Reports this morning suggest that Barcelona are in London today to hold talks with Arsenal over the transfer of Thomas Vermaelen.
El Mundo say that the Catalan’s Director of Football Management, Raul Sanllehi, comes armed with the task of reaching a financial agreement with the Gunners and convincing the Belgian that he won’t end up in the same position he’s in under Arsene Wenger (ie. on the bench).
Manchester United’s interest in Vermaelen is well reported – especially by the Guardian who have been running the story like an advert at least once a week for most of the summer – and having spent so long kicking his heels in North London, the captain’s decision will most likely be made on who can guarantee him the most first team football.
From an Arsenal point of view, a sale to Spain would be most welcome, because who wants to do anything that would make the Dutch Skunk, and by extension Louis van Gaal, happy?
Hopefully the attraction of Barcelona (a beautiful, sunny city – rather not like Manchester) will be enough to sway Vermaelen, but it now looks as if his departure may happen before the first Premier League game of the season.
With Arsenal somewhat light on central defensive options right now, it might force Arsene Wenger into the transfer market before the Palace game.
Sell him to Spain. He has barca dna I’m sure
Like Song (and Hleb before him) he could end up feeling Suarez
sell for 30 million. they paid 20 for some bloke called Matthieu and they f**ked us over Fabregas.
Over charge them like crazy please.
That’s a good move for him, I hear Barca can be Pique about their centre backs
They Puyol the best defenders
They Bartra sign him up before those cunts at Ol Trafford.
They’re Xavin a laugh.
I Chygrynskiy what they see in him.
They’re seriously urting for Center Alves.
If they can get him on the field regularly. That’s where he Bilong s
I really hoped he was Stegen, but if he goes to Spain, Bravo.
This transfer is getting very messi.
Neymar jokes please
I Alves knew he’s going to end up there
considering his scoring record from defence you can see they are trying to add more Bite in their team
enough of barca Song. try arsenal’s wenger
TV5 has handled this business with considerably more dignity than the captains who’ve immediately preceded him–sad to see him go, but wish him all the best. Can’t wait for the “Captain Flees Arsenal” headlines.
It is worth selling to Barca for a couple million cheaper than what we would get from Utd, we cannot improve another rival!
Football transfers are where we mere mortals could talk about neglecting a few millions here and there 🙂
He wouldn’t improve them, though. Last laugh would be on us. Everyone needs to stop kidding themselves about Verminator. Fantastic attitude, nice guy, but a CB3 at best. His best days are past him. Count his form and injury record, that he loves to play midfield rather than defense, and he’s only going to add to defensive woes for whatever club comes grab him. Harsh, honest truth. Bring on the down thumbs, I’m ready…
Hopefully he will go to Barca.
It’ll be interesting to see who we sign to replace him.
Wonder who the next captain will be. Hope it’ll be Arteta and not Per. Don’t wanna see the BFG leave anytime soon
It should be Ramsey.
I’d happily sell him for h-Alves the amount United offer
On a sidenote, interesting how three of the five guys in that pic won’t be playing for Arsenal this season.
Yeah, thank god Bendtner is staying though.
Enough selling our captains to rivals. Send him to sunny Catelunya. And greetings for Song.
He has not had things go his way for the past couple of seasons but TV5 has been classy throughout. He kept a low profile and did not whine for a move away. All the best TV5. Just don’t go to Manchester.
Warm thanks to Vermalen for handling this whole summer like an absolute professional.
Now lets do a chelsea and string united along till the last day of transfer season ‘oh you’ll have to wait till we get a replacement but yes we are open to a deal’ then when we sign said replacement shift him to barca for less money. burn.
Song AND vermaelen in the same team?
It seems after years of getting cunted by barca (cesc and hleb), we’ve just sold them two duds whilst signing sanchez from them. How the tables have turned.
Verminator is not a Dud…please correct yourself
I hate to be cynical about TV5 here, but the little boy inside of me feels selling to Manchester United would suit us better:
1) Who’d you rather see United acquire… out-of-form, injury-prone Thomas Vermaelen? Or World-Cup winning Matt Hummels?
2) This move is clearly being orchestrated by Dutch Skunk. Considering his track-record for rating other players (i.e. demanding that Arsene Wenger sell “useless” Aaron Ramsey; calling Ryo “one of the biggest youngsters in world football”)… I’d bet this move comes back to bite Dutch Skunk in the (rather smelly) tail.
assuming we might be interested in hummels also, why would he then go on to sign for them instead of us?
I honestly don’t think we are ‘in’ for Matt Hummels.
Signing him would present us with the Adams-Bould-Keown dilemma… a nice problem to have if you’re the manager.
But you’d expect a guy like Hummels to demand ‘guaranteed’ first-team football as part of a big-money move.
There is very rarely a situation which I can agree with you on this. Selling decent players to our rivals is NEVER a good idea and as an Arsenal fan, you should’ve had enough of it to last you a lifetime. Barca are Megacunts but seeing TV in their colours instead of the fucking Mancs is infinitely preferable.
I’m more upset about all the FA Cup photos with Vermaelen lifting the trophy, looking already out of date!
Send him to Spain. I can’t face seeing another former player in another teams colours….see RvP, Cesc etc
Next captain should be someone that’s going to be here for a while. I cant see Arteta staying after this season due to progression of other’s. Maybe Ramsey (captained Wales), Mert (big fucking German) Wilshere (despite form still a beast and asnl through and through) could fullfill the role. Maybe even Kos
Making Jack captain is a very bad idea.
how bad is Captain Jack?
I have a feeling Arsene told Arteta he would be captain this year. That’s probably the “respect” he was talking about. If not him then surely BFG
He and BFG have already been the primary deputy captains and I can’t see Wenger changing that.
Barca take him, he’s yours. 2 years ago ago I could never imagine wanting him to leave. Now, anything is better than Manchester, and I have total belief that Wenger will come up with an upgrade
No poo-o-meter?
In other News, can someone tell Sagna to learn How to keep his mouth shut? He’s turning to another Nasri.
Dont know how we can do that? Maybe we send Flamini over
They better serve hin Tea and Busquets..
Him tea and Busquets.
Let’s make Arteta the captain! At least he will go next season 😉 slightly tongue in cheek…don’t shoot me down!
The pun and jokes today are just hilarious! Arseblog commenters, they are fucking excellent!
I heard all this news about Vermaelen going to Barca Inieista-day.
Whoever we sell him to, I think it’d be a shame to not be able to see him in an Arsenal shirt Neymar.
P.S to “the year we’ve been waiting for”, if TV goes Utd, doesn’t mean they won’t also get Hummels.
Cback is priority. Dm is not. We have Arteta who is familiar to the Meterscielny axis and to replace him this late into the pre-season seems foolish at best. Flamini, Chamberlain and Diaby will also be available. We don’t need the Wanyama/MVila/Gustavo type recommendation. have they been effective where they have gone? What we need is to sell Vermaelen for 12m. A bid for Hummels would not be unreasonable considering we can offer CL in addition to the United alleged bid of 30m. Take away the Vermaelen money and we get 18m for a very good 25 yr old player… Read more »
Still a lot of wooly headed thinking here with more concern for DM than for the Cback.
Foolish if we end up with feet of clay.
we don’t want a player who is good enough as a back up, we need a player who can rotate through Meterscielny and offer competition.
Sell him to our feeder club Cuntalona and not to Manure please.