I was secretly hoping that he might make an amazing surge into the first team after Sagna left, but I think we all knew he wasn't quite ready. A shame that he's essentially lost his place to a lad younger than him, but the life long Gooner should be proud of the progress he's made the last couple of years. I genuinely do hope he keeps progressing - his story is great. Coming all the way from non-league football to top level football in under two years. I'm also glad this is just a loan, as I don't think the manager should give up on him quite yet.
As mentioned, we added 19 year old Calum Chambers to our squad, and although I don't know much about the kid, I like the name Calum so he should do well. We also added another world class goalkeeper to the team in the form of David Ospina. He proved he was well worth the £3million we paid for him with his solid performances in the World Cup with Columbia, and he brings with him perhaps the finest addition to the WAGs group yet with his wife, Jesica Sterling.
There's a lot of gossip regarding Vermaelen's future with the club, and it's not looking great to be honest with you. Preferably, we keep him and rotate him in the center of our defense, but he's not the sort of guy to sit on the bench. As I said late last season, he's too good to be a back up center back, regardless of his drop in form. I think we'd all be fine with him taking a move to Italy or Spain or something far, far away like that. What nobody wants is to lose another reputable player to one of our rivals - in this case it's Man United looking favourites.
In the past few seasons we've been selling our top players to the two Manchester clubs on a somewhat regular basis. In past seasons we haven't had much option as money wasn't growing on trees for us. Now, however, I feel we've got a little bit more bargaining power, what with Wenger's Puma-funded penis enlargement and all that.... So let's not be girls about this one and roll over, ok? How about we ask Manchester United and those two Dutch knob ends to politely fuck off. This is, however, the New Arsenal.
Emirates Cup action this weekend, and I know we'll see new boys Debuchy, Chambers and Ospina, but I'm not too sure about Alexis Sanchez. He might still be a week out due to World Cup duty, as will be our German World Cup winners. Unfortunately we probably won't see Ozil, Podo Baggins or the BFG until a week or so into the new season. As long as they come back without injuries I don't think we can have too many complaints - they will, however come back with bags of confidence, and that can only be a good thing.
Here's to another potential signing or two in the coming week, and to another trophy (albeit the Emirates Cup) in our cabinet. We're almost there!
