Written by Mean Lean on Friday, 24 June 2011 14:05
There I was yesterday, bemoaning the lack of news related to Arsenal. I even insulted the tumbleweed that flew past me but today, I take it all back. I apologise for being so bloody ungrateful. It is almost as if my impatience is being punished. Not only punished but punished by the most cretinous cretins ever imaginable, they call themselves FC Barcelona.
They are very well disguised as a thing of beauty and it is very difficult not to fall for their beauty. In fact the only way to see them for what they are is to only view them through a reflection, looking into the eyes of Rosell, Xavi, Busquets and company could well turn you into stone and none of us want that.
Just when you thought they had slithered far away, they come back stalking the ones we are trying to keep safe. to keep out of the reach of stone turning creatures like Barcelona.
It appears that no amount of sword waving in their direction will put them off their aim of luring away one of our young. They still seem rather upset that they did not take great care of one of their babies, often leaving the youngster in the cold without a blanket, his face was covered in snot and generally malnourished. Arsene and Arsenal came along with a warm bottle of milk, blanket and warm flannel to clean his face. We took young Cesc under our wing and turned him into a well rounded adult, now Barcelona want back what they didn't look after and they do not want to compensate us for our hard work.
£27 million pounds is the pitiful offer that they have placed delicately on our desk. Gazidis and co rightly pushed that amount off the table in disgust, I am hoping those Barcelona cretins are scurrying around gathering up their unwanted cash and once they have finished, they can get out and do not come back unless they fancy dropping off some more talented babies that they cannot manage correctly.
We were down this road last summer and I am sure Barcelona are not stupid enough to remember how this story played out. They wanted our player on the cheap and we told them to pretty much French connection themselves. They seem to think that Cesc Fabregas is their property because he is Catalan, well they need to think again. He is registered to Arsenal. Whatever they think, he currently has Arsenal DNA, that DNA is printed on a five year contract that has four years to run. Let them shove that DNA up their Arsenal.
However if they want to break the Arsenal DNA then they can pay Arsenal the amount of money that it will require for us to let our captain leave the club. If that is £50 million then so be it. Deal with it or do not. Maybe they can learn a lesson from this and make all their youngsters feel as if they have a bright future with Barcelona and stop overspending on players outside of their youth system such as Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Dymtro Chygrynskiy.
That is what gets my Anelka goat. They are happy to spend themselves into a position where they can no longer afford to pay their players wages and when it comes to the most creative midfielder in world football today (check the stats if you don't believe me) they want to give us a bag of salted nuts, a can of Coke and 75p
This is Waitrose not Dalston market. Pay the cash or go haggle elsewhere.
Like I said in my blog a couple of days ago, I would rather Arsene kept Cesc until he could leave on a free transfer. Having the money in the bank is great but finding a player with the end product of Cesc is a task that I don't even think Tom Cruise could complete.
Anyway, back to the as usual every day talk. No not how much Denilson is getting paid or why hasn't Almunia been sold yet. I am talking about Chris Samba.
Many people have been speaking about how Samba would improve our defending and on certain days I like the idea. I imagine Samba leaping high above Shawcross to power a header out from his penalty area all the way across to the opposition keeper and then scrunching Shawcross into a ball and swallowing him whole but on other days it scares me to think of him stuck on the half way line with a ball played in between him or Samba being the man on the ball with an attacker closing him down.
I was given some very interesting statistics by our friends EPL Index. A new blogging community that contains Premier League stats galore. The site is not completed as yet but should be done by the start of the new season.
Regular readers will know that I am a huge fan of Laurent Koscielny. If I could adopt him as my little brother then I would do. Not sure why I would do that but hey, why go back? I've made that decision so just deal with it.
He has had a great season overall, especially for a first season. I would love to see him after another season under his belt. It would be an interesting comparison between he and Samba, especially as they are pretty much the complete opposites.
Pass completion: 85%
Tackle Success: 78%
Ground 50-50 Duels won: 58%
Aerial Duels won: 53%
Interceptions: 91
Pass Success: 63%
Tackle Success: 73%
Ground 50-50 Duels won: 64%
Aerial Duels won: 69%
Interceptions: 79
Now we must remember that comparing stats are nothing without context. So here are a few things to think of before having a closer look at the numbers. Koscielny played for a side who had more of the ball than most while you would imagine that Christie Samba's team probably had less than most but certainly more than Stoke! (god I hate that team)
I would imagine that Koscielny would probably be much more isolated than Samba would be as Blackburn are more likely to have more defensive support around him rather than the attacking high line that Arsenal play.
I am sure I have missed out something but when you look at the numbers it all pretty much adds up to what I expected. Koscielny passes the ball much better than Samba. But having said that, much of Samba's passing might be the hoof forward into channels for the likes of Roberts to chase while Koscielny has or had *sniff* the likes of Clichy making good passing angles for him.
Surprising and I guess not surprising that Koscielny has 12 more interceptions than Samba. Surprising because Blackburn surely spend more time under defensive pressure than Arsenal but unsurprising to anyone who has taken the time to watch Laurent 'The Cobra' Koscielny in action.
I was slightly surprised with Koscielny's 50-50 ground duels at 58% considering the fact that he has 91 interceptions. Obviously Koscielny is not a powerhouse defender so he is bound to lose out physically to certain strikers. Samba on the other hand won 64% of duels on the deck. Not many forwards will get to the ball first with Samba around. That said, his tackle success was 5% worse off.
Koscielny's statistics show why we were so successful defensively in open play but it is not hard to see why we were undone from crosses so often. Koscielny only managed to win 53% of his aerial duels. For a central defender that number needs to be higher. Samba added an extra 11% on his percentage with 64% A question could be would a difference of 11% make more of a difference to our results than the interceptions, pass succession and tackling percentage. (They may have made very little sence but this is a free style baby!)
The only way to properly judge would be to see Chris Samba's stats after a year at Arsenal but by that point we would already know if Samba was a success or a failure. Interesting to think about it in the meantime.
Hang on? Close the stats book for a second. Is there a signing in the air? *takes deep breath*
Apparently the Palermo president Maurizio Zamparini has let the cat out of the bag *meaow* and has told an Italian radio station that Ricky boy Alvarez has signed for the mighty Arsenal. Does he not know that we keep hush hush about these things.
He said: “We had a specific interest which we express as early as January. Unfortunately, a mistake on our part has happened and he has already signed for Arsenal,”
The fella looks like a talented player, good dribbler and good awareness but a little slow for an attacking player for my liking and I am not sure where he would fit into our system but hey! I am no scout and it is not on dot com so I will wait until July 1st or whenever the window opens (the day before my birthday so presents are welcome via pay pal)
Transfer rumours are like London buses, none come for ages and then they all come at once. Anyway, cannot type anymore gotta catch this bus before I am sat here in the cold again and the evil clutches of FC Barcelona come and try to take me away.
Back tomorrow.
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