Manchester City attempting to complete #DeadlineDay move for Porto midfielder Nico Gonzalez. No agreement or guarantee it happens but negotiations over 23yo Spaniard ongoing as #MCFC work to strengthen with player who can operate at No6/8.
_______________________________________________
Porto insist on €60m release clause for Nico.
City truly expect to be hit with a transfer ban for a few windows. There's no other way.
F** k me.After a day like yesterday & the Doom n gloom brothers are back on with their reality show.Lol .We really do have the oddest bunch of ‘ fans’.I say that loosely……
The narrative of this blog post would have been something like "look at what we can do if play on top form, imagine what we can do we we properly build a squad and knock off Artetas's arrogance and power", instead it was "look at what we did to City, I told you all everything was fine". Such a downer.
So happy wth the win nonetheless. Will savor it for a while yet.
Arsenal is not the best team in England right now, don’t take my word for it.
Just glance at the league table, it never lies
PGMOL are the not the reason we aren’t topping the table, maybe luck from injuries have been contributory but overall, Liverpool have more consistent than us.
Let’s just carry our momentum until Wednesday and hope for the best.
I listened to Arteta and he doesn’t think like you
I watched Declan Rice’s interview, these people are anchored in reality.
You’re just driving people to a paranoid existence and it’s not healthy
How can you be pointing all the fingers at PGMOL when we’ve FAILED to sign a striker in the 31 days of January?
We are one Kai Havertz injury or one Raya muscle strain away from disaster.
We are the best team in England though. After 50 injuries this season, including injuries to key players, plus a horrific amount of points stolen from us, dents in our confidence due to said situations, we're still there.
-2 pts Brighton home
-2 pts City away
-2 pts Liverpool home
-2 pts Brighton away
Not including games where we got fucked but we managed to win like against Wolves at home and Wolves away.
That's just off the top of my head.
We should be ahead of Pool after a gazillion of injuries.
Pedro isn't as competitive as he was before. He's said it himself. Ageing, fatherhood and life generally has softened him up. I'm not sure he cares so much if we win now. He's just more invested in his narrative bein right or surviving at least. Almost like papa Wenger towards the end. It's a pity really.
I wanted Jesus, Zinchenko and Tomi sold in the summer.
I wanted another CF option Jesus' place - young, super talented project CF, to be raised in our style of play and without the pressure to be instantly top quality.
But you were also chatting that Havertz was one of the top 5 strikers in the world so what exactly is the need for a striker when you had ‘one of the top 5 strikers in the world’?
Nevile or what ever his name is that coward former MU defender has always something bad and negative to say as he did yesterday about Gabriel ( the probably think we forgot how nasty and cowardly he attacked Reyes , a much physically and age wise easy target ) at least Gabriel was having a go at a Giant monster and what he did was not anywhere near what he did to Reyes !!
Started talking about him though as he still made a correct analysis why he gets frustrated with Arsenal as they let teams and stop being proactive and risk taking to continue to attack with intensity after they score, that is spot on if we do that from now on we could probably manage with out striker go attack attack and attack like yesterday obviously there will much less space to attack but intensity can compensate for that.
Ethan and Myles have been at Arsenal since they were 8. I'm sure they have received development, coaching, and all manner of other means of support during their time here.
Accident put them in the team , simple and obvious, are you telling me he thought MLS would bench Calafiori ? why but him if he knew he had ready made better player already ? if he knew that make him even more stupid than I thought. Why did he did not start Nwaneri yesteday ? we won good, if we had nor I promise you would have been even more mad than I am already.
Where are the Mikel out brigade this weekend ? The trolls that tell us we need to change ?
If they were not trolls and meant what they keep harping on about surely that would mean they would be on here like the rest of us win lose or draw ?
You know to show that they mean what they stay and to keep to their narrative? No the usual arse holes are crying under their pillows and cannot come out until we drop points or go out of a cup.
Next negative result will have them flooding back in here to tell us what the board should do.
Arsenal are now in first position and will win the league after beating city 5-1 yesterday. Miraculously, the win added 12 points to our total and we are cruising to the title.
The win also miraculously balanced our squad. We no longer have 5 LBs and no strikers. Merino suddenly has become world class and Haverts 1 goal yesterday took him to 32 league goals for the season. Glory Glory Arsenal, the champions of EPL 2024/2025 season after yesterday
Well he has spent a fortune, made unbelievable mistakes, most of the successes including the teenagers happened by accident other than design, he lacks the killer instinct when the going gets tough and he has a little bit of that Havertz lack of balls and that it the reason we are where we are although it is admittedly not a bad place to be especially after yesterday and he has won nothing big yet, if Slot wins in his first season albeit incredible help by the corrupt PGMOL, Arteta will be under pressure make no mistake , this is sport and once in a while one has to deliver and he has other than that FA cup nothing to show for it and time is running out from him !!
If we even sign anyone, it has to be a versatile player able to occupy at least 2 positions - winger + CF. We're one injury to an offensive player away from having one offensive option on the bench. One.
We won't be playing many games in the next 2 months. Still, not getting that one player in, even if it's a loan from abroad, we'd be leaving ourselves short and hoping we get lucky in the run in.
“looped the ball just high enough to hit the bar and avoid Haaland waiting below it like a shark waiting for chum off the side of a boat.”
Or
looped the ball just high enough to hit the bar and avoid Haaland waiting below it like a troll lurking under a bridge, waiting for a passing Billy goat.
How lovely was that? Humiliating a side that has served up some for us in the past was mint! And ‘set piece fc’ stringing 30-odd passes together that ended with a Hale-End product icing the cake!
‘It was an absolutely horrendous moment that drew fuuuuuu-gasps around the world. xG nerds saying it was a 0.77 chance. Higher than a penalty? Not for me. ‘
Did they really?
I hope not, because if they did , then the xG stat is even a bigger joke than I ever thought it was.
I think I'll vote for getting a "ready" striker now cos in my view, we need to win now. The plan should be to win, not develop a player who may or may not maintain a trajectory
watched him a couple of times - he has pace and move well and is strong. Very raw still and doesn’t get much game time at Bayern. Would be a project but prefer that at 19 rather than Watkins at 29.
But what will be will be. Chances are we get neither!
I had discounted the League Cup to such an extent I genuinely forgot we were still officially in it ! It was only during the City game when the commentator referred to the Newcastle game on Wednesday that the penny dropped
I had only just been saying to a mate about being out of both domestic cups.
"Let's also look at that result with the transfer window in mind. You don't get that moment from Ethan Nwaneri if Arsenal spend £60m on Pedro Neto, just like Chelsea did last summer. Ethan has 6 goals to his name, Neto has 3. Who would you take if you were offered both right now? Through the pain of this season, we now have two teenagers that have saved us £60m in the transfer market. That's why I'm more confident now than I was at the start of the window that whatever Arsenal do today won't be a waste. You only add players that make your team better. If that’s Ollie Watkins, wonderful. If it’s no one, that’s the right move, becuase loading up on players without the right numbers is hope. Hope is not a strategy. The squad will see through bad signings."
Big thanks to the team to the brilliant evening and buzzing morning!
I think Kai is a good player and useful to us, but we are screaming for a striker that scores two goal in the first half from our hard pressing work. (Otherwise why do we do that?). In the first moment he assisted to Odegaard, because he was not confident in scoring himself. And the assist itself was not good, the ball was jumping. Thankfully Martin was much more composed.
The fourth goal happened when City was already down. The team needs a player who can score many non-critical goals, but it's not enough.
PL race is in Liverpool's to lose, so I am looking at the Champions League. And when quarterfinal and semifinal comes, we will need strikers who can decide the game in a handful of moments and Kai (and Jesus) is not that. Currently, 18-year old defender has more character than Havertz for such moments.
It's not the essence of the post. However, it's easier to hit the rolling ball, rather than the jumping one. And the xG model actually doesn't account for the way ball comes to the player.
Manchester City attempting to complete #DeadlineDay move for Porto midfielder Nico Gonzalez. No agreement or guarantee it happens but negotiations over 23yo Spaniard ongoing as #MCFC work to strengthen with player who can operate at No6/8.
_______________________________________________
Porto insist on €60m release clause for Nico.
City truly expect to be hit with a transfer ban for a few windows. There's no other way.
Yesterday’s game was in the knife edge right up to when they equalized
When Thomas Partey intercepted that pass from Foden, he was going to pass as programmed, then the crowd shouted….shooooooooooooot!
The home fans shout to shoot broke the programmed command….he took that regular shot…John Stones assisted and the rest of it is history.
That’s the goal that broke city. The fans willed it.
F** k me.After a day like yesterday & the Doom n gloom brothers are back on with their reality show.Lol .We really do have the oddest bunch of ‘ fans’.I say that loosely……
I blame football manager everyone's an expert now
The narrative of this blog post would have been something like "look at what we can do if play on top form, imagine what we can do we we properly build a squad and knock off Artetas's arrogance and power", instead it was "look at what we did to City, I told you all everything was fine". Such a downer.
So happy wth the win nonetheless. Will savor it for a while yet.
Yesterday is one those days where you get distracted for a good moment and then the cold reality of life hits you in the face.
…and then there’s that Soul II Soul song playing on the background
🎼🎼 Back to life, back to reality
Back to life, back to reality
Back to life, back to reality
Back to the here and now, yeah
I wish you just kept it real 100%
Arsenal is not the best team in England right now, don’t take my word for it.
Just glance at the league table, it never lies
PGMOL are the not the reason we aren’t topping the table, maybe luck from injuries have been contributory but overall, Liverpool have more consistent than us.
Let’s just carry our momentum until Wednesday and hope for the best.
I listened to Arteta and he doesn’t think like you
I watched Declan Rice’s interview, these people are anchored in reality.
You’re just driving people to a paranoid existence and it’s not healthy
How can you be pointing all the fingers at PGMOL when we’ve FAILED to sign a striker in the 31 days of January?
We are one Kai Havertz injury or one Raya muscle strain away from disaster.
Keep it real Peds
We are the best team in England though. After 50 injuries this season, including injuries to key players, plus a horrific amount of points stolen from us, dents in our confidence due to said situations, we're still there.
-2 pts Brighton home
-2 pts City away
-2 pts Liverpool home
-2 pts Brighton away
Not including games where we got fucked but we managed to win like against Wolves at home and Wolves away.
That's just off the top of my head.
We should be ahead of Pool after a gazillion of injuries.
Yea, you are the champions of England…in your hearts.
Such are the great conspiracies
facts matter diss
we had 4 sending offs before 50 mins play time, all questionable with some outright wrong
we have and had important players out due to injury and absence due to said sending offs (e.g. saliba against pool)
I‘d like to see pool without salah for 3 months or city without rodri (see what I did there?)
Pedro isn't as competitive as he was before. He's said it himself. Ageing, fatherhood and life generally has softened him up. I'm not sure he cares so much if we win now. He's just more invested in his narrative bein right or surviving at least. Almost like papa Wenger towards the end. It's a pity really.
He’s also not as principled or disciplined on what he’s preached over the years.
He’s mostly passion on now, maybe that’s what time does to anyone.
He’s leans into reverse engineered logic a lot
I mean is we blame PGMOL for why we aren’t topping the league then maybe we will never win it.
Failure to prepare properly is properly preparing to fail.
We didn’t do the business in the summer and the summer before that in our attack. That last summer window wasn’t right.
We didn’t dot the ‘i’s and cross the ‘t’s
I mean, everyone…especially Pedro, has been talking about the predictability of over-exerting Saka
Everyone bar, raptora know that we needed a striker to rotate with Havertz
Everyone knew Odegaard had some limitations
Arteta should have extended the same ruthlessness he deployed on Ramsdale on the entire team.
I wanted Jesus, Zinchenko and Tomi sold in the summer.
I wanted another CF option Jesus' place - young, super talented project CF, to be raised in our style of play and without the pressure to be instantly top quality.
But you were also chatting that Havertz was one of the top 5 strikers in the world so what exactly is the need for a striker when you had ‘one of the top 5 strikers in the world’?
When he is unavailable, when we are chasing a goal, when he needs a rest and rotation, when we need him as a second striker or as a left CM/AM.
Saka is top 3 RW in the world. That wouldn't stop him from being top 3 in several other positions positions.
Havertz is also very versatile. CF/SS/AM/CM. He can play in many positions and be one of our best players.
Lol
Nevile or what ever his name is that coward former MU defender has always something bad and negative to say as he did yesterday about Gabriel ( the probably think we forgot how nasty and cowardly he attacked Reyes , a much physically and age wise easy target ) at least Gabriel was having a go at a Giant monster and what he did was not anywhere near what he did to Reyes !!
Started talking about him though as he still made a correct analysis why he gets frustrated with Arsenal as they let teams and stop being proactive and risk taking to continue to attack with intensity after they score, that is spot on if we do that from now on we could probably manage with out striker go attack attack and attack like yesterday obviously there will much less space to attack but intensity can compensate for that.
That Snake Neville will turn a positive into a negative when it comes to Arsenal any chance he gets.Hates us & can barely disguise it.
Ethan and Myles have been at Arsenal since they were 8. I'm sure they have received development, coaching, and all manner of other means of support during their time here.
There's nothing accidental about them.
Accident put them in the team , simple and obvious, are you telling me he thought MLS would bench Calafiori ? why but him if he knew he had ready made better player already ? if he knew that make him even more stupid than I thought. Why did he did not start Nwaneri yesteday ? we won good, if we had nor I promise you would have been even more mad than I am already.
It's no accident that we're producing so many quality youngsters, players who have been nurtured since childhood not cherry picked from around europe.
You keep bringing Arteta into it. It's the whole set up that is developing these players not Arteta.
And the system is working. It's no accident.
Where are the Mikel out brigade this weekend ? The trolls that tell us we need to change ?
If they were not trolls and meant what they keep harping on about surely that would mean they would be on here like the rest of us win lose or draw ?
You know to show that they mean what they stay and to keep to their narrative? No the usual arse holes are crying under their pillows and cannot come out until we drop points or go out of a cup.
Next negative result will have them flooding back in here to tell us what the board should do.
Arsenal are now in first position and will win the league after beating city 5-1 yesterday. Miraculously, the win added 12 points to our total and we are cruising to the title.
The win also miraculously balanced our squad. We no longer have 5 LBs and no strikers. Merino suddenly has become world class and Haverts 1 goal yesterday took him to 32 league goals for the season. Glory Glory Arsenal, the champions of EPL 2024/2025 season after yesterday
No need to ba facetious misty.Enjoy the win for once hey?
Trust me, I'm enjoying the win. I think you should tell that to Mr Serge. Enjoy the win. Not act like everything is alright all of a sudden Pete.
Well he has spent a fortune, made unbelievable mistakes, most of the successes including the teenagers happened by accident other than design, he lacks the killer instinct when the going gets tough and he has a little bit of that Havertz lack of balls and that it the reason we are where we are although it is admittedly not a bad place to be especially after yesterday and he has won nothing big yet, if Slot wins in his first season albeit incredible help by the corrupt PGMOL, Arteta will be under pressure make no mistake , this is sport and once in a while one has to deliver and he has other than that FA cup nothing to show for it and time is running out from him !!
Skysports Sheth
Arsenal are unlikely to follow up their interest in Bayern Munich forward Mathys Tel as things stand.
They explored the conditions of a deal in this transfer window.
Man Utd's hopes of signing Tel also fade.
If we even sign anyone, it has to be a versatile player able to occupy at least 2 positions - winger + CF. We're one injury to an offensive player away from having one offensive option on the bench. One.
We won't be playing many games in the next 2 months. Still, not getting that one player in, even if it's a loan from abroad, we'd be leaving ourselves short and hoping we get lucky in the run in.
“looped the ball just high enough to hit the bar and avoid Haaland waiting below it like a shark waiting for chum off the side of a boat.”
Or
looped the ball just high enough to hit the bar and avoid Haaland waiting below it like a troll lurking under a bridge, waiting for a passing Billy goat.
How lovely was that? Humiliating a side that has served up some for us in the past was mint! And ‘set piece fc’ stringing 30-odd passes together that ended with a Hale-End product icing the cake!
‘It was an absolutely horrendous moment that drew fuuuuuu-gasps around the world. xG nerds saying it was a 0.77 chance. Higher than a penalty? Not for me. ‘
Did they really?
I hope not, because if they did , then the xG stat is even a bigger joke than I ever thought it was.
https://understat.com/match/26833
When you click on the pitch graph it says 0.40 xG on the site I check.
The other xG measurers often suck balls. There's no way that was a bigger chance than a pen.
I guess today is all about whether the club push hard for a short term CF fix ie Watkins and improve our chances of
taking silverware this year
OR build for the long term with a “project” striker who can come good quite quickly eg Sesko.
Sixteen or hours all will be revealed
I think I'll vote for getting a "ready" striker now cos in my view, we need to win now. The plan should be to win, not develop a player who may or may not maintain a trajectory
For me getting Tel today and Sesko in the summer would be the perfect answer.
Never seen Tel play is he any good ?
watched him a couple of times - he has pace and move well and is strong. Very raw still and doesn’t get much game time at Bayern. Would be a project but prefer that at 19 rather than Watkins at 29.
But what will be will be. Chances are we get neither!
I am still buzzing from our win vs Cheaty.
Now if we can carry this over to our 2nd leg game vs the Barcodes on Wednesday, this would be even better.
And I think the team can do it!!!
I had discounted the League Cup to such an extent I genuinely forgot we were still officially in it ! It was only during the City game when the commentator referred to the Newcastle game on Wednesday that the penny dropped
I had only just been saying to a mate about being out of both domestic cups.
"Let's also look at that result with the transfer window in mind. You don't get that moment from Ethan Nwaneri if Arsenal spend £60m on Pedro Neto, just like Chelsea did last summer. Ethan has 6 goals to his name, Neto has 3. Who would you take if you were offered both right now? Through the pain of this season, we now have two teenagers that have saved us £60m in the transfer market. That's why I'm more confident now than I was at the start of the window that whatever Arsenal do today won't be a waste. You only add players that make your team better. If that’s Ollie Watkins, wonderful. If it’s no one, that’s the right move, becuase loading up on players without the right numbers is hope. Hope is not a strategy. The squad will see through bad signings."
WOW. Banggggg on.
I agree, but it is unnecessary to read it again !!
Lol. The whole thing is brilliant... and not a point i've seen/heard anyone else make.
Pedro Neto, the benchwarmer of Chavs.
1 goal in 1100 mins in the PL.
Nwaneri has 3 goals in 280 mins in the PL.
Some were hysteric in the summer pushing for Neto. I never liked him.
To be fair.Neto is v.good.But at the detriment of say Nwaneri.No thanks.
But the main reason is ‘ he’s another sick note’ & we have way too many of those,as we all know.
Big thanks to the team to the brilliant evening and buzzing morning!
I think Kai is a good player and useful to us, but we are screaming for a striker that scores two goal in the first half from our hard pressing work. (Otherwise why do we do that?). In the first moment he assisted to Odegaard, because he was not confident in scoring himself. And the assist itself was not good, the ball was jumping. Thankfully Martin was much more composed.
The fourth goal happened when City was already down. The team needs a player who can score many non-critical goals, but it's not enough.
PL race is in Liverpool's to lose, so I am looking at the Champions League. And when quarterfinal and semifinal comes, we will need strikers who can decide the game in a handful of moments and Kai (and Jesus) is not that. Currently, 18-year old defender has more character than Havertz for such moments.
"bad assist" "ball was jumping"
The highest xG chance in the game.
Higher than the chance Havertz missed from.
I just can't with some of you. Then I'm the weird one.
It's not the essence of the post. However, it's easier to hit the rolling ball, rather than the jumping one. And the xG model actually doesn't account for the way ball comes to the player.