Tag Archives: Premier League

Great time to play Man City – PL fixtures announced

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Manchester City at home

Chelsea away

Welcome to the Premier League Unai Emery.

Whilst a lot of people have winced at Arsenal’s tough start to the Premier League season, I prefer to look at it another way.

The beginning of the season is a great time to play both sides due to the World Cup.

Arsenal have just 8 players at the World Cup – Granit Xhaka, Mesut Özil, David Ospina, Nacho Monreal, Mohamed Elneny, Alex Iwobi, Danny Welbeck & new boy Stephan Lichtsteiner.

Only really Ozil, Monreal and Xhaka start in our strongest XI.

This means for the opening day of the season, we could line up the following line up:

Cech

Bellerin Mustafi Sokratis Kolasinac

Wilshere* AMN Ramsey

Mkhitaryan

Aubameyang Lacazette

*If he signs

The only place we are looking lightweight is in midfield, as both Xhaka and Elneny are in Russia, and likely new signing Lucas Torreira will also be out there.

Manchester City, meanwhile, have 16 players at the World Cup.

The likes of Kyle Walker, Sergio Aguero, Gabriel Jesus, Nicolas Otamendi, Raheem Sterling and Kevin De Bruyne strut their stuff around Russia

John Stones, Vincent Kompany, Ederson, Danilo, Fernandinho, Fabian Delph, Benjamin Mendy, Ilkay Gundogan, Bernardo Silva and David Silva will also be out there.

Looking at their squad, you struggle to make a competitive XI out of those players who have not gone.

If they rush some players who will be knocked it early – the likes of Stones and Walker – they might be able to put out a decent XI; but an XI who would not have had much of a pre season.

Chelsea also have a lot of players at the World Cup. 14 in total.

Eden Hazard, Thibaut Courtois and loan man Michy Batshuayi. Gary Cahill and Ruben Loftus-Cheek.

Olivier Giroud N’Golo Kante, Antonio Rudiger, Willian, Cesar Azpilicueta, Andreas Christensen and Willy Caballero.

Kenneth Omeruo and Victor Moses will be playing for Nigeria.

Going into the first few games of the season, they will be without a senior goal keeper and have just senior CB – David Luiz – to choose from.

Emery has a chance of starting the season off with a bang. Two wins against two top 6 sides.

Other fixtures to look out for are:

Spurs (a): March 2nd

Spurs (h): December 1st

Boxing Day: Brighton (a)

New Years Eve: Liverpool (a)

New Years Day: Fulham (h)

Last game: Burnley (h)

The post-Europa league games are also friendly. They will all get moved to Sunday and for away supporters, we have avoided any long trips:

Everton (h)

Fulham (a)

Crystal Palace (a)

Wolves (h)

Tottenham (h)

Southampton (a)

Two of the post Europa League away days in London and the furthest to travel is Southampton. Not bad.

With the transfer window closing on the eve of the Premier Leaghe starting, clubs have to get a move on with any business they have to do.

Arsenal have fairly nice fixtures in the last 8 games of the season. If we start well, we could be in with a shout towards the end.

Up the Arsenal

Keenos

Plenty for Arsenal to celebrate on quiet weekend

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Not much happening with Arsenal over the bank holiday weekend. Usually that means something will occur about 8 minutes after publishing this blog.

Whilst not much has happened over the weekend in regards to Arsenal, there has still been plenty to enjoy and celebrate.

On Saturday night Liverpool lost to Real Madrid in the Champions League Final.

Not just is the result a joy to behold – any Arsenal fan who wanted Liverpool to win needs to take a look at themselves – the fall out has been equally excellent.

The petition set up by Liverpool fans to get Sergio Ramos bans is embarrassing.

Not only was someone sad enough to set it up, over 300,000 people have signed it.

Is that really what modern football is? Petitions and cry-arising?

Ten we have Jürgen Klopp.

He lost his 6 final in a row, but all is forgiven because he sang a song about Real Madrid and wore a baseball backwards.

I have found the press response to Klopp interesting.

The German is now 6 years without a trophy. The year before He took over at Liverpool, they finished 6th.

In the 3 seasons he has overseen the club, they have finished 8th, 4th and 4th. And lost 3 finals. Yet the press defend him and his failures.

1 League Cup won in 12 years. For a club of Liverpool’s size, history and previous success, that is a decade of failure.

Nearly as big a failure as Spurs winning just 1 League Cup in 19 years – and Mauricio Pochettino trophyless in a 10 year managerial career.

Interesting how do Klopp and Pochettino, failing to win trophies and finishing top 4 is seen as a success.

Meanwhile the press have criticised Arsenal’s appoint of Unai Emery. A serial winner.

https://twitter.com/keenosafc/status/1000512913776488449?s=21

Liverpool fans showed their well documented classlessness in fall out of the defeat.

Death threats aimed at goal keeper Loris Karius and his family are not banter. They are a criminal act. The press will not criticise Liverpool’s fans for fear of boycotts. Liverpool will play the victim as they do so well.

The second cause for enjoyment this weekend was Fulham’s victory over Aston Villa in the play off final.

Anyone that has done Fulham away will know that it is one of the greatest away days.

Whether you go on one of the many booze boats that will be run on the day of the game, or drink somewhere in Fulham, it is always a top day.

Welcome back Fulham.

Enjoy the rest of your bank holiday weekend, and hopefully next week brings some more Arsenal news.

Keenos

The transfer window is open

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The transfer window is open!

Despite the season not even yet being over – with the FA Cup and Champions League Final’s still to play, teams throughout England can now buy and sell players.

This is due to Premier League clubs voting to close the own window at 5pm on Thursday August 9, two days before the first match of the 2018/19 season.

Fifa rules dictate the window must be open for 12 weeks which has meant the date clubs can start to sign players has also been brought forward.

In a move designed to end disruption and allow clubs to focus on their football, Premier League clubs have agreed to close the summer transfer window before the start of the 2018-19 season.

The change came after a number of Premier League managers and club officials complained about the negative impact of transfer uncertainty and speculation on their players. Diego Costa, Philippe Coutinho and Virgil van Dijk were just four of a list of players who did not play for their clubs as they pursued exits.

14 Premier League clubs voted for the window to shut before the season starts, starting this season.

EFL clubs have followed the Premier League’s example by bringing their transfer deadline forward but with foreign leagues’ deadlines expected to be on August 31, we are in line for two transfer deadlines next summer.

This means there will be two transfer Deadline Days in August, with the Premier League and EFL windows shutting before the other major leagues around Europe.

The transfer windows in Spain, France, Germany and Italy are all expected to open in early June.

As usual, the deadlines are expected to fall on August 31, with Ligue 1, Bundesliga, Serie A and La Liga showing no signs of following the Premier League’s lead.

Premier League clubs will no longer be able to make signings when the season gets underway, but the change does not apply to other leagues, meaning Premier League players will still be able to move abroad.

That means transfer sagas such as Barcelona’s pursuit of Coutinho last summer could still drag on into the season, creating the same kind of unwanted distractions for Premier League bosses.

However, Premier League clubs will be in a position to charge a premium from foreign clubs after the early deadline has passed, but they will be unable to reinvest their earnings until the January window.

Premier League executive chairman Richard Scudamore told Sky Sports News…

“There was a big concern that the Premier League has been playing two or three match rounds with a degree of uncertainty between themselves.

The Premier League’s chief executive Richard Scudamore outlines the changes to the summer transfer window after 14 clubs voted for deadline day to be before the season started

“It wasn’t unanimous but nobody was pathologically angry about the situation. But there were some concerns by some clubs that, although they wouldn’t be able to buy any more players, their players could still be picked off by those who haven’t closed their windows. It just meant they couldn’t support it.

“We did have managers’ meetings before the season started. The managers are very strong on it. Almost all of them were in favour of shutting it earlier. The clubs just think it’s wrong that, going into the first game of the season, they could be playing against a player that, a few weeks later, could be playing for a different club.”

EFL Chief Executive Shaun Harvey said: “After discussing the options throughout the course of the last few months, I’m pleased that the matter has been determined by Clubs ahead of the start of next season.

“This new approach will give Clubs and managers the stability they crave earlier in the season whilst also providing the flexibility to add to their squads after the traditional deadline until the end of month if required.”

Keenos