Nope it's a stupid headline really but since I'm completely jet lagged after flying in from New York this morning and it's Interlull why not be mad. Actually it's not even that mad as on Monday I was in the Arthur Ashe Stadium watching the US Open Tennis when in the corporate box below me I saw a kid with a New York Yankees top that was inscribed with Arshavin 23. Now I know our new away kit looks a little like the Yankees strip but this was rather odd it had to be said. Having missed the game on Saturday whilst enjoying the delights of MOMA (though with about 10 squillion other people) it was interesting to contrats atmosphere at the Emirates with that at Yankee Stadium on Sunday...

It may suit those Yanks but it would not ever work over here with time outs, continuous advertising and incredibly annoying (to my ears) jingles and prescribed chanting. However, it does get an atmosphere going and that's something that can't always be said about the Emirates. It was interesting to hear a t least one or two chants that did not need to be initiated by the stadium announcer but the lame "Let's go Yankees, Let's go"sounded very Arsenal like!

I'm now off to France and will be on a boat miles from WiFi and mobile signal probably so it will be even longer before a next post but as it's Interlull nobody's out there for two weeks anyway.....right!

Trying to make sense of games like the one last night is always going to be a conflicting experience, you're view or opinion is not unrelated to your pre-match expectations, how you expect football to be played, how the game pans out and what you believe constitutes a great game. Looking around the blogs today it seems that there is a fair share of mixed reaction from disappointment to just plain enjoyment of the madness that is a 4-4 result.

Prior to the match at Anfield I think the majority of Arsenal fans would have looked at team with a defence that contained just 2 first choice members of a back 5 (one still unfit and one just uncertain) and missing both first choice strikers with some trepidation. Combined with the fact that our record at Anfield over the 40 years of supporting Arsenal is littered with thumpings and poor results, it would not leave us optimistic especially as Liverpool had the weekend off and needed the win far more than we did. Bearing that all in mind I think I would have taken a point before the game...

I'll also say that I was hoping for a good performance against a side with so much to play for but once the game starts those pre-match thoughts disappear and you tend to view the game based on how events unfold. On that score, there are two trains of thought, we were either quite fortunate to get a point by scoring some great counter attack goals or we threw 2 points away by being unable to defend a 1-0, 3-2 or 4-3 (with a few minutes to go) lead. For me it's somewhere inbetween and a draw was certainly a fair result at the end of 90 (+6???) minutes.

The other talking point about 4-4 games is whether they are "classics" or "great" or just "error riddled goal fests"! If your Alan Hansen or one of the other cynical media folk it always seems to be about the "poor defending" and, to be fair, there was plenty of that on show last night. But hey, let's celebrate the joy of a game like that for the entertainment it provided, even comedy defending has its own moments and so we should get Silvestre his own pair of big shoes and red nose. Let's enjoy the moment Arshavin announced himself in true style to the Premier League..

No the only really bad thing about last night is the fact that the one man smiling after it would have been Old Red Nose himself and I can never like that...

Is it a sign of the times or are managers just getting madder these days as they desperately try to keep pace with the expectations of fans, boards or the media? Looking at our line up for tonight it seems very odd just as we have seen Benitez criticised and Scolari too (along with a score of others) then perhaps Wenger felt left out.

After the game on Saturday, Arshavin stated he was knackered in the second half just as it started but yet he starts tonight. Van Persie, our sole bright spot these days is rested and Vela is benched after one (admittedly poor) start. Of course, we know nothing and the manager has always done these sort of things when games come thick and fast but it strikes me as an admission of not really knowing his best team. You can't really blame him as the only consistency this season has been our inconsistency.

Meanwhile in the Telegraph today the question is raised, by Alan Smith, of whether it's time for Wenger to be sacked. Well that's the headline but the question is one of many and dismissed by teh ex-gunner. There are some words on the criticism Wenger deserves but the headline is way off the mark fo rthe resulting article - the media eh?

I've given up predicting or even hoping on results so will just sit back and watch something else and wait till the end of the game. Maybe not knowing will help the result!!!

When there are midweek International friendlies and a sort of mini-interlull that takes place just after the TW ends and Chelsea sack their coach it's all a bit weird. From an Arsenal perspective Arsene would love to have some time with his players before next Monday's game against Cardiff (a decision which baffles me despite the fact that it's just for TV as we have no chance of getting a potential 5th round game in next week) especially as some (Eduardo, possibly Arshavin) could do with a work out with the rest of the team.

Eduardo's return, Arshavin's arrival and the potential return to fitness for Theo may mean (and I say this with fingers crossed and a large dose of optimism) that we can head into a run of fixtures in February/March with the opportunity (last chance saloon??) to resurrect the season. Our league games are against teams we should (or in the past should of, this season it's anybody's guess) beat plus the FA Cup game(s - hopefully!) and the Champions League returns. The CL will be difficult since we are playing the form team in Italy but we have much more of a chance with these players in the squad and Adebayor's injury has saved the manager the decision of dropping him, which on his recent form would have been the right one.

Meanwhile, we can sit back and watch how a true classy club like Chelsea manages itself in in its self created mess of a situation that it finds itself in...

My mind has been anywhere but thinking about football for the past three days as I've been suffering from the flu virus hitting Switzerland at the moment. Although I'm just about okay to write this today (and apologies for my two days off) I still feel groggy as though I've been 10 rounds with Mike Tyson.

However, from my vantage point of the sofa (under the duvet) today I've just witnessed the first half of the Stoke v Manchester City game and you can understand the way Stoke lay given their resources but as for Man City, well!! Stoke down to 10 men deserved their goal. It just goes to show that despite the current criticism of Arsene Wenger, some of which is perfectly justifiable, having loads of money splashed around doesn't necessarily work either.

Of course most Arsenal bloggers are probably holding off on their writing hoping to be the first to say Arshavin has been signed, or not! It's probably a no win situation now as if we don't get him some fans will be complaining it's because we don't open the purse strings and if he does, he'll probably flop as he's got so little time to get integrated into the team and the Premier League. 

Meanwhile some good news (for the future anyway) as our Youth team won 4-0 away at Sunderland in the FA Youth Cup so perhaps we'll win one bit of Silverware this year.

One of the main issues that has arisen as a result of the game becoming such a global phenomena is that clubs need to have an A-Z guide of how to work with different cultures. The problems of dealing and negotiating with various agents, clubs and players from all over the world basically seems to mean that too many people are trying to take their 5% here or 10% there as the deal goes through layer upon layer of corruption/bureaucracy/egos etc.

The potential deal with Arshavin is a classic example as we firstly had the problem of the club trying it on with a daily changing of their demands and once the fee has been agreed Zenit then disagree with the player who then tries to change his deal with us. Or something like that because none of us really have any idea.

One thing that has sprung to mind is how much easier it might have been if David Dein had still been around (Arsene certainly is suffering from his departure) and though I cannot see any way back for the man after his duplicitous dealings it does mean that the new man, Gazidis, has to learn quickly how to operate in this world.

Hum Ho!

Since the day the the key player was transferred from The Sailors to The Colliers before the Annual Uppies & Downies game in the 18th Century for a goat and a bag of coal (*) there has been discussion around the true worth of a player. From the first £10,000 player to the first £1M player and beyond the world has debated whether such fees are right/moral/justified or even necessary. So as the TW slowly trudges towards the end of the month I think it's worth raising the question for two simple reasons...

Craig Bellamy & Wilson Palacios are apparently worth £14M each and even allowing for the strange money world that both Man City and Spurs inhabit there seems little financial sense in either. In fact based on these fees Zenit's apparent desire for £20M for that man Arshavin is almost a bargain (maybe!). We all know that the value of a player depends on a few things, only one of which is the player's actual ability. In Man City's case (as before with Chelsea) the value rises because the selling club is keen to get as much cash as they can and with Spurs it seems to be that Daniel Levy is happy to pick a fee randomly out of the air! Add in the need for clubs to start bidding wars and agents trying to get a bigger 10% of a fee and we can see the whole transfer fee valuation is little more than guesswork half the time.

What makes it rather strange is that following Bosman, we had Kolpak and now the rather dark spectre of the Webster Ruling which could, as Arsene Wenger said, make the whole transfer system obsolete in the rather near future. It's okay for a team with a bottomless pit of money to make gambles of the future values of their assets but, using proper economics, teams like us cannot and should not go down that road. It doesn't matter whether we need players (we do)  but also that the price being asked is a realistic and economic figure. If not we have to say no even at the expense of potential failure in the short term.

* - Agent fees were not included

Apparently last week he might be coming, Arsene even hinted that we may be close (to what was never really discussed) and yet all we ever hear are the bleatings from either/both of Zenit and Arshavin's agent. Today we have had a £12M bid rejected according to certain newspaper sources. The story goes on about Zenit wanting £20M, City possibly bidding if Kaka falls through and yet more blah, blah, blah...

Well I've already decided I don't want him now as it's clear all he and his agent are after is a big money deal, whether that stems from the club or the player or both I don't care. Either you really want to be an Arsenal player or you don't and if he's spoken to Wenger (and who really knows) he must know what we are looking for. I'm sick of these so-called superstars appearing at clubs all around the planet and their clubs/agents all remarking about how they are in talks with "several" clubs etc. I'd rather finish seventh than buy players who will in 6 months time be interested in a move to a "bigger" club or whining they don't get to play every week.

What we need are signings like Van Persie (who deserves all the plaudits at the moment) and suchlike, who were pretty much rumoured literally just before we signed them. Too much rumour and distraction normally means the player is just looking for a few bucks.

or John Hawley or Jeff Blockley or countless other crap players playing crap football...

Sorry I don't know what came over me there, it may be to do with the flu/cold (or whatever I have at the moment and all the drugs I've been taking)  but I was just listening to Fighting Talk and the regular gooner, Tom Watt, made a comment about Helder. He was bemoaning the current fans at Arsenal who are either booing or moaning about no new players or just not turning up and as he rightly said some people don't know how lucky they are. Yes we need players and yes our team isn't playing anything like it did but that's football - you don't always win every game and you take the highs with the lows.

When I then read a few Arsenal related blogs on Ole Ole that are also having a go at Wenger it's got me goat (though I never really liked Billy that much) because we should be talking about Wenger's eloquent assault on the Manchester City (AKA the new Chelsea). That's the real problem, especially when (don't believe the talk about our financial muscle) we have no ability to compete financially, probably even with Lerner and his Villa money. The only way way we can really do anything is try and stay under the radar and pick up a cheap player or two - I have no real expectations on Arshavin - we may even want him but only at our price and in today's mad, mad world that's beyond our means. In the past clubs could live beyond their means but not any more. That is something we should all be grateful for rather than wishing we spent millions+.

The main argument I hear is our fans pay a lot of money and that's true but you pay £30 to watch League 1 football these days, everyone charges stupid money and it still is only a small percentage of club revenue - TV accounts for most of it. Sorry I'm rambling or delirious or both at the moment so I need to go back to the drugs...

I don't think I'm the only football fan who thinks the whole idea of spending £100M+ on a bloke that kicks a ball around (and he's very good at it I have to admit) and then pay the same bloke £0.5M a week is a little obscene. Thinking back to previous landmark transfer fees from Trevor Francis to Zidane there has always been a general comment of "is any player really worth £xxxxxx" but never has such money been considered when the world is in such a financial mess. In a similar way, but even more grotesque manner, to the arrival of Abramovich at Chelsea the boys from Abu Dhabi seem intent on just (as Harry Enfield said) showing us they have Loadsamoney and can buy anyone they feel like. Well, at least, they think they can buy anyone, Kaka seems a very decent chap and isn't (from all accounts) driven by money at all but maybe AC Milan will say they might never see an offer like this again. Kaka is a man driven by his religion and is intending to become a priest after he finishes playing and he may just think that the money could be put to good use and at least that would give some moral justification to the prostituting of the game.

Meanwhile Arsenal have another Harry Enfield equivalent (see below) driving us in the TW at the moment even if Arsene is saying we may still be buying Arshavin. I think the phrase"hopeful of buying him" actually means "if Zenit accept our generous offer of Alex Song plus 50p and a packet of Cheesy discos". It might or might turn out to be true but I couldn't really care until we actually hear something that is an actual fact.

Here's our financial whizz kid (excuse the dodgy accent!)