January Transfers Preview: More ‘outs’ than ‘ins’ 30 December, 2007
Posted by lasagnechef in Transfers.trackback
Well in a couple of days managers will be able to get their chequebooks out to strengthen their squads for the season run in. Also, this provides an opportunity to get rid of some disappointing players and weakening veterans. The latter seems more likely in the case of our club.
Half way through the season and we’ve far exceeded any predictions, including my own. Top at Christmas is something we would’ve all have been dreaming of back in August but I for one never thought it’d happen. January gives teams chasing the title a chance to improve their squads and gain an advantage on our rivals. Wenger said recently he wouldn’t be bringing anyone in but I’m sure there’ll be one or two departures.
Outs:
Gilberto Silva is one player that could be on his way out of Arsenal this January. It would be really sad to see him go but to be honest, it’s now or in the summer. I was surprised when he wasn’t named captain at the beginning of the season but he’s lost his place to a re-born Mathieu Flamini. He rarely gets a game now, a few Carling Cup appearances have been his only run in the side. He hasn’t been in the squad for the recent games and you have to think that maybe we’ve seen the last of the Brazilian captain. When he has been given an opportunity, he hasn’t been terrific either; he doesn’t look as good as he did last year and this is probably a lot down to his lack of games.
He’s simply a squad player now, he wont earn his place back in the team, he’ll only be there if we have injury problems and he could get games in the league cup. He can’t be happy. He’s been linked with a move to Italy, Juventus have been named. We’ll just have to see what happens over the next month.
Lassana Diarra is another midfielder that hasn’t seen a lot of games this season. He was signed on the last day of the transfer window and I was really exited. However he personally thought he could come straight into our side and expects to be selected. We’re lucky enough to have a great collection of midfielders here and he’s got healthy competition.
However he’s not happy with that and has spoken out on a couple of occasions about how unhappy he is with the situation. To be fair, he has played a few games for us, yes, a lot of them have been in the Carling Cup but you’ve got to start somewhere and a young player like him can’t just expect to walk straight into our starting 11. I really like him, and he could be really good, but if he doesn’t sort his attitude and patience out then he can leave, we’ve got enough players in his position anyway, but I do hope he stays.
Jens Lehmann is pretty much a dead certainty to leave next month. He started the season as no.1 but after some really bad errors that cost us points he got ‘injured’ and Manuel Almunia hasn’t lost his place in the side since. Wenger got fed up with his mental attitude and sloppy errors and dropped him. Every corner of free kick you’d just hope that Jens doesn’t lash out at any player simply stood near him.
He’s had a fantastic few years with us and as much as some of you might not like him I’m sure you’d still wish him all the best in the future. Almunia’s doing really well so he won’t really be missed in goal, but certainly as a character. It looks like he’ll be heading home to Germany, I think Dortmund are interested. We’ll see where he ends up pretty soon but I’d be very surprised if he was still with us come February 1st.
Ins:
‘Ins’ you say? Bwhaha! You must be joking?!
It’s hardly the biggest surprise that Arsene’s said he won’t add to the squad next month. Mr. Wenger said the only chance of him bringing some one in would be if he was “offered the bargain of the century”. Oh well. There’s noises that Ronaldinho might want out of Barca, if we were offered him on the cheap that might happen…we could do with a left winger.
In all seriousness, we have got Johan Djourou coming back from Birmingham which’ll feel like a new addition. Arsene did say a while ago he might be tempted to buy a defender next month but now we’ve got Johan back he’s not going to.
So in conclusion, Lehmann will go, Gilberto might and we wont bring anyone in. I’ll write a West Ham preview tomorrow, until then.
we have an world class striker coming in, his name is Robin Van Persie. Seriously he has been out for 2 and a half months and he feels like a signing.
Why are people obsessed with signings?
This is not Championship manager is it? We have five wingers in Hleb, Rosicky, Eboue, Theo and Diaby (six if we include Traore who I think would be immense with Clichy behind him) and you are still asking for a left winger who would disrupt the squad.
wrong.
We are at present in talks with Giovanni from Barca.
(consider this leak a X-Mas gift to all my fellow gooners)
Also, if we sold Diarra and Gilberto, we would be left with Cesc, Flamini, Diaby and Denilson. The problem is that Fabregas does not seem to work with Diaby or Denilson.
Diarra should stay.
Wat bout the trialists???? Mputu and Dimitrov????
lier
mputu could sign.
however arsene maybe tempted by etoo and villa both available. etoo in the summer and villa now.
gilberto + money swap for villa?
Actually that’s a good point, looks like we’re signing Mptutu or however it’s spelt
Dont see why we need a new striker. We already have 4 gr8 strikers. Who are you gonner drop 4 villa or muputu? Team is fine
On 13 December 2007, British sports news outlet Sky Sports.com reports the player has been attracted interest from London-based Arsenal F.C. Arsène Wenger extended a trial offer to Levski Sofia and Dimitrov will train in England for an undetermined amount of time. He went to England on 17 December 2007. A permanant move to Arsenal is thought to be announced when the january transfer window opens.The fee is thought to be around £700,000.
I think we need him, and Heinz Muller if THE SCUMBAG leaves
let me just digress a little bit;
portuguese
togolese
irishman
french
paraguayan
zimbabwean
nigerian
spaniard
bulgarian
these are the nationalities of the top ten scorers, in descending order,in the english premier league. i dont think the blame for the woes of the national team lies at the door of wenger,cos only the togolese plays for us.
the so-called experts/pundits need to pull their heads from their collective a*ses and put their thinking cups on…., ow that is assuming there is some gray matter between their ears!
if you think eddy is great then you haven been going to the games.
he is a good finisher but actually terrible linking play. we don’t play that way. at prem league level you need to create chances your self. don’t let the goals at everton fool you. one cannot ignore the 45 mins preceding the everton mistakes.
rvp is very injury prone so yes we do need a world class striker until bendtner and walcott develop.
we only have one striker that gives us consistency - adebayor.
I’d love a winger to sign - Eboue, Rosicky, Diaby and Walcott are all far too erratic, to varying degrees, and Hleb is the only one that can be relied upon with any regularity.
Eboue and Rosicky frustrate me - both technically good footballers, but neither seem to have a decent head on their shoulders. The former is too much of a clown on the pitch, and not in a good way, and the latter tries for the hollywood pass far too often, gives it away too much, and causes a lot of play to break down around him, despite the fact that he does have occasional excellent moments. Diaby is the most one-footed player I’ve ever seen - granted, that one foot is absolutely ridiculously good, but he’s really not a winger anyway. And Theo can’t really stay fit at the moment either, for all his talent.
So a proper winger would be nice - or at least someone who can play wide and not look completely lost, and destroy the teams shape.
Gunners 4 life
Arsenal reall dont need anybody unless maybe a steady central defender coz really Senderos??? u have to be kidding me after all that Drogba did last season, the mere sight of him stepping onto the pitch will see Senderos gifting him a goal and Djorou isnt exprienced enough whil Song isnt a centre back.
So a center back is needed someone who is content on sitting on the bench and waitin for his chance but a quality one, maybe like alex, who does a terrific job deputizong for Terry and Carvalho, other than that, we have a big and great squad.
Gilberto really is time to go so is Lehmann and Diarra if he is to much of a problem then the exit door is not far away from him
dimtrov is more than enuff, if we’re in really the desart, there’s always gibbs.
we need three good players buffon in goals richards in defence and eto up front and we will win the lot,+we got the cash to spend on them. Im not saying our team aint good already but we will b unstoppable with these players what do u think.
you lot are all fools!! Giovanni coming in? your having a laugh!! Get rid of Rosicky? Come on - last season that was Hleb!! Senderos is not going anywhere either …..we may take one of the trialists on and thats it. Lehmann will go, Diarra will stay and Gilberto will probably stay at least till the end of the season because we need his experience.
I think some of you are playing Championship manager!
arsenal to win the european cup by 2010 come on the gooners but hopefully 2008 come on
we got the money like championship manager so lets spend some of it on worldclass players like everyone else we havent bought a big name since bergkamp and what i mean by that is a proven player before he joins if you get my drift
so we can make everyone sit up an take notice.
Actually FIFA Manager ‘08 is better than Championship Manager
.
We don’t need wingers… and we don’t have any (Walcott the exception but he will be converted to the centre eventually). Hleb, Rosicky, Eboue all cut in from the touchline. Wingers stay there. Instead, we get our strikers to drop out to the wing to get the ball - remember when Henry used to drop out to the wing to get the ball? RvP and Adebayor both drop out to the wing to get the ball as well. Bendtner and Eduardo are being taught to do the same.
We have no need for wingers. Width and crosses are provided by the fullbacks and penetration and goals are provided by the strikers.
The only issue we have is that we don’t have enough wide midfielders… or it’s because the one’s we have are injury prone. That’s why we’re getting this Dimitrov fella. Wenger may well use him as a wide midfielder to cut in from the touchline and set up play. From the videos I’ve seen he has excellent dribbling skills are reminds me a lot of Hleb.
I hope we do get Dimitrov, he is absoloute class, reminds me of a young Overmarrs….
I actually agree with “fools” & “Mooney”.
We also have Carlos Vela coming across probably at season’s end. I can’t see Wenger buying a striker who will impede the development of Eduardo, Bendtner & Theo (plus Vela next season). RVP is world class and like him or not, Adebayor is scoring goals (though he really does need to improve his first touch and his decision-making).
I would buy a quality 3rd choice central defender (Senderos and Djourou are not yet good enough and may never be) & another keeper as I am not sure that Fabianski is ready to step into Lehmann’s departed boots.
Happy NY fellow Gooners - our boys top the table!
Goofle: We do not have five wingers. Eboue is a right back, Walcott is a striker, Hleb & Rosicky are central midfield playmakers and Diaby is a central midfielder.
Arsenal doesn´t actually have any _wingers_. Arsene just puts players out of their natural positions. Hleb has done quite well on the right, but he´s better playing central midfield. Eboue is probably the worst player on Arsenals midfield, maybe because he´s not a winger? Rosicky and Diaby are also better as central midfielders.
connolly is coming back from loan and might go to qpr in a permanent deal, van den Berg has joined dutch side Go ahead eagles on loan
Benzema is on his way….wait and see
Ronaldinho ??? u must be joking he is useless if u have seen him play he always looses the ball, thats defo something which would be a negative for our play then a positive.
get richards and dimitrov in
almunia for england
I fail to see how many pundits go on about Manure being too strong and all coz they have this or that. Then they stumble whenever Rooney aint in the team and they say nothing. But our team of callow kids has sometimes not quite done it the usual way but ground out a result. The crime all these pundits commit is failure to mention that Arsenal is as it is in spite of their best player Van Persie being out for what 3 months? He was our top striker last year although he was injured for a long time. I bet we should be 5-6 points better off with VP in the team but if you had given me what we have at the beginning of the season I would have bitten it off your hand.
we havent gt a big enuf sqaud like man u or chelsea or even liverpool if u look when all them 3 play they have gt such fire power on the bench man u gt players lik nani nd anderson saha chelsea gt shaun wright phillips joe cole liverpool gt kewell babel we havent gt many superstars hu can come off the bench ….. if we were goin 2 buy players in positions such as midfield striker or defence then we wud have 2 get rid of some players like eboue he doesnt score ne goals and right wingers shud look at ronaldo joe cole benyaoun
Benzema or Giovani dos santos.
we are in talks with both.
colm 31 December, 2007
with vp injured, arsenal need to buy a decent striker, arsenal always seem to have too many injury’s Adebayor playing up front on his own, wenger should consider buying totti or try to get saviola like we were suppose to.
[...] Gilberto Silva [...]
No depth?
Maybe I’m mistaken, but I could have sworn that our completely second-string side has been beating EPL teams in the cup competitions. And please don’t tarnish the great name of Arsenal FC by saying Chelski are better off because they have SWP.
what we need is a berbatov , but i think our team is fine. we just lack the finishing, although eduardo has shone in that department. Flamini makes fabregas play. most improved player along with gael cliche.
hello mr arsen wenger how are u hope all is going well prety all about this is just that we are going to miss some one like kolo and aboue then four that we have to coupple our defens very well and we are very hungry of defesns and all frome me is 4 u to sing me a good central defens who will cover that gap of kolo and aboue thanks very much your faithfull supporter muhammed arsenal4real
well am very happy to see the whiz kid back at arsenal and all i need is benzema