This article continues in the format established earlier in a review of the forward line.  Also at the end is an update on which of the reserve players are not at the summer camp, and whether that means much…

So, onto the midfield…

By way of explanation I should add that Arshavin and Eboue are included in the Arsenal midfield list (I’m putting them in as a forward and defender respectively) while Vela and Walcott have been listed by Arsenal as forwards by AFC and I included them there.

And what do we find…

I started off the similar piece on forwards saying I had not seen a set-up like it before, and I feel the same about the midfield – it is an extraordinary selection.  I read a piece the other day saying that when a team is made up of 27-28 year olds it can only improve a few percent through increasing awareness of each other.  When a team is made up of younger players it can improve by 30% in a year.  I am looking forward to it.

Of the list Diaby, Denilson, Song, and  Frimpong are players who could play in the defensive role in front of the back four.  At a push so can Ramsey and Fabregas, although naturally you would want them further up the field – and indeed giving Diaby licence to roam makes more use of his skill.

Diaby

Last Season: 35 starts, 5 as sub, 7 goals

Injury potential: He’s had his year out following a Shawcross type assault against Sunderland, and seems to get just the odd muscle pull.  35 starts last season shows his resilience.

Brilliance potential: Still don’t think we have seen the best of him – but the great thing is he can play all over the midfield – and move into attack too.  Remember that game he played in attack with Theo in Turkey (I think) and we were about 4-0 up in 13 seconds.  OK my mind plays tricks but he played as centre forward that day.

Breakthrough potential: If everyone were fit then we might just see a midfield of Cesc, Denilson and Song, but leaving that aside I would expect him to be a regular first choice.

Personality: Never seem to hear anything bad.  After that awful own goal against Man U last year he showed extraordinary nerves to be able to get on and keep playing.  Seemed to conduct himself with dignity for France in the world cup.

Crowd potential: Not quite there with the crowd but a good season will turn everyone around.

International Disruption Potential: French regular, so not too far to go for home games.


Wilshere

Last Season: 7 starts, 8 as sub, 1 goals

Injury potential: Seems to be unaffected by the injury disease that has swept the club.

Brilliance potential: Outstanding and the Barnet game showed he is several centuries beyond where he was last year.  It is all coming good and is about to get gooder (if you see what I mean).  Doubeplusgood in fact.

Breakthrough potential: Presumably not yet first choice, but with the inevitable injuries he will get a place and do his thing.  He now seems to realise he can play football and not beat the entire team every time he gets the ball.

Personality: Looked to have a lot of aggression in him which sometimes came out the wrong way – but then he is hardly out of nappies so allowances are made.

Crowd potential: Adored as the first of the Youth Project kids.  Can do no wrong for those with any sense of history who remember seeing Rocastle and Merson for the first time.

International Disruption Potential: Please don’t let the evil maniacs who run English football destroy him.  Mr Cappuccino – he is no good honest.  Absolute rubbish.  Don’t touch him.


Fabregas

Last Season: 35 starts, 1 as sub, 19 goals

Injury potential: Well, you know.  But if he can just get a bit of a break sometime it might help.

Brilliance potential: Stratospheric.  First choice obviously.  And 19 goals!

Breakthrough potential: He broke through aged 3.

Personality: I tend to view it as a young man torn by demands of his family who want to be with him in Barca, and his devotion to Wenger who made him what he is.  When an entity the size of Barca use you as the football, rather than using a football, you have to be strong, and he is getting stronger.

Crowd potential: If anyone near me boos him I’ll smash his fucking face in.  Well, no I wouldn’t what with me being of the elderly persuasion, but I will remonstrate with the fellow most severely.

International Disruption Potential: Plays for Barca when they pretend to be Spain, and has idiots pulling the wool over his face.  Fortunately is mostly used as a reserve since he doesn’t play for Barca the club.

Rosicky

Last Season: 20 starts, 13 as sub, 3 goals

Injury potential: Hard to say.  Last year was his comeback year and I’d say it went better than it might have done.  If the little injuries are all over, maybe he’ll fire up again.

Brilliance potential: When he came he was sensational, and then the injury started and his career was intercepted.  He is better in the middle than on the wing, but when he gets going on the wing he is on fire.

Breakthrough potential: This season he has to make it all the way through without serious injury, helping relieve the pressure on other players as the games come up in mid-week.  I’d love to see him remind us of his pure football by cutting inside from the wing.

Scoring potential: Could get many more, but needs to be there regularly and able to cut inside to shoot from just outside the area.

Personality: Seems a nice, balanced young gent

International Disruption Potential: Czech Rep, and didn’t qualify for the bent world cup.  Captain of the side last time I looked.  Hopefully won’t qualify for Euros either.

Nasri

Last Season: 29 starts, 5 as sub, 5 goals

Injury potential: Apart from the odd broken leg in the training camp seems to be immune.

Brilliance potential: Won the goal of the year through sheer determination to go through and score.  More of the same please.

Breakthrough potential: He is there, there is nowhere to break into.  When fit he should play – except that if Song, Cesc and Denilson are fit, I wonder if he does.  Too many players that’s the problem.

Personality: We saw him get angry a few times.  Not a bad thing (they don’t like it up em) if he can then turn around and smile in a charming manner to the ref.  Keep the aggro but calm down faster, that’s the way to do it.

Scoring potential: Could get more – just look at that video of the winning goal again.

International Disruption Potential: Not picked by France although clearly he should have been, but long may that situation continue.

Denilson

Last Season: 25 starts, 3 as sub, 5 goals

Injury potential: It seems high – that back injury kept returning, but hopefully all is now sorted.  Although he missed Barnet with an injury so it seems.

Brilliance potential: I rate him like Gilberto – the master of the interception, knowing exactly where the ball will be and picking the spot to walk off with it.  I know half the universe disagrees with me and the other half doesn’t support Arsenal, but when I did a report on a game for a paper the season before last and just watched him, it was extraordinary the way he just seems to know.  But some total prat one day called him “lightweight” and every paper picked up on it.  Just go back and watch the opening game of last season, and ponder why he is so rated in Brazil.

Breakthrough potential: High – he has broken through but he now needs to do it again to convince the doubters.  But if he is moved into the Brazil first team now, he will be like Vela – endlessly jet lagged.

Personality: Another Mr Nice Guy.

Scoring potential: Could be more – mostly from 30 yards out.

International Disruption Potential: If with the change of ownership in Brazil he is moved into the first team now, he will be like Vela – endlessly jet lagged and with more injuries.

Ramsey

Last Season: 12starts, 17 as sub, 4 goals.

Injury potential: Everyone knows.  When will he come back?  Say December and hope for earlier. Maybe this year he has finally got over the horrors.

Brilliance potential: Staggering.  I was raving over him every time he came on the pitch last season until the evil maniac Shawcross did him, and the evil maniac who manages England then picked Shawcross that evening to play for the country.  I suspect Cesc will go in a year or two, and then like Vieira, Henry, Anelka and others, he will regret it absolutely, but Ramsey will just step up into his shoes and we won’t notice the change.

Breakthrough potential: Total.

Personality: Yet another seemingly nice young man.

Scoring potential: Anything Cesc can do….

International Disruption Potential: Played for Wales since the age of two and will probably be their captain before he even gets fit again.  But they don’t qualify for things so that’s a relief.  Should do a Giggs and never turn up for friendlies.

Song

Last Season: 37 start, 1 as sub, 1 goals.

Injury potential: Moderate.

Brilliance potential: Potentially staggering.

Breakthrough potential: I have started reading comments on blogs saying that he really needs to get his game together.  OK I admit it, I am from another planet.  This guy is re-defining defensive midfield all on his own.  Maybe the doubters are aware of what they said about him after he had that bad game at Fulham.

Personality: Gets booked a lot.  (That’s not really personality, I know)

Scoring potential: Who cares, he protects the back four.

International Disruption Potential: Is African and therefore will miss the mid season, not this year but next.  And I think the one after (I read somewhere that they are doing a thing where they will play two African cups one year after the other).

——————————–

Backup – Pick anyone from…

Frimpong, Lansbury, Emmanuel Thomas, Barazite, Henderson. In fact pick all of them since they are all brilliant beyond belief.  Frimpong – see the Barnet game, Lansbury – see the last game of last season, JET – see the youth cup games…

So we need three players on the pitch and I have 8 listed in the squad (excluding Vela and Theo) and I have five listed for breakthrough.  This seems to me like the ultimate protection against injuries.

Lastest reserve news

The reserve team last night was



This suggests, well, I am not sure.  They won’t go on the school trip to Austria, but so what?  If we take the general view that Simpson is back up to the back ups then we might also say Barazite is the same, and that this confirms Randall is just playing out time until he can find a club.

Murphy, Watt, Ozakup and Miquel are rising stars, so either they have a loan deal already fixed (or about to be fixed following the friendlies in England) or they are staying in the reserves ready to lend a hand in the Diddley Cup.

Which also asks the question (for another article) what sort of team do we play in the the Diddley this year.

Overall then the team selection for the reserves last night tells me nothing.  No surprise there.

Xavi believes it is 'inevitable' that Cesc Fabregas will return to Barcelona and is not giving up on a deal for the Arsenal captain this summer.

Barcelona have failed with one offer for Fabregas since the end of last season and have found Arsenal in no mood to countenance the sale of the midfielder.

Arsene Wenger called for the speculation surrounding the 23-year-old to stop at the weekend, while his Barca counterpart Pep Guardiola has expressed his pessimism about agreeing a deal before the close of the current transfer window.

However, Xavi is confident Fabregas will eventually come back to Camp Nou and has claimed his Spain international team-mate will only be on 'loan' to Arsenal this season.
Delaying the inevitable

"We know where Cesc wants to be this coming season, but perhaps there is not enough time for Barcelona and Arsenal to agree a deal," Xavi told the Daily Express.

"Arsenal need to understand they are only delaying the inevitable.

"If we don't manage to get his signature this season then Arsenal only really have him on loan for a year - because there is nothing they can do to stop him joining next summer.

"I haven't given up on him joining us this season but, if he doesn't, it won't be more than a year before he is back home.

"His people will have a whole season to sort out the deal between the two clubs and it will happen at the very latest next summer."

Xavi claims Fabregas told his international team-mates he was keen on joining Barcelona during Spain's successful World Cup campaign.

"We were all with him for five weeks in South Africa and we know he wants to be at Barcelona, he made it very clear," added Xavi.

"But he will under no circumstances do anything that will upset the Arsenal fans. And that's probably why we are going to have to wait for him for another year."

It seems as if Joe Cole was almost certain to join Arsenal after much talk that he had already agreed a deal with us, and with him joining Liverpool, a few people were a bit upset that he chose Liverpool instead of us, but is Jack Wilshere better than Joe Cole?

Jack Wilshere is without doubt one of the great players for the future, and has showed that in many occasions, with his great vision, his brilliant dribbling, and attitude to do his best. Jack Wilshere will be turning 19 on January 1st next year, while Joe Cole will be turning 29 this November. Arsenal do need experience in our squad, but we also need to have a great future as well. Most people would say that we need to worry more about doing good this season, then doing good in 5 seasons, but if you look at teams like United and Liverpool, they have no future besides worrying about bankruptcy. Arsenal are definitely one of the greatest financial teams in the world, without worrying about bankruptcy or who’s going to take over at the club, and we don’t need to worry about 5 years like Liverpool and United do.

Jack Wilshere is one of the best examples of a future player coming up at Arsenal, and he should without doubt get playing time next season in the first team. If you look in the papers, they talk as if Joe Cole is the greatest player of all time, nobody mentions that he had been a bench warmer for the last 2 seasons at Chelsea, struggled with injuries, and had to fight for an England World Cup squad. Wenger might not like to spend big on players, for example Liverpool had to pay £16 million for Joe Cole, even though they were supposed to have an amazing £5 million war chest, Wenger would never have spent that much. Our biggest signing of all time was Andrey Arshavin for £15 million, he is a great singing and better than Joe Cole, but we got Jack Wilshere for nothing.

Jack Wilshere has surpassed many players in quality in the Arsenal first team in my opinion, I would rather have him in goal then Almunia and Fabianski playing goalkeeper at the same time, but he also risen above a few midfielders as well. Denilson is one example. Denilson might be able to make a few good passes and shoot from distance, but he has a hard time playing with the physicality of the Premier League. Jack Wilshere is a really tough cookie. You make him angry and he is sure to dive or spit on your face. He has even risen above Little Mozart, Tomas Rosicky. I admit that I am a huge fan of  Tomas Rosicky, I always admired the way that he read and played the game, but I believe Jack Wilshere has every quality of Rosicky besides experience and long distance shots. Many Arsenal fans around the world are comparing him to Cesc Fabregas, but I’m comparing him with Robert Pires. Pires (wing) and Fabregas (centre) play similar positions, but I think Wilshere could play anywhere in the midfield.

Overall, Jack Wilshere should be given a chance to prove his what he could do in the premier league  next season with Bolton Arsenal. He is our future captain, and England’s future captain. All hail Young Jack.

A strong African defender and a very talented Japanese striker are today’s players linked with a possible move to Arsenal.

Sport.co.uk “exclusively” reports how Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger is monitoring Japanese international Keisuke Honda with Liverpool – apparently – also interested in the 24-year old. The CSKA Moscow striker was impressive in South Africa during the World Cup Finals and with the Gunners set to lose Croatian striker Eduardo, a replacement could be signed ahead of next season.

In other news, The Daily Mail believes Dynamo Kiev are ready to listen to offers from Arsenal for Senegal defender Pape Diakhate. It’s not the first time during the summer that the strong 26-year old has been linked with the Gunners and as Arsene Wenger said, a new defensive player will join his squad this summer. But will it be Diakhate?

MARK SCHWARZER has been offered a player-coach role at Arsenal.

Boss Arsene Wenger has given Schwarzer the extra incentive in a bid to secure the 37-year-old Fulham keeper.

Aussie Schwarzer is desperate for Champions League football and to have the chance to work with some of the club's other stoppers, along with head keeper coach Gerry Peyton.

But the Gunners must increase their bid, having seen an initial Ј2m offer rejected.

However, any deal will be on hold until Fulham appoint a new manager.

Wenger sees Schwarzer as a short-term fix to the club's problems.

Arsenal, who face Sturm Graz in Austria tonight, still have high hopes of 20-year-old Polish stopper Wojciech Szczesny.

Meanwhile Eduardo was in Ukraine yesterday to complete a Ј6m move from Arsenal to Shakhtar Donetsk.

The striker, 27, whose career in north London stalled after suffering a horrific injury at Birmingham February 2008, was not included on the 27-man list of players to travel to Arsenal's Austrian training camp this week.

Eduardo's Croatian international chief Slaven Bilic said: "I spoke with Eduardo. He was very pleased with the move to Shakhtar. He is going to a strong league.

"This season they will again play in the Champions League. This is excellent for the national team."

Shakhtar coach Mircea Lucescu said: "Yes, he had a serious injury and we are aware of the risk."