn't do this - consider our finances have been very good for many years.

What is our status symbol?

Three Doubles? Unbeatable season? FA Cups?

Or no Champions League? Complacency and Arrogance and lack of fear of other teams. Losing out on Titles and trophies. Disrespecting the FA Cup and League Cup. Disrespecting players and also only having one way of playing and arrogantly saying it is the best way?

Is this our status symbol?

When the gloves are off and the papers speak - we haven't won anything for a few years but the money that made us is being heavily guarded.

That is our status symbol. Financial Reports.

Tomorrow You may be Dead. but Football will never die.

2008-05-08T21:06:00.003+01:00

Looking at the devastation in the world today, it makes you wonder what somebody may do with just one more day to live. What would be your dying wish? What would be the last thing you wanted to do before setting off into the great unknown of after-life - if there is one... What is that one last thing you want to leave as a legacy?

One has to wonder where our money goes at Arsenal. There is no denying that we spend big. Since Wenger arrived we have bought many many players. I think in his first year or so, he acquired over 10 to 15 players. That season we won the double.

Arsenal have never really been in any major financial difficulty. Living in a world where mass debt is not uncommon at major companies, in whichever industry, there is little worry about debt unless you can make the payments and continue to make money and pay yourselves. Amidst all this, everyone wants cash from all this. The one thing that makes me wonder is - Arsenal chose a debt, while the rest of the clubs that exist didn't do so and either forced themselves to go into debt or it happened to them over night.

This is the desire to win in football. The belief that you must win or you will die and if you have to die numerous times, then you will die numerous times. The difference with this is, some people can cope with dying because they aim to live forever. It's a bit like the Highlander, the quickening, where - you may lose but you also return, you can return to fight again - at all costs - where money is not an issue. The only issue is to win, to kill, to destroy. Just like everything else in life - we want to continue to survive because, who knows when your end will come.

This year we saw what Arsenal were all about. We're not really that great a club are we, if we're absolutely honest with ourselves. We didn't play to win. We went to major games, where fans travelled either late at night to major historic rivals or even 100s of miles away to see a mediocre game - to watch a team that had intended to lose. After this, there was no desire to win. After this, the club that gives itself many platitudes sold major players - after making massive gains.

In business, in capitalism, this is the ugliest side of football. To betray your client for monetary gain and to ignore the most important factor of sport - to win.

Tomorrow you may be dead. Tomorrow there will not be anything else. If that was the case, then, will Arsenal play football? I am sure some people would say yes, but I am not so sure. After seeing this Arsenal, I am thinking, if tomorrow, there was no life and it was the end and death would take over...

...Arsenal will sell up for whatever price was available. Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchester United and all other clubs will fight for the prize and for the final season in football Arsenal will either fight it out or the fans or whoever is in charge will fail to buy players as they all disappear to the big clubs in Europe. While our major directors - who have considered profit over wins for many years disappear for a final year of wealth.

I don't think we care about winning any more. In recent years, a number of things have made me question the new Arsenal. A few of these are the loss we made in 0102 when we gave massive bonuses to our players and when it was discovered we were exploiting a loop hole that brought on a major fine and having to pay back the Inland Revenue. The reason why I questioned this was, journalists, I felt were dealing in cheap journalism, manufacturing, regurgitating each other's quotes. Nobody was questioning how a club like Arsenal with massive season ticket sales, a bond for many of their fans and with expenses involved, can be deemed a club that is doing things on the cheap - when we're not.

We may applaud ourselves after selling Henry last year but year on year, considering our wages and the sales and buys we make, other than a few of the clubs in the premiership - when we add up how much money we spend on players, we're not far off the top of the table in these terms. We spend just as much towards our players as other teams - the difference is, we also sneakily attract young players and we also do a lot of other shady dealings to hold on to people. We also just a lot of corporate mind games with our human resources by taking our contract negotiations into the press with some cloak and dagger character assassinations.

But, after seeing Flamini's fairwell, I think players have become wise of this. As Wenger over and over was quoted in the press about Flamini - nobody heard anything from Flamini. Nobody could get hold of him. I am assuming in past years, players have given their rebuttal to Wenger's constant press releases about players and fallen for the trap and become the criminal. Flamini on the other hand, didn't. He didn't answer back, he said nothing. He just remained himself.

In recent years we have insulted winning and the drive to win at Arsenal. We've masturbated obsessively over training and development, like we have some divine right over these things, that we are better, stronger and wilder. Are we fuck. We haven't won anything in recent years and when we did, we won by playing some of the best players in the world, a squad full of world class players like Ashley Cole, Patrik Vieira, Sol Campbell, Thierry Henry, Freddie Ljungberg... all players who have disappeared.

All of these plaudits can't really be given to Wenger. In fact, it was the club that did it by spending money. It's all about mind games. I say this because there is a silent majority in the boardroom controlled by the Carr family and the tilt and turn depends upon the majority shareholders and how they are controlled by this family. Let us not forget, that it was in fact a lone David Dein who was removed from the club but there were other board members who have remained silent about this. One has to question their intent with the club.

One the last day of your life, you will ponder what is important. In the world of football - the most important thing is to win. Do you know how important that is? In every corner of every part of this world, where football is played, it is played to win, to win something, or just for the taste of glory to achieve.

Commercialisation has raped football regularly and many clubs have taken advantage of this but most have not made it, it's master. Everybody still believes in winning, to achieve, to gain power and to cope.

Arsenal hasn't and for me, this leaves a bitter taste.

Do we intend to lose? I don't think so but what do we do to win? Do we do anything to win? When we say, we are in transition and we are building - do we go in every game practicing? Everything at Arsenal contradicts itself. Building is a lie when our players are leaving and we have to rely upon new names, new faces to keep this lie of building and developing up.

In fact, in Wenger's time, for all the money we have, the 3rd richest club in the world, we haven't achieved all that much that we weren't achieving before Wenger and with Wenger, we achieved by constant, rapid, buying before each major trophy.

Does anybody even calculate this or are we so in love, in maya and illusion at the glamourised celebrity status, idolatry obeisance we give to TV entities that we've lost what football is about. People say we must support the team, but is the club supporting the team? Fabregas was given a very long contract and in my view, he will leave soon for a record breaking contract elsewhere too. What sense does it make for us to give him a long contract when he is worth more elsewhere - everything about that long contract states, he will go.

In the end though... who cares. I don't.

because I know those in place at Highbury now are not as big as the spirit that football has and they will be looked back as nothing when the real power of football returns and takes over.

I don't mind that clubs are in debt. I don't care but if you can go into battle and die fighting to win and never stop trying to win - Football will never die.

No replacement for Flamini - Flamini Stats and; no point running around if you are in the wrong place

2008-05-06T11:49:00.005+01:00

I think a lot of words have been bandied around about the club in recent years. Mainly building and developing and faith in youth.

I think we can throw those out of the window now can't we, as more and more of or players move on and let's face it - we just get some great players and give them the experience to play in the top flight and then sell them on. Hardly a long term plan is it. More like, just buying players to make a profit.

The difference is, for now, what to do about Flamini? A lot of people are looking for replacements in our team and well... I think that may not work - completely. There is no denying Arsenal will be up there fighting for the top spot next season. I think the club will be in a position to cope with this adequately after this season and with the finances in place - cope with any circumstances that may present themselves.

But you can't replace a player like Flamini. He has moved on to a club where he is being paid very well. He is obviously somebody who is in demand and he was wanted by a lot of clubs. The thing with Arsenal is - if you want to make these players, what are you prepared to do, to keep these players. Nobody thought about this, did they.

I think Wenger, will have to in all circumstances, change the shape of the team. Flamini covered a lot of ground. He was not merely talented as a footballer but he had stamini but also a great reading of the game. There is no point running around if, you are in the wrong place.

We can use this analogy in many different ways. For instance, say Arsenal take on a team from league one and league two. I bet they will run around but all that running around is nothing if you're playing a team, to stand and run in positions where clear goal scoring chances are.

In the say way, this is Arsenal's problem (and where Flamini alleviated us), that we run around a hell of a lot of the time but we are playing teams who know where to stand - we counter negate our own view of football. It doesn't work like that. So that's where experienced footballers come in.

Wenger has a choice after losing Flamini. He would either train a person, a new player, into the Arsenal pass and move against teams trained to stand against us (something Flamini alleviated by complementing Fabregas and Hleb but also operating as a defensive shield) or, revert back to the passing and moving with somebody like Kolo, Song etc playing as we have done in the past few years.

As per usual, after the first few wins in the season, we will go off the boil in the 2nd quarter of the season and eventually finish somewhere near the top and just hope to clinch that titles.

I guess the stats speak for themselves and it just highlights, there are some players we can't replace. Flamini was just under-used over the years and all we have got left is to ask ourselves, what are our weaknesses and how do we alleviate them.

Well, Flamini alleviated them but all we need now is a stronger defence and a greater attack that can score goals from different corners. I think during the Invincibles season our major scorers were Pires and Henry because the rest of the team covered for them and Ashley was defending as well as attacking with them... Ball winners in the middle, alternating play making by Pires and Vieira, ball winning by Vieira, Gilberto and Lauren.

Freddie, just to run around a lot and use his pace to cause problems.

I guess that's about it.

Another great player lost by Arsenal's Inside Problems - Arsenal Leeds Everton Ladies.

2008-05-05T21:15:00.005+01:00

Videos of highlights at the bottom

If we look back at Ashley Cole, one of the best left backs in the country and how the club and the supporters villified him - with the loss of players recently it makes me wonder why the hell we were against him. He wanted another 5k. People called him Cashley...

He only wanted another 5k to stay at a club he was at for most of his life... so why did we attack him for? It's because, well I feel we fell for what the club were doing. We were entranced by the building of a new stadium and all that, that would bring us. New membership schemes that made fans feel a part of the club - everything else. We could go on and on but people don't notice these things because, well we all fall for it don't we.

Now we've lost a player that AC Milan have paid a hell of a lot of money for. A fantastic contract and again, like Ashley Cole and many other players that have moved on from a club and done well, we have given up on him. We are supposed to be building but we live in a strange myth that these players don't do well upon leaving. Says the club that barely scraped into Champions League qualification after being invincible for a season getting an FA Cup and have won nothing... since, but become a club that manufactures excuses and reasons for blame instead of fixing problems.

But we say we can fix problems.

Nobody wanted our other players. I hear about replacements. We think we can replace Flamini. Flamini was one of our most even present players for a number of seasons. Important in Carling Cup campaigns. A great substitute. Touted as the next big thing from Marseille but we wasted him like we do many other players. Again this is something only Arsenal can answer. People talk about other players replacing Flamini, that he isn't as important and that he's not that great. That's complete rubbish.

AC Milan could take the pick of the crop of the world's footballers but chose Flamini at a salary that is comparable to the World's elite. Either AC Milan are stupid (won more trophies than Arsenal) or they think they have a great player.

If we really think AC Milan made a mistake and should have took one of the other players we have that are being touted as great...

Simple question. Why didn't they? Why isn't anybody else interested in Song, Diaby, Gilberto, Denilson. Why isn't anybody interested in the other players? Only Hleb is a factor in place but even he could be leaving soon as well.

So let's stop making excuses as fans. Let's stop blaming the players who lets face it, may not have a career soon and are talented and deserve the wages they are getting. They entertain billions around the world so let's have a reality check shall we. This is the money that is involved so live with it because, if we weren't all interested in it, writing blogs, reading papers, watching sky sports. They wouldn't earn this money.

We should compare ourselves to other teams. After all, we are the third richest club in the world. Yet we spend as much money as a Championship club. Some people would think we're in trouble, but hold on, we spent 10 million to hold on to Henry for a year - eventually releasing him for peanuts if we consider the miniscule games he played for us for that 10 million.

Then he comes out with the BBC when he has a DVD coming out.

We will soon discover what a great player we've lost and I guess we will then make excuses, more excuses then some more excuses and we will continue to do that. It's because, this is what we are fed from the club. People believe the excuses because it helps them support the team because without excusing the frailties of a club, they wouldn't be able to support the team. God knows what they would have been like if we were mid-table.

Thankfully to us, we've never really been out of the top flight so we can't say we've had it bad, but we have had it stupid and this is one of the stupidest periods for Arsenal where, becoming Great, truly Great has been knocking on our door for 10 years now but we ignore it to sell football shirts and make money from membership packs.

Arsenal fc v Everton fc
Uploaded by footister20

Everton Bendtner Double - - Why are board members disappearing or if it's ok why are board members disappearing?

2008-05-04T18:30:00.002+01:00

Somebody said to me today - "everything is fine, this was a great season, we improved on last season, Adebayor scored 5 billion goals, Flamini can leave because we have a replacement, we don't need Hleb, we are building, we are doing well, we are punching above our weight (excuse me while I'm sick on that one)" etc etc etc.

I wanted to write a blog about, assessing what went wrong.

Now Arsenal fans for me fall into two categories. I will first of all say, I don't think there is an Arsenal fan who thinks we don't have the potential to win the Champions League. Ok? ok.

So two categories.

One Arsenal fan will make excuses for the club.

One Arsenal fan will question why the club.

That's it.

So I'd love to dissect the first type because, it just gets your goat when an Arsenal fan, like, a wimp we could say - instead of facing and talking about a problem will always say, everything is cool, everything is fine, we don't need to do anything. They're like the guy who slacks off at work because they hide when something needs doing so others can do it. Life's slacker. Life's nobody. The person who won't be around when something dodgy happens but will talk and talk and talk because they support a club that has never been out of the top league.

Let's face it - it's easy supporting a team that has never really fallen out of the top league for almost 100 years.

So these fans, the first type, are glory hunters. They'll make excuses that everything is good and say everything is fine because that is their glory.

The passionate fan who cares and makes a difference will question their club when, since as a fan they know about the club, they wonder why it cocks up and why the club say one thing but in reality, something different happens.

I'd just like to stress a glory hunter is also a fan.

As Arsenal fans though, we have got it easy, somewhat but these recent years have been the strangest we've ever had. Never has our club had so much grade A global talent but struggled to perform.

Do we blame Wenger? Do we blame the board? Er... Do we blame the team?

Well, I'll remove the team because they're staff under the governance of manager, contract and board. They just do as they are told in the hope that it prolongs their career more and more. Remember - this is a year on year thing and every year is one year shy of that that 33/34 year old cliff edge where they will have to try harder. The Peter Shilton and Teddy Sheringhams of this world were around longer because of the success they achieved in early life...

...under great managers. Under great clubs and also because they are great players.

So, come on, let's face it. Why blame the players? I have seen Arsenal players leave the club in recent years and play great football. So that makes you wonder? Why did we sell them?

Now I could say money and things like that. Surplus to requirements but... I must admit, that doesn't make sense to me. I think something else is involved.

Recent press reports have made me realise that Danny Fiszman is now the main man, in control, at the club. One thing Dein said before he left was, the club is run like an old boy's club.

I am unsure about our board because they don't sing by the same hymn sheet.

Team work. Is that the problem?

So... Project Management 101.

What do you want? What do you want?

The most important question in football. For us anyway.

Why did we build a new stadium? What are we doing with all the money we have?

What do we want?

Do we want to win trophies? Do we want to make the best use of our resources and the potential we have?

Or are we slowly working towards creating a club, the richest club in the world - and then what? Are we stupid enough not to realise that other clubs will be following suit too?

Looks like we are.

I bet, if we broke the 1 billion pound barrier, other clubs will have consortiums coming together to take over them and they will also, in time, break that barrier or will make vital use of the surplus of great players that the technical achievements of the past 10 years have created.

Pointless. It's a simple strategy and with our board members disappearing - I don't think we have a strategy, we've forecasted bugger all for the future as well.

Something isn't right.

Anyway...

Here are some videos.

Bendtner Goal

97 98 Double