August 31st, 2012
It’s that time of year again. Â Jim White is frothing at the mouth in a cage deep in the bowels of Sky Sports, soon to be released. Â Agents are rubbing their hands, clubs are panicking, and Arsenal are doing, well, nothing. Â Transfer deadline day is here.
I’m exaggerating for comic effect. Â We’re not doing ‘nothing’. Â There will be a couple of relatively high-profile departures today – although Theo Walcott won’t be one of them. Â Arsene Wenger has decided to run the risk of keeping him at the club as he enters the final year of his contract. Â The latest quotes from Arsene don’t sound entirely convincing:
“Theo is focused to do well, and whatever happens at the end of the season happens at the end of the season. He loves the club. Maybe we can find an agreement at some stage.”
Keeping him without an agreement doesn’t make much business sense. Â Either we’re very confident he’ll choose to sign, or we simply don’t feel we can afford to lose another established star.
One man who is going is Nicklas Bendtner. Â The Not-so-great Dane is undertaking a medical in Turin this morning ahead of
a loan move to Juventus. Â I think we’re probably all agreed he’s landed on his feet there. Â It’ll be a deal with an option to buy, but he’l have to have a better season than he did at Sunderland to stay in Serie A permanently.
Reports in the Korean media say Park Chu-Young has flown to Spain to complete a transfer to Celta Vigo. Â However, I have it on good authority that Celta are pursuing other options, so this deal may not be quite as advanced as those stories suggest.
There’s a bit of chat that he could be joined in La Liga by Marouane Chamakh, who is linked with a move to Malaga.  I suppose we owe them a favour after stealing Santi Cazorla for £12.6m, although I’d still be slightly surprised to see us let all three of Chamakh, Park and Bendtner go.  If we do, then surely we have to bring in another centre-forward – and at the moment I can’t see us bringing in anyone at all.
There are a few stories doing the rounds in the papers this morning, linking us with Cheick Tiote, Daniel Sturridge, and Michael Essien. Â Tiote I can write off straight away – Alan Pardew spent much of last night’s post-match press conference praising his chairman Mike Ashley for resisting enquiries from other clubs for his top talent. Â Sturridge too seems unlikely – he is one of only two centre-forwards in the Chelsea squad, and question marks over his attitude make him an unlikely Arsene signing. Â The Essien story has a ring of truth to it – Chelsea have little use for him in an over-stocked midfield, and he’s a player Arsene has long admired. Â There are question marks over his form and his fitness, but no more so than when we took Yossi Benayoun on loan from the same club a year ago.
Predicted Outs:Â Bendtner, Park
Predicted Ins:Â None
I’d love to be wrong.
Finally, yesterday saw the most celebrated draw of the football calendar: the
Capital One Cup. We’ve got Coventry at home. Â In other news, we’ve got Schalke, Olympiakos (again) and Olivier Giroud’s former club Montpellier in a comfortable-looking
Champions League group.
And so it’s on with the transfer frenzy. Â Through the pain, the anguish, the glimmers of hope and the long periods of boredom, I’ll be tweeting events over at @Gunnerblog. Â Come Follow Me.
