It is a well known fact that MAF gets his personnel physician to oversee the medicals of incoming players to the club. I believe it was the undoing of John Carew when he failed his 3 day medical, on the grounds of ' Jumpers disease ', that well known problem that affects the modern day striker. So I was wondering, the impending signing of Jon Arne Riise was announced a few days ago, so what do you think the MAF physician has him doing that is taking so long: After a gruelling swim across the Channel, he was expected to free climb the Eiffel Tower, where upon completion he was to camp out at the top of the spire wearing nothing but a Harrod's neck tie. After completing a solo trek up Mount Everest he was required at Motspur Park for tackling practice with Brede, after which if all went well a contract would be placed in front of him and he would be told to sign using his own blood.....................if his mum let him !!!!
Jon Arne Riise has signed according to the Official site, 3 year contract. So thats sorted the left back area out with Briggs and Riise. Reports saying Konchesky has signed for Leicester City, who seem to to be splashing the cash for Sven.
I wasn't as keen on this signing as most others, but it's good that it's settled. Hopefully this is an end to our problems at left back, for a while at least. Good luck, Riise the Elder. I wonder what shirt number he's going to take. I believe that he prefers to be number 17 (that was certainly his number at Roma), which is a problem as someone already has 17 at Fulham... Riise the Younger.
Wow - the poor guy must be knackered after the medical described by Frogman! Still, he looks ok on the photo on the website, no signs of being jaded at all, so must be made of stern stuff. Like Captain, I'm pleased the deal is done and, whilst Riise may not be the best full back in the world he is now ours and that's one of our "must haves" sorted. I'm also intrigued by the no.17 problem. If it is, as it appears, the Riise family's lucky number then does JA get it because he's the elder or does BJ keep it because he got there first?!
Frogman - might want to change your thread to 'Riise Signs' Confirmed http://www.fulhamfc.com/Club/News/NewsArticles/2011/July/RiiseSigns.aspx
Maybe JA Riise can be 17 and BJ Riise (Known to me now as Junior) can be 17.5 Unless we just put Riise 17 on the shirt and swap the brothers round at half-time, without telling the ref. But I bet the tattoos give BJ away. The thing is in my post above I forgot about Salcido. I know he didn't have the best of seasons but wonder if he does stay, could he play right back as he seems to be a two-footed player. I'm still not convinced with Kelly or Baird at right back.
If i'm honest i'm slightly jeilous (due to our issues at left back). on saying this you lot have managed to bag a cracking player . I'm looking forward to seeing Riise in the prem and hopefully he can score a couple of crackers for you (just not against us)
If they weren't brothers, it's unlikely that Riise the Younger would be asked to vacate his shirt number for a new signing, so I guess that Riise the Elder will have to pick another number. There have been cases of new signings taking an existing player's shirt number (Shearer to Newcastle, forcing Ferdinand to become number 10 is one), but they are generally when the new signing is, relative to his new team, a massive star. I don't think that's the case here. It's not great for team morale, as it shows that the newboy enjoys privileged status. It wouldn't seem a very Fulhamish thing to do. I like SuperBrian's idea of a shirt-share and swapping the players at half-time. Maybe we should have a policy of seeking out more players with matching surnames.
Because the Johnson's worked so well... I will be curious to see what happens with Salcido now. My gut says he'll leave, since he's homesick. But despite the hate from certain people, I don't think Salcido is a terrible back up. He's not good enough to be an uncontested starter as happened last year, but Riise, Salcido and Briggs actually provides a level of depth now sorely required at right back.
On a side issue.............I'm a little concerned with some on this board (SBM, Penguin) describing Bjorn Helge Riise as BJ
Good point Tosh. I hadn't spotted that. Where did the J come from? Seeing as we're being picky, something that is a constant irritation for me is the habit of some posters (er... including you, Tosh) to use an ellipsis (three dots) as if it can be extended to however many dots someone wants. It can't, it's a precise punctuation mark and it's akin to throwing extra commas in the middle of sentence, as I have (deliberately,,, to illustrate) just here. Sorry - my professional pedantry is rearing it's head here. Don't even get me started on excessive use of exclamation marks. We punctuate because we care! (yeah, that's an exclamation mark, but it's an appropriate one!!! Those ones just there weren't.) Tone is a difficult thing to get right on these forums. I can't bring myself to use emoticons, but the above paragraph should be read as playful banter rather than actually picking a fight with Tosh or with others, just for offending my punctuation sensibilities. All happy now!
Didn't you know that in certain Scandanavian dialects the letters H and J are interchangeable?! I don't know how I made that mistake - clearly not thinking at all. At least I can comfort myself that its an unusual occurence or I don't think you'd be teasing me or SBM (see how I got that right!) about it!
Reminds me of a funny encounter with my son. We're watching Sky Sports and the anouncer says that some Spanish player named Jesus Martinez has just been sent off for violent conduct. My son turns to me and says, "Wow, that doesn't sound like Jesus."
Thanks Morgs - I'll confess to not having known that one. Great, an extra piece of pedantry to annoy my friends with. (Or rather: ...with which to annoy my friends - as I am sure we all abhor the ending of phrases with a preposition.)
Well I said I was going to call Bjorn, Junior from now on, but I guess it might not catch on. A bit like Hernadez called chick-pea.
As I'm sure everyone now knows, the Riise signing is official. On Salcido (funny how the poor chap pops up so many disparate threads), Jol has said he is open to offers. Apparently the Mexican team Chivas are considering a bid of £1m. I'll raise a glass to that. Share Surly's concern though.
Great signing. I miss Riise, one my fav Liverpool players. I will never forget this: [video=youtube;ND0mFn9kqD0]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ND0mFn9kqD0[/video] Some of his best goals here if you fancy it... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTFAK6eFMbA
