Wenger, you coy devil

After Arsenal collected their first trophy of the season Wenger gave an interview where he clarified his statements of a few days ago.  Basically, he explained that he was just being coy about not doing a midfield signing and that there are, in fact, target(s) but he’s too busy to sign someone right now.

I have to wonder if his “too busy” remark is kind of a shot at the board.  First Dein and now Edelman have left and all the stuff that they did has been shifted onto remaining executives and/or Arsene Wenger.  No one has been brought in yet to do the dirty work around contracts and other such business and so Wenger is left getting his team into shape (which it really needs), teaching players about their new roles, introducing a handful of new kids to the Arsenal way, and dealing with contracts and player movement: maybe he really is “too busy.”

There is good news, though, for those of us who would like to see just one more signing to provide cover in midfield; that Wenger is hinting that Arsenal are actively trying to sign someone.   The “bad” news is that there won’t be a signing before next Wednesday’s game against FC Twente so the team we all saw this weekend is the one we’ll see then.

I did get a chance to watch yesterday’s match and they way I saw it a bunch of schoolkids held a full Sevilla team to a well deserved draw.  There were a lot of problems with the midfield which put extra pressure on the defense but fortunately Fabianski stepped up to the challenge and single-handedly kept out about a half dozen clear chances.  The young man really had a whale of a game and I can see why Wenger isn’t buying a keeper.  That kid is going to be one hell of a keeper for the future.

The rest of the squad didn’t look bad or anything, they just looked inexperienced.  Which is to be expected when Wenger starts a 16 year old and a 17 year old as the central midfield partnership.  Wilshere looked bright in the role of creative midfielder but was often caught in possesion and resulted in too many turnovers.  Rambo, on the other hand, just really looked lost in the defensive midfield role.  To be fair, the young man has the weight of high expectations on top of the fact that he’s really only practiced with the team for, what, a month?  That’s got to be tough.

Funny stat of the day: that match saw 5 Englishmen (born inside the country of England) on the pitch at the start of the match.  Hoyte, Gibbs, Emmanuel-Thomas, Randall, and Wilshere all started and if you count Ramsey (which I know you English like to do) there were 6 “Englishmen” on the pitch.  I thought it was a thumb to the nose at Sepp Blatter and his stupid 6+5 rule; sort of Wenger saying, “we’ll play Englishmen if we want.”

I have a hangover and I’m going to go back to sleep now.  See you tomorrow!

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