Pre-Emirates Cup Press Conference: Wengerese-English Translation

Arsene Wenger just gave his pre-Emirates Cup press conference. But as longtime Arsenal fans know well, Wenger oftentimes doesn’t really say what he actually means. He’ll simply blather on about refusing to pay too much money, and how the team just needs “belief” or some such thing to win, and refuse to give a direct answer to 95% of questions. Do you ever wish you could know what he actually meant? Well, fear no more, because I’ve been studying Wengerese through a Berlitz class, and I am now able to translate his answers into plain English:

–HE SAID: “I feel there will be more teams fighting for the title. It makes it more interesting and open as well – we have seen the start of that last season as well, all of the top teams lost points against the second part of the Premier League. That trend could even become stronger this year.”

TRANSLATION: “We need to watch our ass or we could mess around and get bumped out of the Top 4.”

–HE SAID: In terms of what he will get from the Emirates Cup, he said: “You will see some young players like Emmanuel Frimpong and Jack Wilshere, also the new players like Marouane Chamakh and Laurent Koscielny. It will be good to see them in a competitive environment. That will be interesting. I will also learn what condition we are in physically, because we have worked quite hard and with two weeks to go it is important that we can last in the games. The third point is how ready are we with our team play? How sharp is our passing, and quick movement off the ball?”

TRANSLATION: “This is a glorified friendly, and we’re still trying to build fitness and match sharpness. Also, I think Frimpong is closer to making the first-team than JET or Eastmond, and he’ll probably make the first-team unless he really screws it up the next few weeks.”

–HE SAID: “It’s open. I will pick the team with maybe 48 hours to go. But I have an idea already. We have a good opportunity to see them [the keepers] tomorrow. The Premier League starts on the 14th of August so we have a little bit more time.”

–TRANSLATION: “I know who my good players are, but I have no frakking clue who’s going to start in goal. You better pray to whatever god you worship that I sign a keeper in the next two weeks.”

–HE SAID: “At the moment we are still looking outside to strengthen the squad. If we find the right players we will do it. In what position I cannot tell you. We have signed Chamakh and Koscielny already. There are always two periods in the transfer window – very early and very late. I always did [business] very early. And I always did it very late. The transfer market overall is very quiet. Clubs are very tight with money.” When asked later about whether he wants to bring in another center back, he said “Ideally, yes.”

–TRANSLATION: “I’m Arsene Wenger, bitch! Do you honestly think I’m going to answer this question any differently now than I did the first 3,000,000 times I was asked that in my career? Come on. I’m going to sign a keeper and a defender, both of whom will be pretty obscure and initially underwhelming, but both of whom will hopefully turn out to be good signings. And I’m not going to waste my leverage by publicly stating that we’re desperate for another defender. Even though we most definitely are.”

–HE SAID: When asked if he was surprised by Sol Campbell’s decision to sign with Newcastle, he said, “No, because I thought it was a possibility he could take. Sol I believe has done extremely well with us and we were still open to negotiating with him here. But he made that choice and, no, I am not surprised.”

–TRANSLATION: “Yes, because Newcastle sucks. And because now he has to live in Newcastle.”

–HE SAID: When inevitably asked about the Cesc transfer saga and whether Cesc would leave after this season, Wenger said, “Look at the length of his contract and you will see he has five or six years to go. When you sign a contract it means we are committed to a player to pay him and keep him no matter what happens.” Later, when asked about his refusal to negotiate with Barcelona over Cesc, he said, “We do not negotiate. If I want to buy your house and you don’t want to sell, you don’t negotiate with me, that’s completely normal.”

–TRANSLATION: “Screw Barcelona. Let’s stop talking about this, please.”

–HE SAID: When asked about the new Premiership squad rules, Wenger said, “When you have already 25 [players in your squad], when you buy a player you know you have 26 and now you have to get rid of one. So you have to integrate in the transfer market when you buy a player how much as well it costs to get rid of a player.

You are not sure after you will be capable to buy the player, so I believe it is a disastrous decision for football and for the players and I was quite amazed that the union accepted that. I believe as well for the clubs it is a very bad decision.”

TRANSLATION: “It’s frakking awesome. We’ll never have more than 20 players over the age of 21, so it really screws over the Manchester teams, which is great by me.”

–HE SAID: “I always said Cesc Fabregas will be our captain next year and that we want to keep him. Despite all the speculation last season and the whole summer, nothing has changed. There’s a great attitude and spirit inside the squad and Cesc Fabregas can help us achieve these targets. He’s now at a good age, 23-years-old, and he has just won the World Cup. I believe he will grow in authority again for next season. The biggest achievement for him now is to help us win the title.

I have known players who want to leave and then after they don’t want to leave any more. There are all kinds of situations but I believe what happens after is that when a player stays it is about how much he focused on playing football. It is always in the interests of the player to perform. If he is a champion, he goes on the football pitch and wants to be the best he can. All the rest is a poor excuse for a football player.”

–TRANSLATION: “Cesc is staying, and he’ll still be captain next season. But he’s tried my patience and that of all his teammates with this whole Barca thing, so he needs to sack up, forget about it, and concentrating on leading and winning at Arsenal.”

That’s it, then, translated into plain English. Emirates cup preview coming manana.

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Category: Arsenal News, Arsene Wenger