Cesc has Barcelona swimming in tears

I was joking yesterday about Cesc turning up at Arsenal with a t-shirt telling Xavi to do one. He might not have been wearing that shirt, but he has today released a very honest statement confirming that Arsenal, to use the Spanish way of putting it, can count on him for the season ahead. It's on Arse.com now, but it goes like this,

Firstly I would like to apologise to all the Arsenal fans for not speaking sooner about my future but I have not known what I was going to do until this moment.

"I cannot deny that joining a club like Barcelona was not an attractive move for me. This was the club where I learnt my football, it is my home town where my friends and family are and a club where I have always dreamed of playing. There are not many players in this world who would not want to play for Barcelona.

"I have had many conversations with Arsène Wenger both in person and over the phone over the last few months and although the content of those conversations will remain private, the conclusion is that Barcelona have had two formal offers rejected by Arsenal.

"I am a professional and I fully understand that it is Arsenal's prerogative not to sell me.

"I owe a lot to the Club, manager and the fans and I will respect their decision and will now concentrate on the new season ahead with Arsenal.

"I can assure all the fans that now the negotiations have ended I will be 100 percent focused on playing for Arsenal.

"I am an Arsenal player and as soon as I step out on to the pitch, that is the only club I will be thinking about.

"I am looking forward to the start of the season and putting this speculation behind me."

And that's that. As my friend James said earlier today- I'm sure he forgive me for the reproduction- "Everyone in Barcelona must be swimming in tears".

It's funny to look at the Mundo Deportivo website and see that they are still claiming Fabregas could move, if Barcelona upped their offer to 50m Euros- albeit 5m of those conditional on certain clauses. I think Arsène Wenger's position is clear, Arsenal's position is clear and, as a result, Cesc's position has been made clear; he would like to return home, but accepts that he can't. And, you know, we're quick to moan about them, but I think we have to say a big well done to the manager and board here. They've stood firm in the face of intense pressure from Barcelona's board, players and the media, not to mention the Fabregas family. Pressure? Or just continuous shit stirring?

I don't think losing Cesc would necessarily have been the disaster forecast, but we're quite clearly better off with him. And I don't buy, not for one tiny second, that Fabregas will be anything less than fully committed when stepping over the touchline for us in the season ahead. He wants to win things and he isn't going to do that by sulking. Remember that this is a guy who smashed in a penalty with a broken leg and then hobbled around the pitch for the last 5 minutes trying to win a match against Barca- that's commitment.

What we've seen play out is a testament to the depth of the relationship between Arsène Wenger and Cesc. For me, as you know, Cesc was as good as gone, but the smiley Spaniard who took the field yesterday was a million miles away from the frustrated figure leading his players around for their "lap of appreciation" in May. That has to be down to some serious conversations with Arsène. I hope that, now the youngster's immediate future has been secured, we can set about providing him with the quality he needs around him to help fulfill his ambitions. Which I'm sure he would find it more satisfying to do so as one of the main men here, then as a spare part in that great Barcelona side. It seems as though Cesc's statement has been taken as a one more year compromise, but are Arsenal any more likely to want to sell this time next year?
Questions for another time, perhaps.

I took some criticism earlier in the week for not knowing enough about Emmanuel Frimpong- as if this is the Young Guns blog or something, but I'm happy to tell you that I've just found something out about him. You ready? Okay, here goes; he's the biggest joker in the changing room. That's courtesy of the man known as JET, in this month' FourFourTwo Magazine and I hope I've enriched your life by sharing that nugget with you. There's some great stuff in there too from Robért Píres, but I think I'll save that for the weekend, as you know I have this thing called a life and I'm off to a gig at the Bush Hall tonight. I don't want to get carried away here.
Incidentally, I'm hopeful that if I keep saying things like "I have this thing called a life", you'll stop taking me so seriously. Let's face it, you all have lives and I wouldn't, for a moment, dare to think let alone suggest that my life is in any way fuller than any of yours.

Well, not all of you anyway.

Moving on... let's talk about a subject we can all unite in merriment over, Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. They, of course were drawn to play the Young Boys of Berne in their Champions League qualifier. I'm sure they're quite giddy about that- indeed Bet365 has them at 1-6 to qualify. I'm not a betting man, I just thought it was worth mentioning. You can understand them being quite giddy about it all, first time in the competition and all that. Anyway, Jermain Defoe's been talking about it and such is his huge excitement about the competition, you could forgive him predicting Tottenham could go all the way, but no. Jermain's big prediction for his club is that they will go "further than Arsenal. No disrespect to Arsenal". Aw, blesssssssss!

None taken, Jermain, none taken. But if you want to go further than us, you're talking semi finals at least and I don't think you've got it in you. It's funny how the climax to the season, when we were without the spine of our side for the last six weeks, has really coloured people's perceptions of the relative strengths and weaknesses of the two north London sides. Let's get it into perspective, here and now. Going into April 2010, Arsenal still had a chance of winning the league, Tottenham did not. Tottenham then proceeded on, in my view, a run of victories they will struggle to repeat this decade, never mind this season. We, by way of a contrast, suffered one of our worst sequence of results I can remember and this brought the two clubs much closer together than they should have been. I think young Jermain is also underestimating just how tricky this Champions League business can be. But then, without any experience of it, he would, wouldn't he?

On the subject of inexperienced strikers, whilst I was out and about in Bromley this afternoon, the aforementioned Young Guns Blog tweeted that Arsenal have accepted bids of £1.2m from Hull City and Leeds United for Jay Simpson. As someone who was quite enthused by Simpson's Carling Cup performances two seasons back, I think it's a bit of a shame that Jay will be leaving us. But it's no real surprise. I may have mentioned before that one of my best friends, Baxi, is a QPR season ticket holder and he never once mentioned Simpson to me last season in a way that suggested an Arsenal future beckoned. I think £1.2m is a stellar piece of business for someone with no Premier League experience and a further indication of the value of our academy. Well, it's either that or the fact that there's waaaay too much money in football.

And on that note, back to life....

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