PESKY AGENTS MEDDLING

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Some in the Italian media are reporting that Arsenal have moved to official bid stage when it comes to Dusan Vlahovic.

Here is what I don’t understand: If AFC knew who they were targeting in October, why does it take until Jan 17 to place a bid?

I am just asking that, it’s not a criticism, I’m still in the ‘don’t know what you’re talking about’ dog house after thinking the Arsenal press release was too naive. We might not have even placed a bid here.

What does seem clear from factual evidence sourced in the FT is the agents of Dusan are the worst kind. They tried to extract £6.69m in fees from Fiorentina just to keep the player there. I read one random thread that stated there could be as many as 15 parties trying to extract fees from this transfer. Edu is more than comfortable running in those circles, the guy was shameless enough to put Willian, his agents player, on £250k a week and do the signing at the Kia’s house. Not sure he’s getting that sort of long leash these days. Certain clubs might indulge mega agents, but I don’t think Arsenal are rich enough to be adding 10-15% on top of a big fee… did I say rich? Stupid.

This is another total guess out here, but I’d imagine part of the push from Arsenal to the player will be, ‘fuck your agent, do what you need to do to go to the next level in your career.’ I really don’t understand why so many players are happy to let their agents extract so much cash from their deals. If I were the star and I knew 15 parties were leaching onto my deal, I’d put a stop to it. If an agent is slowing you down, creating a bad rep for you, and cratering your options, then you have the wrong agent. There’s a story doing the rounds in Spain that Ousmane Dembélé was set to sign with Xavi; his agent Moussa Sissokho held a meeting with the club, was very rude, demanded 200m euros over 4 years for the player, and 40m euros for himself. It’s amusing because who doesn’t like to see Barca getting rolled like that, but it does speak to a wider issue… some agents are poison. Going back to Fiorentina, their owner basically confirmed that Gattuso joined and told him which players to sign, and at what fees. The owner told him to go fuck himself and that was the end of that.

There will be a reckoning at some point, the money made around the edges of football is often far from clean, and no one ever seems to pay a price for wrongdoing. I suspect Italy will drop the first show with the price fixing scandal that’s engulfed a load of clubs, then we’ll see if the UK or Spain decide to move on it. No doubt an ex-Arsenal person is sweating about that somewhere in the French Riviera right now.

Arsenal fans took the banter to new levels yesterday, we’re all united online, which makes a nice change, and the misguided pundits looking for retweets and likes at our expense took a battering yesterday. There was a common feature amongst them all. Those that took jabs at Arsenal for postponing the game had NOTHING to say when Liverpool postponed in scandalous fashion. Absolutely zip.

Now, this is a kind of bias, and I won’t have anyone pretend it isn’t so. Jurgen Klopp is the new Alex Ferguson in the media. He has a lot of love from fans, he’s a winner, so journalists don’t want to cross him. They don’t want to lose access, get spanked by him in front of their friends, and it seems there’s a bit of an unwritten rule about criticising him. All is not well at camp Liverpool, but no one writes about it. The German rockstar drew 11 false positives, there was no Martin Lipton hit piece about it, the big journo Twitter accounts didn’t debate the moral bankruptcy of it all, no one questioned their sporting intent. Even when the EFL investigated, the story was written in an almost apologetic manner. Why? Because he has the power.

Arsenal are the whipping boys in the media still. Arteta doesn’t have enough credibility yet. In most lines of business, your reputation doesn’t update in real time, it takes a bit longer. Arsenal should be getting more respect, but we don’t, because we’re still seen as easy prey. Our time will come though, I think Arteta is doing a good job in his press conferences, and there will be a time when he has a bit more edge to him, and journalists have to think twice about whether they want to cross an Arsenal manager that might be around for a long time (or at another fancy club).

Arsene Wenger had the power in the media. Everyone wanted him to answer their question. The big journalists didn’t want to write about his clear demise or ask him tough questions. Every time our season crashed, they all ran to his defence with ‘the warchest is coming’ and ‘there have been internal meetings and Arsene really took this season’s failings hard, he’s going to fix it.’

We are all bias at heart. In our jobs, there is always an element of self-preservation. So when big names ignore bigger names doing bad things, it’s not an accident, it’s because no one wants to damage their career writing things that piss off the biggest names.

Onto other stories. The Arthur Melo story seems to have died a death. The player was subbed at halftime versus Juventus last night and the press in Italy is reporting the loan is off. I cannot say I will miss this rumour, it’s emergency cover at best, so if we have to look elsewhere, then that will work for me.

Miguel Azeez has been recalled from his loan with Portsmouth under the guidance of Dan Cowley. He had this to say.

“There are some areas of his game that are beyond this level and other areas that he needs to keep working at, as with any young player.”

“I have absolutely no doubt that he’ll go on to become a top player..” “We’ve been impressed with his focus and commitment to improve.

I’m not sure if we’ve recalled because we need him in our midfield or Ben Knapper has another loan move up his sleeve.

Auba is going to come back to Arsenal for further treatment. The Gabonese star has rumoured heart lesions. I have no idea what that’s related to, but there’s been a stint of athletes with heart issue post-covid. Good luck to the player, I hope whatever the problem is, it can be fixed.

Get a vaccination, people.

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Dissenter

The club better send a private jet to pick Partey up pronto.

Mulerise14

If we get 4 points from outstanding,cheski will just be 4 points ahead of us…..they have been offcolour of late(long may it continue),so it is not gainsaying that the four of us : Ourselves,Manu,spuds,& cheski are gonna slog it out for two slots……as fans wether you a realist, idealist,or even pessimist…..name your ist* It is getting clearer that we are on a roll and we have the brightest chance of making top 4 this year…..I think we will celebrate St. Totteringham’s Day for the first time in 6 seasons,I would not put money on Manu finishing above us…..and cheski are… Read more »

Dissenter

Actually, the Nigerian player on fire right now isn’t at at the AFCON
Emmanuel Bonaventure Dennis is the very one that would have set AFCON on fire.
The lad has some shades of Salah in him. He won’t be at Watford next season, regardless of whether they survive or not.

Dissenter

Pedro
“Tuchel fan boys in a bind right now.”

Honestly, we need to approach these results against Brighton with some caution. No need for chest beating because this has more to do with Graham Potter than Tuchel.
Brighton are a well coached team and we too will struggle to beat them at the Emirates.

Raulishuss

I wonder if you would have made the same excuse if it were arsenal diss

Dissenter

Any news about the nature of that last Xhaka red card at Anfield?
Per Dale Johnson @ESPN, if Xhaka’s dismissal is deemed to have come as a result of serious foul play, he will face a 4-game ban, owing to a previous red card picked up this season.

If, on the other hand, it came as a result of the denial of an obvious goalscoring opportunity, the Swiss is in line for a 2-game suspension.

It’s still unclear as what type of red card he had.

Dissenter

Pedro
“Diss, we can only do that if you didn’t call Arteta a bum when he drew against him earlier in the year.”

You rascal 🙂
I didn’t call Arteta a bum for drawing away at Brighton.
I’ve been one of the cooler heads here when we’ve lost games

TheLegendaryDB10

Trying to catchup on posts and land on this: MbJanuary 18, 2022    18:13:05 Anyone not happy at Arsenal should be made to read the Sanchez story. Mb , if you don’t like The Arsenal you can just fuck off right now. Nobody is forcing you to follow this great club. There are plenty of other EPL clubs for you to follow. PS: This is old news anyway. Wenger was to entrenched in self preservation (top 4 and nothing more) to care about a player who genuinely wanted to win trophies. But for you to be posting this now is petty… Read more »

AFC Forever

Diss

The red card was for denying a goalscoring opportunity. He gets a one game ban for that plus an extra game because it’s his second red.

MidwestGun

Well it has a little to do with Tuchel… he has only won 3 out of his last 10 League matches. Considering his deep squad that’s pretty bad. and not all due to Brighton..

Dissenter

Raulishuss
I too will take the chest beating mode is we had wrestled 4 of 6 points from Brighton this season.
We too have to play them at home and you know as well as I do that the result is not a given because they are a quality team.
That’s all I’m saying.

Dissenter

AFC
Thanks

Dissenter

Midwest
I guess there’s a confluence of our opinions then
Struggling top managers shouldn’t face well coached teams like Brighton.

AFC Forever

Midwest

You nailed it. We had a team that had barely played together, consisting of young players. Drawing with Brighton away was greeted by some as a catastrophy because it suited the narrative. Tuchel has a squad that is levels above but he gets excuses. The truth is there are no easy games and Brighton are a well coached team with some good players. I always tell people that if it’s that easy to predict results why are the bookies so wealthy.

TheLegendaryDB10

Lolz

Chelski drawing vs The Seagulls.

I know they we’re still 9 pts off them but if they carry on in this vein (pls do!!!) this could make an interesting test if ever 3rd spot is up for grabs. We are 2 pts behind the Hammers with 2 games in hand.

Not going overboard here. Just relishing a mere possibility to knick 3rd from the Chelski scumbags. This would be great if this did happen.

AFC Forever

Antonio Conte is clearly feeling the pressure. He’s had right moan Spuds have got a lot of games to fit in, including the top 3 away, other away games at United, Leicester & Villa plus a rearranged game with us.

The Premier League have responded claiming the postponement rules were agreed last month by every premier League team

Brendan Rodgers defended the Premier League saying all teams agreed to the rules last month and injuries & AFCON were valid reasons to have games called off, it’s not about Covid.

They’re salty which proves Arsenal did the right thing.

TheLegendaryDB10

AFC

The Premier League have responded claiming the postponement rules were agreed last month by every premier League team

That’s a solid middle finger to the Spuds.

They’re salty which proves Arsenal did the right thing.

Anything to rile up these shits down the road is always welcome. 😁

AFC Forever

Legendary

Yep that’s what I thought. I’m loving this new ‘don’t give a shit’ Arsenal. Looks like we have ESR & Saka back from injury too & Odegaard is over Covid. Nice little rest for them all.

TheLegendaryDB10

https://www.arsenal.com/sead-kolasinac-leaves-mutual-consent-olympique-marseille I know it has been posted that the overpayed Kolasinac has finally left the club. But we are getting closer and closer to clearing out the decks of overpayed mercs that had accumulated under Wenger. I like the fact that he left through mutual consent. He finally got the message he was not needed. A clear example of a merc drawing his obscene undeserved salary and hanging on as long as he could. Good riddance. The last piece of the puzzle is indeed Xhaka. I can’t think of any player where the entire fan base will sigh of relief… Read more »

TheLegendaryDB10

AFC

That is good news that Saka, ESR and Øde are back.

I was getting a bit worried with our impending return fixture vs the bindippers on Thursday.

I really want us to give the absolute max vs these cheating liars on Thursday.

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