We’re very lucky to have a wealth of fantastic, young central midfielders. You might say we have too many, however this calendar year it could be a completely different story. At the moment we have Cesc Fabregas, Matty Flamini, Lassana Diarra, Abou Diaby, Denilson and Gilberto; plus Song, Hleb and more in the reserves that can play there. However there are a few names that you wouldn’t be surprised to see elsewhere come August.
Diarra is the one we’re all expecting to leave. Recently I’ve heard whispers that Portsmouth are coming in with a £5m bid. I understand his reasoning behind leaving but he is really missing out on a great career at Arsenal. I’ve said my bit about Diarra before so I won’t bore you with it again. If there’s any truth in that Pompey move that’d be a 3.5 million pound profit for us over the space of a few months. Not bad going!
Flamini has been linked with a move away recently as his new contract still hasn’t been sorted. Apart from Cesc, he’s probably the one in that list we’d want to keep. He’s on the last year of his deal now and he can actually start talking to other clubs as of now. Wenger insists he’s ‘hopeful’ that a new deal will be done; I’ve heard it’s simply about money now, Flamini want a decent package and after his performances this year there’s nothing we can do about his demands. Usually Wenger avoids this sort of situation but everyone thought he’d be leaving in the summer.
Mathieu doesn’t strike me as a person who’s interested in the money side of football; he’s one of the guys you’d expect to just love the game and love playing. I think he is worth signing up even if it’s for more money but I don’t know how much he’s asking for and obviously there comes a price where Wenger will just say no.
If Flamini did decide to move on I’d say Diarra was the man to come into the starting 11 but he seems completely blind to the fact he’s only a step away from the first team. We’d be in a little bit of trouble if Diarra left because Flamini was keeping him out of the team then Flamini left in the summer because of this new contract. I really hope things are getting sorted out behind the scenes; he can afford to lose one of those two but not both of them.
Diaby and Gilberto’s futures are in some doubt too. Abou is a good friend of Diarra’s and I’ve heard he’s unsettled too. I can’t imagine his preferred position is left wing but that’s the only way he seems to get in the team at the moment. Gilberto is getting on and he’s only been picked for a few games this season mostly in the cups. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him move on in the summer; maybe he’ll go back to Brazil?
With all of those there’s nothing we can do as fans but just sit and wait and see how it all unfolds. Last night Arsenal TV launched and the main feature was question time with Matt Lucas, Ray Parlour, Martin Keown and Arsene Wenger. It was quite interesting to watch and we got some decent answers out of The Boss. He says he hopes to have a mainly English side in the future and that Goodison Park is always a hard ground to play at because of the noise. He also spoke about Anelka’s move to Chelsea and that he thought about bringing him back to Arsenal. We all heard the rumors in the summer and it was quite exciting but Wenger decided against the move because he thought it’d be wrong for the club and once a player has left, they’ve left.
There’s still not much news around this week. Hopefully I’ll have something good to talk about tomorrow. Until then.
