Tag Archives: sports

England reinforce their Spursy tag and fall at last hurdle

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Well last night went how most of us predicted. It was all a little Spursy.

Hopefully by the end of this week, Gareth Southgate has done the right thing and announces he is stepping down to allow someone new to take over this England time.

it is quite clear that this England team has outgrown their defensive manager. No longer should we be looking to scrape through tournaments, beating lowly ranked teams, to then go out to our only decent opponent. Southgate is unable to get the best out of the attacking riches we have available.

Let him graciously step aside. Thank him and wish him well. then we move on.

As for the game being on a Sunday night, this is a disgrace. The game so late last night ended up losing its lack of community.

Everyone had been hanging around all day waiting for kick of. By the time the game started, everyone was lethargic, kids were falling asleep, and wives were looking at their watches itching to go home. Finals should be held on a Saturday.

Apparently, it was held so late last night due to the “American and Asian market”. But this was the EUROPEAN Championships. You do not get Eurovision held late on a Sunday.

And one big reason the NFL has never really taken across around Europe is because the Super Bowl is held so late on a Sunday. No one wants to be watching a major sporting event at a time when they want to be unwinding from a weekend and preparing for a week at work.

With both the Euro’s and Copa America now over, we turn our full focus back on The Arsenal.

Our first proper friendly is in 10-days against Bournemouth on some field in America. it will be interesting to see what sort of squad we send out.

After an international tournament, we usually see players get around 3-weeks off. By the time we play Bournemouth, everyone except for our English, Spanish and French contingent would have had at least 20-days off.

Ramsdale, Raya, Saliba, Rice, and Saka are our only players who were still involved in International football beyond 6 July.

For Bournemouth, I expect the team to be all those who did not travel to Germany or America for their countries, whilst Manchester United might see cameos from some of those who were knocked out early or saw little game time.

The Liverpool match is probably the game where every bar the 6 mentioned above will see some action. That would have given most of the squad their 3 week break and a weeks training.

It will not be until the friendlies in London that we see the likes of Saka and Rice. they will be given a proper rest with Mikel Arteta knowing he has a long season ahead.

One thing that is always interesting about these pre-season tournaments is the balance between Arteta wanting to give his players a rest, and the pressure from above for him to play his best players due to the money involved. There will be a lot of unhappy Yanks who have paid a lot of money if they do not get to see Saka, Martinelli, Rice, etc.

This week I expect to see us begin confirming departures. That then frees up the squad places for us to make some signings.

Have a good Monday!

Keenos

Premier League clubs spend over €500m on “bunch of Uber drivers”

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This morning’s blog was initially planned to be a discussion about how the PSR reporting date had become a new influencing factor when it came to transfers being completed.

Summer tournaments such as the Euro’s have always lead to slow starts to the transfer windows. In my mind, the slow start to this transfer window had been exacerbated by PSR.

Deals completed by 30 June 2024 go into the 2023/24 reporting window, whilst deals completed on 1 July 2024 do not need to be reported until 2024/25. If a club was on the brink of breaking the rules in 2023/24, they would be keeping their powder dry until 1 July before completing any deals.

During my research for the blog, I was surprised to read that Premier League clubs had already spent over €500m on new players. That is an incredible when you consider the spending by other leagues in the summer of 2023:

Ligue 1: €910m
Serie A: €878m
Bundesliga: €735m
Premier League: €520m – 2024 to date
La Liga: €443m

With 2 months still left in the transfer window, Premier League sides have already spent more than every La Liga team did in the summer of 2023. And they are over half way to the total expenditure by French teams last summer.

What is even more incredible about this figure is the Big 4 have yet to spend a penny – Arsenal, Manchester City, Manchester United and Liverpool have seen no new arrivals yet.

Surely I am not alone to think that this transfer window has had a slow start?

It might be that the lack of business by big clubs has influenced my mind, or it might be that I just do not care anymore about transfers and the transfer window – it does drag on!

But my theory is a lot of money has been spent on not very much. A lot of “PSR deals” pushing up the total expenditure. And a lot of average players going for €20m+

Ian Maatsen – €44m
Archie Gray – €41.25m
Elliot Anderson – €41.2m
Yankuba Minteh – €38.8m
Igor Thiago – €33m
Lewis Hall – €33m
Omari Hutchinson – €23.5m
Luis Sinisterra – €23.4m
Luis Guilherme – €23m
Taylor Harwood-Bellis – €23m
Omari Kellyman – €22.5m
Ibrahim Osman – €20m

That is nearly €366m on big money transfers, and I do not know who most of them are! In months down the line, fans will be complaining about PSR and how their club is being punished. When the reality is they have spend millions on average players!

This is not clubs spending sensibly.

I could jump in my cab in the morning and not batter an eye lid if any of them were behind the wheel. It is literally over €500m spent on players who would be no more recognisable than an Uber driver!

It still feels like a slow start to the window, and I think that is because a lot of money has been spent on crap. No marquee signings. No big name incomings. Just cash changing hands to try and circumnavigate PSR.

I am happy that we have not made a signing yet. The big, better signings will come once Euro’s is over. The only players available at this time is the average clowns mentioned above!

Have a good Tuesday!

Keenos

“Next Bukayo Saka” departs Arsenal

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It was only a couple of years ago that Amario Cozier-Duberry was labelled “the next Saka” by some fans, and being tipped to follow Bukayo into Arsenal’s first team

The 19-year-old now finds himself without a club after Arsenal announced his departure.

Cozier-Duberry highlights just how big the jump is from youth football to senior, and whilst there was a contract on the table from Arsenal, he has decided to progress his career elsewhere.

Considered by many as the best of his generation, Cozier-Duberry’s progress has stalled over the last 12 months and has been overtaken by the likes of Myles Lewis-Skelly and Ethan Nwaneri.

His departure will lead to some fans complaining that “Arteta never gave him a chance”, but you have to remember Mikel and his team see these kids day in day out. And when you are in a title race you can not really give minutes to a kid to develop.

The situation reminds me a lot of when Henri Lansbury was cast aside.

Lansbury never really got his chance at Arsenal, despite generating a lot of hype as he came up through the youth system. Just as he got on the brink of the first team squad, and 16-year-old Jack Wilshere burst onto the scene. Suddenly there was no opportunity for Lansbury as Arsenal had a generational talent on their hands playing in the same position.

In Cozier-Duberry and Nwaneri, we have two players of similar attributes, playing at a similar level. But Nwaneri being 2-years younger is the differenc emaker when we decide which one we will focus developing.

The Cozier-Duberry departure comes on the same day a former Arsenal “wonderkid” also departs his club.

At lot was expected of Omari Hutchinson. Then 2 summers ago he decided to turn down a new contract and join Chelsea. He was apparently unhappy that we were proposing to loan him out rather than have him as part of Arteta’s first team plans.

What followed was a year of sitting in Chelsea academy, before joining Ipswich Town on loan. He basically lost a year of his career by moving to West London.

His performances with Ipswich were good enough for the Tractor Boys to spend £22m on him, but not at the level that Chelsea tried to keep him and progress him to their first team.

Everytime a good young player leaves a club, the likes of Paul Pogba and Jadon Sancho are mentioned. But for every one of these that go on to be a global superstar (sort of!), there are hundreds of others that just drop down the league.

Whilst I wish Cozier-Duberry all the luck with his career, he is more likely to be playing for Bristol Rovers in 3 years than Bayern Munich.

And the same goes for Chido Obi Martin.

The club have also announced that Reuell Walters is also departing.

Arsenal have an abundance of full backs, so this one came as no surprise and highlights just how far we have moved forward under Arteta.

Two seasons ago I was talking about how Walters could be a good understudy for Takehiro Tomiyasu at right back. These days Tomiyasu is our 3rd choice right back and Walters would need at least 3 players ahead of him injured to get a sniff.

Enjoy your lunch!

Keenos