The number of players that have said that the only reason they are at Arsenal was the direct involvement of Wenger makes this one of the most baffling things ever posted on here. Most of our signings only come to Arsenal to work with Wegner. Why you think some faceless bureaucrat would be better at it than him completely escapes me. Sometimes I think people don't think even for a second before they post.
Clearly Wenger usually gets up at mid-day, watches Jeremy Kyle on iplayer eating toast in his pants and sidles into work early afternoon. Luckily, because he was flying to Italy he had to get up early and was awake when Welbeck's agent phoned. Had he been on his normal daily routine, he may have ended up at Spurs.
Who ever arranged for AW to be away on transfer deadline day, saved our season. I hope he goes away in future, his comment shows he is part of the problem wrt our transfer. If he had been around, we would have probably ended up with Nikola Zigic or some stop gap of that ilk.
Anyone see Van Gaal's criticism of Wellbeck? "Danny Welbeck? He does not have the record of Van Persie or Rooney. That is the standard. That is why we let him go." Hopefully this will motivate him. On the RVP comparison... RVP was 28 when he first managed to score more than 20 goals in Season. RVP was 29 when he first scored more than 25.
Apparently it was Arteta & Merts who sorted it, Wenger wasn't so bothered: http://www.dailystar.co.uk/sport/fo...-Wenger-to-sign-Danny-Welbeck-from-Man-United
It does make me laugh reading all of these views ranging from 'We signed Welbeck despite Wenger' to 'Wenger wasn't bothered' and 'Cut Wenger out of the transfer equation' etc. How naive can you get ? There was obviously something going on that day with the Welbeck/Falcao deal and Wenger, maybe by chance, was in the right place at the right time by virtue of travelling to Italy. It was probably something like Wenger getting the heads up that one of Welbeck's / Utd's / Monaco's / Falcao people were at the airport and they struck up a meeting, which had Wenger been in England, wouldn't have happened. It's kind of predictable though that some people want to turn it into a Wenger bashing exercise, even though he signed him, along with Debuchy, Chambers and Sanchez.
Truth is, no-one knows what happened. Wenger said some funny stuff today, which may have damaged Welbecks confidence dependent upon which reports he's seen. All we can go on is that we've seen another disappointing transfer window where Arsenal yet again failed to sign the players they needed.
I doubt it, unless he's as gullible as some on here. In fact I'd go as far to say that Welbeck probably knows the whole story anyway.
Fergie wouldn't have sold Danny unless the lad asked to leave to get more playing time. It's definitely a new United and one that someone of my age will have to adapt to!
I think this is a bit harsh to be honest. I'm not sure we can say that we didn't need a replacement for Sagna, or a back up keeper, or reinforcements upfront and in Sanchez, Debuchy and Ospina we've got 3 very good players and improvements on the previous players. Chambers and Welbeck could be inspired signings but are younger and should improve. Whether it's enough is another question, but we've signed a number of good players in positions we need them in. Even though personally I would have preferred us to have signed 2-3 more players, I do think it's pretty harsh to say we failed to sign players we needed.
I don't. Arsenal needed a DM & a CB and got neither. They almost didn't get a striker and he's had no time to settle in and meet his team mates. They failed again to assemble a team capable of a sustained title challenge. It was a failure.
To be fair.. we haven't failed yet. No point projecting failure before the Season has even really got started. Sanchez is an exciting signing, Ozil should improve and we are soon to have Walcott fully fit this makes for an exciting attacking lineup. Although, I agree we needed to strengthen in those areas we should consider that 1. We weren't that far away last Season, in fact we led the league for around 5 months - this year the team is undoubtedly stronger. Particularly in offensive areas. 2. Injuries played a big part in last Seasons decline and the Club have attempted to fix this with the arrival of Forsyth. I'm confident the Club did at least try and bring in another CB (we know they went in for Nastasic) - they left it late though and missed out on targets.
The jury is out on whether this was a successful transfer window or not. The results will ultimately prove it at the end of the season, but in my opinion it is a little more than just the players we have, but how we are set out. The real test will come when we play the top teams this season away and whether we have learnt from our mistakes last season? Can our defence be consistently good as last season, will our attacking line be able to break down the more stubborn defences? Both Athletico and Dortmund have proved that with lesser squads, they are able to win the league if you play well and play right. We have a squad capable enough, but can we do it? We will soon find out.