Gooner Talk Weekly Rumour Round-Up!

It’s another Friday and it’s another edition of the Gooner Talk Transfer Rumour Weekly Round-Up. Strangely, this week fewer players have been linked to Arsenal. However, tonnes of news still revolves around the name Samir Nasri. It’s still a mystery that Arsenal have not signed anyone yet, especially the so-called “New Zinedine Zidane”, but we’ll talk about it a little more in the next section.

This week’s edition won’t be any more interesting as the rumours seemed to have reduced for certain unknown reasons. Maybe the European Championships are around the corner and thus all the media focus are now on Switzerland and Austria and the teams which qualified for Europe’s elite national team competition. Yet, we’ll still provide some news which might be more credible than last week’s rumours and raw speculations.

1. Samir Nasri

In last week’s episode, we’ve talked a lot about Samir Nasri and the events that led to the transfer saga surrounding the French man. This past week though news did not develop much as the same old “Nasri will sign for Arsenal soon” title kept on repeating on the site.

When Will The Move Be Completed?

The second week for the saga began with Arséne Wenger’s comments that Nasri’s deal is likely to be concluded before the Euro 2008 competition. The French tactician told French television station TF1:

“It is likely that the transfer (of Nasri) will go through, if it happens, it will be before the start of the Euro (June 7-29)”

Sources: Gooner Talk and L’Equipe

International Duty:

During midweek when many European national teams were having friendlies, France also had a friendly match against Ecuador as a warm-up game before the Euros 2008 competition. Once again, the wantaway Samir Nasri was of course named in the starting line-up and played the full 90 minutes, which gave Arsenal fans first glimpses of what the “new Zidane” would bring to the already very talented Arsenal team.

My analysis of the Frenchman is this. I thought that Samir Nasri is the kind of player who would be given a free role if he joins Arsenal. He can play on the wings and of course his best position would be in the middle. Thus, it is not surprising that he might emulate Pires’ role in the Arsenal team. He’s also an intelligent player whereby he created plenty of space for himself and made good attacking passes for the French forwards.

However, I did notice some Arsenal blogs did not like what they saw in Nasri and compared him with Ben Arfa, whom I thought was more selfish and seemed to play much more within himself rather than for the whole French team against the South American side. It was also unfair to make any comparison at all when Samir Nasri had not been given enough of the ball from his French team mates to try and show off his “hyped up” class.

Nasri and Bernes Speak

Later on in the week, Samir Nasri’s agent, Jean-Pierre Bernés told a Marseille based television channel LCM that the transfer of Marseille’s Nasri to Arsenal would be “completed” in the next couple of days:

“He (Nasri) will leave OM (Olympiqué Marseille), in the next few days he’ll complete his move to Arsenal.”

The Marseille starlet Nasri spoke for the first time when he told French radio station RTL that his transfer is “almost done” and his move to Arsenal would be “resolved in the next few days”. His comments were similar to his agent’s and they also did not contradict what Wenger has mentioned earlier in the week and thus it was no wonder that Arsenal fans were already anticipating the imminent arrival of Samir.

Sources: Gooner Talk and RTL

The whole saga did hit a bit of a frenzy when The Daily Telegraph reported that Arsenal “have signed 12.5 million Samir Nasri” which was then played down by representatives of Arsenal, saying that nothing has been completed yet. This has sparked different views from the Gooners, whereby some suspected that Arsenal were also concluding deals with other players so that the “new players” together with Nasri would be announced simultaneously.

The Waiting Game

Till now though, there was no evidence to back that up so it is very likely that the Nasri deal might still require a few final touch up which might be related to the financial side of the deal. The only thing we can do is to wait. I admit that I’ve also been waiting for the deal to materialize for roughly 2 weeks already but I’ve been told that signing a player is not as simple as “cash and carry”. It’s more than a 2 way thing. So I’m guess patience is the key.

2. Aaron Ramsey

For the third week running, Aaron Ramsey has been featured on the Weekly Rumour Round-Up. For the past week, I’ve read several blogs as well as Gooner Forums that a lot of fans are not convinced by this Welsh player’s link to The Gunners. However, I decided to give it a go as the sources reporting this rumour are at least 70% credible and we’ll see what happen next.

Source: The Guardian

Further Bid Touted

New developments of this news came from The Guardian this week as the site reported that both Arsenal and Liverpool failed in 5 million pound bid for the Cardiff youngster. With that, Young Guns suggested that Arsenal might improve their bid for him, with a possible cash fee upfront with extra money on appearances, if Arsenal seemed interested in getting the winger on a permanent basis.

Advantage to Arsenal?

Gooner Talk did mention that Arsenal could have the edge over Manchester United whereby the Gunners would want him as a first ‘teamer’ if compared to Manchester United’s plans for the youngster (whereby he would be loaned back to Cardiff). Young Guns added this week in their new article about him that Aaron Ramsey’s choice of destination would very much depend on his career and his chances of playing and thus it is believed that Arsenal might have the upper hand.

Rivals

Other than Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur has been suggested as an on-looker of the transfer. If anything wrong occurs on Arsenal, Man U and Liverpool’s side, Spurs might be seen as shocked favourites to obtain Ramsey’s services, but this seems unlikely as Spurs cannot provide Champions League football to the Welsh winger.

3. Sotiris Ninis

Sotiris Ninis is the new name to be linked to Arsenal this week. Playing for Greek side Panathinaikos, the Greek winger is the latest sensation said to be on Arsenal’s radar. It is suggested that should Arsenal fail in the bid of Aaron Ramsey, Ninis would be second choice winger to be bought by Arsenal this summer.

But of course, good players attract rival bids. Clubs such as AC Milan, Real Madrid and Manchester United are also known to be keen on the youngster and have been keeping tabs on his progress. The 18-year-old winger is known to have a buy-out clause worth 11.8 million pounds in his current contract with Panathinaikos, which might put Arsenal off the deal and probably explains why Arsenal would prefer Ramsey to Ninis at the moment.

Yet, nothing has been confirmed or verified as these are merely all speculations. In addition, according to Young Guns as well, Panathinaikos fans would probably block the transfer of Ninis, whom they acknowledge as a “phenomenal prospect”. With the current instability in the Greek club due to the sacking of former manager Jose Peseiro, it is understandable that the fans see the “possible” transfer as “detrimental”.

Source: Young Guns

Transfer Speculation:

1. Wayne Hennessey

The Wolves goalkeeper was rumoured to be on Arsenal’s radar this week. As we know, the German goalkeeper Jens Lehmann would depart from the club this summer and it has also been suggested that Arsene Wenger is “keen” to bring another keeper to challenge Almunia.

The Welsh keeper had a good season with Wolves, where he kept 21 clean sheets this season for both club and country. Hennessey was also rumoured to be tempted to join Premier League clubs this coming summer. However, my opinion is that Wenger would not splash 8 million for a keeper and he has never had the intention to do that anyway.

Source: Lancashire Evening Post

2. Dani Guiza

The Mallorca striker was this season’s top scorer in the La Liga. And that’s probably the main reason why Arsenal are linked to the striker. Adding to the “fact” that Adebayor might “leave” the club soon (according to the media of course), Dani Guiza can be seen as a “suggestion” by the media to replace the Togo international. *Note that I’ve used lots of open/close inverted comas.

The reasons seem to link to each other and lead to this Dani Guiza rumour but it seems this rumour would eventually die off as these are merely speculations. The main reason I say this is that Wenger has enough strikers in his team, with Robin van Persie, Adebayor (I don’t think he’s leaving as he reiterated his wish to stay for many times in a few weeks time already), Vela, Walcott, Bendtner and the returning Eduardo da Silva, so there’s no more space for a new striker.

Source: Goal.com

3. Clemente Chantome, Blaise Matuidi and Mouhamadou Dabo

It has been reported in the French media that Arsene Wenger is interested in Clemente Chantome, as reported also on Gooner Talk last week in the weekly round-up section. Fresh rumours from France are suggesting that St. Etienne players Blaise Matuidi and Mouhamadou Dabo are on Wenger’s purchase list.

There are no exact quotea about these rumours, but there might be something going for this news. For further information on these 2 players, visit Arsenal Insider.

Source: Setanta Sports

With that, thats the end of this week’s edition. It’s sad that I’ve to repeat this for another week that… Hopefully we’ll get the Nasri deal done by next week. Till then, have a great week! Ciao.

Article By kevlinefm

Tags: arsenal, Rumours, Transfers, Weekly