Season In Review: The Awards

Did anyone see the awful two footed challenge against RvP in the "friendly" against Uruguay?  I don't think he got hurt, but it was as bad a challenge as you'll see.  No red card either.

not even a free kick, play resumed from a throw-in!

Just another update regarding the site... we're still working on it.  Not sure why the higher ups are dragging a bit, but we're hoping to have something set pretty soon after Sairax leaves. 

I love Wojo. Watching the Poland v France game and Wojo just destroyed NZogbia. He came out to head the ball away and laid him out.

Him and Sagna played very well today.  Though Sagna's crosses were still a bit off, at least they had some air on them this time.

Good game between the two teams.  Poland played a little better than I anticipated, but had a few stretches that were strong.  Still lacking off the ball movement to create opportunities.  I'd rather they played more for the counter attack since we have some fast players now, and look better when doing it, but this manager seems to be forcing them to play a possession, shorter passing game which they don't have the personnel for.

I'm planning a trip to London next fall to visit my sister, who will be studying at the London School of Economics. I want to plan my trip during an Arsenal home match so that I can attend. Can someone tell me when next season's schedule will be released? Thanks.

I believe on June 17th

Best Arsenal Blog: The Offside Martin/Sairax

Runner up: comments section of the Arsenal Offside

Great stuff, although I would put RVP as best comeback...

is there a fire drill wat does the song mean

it basically asks why the fans are leaving the game early in an ironic fashion....lots of spuds fans were leaving early during the 4-1 carling cup match

lol i see

you did not called Wenger's puffy coat as 'sleeping bag coat'. That very coat makes to Special1 TV, okay?

great stuff, and I agree with most of it (bar the puffy coat remark, naturally)

Just over read and seems right. I think I agree with everything!
Except Songs hair...imo that was a "ring to the finger/ fits like a glove" style, Like Sagna's.
I saw a pic of 2009 I think and Song had his black hair...the blond thing adds something..I dunno, but its my feeling :)
I will go and check the reactions, which I havent been very attentive to, and come back later.
Any news from departing people? (not only players, mommy, not only players, I am holding my tears)

On a fan-to-fan level, Song was starting to look to similar to Adebayor, so in my opinion the blond look was good for him. And the reason he did anyways was to pay tribute to his uncle and father figure Rigobert Song. Then again, Rigobert Song was never the standard for fashion statements.

great stuff mate...well done.

As Mr Redknapp prepares for his day (or perhaps week), in court,
defending himself against charges related to fraud and corruption during
his previous managerial life, he has taken on a new life, doubling as
the man asking the Tiny Totts chairman Daniel Levy to finance three
players he feels he needs to get back in the top four.

What is interesting here is that while most of the quotes relating to
Mr Wenger and Arsenal players appear in one source without being
clearly attributable, often relating to a tiny fragment of a sentence
that Mr Wenger might have said, rather than the whole paragraph, with
Tottenham we have the innocent until proven guilty Mr R saying on Sky
Sports News “I want Daniel to go out and get three fantastic players now
to come in.”  It sounds a bit like apportioning blame before the knife
goes in.

He continues…

“You can’t say that just because we didn’t make the Champions
League, we’re not going to improve next year. If you do that then we’re
not going to get in it again. That’s a fact, because you won’t pass
the teams that finished above you last year.  If we don’t improve then
they will improve. Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal – they will
improve, and Man City… they’re unbelievable. They are never going to
stop improving as will Kenny [Dalglish] with Liverpool now.   You have
to keep improving if you want to keep anywhere near those teams. I
certainly feel we need three players of real quality if we are going to
compete with those teams otherwise it will be very difficult.”

And you can see his point – and it is one he has been developing for
some time.   His theme is always the same, City, United, Chelsea and
with a grudging twitch, us, plus Liverpool lurking.  What now for the
Tinies? he keeps asking.

But they are £30m down on income before
they start.  And yet, hang on…  Haven’t the Tinies been making as much
or more money than we have each season?  I have never quite worked out
how, but that is how it seems.

Now compare and contrast the chairman/owner/manager relationship at
the Tinies with that at Arsenal.  You have Daniel Levy/Jo Lewis in the
Bahamas/The Redknapp (innocent until proven otherwise).   Not exactly
working as a team I’d say.

We have Mr Hill-Wood/Mr Kronke/Mr Wenger.   OK Mr H-W has his
critics, but he is in fact a figurehead – there to represent the long
tradition of his family running the club.  Mr Kronke is as foreign as Jo
Lewis but he’s around a hell of a lot more, and we can see what he has
done with his other clubs.  And we have Mr W (although I have long
wondered when it will be that the anti-Arsenal Arsenal groupings suggest
that we would have won the league under Mr Innocent-until-proven, as
opposed to Mr Wenger.

So what has Daniel Levy said?  In fact he has spoken not of the need
for more players, but of the need to streamline the squad.  So while Mr
Hill-Wood always says, the money is there for Mr Wenger, at Tottenham
there is a total conflict.

And since the Tinies got rid of their reserve team about five years
ago in order to save dosh, streamlining  can only mean two things.  One
is to pull out of the youth leagues, and the other is to cut the first
team squad.

And here’s another thing.  While we spent much of last summer looking
at the impact of the 25 rule, this season it hardly gets mentioned. 
But for the Tinies it is an issue.

Three Tinies are no longer outside the 25, having become 21 years old
during the season, and so adding to the numbers are Sandro, Bale and
dos Santos.   More pressure.

Then there were the big time big money men out on loan: Keane,
Naughton, O’Hara and (oh yes he is still there) David Bentley.  All
back and in the 25.

WHU, as we know, and as mentioned in the last article in this little
series, can’t afford to keep Keene.  Giovani has been at Racing
Santander and the word on the rather dirty streets around the mucky end
of WHL is that Arry don’t like him.  O’Hara has a long-standing back
injury and may or may not survive.

Ledley King is another problem.  £75,000 a week for a very modest
number of matches in a season – a dozen if you are lucky, half a dozen
if not.  Quite expensive really.

Woodgate and Cudicini are out of contract this season I think, so I
guess they go just to cut the wages bill.

Then there is Pavlyuchenko, Hutton, Kranjcar, Corluka, Palacios – all
big money men with big salaries – which makes them harder and harder to
sell.

So what is the poor club to do?  Sell Bale for £30m to Real Mad?  Or
maybe move on Luka Modric who has five years to go on his contract?

This whole muddle has come as a bit of a shock to the club I think,
and the quotes from Arry suggest that he is as much in denial about the
Tinies lack of finance as he is about his forthcoming court case (and
there he is innocent of course until anyone decides otherwise).

Last season we were endlessly told that the Tinies were bidding £30m
or more for Rossi.  The AAA moaned that soon the Tinies would overtake
us and would take our place in the Champs League because we refused to
spend.  But in fact it almost looks as if they are in Leeds-world (you
will remember the Champs League semi in 2001 followed by a quick tumble
into their spiritual home of the third division).

So what of Diego Forlán – wasn’t he trotting the Tiny way – or so we
were told.  Except he is paid over £6m a year.  So perhaps not.

“I don’t know if we have any money to spend,” said Redknapp a while
back.  s. “We might not. I have not asked the chairman. We will have to
wait and see. But if there isn’t, we will get on with it again and be
strong again next year.”

The big problem of course is their endless delay over the stadium. 
While we went on and just did it, they got planning permission for the
WHL project (complete with hotels – who ever would want to stay in a
hotel at WHL?). Then having muddled that through they decided they
wanted the Olympic stadium instead.  But they didn’t get it – so now
they are fighting another expensive legal battle.  This could run for
years and years, and all the while they have a ground smaller than
Highbury.

Of course the press do not see it as a disaster.   They consider
Redknapp’s one season in the Champs as “remarkable” given the size of
the ground – forgetting that we have been there year after year in Mr
Wenger’s time.

But now certainly times have changed and the challenge for the Tinies
is simply to keep going financially.  If the rich overseas owner pulls
out (and we should never forget, the Tinies are just like QPR and
Chelsea in this regard – financed by a rich owner) they are in an awful
mess.

All good, except the note about Papa Song's hair style...that was absolutely perfect for his persona. I wish he still had the beard & hair combo, seemed like he was Samson when he had that, and then Delilah cut it off and he dwindled.

Hm....interesting theory....
also, love the "Papa Song" lol