Granit Xhaka says that Henrikh Mkhitaryan would be a good fit for Arsenal if his potential move to the club is completed.
The ongoing saga with Alexis Sanchez is far from complete, and the 12 noon deadline required to make the players available for their new clubs came and went today with no resolution.
Progress is expected but much depends on whether the demands of agent Mino Raiolo play too significant a part. If it does go through, the Swiss midfielder believes the way Arsenal play would make it easy for him to adapt.
“I read that in 2009 he said that he likes Arsenal,” said Xhaka.
“I’m sure the style of play here would suit him. Every player has their own qualities. He is a great footballer, so let’s just see what happens.
“It was tough to play against him. To be honest, I would rather have played alongside him.
“He is a player who is obviously very good and has lots of good qualities as well.”
He is good and he is nice and also he is quite good at being good and nice and he has many attributes which are good and it would be good to have those because every team can use someone who is good and he is definitely good and good at being good.
So that’s good.
Class A jinxing.
At this point fans will even welcome a Peter Crouch to the club. Speculate less and sign more, I don’t know why signing a player is always a big deal once we are involved. Are we always bidding 40million1pound.
No, no, no, and, no, to all your questions.
And speculation is what WE are doing–they don’t need to speculate anything. They’re just not letting on to us what is happening (which is the best case for business).
I’m not saying everything will come to pass–but if you want it to, we kind of just have to wait now. Sorry?
In all of this its become clear that the squad has totally fallen out with Sanchez. One would not openly be praising the replacement of the guy while, that guy was still at the club.
Xhaka is like, fk Sanchez.
Its been a very unusual transfer (will be if it goes through).
Be interesting reading the ‘good luck’ messages from Arsenal players on social media when he leaves. Couple of the Theo ones actually sounded genuine, doubt any of the Alexis ones will.
I do not care if he doesnt get any farewell from players. He did his utmost to change a culture of lethargy. People dont usually like that in colleagues. He was doing something that we should applaud as fans. He was making no secret of abhoring laziness and mediocrity. He has my farewell.
You act like he is some perfect player? He isn’t. He makes plenty of mistakes. Does he put in effort? Yes but jsut because you look like you are running around the pitch like an energizer bunny doesn’t mean you are putting more effort then others.
Have a recommend for posting anything other than an anti-Wenger rant. (also you’re dead right. It’s been a strange old couple of weeks, don’t know where we are as a club these days)
Can’t help the anti-wenger rants. I see Wenger and I see a guy holding Arsenal back with his outdated and delusional ideas and tactics. Worse than holding back, actually taking the club towards mid table all the while acting like the dictatorial leader of a banana republic who doesn’t have to answer to anyone.
Just want him to leave with every fiber of my being.
I agreed with eternalflamini, and voted your first post up. If only you could have strained every fiber of your being and not posted the second time.
Jesus give it a rest with these dumb, bitter, tabloid narratives about Alexis. “The squad has totally fallen out with him” lol you sound like Poundshop John Cross.
He’s not going because he’s unpopular, he’s leaving to win titles. Teams that finish above us every season are chock full of cunts – the difference between them and us is they deal with it through proper leadership.
Nothing to do with 400k per week then?
I expect you’ll be calling Aubameyang a mercenary when he arrives because he’ll earn more with us than he did at Dortmund.
If
True. Still think we’re getting gazumped
The ridiculous figure I’ll agree with, but that’s Dortmund’s demand, not Aubameyang’s.
First of all calm down. Second when did I say he is leaving cos he has fallen out with the squad.
You could get a transfer without turning the whole squad against you, like Walcott, or you could go the Sanchez route and turn into a sulking diva and have the rest of the squad be like fk off already.
Sure he is leaving to win trophies, but his pursuit of that transfer has turned everyone against him.
You wrote “Xhaka is like, fk Sanchez.” and you’re telling me to calm down?
If you’re bitter about Alexis leaving, say it with your chest. Leave the bitchy back-biting rumours to the tabloids.
You are bit touchy about everyone hating Sanchez for leaving. For what it is worth I would hv preferred Sanchez to stay and Wenger and Ozil to leave.
However that I am bitter enough to plant ‘fake news’ about Sanchez, lol, you can take that attitude and shove it right up your you know what.
There’s legit reasons for some fans (not everyone, stop exaggerating) to be pissed off. I can respect people who don’t need to make up lies to justify their irrational hatred of the player.
At the very least we can agree on the part about Wenger leaving.
I think he wants to win trophies but clearly the money is a big issue for him, otherwise he could have gone to city and been virtually guaranteed a premier league winners medal in May. He would have earned loads at city but seems intent on getting the best financial package available, which I understand, short career and all that
I am waiting for someone to say that aspiring for more money is wrong.
It is not wrong. It is totally justified when you have three years left to pull in the rest of your life’s income in a meaningful way. What is wrong is acting unprofessionally during a contract, as a result of that desire. Then again, there is precious little else for a player to do, and a hyper scrutiny on unrelated emotional ticks by tabloids. So certainly, there is no real way to criticize Sanchez for this–he wants something that we don’t want to give–time to part ways, easy enough. We should criticize the board and Wenger for letting such a… Read more »
If a player is really driven entirely by silverware then Bayern would be the obvious choice as they win the Bundesliga + cup at least every other year.
Bayern made it clear some months ago that they wouldn’t meet Sanchez financial demands which they considered to be unrealistic.
We are the big losers and United have us by the gonads.
Wenger risked keeping Alexis instead of selling him to City last summer for 60m
He is now being sold at half the price (still decent) but to United with City dropping out.
United can dictate price etc and (like Welbeck) we are being peddled a reject low on confidence as subject to this deal.
Panic deal and poor buy with no thought on how it works with current team.
He’s leaving to win titles? So he decides to reject a team on its way to win the title at a canter and instead go to a team with an inferior squad and manager? He’s a plain old fashioned mercenary.
He’s leaving us for the chance to win big trophies. Denying that is silly cos it’s clear any of the clubs in for him offer him more chance of success than Arsenal under Arsene do. I don’t deny he now seems to be choosing which is his new club for financial reasons…… but the two things (the reasons for leaving us & the reasons for joining Man Utd) are not the same.
He’s not leaving to win titles. If he goes to United he is in a team that will at best challenge for domestic cup success. The current United squad are way behind City and no where near the elite in Europe. And during the course of his contract – let’s say it’s 4 years – united will still not get close to City. Money isn’t really the issue either, he just doesn’t want to be at Arsenal any longer and is at this moment in time effectively accepting the best offer on the table. Even if we did match United’s… Read more »
From the same interview….Asked about Sanchez’s future, Swiss midfielder Xhaka said: “To be honest, I don’t know really what’s true and what isn’t. “We’re humans as well and we read things like you do. Alexis is an important player for us, he’s got class which he shows every week, and I will be happy if he stays. If he stays or goes? I don’t know what’s going to happen. At training, he’s always an example for many people because he always wants to win no matter what we are doing – a big game or a small game. I think… Read more »
Thank you.
I guess that settles it
Nothing unusual happening in the squad. Xhaka has not said anything that Wenger did not say.
Arsenal have always been good on a unified PR front. Simply no reason to believe that it will ever be otherwise under Wenger. Players do follow a good example, and at least on that matter, Wenger’s lead is impeccable.
United are getting the better player. We are getting a player low on confidence into our squad also low on confidence. Great idea.
Could one of you nice people just give me a call when this whole fucking saga is over and let me know what happened in the end. Thanks in advance.
Typical Wenger and his team dragging the ass out of negotiations. I bet Sven is pulling his hair out already.
You mean Sanhelli and his team dragging right?
Again, Raul doesn’t start until february, so I don’t see the point of including him or his team in anything. It’s like blaming the guy on his first day for something that happened in the previous year.
Sanhelli, the red hot pepper chilli?
How do you know? You can’t unilaterally negotiate and if you try, the other party will tell you to eff off.
You do realize that Raiola might be the most difficult agent to deal with? The reports are that he isn’t happy with the rate that Arsenal pays to agents and wants more. The player is said to be happy with personal terms and is ready to move
The las bits about being good and nice really made my day.thanks blogs!!
That’s good
Nice
Good.
Update: Nope, it was the weeds. I am sober now & it is not funny anymore. Oh maybe because I read it for the 2nd time. Who knows
Latest addition to Arsene’s North London Nice Young Gentlemens’ club.
Xhaka or Auba?
I know this is a bit off topic, but do you guys think Ramsey will be starting tomorrow? And if so, where? Replacing Iwobi or Welbeck, or replacing Wilshere?
Welbeck and Iwobi played really well against Bournemouth so I think they’ll definitely be keeping their places in the team.
Xhaka should STFU and concentrate on improving his own game. He’s one of many coasting along on easy street. No wonder many in the squad don’t get along with Sanchez.
Right, any player not operating at an elite level must respond ‘no comment, I’m garbage at football’ to any journalist’s questions.
We could all use a good ramble from Rambling Pete right about now…
Malcom deal is off because Arsenal think he is too inexperienced.
Remember when city didnt sign Jesus and Sane because they were inexperienced. Or when utd didnt sign martial because he barely had a career at that point.
Yesterday Rolland Courbis said that there are 4-5 players in Bordeaux who think they are much better than they actually are… Courbis coached Bordeaux, Courbis actually watchs the Bordeaux games, contrary to many Arsenal fans, Courbis knows the French league contrary to many Arsenal fans.
Who is more reliable? He or Youtube and the British press?
Maybe Malcom isn’t all that? Where are PSG, Madrid, Barca, Bayern, Juve, the whole of the Premier League if he was a sure bet?
We don’t have a bottomless pit of money to spunk on the off-chance a young player comes good, it’s a lot easier if you’re Man City or Man Utd. My guess is it’s too much money for too much uncertainty when we need to invest in proven talent all over the squad in the next two windows.
Except he’s one of the best performing u-23 players in Europe, represents a good investment as Brazilians have high resale value, and we can very much afford him. Can we stop pretending we’re poor now?
Maybe PSG, Madrid etc simply don’t need him because those clubs consistently upgrade every year. We don’t, which is why we don’t play in the same European competition as them any more.
not all brazillian’s have a high resale value, good ones do. Can’t just sign some random kid from the streets of Brazil because he will have a high resale value (I’m not saying Malcolm is in that boat)
You mean like Arsenal did with the likes of Vieira and Fabregas? We have a promising crop of young players at the club, but we need players with experience (and a new manager) to turn things around. Would much rather have an older CM than another young promising player – sadly I don’t think we’ll get either this window 🙁
No, they don’t think he’s experienced enough for the fee that Bordeuax are asking for
The media have priced Malcom everywhere between €40m and £75m.
Without knowing the actual price Bordeaux want, we don’t have a clue if he’s worth the money or not…
Not worth it.
At that price we may as well get Mahrez for 45-50m. 26yrs only just entering peak years, flying at Leicester, already blooded in league.
Goody
Didn’t realise he can play anywhere in a front 3. Sign him up!
Niles and Sead on the left, keeping it solid. Attack down the right with Bellerin, Miki and Ozil.
That should help us break open those all out defences.
Heard Miki has a great cross too.
Heard Jesus has a great cross.
Nailed it!
While it’s nice that he liked us in 2009, the key question is how much he likes us in 2018?
Can we just get it done. It’s really fucking tedious now.
Just wondering what you think the starting 11 will be if these players so?
Auba & mhiki!
What formation?
Wilshere, ozil, Ramsey, mhiki, auba, lacazette?
Midfield 4? 2 up top but then does that mean xhaka gets dropped?
I remain unconvinced. Mkhitaryan is an expensive player who is past his best that will struggle to find form in a team which is already struggling. He isn’t a vocal player either, and doesn’t seem like the type to impose his authority on the squad, so really, what can he offer immediately to a team that needs a direct impact? Him joining us on a big contract for a period more than 2 years could leave us saddled with someone that has no confidence, no prospective buyers, etc in 18 months time, making it near impossible to move him on… Read more »
Not to mention he has low confidence and we aren’t exactly high on confidence either. Plus at the age he comes in and for the salary, if he doesn’t kcik on, we will be stuck with him for 4 seasons (like Debuchy) Same euphoria over Aubameyang guises the unbalance nature of reinforcements, really added (lazily) by new scouting/Football ‘director’ team with connections in mind not squad requirement. So Aubameyang wows some with his statistics. So did Lacazette who was suppose to be more mobile than Giroud. So Aubameyang comes in as unwanted from United. So did Welbeck generate excitement over… Read more »
Some people are soo enamored over certain players. I can’t imagine being like that.
Xhaka must seek to change his jersey number. The number 29 hasn’t helped Arsenal players who have used it in the past. He favoured the number 34 but Coquelin had it at the time , so now that it is available since Coquelin’s departure, it is only proper Xhaka grabs it.
I really don’t give a flying twonk about what our most used/pedestrian player has to say about anything.
Alexis is no doubt a special player who makes thinga happen. A flair player and hardworking. But he doesnt play to a structure like, and thats why he didnt excel at barca cos they all ppayed to a certain structure. At arsenal hes always looking to play final ball, hold on to the ball too long, dribble too much. A good thing cos we’ve been crying out for someone who doesnt pass sideways, who takes risk. His game was great and the numbera proved so. However, ive noticed since last year around feb onwards he has altered his game and… Read more »
Yeah maybe if we re-role him into deep midfield like Arteta.
Players coming in for Alexis not the best.
Only Arsenal Fan TV can wet themselves over a player who is low on confidence coming into a squad also low in confidence instead of buying say a Mahrez for 50m who is flying at the moment.
Or spend close to 60m on a player where we already have lots of cover instead of fixing midfield/defense or for the matter wide positions.
Too much goodness. I might get diabetes! ?
That last paragraph sounded like trump talking! ?
Agree that Mkhitaryan will probably fit in but I don’t think that’s necessarily a good thing…