via @Arsenal insta

Good morning dearest readers. I’m teetering on the edge. I’ve gone from 10,000 steps a day / gym 4 times a week / don’t eat because you’re sooooo busy… to a person whose biggest daily exertion is sliding across the wooden floors to the fridge to grab myself a morning beer and a cup of cheese. The body does not forget these transgressions. My girlfriend pretends she can’t see it. But I know. I am… fat.

It sneaks up on you like a coward, hitting you from behind (back fat). You can hide a double chin in a beard for the daily zoom, but you’ll never be able to hide side flank cellulite from a full-length mirror and a downward dog pose. It’s time to take action… I think… I’m going to buy an exercise bike.

I never wanted to be that person, but group cycling might be the only way to save myself from myself. If anyone is a fitness expert, please let me know if indoor biking can bring me back from the brink.

Things that are putting me on the edge… has Ozil agreed to a deal yet? I’ve heard no news. I did hear that Auba and Mustafi sided with him. I expected Mustafi, but Auba? Surprising. Well, not surprising when you consider our glorious run with captains. Makes the fact that Arteta swayed the squad all the more impressive.

Talking of our fave striker, Auba has apparently been reaching out to the top boys over at Inter Milan who seem very keen to bring him back to Italy. I think we need to accept it, he’s going this summer. It’ll hurt, but we’re not going to be able to offer him £350k a week to stay with us.

Arsenal fans need to brace themselves for the reality of what this summer is bringing them: Fuck all.

We are in terrible shape, so pull yourself away from Thomas Partey and Dayot Upamecano rumours, those are pipe dreams as things stand. The job of Raul and Vinnai is simple this summer: Cut, Cut, Cut.

Our wage bill is £50m too expensive considering where we languish in the table and the level of euro competition we’re likely to face this summer. We need to shed a lot of players. We need to rethink how we operate. The club absolutely has to tame Raul and Edu and their penchant for extremely questionable deals. We need a reset.

There’s no Europe however you cut the final league standings. The current hot chat is that points per game is the method being favoured. That puts us in 8th, hilariously ahead of Spurs, but still well out of the mixer. That means financial pain.

I personally think this is good news. Clear out the dross. Restart the future.

There’s going to be action in the world of football. The transfer market has collapsed. There’s too much uncertainty. There are too many lower league clubs that are in trouble. There will be no appetite for mega-deals. I have to roll back my earlier resistance to the change, it is very much going to happen. No ‘deal collapse’ nails this reality harder than Mbappe and Neymar being told they will not be heading to Spain this summer.

Major will have to step in and make moves. I think we’re going to see a number of things happen.

Firstly, the gravy train for players is over. Agent mega fees are finished. The planet is not going to accept this shit any longer. The 12.5% reduction in salary Arsenal players took is going to look paltry in comparison where it’ll end up. The world of football is about to enter a phase where 1) Fans won’t be allowed into the stadium 2) Probably wouldn’t want to even if they were allowed. A poll in the lamestream media in America noted that only 12% of America was unhappy to be lockeddown. The Economist had a similar study of Brits. Apparently, humans have a natural aversion to disease and no amount of Fox News ‘It’s not that bad’ is going to change that view.

Secondly, I think there’s going to have to be a global agreement on where transfer fees will sit. Clubs need to heal their bank balances. £100m deals are dead (Mbappe). More swaps are coming (Barca), gentlemen’s agreements on pricing will come into place, the game will have to go back to something that looks like normality. The only clubs that might be able to splurge will be clubs that are propped up countries. Not sure drawing attention to the unfair advantage would be the smartest given the moment.

Until there’s a vaccine, you’d imagine that we’re going to be in an intermittent phase of world sport. When Bill Gates is telling the world that football is going to be behind closed doors for the foreseeable, you have to imagine he’s thought about it harder than you. That’ll mean the Premier League will have to plug 14% revenue lost. The easiest way to address that shortfall is to renegotiate player deals, something the public would be in favor of… and killl the transfer fee, which the clubs would love.

I don’t see how this doesn’t happen. The game as we knew it is over. That’s probably a good thing.

Anyway, back to my original point, I think we’ll see a united action at some point. The game is too fucked at a every level for it to be business as usual.

Right, that’s me done, see you in the comments. x