We hate locals! / Denilson off? / How we can spank Barca!

Posted on December 23rd, 2010 | by Pedro in Arsenal,Arsenal News,Denilson,Football,Hangeland,Jagielka,Premiership,Roger Johnson,Spahic

Yesterday Chris Samba of Blackburn persuasion made it clear to his new owners that he would like out this transfer window, if he had the chance. The thought of not playing stylish football under Big Sam was just too much for the boy to handle.

Now, I know he’s probably not world going to be winning any Ballon D’ors in the next couple of seasons, but he’s big, strong and extremely capable in the air. He’s also been playing for a team that’s given us enough grief over the years. He’s battle hardened, he’s 26 years old and he has over 100 appearances to his name in the Premiership. Could he be an option at the back for us? Would it do us any harm to have a leader and a communicator in the team? Could he be the beast to Vermaelen’s beauty?

According to many Arsenal fans… no.

It was flagged to me he would be incapable of playing Arsenal’s highline defence. Well, in retort to that accusation, I have to ask, can our of our defenders play in a high line?

I don’t have his speed stats to hand, all I know is that he is dominant in the air and he is a traditional defender. John Terry has never had bundles of pace, yet he has plenty of trophies in his cabinet. Sometimes you need a mix of players each specialising in different areas.

Now, I’m not saying lets run out and buy him, I’m merely asking why Arsenal fans get more excited about Sakho and Spahic than they would over a prove Premier League defender?

Why do Arsenal never look to the league for their defenders when there are clearly plenty of good ones who could do the job

Phil Jagielka is a top defender, I don’t think there are too many arguments against that. Gary Cahill has been having a good season over at Bolton. Brede Hangeland has been ever present in the Fulham starting 11 for 3 seasons now and would be a great asset for Arsenal. How about Roger Johnson at Birmingham? He’s been bossing their defence over the past season. Why not Leighton Baines of Everton if Clichy buggered off to Real Madrid?

Arsenal seem more interested in buying unknown French quantities than they do in looking at the less fashionable names who are already doing it over here. Who’s to say that put in the right environment with better facilities, better trainers these players wouldn’t flourish? I get the impression that if the old back 4 were available today, we wouldn’t have signed them… for me that is sad and disappointing.

Sometimes, it would be nice if substance over style were on the minds of our scouts.

In other news, many Arsenal fans were ~~excited~~ concerned when they read this cryptic message on Denilson’s twitter…

_denilson15 Will take arsenal with me to the rest of my life…….

Yeah, some of us were ruing the moment we prematurely celebrated the Brazilians excellent career at Arsenal. Yep, that vintage bottle of Dom certainly didn’t taste as good when I read this a few hours later…

_denilson15 4 the last time guys….. l am arsenal 2day…..2moro..and….4ever

Oh marvellous. I’m so pleased for him…

I have to say, I’m not too fussed, that £11million would have only sat in the bank gaining a miserly amount of interest anyway. If we did happen to sell Denilson to the highest bidder in the summer, who could we sign?

Well, there’s Etienne Capoue, officially scouted by the Grovers over the past few seasons. He’s a tough tackling, no nonsense holding midfielder who is French and on the under 21 scene. There is also his team mate Yann M’Vila who has also been a scouting target of many of the Grovers. He plays for Rennes, has all the attributes needed to succeed in the Premiership and his name is nice and easy to spell.

Failing that… let’s get Lee Cattermole in!

In other news, another of our European scouts has been checking out Barcelona to see if he can detect and weaknesses, Colm Naish had this to say on his recent visit to the Camp Nou…

‘ Bilbao held Barca to a scorless draw the other night at the Nou Camp. they forced them wide by keeping the back four very narrow (it looked like the 4 backs were in place directly in front of the 18 yard box) then dealing with their crosses. Barca ended up having the likes of Pique running into the box trying to get on the end of crosses to score. they couldn’t play through the middle the way they like to. With effective counter attacking this might be something to think about…Hope Wenger was watching.’

Colm, that’s a sweet thought, but we can be pretty certain Wenger wouldn’t have been watching! Anyway, there’s some food for thought there… perhaps someone should write out a banner with the word tactics emblazoned on it at the Emirates, you know, jolt his memory!

Finally, Johnny saw Le Grove as the most culturally relevant art football blog in the blogosphere and has asked us to showcase his new piece of work titled, ‘The Professor of Science 14’, which represents the players of Wenger’s 14 seasons at Arsenal, there’s a shot of it below and you can follow the link to buy a print of it and see it in the gallery.