A lot has happened since I last wrote, only 4 days back. We have announced Calafiori, and he has joined the players in pre-season already. ESR has successfully completed medical at Fulham and joined their squad in Portugal for the pre-season. Sad to see him go, hopefully he shines there (except of course, against Arsenal).
The news of the morning is that Mikel is hell bent on getting Mikel Merino from Sociedad. There is already an agreement between the club and the player, and it’s only about Sociedad agreeing on the fees. It’s expected to be in the range of £26m – sounds good to me, we recovered almost same amount from ESR’s sale and we will be selling a few more deadwoods in coming days.
No, Merino is not an interesting case as some Twitter journos are trying to paint. He is from Spain, Arteta knows Spanish players. He is 28 year old, midfield always require experience. We can argue that Declan Rice is a better player than Thomas Partey, but we have seen what a fully fit Thomas does to the opposition. He is calm, he can counter press in even a single pivot, his passes are accurate, he has got vision and his between the line passing is out of the world. Think of it like this way, his recent form dropped due to injuries and age, and we went out in market, spent more than twice the amount we spent on him and Rice still has a season or two before he can match his expertise. Experience matters in the midfield.
Two interesting facts about Merino – he has played almost all games in last 3 seasons for Real Sociedad and he is involved in goals/assists (5 goals, 6 assists in 32 games last season). Does that sounds like a player we had and who plays for Bayer Leverkusen these days? Arteta is just bringing in another Xhaka. I hated Xhaka for a good 4 years but his last season with us was fantastic. I don’t mind this move, another reason being I have no faith in either Havertz or Vieira to cover that midfield along side Partey/Rice.
It’s almost a done deal.
By the way, did you read the news about Conor Gallagher? He is going to Atletico for a meagre 30m GBP. I am shocked no Premier League team’s are IN for him (Aston villa was, but the player rejected that move in June). 24 year old, scored 5 goals in 37 appearances for Chelsea last season, I would have not mind if we placed in a cheeky bid for a box to box midfielder, the type we needed after Xhaka left.
Right, that’s all for the day. There would some more movement and it’s only 16 days left since our first game of the season. I’m excited for the new season. Are you?
Something else to think of when we are losing our best talent to rivals, is why isn’t Josh and Stan asking questions?
The lack of questioning makes me wonder if they really understand how things work in football at a professional club.
The club is being run by El B an average footballer at best. After 5 years what qualifies him to stay as our manager? 88522? Do we call capitulating 3 seasons in a row progress?
Probably the biggest question is would Manure, Pool and Chavs still keep their winless manager in similar circumstance?
I think not.
New post.