I grow tired of managers like Arsene Wenger being blamed because English football fails. Every Summer the pundits, reporters, writers talk about the lack of English players at Arsenal, and the simple truth is; they’ve never earned their place.

Down the years Wenger’s given plenty of chances to the English, Ashley Cole was a first-teamer until all he could see on a contract was the wages, David Bentley looked promising, but never lived up to the expectations, Francis Jeffers was a total waste, Jermaine Pennant showed flashes, but never looked like becoming a top pro. Richard Wright was worse than the current ‘keepers, and Theo Walcott has never lived up to his £12 million price tag.

Now, when you’re a manager of a top team, results come first, and if Wenger wasted his time trying with more English players, it would jeopardize Arsenal’s chances of winning, or competing for anything. Look at the other clubs, at Man U, most of the younger players arent English, and the few older British players, are near the end of their careers. At Chelsea Cole, Terry and Lampard are English, the rest of the starters are foreign.

English players are overvalued, and overated, so Wenger is entirely right to only want English players who have come through the academy, because players like Jack Wilshere, Kieran Gibbs, Henri Lansbury and more, are all at the age where they can begin to get games in the first-team.

If you can play somebody like Jack Wilshere, earning £10,000 a week, or you buy someone like James Milner, for £30 million, and have to pay him say £60,000 a week, surely you would choose the former? Milner hasn’t won anything, so why should he be worth that much? Wilshere hasn’t won anything either, but he single-handedly kept Bolton up last season.

Kieran Gibbs is near the level of Clichy, and probably would have made the England world cup squad if he didn’t miss 6 months of the season. Lansbury is wanted on loan by a lot of clubs, both Premier League and Championship, so where is the logic in going to buy an overvalued English player? When you can get a foreign player for a lot less.

Scott Parker and Micah Richards are both rated at £15 million by their clubs; Parker is almost 30, and playing for a broke, and in danger of relegation, team. Richards rarely plays, and is generally considered a flop, who was given too much too young.

When has an English midfielder had the impact at 16, 17 that Fabregas had? When has an English keeper been as good as Lehmann was in the unbeatable season? English media just treats its players as better than the rest, and more important, but they’re not, whoever gives the manager more effort deserves the place in the team, and that’s why this new “home grown” rule is a stupid one, and shouldn’t be allowed.

I didn’t wanna be dedicating anymore articles to this story about Cesc, but alas, here I am.

The latest load of rubbish  from the media is that he’s suddenly going to put in a transfer request to Wenger. I higly doubt he will. Fabregas isn’t a stupid person, I’m sure he reads, and he would have seen that Barca had to take a loan out, just to pay players last month. So where he would expect them to come up with the £60Million I think Arsenal are holding out for, I just don’t know.

Mesut Ozil has been linked to the Spuds, I’ll just wait a minute for the laughing to die down………………..Ok, so just because Liverpool finally blew up, which came as no surprise, and the 4th spot opened up, and the Spuds just happened to get lucky and make it, but will clearly lose 1-0 to the Champions of Belarus in the Qualifiers, they can suddenly afford Ozil?

First of all, he’s not gonna be coming cheap, and I do recall last season, that the Spuds could only spend money they gained by selling players, so I don’t see that happening. I do hope nobody else snatches him up though, because if this Cesc deal somehow pulls through with a transfer request, Ozil would be a perfect replacement, younger, and just as mature..Maybe.

Onto the next one. Van Persie is now Arsenal #10. I love it. The new Dutch maestro. Not as technical as Bergkamp was, but the dude is one of the best forwards in the world. In 38 starts, and 6 sub appearances, Van Persie has scored 20 goals, and gotten 17 assists. Say all you want about the goals Drogba scored last season, Van Persie totals more overall over a seasons amount of games. The big problem is obviously keeping him fit, but it’s gotta be out year at some stage, and why can’t that be this year?

Jack Wilshere. The new man. Not signing, but this is the season where he turns into a man. I doubt Wenger will loan him out to Bolton, he’s better off with Arsenal, rather than being the only thing creative for Bolton. If Wenger can get him 20 games, and about 12 of those starts, from all competitions this season, it will be invaluable. And Jack will impress, because he single-handedly kept Bolton up last season.

Wojciech Szczesny should be the Number One this season. The young Pole has been brilliant in loan spells, and eventually he’s going to have to start playing. 27 appearances for Brentford last season, and a standing ovation in his final game during the loan spell last season, which shows how much he impressed the fans, and let’s face it, does anybody normally give ‘keepers much plaudits? So I say give him a go, if it doesn’t work out, we have 3 other keepers. And Wenger has called off the attempted transfer of Swcharzer, so I don’t see him going for another keeper.

But it’s early days yet, pre season has just begun.

Victoria Concordia Crescit. Victory Through Harmony.

Breaking Story: Man City have bid £45m for Raoul Moat. They have no idea who he is but they hear everyone wants him!

I don’t care how old it is, I wanted some humour for you all!

Anyway, onto serious transfer talk (?) unfortunately not involving Arsenal. But Man City.

Balotelli has been linked with City, and I hope that they buy him, because he’s the kind to disrupt the team, and when he isn’t playing he will probably turn players against the manager, so City will implode, which every non-City supporter will love to see.

I can’t wait for 2012, if UEFA stay true to their word, anyway. They say they will bring in the new rule where clubs wanting to play in Europe have to have made a profit the previous season, which, obviously City wont be able to.

There’s not a chance you can make a profit when your stadium holds less than 50,000 and you are paying £200,000 to a player like Yaya Touré, as well as the many other players on over £100K.

So, even if City win the Premier League (as if!) they can’t be still making a profit, the example of this I’ll use is Barcalona, they swept the football world away two seasons ago, winning everything on show, and still made a loss. It’s once again all about wages and people forget it, these rich Saudi investors wont realise until their request for a EUFA license is turned down, that they can’t run a football club this way, and that’s why I’ll be laughing as Arsenal lift the Champions League trophy in 2012.

Turn on the radio and put on a sports news channel. When they mention Arsenal, you’ll be hearing looney tunes. I promise.

£22 million for Melo?? Of course how much Arsenal would be paying depends on how much you would value Clichy at, but I can’t really give a figure. He’s invaluable.

Clichy has taken a lot of grief this season from supporters, they say he’s been caught out on the left during that patch when he had to play because Armand Traore proved he is not a left-back. Why the people seem to forget how bad Traore was defeats me.

Clichy came good at the end and that’s it. Gibbs is a good left-back. But he’s not played anywhere near enough to replace Clichy. Melo, on the other hand, had a terrible World Cup. He was terrible for Juventus this season, and in my own opinion, Juventus could feel lucky to get £10 million.

Add to that the £20 million supposedly offered for Ozil, you can see why Man United are in debt anyway, because they actually would spend this silly money.

Arsenal have officially signed Koscienly (pretty sure I spelt it right). I know nothing about the guy, but if Wenger says he’s good. You can bet your house he is.

Add him to Chamakh as our Summer signings, and with Wenger confirming that we will probably buy at least one more player, it’s quite a spending spree by the man who usually would sign two players at the most. But considering Chamakh was a free transfer, it’s really like we’ve signed one player.

Wages. That’s what it comes down to, but is often forgotten.

Gallas was on £80,000 a week. I think Silvestre was earning around £30,000 a week. Campbell would have been similar to Silvestre.

That’s a total of £140,000 for those of you without calculators. Minimal.

now add on the money new signings are earning, Koscienly is on a mere £25,000 a week. Chamakh will earn £12 million over a 4 year contract, which is £3 million a year, which rounded to the nearest big number would be around £55,ooo – £60,000 a week.

So Wenger still has about £55,000 to spend on wages next season, if he is going to stay the same on what he spending. That’s easily enough for a decent centre-half.

I can’t guarantee these are the actual wages, it’s simply what I’ve worked down to.

But it shows my point as to why the media are gone crazy. Not only would Wenger probably not pay that much, but the wage structure simply wont allow it. But like I say, nobody cares about wages.

Go on about Cesc as much as you like, but he’s gone off the top of my favourite’s list, I don’t believe referring him to as an Adebayor-like unfaithful asshole is correct in any way.

Adebayor stuck out a few years of a contract, Cesc has been here for 7 years. Cesc has never asked to be paid a bucket load more than he is worth. Adebayor did. Cesc has been loyal, whether you like it or not. He’s out captain, and a Gooner forever. The man I blame for it all is Peter Hill-Wood for his stupid comments about how Cesc couldn’t even make the Barca team. Idiot.

Robin Van Persie has leapfrogged Cesc on my favourite’s list. Why? Because I f*cking love the man. The Premier League’s best forward when he’s fit. He’s incredibly loyal to Arsenal and doesn’t ask for ridicolous wages either. Although he probably deserves them. Van Persie is just one of those guys who loves the club and gives his absolute best. And that’s all I care about for my team.

Thomas Vermaelen. I love him. What a defender! He’s a guy I can look up to and try to learn how he plays, and then try to incorporate that into how I play. He never gives up on a ball, and we all love those cheeky runs into the opponent’s half. Definately the signing of last season.

Alexandre Dimitri Song Bilong. Our Cameroon (stroke Russian?) defensive midfielder has become a fan favourite this year. Breaking up the opponents attacks and even scoring a cracker at Portsmouth, well, We’ve Only Got One Song. Haven’t we?

Jack Wilshere. Yeah I said it. He’s just old enough to get into a pub, but you have to love little Jack. And despite how small he is, he proved in his loan spell at Bolton he can more than handle himself, and even (at times) made an ugly Bolton team seem good. Now that’s talent.

Gael Clichy is one of those guys who gets little credit for doing a lot. Everybody forgot how great he was when he came back from injury (EARLY!!!!!) and all I saw on my Twitter timeline was Clichy hate. I really didn’t like it. He’s always been one of my favourite players just because he has everything.

These are my 5 current Kings without Cesc. Plenty of others could be added with a bit of effort.

I don’t see Cesc leaving this Summer, and I’ve said that from the start.

Barca’s belief that Cesc is theirs, and Xavi going on about “Barca DNA” still annoys me, and I’m sure when Wenger reads it, it gets on his nerves too.

Barca have spent 34 million Euro’s on Villa, and they just bought Mata for 20 million, so where they expect to come up with the 60 million I think would be the minimum needed, I don’t know, it’s not plausible to think they can afford it, and Arsenal have no reason to settle for less, as Cesc is under contract until 2015, and Arsenal make a profit annually.

They would have had to pay more for those two as well, if Valencia weren’t the Man United of Spain, with a huge debt (not as big as United’s) so Barca have only been able to sign players on the cheap side, after wasting 100 million last summer.

Another reason it won’t work is Barca are out of their minds. 29 million was the original offer, and they barely raised it above 30 million when Arsenal rejected them, and Arsenal rating him at 80 million, but Barca believe they have the right to take him “home”, the club which he would only now be starting to play for had he not left.

A lot is made of the Barca youth academy, but the best players have left there, but come back because they weren’t playing much (pique) but Cesc plays every game he is fit for, so that’s not an issue, and as club captain, he’s more important than a reserve player who plays 5 games a season, so his only motivation to leave is to win trophies, but he would play less.

Thomas Vermaelen!

In my opinion by far Arsenal’s best player of the season, played brilliantly with Gallas in defence, and more clinical than the strikers for the season too!

£10 million was a pretty big price for a player none of us knew the name of, but Vermaelen was probably the most consistent Arsenal player this season, even better than Song.

Solid as a brick wall in defence, and willing to throw his body into any group of players, he was almost unbeatable this season and his main downfall was Arsenal’s poor offside trap, and having to play with Silvestre as well, of course.

Good on the ball too, and able to run, or pass, so Vermaelen is pretty much the all-round player, and would more than likely play well in centre-midfield as well, but is one of the league’s best defenders.

The other top players of the season where Song, Gallas Sagna and Fabregas, who scored a striker’s share of goals for the season. But Vermaelen was by far the best for me out of these players, and so he deserves to be named the player of the season.

Before you read this, you need to click his link and read. http://www.tribalfootball.com/arsenal-boss-wenger-why-song-not-centre-half-792801

Wenger says Song isn’t a centre back because of his reactions. I have to disagree, his reactions are brilliant as a defensive midfielder, so why not a centre-back? Why I think Song is not a centre-back is because he doesn’t know his line, he isn’t used to having to be aware of a striker come in from behind him, and him being the last man back.

When you look at the Barca first leg. The first Ibrahimovic goal was partially down to Song. His positioning, Vermaelan had his arm out, pointing out to Song that Ibrahimovic was coming behind, Song didn’t even look back. Ibrahimovic ran across Song and was easily first when the ball was played over the top.

You’re supposed to know where the opposition striker is, it’s as important as knowing where the ball is going to go, because if you can take a step forward, that striker will be offside.

Song would need a pre-season of playing as a centre half before being ready to play there in the Premier League. But I think he is far too good as a defensive midfielder to be playing centre back, especially when Arsenal have such little defensive midfielder backup.

Dominated spurs last night, result was clearly faked.

Positives, not many, but still…

Sol. King of North London. He owned the spurs strikers quite simply, nothing could get past him, he showed pace, experience, ability, strength, and his headers just about didn’t go in.

RvP, the leagues best forward. Had a major impact, every player looked for him when on the ball, he looked anything but rusty, as if he had played all season.  Robin got on the ball when he could, looked calm & controlled and was important for our goal. He had a few chances himself and was unlucky not to score.

Clichy gave everything he had, he was up and down the wing so many times, even with a lack of support in the box for his crosses. He was good defensively too, Im happy my faith came through. A lot of fans were dissing him once he came back from injury (early!!!).

Nasri & Rosicky tried, hard. But nobody was showing for the ball, it really looked to me like that team had given up, they didn’t care. These 5 players were the only ones with a lot of effort.

Denilson jogged the whole game, Diaby was the same, he lost the ball too much as well, Bendtner stood still most of the game. Eboué was very sloppy. But he’s still God. Almunia, let me clear this up. The punch was NOT good. He maybe couldn’t catch the ball. But as a keeper, you should be aiming to punch out to the wing. Through the centre is where the opposition will win the ball back. Out to the wing even for a throw is always the best option.

As I said already, Van Persie coming on led to our resergence and looking like scoring. All we can do is hope RvP can play at least a half against Wigan.

There’s 5 games left in the race to win the Premier League.

Chelsea are top, Man U 2nd, Arsenal rigth behind in 3rd.

Arsenal can move into 2nd if we win against spurs tomorrow.

In my opinion, whether or not Arsenal do actually lift the league trophy this season, the team can only be described as “Winners” or “Champions” to me.

Name another team who has had their captain injured for numerous periods, had the league’s best forward injured after just 11 games of the season, been forced to swap between a striker with no confidence & another who the fan’s do not seem to believe in, had enough defensive injuries to sign a 35 year-old centre-half!

Add to that all the other injuries Arsenal have had, it really is amazing they are in the race!

Arsenal have one of the league’s worst keeper’s based on form this season, yet they have not shifted too many goals.

The problem is the run-in we will face without Fabregas & Gallas who are both influential. We will be forced to either play rookie Kyle Bartley, Alex Song, Campbell or Silvestre in the centre. Add to that a barely fit midfield.

But why is it I have faith we can win the league?? I can’t explain, but I guess at the end of the day, “In Wenger We Trust!”