Arsene Wenger says his beach keepy-uppy skills and willingness to sunbathe in tiny swimming trunks were key factors in persuading Alexis Sanchez to join Arsenal in the summer.
Well, not really. But the boss did admit that constructive meetings with the Chilean and his agent during the World Cup in Brazil did help the Gunners beat off competition from a host of other clubs.
Reflecting on how the deal went down ahead of Sunday’s game with Liverpool, who’d hoped to sign Alexis as a replacement for Luis Suarez, the boss said:
“I met his agent in Brazil a few times. We could talk about the transfer and in Europe we talked with Barcelona once we got his decision that he wanted to join us, and it happened.
“He came out from a period where he maybe didn’t have the number of games he wanted at Barcelona. I just tried, like every manager, to convince the player that you can help him to develop the quality of his game, that the way we play football would suit him and that’s why I think he has chosen us in the end.
“As well, we have continuity. All the player wants to do is play in the Champions League – it is quite simple. We have quite a good continuity on that front.
“We were interested in Suarez last year. He scored 40 goals for Liverpool and that’s part of the competition. At the end of the day, every great player has a choice to go where he wants today.
“Alexis has chosen us – we are very happy for that and I’m not sure that Liverpool was in. I don’t know why he has chosen us and not anybody else, but we are very happy that he has done that.”
As much as Arseblog News would like to believe that it was Arsene who made the difference, we suspect it was Ivan sending Alexis a copy of “Being: Liverpool” that swung the deal our way. That and Rodgers’ creepy teeth…
I sometimes wonder what last season would have been like if we did get Surez and his 40 goals.
He’s a bitey cunt though, would have been hard to like him. Alexis on the other hand…
And besides being a bitey cunt, he is two years older than Alexis.
I’m much happier with Alexis. A lot less baggage than that bitey fellow and a much better attitude.
COYG!!!
My 2 brothers are LiverPOO fans! We need to avenge last year’s debacle.
Yes, we will beat them! I have a feeling that there will be plenty of goals!
Since you are speculating about last season with Surez, my two pence worth on it – we would have won the league, he would have left for Barca and we h hopefully would got Alexis and about £10 – 15M.
The only down side of you see it that way, the British press would have gone to town on the biting incident
£10-15m ? No way.. £35m was an absolute bargain for Alexis Sanchez. He should have gone for somewhere around £50-60m with the current inflated market that’s how good he is. Truth is, nowdays it is very hard to get world class for £35m, just a few years ago you could get the real deal for a lot less.
(Thanks Chelsea, Man Shitty, Man Utd, PSG, Monaco, Real Madrid for being the engine of the inflation…)
And I also doubt that we would have sold a player we signed for a high amount. Where is the sense in paying £40m for a player and then sell him for £60-70m and gain £20-30m?!
No, that would not have happend.
Where would we be with out you Alexis?can’t wait to see an attack with Alexis ozil Walcott and giroud,mouthwatering
I am honestly gonna say at this point that Oxlade Chamberlain has made himself deserving a starting position and he got potential to become just as good as Alexis in my honest opinion. Walcott is an extremly quick and skilled player, but as it currently stands: Oxlade should start week in and week out. As for Olivier Giroud ahead of Welbeck? I am very uncertain about it. Sure when Giroud plays on his highest he is compareable with fucking Zlatan Ibrahimovich or someone. But when he has his inconsistent performances (ahem, stoke), then he can also be invisible and it… Read more »
Were you going to deceive us at any point?
The reason why Theo should start and the ox moved to center midfield is called GOALS.
So where is WOB now..?? Huh? All world class players like Ozil Sanchez are joining Arsenal just because they want to play under Arsene. Can’t even imagine Arsenal without our boss.
the diff between class and crass –
AW played down his influence in swaying alexis’ decision and refrain from rubbing it in on other clubs’ failure to land the chilean while brendan rodgers and liverpool purportedly claimed alexis chose arsenal only because of the london factor
I’d be worried if that was the only reason why they chose to join us. Think about it for a second.
The players you mention are world class players, and I am not 100% sure the only reason why they came to us was to play under Arsene Wenger. They got pretty awesome salaries by the club as well and London is an extremly attractive city to live in. So I am honestly going to say: The WOB:s will always be here now as an consequence of arsene wenger’s failure to beat our title rivals in the league during the last few years. We are still at 6th place, and we spent around £80m this summer. Yet there are still gaps… Read more »
We owe so much to the man but when results just get worse and worse and nothing improves then a change becomes inevitable. He should get a statue outside of the stadium, or even get the stadium named after him as he pretty much is the reason why we have one of the most beautiful stadiums in the world.
You gotta love the man, but if nothing improves then he needs to realise himself that he does not have more to give and move on..’
I sadly agree with all your points.
What Wenger described, isn’t that also known as “tapping” the player? That’s obviously how the majority of transfers are dobe these days, but you rarely hear managers say that
Barcelona wont do nothing, as then they would have to face the music over Overmars, Petit, GvB, Hleb, Cesc, Henry, and etc…
No team approaches a big club without first checking if the player would like to play for them. Money/terms don’t come into it but every player has certain clubs they wouldn’t play for (or only when they’re in serious decline talent-wise) and it would be really embarrassing to approach Barca, for them to say ‘OK’ and then the player to say ‘I wouldn’t join you cos I’m a pervert (spuddie fan)’. Not such an issue with players in lower clubs/leagues.
I love your putting Song in the etc….
Barca had made it k own last summer that Alexis was for sale, so no tapping up.
That and the tapping up regulations are a joke. There is no rule against talking to a player’s agent (most of them have multiple clients, which player they talk about is pure conjecture) and there is no rule against an agent telling his player that an offer is on the table.
Even the above can be circumvented if you approach the player’s club for permission first (even if no money eventually changes hands).
A cunt he may be, but I love Suarez the footballer. He somehow makes you forget that he is a psychopath when he gets on the pitch and plays the way he plays. Last year we had the defensive stability bar the 3 games we fucked up but believe me if we had signed Suarez we would have been the defending champions right now. i would love to get Sagna back on loan even though he left for the money to give us some cover at centre back. The reason is that he is a known quantity and doesn’t need… Read more »
should have never let sagna go in the first place. given what we’ve seen this year, which was entirely predictable, how stupid does it look to have let him go over nothing more than contract terms?
easily one of the decisions that has annoyed me most re: arsenal since the fa cup win.
Not sure why so many thumbs down, guess people still upset about Sagna leaving… he would be good to have back as we could shift Chambers back to CB and Sanga RB when Kos is crocked. Man C would never loan him back though…
Great players….Alexis, Welbeck, Giroud, Ozil, Walcott, Ox, Cazorla, Ramsey…..think how much better we’d be doing with another manager!!
Not sure if “another” manager would’ve signed Alexis.
Or Giroud, Cazorla, waited for Ramsey, shown proven opportunity and development for young Walcott and Ox, it goes on and on.
With another manager we wouldn’t have any of those great players and we’d be somewhere in the bottom half of the table.
Well he is just to good to play for Liverpool. Would be extra nice to make a mug of Gerrard as well.
I’d give Alexis a tug of love
Alexis is in the last 16 of the champions league, where are liverpool? Brendan Rogers has spent far too long with that cunt from Fulham.
But AW couldn’t have done this – according to my Twitter timeline he was only in Brazil to play on the beach, commentate for French TV and steal £8m per year from AFC.
The anti-AW agenda has more spin doctors than Tony Blair’s New Labour with Alistair Campbell.
He’s been a fantastic signing, but if he has to keep carrying the team like he has been his stay will most likely be short-lived.
I remember some people were annoyed that we didn’t get balotelli LOL
No not just annoyed but demanding the manager gets sacked…… hehe ….fucking clueless monkeyboys.
The wobs are in agonising pain with every victory we make….long may these anti-wenger cunts suffer
Okay.
(See link at end)
I am quite comfortable in the Wenger must change things around or go squad. It looks more truthful than the two other sides.
Was at Newcastle game and great to hear fans back Wenger. Like him or not supporters have a job to support unless they want to see him fail that badly that the team feel all their negativity. Like Wenger says judge him at the end of the season. Alexis is one of his best signings and it always takes time for new players to gel, i think we will have awesome 2015 with hopefully players returning from injuries. With 1-2 january additions we will competitive with the top sides.