Hello all, hope you are all keeping well and safe. It’s a difficult time for everyone and football seems such an irrelevance, but life goes on, boredom sets in and we tend to retreat to safe ground. So here I am , writing an irrelevant blog about a long irrelevant player. Irony knows no bounds.
Yesterday I noticed that Arseblog had released a podcast featuring Cesc Fabregas, our former El Captain. Now under normal circumstances ,I doubt I would have bothered to listen, but these are not normal circumstances, and I dug in.
I have to be honest, and say I though it was a very good and interesting podcast. Arseblog asked all the questions he should have and Fabregas answered them all, there were the odd occasions that Arseblog attempted to get Cesc to be critical of Arsene, a bait Cesc, to his credit, refused to take, but in general, it was a fine podcast.
So the question I ask myself is did my opinion of Cesc change? The answer is yes, it did. However, not because I learned anything new. In fact everything he said about his leaving just confirmed what I had believed to be true at the time.
To be clear, Fabregas forced his way out, and let the club, his teammates the fans and Arsene down. He was selfish and ungrateful, he was a snake!
However, what did change is how I now feel about it.
He was our captain and best player, but he was just 24 years old. He had shouldered a great deal in the final 2 or 3 years and being just 24 that is a lot to ask of anyone. I believe he thought we were not in a position, especially financially, to win the big trophies, whether he stayed or not. I genuinely believe that had he though he could have made the difference, he would have stayed. I 100% believe he loved the club and Arsene, but Barca was calling. It’s easy for any of us to say we would have remained loyal, but unless you could walk in his shoes, with his head on, I’m not so sure.
The pain I felt, and the pain most fans felt, was so extreme because the boy meant so much to the club and us. He meant so much to us because he had given us so much, and there is nothing worse than a scorned lover. Well I was a lover, I was scorned and I became bitter and hateful towards him. He got the brunt of me being unable to cope with his loss.
What he gave from the age of 16, and for 8 years was special. He was a joy to watch and a credit to himself and his profession. All that he gave, all that he was, should not be forgotten because we think he should have considered us rather than himself.
There is a debate going on twitter as to who was best at their peak, Cesc or Ozil? And it’s a close one, that’s how good he was.
I am grateful to Arseblog and Cesc for that podcast. Not because I learned anything about Cesc, but because I learned my feelings towards him were about the way I dealt with, and processed, his leaving and not actually with him leaving.
Was he a Snake? Yes, he was. But for 8 years he was a prince, our prince. Now I’m happy to remember those glorious 8 years and accept he made a selfish choice at just 24 years old.
Positively Arsenal 
Can also only agree on the Liverpool factor, we have seen a big effort from various parties all season to ensure they win the title, look at their VAR decisions, and referees queuing up to embarrass themselves and their profession when Liverpool play, just for starters.
I believe there are parts of the English football establishment who will not rest until Liverpool and Utd are fighting for the title every year, with the tantalising prospect…for them…for a new money tyrant run North East contender as well.
That said, read that project restart is far from a done deal. And there are going to be some very strange results, with players not match fit, wary of the situation, their hearts not in it, in front of empty stadiums, Riley will have to be at his best to secure the desired outcomes in this environment . Just all seems a bad idea to me at this time
Guessing the last time football was stopped may have been the outbreak of Ww2 layksite? But if so, no idea how they did it?
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Re-read Emery’s comments in the press this weekend, seems he really wanted zaha.
Fine, good player, except Palace wanted 100m , and many of his goals and stats come from diving in the area, seems emery hadn’t factored in the concept that Arsenal players gain nothing positive when they go down in the area.
Emery also says he didn’t feel supported from above, ignoring the fact most clubs would have sacked him after the end of last season, and his disaster out handling of players used to working with a manager they respected
Still, perhaps no need for more words on emery, and we have the right man in place now
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Mouthing off strikes me as an odd job-search strategy, but then again Emery was always one for the strange choices.
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can anyone explain why the EPL are talking about not using VAR if the league is restarted, what reason could there be for not using it, surely if its deemed safe for players and staff to be at games, then there is not one single reason why the PGMOL can’t operate VAR
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Hey, we might get our apology for game 50 one day. UEFA’s disciplinary committee have, recently it seems, admitted that ref Deniz Aytekin ‘failed in performance of his duties’ in that Barca PSG game in 2017, the one where Barca’s diving in box was outrageous even for them.
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Can think of at least one other ref who should be forced to apologise for blatantly helping Barca in the Champs league, against us
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I see that snake Ashley Cole has been using the global catastrophe to stick the knife into the Arsenal.
He says he could see Arsenal’s winning culture fall apart. So he left?
in 2007 (I think) against an arsenal youth team we saw how his Chelsea winners could win. By cheating.
That Chelsea team were so used to favours I suppose that all explains the shock for some when Mesut Ozil left the pampered Terry & Cole on their Arsenal’s during the 2010 World Cup.
Per Mertesacker alone played in three more tournament finals then The Golden Generation (they never made any) and that is because he is ten times the winner of any of them. And everyone in Football knows it.
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Never mind the global pandemic these awful cumming over Cummings brown shirt wearing weirdos down at Aunty Bleeb such as Wayne Linekar, Phil Neville or Jimmy Saville,
they still hate The Arsenal don’t they?
Can’t imagine why…
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Ashley’s latest comments seem to contradict what was written in his own biography, about nearly crashing the car to be sick or whatever over the disputed £5g a week.
Good player though. We really have had some excellent full backs, or whatever they are called now.
Yes, we did lose some great players around then, there was the new stadium, but still, Wenger managed to to fashion a potential title winning side by the 08/09 season, until the newly installed Riley managed to intervene, as he has done ever since where required.
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