Tag Archives: She Wore A Yellow Ribbon

Diego Simeone fails Arsenal interview

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With 12 minutes on the clock, the interview was over. Diego Simeone got up, left the away dig out and left Ivan Gazidis without a decision to make.

Simeone would not even make the short list to replace Arsene Wenger, let alone be given the job.

As he left the pitch, snarling and swearing at all those around him, he showed why most top clubs would not consider employing him.

There is a huge difference between passion and abuse. Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola show passion on the touch line. Simeone just abusing anyone and everyone.

Constantly arguing with the 4th official, abusing the referee, attempting to intimidate the opposition. He is not passionate, he is just abusive. And his back from staff and players take lead from him. Jumping up in unison at every tackle, demanding a yellow card.

Last nights performance by Simeone should not be a surprise. As a player he was cynical, a cheat. He was the type of player I truly despise. A fake hard man. Happy to rake his studs down an opponents Achilles, always leaving his foot in on a challenge, but you go near him, he would throw himself to the ground and cry, no matter how little contact there was.

We all remember David Beckham in 1998, sent off for a petulant kick against Argentina. Guess who the Argentinian was who went down like he was shot? Yes, your correct, Diego Simeone.

He was an expert in the dark arts, and his Atlético Madrid team have been built in the vision of himself as a player.

Now I know they were down to 10 men early doors yesterday, but the behaviour of their players is no different to if they had 11 men.

Simeone has set them up to be anti-football.

10 men behind the ball at all times, wasting time at every opportunity, and throwing themselves to the ground at the slightest of touches.

Some will say “but he wins things” but this is untrue. Atlético have not won a trophy since 2014. And even if they were more successful, there are ways to win things, and it is certainly not the Simeone way.

Look at Manchester City. The free flowing attacking football wining trophies. Arsenal under Arsene Wenger in the early years. Barcelona or Real Madrid now. These are winners, who do it the right way. That is what Arsenal need to aspire too. We should not be looking to dive and time waste our way to a Premier League trophy.

“But George Graham played defensive football” you cry.

That might be true, and Arsenal were often labelled “boring boring Arsenal” under Graham, but one thing he did do was uphold the class and tradition of the club. Simeone is happy to sacrifice who we are and what we represent to impose his own brand of “success” on the club.

Look around world football, Jose Mourinho, Antonio Conte and Max Allegri are often considered defensive coaches. But in comparison to Simeone, they play attacking football, football in the right way.

There are ways of playing the game.

I have been highly critical of Klopp in the past. His lack of success in the last 4 or 5 years is similar to Simeone’s, but what he does is he upholds the dignity of the game.

Klopp plays an attacking brand of football, shows passion on the touch line, intelligence off the pitch, and is a gentleman to the press, media and opponents. He understands the history of Liverpool, the passion of the fans, and he has connected and revitalised them. Simeone is the polar opposite of Jurgen Klopp.

The likes of Allegri, Leonardo Jardim, Luis Enrique and Joachim Lowe are the types of men we should be going for. Men who are intelligent, respectful, and will uphold the traditions of the club. And men who are able to do all that whilst being successful.

I have never been a “success by any means possible” type of guy. I want us to win, but believe we are The Arsenal. That there is a right way to win and a wrong way. Simeone only cares about winning. He would happily drag the Arsenal name through the mud to win a game.

He is a man who lacks the class, lacks the integrity to be an Arsenal manager, and he showed it last night.

We are The Arsenal, we do not need to resort to employing someone like Simeone to make us challengers again.

Keenos

10 reasons why Arsenal will beat Atletico Madrid + Starting XI

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  1. Atletico Madrid come into the game in poor form – just 1 win in 5
  2. Meanwhile Arsenal have won there last 7 home games
  3. The only time Arsenal and Atletico Madrid have played each other was in the Emirates Cup back in 2009. Arsenal won 2-1
  4. Against West Ham at the weekend, Arsenal faced a well organised rigid defence. Perfect preparation for Atletico. Arsenal scored 4
  5. And that was done without the creative output of Mesut Ozil, who will return to the starting XI
  6. Arsenal have scored in each of their last ten in all competitions
  7. The Gunners are the Europa League’s top scorers with 29 goals this term
  8. Alexandre Lacazette has scored 6 goals in his last 6 games
  9. Atletico Madrid have dropped down from the Champions League, where they won just 1 game in the group stages
  10. The last time Diego Costa faced Arsenal, he was comfortably kept quiet by a back 3 of Holding, Mertesacker and Monreal

Predicted starting XI

Cech

Bellerin Mustafi Koscielny Monreal

Xhaka Ramsey

Ozil

Iwobi Lacazette Welbeck

The truth behind Arsenal’s £50m “war chest”

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Yesterday morning’s hit gathering headline comes from the Daily Telegraph, who reporting that the new Arsenal manager will be “restricted to a £50m summer transfer budget”. As with anything Arsenal, fans have thrown their toys out of the pram.

The reaction from Arsenal fans, the bitching and moaning, is not to be unexpected. When even the most average player like Granit Xhaka now costs £35m, £50m is just not enough.

“We need to spend £150m this summer” one said to me on the news. And yes, this is true, we do need to spend big. But we also need to look at the bigger picture. Because the fans moaning about having just £50m to spend are complaining without having the full knowledge.

To quote one of the Arsenal Fan TV lot, it is about “net spend” not total spend. So Arsenal might have a transfer budget of just £50m, but this is actually a big chunk of cash. In fact, only twice in the clubs history, have we spent more than £50m.

So it pretty much is a non-story that Arsenal “only” have £50m to spend this summer, as over the last 8 years, we have a net spend averaging just £16m. So the real story could be New Arsenal Manager Has 3 Times As Much Money To Spend.

And now this is where it gets interesting…

So if we spend £50m net this summer, it will actually be twice as much as we have spent on average over the last 5 years. I will also be superior to Tottenham, Chelsea and Liverpool.

It still leaves us massively behind the likes of Manchester United and Manchester City, but this shows the gulf in finances.

Can we expect to be spending the same as Man U when they have a turnover of nearly £200m more than us? Or the same as Man City who are unlimited funds through their owners?

Now we could all moan that Stan Kroenke should put his hand in his own pocket, but I prefer the Manchester United or Liverpool model of being self sufficient, not a rich mans play thing.

For Arsenal to spend more, they need to make more.

I have been a long term critic of Ivan Gazidis and the commercial revenue team.

We have behind Manchester United, Manchester City, Chelsea and Liverpool in terms of commercial income. The boost we get from stadium income is lost through poor shirt deals, no sleeve deals, and not getting enough money from Puma.

Some new deals are in progress. Our sleeve deal is expected to bring in £15m, and the new deal with Adidas/Puma/Nike will add an additional £25m in revenue. But more needs to be done to bridge that gap between ourselves and those above us.

We showed a half yearly profit before player trading of £20m in our accounts. It is from your profit that your transfer budget comes from. So how can we expect to have a £200m transfer budget if the club only makes £40m? That would leave us losing £160m.

Football is a business, at the end of the day. Unless you want to put the club in massive debt, you should only spend what you bring in.

So we have established that £50m for incoming transfers is OK, about level with other sides above us (excluding the Manchester 2). To allow us to spend more, we have to maximise player sales.

Selling the likes of Davis Ospina, Calum Chambers, Shkdoran Mustafi, Joel Campbell, Lucas Perez, Chuba Akpom, Carl Jenkinson would raise up to about £80m. If all that money is made available for the new manager, suddenly we are looking at having well over £100m to spend on new players.

As I wrote earlier, we have at least 10 players that are expected to leave. These will both raise additional funds and save on salaries.

Understand how things work, rather than just read the headline.

On a final note, lets be honest, any talk about budget is just made up rubbish.

We are in April. A budget will not be set until the new manager is appointed, until we have (or have not ) secured Champions League football, and until season ticket sales come in.

And then you need to take into account the amortisation of the transfer fees, wages, signing on fees, agents fees and much more. Any head line about transfer budget is literally made up.

So if you are sitting and moaning about us only having a £50m budget, well done for being dumb, well done for:

  1. Not understanding how it compares to previous years
  2. Believing made up newspaper articles designed to create hits and outrage

Have a good evening

Keenos