In an ideal world we'd be putting Saturday's defeat behind us and saying no more about it. That, however, is impossible given the furore caused by Emmanuel Adebayor.

It's likely he's going to be hit with FA charges for the celebration and the stamp on Robin van Persie. Regarding the celebration there are those who say Arsenal fans shouldn't have reacted like that and perhaps that's true to an extent. There's an accusation that football fans are very quick to dish out banter but when they get a bit back they get a bit precious, and that's also true at times.

But there's a responsibility on players to rise above it. I've read about the 'abuse' handed out to Adebayor, he's used it as an excuse himself, but eye-witness reports from the game itself don't tally with what he says and what's being said in the press. And I've heard him get worse stick when he was an Arsenal player and he didn't react like that. He wanted to wind-up Arsenal fans, it worked, but the onus is on him to be the professional. He is the one paid huge amounts of money and that there was bitterness from Arsenal fans is because they were the ones whose season tickets etc were paying him to amble about last season. 

Kolo Toure came over and dragged him away. There's a picture of both Kolo and Craig Bellamy holding their hands up to apologise. Craig Bellamy. This is a man who hit one of his own teammates about the legs with a golf club and he's more professional than Adebayor. The Greater Manchester police are less than impressed which is bound to have a bearing on the outcome on the FA investigation.

Mark Hughes, Man City manager, knows Adebayor is in the wrong but has done little but make excuses for him. While I don't expect any manager to castigate his player in public you have to laugh when he says:

He needs to be cut a little bit of slack given what he has gone through in the last 18 months

What has he gone through? Serious illness? Unemployment? A traumatic accident? A death in his family? No. He created a sticky situation for himself at work, where he was paid £80,000 a week, and then made that situation worse when it would have been easy to make it better. Then he got a different job which pays him £140,000 a week. A WEEK. What he's gone through? Give me a break and spend a few days in the real world. There are people who go through worse every single day of their lives and nobody should have any sympathy for Adebayor about what happened to him at Arsenal. It was his fault and his fault alone.

The van Persie stamp should see him banned for 3 games automatically. If the ref had seen it - and maybe he should have got laser eye surgery instead of hair implants - it would have been a red card. Adebayor claims he tried to speak to van Persie afterwards but naturally the Dutchman was having none of it. I would have liked to see more of our players follow that example than spend time hugging him afterwards but that's very much a side issue.

Any kind of violent play should be punished as severely as possible and that goes for Arsenal players who set out to deliberately injure an opponent too. What will gall City fans when they get over their crowing and stop and think about it is the fact that Adebayor went out on Saturday with nothing more than his own agenda in mind. He wanted revenge. Quite what for I don't know. As Arsene Wenger said:

At Arsenal we tried to treat him well. He came from Metz where he did not play and now he is the player he is. I do not feel we treated him badly.

And he's right. He had an issue with the fans and the fans had an issue with him but what did Cesc Fabregas ever do but create goals for him? So why the vicious stamp on his ankle? I never heard Robin van Persie say a bad word about him so why rake his studs down his face? The fact is that Adebayor was not a Man City player on Saturday, he was an Adebayor player. He'll now miss at least 3 games (maybe more if he gets banned for the celebration), including the Manchester derby this weekend, and it's the first little hint City fans have that the most important thing to Adebayor is Adebayor, not his club.

It was self-indulgent, unprofessional and when you read him saying that he has no idea why he should be banned for anything then, if you're a City fan, you've got to be a bit worried. That lack of insight applies to his performances on the pitch and his behaviour off it too. He could not understand why Arsenal fans reacted to his antics last summer because he lives in a cosseted bubble where he gets to do what he wants without worrying about the consequences. Now, perhaps, he'll get a taste of reality.

Anyway, I think we've spent enough time on him. When the verdict comes it'll be mentioned here. Then until April 24th, when he returns to the Grove for the first time, this shall remain an Adebayor-free zone*

There's not a whole lot else going on this morning, it has to be said. Eduardo's appeal against his 2 match ban takes place today in Switzerland so we'll find out if he's available for Wednesday's trip to Belgium.

What's not in doubt though is that we need to put Saturday behind us, regroup and start winning football matches. The start to the season calmed a lot of nerves, the last two results have re-opened old wounds, so to speak. Now comes a real test of the manager's belief in these players. We've got a great chance to create some momentum, both in Europe and domestically, but thoughts on that, team selections, injuries and everything else can wait until tomorrow.

Till then.

* unless he does something especially cunty in which case all bets are off

It was inevitable that the headlines this morning would be about Emmanuel Adebayor. However, while many of us thought it'd be because he scored a goal (ex-Arsenal players always score, dontcha know?), I doubt many of us thought Adebayor would sink to the depths he did yesterday.

I think the referees assessor needs to look very closely at Mark Clattenburg's performance yesterday because he allowed Adebayor to get away with an extremely nasty foul on Cesc in the first ten minutes. He went over the ball and stamped on his ankle. At the very least that was a yellow card. Clatterburg saw it and he seemed to take into account the circumstances and just gave Adebayor a ticking off. It shouldn't matter that he was fired up, it shouldn't matter what he had been saying pre-game, dangerous tackles should be punished and the ref let him away with it.

In the second half Adebayor deliberately stamped on Robin van Persie's face. Watching on the stream yesterday I first thought he'd stood on his hand, but right under the eye of the ref he raked his studs down van Persie's face. Take a look. Robin released a statement after the game, saying:

He set out to hurt me today. I knew he was aiming for a collision because he changed the angle of his body to allow contact to be made.  He moved backwards when his natural momentum would have taken him forward. I find that deeply disrespectful. He has shown a real lack of class today, to me and the fans.

So it's not unfair to suggest that when Adebayor scored City's third goal he should not have been on the pitch. That it took him causing a near riot with his provocative celebration to earn a yellow card is a sad indictment of the Clattenburg who redefined awful yesterday. As for Adebayor - I don't buy his apology. Sure he was emotional but he knew exactly what he was doing. He'd slagged off Arsenal fans before the game and the celebration was designed to wind up the travelling Gooners even more. 

It shows him up as the classless, moronic, idiot he really is. There's no excuse for the tackle on Cesc (we're lucky he wasn't badly injured), the celebration, stupid as it was, I can live with because that's the kind of thing cunts do, but there's absolutely no justification for the stamp on van Persie. It was dangerous and cowardly and he needs to be punished for it. The FA have confirmed they will be taking a look at it and I hope he's sanctioned properly and I hope Clattenburg is too. 

Now, leaving that massive cunt to one side what can you say about the game? Defensively it was not our shiningest moment, was it? City opened the scoring when a suspiciously offside Micah Richards looped a header towards our back post. It seemed to take Almunia an age to react and when he did the ball dropped over him, hit the post, hit his head and went in. You have to say there's an element of bad luck about it but the Spaniard hasn't had a great start to the season. I don't think it's any coincidence that Almunia's best season came when he had Jens waiting on the bench, that kind of competition for his place is not there any more and I think that's a factor.

Until then I thought we'd bossed the game and were playing quite well. The goal knocked the wind out of our sails a bit and we might have gone further behind. The moment that stands out is Stephen Ireland running through and Gael Clichy actually running away from him. I still don't quite know why Ireland didn't shoot, I think Clichy's bizarre movement confused him and the defender eventually came away with the ball. I may be wrong but Given didn't have a save to make in the first half.

In the second we struggled to get going until the introduction of Tomas Rosicky added something to our attacking play. He played a ball into Robin van Persie who turned Lescott brilliantly and finished with his right foot into the bottom corner to make it 1-1.

Then we self-destructed. Clichy got caught upfield, there was no effort on Diaby's part to get back, and when Song was beaten in the left back position it was easy for whichever scabby cunt it was to set up Craig Bellamy to make it 2-1. The third came from the left back position as well, some scabby cunt crossing for Adebayor to score and Shaun Wright-Phillips made it 4-1 as we got caught on the counter. Tomas Rosicky made it 4-2 with a nicely taken goal and it's good to see him back.

In the last 10-15 minutes we might have scored 3 or 4. Clattenburg ignored Barry's clear handball at 3-1, which would have made things interesting, van Persie hit the post, Adebayor cleared one off the line, another deflected just wide, Given made a goal line save and we certainly had enough chances to level things up. You might well ask why it took us being 4-1 down to play with the kind of urgency we showed in the latter stages of the game. The 4-3-3 formation is so dependent on hard work when you don't have the ball. I felt we didn't really do enough when they had possession and when we had it we seemed lethargic and sloppy. Maybe a post-Interlull hangover but then City had plenty of players away too.

The defensive instability will worry the manager but this is the same defence people were lauding as much improved a couple of weeks ago. To me the reason it was improved was because everybody, from front to back, worked really hard. I don't think you can say that was true yesterday. As well as that I think we were missing a bit of creativity. If Cesc has an off day, as I think he did, then we're going to struggle if we don't have Nasri, Rosicky or Arshavin in the team. I'm beginning to think Denilson/Song is an either/or situation, so having Rosicky back is good news. Let's hope he can stay fit. 

Overall not a great day but it's early in the season yet. Just as the win against Everton didn't mean we were the best team in the world defeat yesterday does not mean we're the worst. What is clear though is that we need to work harder, as a team, and cut out the individual errors which always seem so costly. 

Looking at the next run of games in the Premier League (Wigan, Fulham, Blackburn, Birmingham, West Ham, Spurs, Wolves, Sunderland before we play Chelsea) there's certainly the opportunity to put a decent run of results together and get some badly needed momentum going.

Next on the agenda though is Champions League action as we visit Belgium to play Standard Liege. The recovery has to start there.

Morning, hope we find you well and all set for this afternoon's crunch game against Man City, the lottery winning chavs of football.

Under normal circumstances you'd be talking more about the clubs, the tactics and so on, but of course there's only one story this morning - Emmanuel Adebayor. To be perfectly frank I'm not inclined to spend too much time on him. We know he has an ego the size of a hippo's clunge and you can be quite sure he's absolutely loving all the attention he's being given at the moment.

Pre-game he's given interviews to give his view, but here's the thing about Adebayor. He's a liar, as we all know, and a piss-poor spin merchant. We went through it last summer. In one interview he was staying, the next, just moments later, he was going. It wasn't about money, but his agents hawked him around to as many clubs as they could resulting in a whopping pay increase at Arsenal. Then he told us that he had no idea what was going on because his mobile phone had been off all summer. 

I think he honestly believes that Arsenal fans are stupid. Why else would you tell such a momumental untruth? 

This interview in the Telegraph is full of more of the same. His ludicrous explanation as to why he fell out with Nicklas Bendtner (over some shoes), his pathetic justification for headbutting Bendtner during a match, his boo-hoo-bollocks about how the Arsenal fans treated him and that Wenger told him he was only selling him because we needed the money. As if the manager would tell him something like that.

LIAR. I know there was a lot of divisiveness at the time, when he was still at the club, and when he was on the point of leaving, but as far as I'm concerned Adebayor got the treatment from Arsenal fans that his behaviour merited. He lied to us, he underperformed, perhaps deliberately, he was clearly a disruptive influence in the dressing room, he treated us as if we were morons and if you do that to people then they're going to react. 

He's not our problem now though and I don't want to dwell on him too much but this quote sums up Emmanuel Adebayor for me. He's talking about his new club and the fans there:

What is good at City is that the fans are truly fans. They love you. Arsenal have a lot of fans who are not fans. Arsenal have fans from America and Jamaica. Today they are Arsenal fans, tomorrow they will be Liverpool fans and after tomorrow they will be Manchester United fans. 

Honestly, what a thing to say. How insulting to Arsenal fans in general and those from the US and Jamaica. And clearly he's talking right out of his elongated arse. It's obvious why too. In all my years of watching football Adebayor is the most insecure, needy player I have ever seen. He wants the City fans to love him. Therefore insult Arsenal fans while calling them great. He claims he'll score when the fans are behind him, if they're not then how can he give 100%?

Frankly he's a pathetic excuse for a man. A decent footballer on his day but not much of a person. Arsene Wenger reckons Adebayor should be respected but he said the same thing about Ashley Cole and that never happened. I hope the Arsenal fans give him a huge amount of stick today (although hopefully not with that elephants song - that is a Sp*rs song) and conversely give Kolo the respectful reception he deserves. Because he does deserve it. Adebayor deserves nothing more than all the vitriol and opprobrium the travelling Gooners can muster.

One thing Wenger is right about though is that he is on fire at the moment (sadly not literally) and we have to put out that fire. He was always a streaky scorer, getting his goals in clumps and then going a little while without scoring, so we need to put an end to this streak today. It's another big test for William Gallas and Thomas Vermaelen but hopefully the knowledge Gallas has of playing with him will work to our advantage.

In terms of the team I think the only decision the manager has to make is who will play in the position that Andrei Arshavin would have occupied. I know Eduardo is the obvious choice but I think the boss will have watched him play 90 against England midweek and consider leaving him on the bench. So I think we'll line up as follows:

Almunia - Sagna - Gallas - Vermaelen - Clichy - Song - Denilson - Cesc - Diaby - van Persie - Bendtner.

Subs from many. It'd be nice to see Tomas Rosicky on the bench. If he can play an hour in midweek there's no reason why he can't be an option for 15-20 minutes today.

Last season's game at Middle Eastlands was a disaster. Probably the worst performance of the season. City won 3-0, it might have been 5 or 6, so leaving aside the fact we all want to see Adebayor end up on the losing side, that's got to be a motivation for the lads today. We'll have to play well too. City are a much better side than they were back then but perhaps there's a touch of overconfidence about them when you listen to their players and manager talking in the press. Let's hope so.

Personally I'm hoping that Bendtner scores the winner, runs the length of the pitch, gives you know who both fingers prompting a series of headbutts which results in an 8 match ban for Needybayor. A man can dream. I know that's unlikely but I'm still having a little flutter on Nick to score.

Roll on 3pm, I am looking forward to this. COME ON YOU GOOOOONERS.

Morning all, hope you find you well this Saturday.

Let's start with our old pal Adebayor who has been talking, again, and urging his new club to buy Kolo Toure. He's hoping it'll be a case of Abu Dhabi Do, saying:

Kolo is a great friend of mine - he's a big player for Arsenal and a top defender. If the manager could get him, he can get exactly what this club wants and needs from him, I'm sure about that. I know how good Kolo is and I think what Man City needs now is a top-quality defender like him or John Terry.

It's funny how he's been at the club less than a week and he's already telling the manager what to do. Leaving aside the fact he's urging him to sign one of our players. He really needs a big goblet of shut up juice right now, the lanky twat. Any vague feelings of goodwill towards him must surely be well and truly evaporated now.

Anyway, it seems like it'll be a case of Abu Dhabi Don't as Kolo's brother, Yaya, reckons City aren't big enough for his brother. He says:

The most important thing for my brother is that he can play with a big team. Arsenal play great football and City are not there yet. And they have Craig Bellamy. Who in their right mind would want to go to a club where that neckless savage plays? Come on. 

I have to admit that down through the years I've always had kind of a soft spot for Man City. And by soft spot I mean I didn't hate them quite as much as I hate all the other teams, simply because they were United's rivals. But now. Pffff. Forget it. They are right up there with the most objectionable teams of all time. Like a family of knackers that has won the lottery. No matter who they're playing next season I hope they get spanked like Max Mosley in a dungeon.

Gael Clichy sums them up perfectly. He says:

I really believe if you are a player who thinks only about money then you could end up at Manchester City. You have to think if you want to play for a big club and have your image or if you want to play for a good club and earn big money.

Hard to argue with that, is it? Why did Robinho go to Man City from Real Madrid? Prestige? The chance of winning important trophies? My arse. He went because they made him an offer he couldn't refuse. The same with Adebayor. The same with Tevez. They've gone there because the money is too good to turn down and it's brilliant that somebody like Clichy has come out and said exactly that.

Reports from Italy suggest a Fiorentina deal for Emmanuel Eboue is almost complete. Again the fee mentioned is aroun €9-10m which is fantastic money and even their current right back is talking about the possibility of him coming in. I shall await further developments before making any comment.

Meanwhile, you have to laugh at the reaction of some people to the fact that Lorik Cana has signed for Sunderland. It seems most people's knowledge of him is based on a 5' YouTube clip of him fouling his way around the pitch like the love child of Robbie Savage and Joey Barton.

I will happily confess to knowing very little about him other than that video and the fact he's been built up, in some quarters, as this mythical answer to all our midfield problems. But doesn't the fact that he's gone to Sunderland say something? Doesn't the fact that no other big clubs were even linked with him say something? If there was the chance of him signing for Arsenal wouldn't he have hung on before putting pen to paper at the Stadium of Light?

I doubt we were even interested, mostly because anyone with any knowledge of French football beyond a YouTube compilation reckons he's a staggeringly average footballer who is no improvement on what we have already. I will trust people who watch the French league week in, week out and if they tell me he's not good enough then I will believe them far more than any hysterical blog which now reckons that we're practically heading for relegation because we haven't signed the Albanian Terry Hurlock.

Honestly, people need to get a grip. Nobody's denying we need a midfielder but Cana is not, and never has been, the answer.

I've been avoiding the Patrick Vieira to Sp*rs stories in the hope they'll go away. Ol' Twitchy reckons Paddy wants to go there though, simply because he wants to play football. Christ, if he's that desperate just to play football he can come play for my Astro team. Tuesday nights + a game of 5-a-side on Sunday, we'd win every game with him in the team and at this point he hardly needs money at all, does he?

I know he was a great player for us but if he goes there to play for them then his legacy would be tainted in a big way. Surely there must be dozens of other clubs who would want Patrick Vieira. Seeing him stroll about the pitch with a weeping cock on his shirt would be hard to take.

Anyway, that'll be that. I have got no plans whatsoever for today. Some intense lazing perhaps, maybe a beer or two later. So, till tomorrow, have a good day.

Oh dear, it would have been nice if Emmanuel Adebayor had just gone to Man City, accepted graciously that his Arsenal career was over because of his own actions, and just shut up. Sadly, the average Premier League footballer is about as predictable as the sun coming up in the morning and setting at night. He's had a fair bit to say and it's typically deluded stuff.

Firstly he has a little pop at the fans, saying:

When a player plays well, clubs come in for him. I scored 30 goals for Arsenal two seasons ago and it was not my fault that Milan, or Barcelona or Real Madrid wanted to buy me. The fans never understood that and I cannot understand why the fans went after me.

Ok, so we accept that a player who plays well for a big club might attract the attention of other big clubs. Not a problem at all. That is, as they say, par for the course. What you shouldn't do in those circumstances though is talk about how great it would be to sign for Barcelona, passing off the comments with 'I am an Arsenal player for now but who knows in football?' style crap.

Don't, just after the season ends, go to Barcelona, give an interview to El Mundo talking about how you'd love to play with Thierry Henry again and don't let them take a picture of you holding a copy of the newspaper grinning like a Cheshire cat.

Don't have your agent talk time and time again about Milan and important clubs and offers and how you have to prepare for your retirement at the age of 24. Don't, months later, talk about how Milan is Beyonce and how much you fancy Beyonce, making Arsenal out to be the Susan Boyle of football.

So while it's not his fault that clubs wanted to buy him he has to accept that he and his agent encouraged them. They then used that interest to negotiate a better contract at Arsenal having just been given a new contract the summer before. Trying to get the best deal for yourself is one thing, holding the club over a barrel to do it is another.

And the fans understood perfectly what he had done, how he had behaved. If he can't understand why fans felt betrayed by what he had done then he's deluded. The worst part is I genuinely believe he doesn't think he's done anything wrong. In the BBC interview as well he said the same thing. 

But in reality what kind of a hard time did he get? A few jeers at the Emirates Cup last pre-season and his inadvisable kissing of the badge after scoring a penalty against Madrid certainly didn't help but I think the vast majority of fans were happy to let him know what they thought of his summer antics and then that was that. As I said on this blog back then the best way for him to win the fans back was to work hard and score goals. For a time it seemed that was what he was doing but it quickly became clear running and working hard were beneath him - culminating in those ghastly semi-final/end of season showings.

For me the bottom line is blaming the fans is a cheap shot and cowardly. There were other players who got more stick than him last season. Nicklas Bendtner, for example, went through a period of a couple of months where he couldn't trap wind, let alone a football. Every time he misplaced a pass there were audible groans and moans and jeers and the grief he got was, in my opinion, far worse than anything directed at Adebayor. Yet he got his head down, worked hard and made things better for himself. He didn't go bleating and crying to Garth Crooks. 

Adebayor goes on to say:

I was in the same position as Cesc. Every summer Barcelona tried to sign him, but the fans never turned on Cesc.

Is he really comparing himself to Cesc? A young man who has been at the club since he was 16, who has represented us brilliantly, and who, despite the vagaries of the Spanish press, about whom we know so much, has categorically denied any stories about him moving back home almost as soon as they emerged.

The reason fans never turned on Cesc is because he never acted like Adebayor.

In his first interview with Man City Adebayor claimed the move was not about money. Today he says:

I know a lot of people will be saying, ‘He went for the money’. But I would like to hear any man, if he is honest, say he would refuse it if he was earning £10 and someone offered him £30.

Fair enough, at least he's honest about that. Now. The reason he went to City is because Wenger didn't want him anymore. And because they were offering him a ridiculously large amount of money for a player of his ability. It wasn't because the fans turned on him, not because AC Milan wanted to buy him. If Wenger had wanted to keep Adebayor he'd have done exactly that, we'd have seen a couple of articles on the official site about how last season was poor but the next one would be better, blah blah blah.

His claims about Arsenal needing the money might have some validity, we'll see. It might well be a case that Arsene and Ivan Gazidis have sat down, identified where they need to strengthen the squad and said 'Well, if we sell Adebayor that gives us £X to spend on a midfielder/defender' etc. The main point though is that if Wenger wanted to keep the player he would have kept him.

And even if we did need to sell a player to raise funds for a signing or two to make us stronger, what's the problem with that? Is it not better for a club to live within its means, to operate like any normal business would, instead of blindly borrowing? Of course it's down to the manager to use that money now to make us stronger.

It's not at all surprising it's ended this way. There's a tremendous sense of bitterness from Adebayor, his vastly improved pay-packet is cushioning the blow of taking a drop in terms of the stature of the club he's playing for. But the sheer unwillingness to accept any of the responsibility for what happened and to point the fingers at the fans and the manager shows what kind of a character he really is.

When he sold him I was of the opinion it was the right move and we'd be better off for it. This has only reinforced that. And that, my good old friends, is about the last thing I've got to say about him. We play City away on Sept 12th, I'm sure the away fans will be in good voice that day.

In other news The Sun is linking us with Klaas Jan Huntelaar again. I don't really see anything new in that and I think he's too expensive an option to be honest.

Thierry Henry has been talking about Arsenal as well. He says:

It's not going to be easy without Adebayor, obviously, and what happened with Nasri was unlucky, but I still believe they can win the League. It can happen this year. I know everybody is saying this and that but in my heart I will always talk like that.

When you compare the way he speaks about the club to the comments made by Mr X-Factor the other day it just shows what a legend Thierry is. It is interesting how soon we're being completely written off this season. Nobody expects us to challenge for the title, many expect City to eclipse us, and while I still think we need to add to the squad to be truly competitive for the upcoming campaign it's way too early for the obituaries to start.

Thierry also talks about how 'vital' Cesc is but then we know that already.

Marouane Chamakh says he's ready to join Sunderland and that he's fed up waiting for Arsenal. Ok then. I'm not exactly going to shed any tears.

Apparently Fiorentina are going to offer €10m for Emmanuel Eboue. That seems like a reasonable deal to me. We get a load of money. They get Eboue. I'm trying to see a flaw in this plan. I suppose the main problem is that the story itself is most likely fiction.

Johan Djourou on how this could be his breakthrough season. He's partnered Vermaelen twice in pre-season so far, I suspect the boss is having a good look at how they work together. It is time for him to take a step forward though, fingers crossed it happens.

And that'll be about that. Have a good Friday, more tomorrow.

So he's gone. After a week of not so much 'Will he? Won't he?', more 'When will he?', he finally willed yesterday evening.

Emmanuel Adebayor signed a 5 year deal with Manchester City. Arsenal receive a fee believed to be around £25m and it's good business for all concerned. City get a striker better than Darius Vassell and we get a load of money for a player who didn't want to be at the club anymore.

In this pre-confirmation-of-transfer interview with the BBC Arsene Wenger said he felt there was a little bit of resentment on Adebayor's part that he didn't move last summer. He obviously had his heart set on Milan or Barcelona. It also confirms that he did want to go last summer despite many people thinking this was not the case.

You have to wonder though - if he felt resentment staying at Arsenal when he wanted to be elsewhere, what is he going to feel at City? No doubt he's got a big, big wage increase, which will certainly help make it easier, but there's no question it's a step-down in footballing terms. No Champions League, no European football of any kind this season, and while they've certainly got plenty of ambition, neither Rome nor Abu Dhabi were built in a day.

Anyway, he's a footballer who had his head turned by money, he's not the first and he certainly won't be the last. His advisors have taken away a real chance from him, a player who, if he had kept working hard and not believed the hype, might well have had a great career at Arsenal and improved as a footballer while doing so.

But when you're dealing with a guy who, at 24 years of age, talks about having to prepare for his retirement then you know where his focus is. He says he didn't go to City for cash, which may in part be true. He went to City because he really had no choice, he'd backed himself into a corner at Arsenal with his behaviour, poor performances and the Football Focus interview which was essentially Gooner Hara-kiri.

There was no Barcelona offer this summer. There was no Milan offer, even with all of that Kaka money and their very real need for a striker. City was the only option he had. And look, he acted like a cunt, in my opinion, but in the grand scheme of things he's just another footballer who was badly advised, let his ego get the better of him and fucked things up when there was no need for it at all.

I've noticed a couple of headlines this morning claiming that AW says the fans forced him out. Firstly, Wenger said no such thing and secondly it's not true. The responsibility for what happened last summer is entirely Adebayor's, and what was borne out of that is down to him as well. 

So I'm glad to see him go but that's about as far as it goes. Arsene Wenger can wish him well and thank him for the goals he scored, as you would expect the manager to do. Arsenal fans can remember some fantastic goals, particularly against Sp*rs, and consign him to history which is where he now belongs.

The main talking point now is : What are we going to do with all that delicious money?!

I've been of the opinion that Adebayor doesn't necessarily need to be replaced, depending on how we line up nect season, and it's something the boss is obviously considering too, although he does mention Chamakh. He says:

We have Van Persie, Arshavin, Rosicky, Walcott, Bendtner, Eduardo. We are not in a hurry. We just want to prepare for the season and see if we need to add something. Chamakh is one of the players we've followed and if we need to go for a striker he's a possibility. We're keeping an eye on him.

Without wishing to sound like a broken record I can live without a striker coming in, I can quite happily accept Chamakh as a relatively cheap gamble if that's what he wants to do, but I dearly want to see us pursue the midfielder the manager seems to think we need as well. We were clearly after Melo and it'd be nice to go out and do that business as soon as possible. No doubt there'll be all kinds of speculation now that the press know we have a few bob to spend (like The People going all original and linking us again with Obafemi Martins).

Anwyay, all that transfer malarkey aside it was nice to have football yesterday. I watched the 2-2 draw with Barnet which saw our goals come from Andrei Arhsavin after nice work from Sanchez Watt in the first half and a beautiful curler from Nacer Barazite in the second. Their goals came from scrappy defending, both from set-pieces, so obviously old habits are dying hard.

But there's really no need to analyse the performance in any way. It's the first warm-up game of pre-season, anyone who wishes to sound alerts or anything like it is taking life way too seriously. We saw the debut of Thomas Vermaelen who played like this was the first warm-up game of pre-season so it's far too early to start making any judgements.

For me the most positive thing was seeing Tomas Rosicky back. He captained the side, looked absolutely delighted to be out there, and got stuck in to a couple of really strong challenges which I'm sure will give him plenty of confidence. It's good to have him back.

Next week the lads head off to the Austrian training camp and some more warm-up games. The next one is on Tuesday against SC Colombia. 

And that's about that for this Sunday. Have yourselves a fine day. More tomorrow.

On the day pre-season begins the Adebayor saga rumbles on.

The Mirror says the deal was 'completed' last night but there are complications as Adebayor is holding out for a 'loyalty bonus' because he never asked for a transfer. I don't really need to talk about how incredibly dense that is, do I? And if he's still holding out for a loyalty bonus then how can the deal be complete?

I'm not even sure why things like that are in contracts. There was the same discussion last summer, also involving Adebayor, unsurprisingly. When it was clear his agent was touting him around Europe there was no question of the player actually handing in a transfer request lest he be denied this sum of money. And the last time Arsenal encoutnered this was with the husband of 20% of Girls Aloud.

The reason his move to Chelsea was so complicated was because he, amazingly, after going to meet Chelsea and everything else, wanted a loyalty bonus. So you can see Adebayor is in good company there. Greedy and utterly deluded.

The other story that emerged was in the Mail, City apparently furious that Adebayor's people had offered him to Chelsea. I wouldn't be surprised if his agent did that, to be honest I wouldn't be surprised if his agent stuck up flyers on lamp-posts with tear-off telephone numbers, but I doubt there's real interest from Chelsea. 

There were reports on Sky Sports yesterday about how Adebayor was at the training ground to say his goodbyes, the infamous clearing out of the locker, but how much truth there is to that I don't know. What I do know is that the longer this goes on the worse it is for everyone. Adebayor needs to accept that his Arsenal career is over, that City are the only club prepared to offer him the money he think he's worth even if that means no Champions League football and that scuppering the deal over some outrageous 'loyalty bonus' is going to make him even more unpopular than he is now.

Onwards to better things though and the squad for today's game - hah, you like that? - TODAY'S GAME - against Barnet was announced. As expected it was a mix of youngsters and some of the players who returned earliest to pre-season training. So Gallas, Almunia, Djourou, Arshavin and new boy Thomas Vermaelen will be on show at some stage, as will Tomas Rosicky.

He last played for Arsenal on January 27th 2008 and has battled a very, very serious knee problem ever since. There were genuine fears that he might not play again, the injury was so unique doctors had no idea how to treat it, but here we are 18 months later and he's back. Cesc Fabregas says of him:

He's the type of player you enjoy playing alongside and as a guy he's amazing. He didn't deserve his injury but I am sure he will come back stronger. I wish him all the best because everyone here at Arsenal loves him a lot. Technically he is one of the best in the world and physically I am sure he will be really strong because he's been working really hard. I am happy because soon he is going to be back and I can't wait to see him playing again.

If he can stay fit there's no question at all that he adds quality and depth to our squad. And I do hope his injury worries are behind him. You can talk all you want about how hard it must be for a professional football to be injured, picking up your big pay cheque, but if you love to play football, whatever your standard, missing any period of time through injury is hard to take. To be out for that period of time, to have gone through all that uncertainty, must have been wretched, so fingers crossed he can play a big part in the season ahead. Welcome back, Tomas.

The game is live via Arsenal TV online this afternoon, kick off is 3pm. 

In other quick news Theo Walcott talks about how we need to start grinding out results while Bordeaux's Marouane Chamakh says he'd happily play for Sunderland or Blackburn but Arsenal would be a dream, kinda like saying if I have to eat Aldi frozen lamp chops I will but I'd prefer the Kobe beef.

Right, that'll be that and on the day that's it in it here's to football once again. Although you do come across some infuriating characters you've gotta love the game and the Arsenal.

Morning all,

it looks as if Emmanuel Adebayor will be a Man City player sooner rather than later. As they unveiled the Argentine monster yesterday they confirmed talks with Arsenal were ongoing about the purchase. Their manager, Mark Hughes, said:

Yes, there has been contact. There is a deal to be done, possibly. But it's not been concluded as we speak here. Until that actually happens it's not really the time or the place.

However, reports emerged yesterday suggesting that Adebayor had undergone a medical and today will have a work permit hearing in Manchester. I'm not sure I understand that. Surely he has a work permit already if he's playing for Arsenal. I wasn't aware these things were club specific. Anyway, that is the state of play.

The fee, when it's announced, no doubt be 'undisclosed' but it's thought to be around the £25m mark. It's hard to argue with that. Speaking about the possible sale Ray Parlour says:

He was too lazy at times last season and just didn’t do it. His body language wasn’t great. Wenger will not stand in his way because they can get a lot of money for him and then get a very good player to replace him.

His attitude amazed me at times last season when he just didn’t put it in.

And Ray Parlour is a man who knows a thing or two about effort on the football pitch. I've thought since the BBC Football Focus interview that Adebayor's time was up at Arsenal. After that interview he was dropped from the final games of the season, the manager doing his usual diplomatic thing of claiming the player had an injury, but in my opinion that was a deliberate manoeuvre from Adebayor to ensure he got a move this summer. You don't go on TV and do an interview like that without understanding the consequences. It was grossly unprofessional.

What was worrying though was the fact that nobody seemed even remotely interested in him. Barcelona's main targets this summer have been David Villa and even Diego Forlan, Real Madrid bought top class attacking players in Kaka, Ronaldo and Benzema, while AC Milan, the favoured destination, have been sitting with £55m burning a hole in their pocket and they haven't made any contact at all.

With all that money they haven't approached us once about Adebayor. His stock, which was so high last summer on the back of his fantastic season, has fallen dramatically. So much so that the only club interested in him in Man City, a rich man's toy going about the place playing Championship Manager. 

In a way it's kind of sad. Had he had good advice from his 'people' last summer he might not have thought he was one of the best strikers in the world, merely an improving one with plenty of potential who had created a wonderful platform for himself at Arsenal. The previous summer Arsene Wenger gave him a new contract and a healthy salary rise based more on the manager's faith in him rather than his performances. When the performances AW hoped for arrived the agents and vultures came calling and Adebayor believed every word they told him. But what they told him was not for the good of his career, it was for them to take their cut, make their percentage from a big transfer or a bumper new contract at Arsenal.

Fans made it clear what they thought of his antics at the Emirates Tournament last summer, reacting to the player's ludicrous claim that he'd had his phone off all summer and had no idea what was going on. They didn't like that he flirted with clubs all summer and then kissed the Arsenal badge having just scored a penalty in a meaningless friendly. 

The only way for Adebayor to engage in proper damage limitation was on the pitch. Not in interviews, not by kissing the badge, and to be fair to him in the early part of the season he seemed well up for it. Yet as time went by the running his socks off stopped, the chasing and harrying defenders dwindled, and it culminated in those two unforgivable performances in the Champions League semi-finals, referenced in that BBC interview where he basically said 'I'm up against Vidic and Ferdinand, what do you expect me to do?'

Yes, 16 goals in an injury hit season was a decent return but there's more to this deal than what he has or hasn't done on the pitch. You can't overlook what goes on behind the scenes, what happens off the pitch, attitude in training, relationships with teammates etc - and the man who knows best in that regard is the manager. He will have taken all those factors into consideration before making any decision. He'll know he's making a potential rival stronger, Adebayor is a far better player than Darius Vassell, but he's not going to do it without believing it's in the best interests of Arsenal.

The decision to sell him will have been Arsene Wenger's and only Arsene Wenger's. He knows he's got a player who doesn't want to be at the club anymore and he knows he's being made the kind of offer which will allow him to strengthen his squad. The kind of offer that no other club in the world would make for Adebayor. As I said yesterday if that £25m is reinvested in the squad we make ourselves stronger, not weaker, and for me that is the main point of this deal.

How soon will we get confirmation? Who knows? It wouldn't be a surprise to see it go through today at some stage. City have a tour of South Africa which I imagine they'd really like a famous African player to be part of. After that it's down to us to use the money well, consign Adebayor to history like the countless other players who have left our club down the years, and move on.

In other news the club have hinted at players who may be involved in Saturday's game against Barnet. They don't guarantee anyone's involvement but say some of the players who returned for pre-season on July 7th could be involved. I suspect we'll see a very young team against Barnet with a sprinkling of senior players. The papers are speculating that Tomas Rosicky and Philippe Senderos will play but they're merely part of the July 7th group, it could be any of them. 

Beyond that not much else happening. Let's just hope this business can be wrapped up quickly, the sooner it's done the better for all concerned.

Morning, 

obviously the main topic of conversation today is Emmanuel Adebayor and Man City. Reports began to emerge yesterday that the club bought by Mustapha Million had made a bid for the player and were 'in talks' with Arsenal. Apparently contact was made over the weekend and former Arsenal player Brian Marwood, now part of City's administration team, is involved in the negotiations.

The consensus appears to be a fee of around £25m with Adebayor set to earn a salary of up to £170,000, although the £130,000 reported elsewhere makes more sense. I mean that relative to the £170,000. Stepping back and looking at it it's hard to get your head around it. As the man from East Lower says:

To ‘reward’ Adebayor for scoring 30 goals, Arsenal doubled his salary last summer. And now, to ‘reward’ him for being 50% as prolific, City intend to double it again. Half as good – twice as well rewarded.

Now really, what kind of industry does that?

That is a very good question but it's an industry that has been utterly skewed by a small minority who fling cash around like it's Monopoly money. Madrid have spent £150m+ on three players, City are offering monstrous wages and can probably tempt clubs into selling by offering all the cash in one go instead of a spread of payments like most transfers, while Chelsea have been huge spenders since Abramovich took over.

City yesterday completed the signing of Carlos Tevez. He turned down the chance to stay with United, a team that consistently challenges for the most important trophies each season, to go play for their local rivals who aren't even in Europe. Money talks. Great huge sums of money talk. And while we can sit here and tut and shake our heads, the fact is that money talks in every industry, not just football. Get an offer to double your salary in your day to day life and chances are you'd consider it.

If we were footballers we'd like to think we'd be above that. If we were earning £80,000 a week at Arsenal the lure of £50,000 more or £90,000 would count for nothing. We'd have some loyalty. The reality is though that we're Arsenal fans, players are just players who, for the most part, will go where the conditions ar best, where the money is best, where their ego is pampered most.

You can't expect loyalty, even from a bloke whose salary you more than doubled the summer before. If this offer is real, if City are really offering us £25m for Adebayor then we will take the money, especially if we can do a deal to get it in one lump. If City are really offering Adebayor £130,000 a week then he will sign for them and it won't cost him a thought. 

Would it make sense on a footballing level? Adebayor has scored 46 goals in two seasons, a very healthy return by any standards. However, we know all about the problems, I'm not going to rehash them today, and it's widely known that the manager is prepared to sell him and was prepared to sell him last summer if the right offer had come in. 

Arsene Wenger was hardly unequivocal when asked about Adebayor's future, saying he could stay if he wanted, and the fact that he has quite obviously lined up Bordeaux's Marouane Chamakh to replace Adebayor says a lot. 

There are those who will say that by selling Adebayor and bringing in Chamakh we make ourselves weaker. I suppose on paper it might look that way but if Chamakh comes in he's added to forward line-up which also includes Robin van Persie, Eduardo, Andrei Arshavin, Nicklas Bendtner, Carlos Vela and possibly Theo Walcott. There are more than enough goals there to compensate for Adebayor's departure.

If the remainder of the money is used to fund the central midfielder we're all looking for then I don't think we're weaker at all. We're stronger. Are we making City better? Maybe so but City can buy anyone they want, and there are better players than Adebayor out there, in my opinion.

So, we'll have to wait and see what happens but to my mind if this deal is genuine then it's in our interests to take it - provided the money we earn from the sale is reinvested into the squad. A £20m+ profit on a player who cost far less than the £6m mooted at the time of his arrival is fantastic business but that profit must be used to strengthen the team.

In other news it looks as if our executive team is being added to. In the Ivan Gazidis interview last week the CEO spoke about improving Arsenal's income from a marketing point of a view and reports suggest 'veteran sports marketer' Tom Fox will be joining the club. You can read more about him here.

The Mirror reports we're about to nick one of Chelsea's youngest stars. Midfielder Frank Nouble is rated one of their most exciting talents but has refused to sign a new deal and speculation is he's coming our way. At 17 though he's just another one to add to the list of exciting young players at the club, if he comes.

The BBC's business editor takes a look at Arsenal's finances. Interesting but surely the document commissioned by Usmanov will naturally take a negative view on things to try and convince people that his rights issue offer appears more attractive? It seems rather a lot to suggest a £20m fall in earnings. Anyway, it's worth a read.

So, there you go. Not a lot else happening but you have to imagine that if the Adebayor deal goes through it'll spark all kinds of stories about how, when and on who we're going to spend the money. The quiet time may be over.

Till tomorrow.

This has just reached me. Emmanuel Adebayor's people have produced a brochure, similar to the one used to attract interest in Michael Owen, to help 'sell' him to other clubs.

Arseblog has exclusively received a copy and you can download it for yourself here.