Tag Archives: Aaron Ramsey

Arsenal set to name new captain

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Over the summer, the club have been very open with pictures and videos from the training ground.

Whilst none of the training sessions are any different to the past – players kicking a ball, jogging a little bit, doing press ups – the openness has been a breath of fresh air.

The most recent video was of Matteo Guendouzi’s first training session.

It seems Unai Emery and his coaching staff have continued Arsene Wenger’s tradition of shaking hands with every player as they enter the training pitch. It was also good to see senior French speaking players like Alexandre Lacazette and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang taking their new 19-year-old team mate under their wing.

There was a very interesting snippet within the video that many people probably missed. Aaron Ramsey was leading the warm up – usually the task of the captain.

The first half of this blog was written prior to Arsenal playing Borehamwood on Saturday.

During that game, a strong Arsenal team ran out 8-0 winners.

Captaining he “second half XI” was Aaron Ramsey.

The Wales international is yet to commit to a new contract with Arsenal, but once he does, he looks to be the most suitable player to replace Per Mertesacker as club captain.

I have been blogging about how Ramsey should be the next Arsenal captain since 2013.

With Laurent Koscielny out until January – and no longer guaranteed a first team spot – Ramsey is the only player who ticks all the boxes.

The Wales international has recently spoken about the appointment of Unai Emery as Arsenal’s new boss.“Exciting times” was the exact term that he used. I fully expect him to sign the new deal and be given the armband.

As captain, you want a player to fit a criteria.

You want him to have been at the club for some time, to understand the ethos of the club. At 27 years old and having been at the club for 10 years, he is the most logical choice next season.

The player needs to command respect from his team mates, through both his ability to lead and his performances on the pitch.

Aaron Ramsey ticks quite a lot of boxes. He’s one of the longest-serving players in the first team. If there’s a structure, Aaron Ramsey could be that guy.

Ramsey became the youngest ever Wales captain at the age of 20 years 90 days back in 2011.

It will be good to have a captain who plays week in week out after it seemingly being forever since we had one.

Keenos

How does Lucas Torriera fit into Arsenal?

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By now you all would have seen the Big Dave Ornstein news from a few last night.

That Arsenal are in talks to sign Uruguayan defensive midfielder Lucas Torriera.

Usually when Ornstein tweets, the deal is not too far from being done, so we can afford ourselves to consider just how the Sampdoria midfielder will fit in at Arsenal.

Signing Lucas Torriera would support my view that we will play 3 in the middle next year;

Xhaka Torreira Ramsey

Ahead of them will be a narrow two of Mesut Ozil and Henrik Mkhitaryan, with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang up top.

The midfield 3 will give us a lot more balance and defensive stability than we had last season when we often played two.

It will give Aaron Ramsey the licence to get forward and attack the opponents box. It will also free him to press high up the field, putting pressure on the opponents deep lying midfielders.

With Ramsey getting forward alongside Ozil and Mkhitaryan, it will over load the opponents who will struggle to defend against all 3 – probably forcing them to bring a centre back out of shape create space for Aubameyang behind.

Ramsey will be free to press forward knowing that he has Granit Xhaka and Torriera sitting behind him, in front of the back 4

With both men having the ability to play from deep, it will give the defenders two options when passing the ball out.

Opponents will not as easily be able to pick off us transitioning the ball from defence to attack with both Torriera and Xhaka. Last season, if they stuck a man on Xhaka, it forced us long, or into mistakes.

Torreira will move Xhaka forward one, allowing him to press higher and be more influential on the ball.

Last year he was often caught out trying to press high, leaving too much of a gap between defence and midfield.

He will be free to do a similar job next season, but know that there is an extra player behind the him to sweep up to mistakes (instead of opponents being straight at the back 4 when he gives the ball away).

Xhaka has always been at his best for club and country when he has had another midfielder behind him. He has never really been the deepest of the midfielders.

Xhaka will also have to be the muscle in the midfield.

Torriera is tiny so Xhaka will have to ensure he does not get bullied. A similar role to what Matic used to do alongside Kante when Chelsea won the title.

I would be a liar if I pretended to know anything about Torriera, but in the little bit of research I have done, he will bring balance to a midfield.

It will also leave us with a second string trio of:

Elneny AMN Wilshere

So plenty of options, plenty of flexibility.

We now just need to get the deal over the line.

Keenos

Aaron Ramsey, Sokratis, Caglar Soyuncu and Jack Wilshere

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It all seems to have gone a little quiet at Arsenal – and usually this means some news will probably break today!

It is kind of the pre-World Cup lull.

Maybe fill that time by getting an early bet on for next season? If your looking to back Arsenal make sure look at a Ladbrokes review.

Anyone at the World Cup is currently under lock and key in final preparation training camps before flying out to Russia at some point this week.

It is important final preparation so unlikely that too many countries will allow their players to disappear for a day or so to compete a medical. It is at the stage where agents and hangers on will also be prohibited from contacting players to avoid their concentration being taken elsewhere.

As for players not at the World Cup, they are on a well earned break.

Whether it be relaxing in LA, returning to the country of their birth, on a beach in Barbados, a golf course in the Algarve, or just disappearing off the map, it is the time they can refresh themselves, turn their brains off, spend some time with their family.

On top of that, a lot of the club staff will also be away. A bit of time off before pre-season starts in 3 weeks.

So it will probably be a quiet week in terms of official announcements, but those not away within the club, agents and lawyers, will still be working hard to complete deals as soon as their representative is back.

Rumours are circulating that Aaron Ramsey has agreed his new deal in principle. A new 4 year deal at around £200,000 is what has been mooted.

The delay has always been surrounding his agent, David Baldwin, leaving Base Soccer to set up his own agency.

That now seems complete and last week Aaron Ramsey announced that the new agency was now up and running, with himself as its first client.

The deal to announce Ramsey will probably happen once he is back in the UK after his break.

Sokratis seems to have been plodding on for a while, struggling to get over the line.

Talk now is that it will be done on the 1st July. The reasoning for the delay is that Borussia Dortmund want the transfer to be in their 2018/19 accounts, not 2017/18.

Not sure how true it is, as the source is a writer for Goal.com, who made their name on click bait journalism.

Arsenal could easily announce him today, and the official transfer could not go through until the end of the month. A lot of deals happen like this, especially when a player is signed in April or May for the new season, even though the window is not yet open.

I very much doubt the delay is due to Dortmund holding it up.

It would not actually surprise me if Arsenal are being cheap. By not completing the transfer until June, the club will save themselves a months wages from when the medical was done – about half a million pound.

Arsenal will be in no rush, despite fans wanting to hear news, with the squad not due to report back for pre-season training until the week starting Monday, July 2.

The last name doing the round is Caglar Soyuncu.

The 22-year-old Turkish international, who plays his club football with Freiburg, is the latest name to be linked with a switch for a fee reported to be in the region of £35M.

The player’s agent, Mustafa Dogru, has told Turkish Football that talks are ongoing between club and player.

“(Sven) Mislintat has been keen on Caglar since he was at Borussia Dortmund. He first scouted him back in Germany. Sven is interested in Caglar, there are concrete talks, all that remains if for a fee to be agreed. We will see what happens next,” he said.

This feels more like the agent fabricating a story in the hope it generates interest in his client.

With Soyuncu’s Turkey not at the World Cup, I imagine he is on a beach in Kusdasi, near his home town of Izmir, whilst any sort of talks are happening in the background.

The last bit of news is Jack Wilshere’s contract.

In the recent released list submitted by the Premier League, Wilshere’s name was missing. Instead he was on the retained list with (offer) against his name; Signifying that there was a contract offer on the table.

Wilshere is unable to officially speak to any English clubs until the end of this month (or is it the beginning, I always forget). That means he is likely to see what other offers come in before he signs a new deal.

This hinders Arsenal’s transfer spending as we will not know whether we need to sign a replacement until he either stays or go’s.

It might feel frustratingly slow at times, but rest assured there is plenty going on and the flood gates of news will open.

Keenos