Vela warning, a new contract and Wenger on the defence

Young Guns has today reported that young keeper Wojciech Szczęsny has signed a new deal at the club, the 18 year old is thought of highly by Arsene Wenger but he has a fight on his hands to overhaul Fabianski and Mannone for the number 1 jersey. However, he is optimistic;

“My plan for the next seven years is to become Arsenal’s number one goalkeeper. Therefore, at this point in time, it doesn’t bother me if I am number 3 or number 4 choice. For me, this contract means that the Club believes in me, and that they do not want me to go anywhere.”

You never know he might prove to be a real gem, good luck to him!

Now onto Carlos Vela, a kid that lit up the Emirates this week with his stunning hat-rick. How he scored his second i will never know, it was out of this world.

Anyway, he has warned the other youngsters at Arsenal to take nothing for granted as there are no guarantees at Arsenal;

"All of the players looked as though they have a great future here, but none of us can be certain of that.

"Some will make it with Arsenal but we all know that others won't."

That is dead right. I'm afraid not all the players that featured the other night will make but but i think they will nevertheless all have very good footballing careers as they have the talent. They have just got to be sensible now and look after themselves and keep wanting to learn.

Vela also said his loan spells really helped him in Spain;

"It was good to go out on loan because I know I'm still young.

"It helped develop and improve my football. I believe I am ready and Arsene Wenger brought me back because he believes I am ready.

"But I just need to be calm and consistent and get into the first team."

On Tuesday night Wenger showed why he persisted with Vela, he is amazingly talented and the spell in Spain kept him out the spotlight too.

Now, did you know that Arsenal have not conceded a goal from open play this season? If you think back, the Fulham goal was a corner, as was the Bolton goal. The Kiev goal was from a penalty kick. Quite some run isn't it?

In total we have gone 810 minutes of football without conceding from open play. Wenger thinks this is a key part in the team spirit;

“We have defended very well, It has not been noticed yet but we’ve only conceded those two goals from two corners. In open play we are quite solid. That, for me, is a good response and a good explanation for the team attitude in the squad.”

And despite conceding goals was our downfall last season, Wenger will not budge from his attacking stance;

“What makes me happy at the moment is that we have a good combination of defensive balance and offensive efficiency, Sometimes when you work on defending better you lose a number of goals.

“But at the moment we are combining the two and it means when everyone puts the effort in we still can be very dangerous going forward.”

I am a believer that if you score more than the other team you will win, no matter what. I think attacking is the way to play football. Defending is not as important as attacking, but it is still a big bonus to have a defence that will shut teams out like ours has.

We are trying to land another young Spaniard from Barcelona according to this story, if he is another Fabregas I'm not complaining!

Otherwise there is not much else floating around today. Hopefully i will be back tomorrow. If not, back Saturday!

Take care Arse's

New deal for Djourou and the youngest side ever tomorrow.

Today It has been confirmed by Arsenal that young defender Johan Djourou has signed a new long term deal at the club. I think this is brilliant news because the kid has amazing potential and at one stage was a player the club kept very quiet about as they were worried other teams might snatch him off us, such is his potential. He has been getting better and better and is probably the long term replacement for William Gallas. Lets hope he lives up to expectations!

Wenger has suggested that he may put out his youngest side ever tomorrow, Wilshere is expected to start whilst players like G.Hoyte, Merida and even Frimpong set to appear;

“There is a possibility [it will be the youngest side ever],” said Wenger. “In the first team there are many players around 20. In the Carling Cup we will keep a few in there but the side will be more between 16 and 19. At Arsenal you can say 20 and 21-year-olds are the experienced players.

“You are likely to see Gavin Hoyte, Abu Ogogu, Aaron Ramsey, Mark Randall, Jack Wilshere, Fran Merida and Carlos Vela. Maybe Bendtner will play. Song, Djourou and Lukasz Fabianski will be the experienced players. But you will have players like Emmanuel Frimpong and Jay Emmanuel-Thomas so it will be a very young side.”

You have to wonder whether it will be a bit too young a side to overcome what will be a robust Sheffield Utd but it will be a fantastic test for them and I'm pretty sure at 15 quid a ticket the Emirates will be full!

Wenger has also said that he is happy to be building a side in a different way from other top teams such as the Mancs and Chelsea;

“When you are not on the transfer market you are a little bit ignored at the start of the season because the attention is focused on the big signings,” said Wenger. “Most of the time, big signings mean you are favourites.

“We have gone a different way. We are trying to build a young side with a cohesive way to play the game with a culture of football we like.

“We were close last year so there is no reason why we should not be in there again this season.

“Today we had Denilson 20, Fabregas 21, Bendtner 20, Walcott 19, Song 20. When those players fight for the title one year you can hope they will be better the next year.

“We are more robust than people think we are.”

I think these players will do him proud and get us silverware at some point because he sure as fuck deserves it, the man is a genius and a total and utter legend. I for one, admire him. The youngsters will get better and Denilson looks like he could bag a few handy goals this season, he has two already, and a fair few assists too.

King Kolo has also highlighted the importance of away wins this season, and he is dead right;

“We know every time we come away from home we need to do well,” he said. “We lost a lot of points last season and we knew we had to work on it.

"We just have to play as well as we do at Emirates Stadium. There we are on top but sometimes when we go away we just don’t start well. We have been working on it and we hope to keep going.”

Snatching draws and wins away from home will put us right up there and if we get a good 7-8 game run going now of wins we will be in a fantastic position and i really fancy us to beat all our rivals this season, we are more than capable of it.

There is also a fantastic free video on the clubs website with Dennis Bergkamp's 10 best goals, they are all absolute stunners!

What a player he was. Now I'm getting all nostalgic!

Sorry for no real post yesterday, i was rushed off my feet.

Keep reading and looking forward to tomorrows game!

O what lovely places we are visiting!

Bolton is one of the worlds most picturesque places. Not.

The squad have already seen the delights of Blackburn, Kiev and are now about to visit the beautiful Bolton. But before i preview the game I'm going to chat a bit about Alex Song, Theo and Denilson.

Alex Song has been earmarked by Wenger to fill in that problem central midfield position, and i think he can do that. He works hard for the team and yes, he does make a few mistakes but he is still very young and doesn't really have much experience so far. When he came off against Kiev we saw how much more vulnerable we were with massive gaps appearing and with Song on the pitch they were not appearing at all. He is powerful and a good runner with the ball, as demonstrated when he played against Blackburn in the Carling Cup last year, he rampaged forward on many occasions leading the commentators on 5Live to describe his runs as 'Beckenbauer like'. Song is also strong in the tackle and i think we will be very important for us this season, i think he will start against Bolton.

Wenger has pretty much said the same of Denilson too, i like Denilson, i think he could be a class player but i do doubt whether his involvement in the team stifles Cesc's influence, he is still very young and if we had more midfield cover i think he may well have gone out on loan in the summer.

Wenger is definitely trying to boost their confidence.

Gallas has also got Wenger's praise;

"He was a striker when he was young and you can see he has the nose to be where you have to be at the right moment. If it is a corner or a deflected goal, William Gallas is there. He has kept something of a striker in him and that comes out in these desperate situations.

"The biggest quality of a striker who scores goals is exceptional skill or through anticipation and understanding where the ball will be. William anticipates and attacks the space.

"His goals can make the difference. I am convinced that in a game like Kiev it was an important goal, because coming back from Kiev with a defeat or with a point, it is a completely different perspective for the Champions League and the game at Bolton."

I do think his goals are very important to us, every team needs a defender that can pop up with goals and without Gallas we don't really have that as Toure will only get one a season and two if he is really lucky. Saying that, without his goal we wouldn't have got the the champions League Final.

Theo Walcott also needs more protection from those ref cunts according to Arsene, i cant help but agree, Ronaldo gets that protection so why shouldnt Walcott? Kicking players isn't football, its violence. Wenger doesn't want special protection for him but wants him to stop being targeted, defenders go for him, not the ball.

Right now, Preview time.

Today we can open up a gap over Chelsea and Man United as they play each other and we just have to take advantage. Bolton is a tricky place for us, we lost there 3 years on the spin recently and last years game showed just how much character we had and this year its another test. They will kick, there is no doubt about that, luckily Diaby isn't playing but i feel we do need Eboue to keep a lid on things and we need our players to give it right back at the cunts and with Song and Eboue i feel we will. I'm not sure about Bendtner starting up front with Adebayor, Van Persie has had some torrid games against Bolton, i think we all remember this comical moment;



That was very funny indeed but he got a kind of revenge with the penalty last season.

Arsene Wenger wants fatigue to be forgotten about because we just have to win;

“It will not be an issue because we don't put that in our brain, You want just to keep the focus as we had it at Blackburn and Kiev then let's get the maximum out of the game.

“When you are a competitor you want competition so you cannot complain when you have that competition and you are tired. This is a fantastic opportunity because when you are a football player you want to play football matches.”

We also had a similar period like this last season and it probably cost us the title;

“Yes at that stage we played four away games on the trot, We lost in Sevilla but after that we won at Aston Villa.

“At Middlesbrough it's true we were a bit jaded physically. But I don't expect that [again]. We had a bad start up there and, of course, when you are a little bit jaded it is harder to get back into your game. So it's important we have a successful start to this game.”

We have Nasri, Sylvester (again, told you so) and Diaby missing along with of course Dudu and Rosicky.

The game is at 5 or something like that, hopefully we will be alright and not do what we did against Fulham. However i am not overly optimistic.

Prediction: Bolton 1 Arsenal 1

I think Elmander has a point to prove for Bolton and i feel we may be on the receiving end, I also fell Adebayor will get another goal.

The reason i will go for the draw is the we have a dodgy defence and Davies will exploit that and also we were not clinical enough against Blackburn (we did score 4 but had many more chances) and Kiev, that was costly.

Depending on time i may do a match analysis later i may not,

Leave me your predictions here, and keep your ideal Eduardo comeback scenario's coming in! look back to yesterdays blog for ideas.

Contact details are on the right hand side of you need them.

Up the arse Gunners.